Nakate entered the town but was empty. White feathers covered the streets, drifting in piles against the walls and scattered across every step and doorway. Nakate stepped carefully, his eyes tracing the feathers as he made his way to the guild.
When he pushed the door open, more feathers greeted him, spread across the floor like a blanket.
There were two people inside, standing near the center of the room. They were speaking to each other, calm and casual, but every few moments one of them turned their head downward… toward a white feather on the floor.
'Why are they talking like that…?
Do they not see what I'm seeing? Or… is it the other way around?
I don't get it.'
Nakate walked toward the stairs. For a moment it felt normal, almost peaceful, but halfway up he bumped into something. Something solid. He staggered back and looked down.
A single white feather rested where he had just tried to step.
"What…?" he whispered.
The two people downstairs turned their heads toward him at the same time, their eyes following him in silence. Nakate didn't speak. He kept walking, choosing to ignore whatever they thought they saw.
When he reached the room he and his party had rented, he opened the door slowly. The inside was empty. Nakate stepped inside and let himself fall onto the bed. The mattress felt warm from the sunlight still fading through the window. His muscles relaxed all at once, exhaustion settling into every part of him.
As his eyes grew heavy, something drifted down from above.
A black feather.
It floated in slow circles, lowering itself until it rested gently on his face.
Nakate didn't move. He let it fall and stay there.
Then he closed his eyes and slipped into sleep.
Morning light slipped through the window's medieval lattice, scattering soft shapes across the room. Nakate blinked awake, the warmth brushing over his cheek. He pushed himself up, feeling oddly refreshed. Almost as energized as the first night he'd ever slept in that bed.
He stretched, rubbed his eyes, and headed downstairs.
Before he even reached the bottom step, he heard laughter, clattering mugs, voices overlapping in loud celebration. The guild was full. Adventurers crowded around tables, commoners pouring drinks, people cheering about something he couldn't quite place.
Nakate stopped near the railing, watching.
'It's weird… I remember there being a race of shorter people here. And those ones with the pointy ears.'
He scanned the crowd again.
Everyone looked normal. Human. Same way Blindseer had looked before, the same kind of normal.
'Celtor… that's what the green-skinned ones with the face marks were called, I think. 'He swallowed. 'But… I can't even remember where I learnt that.'
The guild's laughter grew louder around him, he couldn't find the two S-ranks anywhere, so he walked up to one of the adventurers and cleared his throat.
"Hey, um… what was it that was going on yesterday?" His voice cracked a little with embarrassment.
The Celtor slapped the counter with a wide grin. "Harvest season, of course! That means free beer for the whole month!"
Nakate nodded slowly, trying to process the sudden shift in mood from yesterday to today. He turned away from the loud Celtor and approached the guild counter.
Behind it stood the same girl he remembered… except she wasn't the same. Her skin was green now, her features unmistakably Celtor, just like everyone else here.
"Oh, you're back from your journey!" she said brightly. "So tell me—how was it? Your first solo mission?" She leaned in, studying the dirt on his clothes and the tiredness clinging to his face.
"It went… fine," Nakate answered. "I had to fight a skeleton that burned itself."
But even as he said it, the words twisted inside him.
'No. That's not what happened. It didn't burn itself. It burned me. And it wasn't a solo mission, was it?'
Nakate forced a smile. "I'll go outside for a walk."
The girl nodded back cheerfully.
***
Outside, the noise of the guild vanished instantly, swallowed by the quiet. Nakate froze in place.
The town was empty.
No adventurers.
No merchants.
No guards.
Not even the white feathers.
He stepped forward slowly, the emptiness ringing louder than the cheers inside the guild.
"I guess everyone is at the guild…"
Nakate wandered through the silent streets, circling a small stone bridge that arched over a narrow stream. His footsteps echoed faintly each time he passed it, always alone, always returning to the same spot.
He ran a hand through his hair, gripping the back of his head as frustration built up. "Why can't I remember anything?" he muttered, hitting his forehead with the heel of his palm. "It's like I was just dreaming and now I finally woke up…"
He stopped at the middle of the bridge, staring at his reflection in the shifting water below.
"Even then—who were the other two adventurers? What was the solo mission? Was I imagining them? All of this? Did I just make everything up?"
His reflection rippled, warped by the current.
And for the briefest moment… he thought he saw black feathers drifting down behind him.
Nakate didn't think. His body moved before his mind caught up.
He vaulted over the bridge's edge and hit the water, only for the cold sensation he expected to never come. Instead, the moment his boots touched the surface, they dissolved into drifting black feathers, that then scattered around his feet.
Nakate froze, eyes wide. "W-what…?"
He looked up.
Two figures stood on the riverbank, Nakate saw the same S-ranks he'd seen before. Their eyes met his for only a heartbeat.
Then their bodies unraveled.
Both of them burst into spiraling clouds of bright violet feathers that whirled upward like sparks from a dying fire. In seconds, they were gone.
Nakate stumbled out of the river, panic tightening his chest. "W–What the hell is going on!?" he shouted, the words tearing out of him.
***
He ran.
Through the empty streets. Past abandoned stalls. Past homes that looked lived-in yet strangely untouched. His footsteps echoing louder and louder.
He slammed the guild doors open—
And stopped dead.
The entire hall was filled with white feathers.
They drifted through the air in slow, weightless spirals. Every table, chair, and cup lay buried beneath them. The warmth and noise that once filled the guild was gone, replaced by suffocating quiet.
Nakate's breath trembled.
In the center of the room, something stood with its back turned toward him.
A white owl.
Perfectly still. Perfectly poised.
Around Nakate's feet, he realized, the purple feathers had arranged themselves into a loose circle, almost like something had quietly marked the ground beneath him while he wasn't looking.
The owl shifted, as if acknowledging his presence.
Slowly, it began to turn toward him.
It wore the mask of a deep owl, only this one was pure black instead of white.
Its body, strangely, was the opposite; white instead of the usual shadowed black.
It was small, almost childlike in size, and its eyes… they glowed a vivid, unnatural purple.