Duality of Shadows - Chapter 9: Have a little fun

After being torn from the only life she knew, 16-year-old Margo is forced into a new home with strangers who call themselves her parents. Haunted by memories of her past and consumed by feelings of isolation, she struggles to adapt to her unfamiliar surroundings. School offers little relief—until she meets Lucien, a mysterious boy who appears just when she needs a friend the most.Gabriel is everything Margo needs: kind, attentive, and always ready to whisk her away from her troubles. Each night, he invites her to secret places—an abandoned playground, a fog-choked garden, a crumbling train station at the edge of town—each more unsettling than the last. Yet with every chilling rendezvous, Margo feels more alive... more seen.But something isn’t right. Gabriel never comes to school during the day. Her adoptive parents never see him. And when they catch her talking to thin air, their concern deepens into fear. They say Gabriel isn't real—that he’s a figment of her imagination. Margo wants to believe them, but Gabriel feels real. More real than anything else in her life.As the nights grow colder and more twisted, Gabriel’s true nature begins to surface. Shadows move where they shouldn’t. Time warps in his presence. And the places they visit seem to echo with whispers from another world. Margo is forced to ask herself: Who—or what—is Gabriel? Why does he only want her? And what will happen on the final night he asks her to come with him?As the line between reality and delusion begins to crumble, Margo must make an impossible choice: stay in a world where she feels loved, or return to one that barely feels real.But one thing is certain—some friendships never let go.

Living on the streets of Orchard's Reach, Sen never dreamed about becoming a cultivator. He barely even knew what cultivation was, let alone wanted to do it. When fate intervenes, though, he finds himself the disciple of a cultivator. Like all who find themselves on the path to defying the heavens, Sen will have to decide what kind of person he wants to be and what kind of mark he wants to leave on the world.

Rowan was just a broke college dropout—until he was summoned to another world.Dragged into the war-torn realm of Laronia, Rowan stands beside four other chosen heroes, each blessed by prophecy… except him.While the others awaken to legendary powers and divine roles, Rowan receives a blank grimoire. No magic. No title. No future.Cast aside and marked a failure, he prepares for death—until the silence inside his grimoire begins to speak.The gods made a mistake. And this world is not ready for what lies beneath the Wordless Mage.