2

My eyes went wide.No Way.This couldn’t be real. I must’ve been too exhausted and accidentally dozed off in the café, right?

“This is just a dream,” I muttered under my breath and without thinking, I smacked my own cheek.

Slap! … Slap!

Alan flinched, rushing toward me.

“Hey, hey stop! You’ll hurt yourself!”

But the sting on my skin was real. This wasn’t a dream. My heart sank, terror clawing up my throat. Margaret and Robert were already bent over the strange machine, fussing with its scorched gears. The air around them was tense, heavy with the realization that this invention passed down for generations and finally tested today had worked… but at a cost.

I couldn’t go back. Not yet.

“Are you… alright?” Alan asked worry lining his voice. His chubby cat waddled beside him, its belly swaying like it had eaten one meal too many.

I snapped, panic breaking through.

“No, I’m not alright! I want to go home now! If you don’t send me back, I’ll call the police!”

A low chuckle escaped Robert, his eyes never leaving the machine. It was a mocking laugh, like he found my words ridiculous.

“What’s so funny?!” I shot back, glaring.

He only shook his head, lips curved in amusement.

Margaret, ignoring him, brought me a glass of water. She offered it with gentle eyes.

“Please, drink. You must be thirsty. Forgive us for this mess… the machine is broken, and it will take some time before we can fix it.”

I hesitated, refusing to take the glass. What if it was poisoned? My paranoia whispered loud in my ear.

Margaret didn’t push further. She simply placed the glass on a nearby crate close enough for me to reach, if I changed my mind.

Alan, who’d been silently observing me all this time, gave me a small, reassuring smile.

“I’m Alan,” he said, pointing toward the others. “That’s Margaret and the one over there is Robert. And you are…?”

“Sora.”

Robert raised his brows. “Soda?”

Great. Apparently his ears were clogged with wax.

“It’s Sora. Sora Hugh,” I corrected firmly.

Margaret gave me a kind smile and nodded, while Alan followed with his usual awkward grin.

“Pleasure to meet you,” Robert said politely while his eyes focused on the machine.

“Yeah, not for me,” I shot back.

Alan only grinned and took me outside of the room so that I could finally see with my own eyes that I truly was in the year 1890. Everything looked vintage and not as modern as in the future.

Inside the room, Margaret whispered to Robert, who was still examining the damage on the machine.

“We have to send her back quickly, and no one must know that we succeeded…”

Margaret looked a bit guilty, and Robert only nodded while wiping the sweat from his forehead. His hair was already sticking flat from the sweat.

“This will take a little longer to fix,” Robert said, and outside, Alan was guiding me around as I confidently told him all sorts of things about the future. Alan’s face shifted between wide open amazement and disbelief as he tried to take in everything I said.

“Do people fly in the future?” Alan asked, eyes wide with curiosity.

I couldn’t help but laugh, shaking my head. “No, not people. We’ve got airplanes but no human wings or anything like that.”

His ears turned a little pink, and he gave an awkward nod. “Oh… I thought maybe humans could fly one day. What about… magic?”

I raised an eyebrow at him, puzzled. “Magic? No. There’s no magic in the future.Only in the movies.”

Alan nodded slowly. “So… magic only exists in our worl—”

He stopped mid-sentence when Margaret appeared in the doorway, calling for him to help Robert. I froze for a second, wondering what he had almost said.

Then Margaret turned to me, her voice softer. “Come with me. You’ll need proper clothes. Choose whatever feels right, and tomorrow I’ll take you around the city at least until the machine is repaired.”

She smiled, and for the first time since I landed in this strange place.Then i picked out a few outfits I’d be wearing for the next couple of days. The clothes looked vintage, soft to the touch so different from anything I was used to. I slipped into a simple dress, nothing too flashy, just enough to blend in. Margaret had made it clear: my presence here had to stay a secret.

When I caught my reflection in the mirror, I couldn’t help but pause. Honestly? The dress looked beautiful on me and fine ,I kind of loved it.

Soon after, Margaret took me outside. The world beyond those walls really did feel like stepping into a living painting. People still traveled by horse-drawn carriages, the air was thick with something unnameable, and though I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, I felt it the strangeness in the air.

We walked down a narrow street, lined with shops selling everything from tiny trinkets to massive pieces of furniture. Every single thing looked antique, like it had a story waiting to be told.

“Do you want to buy something?”

Margaret tilted her head up at me with a smile.

I shook my head quickly, though honestly? I was lying. Everything around me looked so tempting.

“No, I’m fine. But… what is this place?” I asked, my eyes darting from one storefront to another.

“This,” Margaret replied, “is Neld Street. It leads toward the main town. There are plenty of other roads, of course but Neld is special. People know it for selling rare furniture anything from the tiniest trinket to the grandest piece.”

I nodded slowly, still taking it all in. This place was extraordinary. And the wildest part? It was all real.

-

The discovery of a man’s corpse had become the hottest talk in the far edge of Sidian village.

A body or rather, just a head without its body. Crimes had been rising lately, each more disturbing than the last, and no one knew who was behind them.

But some whispered that this wasn’t the work of an ordinary killer.

“Mr. Duncan…”

“Franky.” He replied without turning around, his blue eyes fixed on the scene as if dissecting every detail of the murder.

“This is the seventh body this month,” Franky said, glancing at the six sketched portraits of the previous victims."And judging by the way this one was executed ,i'm sure it’s the same killer.”

“The murder was carried out with such precision,” Duncan murmured.“The killer leaves the head behind… and turns the rest of the body into nothing but ash.”

He crouched down, brushing his fingers lightly against the gray dust scattered on the ground, not far from where the victim’s head lay.

Franky stepped closer, a faint crease forming on his brow.“So... this means it's them?"

By them, he meant the ones whispered about in hushed voices the faction known as the Riots, a group of magic-wielders infamous for leaving chaos in their wake.

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