With a wave of the Creator's hand...
Words flowed through the invisible sky.
The world turned within untouchable time.
Newly built structures scattered into dust that did not exist, while "ruins" that should have collapsed long ago rose from the empty ground. Cracks in the ruins were mending, and fallen fragments were crawling back into the fissures.
The ruins were no longer ruins, and the collapse had never existed.
The monument in the square grew increasingly transparent. White specks drifted through the air like the static flickering on a broken television screen. The image that should have been incomparably clear was becoming blurrier and blurrier, and some things that had already happened were being forgotten by the world.
Before the monument, an old man holding flowers froze. He seemed to have suddenly forgotten why he had come, and in his daze, the flowers in his hands nearly fell.
By the time he came back to himself, a bespectacled youth had appeared beside him.
"Sir, there's no need to leave flowers. Go home." The youth's voice reached the old man's ears. He had always been hard of hearing, yet he heard the youth clearly. That somewhat ethereal voice seemed to speak directly into his mind.
"No, I still have to leave them. I have to..."
The old man's mind was hazy, but he still remembered that he had come to lay flowers. Only after placing them on the monument could he leave.
"Who are you laying flowers for?" the youth asked beside him.
"So many people! So many! My Old Friends, my beloved, my neighbors, those young men who saved me, the soldiers who brought me food, and... and those brave people who went to the Abyss..."
The old man began counting on his fingers, but as he counted, he suddenly