Chapter 92
The tension that had frozen in every molecule of air slowly melted, marking the return of the natural law of time.
In the midst of that shift, the sky began showing its first signs of normalizing, yet the normal it regained no longer felt the same as before.
There was a strange, guarded silence, as though the world had just awakened from a long dream it was never meant to experience.
Theo stood at the exact center of that transition.
His body was still, but his eyes were forced to witness the maddened dance of the sky.
The sun and moon exchanged positions with a speed that stripped bare the limits of human perception.
Day and night occurred like a blink of light seized by an impatient giant hand eager to restore the order of nature to its original page.
It was not merely fast, but raced beyond the meaning of speed itself.
Sunlight spilled like forced golden lines, while the full moon rose and sank like the pulsing heartbeat of an ancient, panicked creature.
What Theo witnessed was not mere passage of time, but a grand correction carried out by nature to close the wound opened by the Sa of Valthura and Quorin.
Within a few seconds that felt like thousands of compressed years, the clouds that had marched backward rediscovered their rhythm.
The flowers that had folded in reverse now bloomed again in their proper order.
Fallen leaves leaped back to their branches before falling once more, this time in the correct direction. Even the wind seemed to swirl as if negotiating with itself before deciding the path it was meant to follow.
The universe worked furiously—far harder than anything comprehensible to those living within it—to return the world to its former state moments before the arrival of Valthura and Quorin.
The world became like a stage being tidied after a wild performance that was never written into the script of Flo Viva Mythology.
And when everything finally began syncing again, Theo remained transfixed, watching the sky move with an inhuman rhythm.
In the reflection of racing light, he saw not only the restoration of reality, but proof of how fragile the timeline was in the face of beings capable of forcing it to spin backward.
In the silence that lingered, only one thing was certain.
The world had indeed returned to its original form, but Theo realized he had witnessed something no living being should ever be able to see.
'Since everything is already back in place—'
"From here on, Aldraya?"
Time, now restored, rewove the world's texture around them, erasing every disturbance that had once cracked his awareness.
The numbers 10:02 on Theo's wristwatch glimmered softly, giving its blessing to the calm morning.
Light touched his shoulders, framing his steps with a serenity almost too peaceful for someone who had once seen reality split into two devouring layers.
In the clarity of morning, there was something halted yet still flowing, like a deep breath taken by the world as it prepared to witness the next chapter of their journey.
The intention to take Aldraya to a place long left behind on his list pulsed quietly within him.
He recalled the route they had nearly taken but never reached, abandoned when Aldraya chose another path, leaving a blank space in a narrative that should have been beautiful.
Now, that blank space seemed to demand being filled.
Theo turned his body slowly, parting the surface of clear water.
Beside him, Aldraya stood firm, still staring straight ahead with a calmness he had never fully understood, as if her eyes could pierce the quietest point of the horizon.
The young man's movement came faster than his thoughts.
His right hand lifted, offered to Aldraya with a gentleness loud in intent yet soft in words.
There was a faint awareness that the gesture was more than an invitation—it was a declaration that this morning needed to become something different.
Light filtered between his fingers, making his skin appear paler than usual, and for a moment he felt like someone walking at the border between a stable world and one always shaken by divine paradox.
'She stays silent, calm like a sacred statue without life.
Yet her hand moves toward mine without actually touching.'
Fhhhh!
'Even with her body hosting the seed of the Administrator, she still accepts my invitation.
And yes, her face remains expressionless, just like the Aldraya I know.'
At first, he caught a faint motion at the edge of his sight, like a sliver of light trying to form a signal.
Aldraya slowly lifted her hand, intending to accept Theo's gesture.
The movement was small, barely disturbing the stillness around them, yet enough to make the world behind Theo's back tremble gently.
As though the entity dwelling inside the girl approved of the young man's invitation, as if the dormant Administrator seed within her understood that this date was not a trivial promise, but part of a deeper, quieter path.
Theo watched her with a breath that restrained itself.
There was a strange echo hanging between memory and reality, for the figure standing before him resembled the previous Aldraya in uncanny ways.
Not in form or voice, but in that emotionless calm unbound by anything human.
Her expression remained flat like the surface of frozen midnight water, without the curve of a smile or the hesitant blink common to most people.
Even the motion of her body flowed in straight, precise lines, as though emotional life had never been included in the blueprint of her existence.
Both were the same—Aldraya before and Aldraya now—and that resemblance stabbed far deeper than he expected.
"Pain… pain… pain."
A touch meant to be simple transformed into a strange pause that split the quiet space between them.
In that tightly packed second, as Theo's fingertips nearly brushed Aldraya's delicate forefinger, her body moved with an oddness not fully describable as human reaction.
Eight steps shot backward as if an invisible force yanked her away from the meeting point.
The air seemed to cool, aware that something meant to happen had been diverted by a current deeper than instinct.
Aldraya's silhouette bent slowly, one hand clutching her head as her hair fell, veiling part of a face now tensed.
Eyes usually silent and empty squeezed shut, drawing a sharp line beneath her tightly furrowed brows.
No loud sound shattered the air, yet its vibration seeped through like rumbling swallowed by the earth.
Though her movement resembled someone enduring pain, there was no fear or panic painted on Aldraya's face.
Only that same blankness.
Only the emptiness she carried from the beginning.
Yet the repeated whisper slipping from her lips—toneless, emotionless—made the scene even more disturbing.
Like an echo from a soul that did not know how to express suffering, but produced it anyway as a mechanical response.
"Pain… pain… pain… pain…."
"Aldraya, what's happening?Are you feeling something? Tell me, don't hold it in."
"Throbbing… pain…."
"Please, Aldraya. Don't stay silent like this. I need to know what's hurting you."
The panic spreading in Theo's chest surged quickly, as though his body reacted before his mind could form the fear into complete shape.
He stepped forward without hesitation, crossing the distance that had just opened, and grasped Aldraya's shoulders with a heartbeat stumbling out of rhythm.
To be continued…