Ai, still perched on the edge of the bed, blinked at me with an almost innocent expression, as if she hadn’t just been biting me moments ago. Her long, snowy hair cascaded down her shoulders, catching the soft morning light filtering through the window. The way she looked at me, calm, composed, yet slightly hesitant made it clear that she wasn’t here for a casual visit.

  “Well…” she started, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear, “Miss Catherine came by to the shrine yesterday afternoon to take her stuff.”

  I stared at her, waiting for more. She paused for a moment, as if expecting me to react.

  “…Okay?” I prompted, still not understanding why that meant she was suddenly here in my room.

  Ai’s fox ears twitched slightly, and she shifted her weight. “So, I teleported here to tell you that!” she declared, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

  Silence stretched between us.

  I glanced around the dimly lit room, my half-eaten piece of dry bread still sitting on the nightstand, the faint sounds of people chatting downstairs drifting through the wooden walls. Outside, the morning sunlight peeked through the window, dust particles dancing in its gentle glow.

  "...Wait a minute," I said, narrowing my eyes. "That still doesn't explain why you were biting me!"

  Ai flinched, her ears flattening against her head. She quickly averted her gaze, her cheeks turning the faintest shade of pink. "T-that’s…!" she started before letting out a small grumble. "You weren’t waking up! I was worried, okay?! I thought maybe if I… you know… bit you, you’d snap out of it!"

  I opened my mouth, then closed it again. A beat of silence passed between us before I sighed. "...Ai. That is not how you wake someone up."

  Ai puffed up her cheeks. "Well, it worked, didn’t it?"

  I groaned, flopping back down onto the bed, staring at the wooden ceiling. I was too tired to argue. "...I don’t even know what to say to that."

  A soft giggle escaped her lips, and despite everything, I found myself smiling just a little.

  “So, where is Catherine now?” I asked, trying to make sense of Ai’s sudden visit. If she had traveled all this way, using teleportation, no less, then maybe something important had happened.

  Ai’s icy-blue eyes blinked once before she responded, her voice calm and matter-of-fact. “She made another tent in front of the shrine and rested there.” She paused for a brief moment, her fox ears flicking slightly as if recalling the memory. “She seems really unwilling to enter the shrine.”

  I frowned, my fingers idly tracing the fabric of the blanket beneath me. “I see…” I murmured, lost in thought.

  Wait. My thoughts screeched to a halt as something suddenly clicked in my mind. My eyes widened in realization, and I quickly reached into my inventory, summoning a small bag of coins. The weight of it was solid in my palm, and the familiar clinking sound reminded me of exactly why I had this in the first place.

  “I forgot to give this to Catherine!” I exclaimed, holding up the pouch like I had just unearthed some long-lost treasure. The coins inside were from the magic crystals I had sold to the merchant back in the village. It was supposed to be an errand, something I was meant to hand over to Catherine. And yet, in all the chaos of traveling, fighting, and nearly getting myself killed multiple times, I had completely forgotten about it.

  Ai, however, simply shook her head, her expression unwavering. “Miss Catherine said it’s yours.”

  I froze, my fingers tightening around the bag. “…What?”

  “She left it for you,” Ai continued, her gaze steady. “She never intended to take it back.”

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  My grip on the pouch loosened as her words sank in. “Oh,” I muttered, suddenly feeling a little foolish. “No wonder she never pressed me about it.”

  I stared down at the bag, feeling a strange mix of emotions. I exhaled slowly, tucking the pouch back into my inventory. “Well… I guess that’s that, then.” But even as I said it, a lingering thought remained in the back of my mind.

  “Where is Miss Yuzu?” Ai asked, her sharp blue eyes scanning the room with a curious tilt of her head. Her fox ears twitched slightly, as if expecting to hear the familiar voice of the black-haired fox girl at any moment.

  “Uh…” I muttered, following Ai’s gaze as I also glanced around the small inn room. The bed, the window, the wooden floor, nothing out of place. No sign of Yuzu. I scratched the back of my head, my brows furrowing. “No idea.”

  Stepping off the bed, I walked toward the small wooden desk sitting in the corner of the room. As I got closer, something caught my attention. A piece of paper resting on top, its surface covered in small scribbles and anime-style drawings.

  Curious, I picked it up.

  It was a sketch. A rather detailed one, actually. It depicted Yuzu herself, drawn with her signature black cloak draped over her shoulders, standing at what looked like a door. And then… There was me, drawn sitting on the bed, a small sun doodled above my head, with an arrow pointing downward.

  I blinked.

  Was this… supposed to be a message?

  I turned the paper sideways, then upside down, trying to decipher it like some sort of ancient relic. After a few moments of staring, I tilted my head. “So, she went out… and she wants me to… stay in the room?” I mumbled, trying to make sense of the arrows.

  Ai peered over my shoulder, squinting at the drawing with an unimpressed look. “Miss Yuzu’s art is surprisingly good,” she muttered, tapping a clawed finger against the desk. “It actually resembles her quite a bit. But the meaning is… questionable.”

  I nodded in agreement, but despite the crude way the message was conveyed, I couldn’t help but admire Yuzu’s sketching skills. It looked eerily similar to the way she was designed in Luminous Dream. The same confident stance, the same mischievous smile in her doodle. She really had talent.

  In Luminous Dream, Yuzu was well-known in the in-game world as a mangaka, someone who created manga and illustrated stories. More specifically, she was a doujinshi artist, meaning she made fan comics, often inspired by existing works or personal experiences.

  She never outright admitted she was the creator, always maintaining an air of nonchalance whenever someone brought up her art. Even in Luminous Dream, it was up to the player to piece together clues and figure out that Yuzu was the artist behind some of the most beloved underground comics in that world.

  For a moment, I imagined Yuzu hunched over a desk in a dimly lit room, completely absorbed in her work, ink staining her fingertips, stacks of unfinished drafts surrounding her. Even in a fantasy world, the image felt surprisingly fitting.

  Shifting my attention, I noticed a small wooden box next to the paper. Without hesitation, I lifted the lid to reveal a bowl of soup inside. I pressed my fingers against the side of the container. It was lukewarm, not completely cold, which meant she must have left it here not too long ago.

  “She must’ve put this here before I woke up…” I murmured, my voice trailing off as I spotted something else beside the box.

  A small note.

  Unlike the neatly drawn picture, the note was an absolute mess of scribbles. The handwriting was uneven, the letters were crammed together with barely any space between them, and some words were written at a slight slant, as if Yuzu had been in a hurry—or perhaps just didn’t care enough to make it neat.

  I squinted at the text, tilting my head to the side as if a different angle would magically make the message more understandable. But no matter how much I stared, the letters remained an indecipherable mess of symbols and strokes that held no meaning to me. The truth was, I still couldn’t read the written language of this world, so even if it had been written neatly, I wouldn’t have been able to make sense of it.

  I let out a defeated sigh and held the note up for Ai to see. “Yeah… I have absolutely no idea what this says.”

  Ai took one glance at it and immediately let out a defeated groan. “What in the world… her handwriting is terrible,” she muttered, narrowing her eyes as if that would somehow make the text more legible.

  I stifled a laugh. Even without knowing what it said, just watching Ai struggle with it was strangely amusing.

  “Can you at least try to read it?” I asked, still hopeful.

  Ai sighed, rubbing her temple before leaning in closer to the paper. “…I’ll try, but no promises.”

  Ai leaned in closer, her expression twisting in mild horror as she tried to decipher the messy scrawls on the paper. Her fluffy fox ears twitched in frustration, and she even tilted her head as if that would somehow make the writing clearer.

  “Ugh… her handwriting is bery terrible,” she muttered, mimicking Yuzu’s speech pattern without even realizing it.