Anomaly

We didn't have much information that could actually help us with the investigation. In practice, we were moving forward completely blind, feeling our way through the dark as we searched for anything that resembled a useful lead. Even so, it wasn't like that was necessarily a problem.

After all... when has anything I've gotten myself involved in ever been easy? As I walked, I couldn't help but think back on all the times I'd somehow ended up caught in anomalous incidents. Rampaging anomalies, anomalous zones, phenomena that defied all explanation... it seemed that no matter where I went, I always stumbled into something capable of completely shattering common sense.

The ironic part was that the more I thought about those events, the more I realized just how much my life had changed. Before I became an anomaly myself, my life had been seemingly ordinary, almost boring. Now... every new day felt like another desperate attempt to survive yet another disaster.

And that wasn't even taking into account the fact that the world itself had gone insane, with anomalies popping up everywhere, turning the impossible into something that was almost routine. More than anything, though, there was one thought that refused to leave the back of my mind.

Knowing that I'm technically the son of Creation itself... was still something I couldn't fully process. That seemingly simple fact carried an overwhelming weight, stirring up emotions that were hard to put into words. It wasn't exactly pride, fear, or awe, but some strange mixture of all three.

Anyway, setting my inner monologue aside, Charlotte, Rupert, Victor, Arthur, and I didn't have to walk very far before it became obvious that something was deeply wrong with this neighborhood.

Not that the rest of the city was in much better shape, far from it, but there was something fundamentally different about this place. The absolute silence was only the beginning. Even putting aside the complete absence of people, there was something about the atmosphere itself that made the air feel unnaturally oppressive.

The streets were perfectly still, without the slightest hint of wind, and even the most ordinary sounds of a city, the song of a bird, the buzz of an insect, the creak of an old structure, were nowhere to be heard. It was an unnatural silence.

Rupert didn't seem to notice anything beyond the obvious. Naturally, he knew something was wrong, the neighborhood was completely deserted, but he didn't appear to sense the strange feeling that made my skin crawl. It was as though something invisible was watching us, a silent presence lurking just beyond the edge of my senses.

Charlotte looked visibly uneasy as well. Her eyes swept across the empty streets with growing anxiety, while her shoulders remained subtly tense. She was probably sensing the same thing I was, even if she couldn't quite put it into words.

Victor, meanwhile, seemed even more alert than usual. His gaze carefully examined every corner, every window, and every shadow with painstaking caution. I imagined the anomalous ability I'd passed on to him was working at full capacity right now, warning him that something was dangerously wrong, even if it couldn't tell him exactly what.

Arthur was a different story altogether. Thanks to the monocle he wore, his eyes lingered on specific spots around us for several seconds before shifting elsewhere.

Every now and then, his expression would grow slightly more serious, as though he were catching glimpses of fragments of something invisible to the rest of us. He was clearly seeing something... the problem was that even he didn't seem to understand exactly what it was.

From my perspective, the deeper we ventured toward the center of the residential district, the stronger the sensation crawling across my skin became. It was a constant irritation, like hundreds of tiny needles lightly brushing against my body without ever actually piercing it.

It wasn't painful, but it was persistent enough that ignoring it was impossible. Charlotte seemed to be going through something similar. Actually, judging by the look on her face, she had it even worse. Her expression remained tightly drawn, her brows furrowed and her jaw subtly clenched.

Every so often, she rubbed her nose with the sleeve of her jacket, scratching it with obvious irritation, as though a nauseating odor had saturated the air and was growing stronger with every block we crossed.

She let out a short sigh before finally breaking the silence: "Something around here smells absolutely awful..." she muttered, making a face of pure disgust. She rubbed her nose again, clearly bothered: "My nose has been driving me crazy ever since we started walking through these blocks... and the smell just keeps getting worse. And that's not all"

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Charlotte ran a hand over her arm, trying to ease the sensation: "I also feel like something's constantly prickling my skin. It's like... I don't know... like there's some kind of invisible dust clinging to me"

As she spoke, I couldn't help but agree with her inwardly. I couldn't smell whatever strange odor was bothering her so much, but the unpleasant sensation crawling across my skin was exactly the same.

Charlotte's words naturally caught Victor's, Rupert's, and Arthur's attention. The three of them exchanged confused glances for a brief moment, since none of them seemed to be experiencing any of the symptoms she'd described.

So... Charlotte really was smelling something? I decided to find out for myself. I slowly drew in a breath, focusing every bit of my attention on my sense of smell. Nothing.

There wasn't even the faintest trace of an unusual scent. What made it even stranger was that my sense of smell had long since surpassed what any ordinary human, or even any animal, could ever hope to achieve.

I could pick up scents from miles away, separate different smells even when they were all mixed together, and follow trails that, to anyone else, simply didn't exist. Even so... nothing. Not a single odor that came even remotely close to whatever Charlotte seemed to be smelling.

Still, all it took was watching her for a few seconds to realize she wasn't exaggerating. Every time she absentmindedly took another breath, her expression tightened a little more. Her nose wrinkled, her eyes narrowed, and her lips twisted into an unmistakable grimace of disgust, as though she were being forced to breathe in the most revolting smell imaginable.

It was such a natural, visceral reaction that anyone would have reached the same conclusion: whatever Charlotte was sensing had to be utterly unbearable.

Letting out a quiet sigh as I finally put that train of thought to rest, my gaze wandered aimlessly until it was naturally drawn to the top of a nearby utility pole. As if he'd been expecting me to look for him, my Alter Ego was already sitting up there, perched atop the narrow metal structure with an almost absurd sense of ease.

His legs swung back and forth in a carefree rhythm, a strangely adorable gesture for something that looked like a mass of shapeless black mist, with nothing but two glowing crimson eyes floating where a face should have been.

The instant our eyes met, his head slowly turned toward me, as if he'd sensed my gaze before he'd even noticed me. We stared at each other for several awkward seconds, an uncomfortable silence hanging between us. Then he simply... Snorted.

It was a short, dismissive snort, dripping with almost insulting contempt. His crimson eyes half-lidded, somehow conveying an expression I'd never imagined seeing on something made entirely of shadows.

Boredom. Actual boredom... Are you kidding me? While I was over here racking my brain, this asshole was... bored? My brow twitched involuntarily. Hold on... Would it be considered insanity to get annoyed... at myself?

Shaking the thought aside, I completely ignored my Alter Ego, who, for some reason, looked oddly sulky about something, and turned my attention back to Charlotte: "Do you think you can trace where that smell is coming from?" I asked: "Maybe that's the clue we've been looking for"

My voice seemed to pull her out of her own thoughts. Charlotte blinked once, as if she needed a moment to reorganize her thoughts. Despite the obvious reluctance written across her face, she gave a small nod: "I can try..." she murmured, making no effort to hide her lack of enthusiasm.

She took another deep breath through her nose. The moment she did, her expression immediately twisted with disgust. Her brows knitted together, her nose wrinkled, and her lips pressed into a thin line, as though the smell were so overpowering she could actually taste it.

"It's even worse when I focus on it..." she muttered before slowly letting the air back out. Without another word, her eyes swept across the street, carefully searching every detail that might reveal the source of the nauseating odor.

Her gaze drifted past the silent houses, the neglected yards, and the deserted street corners... Then it stopped. Charlotte froze completely. Her eyes were locked onto an intersection several yards ahead, where the residential neighborhood split into four different streets.

She narrowed her eyes for a few moments, as though trying to confirm what she was sensing. Then she slowly raised her hand and pointed toward the intersection: "It's coming from there" she said quietly, yet with absolute certainty: "The smell is spreading through all four streets... but the source... the source seems to be right at that intersection"

Charlotte suddenly paused. She blinked several times, as though she were adjusting to an entirely new level of perception, and a single tear silently rolled down her cheek. Bringing one hand up to cover her nose, she grimaced in pure revulsion: "Oh my God..." she murmured, her voice filled with disbelief: "Now that I'm actually aware of where we are... this place smells even worse. Seriously... that's disgusting"

She slowly exhaled, shaking her head as if trying to ignore the smell, but the look of disgust never left her face. Well... anyway. After Charlotte's brief monologue, we started heading toward the place she'd pointed out. That said... Maybe it was just my imagination.

Ever since we started walking again, I couldn't shake the strange feeling that we were being watched. At first, I dismissed it as simple paranoia. But as we continued down the streets, that explanation became harder and harder to believe. In more than one house, I caught tiny gaps between the curtains.

Behind them... Eyes. Motionless, silent eyes, staring directly at us. The moment I turned to look at them head-on, the curtains snapped shut almost immediately, as if whoever was inside didn't want us to know they'd been watching.

And there was something else. I just couldn't shake that uneasy feeling. It was like a persistent premonition, a quiet voice whispering in the back of my mind that everything was about to spiral completely out of control... As usual.

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