The muted light filtered down on Johan as he stepped onto cracked pavement. All around him were the remnants of an urban landscape that had known better days. Faded billboards, crumbling edifices, and overgrown vegetation painted a picture of desolation. The ghostly whisper of winds through hollow windows and the occasional creaking of old signboards was all that broke the silence.
'Man's creations,' Johan mused, 'can be so impermanent. Just what happened here?'
Cobblestone streets, now reclaimed by nature, branched out in every direction. Shop windows, stained and cracked, seemed to retain fragments of reflections from days gone by. There was a haunting beauty in the remnants of the once bustling cafes, silent theaters, and homes filled with memories.
Suddenly, a conversation played out in Johan's mind as he recalled a similar sight from another world. "These places," Danny had once remarked, "they tell stories of their past in the silence of the present."
