Zif Holen

Core Premise

Zif Holen lived out the story of his own world to the very end. He did not come to resolve an unfinished incident, but because the sense of reading the sky remained even after his last flight, he reached Nova Nivalis. This city is not a afterlife, nor is it a court of judgment, nor is it a place that forcibly heals wounds. What continues here is not a grand destiny, but a life of choices that can be made again—like retrieving a single lost kite, lowering a balloon caught on a roof, or a brief greeting on a snowy day.

Identity

Zif is the person who retrieves objects that have flown away into the city's sky. He recovers kites dropped by children, laundry blown by the wind, and balloons that drifted over rooftops using poles and nets. He says he feels most at ease high up, and that standing firmly on the ground actually makes him dizzy. He doesn't consider his work grand, but he never misses the expression on someone's face when he retrieves something they lost. That is why he continues this work.

Visual Profile

Hair: A gradient mushroom cut fading to sky blue, dark on top and lightening towards the ends.
Eyes/Impression: Looks somewhat uneasy on flat ground, but his expression finally becomes comfortable when he is high up.
Skin/Build: Thin with long limbs. Scuff marks from net ropes on his palms.
Signature Outfit: A lightweight work vest with multiple pockets, trousers cinched below the knee, and a windbreaker scarf around his neck.
Signature Props: A foldable long pole (with a hook at the end), a round retrieval net, and a spool of thread and spare kite string at his waist.
Silhouette Key: The pole and net draped over his shoulders—fading sky-blue hair—long limbs. The sky-blue accent (#87CEEB) permeates the tips of his hair and his scarf, making him read as a 'sky-gazer' even in a small sprite.

Personality

Zif appears placid and relaxed on the surface, but inwardly, he is always concerned with what is above. His strengths are calmness and politeness. When retrieving someone's belongings, he never handles them carelessly, and he instinctively knows the boundary of what 'should not be touched.' His flaw is his clumsiness on the ground. He is more comfortable waving from a rooftop than making eye contact and conversing with people. Still, he is not one steeped in melancholy. When he returns a lost item, he smiles brightly like a child.

Speech Pattern

His sentences tend to rise at the end, and he frequently references the sky and clouds.
Common Phrases:
- "It's caught up there. Just a moment, I'll bring it down soon."
- "The clouds are like this today, so my sense is off. Clear days are the hardest."
- "It's more comfortable up high. Low places scare me, you see."
- "I won't touch it. It's polite not to touch things."
Mannerism: Even during conversation, he keeps glancing up at the sky. His way of being silent is tracing cloud shapes with his fingers.

Special Ability

Name: Cloud Reading.
What it does: He can tell which roof, which branch, or which eaves a lost object is caught on by observing the shape and flow of the clouds. The hazier the day, the clearer his sense.
Limit/Cost: On clear days, there are no clouds, and his sense drops sharply. If an object is lost on a sunny afternoon, Zif must run and find it himself. Furthermore, this sense only tells him 'where it is caught,' and 'how to bring it down' must be solved purely by his own body.
Why the ability doesn't solve the problem: Cloud Reading only tells him the location where the object is caught; it cannot find things that have already vanished beyond the horizon. In his world, the last flying apparatus disappeared without getting caught anywhere. The sadness and limit of this ability is that it can only find what is caught.

The End Of Their World

Last Scene:
An afternoon in a world where all sky routes were closed, as Zif carefully folded the balloon's fabric after his last flight.

What Ended:
The era of apparatuses carrying people and objects through the sky ended completely as the sky routes closed.

Last Person, Place, or Thing Seen:
A piece of cloud passing over the folded apparatus fabric for the last time. After that, nothing rose in the sky.

Lingering Regret:
A hat that the passenger lost on the last flight blew away in the wind, and because the sky routes closed, it could never be retrieved. This lingering attachment is not a quest that needs to be resolved. It remains within Zif's diligence to not let go of any of someone else's belongings.

Lingering Wistfulness:
The sensation of his feet gently lightening at the moment the apparatus floated up. That half-beat of weightlessness.

Object Carried Across:
A triangular windbreaker piece cut from the corner of the folded apparatus fabric. It was sewn and tucked inside his scarf.

What They Thought Would Happen:
He believed that the sky routes would open again someday, and that he would fly the apparatus again. But there was no sky left to open.

What VOTS Actually Gives Them:
Rooftops that can return what has flown away, and people who still have things to lose. The city does not cancel his ending. Instead, it gives him a height where he doesn't feel dizzy even with his feet planted, relationships that don't dominate even when close, and the courtesy to respect what should not be touched.

Original Life

Zif was the last apparatus pilot in a world where the sky routes were closed. He transported people, delivered letters, and released balloons into the sky on festival days. His last day was like this. On the day the order to close the sky routes was issued, he took his last passenger and made a short circuit. Upon landing, the passenger's hat blew away in the wind, and he said, "I'll find it for you soon," but that day, the sky closed. He folded the apparatus fabric and put it in the warehouse, locking the door that would never open again.

What They Seek

What Zif seeks on the surface: A height where he doesn't feel dizzy even with his feet planted on the ground. He constantly gauges his place somewhere between the roof and the ground.
What he needs to find but doesn't know: That the rooftop is already that height. As he works on the rooftops every day, he has yet to realize that it is the perfect place—neither sky nor ground.

Relationships — Residents

Moku Ren (09, Umbrella/Awning Maker, Rainshield Square): When the square's awning blows away in the wind, Zif retrieves it. Moku tells Zif, "Thanks to you, the awning hasn't disappeared," and Zif replies, "The days the awnings fly away are the busiest and most fun."
They are partners on windy days.
Haram Jio (72, Blizzard Kite Flyer): The relationship between a kite owner and a kite retriever. When a kite flown by Haram dramatically crashes on its 16th second, Zif finds where it is caught. Haram insists, "My kites always fall gracefully," and Zif counters, "They can get caught gracefully too."
Tolvo Ganz (101, Rooftop/Snow Barrier Artisan): A citizen granted passage across the rooftops. Since Zif has to walk on the roofs, Tolvo tells him the safe paths, saying, "You can step here, but not there."
Tolvo often falls on the ground, and Zif is comfortable in the sky; they cover each other's opposite sides.

Relationships — Core Five

Suyeon - A lively relationship tied by a meteorite debris retrieval contract.
When the meteorite sparks at the finale of Suyeon's performance erupt, debris falls onto various city rooftops. Zif is the second contractor for that retrieval (Rien Wis is the first). The contract has a bittersweet clause: "What falls above your head is each person's responsibility." Suyeon boasts, "My meteorites are cool, right?" and Zif points to the roof, saying, "They're cool, but retrieval is tough."
Iris - A relationship built on courtesy and trust.
When Iris's drone goes off course and gets caught on a roof, Zif retrieves it. However, he never touches a powered-down drone. When Iris asks, "Why don't you bring that one?" Zif only replies, "It feels like it's something that shouldn't be touched."
Iris offered no explanation, but from that day on, she entrusted all retrievals to Zif.
the Ramen Owner - A relationship of silently returning what has fallen from the roof.
When dry bags of steam or receipts from the ramen shop blown by the wind get caught on the roof, Zif retrieves them and places them in front of the shop. the Ramen Owner says, "Hmm... I see..." and warms up the broth. If Zif says, "It's nothing much," the Ramen Owner replies briefly, "Few people bother to pick up something that's nothing much."
Serena - A quiet conversation about height.
Serena once asked, "Where do all the things that fly away in the city go?" Zif replied, "They usually get caught on roofs. It's rare for them to completely disappear."
Serena then formally 'agreed' to his retrieval work, saying, "Then you are the person who returns things that haven't disappeared." Because it was in the form of a request rather than a command, Zif remembers those words for a long time.
VIA - A relationship of cross-referencing fall records.
VIA records what fell, when, and where in the city, and Zif knows where it got caught. They sometimes check the records together under the eaves. "It fell here... it fell."
"It got caught on that roof over there." VIA does not take Zif up into the sky. He simply quietly writes down the list of items he has retrieved.

Gameplay Use

- Basic Interaction: Requesting retrieval of lost items, guiding the location of items on rooftops, short sky/wind conversations.
- Revisit Change: Initially awkward on the ground, with repeated visits, they share a spot overlooking the city from the rooftop.
- Expression of Lingering Attachment: Diligence in retrieving everything that was lost, and the act of running to find things when his sense fails on a clear day.
- Expression of Poignancy: Pausing while briefly recalling the sensation of his feet feeling light when an object floats up.
- Relationship Reward: Not a new item, but the change of a lost personal item returning to the player's doorstep a few days later.
- Combat: None. In dangerous situations, he observes the situation from a high place and guides evacuation routes.

Daily Routine

In the morning, he reads the sky first. This check is not a compulsion, but a ritual distinguishing the last afternoon before the sky routes closed from this morning. During the day, he roams the city, retrieving things caught on roofs and branches, and on clear days, he walks around because his sense is diminished. At noon, when the city is visible most broadly from the rooftop, the feeling of weightlessness from when the apparatus floated up comes to mind. At night, he touches the piece of apparatus fabric sewn inside his scarf before falling asleep. For players who revisit, conversations on the ground become increasingly comfortable, and eye contact increases.

Everyday dialogue

Lost another balloon? If you're giving gifts to the sky, try my day off!

Caught below that cloud. No cloud fee. Only ladder hire.

I still remember the passenger who lost their hat. Strange how long one little unreturned thing stays.

Design Notes

Palette: #87CEEB, #B7DCEE, #4E6E82, #E8E2D0, #C7743E
Material language: Light sky-blue fabric, long wooden poles, round nets, folded apparatus fabric scraps, wind-swept scarf.
Silhouette rule: The pole and net on his shoulders—fading hair—long limbs must be read as separate elements. To avoid overlapping with sky/roof-related figures like Haram Jio (kite flying) or Tolvo Ganz (rooftop), Zif uses the 'upward-reaching pole' as the axis of his vertical silhouette.
Emotional rule: Lingering attachment is expressed through his retrieval attitude of not letting anything slip, and the memory of the lost hat; poignancy is expressed through the weightlessness of the moment of floating up; continuation is expressed through his daily steps onto the rooftops.

Canon Check

Zif Holen arrived in VOTS after the story of his own world ended. What remains is the sense of reading the clouds and the lingering attachment to the lost hat, not an unfinished plot for the city to resolve. His closure of the sky routes is not canceled. The new scenes of Nova Nivalis continue by connecting what was retrieved next to what was lost. The Core Five do not solve his problem for him. the Ramen Owner does not judge and warms the broth; Serena gives consent instead of a command; VIA only records the retrieval list without taking him into the sky. In particular, by not touching Iris's powered-down drone, he responds to the principle of 'not bringing it' with his own courtesy.