"♪~♪♪~♪~♪♪~♪~~♪♪... Gloria in excelsis Deo... ♪"
In the empty, silent town, a clear, childish melody steeped in an eerie atmosphere drifted from the thin mist shrouding the streets.
In an instant, a petite figure surrounded at her feet by dozens of black cats skipped toward the square, raising a hand puppet and gently waving it in time with the beat.
At once, the mist billowing behind the little blonde girl twisted and writhed. An invisible force stretched open a narrow rift in space, its dark interior flickering with bizarre, dazzling colors like dreamlike soap bubbles squeezed together.
Then, a white-haired man with hollow, vacant eyes was spat out from the rift.
Under the faint sunlight, dozens of invisible, translucent tendrils could vaguely be seen wrapped around the man, tossing him out from that black, kaleidoscopic interior.
"Abby found him first!"
Abigail pointed at the "mouse" on the ground and excitedly announced the result of the contest to the two adults waiting in the square.
"Mouse, hehe, mouse... black ones, golden ones, big ones, small ones... You're a mouse, I'm a mouse too..."
As the sounds reached his ears, madness and confusion gathered in the unfocused eyes of the white-haired man sprawled on the ground. He giggled and muttered incoherently, crystal-clear drool sliding uncontrollably from the corner of his mouth as his body suffered muscle spasms and incontinence.
Arcueid looked at the figure whose bones twisted unnaturally and whose muscles wriggled and trembled unconsciously across the ground like maggots, hesitating slightly.
"Ode Bolzak?"
"Mm, it's him..."
Samael carefully examined him, comparing him again with the portrait outlines on file, then nodded. A trace of mockery appeared in his eyes.
"But it looks like he's already gone insane."
The ancient serpent looked around and muttered with a frown.
"Right, where are those