Time could never be repeated. Not even for a single second.
Perhaps that was why regret existed.
What was lost stayed lost. The world never returned it. Every passing moment disappeared forever, swallowed whole by time itself.
"AAaaakkh!!"
Noise.
A horrifying sound echoed nearby, sharp enough to stab directly into the mind. Countless screams overlapped together, distorted and inhuman. Something was speaking behind them. Slow. Heavy. Unclear.
Its presence felt close enough to breathe against his neck.
'A touch of death. I couldn't stop my hungry folk. Especially when that person looked so… delicious.'
Ambiguous.
Truth itself felt distorted.
Right and wrong blurred together beneath an unbearable haze. Logic mixed with madness until both became indistinguishable. Even reality seemed to wear a mask.
'However... You will compensate me in exchange for their lives.'
Chains.
Debt was no different from chains wrapped around the soul. Once someone fell deep enough, climbing back out became nearly impossible. Endless consequences waited below like an ocean untouched by sunlight.
* *
Zeyn suddenly opened his eyes.
Cold rain poured endlessly onto his face.
For several seconds, he simply laid there on the deserted street while his blurry consciousness slowly returned. That strange dream still lingered inside his head like rotting fog.
Heavy rain during sunset was nothing unusual in Grimoir City.
"Rain… again…"
Dense fog swallowed the streets as far as the eye could see. Streetlights flickered awake one after another, alongside giant LED displays glowing faintly through the mist. Night was slowly devouring the last traces of sunlight.
The city moved on as if he didn't exist.
"Sister Bella…"
The moment he whispered that name, pain exploded inside his skull.
"Arrgh!"
A blurry image appeared behind him. A half-snake woman. Smiling.
Her expression was horrifying enough to make his stomach twist instantly. The headache worsened, nearly forcing a groan out of him. Fragments of memory scattered apart like dust swept away by the rain.
'You will compensate me in exchange for their lives.'
"Shut up…"
Only then did he remember why he had been wandering around all day.
His wallet.
Ever since leaving home after martial arts practice, he had spent hours retracing every place he visited. Anywhere that might offer even the slightest clue. But after searching everywhere, the result remained the same.
Nothing.
Either it had fallen somewhere he never noticed… or someone had already taken it.
"Hah… what a bad luck."
Rainwater dripped from his soaked hair while the fog thickened around him, blurring even the nearest streetlights.
Then the voice returned.
'You owe me two lives… my dear brother.'
"I know… s-shut up already, Sis!" Zeyn grabbed his head tightly.
The pain still wouldn't stop. Neither would the voice.
He couldn't even remember how he ended up collapsing alone in the deserted streets of North Grimoir.
One moment he had been searching, and the next, his head started throbbing violently before everything went black.
And after that came the nightmare.
"I haven't forgotten my debt…" he muttered weakly to himself. "For now, let me do my thing."
He still had to continue searching. It didn't matter how soaked he became.
"Are you behind this rain too, Sister?" Zeyn smiled faintly in ridicule. "Fine by me. I've always liked the rain anyway."
As if responding to his words, a massive flash of lightning suddenly split the heavens apart.
*BLLLARRRZZZTTT—!!
The entire sky trembled violently.
Zeyn instinctively narrowed his eyes.
Heavy storms were common. Lightning wasn't unusual either. But something about this felt wrong. The bolts descending from the clouds looked far too massive, their diameters unnaturally large compared to ordinary lightning strikes.
And more importantly… None of them touched the ground.
*BLARRZZZT—!!
Another bolt descended, but then bounced back upward.
"Hah…?" Zeyn stared at the sky in confusion.
The lightning looked as though it was trying to strike something above the city itself, only to rebound back into the clouds moments later.
"Wait… what?"
He wasn't stupid enough to mistake it for some ordinary weather phenomenon.
The lightning should've been hitting buildings. Especially around West Grimoir where countless skyscrapers towered high above the city alongside massive lightning rods.
Yet every strike kept deflecting away from something invisible.
*BLLLARRRZZZT—!!
Again, another impact. Another rebound.
Zeyn's expression slowly darkened.
"That's definitely not natural…" he muttered while staring cynically into the storm above. "Is this really your doing, Sister?"
Something was happening above the city. Something was attacking. And whatever existed up there still remained hidden behind layers of ambiguity.
* *
A few moments earlier.
Near one of the outer border regions of Grimoir City, heavy rain poured endlessly from the darkened sky. The beautiful orange glow of evening had long disappeared, replaced by an endless storm that had swallowed the city since late afternoon.
The atmosphere remained eerily quiet.
Especially within the deserted pine forest near the outskirts.
"Go away! Go away…!"
A man stumbled frantically through the mud, slipping multiple times as he forced himself deeper between the rain-soaked trees. Branches scratched against his clothes while panic twisted across his face.
Something was chasing him.
He kept glancing backward in terror.
Several streaks of light suddenly shot past the trees behind him, fast enough to resemble tiny bolts of lightning. One of them barely missed his shoulder before exploding against a nearby trunk with a burst of sparks.
The smell of burnt wood instantly mixed with the rain.
The man nearly screamed.
He didn't know what those things were, but he knew he was being hunted.
For several minutes, he continued running desperately through the forest while the strange projectiles pursued him relentlessly.
Then,
*Bzzzttt—!!
"Uaaaghhh!!"
A streak of light pierced directly into his back.
The impact resembled lightning itself.
His body convulsed violently before collapsing unconscious into the mud. Thin smoke slowly rose from his burned clothes.
Footsteps approached calmly afterward.
An Asian man wearing a dark raincoat emerged from between the trees. He looked to be around thirty, with long wet hair tied loosely into a small ponytail behind his head.
Attached to his wrist was a metallic bracelet projecting a transparent holographic display.
The man casually spoke toward it while observing the unconscious victim at his feet.
"I've arrived at the western border," he reported calmly. "First target successfully neutralized."
He then loosened his tied hair slightly before lifting his gaze toward the distant city skyline.
Even through the rain, Grimoir City still looked enormous and beautiful beneath the storm.
"So this is Grimoir City, huh…" he muttered quietly.
A faint smirk formed on his lips.
"Wait… is it Grimoir or Grimoire?" He tilted his head slightly. "That spelling's weird."
His quiet amusement was interrupted by a sudden vibration coming from the metallic bracelet on his wrist.
A holographic notification appeared above it, flashing repeatedly with an incoming call symbol.
The man casually answered by sliding the transparent screen sideways.
"Lord Five…" a voice spoke from the other side.
"Hello. I've arrived," the man replied calmly.
"You already entered the city?"
"Not yet." He glanced toward the distant skyline through the heavy rain. "According to the higher-ups, there's some kind of protective barrier surrounding the area. People like us can't enter normally."
"But locals still can?"
"Apparently."
The voice on the call became more serious.
"Be careful. This target might be troublesome to handle. Proceed according to the operation plan." A brief pause followed. "We're counting on you, Lord Five."
The call disconnected immediately afterward without even a proper farewell.
The man sighed tiredly, "Seriously… my coworkers always hang up like that."
He lowered his wrist while glancing toward the unconscious victim lying in the mud beside him.
For now, his task remained simple: Find a way into the city. Whatever organization they belonged to still remained unclear.
"Grimoir…" he muttered softly. "The city known as the Crying Maestro."
Without hesitation, he grabbed the unconscious man by the collar and started dragging him across the muddy forest floor as if hauling luggage.
Then he suddenly stopped. Slowly, he raised one hand toward the storm-covered sky above the center of the city.
A faint tattoo became visible along his arm beneath the rain. An Ionian numeral symbol representing the number five.
"Heheh… They seriously assigned this entire area to me alone?" He sounded almost insulted. "If I really wanted to, I could destroy this whole city!"
The clouds above suddenly shifted violently.
Massive currents of electricity surged between them, producing blinding flashes of light and deafening thunder. The storm itself seemed to react to his presence.
Then, with a simple downward motion of his finger,
"Take this!"
*BLLLARRRZZZT—!!
A gigantic bolt of lightning descended directly toward the center of Grimoir City.
But,
The bolt ricocheted back upward into the clouds like light reflecting off a mirror. The entire discharge scattered wildly across the sky before vanishing without leaving the slightest trace behind.
"Hm…?" The man narrowed his eyes.
*Kzzz…. BLLLARRRZZZT—!!
Again, another strike. Another rebound.
*Clrazzzt~ Blarrzttt!
No matter how many times he tried, the result remained identical. Eventually, a tired sigh escaped his lips.
"So this city really does have a guardian…"
He pulled up the hood of his raincoat before resuming his walk, dragging the unconscious victim behind him like discarded cargo.
A faint grin lingered beneath the shadow of his hood.
"Good." His voice sounded amused now. "That makes the hunt more fun."
* * * *