Guess who's back, both meta-wise and story-wise?

I apologize for the delay and unannounced hiatus. And happy every holidays that occur during the hiatus~.

But hey, the story continues!

This chapter marks the beginning of the third arc, "Third Day". The titles will follow the "Third Day - [POV character's full name]" pattern.

An auburn-haired boy was strangled by two men in suits.

"Dad, DAD! Why do you-"

The boy struggled to fight the men, but one of them covered his mouth.

A man in his thirties who stood in front of those three just knelt and cried.

"I'm sorry, my son. But this is for your sake."

Another man in suits approached the man from behind, with knife in his grasp. The boy tried to warn his father, but-

Maku opened his eyes and rose from his bed. He felt exhausted and scared, as if he was just running away from a threat. Then, he glanced at the mirror on his desk. His eyes turned blood red, and his skin turned pale. He cuddled his blanket, and looked away from the mirror.

Just what happened to me?

He thought that if he slept early, he would woke up sooner to prepare for his escapade. So after he helped his mother and Makkie cleaning up dishes, he went to his bedroom and slept.

After gathered enough courage to do so, Maku glanced at the mirror again. It seems like his appearance reverted into his usual self.

Now that he thought about it, everything began to get stranger and stranger after he met Elise. His innate Thief abilities awoken, he became stronger and faster, he could handle high-leveled monsters with ease, and he began to dream scary things. His mother told him that she often heard him muttering strange things in his sleep. And after reading up Benkaisten's diary, Maku couldn't help but feeling that something's amiss.

Where's dad?

Maku's head ached. It's probably one of the effects of that "Transcendence" thing Elise explained. She once told him that when he begins to remember "things that should've been forgotten", he would feel "an unbearable pain"…or something like that. That Elise, she's always cryptic.

Aaand now he realized that while he's thinking about her, the pain faded.

Maybe it's a "bound by destiny" thing from those trashy novels Digotz once showed to him? Heh. He's thinking about that blockhead again; maybe he really, uh, loves him after all. In platonic way, of course.

Hmph. Gotta sleep for tomorrow.

When Maku was about to rest his head on his pillow, he heard a loud flipped switch's sound. Soon after, everything he sees turned red. Maku opened the window to see the outsides, and they're all the same. The sky, the walls, and the trees are all bloody red. The people didn't move at all. The curtains stopped moving, even though he opened the windows. He could feel the air, but they're stagnant.

"…The Anti-Intruders System, Level X…total stasis of the town's time and space, blocking of outside energy, three-dimensional impenetrable barrier…"

Maku shook his head to regain his consciousness. What was he talking about? Although he's fully aware of the "system", he never knew anything about "Anti-Intruders System Level X" or something like that. What's up with him? It was like that moment when he attacked Elise due to his uncontrollable rage. He knew he did something, but he couldn't do anything about it. It's like someone was controlling him or took over his consciousness.

He looked up at his surroundings again. The sky's still bloody red, and the moon's shining grimly. When he looked up at the top of the dividing wall, he spotted two persons standing there. One's a knight-like figure with long capes, and another's a woman with slender figure. Or that's what he could've seen, given the sky's all dark.

Fearing that the two would come to his place, Maku went to snatch his bag on his desk and took a Main Gauche from it.

When he returned to the window, Maku realized that the two figures had vanished from the wall. No, they just jumped from there and landed on the rooftop of the house next to the bar. Then, the woman jumped to- wait, did she just-

Before he could move his hand, the woman had landed in front of him. Now that she's close to him, Maku could see her clearly. She's a Professor, wearing the male version of the coat with some kind of black catsuit underneath. She has a beautiful face, short emerald hair, and…blood red eyes.

She approached him and glared straight at his eyes. Seconds after, she put a relieved, yet disturbing smile.

"We've found you."

-TO BE CONTINUED-

Yeah, yeah, I know this chapter is short. But this is just a set-up chapter.

Sorry for keeping you all waiting for who knows how long, my dear readers. But my second semester in Visual Communicative Design was hell. So many assignments (or ass-ignments, according to myself) and projects, and I didn't have time to write. Luckily, I've planned the whole story and all the twists during those times. What's important now is to figure out how to execute them.

As I'm aware that this chapter is nowhere near perfect grammar-wise, I'll edit this continuously.

Also, I'll change the character tags to those of the real main characters. Yeah, it's technically a spoiler, but eh.