I’m not sure how many minutes have passed. All I know is that the sounds of the pounding against the storefront window continued to echo for quite a while. Even so, I wasn’t worried at all. Those birds wouldn’t be able to do any harm to my Alter Ego.
Honestly, they were too weak for that. The curious part is that I didn’t even know exactly what it was capable of — the extent of its abilities was still a mystery to . But sohow, I just knew it would be fine. It was a strange certainty, almost instinctive, as if sothing inside already knew the answer.
Anyway, after a few minutes of complete silence in the shop, the sounds of banging from outside began to fade, gradually weakening until they stopped altogether.
Only the controlled breaths of the people inside the shop remained, softly echoing in the tense atmosphere. Still, no one dared to say a word — perhaps out of fear that there might still be one of them out there, lurking in the dark, waiting for the slightest sign of movent.
However, I already knew that there were no more of them outside. My Alter Ego — the one who had kept the curtain on the window, preventing the flesh birds from invading the shop — began to dissipate slowly, transforming into a dark mist that dispersed into the air before taking its usual form again: a figure that resembled in many ways, but was, at the sa ti, strangely distinct, as if reflecting a distorted version of my own essence.
Outside, after my Alter Ego returned to its normal form, it remained still. Its gaze was lost in the thick fog, as if seeing sothing hidden there — and indeed, there was. I couldn’t make anything out in that dense mist to confirm, but I felt, with an unsettling certainty, that it was staring at soone. Soone I knew very well.
***
(POV - Arthur Hensley)
Arthur no longer knew exactly how much ti had passed — days, weeks, maybe months — since hell started. Everything happened suddenly, as if a portal straight to the abyss had opened in the middle of the world, ripping apart reality without warning. From there on, creatures that should have stayed locked away in so forgotten place began to invade the human world.
He had already lost count of how many tis he’d heard strange sounds coming from the dense fog — whispers, footsteps, cracks — only for nothing to happen for hours on end. That uncomfortable silence, at tis, was worse than the attacks themselves.
With that thought, Arthur brought one hand to his forehead, the visible exhaustion on his face seeming to deepen even further. His heavy eyes and weary expression betrayed the toll: “I think I need more sleep... I still feel strangely drained, even after sleeping”
Arthur hadn’t been able to sleep properly since the first day that thick fog appeared out of nowhere. The weather had remained unchanged all the ti, as if the world was stuck in a faded photograph.
Sotis, the visibility worsened a bit, but other than that, it was practically impossible to distinguish day from night. Without any reference to ti, Arthur started sleeping only when exhaustion beca unbearable or when he found a mont of relative calm that allowed him to rest.
However, Arthur couldn’t estimate how much ti had passed since he’d fallen asleep. The fog kept him in a constant state of alert, tense at all tis, not knowing when sothing might erge from that dense darkness.
For him, all hours seed the sa, as if ti had stopped. That’s why, even “sleeping” Arthur always felt tired and drained. Of course, he attributed part of that exhaustion to the constant stress — after all, his attention had been on the edge since the fog first appeared.
Setting those thoughts aside for a mont, Arthur placed one hand on the rough wall of the alley, feeling the cold concrete against his skin. His eyes slowly scanned the environnt in front of him, alert to the smallest movents. He was standing at the entrance of the alley that led directly to the main street.
His goal was to reach the organization’s base — a distant but essential refuge. However, even Arthur had to admit that this was borderline impossible. The path was fraught with dangers, and the chance of being captured — or worse, killed by an anomaly — before getting there was alarmingly high.
That’s why Arthur decided to change his strategy. With that thought, he raised his gaze, fixing it on the distant sky, where sothing floated silently. His eyes narrowed as he noticed the vague, threatening shape: “If it’s the [Angel of Death], she’s probably seen that too” he muttered, a growing sense of unease spreading in his chest.
Personally, Arthur saw the situation as hopeless. It was clear that they had already surpassed the limits of what humans could control. In this context, it was likely that Emily had been the one to send the anomaly away, since, in a situation like this, she was the only one capable of crossing the fog safely.
It was this conviction that pushed Arthur to head toward the floating light in the sky, a light that undoubtedly led to the destination of his hope: the [Angel of Death], who was likely heading there too.
It was exactly at the mont when Arthur had this thought that he heard a sharp, screeching sound, as if a stone had been thrown against glass or sothing similar. The comparison that ca to his mind was that, although the sound was hard to describe accurately. What caught his attention, however, was the fact that the noise ca from a direction opposite to where he had planned to go.
Despite trying to assess the situation, Arthur couldn’t ignore the feeling that the sound was very close, maybe just five minutes away, or sothing like that. What he knew for sure, however, was that whatever was making that noise was close enough for him to not be able to ignore it.
Arthur briefly fixed his eyes on the bright light cutting through the distant sky before shifting his gaze to the source of the sound he’d heard monts before. Although his mind was fully aware of what his priority should be — sothing obvious given the situation — a brief sigh escaped his lips, as if he were trying to calm the internal storm.
His gaze remained fixed in the direction of the noise, as his almost stealthy steps slowly took him there. Arthur wasn’t moving out of altruism, but sothing darker and harder to define, a need imposed by a reason he himself preferred not to face.
“Haa...” Arthur sighed, his gaze distant and lost in thought. He bit his lower lip, a faint worry crossing his expression: “I hope I don’t regret this decision” he said, his voice filled with uncertainty.
Truth be told, Arthur, like everyone else, was just trying to survive. The only difference was how much he knew about the others, which made him question whether that had any impact on his actions. Maybe that was why he felt, in a way, guilty.
This feeling intensified with every step he took toward what seed to be the end of the road—a path marked by scattered bodies, both adults and children, that he encountered along the way. The scene, grotesque and silent, made him question whether humanity should have been kept in the dark at so point.
Perhaps, if they had known what they were truly facing, more lives could have been saved. Of course, that thought quickly dissipated, like a passing cloud, yet he couldn't shake the weight of that doubt, trailing him with every new body he found.
Walking slowly through the thick fog, Arthur raised his cane and let it fall gently to the ground. The sound of the impact seed to echo in the stillness, as shadows danced around him, forming a do that enveloped him. His lips parted hesitantly, as if the words were reluctant to leave.
Finally, in a low whisper filled with tension, he said: "I hope it's not too late"
With those words, Arthur slowly disappeared, his figure swallowed by the shadows, as if the darkness itself claid him. At the sa ti, the fog around him began to thicken, its density increasing with every passing second, wrapping everything in a cloak of mystery.
Distant, almost surreal sounds echoed unsettlingly in his ears, as if the very environnt was filled with invisible horrors, reminding him of the threats lurking within the fog.
Minutes later, walking silently through the dense mist, Arthur finally seed to reach the spot where he had heard the noise earlier. Before him stood a diner, seemingly harmless, rising among the shadows. However, as he drew closer, a strange chill ran down his spine.
The front window of the diner appeared to have been corrupted by sothing... sothing dark. The transparency of the glass was now distorted, as if it had fused with a black, viscous sli, or at least sothing resembling it.
The substance pulsed slowly, as if alive, and the faint glow of the diner's interior light reflected distortedly on the sticky surface. Arthur paused for a mont, confused and cautious.
Moreover, on the ground in front of the window, several pieces of at from creatures resembling birds were scattered haphazardly, as if they had been thrown there in a sudden and violent strike.
Arthur felt a whirlwind of confusion as he observed the scene; nothing seed to make sense to him. How had those birds died? Had they collided with the black sli filling the window, or was sothing even more incomprehensible happening? Arthur had no idea.
He felt a shiver, but one thing he was certain of: the noise he had heard earlier ca from this diner, though he still couldn't glimpse the interior. The place was shrouded in dense darkness, and he couldn't even discern if there were people inside.
While pondering what to do, Arthur noticed sothing strange in the sli stuck to the diner's window. At first, he thought it was just his imagination, an illusion brought on by the stress of the mont.
However, upon closer inspection, he realized the substance was releasing a kind of dark mist, slowly spreading across the glass, as if the sli were alive and breathing. The smoke seed dense, distorting the clear fog around him.
Arthur watched intently as the mist began to concentrate in front of the diner's window, gradually shaping into sothing indistinct. The form intensified, as if a presence were slowly taking shape.
Just seconds later, the mist dissipated to reveal a figure resembling a little girl. Her body was entirely dark, as if ford by the mist itself, emitting a continuous flow of shadowy vapor.
The creature was the size of a child just over ten years old and wore what appeared to be a type of dress, or perhaps a large shirt, exhaling mist as dense as its body. The air around her seed to grow colder, as if the very essence of the mist absorbed all the light.
However, what stood out most were the creature's red eyes, glowing with an almost supernatural intensity, standing out even in the thick fog enveloping everything around. The gaze, as vibrant as it was threatening, seed to pierce the dense smoke with ease.
Slowly, the being turned its head, directing its crimson eyes toward Arthur. Although he should have been invisible, the being observed him with unsettling calmness, its expression indifferent as if it knew exactly where he was.
Even in the strangeness of the situation, Arthur couldn't help but let a relieved smile appear on his face. The reason was simple and direct: he knew that if this being—a manifestation of a specific anomaly—was here, it ant the anomaly he was seeking was also nearby.
Furthermore, considering the chaos in the diner—the anomalies, which more resembled grotesque birds made of flesh, scattered across the floor—and the fact that the counterpart of the [Angel of Death] had transford into a protective black sli, it wasn't hard to conclude where the presence of the [Angel of Death] was.
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