"We're going to school," Arata announced suddenly, as if that was the sort of thing you could just drop casually after a night of fighting spirits.
I stared at him, deadpan. "What do you mean, school? You're not about to enroll me in math class after nearly killing me with a bathroom ghost."
Arata smirked. "Not that kind of school. A building that looks like a school. Technically it was one, about seventy years ago. Now it's a meeting room."
Genkei tugged his hood lower. "Ridiculous."
"Everything's ridiculous until you get used to it," Arata shot back.
Meanwhile, Miu had been walking silently behind me, her hands folded neatly, her expression unreadable as always. Then, like she'd been rehearsing the timing, she tilted her head and spoke.
"Do you think cemeteries are schools for the dead," she asked, "or that schools are cemeteries for the living?"
I froze. "…What?"
Her glasses reflected the lantern light, and her voice didn't change at all. "Both are filled with names you memorize. Stories you never revisit. Buildings where the people inside decay slowly, and leave nothing behind but marks."
"…I hate this. Stop talking."
Saiko nearly tripped from laughing too hard. Genkei's shoulders tensed, and he muttered, "You're unbearable Saiko."
I sighed. "You really like saying things that sound profound until I actually think about them."
"That is what makes them profound," she answered without missing a beat.
I groaned. "Never having a normal walk with any of you again."
The walk wasn't long—stone corridors threaded like veins beneath the earth, eventually opening into a staircase that climbed upward, unlike everything else in the Benikaen that always dragged us down. When we reached the top, sure enough, there it was: a school hallway, complete with sliding classroom doors and polished wood floors, preserved like some eerie diorama from another time.
"You've gotta be kidding me," I muttered.
"Welcome back to homeroom," Arata said, grinning.
"Your hood makes you look like a depressed crane," she said, poking at the droop of Genkei's hoodie.
Genkei pulled it tighter. "I'm not depressed. Or a crane."
"That's exactly what a depressed crane would say."
He kept walking without looking back.
I sighed. "Déjà vu. Haven't we had this conversation before?"
"Did you know that every time you sigh a little bit of happiness gets let out?" She grinned and skipped ahead, deliberately brushing past him.
Then we reached the doors. Heavy wood, lacquered black, carved with curling designs. The crest of the Onmyōji clan painted in stark white across them. The smell of incense grew sharper as Arata casually pushed them open.
Inside—desks. Neat rows. A blackboard at the front. For one dizzy second, it looked like an ordinary classroom. Then my eyes adjusted, and it felt nothing like school.
The room was full. Every desk occupied by men and women in cloaks and coats like ours. Some wore patterns, others stripes. At least thirty of them, seated in neat order, watching
Saiko froze. "…Wait. There's this many of us?!"
She smacked her hands on a desk. "You made us sound like we were special, the first cool kids in history, Arata! Like pioneers! What the hell?!"
Arata shrugged, strolling in with his usual lopsided grin. "You are special, just not exclusive. I mean, I never said you were the only cool kids. Just the ones I picked."
"That's worse!" Saiko hissed.
"Look," he said, pulling a chair back lazily, "you need to be able to tell Gravebinders apart from Onmyōji. Colors make it easy. Fashion and function. What's wrong with that?"
I sat down, groaning. "…I feel scammed."
"I thought you hated yours itsuki."
Saiko folded her arms, sulking. "Scammed and underdressed."
At the front of the room, three men were waiting. And none of them looked normal.
The first had a shaved head, save for a single braid trailing from his temple down to his chest. His robe sleeves were splattered with ink stains, and sutra tattoos ran over his hands, squirming faintly as he flexed his fingers. His eyes were red-rimmed, like he hadn't slept in years.
The second was enormous, shoulders filling his patched-together robe. His jaw was lined with a scar shaped like a lightning bolt, and a necklace of shattered rosary beads clinked faintly as he moved. He chewed on a toothpick as if daring someone to question it.
The third was thin and wiry, his hair sticking up like quills, dyed half white and half black. He smiled with too many teeth, his foot tapping constantly, and the dozen folded ofuda tags on his belt jingled whenever he shifted.
The braided man spoke first, voice flat and sharp as a blade. "Arata. Your choir is late."
Arata yawned loudly, waving dismissively. "Eh. If the song's good, nobody cares when it starts."
The scarred giant grunted. The wiry one cackled, clapping his hands together.
"Since there are unfamiliar faces," the braided man continued, ignoring them, "introductions come first. My name is Kanzeon Ryūkō. Keeper of Sutras. Rank: Tongue." He pressed his tattooed palms together in a prayer-like motion.
The giant cracked his knuckles, voice low and rumbling. "Daiten Gorō. Iron Prayer. Rank: Sealwright. Don't bother remembering my face—remember my fists."
The wiry man leaned forward, smiling far too wide. "Shōjō Karame. Laughing Rope. Rank: Tongue. Don't ask why I laugh, or I'll have to ask why you don't."
Saiko whispered, "Why do they all sound like pro wrestlers?"
I whispered back, "Because they are. Just with ghosts."
Ryūkō ignored us, his red-shot eyes scanning the crowd. "You have chosen—or been chosen—for the path of the Gravewatcher. A path of burden, of weight. Each of you carries a fragment of the dead. Each of you will climb—or fall." His voice tightened. "From Pale, to Graven, to Mourner, to Bearer, to Warden, and perhaps, if fate is cruel, Pale Monarch. Very few live long enough to rise that far. Fewer still keep their sanity."
The scarred giant leaned forward on the lectern. "And the graves themselves—don't forget them. Common graves, the dead of everyday lives. Ancestral graves, bound by blood and worship. Historical graves, warriors and poets, monks and rebels whose names still burn. Forgotten graves, unmarked and unritualed, violent and vengeful. Noble graves, imperial graves—the Goryō, spirits of wrath so great they toppled dynasties."
Karame grinned, practically bouncing standing up. "Onmyōji follow another ladder! Our power isn't borrowed but woven. First come the scribes, who scrawl charms and summon simple shikigami. Then the Sealwrights, who lock curses and build barriers. After them, the Tongues, who speak to spirits and unravel bonds. Then the Diviners, whose eyes stretch past time and illusion. And at the top? The Grand Onmyōji, rare as thunder with no storm, commanding spirits by a single word."
"Chains and threads. Anchors and veils. One path binds. The other unbinds. Both flawed. Both necessary." Miu said.
Karame clapped his hands, delighted. "See? She gets it!"
I rubbed my temples. "I don't."
"Exactly!" Karame laughed harder.
The room broke into uneasy murmurs as the explanations wound down. Arata, of course, leaned back on his chair like none of this mattered, balancing dangerously on two legs. Genkei sat stiff as stone, hands gripping his sheath tightly. Saiko sulked, still annoyed her "special" outfit wasn't special anymore.
Somewhere in the back of my head, I felt Aka Manto stir. Watching. Waiting.
When the meeting finally ended, we filed out into the hall, heads spinning. Tenmyō was waiting for us.
"Well done," he said smoothly. "Congratulations. You're officially Graven now."
We all froze.
Genkei frowned. "…That can't be right. We're only Pale."
Tenmyō tilted his head, almost amused. "Pale? That rank is for binders who've only just formed their first contract. None of you are there anymore. You've already proven stronger. You're Graven, whether you realized it or not."
I blinked. "Wait, then why—"
Arata scratched his cheek, grinning. "Ah, that's on me. I mixed them up. Forgot which one came first. Pale, Graven—same ghostly paint to me. My bad."
I gawked at him. "You're telling me you didn't even remember the basic rank order? You're supposed to be our teacher!"
He shrugged, smirking wider. "I never started that low, so I mixed it up."
Saiko groaned. "Are you kidding me?!"
I turned to him, exasperated. "Then what rank are you, Arata?"
He tilted his head just enough for the lantern light to catch his eyes. "I'm one sea from the top. Diviner"
The words dropped like stones in water.
Genkei stiffened. Miu adjusted her glasses, silent. Saiko gawked, caught somewhere between impressed and annoyed.
I realized for the first time just how high above us Arata really stood.
None of us spoke for a long moment I think.
Saiko was the first to break the silence, blurting out, "One from the top?! You've been clowning around this whole time and you're basically… god-tier?"
Arata grinned, rocking back on his heels. "Nah, not god-tier. If I was, I'd be taller."
I wanted to smack him. "You can't just drop that and laugh it off. You're saying you're basically the strongest Onmyōji we'll ever meet."
He tilted his head, his smirk widening. "I didn't say strongest. I said close. Don't confuse directions with destinations, kid."
Miu's voice cut through gently. "A step from the peak is still higher than the ground."
Genkei folded his arms. "Then why are you even with us? If you're that powerful, wouldn't your place be elsewhere?"
Arata winked. "Maybe I got bored of the peak. Maybe I like climbing with company."
I groaned. "You're impossible."
"Not impossible," he said. "Just improbable."
Before the argument could spiral, Tenmyō cleared his throat. His tone was calm, but it silenced us faster than any shout. "You all misunderstand the more important point. Rank is only one thing. What concerns me is your particular… peculiarity, Itsuki Ririku."
I blinked. "My… what?"
Genkei adjusted his hood, speaking for me. "He means how you bound with Aka Manto. With no grave. With no ritual."
Saiko leaned forward, eyes wide. "Yeah, seriously. You just absorbed her. You weren't even trying! How the hell does that work?"
I rubbed the back of my neck, uneasy. "I don't know. It didn't feel like the gravebinding everyone else described. It wasn't heavy or suffocating. It was… like falling into someone else's dream. Then I woke up with her cloak and knife."
Tenmyō studied me quietly. His gaze wasn't harsh, but it was heavy, like he was measuring me against a scale I couldn't see. "Unprecedented."
Miu raised her hand like she was answering a riddle only she understood. "Not unprecedented. Unnamed."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Saiko asked.
Miu adjusted her glasses, her voice flat but faintly musical. "If a child is born with no family registry, are they not still alive? If a grave has no marker, is it not still a grave? Absence does not erase. It only confuses."
Genkei frowned. "Then what did he bind to, if not a grave?"
Tenmyō finally spoke again. "The ghost itself."
"Ghost?" I repeated.
Arata leaned in, resting his chin on his palm, eyes twinkling with amusement. "Ah, now we're getting somewhere. You kids keep mixing 'spirit' and 'ghost' like they're the same thing."
Saiko raised an eyebrow. "Okay, so what's the difference?"
Arata straightened, suddenly serious. "Spirits are just that—spirits. People who died. Your average father, sister, warrior, merchant, monk. Their graves hold their memory, and gravebinders pull on that memory to fight. Simple."
Then he wagged a finger. "But ghosts… ghosts are different. Ghosts are the ones you whisper about. The ones with names, with stories. The ones kids tell each other at night to scare themselves. Kuchisake-onna. Teke Teke. Aka Manto. They're spirits too, but shaped, chained, locked into what their stories say they are. You can't make Aka Manto into a gentle nurse, no matter how nicely you ask. Her powers are bound by her tale."
Genkei's eyes sharpened. "So Itsuki didn't just bind a spirit. He bound a ghost. Without a grave."
"Exactly," Arata said, snapping his fingers. "Normally impossible. And yet here he is, standing, drooling a little, but alive."
I scowled. "I wasn't drooling."
"You were absolutely drooling," Saiko said, smirking. "Genkei, back me up."
Genkei actually nodded. "…You were drooling."
I threw my hands up. "Unbelievable."
Miu's voice slipped in again. "Belief is irrelevant. The world does not wait for us to believe in it."
"Not helping!" I shot back.
Tenmyō ignored the bickering. His gaze was still fixed on me. "Ghosts are dangerous because their fame feeds them. The more their story is told, the stronger they become. To bind one without grave or rite is unheard of. Dangerous, yes. But also… perhaps necessary."
"Necessary?" I echoed.
"We'll see soon enough. The age of ordinary spirits may be ending. This new ability may be of use in the future."
No one laughed this time. Not even Arata.