The world in my dream is not mine.
It’s too dark, too red, too cold.
It breathes like a wound.
And it speaks like ghosts.
I’m standing at the edge of a river I’ve never seen, yet I know it by name.
Hangang River.
The waters glisten black, and someone is floating—no, drowning—and my legs refuse to move. I try to scream, but my throat fills with mud.
Then I see her.
Ha-Ya.
Her face is pale, lips tinted purple, water clinging to her lashes like sorrow.
“You didn’t save me,” she says. Her voice is hollow. Echoing. “You were supposed to be with me that night. If you had come, I’d still be alive.”
I step back.
“No. That’s not—”
“You killed me,” she interrupts, calm like the stillness before a storm. “Not with your hands. But with your absence.”
Her face sinks beneath the water.
And then another figure emerges.
Harin.
Her hair is wet. Her wedding dress torn. Her eyes... they look like mine.
"You took everything," she whispers. "And you still act like the victim."
Tears fall down her face, but the water swallows them before they reach her chin.
“I wanted peace, Ye Na. But you made me a villain.”
“No... I didn’t want this,” I whisper. “I didn’t even know…”
“You knew,” she says softly. “You always knew I couldn’t win against you.”
The river splits open again—and someone else walks out, barefoot on the water.
Han Wool.
His face is twisted in something I can’t read—grief, betrayal, hurt.
“You always choose yourself,” he says, voice cutting deeper than the wind. “Even when you said it was for me. It’s always you. You’re selfish, Ye Na.”
“No,” I breathe.
He keeps walking toward me, expression unreadable. “You broke me. And then you walked away like I didn’t matter.”
“I didn’t walk—”
“You did.”
And the moment his hand touches my cheek—
I wake up.
Gasping. Drenched in sweat. My forehead stuck to the surface of my desk. A dull ache pulses in my temple, heart drumming too loudly for the silence around me.
It’s morning. Dim sunlight filtering through the blinds of my office. My computer screen still blinking. My notes scattered.
I sit up slowly, trying to catch my breath, the aftertaste of that dream lingering in the back of my throat like blood.
My heart is still running when I look up—
And freeze.
Someone is standing near the office window. Quiet. Still.
Han Wool.
The light behind him frames his face in gold. His eyes aren’t angry. They’re tired. Sure.
YOU ARE READING
When the Clock Strikes|Pi Han Ul x Reader|
FanfictionBeak Cheonga never expected much from life. Not love, not warmth-just survival. Adopted into a wealthy family that never truly wanted her, she learned how to exist in the empty spaces between their affection. Transferring from Daehwa High to Yusung...
