The storm broke without warning.

One moment, the stage lights had been blazing—the pounding rhythm of drums, the dazzling swirl of spotlights, the sea of fans roaring their names. The next, everything dissolved into a shattering pulse of sound and shadow. The rift tore itself open right there on the arena floor, a jagged wound of fire and smoke, and in its pull, three figures were hurled into an abyss of freezing dark.

When the light faded, there was no crowd, no music, no Seoul skyline. Only snow.

Rumi groaned first, shoving herself up from the half-buried drift she had landed in. The cold bit instantly into her skin, searing like knives along her arms. Her concert outfit—a shimmering silver jacket over a crop top, torn black jeans, and sleek boots—was never meant for this kind of cold. Breath misted in front of her as she clutched her sides, looking around wildly.

“M-Mira? Zoey?!”

A muffled curse answered her. Mira staggered upright nearby, shaking snow out of her dark, glitter-laced hair. She, too, wore only stage clothes—short leather jacket, ripped skirt, fishnet leggings—things designed to look fierce under stadium lights, not protect against frost that could kill. Her lips were already blue, but her eyes sparked with alarmed focus as she scanned the empty horizon.

Zoey was slower to rise. She dragged herself out of a snowbank, her long, flowing performance coat now tattered and soaked. Beneath it, her thin lace bodysuit clung to her shivering frame, and she hugged herself tightly, teeth chattering. She gave a sharp, uneven laugh, her breath ragged in the frigid air. “This… this isn’t backstage.”

All around them stretched wilderness. Towering pines, their branches sagging beneath layers of white. A jagged line of mountains in the distance, peaks lost in storm clouds. The snow beneath their feet crunched like glass shards, and the wind howled through the trees with a voice like wolves. No city lights. No crowds. No familiar skyline. Only the raw, biting silence of a world that felt ancient and untouched.

Rumi tried to steady her breath, but it came fast and shallow. “Where the hell are we? This… this can’t be real.”

Mira shook her head, teeth gritted. “It feels real. Too real.” She rubbed her bare arms furiously, eyes darting to the shadows between the trees. The woods seemed… alive. Not with the hum of nightlife, but something heavier, stranger. Old. She couldn’t explain why, but it pressed on her chest, thick and suffocating.

Zoey dropped to one knee, scooping up a handful of snow, letting it melt in her glove. “Real,” she whispered. Then louder, panicked: “We’re not dreaming! This isn’t a stage trick—this isn’t… this isn’t our world.”

The three of them clustered together, trembling from more than the cold.

Rumi tugged Mira’s sleeve, her voice cracking. “Do you hear that?”

It was faint, far off, but unmistakable: the echoing howl of a wolf pack. And closer, something heavier, crunching through the underbrush.

The storm swirled tighter around them, flinging ice like knives. They were too exposed, too thinly dressed. If the cold didn’t kill them, whatever prowled the forests just might.

Mira squared her shoulders despite her shaking body. “We need shelter. Now.”