(No explanations are available regarding this piece, since it isn’t attached to any one storyline of mine; the bird mentioned in the end may or may not be tied in with Giose and Zero eras, but the character, as far as I know, has no name.)

It wasn’t a place that anyone was supposed to go. The fences were enough of an indication to most people, surrounding everything and screaming obscure warnings in their silent black print. Obscure because no one could read them; silent, since they held no complete words. Instead there were the shapes that almost seemed like writing, buried under years of dust; and something the color of clay, the consistency of rough bark. He had a feeling it was the disease that had killed the guardians–that this place had come under the touch of plague.

He did not fear the plague.

There were places where the wall was broken by something like a net, only standing upright and cold to the touch. It was discolored, blistered, and he suspected that it had once had a shine to rival the sun–if it had ever been young. There was something thicker, hanging to one side, and touched with the markings that plastered the stone. Above them, superseding, was something like a pronged eye. It surprised him–he made a mark against the Twelve-Fold Curse before he could come to his senses, and try to open the door.

There was no grass beyond the wall, but only what to his feet felt like cold, rough stone. It ran in a grey expanse in every direction but back, broken by weeds and splits in the earth. What might once have been lines painted on the rock stood out every so often–but they were unclear, so much so that he almost wondered if they weren’t natural.

But the ground didn’t hold his attention. It was the tower at which he stared.

There, just past the splintered grey, a magnificent structure reared upright. He craned his neck, trying to see where it ended, but the highest point was lost against the sun. It seemed to be a group of three identical towers, set together around a small center point. Something gleamed there, but he wasn’t sure what.

There was something else now. A tongue of material, jutting from the outside edge of each of the towers. He took a step closer, and saw–

But something was wrong. The structures had gone dark. And the sun was hiding. He looked left, right, upward–

And he only just saw the bird with the girl’s face before the world went black.

–crimson.echo//lastfactor&c.