The hours passed...
And with every minute that passes,
the walls were being sealed with blood in the surrounding areas.
---
🌅 Until the sun rose...
Renji opened his eyes with difficulty,
and the vision was blurry at first.
All he sees in front of him is snow... mixed with blood.
---
Renji panicked immediately,
he looked around... then at his house.
He found it partially destroyed:
The windows were ground.
The walls broken.
The doors broken.
And the blood crawling outside... as if it is looking for new victims.
---
Renji ran with all the strength he was given, gasping and stumbling,
all his thinking was screaming inside him:
"Oh no no no no no no!!
Himari!!!
Mom!!
Hiroshi!!
Please... be alright! Please!!"
---
🚪 Renji stormed into the house while shouting with a broken voice:
"Himarii!!
Mom!!!
Hiroshi!!!
Himariii!!"
---
Renji stepped forward with nervous steps... looking in all directions...
Then suddenly:
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
---
He ran immediately when he saw his dead mother in front of him...
and her body was over Himari's body...
in a protective position.
His mother had given all the strength she was given to prevent death from reaching Himari...
but that was not enough.
---
Renji lifted his mother while crying strongly,
looking at her face and her deep wounds...
And he said with a broken, shaky voice:
"Mom!!
Mom please... just breathe!
Give me a sign... do not go!!
Please do not go!!!"
But...
No reply.
No breath.
No pulse.
No life.
---
Renji hugged her tightly,
he was collapsing completely while holding her in his arms...
his tears fell strongly on her disfigured face.
And his screams were tearing the walls of the ruin around him.
---
But. There was a very weak movement.
Beside him then he heard a weak voice
"Brother..."
A weak voice...
Broken...
Shaky like a cold breeze inside hell.
It was Himari.
She did not die...
but her wounds were very serious,
and she needed immediate treatment.
---
Renji placed his mother gently on the ground,
then rushed to his sister, holding her carefully while trembling.
She looked at him while bleeding...
her eyes half closed...
she was between life and death.
"Himari!!
You... you are alive!!
You are alive!!"
---
Renji lifted her and began pressing on her wound to stop the bleeding...
His breaths speeding up...
his mind blurry...
his heart almost exploding from fear.
---
But there was no time for panic...
nor for sorrow.
All Renji was thinking about...
was saving his sister.
Quickly.
As fast as possible.
---
His steps were heavy...
and every step left a trace of blood behind.
As if the earth itself was recording its testimony of the place of the beginning.
---
Renji descended from the mountain at his fastest speed.
His eyes fixed on his village that finally appeared on the horizon.
And here. Renji's eyes shined with hope and optimism and he said to himself:
Maybe...
maybe Himari is still able to be saved.
---
He looked at his sister who was breathing with difficulty, and whispered to her:
Himari, hold on...
you will live, do you hear?
You will liiiiiiive!!
Himari could barely see...
her vision blurry, but she barely managed to recognize his face with difficulty.
And she whispered with a weak, broken voice:
"Brother..."
---
And in that moment, Renji entered the village
and a faint smile appeared on his face amidst the tears.
He thought he had reached salvation...
but the truth was harsher than he could bear.
---
He stopped.
Froze.
Looked around...
All he found was:
Corpses.
Wounded.
Children crying beside their torn-apart parents!
---
There were mothers...
pregnant.
Their stomachs had been torn open...
and the babies pulled out before they were born...
then killed before their eyes.
And the mothers died...
and the last thing they saw was their own flesh and blood being slaughtered without mercy.
---
Renji fell to his knees...
The tears pouring down.
More...
and more...
and more.
His back weighed down by the body of his sister who was still moaning...
But hope?
Ended.
The world was spinning around Renji, he wanted to scream, cry strongly, anything.
But all hope shattered before his eyes and the candle of hope was extinguished.
..... and death was beside every wounded.
---
"So?
Do you want to save your sister?
Or will you leave her to rot like what happened to everyone?"
---
Renji froze. In his place but could not move. The world began spinning around him quickly.
Everything fading and then.....
The world disappeared.
---
No sky.
No forest.
No village.
No sounds.
Only a strange ground...
reflecting a faint yellow light that extended to infinity.
Renji stood up slowly...
his face pale.
His eyes empty of life.
As if his soul had left him.
But when he lifted his head...
he saw something that made the blood freeze in his veins.
---
It was standing in front of him...
That being.
---
The same creature that turned into smoke
and entered Renji's body...
before the appearance of the fourteen.
Before everything began.
---
It was one of the beings of the book.
But it was not ordinary.
---
It had an external skeleton
that looked like armor from hell.
---
Its eyes were glowing with a fiery orange color,
as if whoever stared into them...
their soul would burn.
Its veins were glowing with the color of flame,
as if what ran through them was not blood,
but pure hell.
---
This was not just a being.
This was a declaration of the end of mankind.
---
Renji lifted his head while kneeling on his knees, and said in a weak, broken voice:
"Who are you?"
The smile of that creature widened, and it placed its hand on its chest. It bowed in a theatrical way and said:
"I am your salvation... or your death.
I, if you give me, will save... your little sister who is taking her last breaths as we speak now."
Renji gasped when he remembered Himari, he looked behind him, but she was not on his back. Renji stood up straight, turning around like a madman searching for his sister.
But that creature ignored that and continued, saying:
"I have been called many names throughout the ages...
but you, boy, can call me..."
That being raised its hand, and from it came blue flames, then they turned into burning orange, and began to form a name in the air:
"Raizen."
Renji read the name in a low voice, barely able to move, and said:
"Raizen... please, I will do anything... but save my sister."
"Hic… Hic…"
Renji could not hold back his tears and his panic for his sister, and he continued in an even more broken tone:
"Please... I beg you, just save her and I will do whatever you want."
Then he said, almost whispering:
"Please... I beg you..."
Raizen looked at him with disgust, then...
WHUUMPH!!
He kicked him hard in the stomach, sending him flying from the force of the blow.
UGHHH—THUD!!!
Renji crashed to the ground hard, clutching his stomach in pain.
"SNNNK... haaah... KH-KHFFFHH!! splurt..."
He gasped from the pain, clutching his stomach and coughing up blood violently, his nose touching the cold floor, groaning in silence, and speaking in a voice closer to a whisper:
"Please... I will do anything... but save my sister... she is all that's left... I'm not ready to lose her... please... take my life in exchange for hers."
Raizen did not care about Renji's sorrow or panic — instead, he felt disgust.
He kept striking Renji with force until he became unable to move.
Then, in a moment, Raizen stopped... stepped closer, grabbed Renji's head, and lifted it by his hair, saying:
"Tch. How pathetic.
I thought you were stronger than that.
I turned to a weak human to protect me from my inevitable death because of my master Ronnzztan's curse.
And now... you are not even able to protect your little sister.
I bet she was the one protecting you, because you can't even protect an ant... you weakling!!"
---
Renji was crying silently, unable to reply... because he was right.
He didn't protect his family.
His mother was dead.
His brother had disappeared.
His little sister was calling out to him, begging him to save her — but he could do nothing.
The feeling of weakness crushed him.
And it wasn't just physical weakness, but an inner weakness...
Regret... because he hadn't protected the ones he loved, and now the only person left would also be gone.
---
Renji muttered, his eyes directed toward the ground:
"You're right."
Raizen tilted his head, starting to listen more closely.
"I am weak...
I didn't save my family...
and right now I'm powerless to save my sister from death."
He gasped between his tears and continued:
"I am the reason!!
If I hadn't taken that book... if I hadn't opened it...
everyone would still be alive.
My mom would be here.
My sister wouldn't be on the verge of dying!!"
Renji lifted his head, his eyes widening. Raizen created a flame in his hands, bringing it close to Renji's face so he could see what was inside it...
And it was showing fragments of his memories with his brother Hiroshi:
"Get away from me, you failure.
Don't touch me with your filthy hand.
Get out of my sight.
Who said I love you or want you in my life?
Do you think you're good because everyone loves you? Because you're always nice to others?
No.
You're just a failure... and you'll always be one."
The flame showed everything Renji had gone through with his brother... all the way to the moment of freeing the book.
Hiroshi, holding the book and pulling it out...
then standing under the moonlight, saying mockingly:
"Aww.
Are these drawings your monsters?
Cute.
No, really cute, little brother."
And here, the moment the book was exposed to the moonlight, the images began to move...
As for Hiroshi, he ran in panic toward their mother, leaving Renji with the book, to face all the consequences... alone.
---
Raizen slowly closed his fist, and the flame went out.
And he said:
"So... will you stop blaming yourself like a child and become a man? As you should be, mortal."
Renji was surprised by Raizen's words... the same Raizen who had just been beating and insulting him. Renji stayed silent for a few moments.
"You really are weak for taking all the blame yourself.
Didn't you notice that the one who freed us was your lunatic brother?
Not you."
Raizen moved closer to Renji's face and continued:
"He's the one who placed the book under the moonlight.
And that... was the key to freeing us.
An impure heart, full of envy and arrogance, holding us under the moonlight."
---
Renji's heartbeat quickened... not from fear, but from pure anger, making him tighten his fist, rethink what happened, and mutter:
"Yes.
I am not the one who did it.
I am not guilty.
I am not the one who put the book under the moonlight.
I am not its creator.
I am not Kimaruwa Ronnzztan.
Nor Hiroshi.
But... I am the reason.
I am the one who brought the book in the first place."
Raizen laughed loudly, yanking Renji by the hair and shaking him:
"Even after you've learned who the real killer is, you still think you're the one at fault?
Oh, how pure you are, boy.
And that's why... you're perfect for me."
"I will grant your wish.
I will make you reach your revenge.
But first... let's heal your sister, as you kept asking."
Renji gasped with joy, quickly standing up and saying:
"Yes! Please, just heal my sister, that's all I want!"
Raizen turned away, speaking without looking at Renji:
"She's already been healed.
When you leave this world, you will find her next to you... sleeping.
Carry her and go somewhere safe.
And then... there will be another conversation between us."
Renji tried to ask him how he did it, but the world around him... began to crack slowly.
Raizen turned into smoke and vanished with the raging winds.
Renji shouted:
"What the hell is happening!?
The world is being destroyed around me!!"
He began turning around, searching for an exit, but everything was collapsing around him.
AAAAAAAAHHH!!!
Renji screamed with all that was left in him as the world around him crumbled.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_