And so, Ray opened his eyes.
"—Hah."
He gasped for air, like a drowning man bursting from the water's surface, greedily gulping down fresh oxygen.
Though the experience just moments before had been nothing more than an illusion, the sight of destruction paraded so vividly before his eyes had felt no different from reality.
As if…
He had truly lived through it before.
He rubbed his temples and rose to his feet, surveying his surroundings.
This was no longer the concert hall, nor the familiar streets of Ragunna. This was an entirely foreign domain.
The sky was saturated in a dreamlike pale pink, and vast grasslands stretched out before him, covered in flourishing violet flora, dotted with countless strange, nameless blossoms. An elusive sweetness drifted upon the breeze whenever it stirred.
"Where… is this?"
Ray murmured to himself. The final image lingering in his mind remained frozen on that instant when Phrolova had kissed him.
Everything after that had gone blank, as if someone had forcibly cut the reel of time.
When his consciousness reconnected to reality, he found himself already standing in this strange new world.
"Anby? Anby!"
He looked at the tacet mark on the back of his hand, attempting to rouse the slumbering Anby.
But Anby gave no response whatsoever. The bond between them felt as though it had been severed by something intangible, not even the faintest echo could get through.
He frowned slightly and lifted his gaze toward the distance. At the edge of the horizon, the haphazard rooftops of what seemed to be a sleeping little town loomed faintly beneath the pale pink sky.
"Anyway, I'll head over and take a look first. Who knows what Phrolova dragged me here for."
"And where the hell has she even disappeared to?"
With that, he set off in the direction of the town ahead.
As the distance closed, the outline of the town gradually sharpened into clarity.
Not far from the entrance, several figures had gathered and were conversing in hushed tones.
"So… can we really get out of here?"
"Put your faith in Phrolova."
"I don't know, I think staying here wouldn't be so bad either…"
Their words were soft, yet they drifted into Ray's ears without missing a single syllable.
He halted his steps, puzzled. After a brief moment of hesitation, he still walked toward them.
Almost at the exact same moment, the group noticed his presence as well.
At first, they simply froze in place. Then, expressions of utter disbelief spread across their faces, it was more than mere surprise. It was as if they were witnessing with their own eyes some reality so incredible it could overturn their entire worldview, a mix of shock, hope, and awe.
Ray felt incredibly uncomfortable under those stares.
Why are they all looking at me like that?
And what did they mean by all that talk just now?
"You… you're someone from outside?"
"Are you a friend of Phrolova's?"
"Perhaps… Phrolova's boyfriend?"
Before Ray could even open his mouth, those looks brimming with anticipation practically pierced straight through him, making him swallow the questions he'd originally intended to ask.
Ray's lips parted slightly, an expression of pure bewilderment crossing his face. "What do you mean by 'someone from outside'? As for Phrolova… yes, I suppose I am her friend."
At the very least, their current relationship could be defined that way.
"It's really true, someone from outside!"
"Does this mean we can go to the real world?"
"Has Phrolova's research finally succeeded?"
Faced with these questions, Ray only grew more confused. "I'm sorry, I have no idea what any of you are talking about."
Phrolova's research?
Go to the real world?
What was any of that supposed to mean?
"Eh, you don't know? How is that possible?"
"If you didn't know, how could Phrolova possibly let you in here?"
"As I thought, you're someone very important to her!"
Ray opened his mouth as if to speak, then hesitated, unsure of how to respond for a moment.
He couldn't shake the feeling that the three people before him were deeply strange. Though they appeared no different from ordinary humans on the surface, for some reason, they gave off an oddly unsettling impression.
"Forgive me, but regarding those questions… could someone explain to me what exactly is going on here?"
Hearing Ray's question, the three of them finally realized their lapse in decorum and hurriedly offered apologetic expressions.
"Sorry, sorry," one of them, a young girl, said with an embarrassed wave of her hand. "We were just so excited, it's the first time we've ever seen an outsider enter this place."
She stepped forward, her smile radiant. "I'm Emino. This is Runo, and this here is…"
She paused suddenly, tilting her head in thought for a moment. "Ah, that's right, it's Bier."
She actually had to think about it?
Were they not familiar with one another?
Yet judging by the way they stood together, they certainly didn't seem like strangers.
"We're all friends of Phrolova's," Emino said with a smile. "Since you're Phrolova's friend, that makes us friends too, doesn't it?"
Ray froze for an instant, then managed to force a smile. "Uh… I suppose so. So, where is Phrolova right now? I have some questions I need to ask her in person."
"Phrolova? She's just over—"
The girl lifted a hand to point behind her, but her voice cut off abruptly.
Her figure began to flicker and fracture like an image with poor signal reception and it wasn't just her. The other two also began to crumble and scatter, dissolving into countless motes of light.
What finally presented itself before Ray's eyes was...
"Tacet Discords?!"
He gasped in disbelief.
"How can this be?"
It had all happened in the blink of an eye. The people before him had transformed into mindless Tacet Discords.
Ray reflexively retreated half a step, the vocal mark on the back of his hand shimmering with a faint glow. Frequency coalesced and took shape in his grasp, ultimately forming an ornate longsword—
Blood Oath Covenant.
The blade Cantarella had gifted him before.
He dropped into a combat stance, only to be caught off guard by the discovery that these Tacet Discords had no intention of attacking whatsoever.
They merely murmured indistinct, garbled phrases to themselves, their movements utterly devoid of logic. They even completely ignored his presence, mindlessly repeating certain motions on their own.
"What on earth happened to these people?"
No were they even people at all, or Tacet Discords?
Ray stared blankly at the "Tacet Discords" scattered throughout the small town, a terrifying thought suddenly flashing through his mind.
In Solaris, all things were composed of frequency, life itself included.
Under special circumstances, when the deceased's attachment to reality surpassed their fear of death, they would not fade away entirely. Instead, they would leave behind an imprint, akin to a soul.
The world called them: Reverberations.
Ray's expression twisted into one of sheer horror.
Could it be that these people were all already dead, and what stood before him now were nothing but their Reverberations?
But he quickly shook his head, rejecting the notion.
No. If they were merely Reverberations, they should have dissipated quickly.
Besides, their current state…
"Has Phrolova forcibly anchored these Reverberations into the husks of Tacet Discords?"
"What on earth is she doing?!"
"Is this not simply toying with life itself?"
"This is no different from the fanatics of the Fractsidus—wait, Fractsidus…"
Ray paused for a brief moment. In a daze, he suddenly felt as though he understood something.
Just then, a gentle piano melody drifted out from a small house up ahead, reverberating throughout this strange world.
Ray furrowed his brow and followed the sound toward its source.
It was a two-story house, its white window frames entwined with long-withered vines.
Through the clear glass window, he could vividly make out the silhouette of a girl seated before the piano.
He stood in silence for a moment, then finally pushed the door open and stepped inside.
Phrolova seemed to have sensed his arrival long before. Her fingers played the final note upon the keys, its lingering resonance trembling softly in the air.
She rose slowly and picked up a blooming red spider lily from the top of the piano, cradling it gently against her chest.
When she turned around, a soft, gentle smile graced her lips.
What met that smile, however, was the cold edge of a blade.
"You'd better give me a clear explanation." Ray's Blood Oath was aimed steadily at her heart, his voice guarded and sharp. "These Tacet Discords. What exactly is going on here?"