A Mysterious Shadow

Who is that?

I can feel a mysterious force drawing me to her as I slowly advance toward the shadow.

No details are visible except for the outline of her feminine physique. I can't even tell whether she is facing me or not.

The shadow is not making a sound. All that I can hear is the serene mountain breeze mixed with the girls' laughs and splashing water.

"Come here!" I hear Astra shouts with a cackle.

"Ah! Stop it!" Faye yelps.

But my mind has zoned out of all that noise and is focusing solely on that figure.

"Who are you?" I ask, but for some reason, I can't raise my voice beyond just a whisper.

The shadow doesn't seem to have noticed me. She continues standing without movement.

What is she looking at?

Suddenly, two strange shapes spring out from her back and expand rapidly, bringing a flapping sound with them.

They are… wings.

She has wings.

A Blessed Beast? They can have animal features, right?

There is an unspeakable aura around her, one that forces me into a state of tranquility.

Step by step, I approach this shadow, and she doesn't react at all.

I am a few feet away from her now. If I were to leap forward and reach out my hand, I can probably grab one of her wings, but something tells me that I shouldn't.

"Who are you?" I ask again.

The shadow turns her head nonchalantly. Even though I can't see her face, I can feel her gaze land on me.

WHOOSH.

A second later, the mist is disturbed by a breeze, and the shadow vanishes into thin air.

What?

Am I hallucinating?

I tread to where the shadow stood a second ago, and there are no traces of any person being here.

This is dumbfounding.

Who could she have been?

As a barrage of questions races through my head, I feel the rocks slipping away from under my feet.

All of a sudden, the ground collapses and slides down a slope. I lose my balance and fall down the drop.

Fuck, I have no idea where I was standing. I could be falling down the side of a cliff. This is going to hurt.

SPLASH!

Not two seconds into free-fall, I hit a surface, one of water.

I hear the sound of girlish shrieking as I sink under. I quickly reorient myself stand up in the waist-deep water. The helmet made sure I didn't breathe in any, but it also got completely fogged up. I can't see anything.

I press the button on my chest, and the visor goes away.

In front of me are Astra, Faye, and Lohikaarmi, completely bare and staring at me with surprised faces, except for Lohikaarmi, who is as deadpan as always.

Faye's cheeks light up in red, and she covers her front, even though, to be honest, there really isn't much to hide, at least not compared to Lohikaarmi beside her.

"Ooh, Kris, I thought you weren't that kind of guy," Astra teases after she gets a bearing on what is happening. The water goes up to her neck, so nothing is exposed, but I still don't like it.

My mind is moving too fast to care about shame.

"Come here for a second, Astra," I say and grab Astra's arm to drag her away.

"Whoa," Astra says as she is being dragged, "I guess Kris has really lost control of himself after seeing-"

"There was a person," I cut her off and whisper close to her face so the other two can't hear.

"What?" She asks, realizing that I am serious.

"There was a person standing right up there." I point to the edge of the pit.

Astra looks over. "Are you sure you weren't just seeing Lohikaarmi?"

"Yes, I would have noticed her horns, but that person, she had wings, Astra, wings."

"Wings?"

"Yes."

"Oh, I see," Astra says.

"What is it? What do you see?'

"You've gone crazy." She taps me on the forehead.

"No.'

Astra laughs. "I'm joking. You saw an angel, that's all."

That's even more surprising than me being crazy.

"What? What do you mean I saw an angel? Why did you not tell me there are angels in this world?" I say.

"Well, you never asked. Plus, they don't really do much."

"What are they? Are they dangerous?"

"No, you silly, of course not. Angels are the reincarnation of past Popes. Their jobs are mostly to guide people with extraordinary blessings or divinity levels. I guess they just mistook me for one."

"They don't know that the Goddess is no longer in Heaven?" I ask.

"No, they can't just go up and down like there's a staircase," she says.

"So, what does this mean for us?"

"Nothing, really. Angels aren't allowed, or rather, don't have the ability to physically intervene with the material world. All they can do is create signs to aid those worthy. Just ignore it. You might even be able to make friends with her. Who knows?"

"That's it?"

"Yeah."

Why do I feel like there should be more than just ignoring the appearance of an angel?

"Is there anything wrong?" Faye asks from the other side of spring.

Astra runs through the water toward her.

"The only thing wrong is how big Lohikaarmi's bonkers are!" She yells as she leaps onto Lohikaarmi.

What will the angels think if they find out that this brat is their Goddess?

"A-Are you joining us, Kris?" Faye asks.

"No," I say and climb out of the spring. Water drips down from my clothes as I get on dry land.

I need to calm myself down. This whole angel business happened too fast. What am I supposed to make of this? I guess I will just listen to Astra's advice and ignore it for now, but knowing that someone is constantly watching me is not the most settling thing.

Out of sight, out of mind, I suppose.

There are multiple springs, and one of them happens to be on the other side of a rock from the one Astra and others are in. It's a perfect spot for me to take a little break.

I walk behind that rock and make sure that I am not in the girls' line of sight, then I begin to undress.

The Exosuit requires a little more effort to take off than the elven clothes, but soon, I am ready to dip in.

It's been days since I last had a shower. This is much needed.

I step down into spring water. The heat is a little painful at first, but my skin adapts to it pretty quickly. I submerge my body and sit down on the bottom so the water reaches right below my chin.

"Ahh…" I exhale out of pleasure.

This feels nice. A welcome way to relax from all this stress.

Natural springs still exist on Earth, but unless one wanted to be dissolved by acid, there's no way they can take a bath in one. This is another luxury that I couldn't have had back there.

The mist here is thin. I can see clearly up at the sky, and just when my eyes glance upon the blinking dots, a shooting star cuts across the night toward where the Holy Capital is.

Is this one of the signs Astra was talking about?

Before I knew it, my tired eyes close shut, and I dozed off.