Ding—Ding—Ding—Ding—Ding—Ding—Ding—Ding—Ding—Ding—!
Somewhere in the distance a clock is chiming…
Your mind is fuzzy… the air around you thick with fog that is slowly clearing…
You squint, thoughts finally starting to fill your head once more as the heavy darkness clouding your mind lifts with the fog…
As the fog thins, a stony path becomes apparent…
The farther along you follow it, the more structured the path becomes.
The grass and moss between the rocks becoming sparse, the tiles becoming more uniform and closely laid.
The sound of your feet falling on stone as you hurried along, feeling drawn to the mansion that started to appear through the fog, looming ominously in the middle of the sea of confusion.
But your trek was cut short, the fog clearing completely as you come across a large metal gate, wrapping around the mansion and preventing you front continuing…
You grab the black bars of the gate and rattle them in frustration.
There was only this, or the sea of fog again.
Footsteps echoed once more, this time from behind you…
“Oh…? I don’t believe we had plans for guests…”
You turned, eyes falling on a girl…
Pretty gold eyes under long dark lashes… Brown hair, chopped blunt above the shoulders… Pale, soft skin, complemented by rosy cheeks and glossy lips… The light smell of roses and earl gray tea seems to accompany her as she stops in front of you, blinking those gold eyes and studying you curiously.
“Hmm… まあ, いいか~! Would you like to come in?~”
Her eyes glint, almost glowing in the dim light of the street lamps around the gate.
It gives you a knotting, uneasy feeling in your stomach, and an almost familiar burning feeling in your chest…
You feel a sharp pain suddenly, stabbing straight through you.
You jolt, the feeling striking you with enough pain to physically cause you stumble back… Your back hitting the gate.
She doesn’t even flinch, still smiling and leaning in slightly, waiting for an answer… Eyes seeming to look straight through you…
It made you feel cold. Like you didn’t even exist. Like you…
“Well..?~ Do you want to go in…?~”
Her voice snapped you from the trap of her gaze, and you nodded in response without fully processing the question.
Her grin seemed to grow slightly, a wicked pleasure in her gaze.
She raised a hand and made a forward flicking motion towards you, her finger pointing straight at your chest, like pinning your very soul…
The gate swung open, causing you to fall back on the path, your hands scraping against the stone.
“Maybe I’ll see you inside.” she grinned down at you, eyes glinting devilishly, “Be careful, my brother doesn’t appreciate unwelcome guests~!”
She giggled, skipping and spinning past you and disappearing around the curve of one of the paths.
You stayed put a moment, unsure of what to think about what just happened…
Eventually, you slowly pulled yourself from the ground and turned to face the grand building properly…
“Welcome to the Phantom Manor.~”
The gate creaked open with an eerie squeak of the hinges, and you took a step through...
Immediately past the gate, your head seemed to cle
