{Guys, some disturbing content ahead. It's kind of related to horror elements, that's what I could divulge without spoiling. My suggestion is if you can't handle that or can, but are doing something like eating while reading the chapter, then PLEASE DON'T read this chapter.}
"Sir, I will extract whatever information I can from him."
Kazu watched silently as the people from the council took Dave away.
He glanced towards the crying girl who was trying to stop the people from taking her father away.
He sighed.
"Why does it have to be so complicated?" He walked towards the girl before putting his hands on her shoulder.
"Vanessa... See, they are just taking away your freedom for questioning. I promise you that I will do my best to find the truth about your sister's death." Kazu forced himself to put on a serious expression.
The girl sniffed as she looked at him. No words came out.
Just like that, Kazu stood silently with a crying girl beside him as they watched the people take away the girl's father.
---
"This is definitely a trap," Kazu muttered as he looked at a map present in the basement. The map depicted Fiore, with a mountain range marked in red.
"And I am willingly walking in this trap. Well, it would definitely be better than any place other than this." He said out loud as he immediately started preparing for the trip.
This city is bizarre, and Kazu will not be coming back to it anytime soon. At least he hoped.
---
It took Kazu 1 week to reach the entrance of the mountain range by train.
"I am going to be broke by the time this mission ends at this rate." He sighed as he fixed the bag strap and entered the range.
Coo Coo Coo
Kazu jumped back before snapping his head towards a nearby branch.
Pigeon.
A single pigeon was staring at him.
"Will this count as PTSD?" He forced a laugh before moving on.
Coo Coo Coo
But just after walking for 10 minutes, Kazu heard another sound, making him pause.
He turned in the direction and saw 3 pigeons looking at him.
Staring.
"Fuck you." He showed a middle finger before continuing his path.
It was soon sunset, so Kazu made a camp and retired for the day.
"It will take a few days to reach the summit, though I don't know if I should go there first or instead search through the perimeter."
---
The next few days went similarly.
Kazu scouted the mountain range, saw pigeons, and avoided them, then continued the search.
This cycle repeated again and again.
Until it didn't.
Kazu froze, his breath caught in his throat.
The pigeon's claws pinned its fellow down, wings thrashing weakly against the dirt. Then—
crunch.
Its beak clamped down on the other's neck, snapping bone with a sickening crack. A spasm, a twitch, and then the predator began to feed. Pecking first at the eye, then tearing deeper with wet, deliberate motions.
Kazu forced his gaze away, swallowing hard. "It's a variant. Just some magical mutation," he told himself, gripping the strap of his pack so tightly his knuckles went white. But his instincts—the same instincts that had kept him alive in the woods—whispered otherwise.
The crunching didn't stop when he looked away. It stayed in his ears, echoing long after he'd left the clearing.
---
That night, by the campfire, the memory gnawed at him more than the hunger in his belly. Each twig that snapped underfoot sounded like a neck breaking again. The shadows of the flames warped into winged shapes, flickering and twitching at the edges of his vision.
He lay down, but closing his eyes only made it worse. In the silence, he heard the crunch again, wet and sharp, followed by a faint fluttering. He sat up, knife in hand, eyes darting into the darkness.
Nothing. Just trees. Just quiet.
He tried to steady his breathing. "Ah, too much imagination."
But when he finally drifted into a half-sleep, dreams pressed down on him like a weight. Pigeons hanging upside-down from branches, wings spread like broken marionettes. Dozens of black eyes opened in the dark, all fixed on him.
Kazu woke with a start, sweat cooling on his skin. The fire had long gone out, leaving only faint embers. He wiped his face with a shaky hand. Morning couldn't come fast enough.
---
"This is also a dead end" Kazu crossed out another location from the map.
It has been a few days since he arrived on the mountain, and he had been successful in ignoring the abnormalities and pretending that everything is fine.
"12 more areas to scout before I could go home." He saw the direction of the next location before heading there.
Chew Chew Chew
Some chewing noises came from the side, promptly causing Kazu to turn in that direction.
He was half-expecting cannibalism.
What he saw was worse.
One pigeon shuddered, its feathers ruffling like something inside was clawing to get out. A wet crack split the air as its ribcage bulged unnaturally, bones bending outward. Then, with a sick, tearing pop, a slick pink beak punched through its chest.
Kazu froze. The world seemed to tilt as the newborn bird wriggled out, its tiny claws scrabbling against its parent's collapsing body. The skin and feathers peeled like damp paper as the hatchling forced itself free, drenched in blood and yolk-like slime that glistened under the fading light.
It didn't even look at the corpse it had crawled from. Instead, the newborn pigeon shook itself once—casually, like this was normal—and let out a thin, broken coo.
Kazu's stomach lurched. He had gutted beasts before. He had seen wolves rip deer apart in the wild. But this—this wasn't predation. This wasn't birth. This was something obscene pretending to be nature.
His breath hitched. He staggered back a step, suddenly aware of how quiet the forest had grown. No wind. No insects. Just the soft, greedy sound of the hatchling tearing into the parent's remains, feeding on the body that had birthed it.
This was the end of the straw for the bizarreness he could handle.
"Something is definitely wrong...I need to escape. Yes, I need to escape this cursed place. Escape to...?" Kazu tilted his head.
Where would he escape to?
Where is a safe place?
"Magnolia! I need to go back to the guild." Kazu muttered before, intending to exit the mountain.
---
"Why is this map becoming more and more unreliable? It's as if it's a real maze." Kazu had been circling the same scenery for the 9th time within an hour.
Whenever he thought that he had left the area, the same rock and trees came to haunt him again.
"I don't think I should continue anymore. Let's make a camp." Kazu gave up on exiting for now and focused on the immediate goal.
He quickly set up the camp, opened his sleeping bag and slept.
At least tried to.
Coo Coo Coo
The sound of the pigeons was ever-present.
"Why don't you continue cooing? Why is it so random? As if made to torture me to not sleep." It would have been fine if their cooing became a background sound, but that wasn't the case.
Kazu somehow made it through the night with half-sleep.
He exited the tent and looked at the sunrise for a few seconds.
Growl
His stomach made noises, indicating that he was hungry.
"Lucky that I still have some bars left."
He took out an energy bar and moved it towards his mouth.
Just when the bar reached midway—
"AHHHHHHHH..." Kazu felt his heart almost come out of his chest as he saw his energy bar turn into a pigeon.
If he had been one second later in stopping, he would have eaten a raw pigeon.
He quickly threw away the pigeon from his hands before throwing away the waist bag, afraid that it would contain something weird too.
"Why is this happening to me? Why?" Kazu held his hair in anger.
He wasn't able to escape. He wasn't able to sleep properly, and now he doesn't seem to be able to eat food properly.
---
"It's been 4 days... or has it been 40? Where is the exit? Why are there so many pigeons?" Kazu found his body going weak.
He hasn't slept or eaten for a long time. He has also lost track of time.
Sometimes the sun quickly comes and just as quickly goes away.
Sometimes it never comes for a long time.
Clap Clap Clap
Suddenly, a small, yet distinct clapping voice filled the clearing.
Kazu turned sideways and found a man walking towards him.
"I didn't think you would last this long." The man said with an amused smile.
Kazu recognised the man.
How would he not? He had been trying to find the man for a long time now.
Veyren Kalt
The source of how all this began in the first place.
"I thought something was wrong. So, it was you." Kazu frowned.
He quickly moved his Ethernano to his legs, intending to knock the man in one go.
THUD
Kazu found himself dropping to the ground.
"It seems your legs can't support you anymore? Do you even know how long it has been since you have eaten or drunk anything? Let alone sleeping. You are even weaker than a non-magic kid your age." A sadistic smile appeared on Veyren's face as he walked towards Kazu.
He only stopped just before the latter's lying body.
***
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