Hortus Arcanus planēta

ACT 2

flag

Then, with steady resolve, I spoke the words—

“Twilight Sky.”

It looked like we had stepped inside the tower.

Then, inside the tower, there stood a silver music stand.

In front of it were double doors that opened like windows, and beyond them, I could see Al and the others’ palace.

Apparently, this tower had been built deep within the forest.

I stepped toward the silver stand.

Then, I slowly opened the double windows before me.

At that moment, together with a gentle breeze, a single pink flower petal softly drifted down onto the silver stand.

My blonde hair fluttered lightly in the wind as well.

The breeze felt comforting, and for just a brief moment, I closed my eyes.

Al said nothing either.

A silent stretch of time passed—perhaps only a few seconds, perhaps several minutes—as if we were both simply surrendering ourselves to the wind.

I was the first to speak.

“Hey, Al… What kind of flower petal do you think this is?”

As I carefully placed the petal that had fallen onto the silver stand into the palm of my hand, I asked him.

“I don’t know either… but I have a feeling it’s connected to that book somehow.”

Hearing that, I thought, Just as I suspected.

The petal looked exactly like the one I had seen in the book’s illustration earlier.

I couldn’t understand the language written in the book, nor could I make sense of its contents, but the illustrations depicted flower petals, a button, and some kind of national flag.

And on the page directly behind the illustration of that “unknown flag,” though faded and difficult to see clearly, there was something resembling a musical note—or perhaps a staff of sheet music.

It looked like a black circle pierced vertically and horizontally by thin black lines.

Curious, I turned to Al and asked,

“Al… do you know what this illustration is?”

Then Al answered, almost overlapping my question itself—

“It’s the flag of this country.”