Might Change Some Shit

Aaliyah never thought sleep could rewrite a life.
One moment she was still clinging to her friend as they danced at the party and the next moment she was in her mother's embrace. Finally she stepped inside her room . 'I need to change' she told herself, as she laid down on the bed scrolling through her phone . But sleep overtook her
And then-
Blue sky.
Green canopy.
Birds tweeting.

The world had cracked overnight.

It should have been beautiful, but beauty was the cruelest part of it all. Because when she woke, there were no Sheila's teasing remarks, no mother's warmth, no father's banter. Only trees that stretched endlessly, and a river that mocked her thirst with its wild clarity.

Two days. Two hollow, endless days she had stumbled through this strange wilderness, each hour more unreal than the last. And when the voice arrived, cold and detached, spelling words into her vision she couldn't escape, she understood the truth:

This wasn't a dream.

> [Survival System Activated]
Player: Aaliyah
Objective: No mission as of yet.

Her fingers trembled as the glowing text faded into the air.
She had no idea where she was.
She had no idea what she was.
But the world around her was alive in ways her old one never was-eyes watching from the shadows, the sound of padded feet circling just out of sight.

Aaliyah swallowed, her throat raw, her chest aching with something between fear and defiance.

This was no forest.
This was a cage.

And the beasts were waiting.