Amid a sudden whirl of dizziness and a thunderous roar in his mind, Modir felt his soul abruptly torn from his body, drifting through some empty, void-like state. He did not know how long he drifted, only that he rapidly crossed an immense "distance" beyond mortal comprehension—then his battered soul was roughly stuffed back into its shell like a bundle of rags.
A moment later, the old mage slowly came to. The instant his senses returned, he reflexively assumed a guarded stance. One hand reached for his Battle Staff, the other for the enchanted short sword he carried for protection, followed by a barrage of instant Protective Spells... He clearly remembered the same sequence having happened not long ago.
But this time, he had not awakened in that black, white, and gray world—when he opened his eyes, he saw the familiar single-person adventurer quarters. Everything within sight possessed normal, vivid colors. Through the window came the lively sounds of Adventurer Camp, along with the dim, murky daylight unique to the polar night filtering through the gaps in the panes.
"This is really damned strange..." Modir muttered, though he did not relax in the slightest. He swiftly inspected every detail in the room, confirming that everything matched his memories. Then he went to the window and brushed his fingers across the faint dust on the sill.
He had touched the same spot on the windowsill in that faded black-and-white world, but the dust here bore no trace of having been disturbed.
The old mage leaned toward the window and opened the shutters a little. Beneath the nearby streetlamps and the extremely faint daylight, he saw people coming and going through Adventurer Camp. It seemed another group had completed a clearing or exploration mission near the camp. The jubilant adventurers were calling