Tianmu: Eyes of Illusion

It started on the subway.

Lucas was still shaken from the mirror incident the night before. He hadn't slept much—just dozed off in patches, always waking with the image of that glowing eye burned behind his lids. The whisper still echoed faintly in his skull: "You've opened the first gate."

Whatever that meant.

Now, he sat slumped in a scratched plastic seat, earbuds in but no music playing. Just pretending to be normal. The train rattled through Haleford's underground, a low growl of iron and time. His fingers tapped idly against his thigh as he watched the grime-slick tunnel walls flash by.

Then something caught his eye.

A faint glow—only for a second—painted on the black concrete outside.

A symbol.

He jerked upright and pressed his face to the window. It was gone. But in that brief instant, he'd seen it: three interlocked circles surrounding a vertical line, pulsing faintly with golden light. No graffiti. No paint. Something else. Something older.

The lights in the subway car flickered.

No one else reacted.

Lucas's heart thudded.

Later, walking through Haleford's rain-drenched streets, the feeling only grew stronger. The city seemed… layered now. A second version of it lurked beneath the surface—shadows that moved a beat too late, reflections in puddles that didn't match the real world.

And then there were the symbols.

He saw them carved into the mortar between bricks, faintly glowing under streetlamps. Drawn in chalk near storm drains. Painted behind rusted dumpsters where no one should have been able to reach.

They weren't random. They formed patterns, clusters. Like a language made of geometry.

And they were watching him.

At least, that's what it felt like.

Lucas turned a corner and froze.

Across the street, partially obscured by fog and neon haze, stood a figure in a long coat. Motionless. Head slightly tilted.

Watching.

Lucas blinked. A car passed. When it was gone, so was the figure.

Back at his apartment, he locked the door behind him, breathing hard. Rain pelted the window. His soaked jacket left a trail on the floor. He peeled it off and turned on every light.

Then he reached for the mirror.

Nothing.

No symbol. No ripple.

Just his pale, anxious reflection staring back.

He turned to the envelope that came with the mirror, now open on his desk. He read the calligraphy again, slower this time. The words stirred something in his memory, something from childhood stories his grandfather used to tell in hushed tones over cups of barley tea.

"The Eye of Truth sees not just the world, but the cracks between it."

He remembered another thing too—something his grandfather once said, laughing but serious underneath.

"Some truths are only visible when you stop trying to see them."

Lucas turned off the overhead light and let the apartment go dark.

Then he breathed in, slowly. Out.

Focused on the silence.

And the mirror changed.

Faintly, barely perceptible, the surface rippled again. Like fog lifting from a window.

A new symbol appeared—different from the others. This one resembled a labyrinth spiraling inward, pulsing softly.

Then he saw it. Reflected behind him.

A shape.

A person. No. A shadow shaped like a person. Standing still.

Lucas spun around—his chair toppled.

No one.

Just his empty living room.

Except now, one of the symbols from the subway—those interlocking rings—was burned faintly into the wall. As if left by heat, or thought, or memory.

He didn't leave the apartment the next day. He ordered food but never answered the door when the knock came. When he finally peeked through the peephole, no one was there. Just a folded piece of paper wedged into the frame.

No writing. Just a single drawn symbol:

An eye inside a triangle.

Not the same as the one from his dream.

This one was closed.

Next chapter preview:

Chapter 3 – The Artifact

Lucas opens the last box from his grandfather. Inside, a clue to his family's true legacy—and a mirror that doesn't just reflect, but remembers.