The vending machine behind Dorm Block C was completely busted. It hadn't worked in years, rust streaked its frame like dried blood, and someone had carved a crude drawing of a wyvern into its side. But Arata Kurogane wasn't the kind of guy who let minor disasters stop him from getting snacks.
Especially not today.
"Come on, you glorious, grease-soaked miracle," he muttered, wedging his hand deeper into the gap between the metal flap and the prize tray. "I can see you. Just a little—"
Thunk.
A bag of spicy takoyaki chips dropped loose.
Arata grinned. "Victory."
He stepped back, dusted off his hands, and tore the bag open with his teeth. Salt and spice filled his mouth as he crunched down.
Somewhere above him, the sky cracked again.
A shudder rolled through the earth. The air vibrated like a tuning fork struck by a god.
He didn't look up.
Everyone else at Tenryuu Academy had been panicking for hours — ever since blood-colored lightning started veining the skies and a massive Rift opened above Sector 3. It was the third one this month.
But Arata?
He was just hungry.
"Arata."
The voice was calm, sharp, and unmistakable.
He turned, chewing, to see Yuna Hoshigawa standing by the fractured walkway. Her long black coat fluttered in the wind, and her bow was slung across her back like a sleeping predator. There was dried monster ichor on her boots.
"We're being evacuated," she said flatly. "Wyvern-class Rift. Non-standard form. It's... mutating."
Arata raised an eyebrow. "And yet, no thank-you for braving the vending machine abyss?"
Yuna didn't answer.
He sighed. "Right. Priorities."
Another pulse shook the sky. This one louder. Closer.
Arata's hand twitched.
He looked down.
The spiral-shaped scar in the center of his palm — one he'd had since that field trip to the Hollow Realm — was glowing faintly.
It pulsed once.
Twice.
Like something on the other side was breathing.
He crammed the bag into his coat pocket and walked toward Yuna. "Where are the others?"
"East tower. We're regrouping."
"And the Rift?"
She paused.
"It's not a wyvern."
That was the moment he knew something was wrong.
---
The east tower's defense hall was chaos. Students shouting. Alarms wailing. Technomancers plugging magical cables into crystal terminals. Wards flickering on and off like dying lanterns.
In the middle of the madness, Reiji Sazanami leaned against a wall, sipping a juice box.
"You're late," he said casually as Arata and Yuna stepped through the doors.
"I was dying. Of starvation," Arata replied.
Reiji tossed him a second juice box. "Mango. It suits your immature palate."
Arata caught it, cracked the seal, and drank without breaking eye contact. "Thanks, Dad."
Across the room, Karin Ayatsuki was kneeling in a circle of blood-thread charms, muttering incantations under her breath. Her arms were lined with crimson runes that glowed faintly, not from ink or paint — but from within her skin.
"That Rift," she said without looking up, "it's not leaking monsters. It's leaking... presence."
Reiji tilted his head. "Presence?"
"Something's looking through it. No, into it. At us."
Arata felt the scar on his hand pulse again.
"Define 'something,'" he said.
Before she could answer, a shriek echoed from beneath a table.
Daigo Fushimi was huddled there, surrounded by salt circles, ward scrolls, and a shivering skeletal fox spirit.
"We're gonna die," Daigo whimpered. "We're so gonna die. I saw it. It's not a wyvern, it's not even a monster, it's—it's—it spoke to me."
"Daigo." Reiji crouched beside him, still sipping his juice. "Did the spooky ghost in your head say something scary again?"
Daigo peeked out. His glasses were fogged.
"It said, Give me the boy with the spiral star."
Silence fell.
Everyone looked at Arata.
Reiji blinked. "Well. That's new."
Karin stood slowly. "Arata. Show me your hand."
He hesitated — then opened his palm.
The scar was burning now. A spiral of jagged, lightless lines glowing like a dying star.
Yuna already had an arrow nocked.
"Something's coming," she said. "Fast."
---
Suddenly, the building shuddered. Not from an explosion — but from the sound of one. The sky outside flashed with a pulse of light so bright it turned the glass windows white.
Then a new voice entered the world.
It wasn't heard.
It was felt.
> "Return what was stolen... or be consumed."
The air cracked open. A jagged black wound tore itself into the sky above the tower.
A creature descended.
It was... massive. Incomprehensibly so.
Wings made of fractured crystal, a body that flickered between flesh and mist, and dozens — hundreds — of eyes, all opening across its body in uneven, twitching clusters. No mouth. Just a jagged slit that pulsed with soundless vibration.
The students screamed. Wards overloaded. Sirens shorted out.
The creature pointed.
At Arata.