[Tick.]
A metallic tick echoed through the intersection. At that exact moment, a pedestrian crossing the street froze mid-step. One foot remained suspended above the asphalt.
Zekai's eyes narrowed.
...What is this?
It wasn't just the pedestrian.
The roar of car engines vanished. So did the footsteps, the chatter, the distant horns—every ordinary sound of the city disappeared at once, leaving behind a silence so heavy that Zekai could hear his own heartbeat.
Thump. Thump.
He slowly turned his head.
The drivers waiting at the red signal weren't completely still. One man blinked. Slowly. Too slowly.
A biker turning his head seemed to skip between positions, as though reality had forgotten to render the movement in between.
Zekai's eyes narrowed.
It wasn't that everything had stopped.
Something was wrong with the flow of reality itself.
Some things were frozen. Others moved in broken fragments. As though the world had skipped a step.
Am I the only one noticing this...?
A cold sensation crawled up Zekai's spine. Every instinct he had screamed the same word.
Run.
He immediately bent down and snatched his phone from the asphalt.
The screen was still lit.
Grandpa Marcus — Call in progress.
"Grandpa?"
Bzzt—
Harsh static burst from the speaker. The signal bars dropped to zero.
The call disconnected. A message appeared across the screen.
[Network connection has been forcefully terminated.]
"Damn it."
Something was wrong.
Marcus never called this early. Never. Not once.
Zekai lowered the phone and looked toward the black stone cube lying near his feet.
So that's what had fallen from the coat.
His fingers tightened around it.
He remembered the impact—the sudden shift inside the coat, the faint click he'd barely noticed before the cube struck the asphalt.
Earlier, he'd only found the strange black-and-red tarot box in Marcus's coat.
He hadn't even known there was another pocket hidden inside it.
A pocket containing this.
"...Why was Grandpa carrying something like this?"
He crouched and picked it up.
"...!"
Freezing pain shot through his fingertips. Zekai almost dropped it.
The object felt impossibly cold against his skin—not the ordinary cold of ice, but a deeper chill that seemed to seep beneath his fingertips. It was also far heavier than something of its size should have been.
Why was Grandpa carrying this?
Before he could examine it further—
"Mr. Zekai!"
Zekai's head snapped toward the voice. Aron was running toward him.
Running. Zekai stared. Everyone else was frozen—or moving in those strange, broken fragments. But Aron was moving normally. His footsteps struck the asphalt. His chest rose and fell with every breath.
Zekai's gaze dropped to Aron's hands.
The black-and-red tarot box was still clutched tightly against his chest. For the briefest moment, one of the crimson patterns along its surface seemed to pulse.
Zekai blinked. It was gone. He looked back at Aron.
...Was that just his imagination?
Then—
His body jerked. For a fraction of a second, Aron seemed to skip forward several inches.
Zekai's eyes widened. It was the same strange distortion he'd seen in the world around him. But Aron hadn't stopped. He kept running.
Why can he move?
"You forgot this—!"
BZZZZT!
The traffic light above them flickered violently. The digital countdown scrambled into unreadable symbols before suddenly turning blood red.
Then the ground trembled.
Rumbleeee—
Zekai's eyes sharpened. Not an earthquake. This was pressure. Something immense was pressing upward from beneath the ground.
A pedestrian nearby suddenly dropped his shopping bags. The bags split open. Oranges rolled across the asphalt.
The man didn't react. He remained frozen in place, staring ahead like a lifeless doll.
Shadows stretched across the street. For a brief moment, they moved like living things. Then they snapped back into place.
Crack!
The sound of breaking glass echoed through the intersection. Space itself had fractured.
Aron grabbed Zekai's shoulder. His entire body was trembling.
"M-Mr. Zekai..."
Zekai turned. For the first time, there was genuine fear in Aron's voice.
A massive vortex of grey mist twisted open in the center of the intersection. Something was inside it.
Zekai couldn't see what. He didn't need to. The presence alone was enough to make every instinct inside him scream.
Yet when he looked beyond the vortex, the city remained completely normal. Cars moved. People walked. Somewhere in the distance, someone was laughing.
It was as if an invisible wall separated this intersection from the rest of the world.
Aron's face turned pale.
"What the hell is this...?!"
Zekai didn't answer. Because a second later—Voices exploded inside his head.
—Please!
—Run away!
—Save me!
—Please don't leave us!
"Aaaagh!"
Zekai clutched his head as pain tore through his skull. Beside him, Aron dropped to his knees, screaming while covering his ears.
The voices grew louder. Hundreds of screams merged into one deafening roar that seemed to shake Zekai's very soul.
Then—
One voice emerged from the chaos. Calm. Deep. Judgmental.
"You saw it... and did nothing."
Zekai's breath caught. That wasn't a human voice. It sounded like a verdict. The air around them suddenly became still.
Zekai forced himself to look toward the vortex.
"Look at the mist."
Aron raised his head.
"...What?"
"It isn't expanding."
Zekai's breathing slowed.
"It's waiting."
Aron's expression changed. He grabbed Zekai's jacket.
"We have to run! We're going to die here!"
Zekai's heart hammered against his ribs, but he bit down on his tongue. The sharp pain gave him enough clarity to think.
"Don't move." His voice trembled, but he forced the words out clearly.
"Stay right next to me."
"Mr. Zekai, we have to run! Right now!"
Aron desperately pulled at his shoulder.
"The mist! We can still get out!"
Zekai didn't move. Something inside him refused.
The mist wasn't chasing them.
It didn't need to. It was waiting. Like a hunter waiting for its prey to panic and run. No.
His grip tightened around the black cube.
If we run... we die.
The grey vortex suddenly pulsed.
BOOM!
The pressure slammed into them. Aron's body was driven against the asphalt.
Then—
Everything stopped. The screams vanished. The wind disappeared. The vibrations ceased. Even Zekai's heartbeat seemed to disappear for one terrifying instant.
Flash!
A blinding white light swallowed the intersection.
"Mr. Zekai—!"
Aron's scream disappeared beneath the roar of pure energy.
Zekai shut his eyes. His body became weightless. He couldn't feel the ground. Couldn't hear Aron. Couldn't even feel his own hands.
Something suddenly tugged at his arm. Zekai's fingers loosened.
The bouquet slipped from his grasp. White petals scattered into the endless light, spinning weightlessly around him.
One brushed past his face. Then another. Zekai reached for them. "Wait—"
His fingers closed around nothing. The petals vanished into the white. For what felt like an eternity, there was nothing.
✦ End of Chapter 2 — The World Skipped a Step ✦