Renji turned sharply, but the street was empty.

No one was there. No footprints. No movement. Just the thick fog swallowing the world around him.

His skin prickled. Someone was watching. And then.... a voice.

"You shouldn't have woken up here." Lily. She murdered.

Renji listened, clenching his fists. "What does that mean?"

"It means...." She stepped closer, her voice softer than air. "You don't belong here. And those who notice you? The town takes them."

The words sent a chill down his spine. "Takes them where?"

Renji turned, scanning the fog chocked streets. The people continued their endless mechanical loops—brushing dirt that wasn't there, flipping blank pages; then he remembered.

The man who told him to run didn't vanish. Who was that man? Or was it that he was just imagining things? Was it a false memory? He had a lot of questions.

Then, Renji saw something worse.

The little girl with unkempt hair and a dress torn at the hem, was still watching him.

She hadn't moved, hadn't reacted, yet... She was closer now.

Renji stiffened. Had he imagined it? Or had the distance between them actually shortened?

"She doesn't follow the town's rules." Lily murmured. "That's why she's dangerous."

Renji exhaled. "Who is she?"

Lily reached forward, and before Renji could react, she placed two fingers lightly against his forehead.

A sharp pain tore Renji's skull.Images...fragments of something half-remembered... flashed in his mind.

A voice whispering.. Don't forget, don't forget, don't forget.

Renji gasped. Stumbling backwards. His vision blurred as reality twisted... The town flickered shifting between existence and emptiness. The town before him faded and then reappeared like unfinished sketches.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

The air itself felt thin.

Lily's voice cut through the distortion. "Now you understand."

Renji's hands trembled. "This town... it's not real."

"Not in the way you think." Lily’s expression darkened. "It exists outside of time, outside of reason. It’s a place that shouldn’t be, yet it is."

Renji’s breath was uneven. "Then why am I here?"

Lily’s eyes flickered. "Because you are also something that shouldn’t be."

Renji’s blood ran cold.

"Don’t be absurd," he snapped. "I’m human."

Lily simply smiled.

Behind her, the shadows began to stir.

A new sound shattered the silence.

A slow, unnatural scraping.

Renji turned sharply.

At the edge of the fog, a Watcher had appeared.

It wasn’t a person. It wasn’t even truly a shadow. It was a hole in the shape of a human—an absence of light, of reality itself. The darkness inside it seemed to stretch into something deeper, something infinite.

It stood there, unmoving. Watching.

Then, without warning, it twitched.

The scraping sound grew louder.

Renji’s breath hitched. He took a step back—then another...

The Watcher snapped its head toward him.

A whisper, impossibly close: I see you.

The fog surged forward. The streets twisted into a spiraling maze of endless turns and dead ends. The Watcher lunged.

Renji ran.

His heartbeat slammed against his ribs as his feet pounded the pavement. Behind him, the Watcher moved without moving—it didn’t walk, didn’t step, yet it was always closer.

The town distorted as he sprinted—buildings melting into new shapes, streets folding into themselves.

Then—

Another figure stepped into his path.

The girl.

She stood directly in front of him, her face hidden by tangled hair.

Renji skidded to a stop. "Move!"

She didn’t.

His body seized. Something in the air changed—his skin crawled with an unfamiliar sensation, like he was being unraveled from the inside out.

Then, for the first time, she spoke.

"You don’t belong here."

Her voice was his own.

Renji staggered back. "What—"

A sharp, cold grip latched onto his wrist.

He twisted—Lily had grabbed him.

"No time," she hissed. And then she pulled him through a door that hadn’t been there before.

The door slammed shut.

Renji stumbled forward, panting.

The room was… wrong.

It wasn’t part of the town. It felt old, familiar— yet not his own. Bookshelves lined the walls, their spines marked with names he couldn’t read. A single chair sat in the center, facing a mirror.

Lily exhaled. "That was close."

Renji turned to her, his mind reeling. "That thing—what the hell was that?"

Lily adjusted her gloves. "A Watcher."

Renji swallowed hard. "And that girl?"

Lily hesitated. "She’s something worse."

A sharp tapping sound echoed through the room.

Renji turned toward the mirror.

His reflection was missing.

Instead, something else stood in the glass—a dark, shifting shape, staring back at him.

Then, it smiled.

And whispered: "You don’t belong here"

End of chapter 2