Hope born of solitus

*

She gradually stepped closer to the couch, her movements slowing to a crawl. Did fear grip at her heart? Constrict her chest? Grasp at her neck...? Why did she stop...?

He looked to be a father figure, it was obvious he was no longer alive from how he hadn't reacted to the entrance being pried open, nor has he moved a single muscle for the entirety of the time Lastia was here. Not even a heartbeat. What kind of face was he making? Was it fulfillment? Indifference? Jubilation? Melancholy?

What was he thinking at that moment? Was he hoping he could have done something different? Something to save his loved ones...? Probably not, he died on his couch... Without being aware of his cause of death. There won't be a ghastly figure on the other side, it would just be a perfectly normal face. It hadn't even had time to rot yet.

It was all the more terrifying to her. What expression he had, just as he died? It would be painfully mundane, soul crushingly ignorant of the circumstances. She stepped away from the couch and headed in another direction. There was a collapsed figure, her legs stuck out of the kitchen entrance, her body obscured behind the kitchen counter. Her footsteps felt heavy as she lifted them past the body laying on the floor. Finally she peeked into a bedroom.

This time she couldn't avoid seeing its face. A young girl, about 11, sleeping peacefully under her blanket. She wasn't aware that that would be the last time she slept. Her heart ached, unable to save any of these individuals. She walked to the desk and saw a peculiar book, it was open.

'Day 200, the streets were getting emptier. I asked Mum if she knew why less people were going out. She didn't know either, but she seemed fearful of something. As if a ghost was always peeking at her.

Day 205, there were no longer any pedestrians outside. I could see outside my window... But mum says to close the window and keep silent, even though we're at home.

It was strange. I haven't gone to school in a week at the behest of mum, but... We haven't been contacted by the school once. It's as if there was no longer anyone there to contact us, no longer anyone to manage thus residential zone... Everything outside felt barren, and eerily silent. I hope it's only because everyone else is also trying to keep silent... To be safe from whatever mum is scared of.

Day 212, after a couple weeks, one of our food deliveries finally reached us. It took multiple refunds and many days, but with this our groceries should last longer... I'm afraid... We can't go outside, and the delivery men... They're clearly going missing but dad and mum and ordering without regard for their safety...

Was this right? They... They have families to return to too, don't they? '

The entries stop there, considering the condition of its owner nearby, it didn't seem like the diary could continue any further. It begun with people going missing, first the authorities and those at the school, then the common people... In this city, the normal people died while in the midst of their daily lives. What about the magical girls protecting the land? Surely there should have been signs of resistance, they wouldn't perish just as fast as the others, would they?

In the end it came down to the fact that she had {Feed} to protect herself, as if it was a gift from the heavens. She just happened to have magic that opposed the abilities of most Traces. They wouldn't do much against Remnants and enemy magical girls, but this black smoke was still mostly composed of magical energy even if the Trace here had evolved into a Remnant. The easiest type of energy to absorb was magical energy...

She didn't spread [Ingest] all over the city, if she did it would only alert the Remnant to her threat. Even the destruction she caused to numerous buildings and the release of sentient black smog could be said to be the Remnant's defence mechanism. One could like it to the involuntary groans of pain that arise from kicking a sleeping person. It was also why the moment she entered the building, it also stopped chasing her...

Now that she was completely submerged in this building's smog, it treated her as if she was already dealt with. If its nervous system believed she was dead, then it wouldn't do anything more, not even involuntary reactions. When something is asleep, the state of sleeping itself can't also be asleep, there isn't a secondary layer of sleep. This was as far as its responses go, staying in here would keep her concealed until it woke up.

She was impervious to this rudimentary black smog, to other magical girls it might feel like wading through viscous cement, perhaps that's why they were defeated. The smog could strip the mobility of others as well as suffocate or invade their bodies. For now she needed to investigate, find a core or a real body and eliminate it.

"...." (Lastia)

Staring into the television and its viewer for one last time, she wordlessly poked her head outside before shoving the door into its place. No words could begin to describe her thoughts, so she decided to bury them together with the victims. With that, it was clear that all of this started right before she arrived. The Trace grew and slaughtered without a pip of noise, then when faced with the resistance of this land, it squashed them.

Not a single scream nor choke, the air was occupied by the black smog and their tearful cries couldn't travel past it. The zone felt alive, packed with presences. These presences turned out to be that of corpses, a camouflaged signal that tricked the senses. Heavy. The weight of her enemy's sin is as heavy as an entire city, and it could do worse if she didn't stop it. The schools were the first to close and alert the residents, they might have some hints even if the facilities do not physically hold the culprit.

She avoided the main road and jumped from window to window, beginning with the building next to this one. The buildings were so close that a normal person could do this, one wondered why windows would be built at such locations when there would be nothing to see other than the walls of another. It could be a measure in case of the outbreak of a fire. The buildings were fully concrete, so even fires would find it hard to spread past a single suite. Maybe, they were just meticulous.

She landed on the frame of the next building, her heels clattered as they smashed against the metallic surface. She hopped down onto the ground, similarly, it was completely covered in black smog.