[Ray's POV]
I had been walking for what felt like an hour, my path a deliberate navigation through the village's forgotten arteries.
One damp, shadowed alley bled into the next, each one narrower and quieter than the last, the festive roar of Meadowlark fading to a distant, muffled memory. The air here smelled of wet stone, mildew, and the faint, lingering traces of things best not examined too closely. The cobblestones underfoot were slick with moisture and something darker—something I didn't want to identify.
This is where the village hides its rot, I thought. Beneath the pretty lanterns and the laughing crowds. Every city has an underbelly. Every town has a shadow.
This is Meadowlark's.
Finally, at the end of a particularly foul-smelling, dead-end lane, I saw it. A single, grimy window glowed with a weak, yellow light. A hand-painted sign above a heavy, reinforced door simply read "Goods & Sundries."
Unassuming. Almost laughably so.
