The first thing I saw on my birthday was the ceiling.
Same cracks in the corner. Same flicker in the overhead light.
For a second, I almost forgot what day it was.
Almost.
Then it hit me.
Today wasn't just my birthday.
Today, the Soul Lens would dig through my memories, my regrets—my entire existence—and assign me a color.
A rank.
A future.
Or a sentence.
If it saw what I saw when I closed my eyes…
I wasn't sure I'd walk out the same.
Downstairs, the smell of grilled rice cakes drifted through the air.
My mom never made breakfast like this unless it was someone's birthday.
But she didn't say anything when I came in. Just nudged a plate toward me and poured tea like it was any other morning.
"Sleep okay?" she asked, not looking at me.
"I think so."
She nodded.
Quiet. Normal.
Like this wasn't the morning I'd sit in a chair and let a machine crawl through my soul.
I ate in silence. Tried to pretend the food didn't taste different.
Then the doorbell rang.
I didn't even have to check.
"Open up, birthday boy!" Kaito's voice was already halfway through the door.
I opened it to find him holding a bag of snacks and a ridiculous balloon that said "YOU SURVIVED 15 YEARS."
Behind him, Emi leaned against the wall, arms crossed and unimpressed.
"You look like hell," she said.
"Good morning to you too."
They walked in without asking, like they lived here.
"Made it to sixteen," Kaito said, flopping onto the couch. "Statistically, that means you've survived 100% of your life so far. Nice work."
He tossed me a canned drink. It was still cold.
"You nervous?" he added, too casual.
"No."
He raised an eyebrow. "Liar."
Emi sat at the table and stole one of my rice cakes.
"You better not cry in the chair," she said. "That machine reads your soul. Tears might short it out."
I snorted. "I'll do my best not to ruin government property."
"Try not to awaken Red while you're at it," she added, sipping tea like it was a completely normal thing to say.
Kaito leaned forward, pulling something small from his pocket.
"Oh—almost forgot. Close your eyes."
"What?"
"Just do it."
I rolled my eyes but obeyed. Something cold brushed against my wrist—then a soft click.
"Okay, open."
I looked down. A sleek black band, barely thicker than a watch strap, sat snug around my wrist. Matte finish, subtle circuit lines pulsing faintly.
"Synchronicity Band," Kaito said. "Top model. Tracks vitals, syncs with ours, has short-range projection, and the color-shift feature."
"I picked the style," Emi added flatly.
Kaito tapped his own. A small hologram flickered to life above it—an old picture of the three of us. Younger. Me with messy hair, Kaito throwing up crooked peace signs, and Emi in the background, mid-eye-roll.
"You've shown me that one like six times," she said.
"Because it's legendary."
The image shimmered once before fading. My own band blinked softly—brown. My normal eye color.
I turned my wrist slightly, just enough to feel its weight.
"…Thanks."
Kaito just smiled.
"You know," he said, "if things go well today, you could apply for the Elite Academy."
I blinked. "You think I'd get in?"
"You've got the brains. The rest will catch up."
I didn't answer.
He grinned. "C'mon, we could be squad mates. Me with my brilliant Blue tactics, you punching people through walls with—what, Green maybe? Or Violet if the stars align?"
Emi smirked. "As long as he doesn't awaken Gray and cry about it."
They were joking. Lighthearted.
But my chest was tight anyway.
I didn't care about the Academy. Not really.
What scared me was the machine.
The part of me it might find.
"Akira," my mom called gently from the kitchen. "It's time."
I stood.
Kaito slapped my shoulder. "Try not to explode."
Emi smirked. "Idiot."
The Synchronicity Band blinked again. Just once.
And just like that, I was out the door.
The government facility didn't look like a place where you discovered your soul.
It looked like a lab.
White walls. Fluorescent lighting. Vents humming just loud enough to notice. The faint scent of sterilization lingered in the air—like the whole place had been scrubbed of feeling.
There were rows of chairs along the wall. I took one near the end.
About a dozen others sat scattered through the waiting area—some tapping their feet, others checking their wrists or fidgeting with ID bands. Everyone was dressed just a little too neatly, like they were pretending today wasn't what it was.
A girl two seats down was muttering something under her breath, hands folded like she was praying. A tall guy across from me kept cracking his knuckles.
A door hissed open on the far side of the room. A woman in a gray government uniform stepped out.
"Next."
The boy who'd been pacing stood and walked toward her.
He didn't look scared. Just blank.
The door slid shut behind them.
There were no sounds. No flashes of light. No countdowns.
Just stillness.
Three minutes passed. Then five.
When the door opened again, he stepped out slowly, eyes slightly glazed.
A faint gray shimmer flickered in his pupils before fading.
A voice chimed from the wall-mounted console:
"Takeshi Rando. Classification: Gray. Level 44."
He was handed a black envelope. Didn't even look at it. Just walked out.
No applause. No reaction.
Only the air getting heavier.
Another name was called.
Then another.
Gray. Gray.
Level 19. Level 37.
Then one girl came out with her eyes flickering a soft green.
"Mina Albrecht. Classification: Green. Level 53."
A few people glanced up. Still no one spoke.
I stared at the floor.
The Synchronicity Band on my wrist blinked—soft brown, matching my natural eye color.
It logged a spike.
My pulse was too fast. My hands were colder than the floor beneath them.
More names.
Green. Gray.
Level 50. Level 28. Level 12.
No one awakened Blue. No one awakened Violet.
Not yet.
Then the woman stepped out again.
"Akira Ramou."
The name rang out like a dropped stone in water.
I stood.
No one looked at me. But I could feel the room shift slightly—as if everyone was listening, just not openly.
The hallway stretched in front of me like it was waiting.
The door closed behind me with a hiss.
And everything went quiet.
The room was colder than I expected.
Clean, silent, and unnaturally still.
No screens. No flashing lights. Just a reclined chair at the center, shaped like something between a medical bed and a throne.
Two technicians stood off to the side. Neither looked at me long.
I sat.
The chair adjusted automatically to my weight—firm, but not uncomfortable. My arms rested on molded supports. My neck was cradled.
A faint click echoed as the Soul Lens headset lowered over my head, covering my eyes and temples.
"Breathe normally," one of them said, distant. "It'll start in ten seconds."
I barely heard him.
Then—darkness.
Not sleep. Not dreaming.
It felt like falling in every direction at once.
Light and sound vanished. Time bent. And then—
I was standing.
Feet on fractured pavement.
Smoke rising from twisted wreckage around me. The sky was a dull, choking gray. No sun. No wind. Just stillness and ruin.
The air smelled like burning metal and something worse—ash and blood.
Something had happened here.
Something horrible.
I turned.
Kaito.
He was collapsed against a chunk of debris. His clothes were torn, face bloodied, one leg twisted unnaturally beneath him.
I rushed to him—dropped to a knee.
No response. Shallow breathing. Still alive.
I heard a sound—weak, close.
"A...kira…"
I spun toward it.
Emi.
She was a few meters away, half-buried under collapsed rubble. Her lips were cracked, blood tracing from the corner of her mouth.
Her eyes barely opened. Her voice a ghost.
"Akira… run…"
I froze.
Why would she say that?
Why here?
I turned slowly. Every instinct in me already screaming.
And then I saw him.
A figure standing in the smoke.
Tall. Motionless. Wrapped in shadows. His aura shimmered like heat waves—red and rippling, alive and angry.
At first, I couldn't see his face. Only the glow of his pupils—crimson, burning against the ash.
Then the smoke parted.
And I stopped breathing.
Because it was me.
Not exactly.
He looked older. Harder. His jaw was sharper, eyes deeper, the weight behind them unbearable. The stance was too still, too balanced.
But the face was mine.
My eyes. My jawline.
Just… wrong.
Twisted by silence and strength.
Dead behind the power.
Red. Me. Renji.
I staggered back, heart pounding. My legs felt numb.
This wasn't memory. It wasn't fantasy.
It was recognition.
He didn't speak. Just stared. Like he'd been waiting.
Then—slowly—he took a step.
I took one back.
Another step.
I couldn't move.
Pressure rolled off of him like a second gravity. The Red Spectra shimmered around his body, bleeding into the cracked earth below.
Behind me, Emi whispered again—barely audible.
"You're not ready…"
Red-Renji took another step forward.
Then he spoke. His voice wasn't angry—it was calm. Cold.
Like the truth, not a threat.
"You should've stayed dead."
"You think they'll love what's buried inside you?"
"This is who you are. The one who watched everything burn… and waited for the silence."
He takes a step closer. Smoke coils around his feet. The air feels heavier.
"You didn't cry for them. You didn't stop it. You just watched."
He tilts his head. A faint smile—not joy, not cruelty. Just inevitability.
"And somewhere deep down…"
Beat. A silence too loud to ignore.
"You liked it."
Something inside me snapped.
I clenched my fists. Ground my teeth.
This wasn't real. Couldn't be real.
I stepped forward.
"You're not me."
The figure tilted his head—almost like he was amused.
Then I forced it out louder:
"You're not me anymore."
He vanished.
And in the same instant, he was in front of me.
A hand clamped around my face—fingers like iron, tilting my head upward like I weighed nothing.
His face—my face—loomed over me.
Eyes burning red. Pupils glowing like embers behind a shattered mask of calm.
"Look at you," he said. "Still pretending you're different."
"You think kindness will save you? That loyalty makes you pure?"
"Let them die. Let the world rot. And when there's nothing left—you'll come crawling back to me."
I trembled. But I didn't pull away.
"You will be me," he said, voice now a whisper against my ear.
"The moment they fall—when your love dies, when hope rots—you will beg to be me."
I wanted to scream. But nothing came out.
Until—
My wrist shifted slightly.
The Synchronicity Band blinked.
Just once.
Brown light. Soft. Familiar.
And in that flicker, I saw it.
Kaito's dumb grin.
Emi's eye-roll.
Their voices. Their presence.
Not as weakness.
As anchor.
As reason.
My hands trembled—but not from fear.
I pushed against his chest, barely moving him.
"You're wrong."
His eyes narrowed.
"I will never be you."
He didn't back off.
He leaned in closer.
"You will be. You just haven't lost enough yet."
My heart cracked like thunder.
Something snapped in me—not a break, but a rupture.
Pain surged through my chest—no, power.
I screamed, but it wasn't from fear this time.
Light erupted from my skin—raw, violent, unstable.
Green. But not ordinary.
It flickered—edges gold for a blink, like my soul tried to reach higher than it was allowed.
My hands ignited. The earth shook.
I struck forward—not with my fists, but with will.
Spectra surged outward, a shockwave of emerald force that launched him backward, tearing through the air like a cannon blast.
He didn't scream.
He just smiled.
As the smoke cleared, his voice echoed once more—disembodied now, fading with the world:
"We'll see."
The battlefield fractured around me. The rubble cracked like glass, light flooding through each seam.
My vision blurred. The smoke turned to mist.
And then—
I woke up.
The room was spinning.
Cool air. Artificial light.
The weight of the Soul Lens headset still pressed against my face.
My fingers twitched.
Then—I moved.
Slowly. Uncertainly.
I reached up and removed the headset myself. My arms were shaking.
A thin wisp of green light flickered around my fingers—brief, unstable, and gone before the technician even noticed.
The nearest monitor beeped.
A woman's voice rang from the wall:
"Akira Ramou. Classification: Green. Level 98."
The voice was mechanical. Cold.But the number hit like a thunderclap in a vacuum—loud but empty.
I blinked.
I was still breathing. Still me.But something had cracked open.Something that wouldn't close.
I looked down at the Synchronicity Band.
It blinked once.
Brown.
Still me.But I don't think whatever's inside plans to stay quiet.