"Where did she go?" Richard muttered again.
A bad feeling crept into his chest.
It was small at first, like a cold worm crawling beneath his feathers.
He frowned.
No.
Calm down, Richard. This was his beloved hen they were talking about. It was not like she had never gone to spend time in some far corner of the flower field where finding her was difficult before.
So naturally, this was not strange.
But still, Richard turned around once more.
Then twice.
Then a third time, just in case his vision had decided to betray him as well.
The pond, however, remained quiet.
His chest tightened.
"…"
Richard lifted his beak with forced dignity.
Yes.
That had to be it.
Perhaps she wanted him to search for her again. Perhaps this was some ancient chicken tradition unknown even to his vast knowledge. A mysterious hen ritual passed down through generations of unreasonable hens!
His eyes sharpened.
If so, then this Boss would complete it perfectly.
Richard stepped forward.
Then immediately winced.
The strain stabbed through his body. Dried blood cracked along his feathers as he moved. His muscles screamed as if every one of them had filed a complaint to him personally. His bones felt like they had been pecked by invisible woodpeckers for an entire night.
He ignored it and hurried around the pond.
First, he checked the center where she usually sat.
Nothing.
Then he checked the edge where she sometimes stood while pretending not to wait for worms.
Still nothing.
His feathers slowly bristled.
Richard leapt down from the pond's center and hurried down the hill. His steps were uneven, but each one grew faster than the last. Flowers bent beneath his claws. Grass scattered. Small insects fled from his path, wisely deciding that whatever drama their feathered overlord was experiencing had nothing to do with them and should remain that way.
At the base of the hill, several wounded creatures rested beneath leaves and woven grass.
The black-scaled lizard lay there like a collapsed mountain of scales. Its wounds had closed somewhat, but the aura around it remained weak, heavy, and exhausted. Nearby, smaller lizards curled together. Rabbits lay under broad leaves. Chickens rested with bloodied wings. Even a few snakes coiled quietly in the shade, hissing softly in sleep.
Richard approached in a hurry.
"You!"
A snake twitched.
One eye cracked open.
"HissHissHissHiss~?" it hissed.
Richard stepped closer. "Did you see her?"
The snake blinked slowly.
"???" seems to have manifested on top of its head.
"My beloved hen!"
The snake's eye opened a little wider.
Then it shook its head so fast that its body nearly tied itself into a knot.
Richard froze.
The cold worm in his chest curled tighter.
"You have not?"
The snake shook its head again, even faster this time, as if afraid that answering too slowly would somehow become a crime.
Richard turned to the nearby rabbits.
"You."
The closest rabbit jolted awake so hard its ears slapped its own face.
"Squeak?!"
"Did you see my beloved hen?"
The rabbit shook its head desperately.
Richard turned to the chickens.
They clucked nervously.
None had seen her.
With every answer, the cold in Richard's chest grew heavier.
No.
This was still fine.
Perhaps she had gone a little farther away this time.
That was all.
Yes.
A little farther away.
Richard turned from the resting area and hurried into the flower field.
The moon had risen by then, thin and pale above the horizon. Silver light washed across the petals, making the whole field look like a sea of sleeping stars. Normally, Richard would have appreciated such a scene. He might have puffed his chest and thought, As expected of my territory.
Tonight, he saw none of it.
He searched.
The flower field.
The small stream and even the corners where she sometimes spent her time.
Her old resting place.
The patches of flowers where her black feathers would have stood out easily beneath moonlight.
Everywhere.
Still nothing.
No familiar presence that made his chest feel strangely warm and strangely nervous at the same time.
Richard stood in the middle of the field, breathing heavily.
His body swayed once.
He forced it still and decided to check with the one thing he had been afraid to use.
Richard closed his eyes.
The world inside him opened.
Golden threads spread through his mind.
They appeared one by one, countless tiny lights connected by faint warmth, pulsing gently like heartbeats beneath a vast invisible crown.
The black-scaled lizard was there.
Its thread was weak, flickering like a campfire after rain, but it still burned.
Richard felt a bit of relief.
Good.
That lazy fool was still alive.
He would kick it later.
Gently, perhaps.
No, wait.
How dare it attack him like that?
Maybe not gently after all.
Richard pushed the thought aside and looked farther.
The smaller lizards were there too.
The rabbits were scattered throughout the network in tiny warm threads.
Richard's brow tightened as he sensed them one by one.
The chickens were there.
The snakes were there.
The creepy snake was there too, its thread colder and stranger than the rest, coiled quietly in a corner of the golden network like an unwelcome guest who had somehow received a formal invitation.
Then he sensed it.
The snapped thread.
One that belonged to the dead rabbit.
The link remained like a broken root inside his mind. A place where warmth had once been, now cut off 'forever'.
Richard's breath hitched.
He did not look away.
This was his fault.
It was also his responsibility to bear.
His claws sank into the soil.
Then he searched for the thread that should have been closest.
The one that had always sat near the center of his network.
Richard searched.
But…
He found nothing.
His eyes snapped open.
For a moment, he simply stood there beneath the moonlight.
Then he closed them again.
The golden network expanded.
Threads stretched outward faster than before.
The lights of his subjects brightened in his mind, then blurred as he pushed past them, searching deeper, wider, harder.
The lizards, rabbits, chickens, snakes.
And even the snapped thread of the dead rabbit.
All of them were still there.
But not her.
Richard opened his eyes.
The flower field spun slightly.
He shook his head.
"No."
His voice was quiet.
"That is impossible."
It was not the first time he had failed to find her.
Before awakening his Path, she had sometimes wandered away, forcing him to search every corner of the territory like an idiot. But still, on the days he searched hard enough, he would eventually find her in some corner of the flower field.
Back then, he had only his eyes, his nose, and his excellent instincts.
But now he had his Path.
No matter where she wandered within his Domain, he should have been able to sense something.
Even if she had wandered to the very edge of the territory, even if she hid behind trees, even if she somehow buried herself under a pile of worms in an attempt to test his wisdom, there should have been something.
But there was nothing.
The cold worm in his chest became a claw.
Richard slowly looked up.
His gaze moved toward the sky.
The memory returned.
That terrible crack across the sky and earth and the message of the collapsing world.
He remembered running toward the pond.
He remembered seeing her before passing out.
Or…did he?
Was that just an illusion his exhausted body had created so it could finally rest?
His feathers trembled.
It could not be.
No.
That crack could not have affected her, right?
It could not be that she was the only one affected.
It could not be that while everyone else remained, she alone had been taken.
But…
A thought surfaced.
What if it did?
What if it killed her?
Richard froze.
Then he went silent.
Dead?
His beak parted.
"Dead?"
His beloved hen?
Dead?
The word echoed once.
Then again.
Each repetition grew louder.
His head began to hurt.
At first, it was a thin pain behind his eyes.
Then it spread.
Needles pressed into his skull. His thoughts scraped against each other like broken stones. The golden network trembled violently.
"No," Richard muttered.
The word came out weak.
He hated that.
"No. She cannot be dead."
His legs moved before his mind could decide.
He staggered forward, then steadied himself.
[Talent: The Path - Activated]
The world shifted.
Colorful filaments of roads appeared before him, thin roads of possibility spreading from his chest into the night. Some were faint. Some were crooked. Some curled in useless loops. Others stretched toward the distance like threads thrown across fate itself.
Richard focused on one desire.
To find her.
The filaments trembled.
Then almost all of them vanished.
A few remained.
Among them, one large white road shone brighter than the rest. It was pale, almost gentle, like moonlight reflected on a feather.
Richard stepped onto it without hesitation.
The world blurred.
The flower field stretched around him. The white road carried him forward. He saw the pond. The hill. A black feather that may or may not have existed.
Then a ripple of silver light.
His heart pounded.
There.
There had to be something.
He took another step.
The road broke.
Richard stopped.
The white filament ended in front of him, cut cleanly as though severed by an invisible blade.
Beyond it was nothing.
Richard stared.
"…What?"
The word slipped out stupidly.
He stepped closer.
The broken end of the road flickered, then crumbled into pale dust.
[Talent: The Path - Deactivated]
Richard stood in the moonlit field.
His breathing quickened.
No.
No, that was wrong.
He activated it again.
[Talent: The Path - Activated]
The filaments returned.
Again, the white road appeared.
Yet again, he stepped onto it.
The world blurred as he reached once more towards the pond, the hill, the silver ripple and the black feather.
But yet again, the road was cut.
[Talent: The Path - Deactivated]
Richard's feathers lifted.
"Again."
[Talent: The Path - Activated]
The white road appeared.
He stepped forward.
It broke.
"Again."
The road appeared.
It broke.
"Again."
Appeared.
…
The moon crossed the sky.
Night deepened.
The flower field watched in silence as its ruler stood alone among the petals, activating his Talent again and again like a desperate fool trying to force open a locked door with his head.
Each attempt carved pain deeper into him.
His eyes burned.
His skull throbbed as his mind recoiled from the strain.
[Warning]
[Repeated forced activation of Talent: The Path in short span of time may damage Body, Mind and Soul.]
Richard did not read it.
"Again"
The white road appeared.
He stepped onto it.
It trembled beneath his claws like a dying thread.
But before he could take another step.
BANG.
The road shattered.
"Ugh!"
Pain exploded behind his eyes.
Richard crashed back into reality.
Blood seeped from his eyes, trailing down his crimson feathers in dark lines.
His legs buckled.
He collapsed to his knees in the flower field.
For several breaths, he could not move.
The world tilted, the sky spun.
The moon became three moons, then one, then none.
His head hurt as if a thousand blades had been driven through it and then stirred around by someone with a personal grudge against chicken brains.
Warm blood dripped from his eyes to the grass.
Then a faint blue shimmer passed through him and the bleeding stopped.
The damaged flesh around his eyes healed silently, without asking permission from his body, the world, or Richard himself.
He did not notice.
Even as his sight cleared, the pain in his mind remained.
Worse than before.
He stared at the grass.
The white road had broken.
Again and again and again.
He could not sense her.
His Talent could not find her.
He could not reach her.
This world had no road to his beloved hen.
Richard's beak trembled.
Then, finally, the words came.
"She is dead…"
The flower field did not answer.
Richard's eyes widened slightly, as if the words had been spoken by someone else.
Then they returned.
She is dead.
My beloved hen is dead.
Dead.
Dead.
Dead.
Dead.
Each word fell into him like a stone.
The hen who sat beside him.
The hen who glared at him like the entire world had personally offended her dignity.
The hen who clucked at him softly before eating the worms he brought her.
The hen who used looked annoyed whenever he got close, yet somehow never truly left.
The hen who had always sat beside him when the world became too heavy.
The hen who he had known since birth…gone?
Richard lowered his head until his beak nearly touched the soil.
"No…"
His voice cracked.
"She cannot…"
Die.
His claws curled.
"She cannot be…"
Dead.
Something inside him bent.
Then bent further.
Then snapped without a sound.
[Abnormal status condition has been detected.]
[Mind stability has fallen below the safe threshold.]
[You have been inflicted with Madness: First Stage.]
[Madness has forcibly stimulated your Body and Mind]
[Body: E+ → D]
[Mind: E → D-]
[Warning: Cognitive output has increased. Mental stability continues to deteriorate.]
[You have surpassed the limit of your race.]
[Your achievement has been noticed]
[Soul: D → D+]
[Note: Further natural progress on Body and Mind is not possible]
[Evolution or Bloodline Manifestation is recommended.]
The translucent messages appeared before him.
Richard did not look at them.
His gaze remained fixed on the empty grass.
His breathing slowed.
The trembling in his body started to fade little by little.
The frantic panic in his eyes lessened, not because it had healed, but because something else had covered it.
My beloved hen is dead.
Then…
Can't I just revive her?
The thought arrived cleanly.
Like a blade washed free of blood.
Richard slowly lifted his head.
"No, I must revive her."
His voice was calm.
"I must revive her."
The golden network pulsed weakly in his mind.
The snapped thread of the dead rabbit remained.
The missing place where his beloved hen should have been remained.
Richard stared into both.
Revive them.
No matter the price.
Richard rose slowly.
His tired body and mind protested.
He ignored them.
[Talent: The Path - Activated]
The words appeared without conscious command as he instinctively activated it.
Filaments spread before him once more.
The roads trembled.
Many collapsed instantly, unable to bear the weight of that desire.
Then one road remained.
The familiar red.
Richard had seen it before.
The road toward the next stage, one he had been conflicted with before.
The road that had made his heart hesitate. The road that had made his feathers tremble. The road that had made his mind whisper that there had to be another way.
At the end of the red road, a battlefield waited.
He saw his subjects charging beneath a dark sky, and saw himself standing at the edge watching.
Then he saw one small golden light flicker.
And finally…went out.
Before, Richard's heart would have recoiled, he would have demanded another road.
Before, he would have screamed that a boss did not sacrifice his subjects for a better future.
Now, he looked at the dying light and felt something harden inside his chest.
One more death.
For a future where death would no longer be final.
One more life lost.
So all lives could return.
Just one more.
So those who had died due to his mistakes could come back.
So his beloved hen could finally appear before him again.
This was the only way.
The red road pulsed beneath his claws.
[Second Stage: The Sin of Indecision]
[Conditions: Unknown → …]
Richard read the words in silence.
His eyes were calm, but the burning conviction behind them could not be hidden.
The moonlight touched his bloodstained feathers. The flowers around him bowed beneath a pressure that was neither wind nor authority, but something more broken than both.
He was done hesitating.
Richard stepped forward.
The red road accepted him.
And so, beneath the moonlit flower field, a certain rooster took his first true step into madness.