Chapter 254: New Dera

New EarthThe steady thud of fists hitting leather echoed through the empty gym.

Dera’s knuckles stung through the wraps, but she didn’t stop. Each punch landed harder than the last, the bag rocking on its chain. Her breathing came sharp, her arms slick with sweat, but it wasn’t exhaustion that furrowed her brow. It was confusion.

She kept seeing flashes.

A forest at night, teeth glinting in the dark. A silver knife in her hand. The roar of something not human. The sound of Ken’s voice, breaking when he called her a liar.

She blinked, fists slowing. The bag swung back, bumping against her shoulder.

"What the hell is wrong with me..." she muttered.

She shook her head, tried to push it away, but it never stayed gone. Every time she closed her eyes, it was there. Those memories—or dreams, whatever they were.

She wasn’t just a woman at a gym in New Earth. Not in those flashes. She was something else. A hunter.

And worse, it felt real. Too real.

She threw another punch, harder this time. The chain creaked.

Her father’s voice came next, as if pulled from another life. A voice layered with years of leadership and exhaustion. He had been mediating between humans and the supernatural. Supernatural. That word alone made her chest tighten.

Because in the dream—if it was a dream—they were everywhere. Witches. Werewolves. Vampires. Monsters crawling from places no one wanted to name.

And she’d lived in the middle of it.

Her fist froze mid-air. She pressed her forehead against the swinging bag, sweat dripping to the mat.

Ken’s face came to her again. The boy who’d loved her. The boy who turned his back on her after she killed his witch friend.

Her hand shook.

"I didn’t have a choice," she whispered, the words spilling like an old wound reopening.

She remembered it too vividly: the witch chanting, the air splitting open, the world seconds away from ending. She remembered the knife going in, the scream that followed, the silence after.

She remembered Ken’s eyes when he found out.

She exhaled, long and ragged, pushing the bag away.

And then there was Lucifer.

Not the devil. Not in the way stories told it. No, this was someone else. Someone she had known. A vampire. The strongest. The one who had walked beside her through blood and fire. He had fought with her, saved her more times than she could count, always with that maddening smirk, always with crimson eyes burning like fire in the dark.

Her fists clenched tighter.

She remembered him standing at the summit in Geneva, the night the world finally saw the supernaturals as more than shadows. She remembered him cutting through enemies like they were nothing, remembered him saying she had guts when she didn’t think she had anything left.

And then... the memory always slipped. Like fog covering the rest. She knew the world had fallen. Destroyed. But how? Why? That part never came clear.

Her eyes burned. She didn’t stop the bag when it swung back, letting it thud against her chest.

Dera stepped back, wiping her forehead with her forearm.

"It’s just dreams," she told herself. "Weird, stupid dreams."

But she didn’t believe it.

Because now, even awake, the skills she had in those dreams were bleeding into her real life.

Her reflexes were sharper. Her body moved like it remembered battles her mind shouldn’t know. She had sparred with trainers twice her size and come out untouched, her hands moving faster than she could explain.

And last week—last week she’d thrown a knife across her apartment without even thinking. It had hit the tiny crack in the plaster on the wall dead center.

She wasn’t supposed to know how to do that.

She stared at her hands, at the faint bruises blooming across her knuckles.

"What are you?" she whispered to herself.

The bag swayed, groaning on its chain, and she finally pulled the wraps off. Her fingers ached, but it grounded her. She grabbed her water bottle, drank, and sat down on the bench, her chest rising and falling.

The gym was empty. Just her, the bag, and her thoughts.

She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, staring at the floor.

The flashes weren’t stopping.

They weren’t fading like dreams should.

And now she was terrified they weren’t dreams at all.

Her mind raced back to Ken, to her father, to the witches and wolves, to Lucifer—the vampire lord, the one who had become the strongest of them all.

If that had been real... if that had been her life... then what the hell was this?

What was New Earth?

Was she living in the ruins of someone else’s story? Or was she just going insane?

Her jaw tightened.

She wasn’t the type to sit and wait for answers to fall into her lap. Not if she was the same person from those flashes.

No—she needed to dig. She needed to know.

She stood, grabbing her jacket from the rack, tugging it over her shoulders. The zipper caught for a moment before sliding up, sealing her in. She threw her bottle back in her bag, slung it over her shoulder, and headed out into the night.

The air outside was crisp, carrying the faint hum of the flawless city around her. Neon lights glowed overhead, holograms drifting across the skyline. New Earth. Perfect on the surface.

She didn’t trust perfect.

The streets were quiet at this hour, just the buzz of signs and the occasional hum of a transport gliding past. Dera walked fast, head down, her fists buried in her pockets.

There was one place left to go. One lead, even if it was stupid.

A psychic.

She snorted under her breath.

She didn’t even believe in them. Most were frauds, selling smoke and mirrors to desperate people who wanted their futures read. But right now... she was desperate enough.

Because if anyone could even pretend to explain why she was remembering another life—why she felt like she’d died in another world and woken here—it would be someone who claimed to speak to the unseen.

Even if it was a lie, maybe it would point her somewhere. Maybe it would give her something to chase.

She needed that. She needed something before she lost her mind.

Her boots tapped steady against the pavement, each step carrying her further into the district where lights flickered and the air smelled faintly of smoke.

Her heart pounded harder than it should have. She tried to steady it, tried to focus, but the flashes wouldn’t leave her.

Ken’s eyes. Her father’s voice. The witch’s scream. Lucifer’s smirk.

Her throat tightened.

"Just dreams," she whispered again.

But her hands curled into fists inside her pockets.

She didn’t believe it.

Not anymore.

And when she pushed through the crowded, neon-lit street that hid the psychic’s door in its back corner, she knew one thing for sure.

Whether it was real or not—whether she was insane or cursed—she was going to find the root of it.

Because if the world really had ended once...

She had to know if it was about to end again.

The door creaked as Dera pushed it open.

The smell hit her first—cheap incense, too heavy, cloying. It clung to her throat, burned her nose. The room was dim, lit by strands of purple lights that hung across the ceiling. A crystal ball sat crooked on the table, glittering faintly under the fake glow.

The psychic sat behind it, draped in shawls that looked like they’d been pulled from a bargain bin. Her hair was dyed a harsh red, streaks of black roots already pushing through. She smiled too wide, her lipstick cracked at the edges.

"Welcome," the woman purred, spreading her hands dramatically. Her rings clinked together. "I felt your presence coming. You’re burdened by a heavy spirit, yes?"

Dera blinked, unimpressed. She hadn’t even sat down yet.

"You sure about that?" she said flatly, stepping closer.

The woman nodded eagerly, her eyes narrowing as if she were gazing through Dera. "Oh yes. I see shadows all around you. Pain. Loss. You’ve lost... a man. A lover. He betrayed you."

Dera stared at her for a long moment.

"Wow," she said, voice dry. "That narrows it down to about half the population."

The psychic faltered, her smile twitching. She tried again, waving her hands over the glass ball like she was stirring soup. "I sense you carry a secret. A destiny you have not yet fulfilled. And there is someone... watching over you from beyond."

Dera leaned on the chair across from her, not bothering to sit. "Lady, you’re one sentence away from telling me I’m cursed and need to buy a crystal for four hundred credits."

The psychic’s mouth opened, then shut.

Dera’s eyes scanned the room—the fake candles, the plastic bones on the shelf, the price list taped behind the beaded curtain that led to the back. She could hear the hum of an old refrigerator, probably storing sodas.

It was all smoke and mirrors.

She knew it in her gut.

She stood straight again, shouldering her bag. "You’re not a psychic. You’re a scam artist with a candle problem."

The woman bristled, her smile falling. "I don’t appreciate your tone—"

"Yeah," Dera cut in, "and I don’t appreciate being lied to."

Her voice carried an edge sharper than she intended. For a moment, the room fell quiet, incense smoke curling lazy between them. Dera’s pulse thudded in her ears.

She thought of the flashes again—of the witch’s scream, of Ken’s eyes, of Lucifer standing with blood on his hands. They weren’t lies. They weren’t smoke. They were too real.

And this woman—this fraud—wasn’t going to give her any answers.

Dera turned, pulling the door open. The bell above it chimed. She didn’t look back.

The psychic’s voice called after her, strained, a little desperate. "Wait! You can’t run from your fate!"

Dera stepped into the night, the door slamming shut behind her.

The air outside was cleaner, sharper, the neon lights reflecting off the wet street. She shoved her hands into her jacket pockets, her jaw set.

"Yeah," she muttered under her breath. "But I can run from bullshit."

"Good thing you still have your good intuition."