Morning in Etheria was quiet, too quiet, considering what was about to happen.
In a lush, sun-dappled corner of the forest's grassy plains, a chubby white cow named Holy chewed peacefully on grass. Her tail flicked lazily. A breeze rustled her ear. Life was simple. The cow mooed softly, unaware of the chaos brewing elsewhere.
Not far away, in a makeshift laboratory stitched together with canvas and mana-thread, Yuuna hunched over her workbench. Scattered across the wooden table were blueprints, scribbled notes, glowing fragments of enchanted cloth, and a partially assembled cloak. The lab smelled faintly of burnt cotton and old spell ink. A single, flickering lantern hovered overhead, Magic Lantern II, freshly patched from its last meltdown.
Yuuna squinted at the diagram before her. "Chameleon skin… moon cotton... stable enchantment formula... should work."
From the tent flap, a rustling sound interrupted her thoughts.
"Mmph! Mornin'," came Sakura's muffled voice. She stepped inside, cheeks puffed out, a stick of fried mochi still poking from her lips. Her pink hair was as wild as always. In her hands, she carried a small plate of snacks, rice balls, meat skewers, and a very suspicious-looking cookie that was probably Orchid's.
"You're early," Yuuna said, eyes still on her diagram.
"I smelled mochi. And boom smoke. Thought you were up to something." Sakura sat down beside the workbench and stared at the white robe laid out. "New clothes?"
"Not quite. This is an experimental cloak." Yuuna tapped the fabric. "Using white chameleon skin and moon cotton. It should grant temporary invisibility. Keyword: should."
Sakura blinked. "Cool! I can sneak past Kyle's prank traps."
"I need someone with a large mana pool to test its activation," Yuuna continued. "That would be you."
Sakura grinned. "Me? Oh, I'm honored."
"Just don't overdo it."
Sakura placed her half-eaten snack aside and hovered her palms over the cloak. She began to channel her mana, slow and steady. A soft glow pulsed beneath the robe. A magic circle appeared, traced in radiant silver-blue, humming with energy.
"It's working..." Yuuna began.
Then the magic circle began to spin, slowly at first, then faster and faster, like a whirlwind of glowing runes. Its lines twisted unnaturally, colors bleeding from silver-blue into deep crimson and bright green, then shifting again into a chaotic spectrum as if the very fabric of mana was unraveling. The air crackled with unstable energy. A low hum vibrated through the floor. Sakura's hair lifted from her shoulders, drawn by the rising mana pressure. Then, with a sudden pulse of blinding light...
BOOM!
The blast sent Sakura tumbling backward, her hair frizzed out like a static-charged dandelion. Smoke filled the tent. Somewhere far off,
Holy the cow flinched at the distant thunderclap, her round body jolting slightly as her ears twitched in alarm. A few half-chewed blades of grass tumbled from her mouth, landing softly on the ground below. She blinked once. Then again. Her large, glossy eyes turned toward the sky where a faint trail of smoke curled above the treetops. After a long, thoughtful pause, as if weighing the importance of explosions against the value of breakfast, she gave a soft, unimpressed moo and lowered her head back to the grass, resuming her meal without a care.
Inside the tent, Yuuna fanned away the smoke. Sakura coughed, singed but otherwise fine.
"Again?" she wheezed.
Yuuna examined the charred remains of Cloak I. "It wasn't your fault. The enchantment matrix was unstable."
"I did control my mana this time," Sakura insisted, brushing ash off her sleeves.
Yuuna nodded. "I know. The issue's here." She tapped the diagram. "The channel lines overlapped. I'll reroute them."
She grabbed a fresh piece of moon cotton and chameleon skin, then began adjusting the array. The cloak's second version took form, its embroidery glowing faintly with the new circuit layout.
"Ready for Cloak II?" Yuuna asked.
Sakura raised both arms in a small cheer. "Let's go again!"
This time, the magic circle activated cleanly. Its runes ignited with a perfect hum, lines of silver and white light interweaving in harmony. It gleamed, brightly, brilliantly, until it was nearly painful to look at. Then, without warning, the seams of the cloak puffed and hissed as if holding back pressure, and with a sharp fwoosh, an eruption of vibrant rainbow smoke burst outward.
The colors danced in the air, fiery reds, ocean blues, shimmering violets, and sunny golds, swirling together in a dazzling spiral that shot upward like a magical geyser. Sparkles twinkled in the mist like scattered stars, and trails of color curled through the tent's rafters, painting the air with streaks of enchanted hues. For a moment, the entire lab was bathed in swirling rainbow light, casting reflections like stained glass on every surface. The cloak fluttered as if alive, glowing softly beneath the storm of colors.
And then...
BOOM!
The explosion shook the nearby trees. Somewhere in the distance, Holy mooed, not in alarm, but as if mildly impressed. A rainbow mist floated above the plains.
Inside the scorched lab, Yuuna muttered, "That wasn't in the script."
Sakura blinked, eyes wide. "It smelled like pudding this time."
Yuuna stared at her diagram again. "This isn't right. None of this should cause an explosion."
Sakura leaned over her shoulder and studied the sketch. "Ew. That's ugly."
Yuuna gave her a sidelong look. "It's a functional circuit layout."
"It looks like a worm with a headache." Sakura grabbed a pen and scribbled in a bear head next to the glyph. "Let's make it cute."
The bear resembled something between a deflated balloon and a failed rice ball, lumpy, uneven, and tragically asymmetrical. Its head was oddly squashed to one side, as if someone had sat on it, and one ear was missing entirely, replaced by a scribbled swirl that might've been a bow… or a worm. The eyes were large, round, and wildly uneven, one staring off into the void, the other drooping like it had given up on life. Its mouth, drawn as a jagged squiggle, looked less like a smile and more like a scream frozen in time. It radiated an aura of chaotic innocence, so ugly, it was almost charming. Almost.
Yuuna sighed. "That doesn't help."
"Too late. It's on the diagram now."
With no other cloak fabric left, Yuuna shrugged and used the copy with the bear doodle. "Cloak III. One last attempt."
They repeated the process, both more cautious this time. Sakura placed her hands gently over the cloak, her fingers trembling slightly with anticipation. She took a deep breath, focusing her mana and letting it flow steadily, smoothly, no sudden bursts, no wild surges. A soft hum resonated from the fabric as the cloak responded.
Below it, the magic circle began to glow. The glyphs lit up one by one, tracing delicate lines in the air as if being drawn by an invisible quill. A steady shimmer spread outward in rhythmic pulses, bathing the tent in soft silver-blue light. The circle held. No spinning, no flickering, no sudden pressure.
And, most importantly, no explosion.
The silence that followed was almost deafening. No smoke. No shockwave. Just an eerie, magical calm. Sakura and Yuuna slowly turned to look at each other. Eyes wide. Breath held. Expressions hovering somewhere between disbelief and suspicion.
"…Did we just… succeed?" Sakura whispered.
The cloak pulsed. Still stable.
Yuuna lifted it cautiously, inspecting every seam. "This isn't invisibility…"
Sakura slipped the cloak on before Yuuna could protest, the fabric whispering around her shoulders as she fastened the front with a small flourish. She drew the hood up slowly, the white chameleon-skin folding over her head like moonlight over snow. The moment it settled, a subtle pulse of magic rippled outward.
Her body began to shimmer, the outlines of her figure warping like heat waves rising from sun-baked stone. The details of her face, eyes, nose, smile, softened and smeared, as though someone had wiped a hand across a painting not yet dry. It wasn't invisibility, but something more elusive. Her presence remained, but her appearance slipped just out of focus, difficult to track, harder to hold in the mind's eye.
Even her voice changed. When she spoke, it echoed oddly, layered with a faint distortion, neither clearly male nor female, young nor old. It was as if her words came from somewhere behind a veil, reshaped by the cloak's enchantment. The cheerful Sakura tone was still there… just blurred.
"Can you still see me?" she asked.
"Yes, but… it's like you're not you," Yuuna murmured. "You're blurry. And your voice, did you just become a baritone?"
Sakura pulled off the hood. Her face returned to normal. "Weird."
Yuuna was already jotting down notes. "It's not invisibility. It refracts light and sound. A defensive illusion, maybe? Your appearance is distorted, not erased."
"So it's not Cloak of Invisibility," Sakura said.
"No. It's Cloak of Blurr."
Sakura's eyes sparkled. "It's so cool!"
Yuuna examined the scribbled bear on the diagram. "This… might've been the key."
Sakura gave her a smug grin. "Told you cuteness is the answer."
"Or chaos. Either one."
Outside, in the sun-drenched meadow, Holy the cow lifted her head from the grass and gazed skyward. A faint, shimmering cloud hovered above the treetops, wispy, distorted, and constantly shifting like a mirage caught between sunlight and shadow. Its edges rippled, unfocused, as if reality itself couldn't decide what it was seeing.
Holy blinked slowly. The blurry cloud shimmered again, releasing a faint sparkle of residual mana that drifted lazily through the air like enchanted pollen. She chewed thoughtfully. Then, with a deep, deliberate moo, long and low, the kind that carried weight, she tilted her head ever so slightly, as if giving the mysterious haze her solemn bovine approval.
---
Later That Evening
News of the "Cloak of Blurr" invention didn't take long to spread, especially after Fahleena loudly announced to everyone within a hundred meters that she had "witnessed a new artifact of destiny." Naturally, she demanded to try it first. Yuuna hesitated, but relented.
Fahleena donned the cloak with dramatic flair, threw up the hood, and became a blur. "I am the mist between fate and future!" she declared, before promptly tripping over a root and tumbling down a hill in a blur of limbs, leaves, and muffled squealing. Yuuna confiscated the cloak immediately.
Gigih, ever curious, attempted to copy the enchantment glyph onto his mage hat. The result: a loud pop and a swarm of nearly-invisible bees that chased Kyle and Sinryo around camp. Kyle, wielding a pudding cup as a shield, screamed something about "mana bees from another dimension."
Fuhiken calmly stirred a pot of stew while ducking a bee. "No more testing near the food, please. Especially if Orchid's watching."
"I didn't even do anything," Orchid said with an innocent smile. "Today."
Jessica swatted a bee with the flat of her katana while muttering, "I liked it better when things only exploded."
Gabyola, as usual, tried to maintain a shred of dignity among the chaos, quietly leading the girls away from the magical mess while pretending they were just going for an evening walk.
As the sun dipped lower, a soft rustle of footsteps approached. Lucretia entered the camp. She looked around the chaotic scene with mild amusement.
"So," she said, voice light but calm, "I hear something exploded."
Yuuna exhaled. "Only three times. It's been a quiet day."
Lucretia approached the table where the burnt cloak remnants and magical notes lay scattered. She picked up the latest sketch, featuring Sakura's doodle of a lopsided bear now accompanied by a floppy-eared bunny.
"Is this… part of the enchantment?" she asked, brow raised.
"It shouldn't be," Yuuna muttered, rubbing her forehead. "But for some reason, that version worked."
Sakura grinned. "I told you the bear was lucky."
Lucretia smiled, tilting the paper. "Well, it may not be elegant, but sometimes magic isn't. Sometimes it just needs a little heart. Or chaos."
Yuuna frowned thoughtfully at the diagram. "It's not invisibility, but it's useful. The cloak blurs the wearer, distorts light and sound based on intent."
Lucretia nodded. "That's still impressive. Making something unexpected is still progress. You're learning in your own way."
Sakura puffed up slightly, clearly proud.
Lucretia stepped away, looking up at the last shimmer of a blurry cloud still lingering in the sky. "I suppose even explosions leave behind something beautiful."
Yuuna glanced upward. "That was Cloak II. Rainbow smoke."
"It looked like a sky painting," Lucretia said softly. "Holy was staring at it for quite a while."
As if on cue, from the far edge of the meadow, Holy the cow lifted her head and released a long, resonant moo, a deep, slow sound that echoed gently through the forest. It carried a curious weight to it, as though the cow had been quietly observing the day's magical chaos and had now chosen the perfect moment to offer her solemn, contemplative commentary.
MOOOOO...
Lucretia smiled and added, "See? She has good taste."
Fuhiken looked up from stirring the stew. "I'm not explaining any of this to Lucretia again, am I?"
"No need," she replied, waving a hand. "I already understand completely. I just choose not to stop you."
Yuuna groaned quietly. Sakura chuckled. The others began to settle down for dinner, the chaos slowly melting into laughter and calm. And above it all, the blurry cloud drifted gently across the sky, soft, strange, and a little magical. Like most things in Etheria.
---