~ The wind whispered her name. The mirror whispered it louder. ~
They say the sky cracked with thunder that night, but thunder was only part of it.
It was more like... a scream.
A long, aching scream stitched with wind, wrapped in silk, and laced with stars unraveling.
---
The moment Spidey stepped through the mirror, everything changed.
It wasn't cold. It wasn't warm. It just was. She felt like a thread pulled through a needle stretched, reshaped, rewoven. Light spiraled around her like ink in water. Whispers brushed her ears some crying, some laughing, others begging to be remembered.
> "Do not answer them," Nyxi warned, crawling along her shoulder. "Not yet. They remember pain and speak it sweetly."
Spidey blinked, trying to adjust her eyes to a sky that shimmered like stretched velvet. The stars were not dots they were delicate orbs, each hanging from glowing silk threads that trembled with every breeze.
> "Where… where are we?" she breathed.
Nyxi's voice echoed gently.
> "The Realm of Threads. Some call it the Weave Between Worlds. Some call it the Forgotten Stitch. But it was once... home."
Spidey turned slowly.
The ground beneath her feet was soft not like grass or soil, but like layered webs, impossibly strong yet whisper thin. Trees rose tall around her, their trunks spiraled with runes, and their leaves shimmered like mirrors.
And the sky... oh, the sky.
It was stitched.
Lines of glowing silk stretched from cloud to cloud, thread to thread, star to star. But many had snapped some frayed, some burned black at the ends. They hung loose, swinging as if sobbing.
> "It's beautiful," Spidey whispered.
"It's breaking," Nyxi corrected.
---
Suddenly, a tremor rolled through the realm.
A ripple of soundless pain surged across the threads, like a plucked harp string gone wrong. One of the silk threads above snapped with a soft ping. A star flickered. Then vanished.
Spidey gasped. "Did that—did that die?"
> "A memory," Nyxi said softly. "Each thread is one. The Great Web holds all that was dreams, truths, forgotten names, stories never told. When the Web breaks... so do they."
> "Why is it breaking?" Spidey asked, heart pounding.
Nyxi looked up at the torn sky.
> "Because the Weaver of Silence has gone mad."
---
Spidey followed Nyxi across the silken forest, past trees that whispered things in languages her bones remembered but her mind did not.
They passed a fountain carved from obsidian, where reflections changed faces mid glance.
They crossed a bridge made entirely of humming threads each footstep played a note. Spidey's notes sounded soft and mournful. Nyxi's? Fierce and steady.
> "This place…" Spidey murmured, "it knows me, doesn't it?"
Nyxi stopped. Turned.
> "It remembers you. Even when you forgot yourself."
---
As they moved deeper into the realm, the sky began to weep not rain, but memories.
Tiny glowing fragments fell like snowflakes moments stolen from other worlds. Spidey caught one in her palm.
A boy laughing. A woman humming to herself while sewing. A child clutching a toy, eyes full of wonder.
Then the fragment faded.
> "Why does it feel so… sad?" Spidey asked.
> "Because every broken thread means someone, somewhere, has lost a piece of themselves," Nyxi said. "They just don't know why they feel emptier."
Spidey swallowed hard. "Can I fix it?"
> "Yes."
> "How?"
Nyxi's red runes glowed brighter now.
> "By weaving the lost threads. But there is a price."
> "Of course there is," Spidey whispered. "There always is."
---
As they reached a clearing, the silk beneath Spidey's feet darkened. The stars above this part of the sky were gone, replaced by a heavy void that pulsed like a bruise.
In the center of the clearing stood a torn loom massive, ancient, its threads tangled and rotting. Surrounding it were broken needles, shattered spools, and pieces of lost time.
And carved deep into the ground:
"When the last thread snaps, the silence will consume all."
Spidey stared at it, fingers curling into her palms.
> "So this is where it begins," she said.
Nyxi nodded.
> "And where you begin."
> "Me? I'm just… a strange girl from a dead village. I talk to spiders and get yelled at by my mother. I'm no one."
Nyxi crawled up to her collarbone and looked her dead in the eyes.
> "You are the only one who listened. That's enough."
---
Thunder cracked again not from the sky this time.
From the Web.
Another thread snapped. A loud, keening echo filled the realm.
And suddenly, the air grew thick. From beyond the trees, dark tendrils slithered slow and searching, made of shadow and static.
> "They're here," Nyxi hissed. "Echo-shades. Born from what the Weaver has devoured. Don't let them touch you."
> "What do they want?" Spidey asked, backing up.
> "Everything."
One slithered close, its face like an erased page. It reached out a limb of fog, whispering with a thousand broken voices.
> "Spideyyyyy... you miss your father's voice... don't you?"
She froze.
> "He never said goodbye."
> "He never looked back."
Spidey trembled.
> "Your mother blames you... she always has..."
> "Your laughter made her cry…"
> "You were never wanted…"
"SHUT UP!" Spidey screamed, clutching her head. "SHUT UP!"
Nyxi darted forward, biting into the shade's limb. A flash of red light burst. The shade recoiled, shrieking.
> "Don't listen to them," Nyxi growled. "They feed on what you doubt. You must choose what you believe."
> "I—" Spidey panted, tears burning her eyes, "I don't know what's true anymore."
Nyxi's voice softened.
> "Then make truth. One thread at a time."
---
And just like that, the shades dissolved sensing they'd gotten what they wanted for now.
Spidey stood in the middle of the broken Web, her fists clenched, heart thudding.
> "Alright," she said, voice hoarse. "Where do I start?"
Nyxi's eyes glowed.
> "The First Trial. The first price to weave a thread must be something precious. A memory."
> "Like… my favorite food or something?"
Nyxi was quiet.
> "No, Spidey. Something you'll miss."
---
Spidey stared up at the broken sky, the silk threads twisting in agony.
She remembered a day when she was very small. Rain had fallen gently. She had laughed, really laughed barefoot, dancing in puddles, her mother smiling through the open door. Her first real laugh.
She felt it now the warmth, the sound, the echo in her ribs.
> "Take it," she whispered.
> "Are you sure?" Nyxi asked.
Spidey nodded.
> "Let the Web have my first laughter."
---
A glow spread from her chest. It lifted, soft and golden, curling into the air like a butterfly.
It drifted into the broken loom.
One thread mended.
A single star blinked back into the sky.
---
Spidey sank to her knees, gasping, empty and full at once.
> "This is only the beginning," Nyxi said gently.
Spidey looked up, tears in her eyes.
> "Then let's keep going."
---
TO BE CONTINUED…
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