The mist had grown thicker.
Even the moonlight seemed afraid to touch this place.
We walked in silence for what felt like hours — through forests that breathed like lungs, through air that stank of blood and wet ash. Every sound seemed to come from somewhere behind us.
The shrine maiden led the way, her lantern burning with a faint blue light. It did not sway, though no wind blew.
"Ren," she said softly. "Do you feel it?"
The word feel barely reached me. My senses had begun to twist — hearing turned to echo, sight to blur. But instinct knew.
"Yes," I whispered. "The air is alive."
"No," she murmured. "It's dying."
Ahead, the fog thinned, unveiling a scar of blackened land.
Grass burned down to its roots. Armor half-buried in the mud. Swords and naginata scattered like the bones of trees, their edges still crusted with the blood of those who never left. A torn banner sagged from a broken pole, its colors bled away by fire and rain.
The air reeked of burnt lacquer and old iron. Somewhere in the fog, I thought I heard the faint echo of a war horn — drawn out and hollow, as if the land itself were remembering.
A battlefield.
Or perhaps a graveyard pretending to be one.
I stepped forward, and the ground groaned beneath my weight. A sound like bones shifting in the dark.
"Who fought here?" I asked.
"Your clan," she said. "And the ones who burned them."
Her voice trembled — just enough for me to hear.
The air thickened, heavy and oppressive, pressing on my chest until each breath rattled with ash. Beneath my ribs, the Yomi Flame stirred, whispering like a serpent roused from slumber.
The blood moon's vow I had sworn only hours earlier pressed against my heart like a brand.
Then came the voices.
Soft at first, like silk rustling. Then sharper, colder.
My name.
Ren Kagemura.
They rose from the ground — figures wrapped in shattered armor, faces hidden behind cracked masks. My soldiers. My friends. My clan.
They stared at me with hollow eyes filled with blue fire.
"You left us," one hissed.
"You burned with us," another moaned.
"Yet you stand."
Others joined, until dozens of voices overlapped — accusations, curses, prayers turned bitter.
"You swore to protect us."
"You carried the banner."
"You drank with us, laughed with us — and when the fire came… you ran."
The fog shifted, and the voices became faces.
Haruto, my spear-brother, whose wife had begged me to keep him safe. His armor cracked open, revealing charred ribs. His hand still clutched a broken yari, the point twisted like bone.
Kiyoshi, barely sixteen, whose voice had once broken with pride when he swore loyalty to me. His throat now dripped blood, his mask shattered in two. His eyes accused me more than words ever could.
Aya, who had sung beneath cherry blossoms, her voice gentle as spring rain. Her lips were now melted into a grotesque smile, her skin flaking like burned parchment.
And beyond them, others came.
Masao, who had boasted he would outlive us all — his laughter silenced, his jaw hanging loose.
Chiyo, whose daughter had tugged my sleeve for sweets — her hand now skeletal, bones clicking as she reached toward me.
Each face was a dagger, each voice a weight pressing me down.
The Yomi Flame flared, answering their rage. Blue light rippled down my arm like veins of lightning, pulsing with each breath.
"I didn't leave you," I said through clenched teeth. "I—"
The words strangled in my throat.
Because I had.
I'd fled when the temple burned. I'd run from the screams.
Their chorus swelled until it was unbearable — a storm of grief and rage. The fog thickened, bleeding into shadow.
And from it stepped another figure.
At first, I thought it was a reflection.
Then I realized — it was me.
Same armor. Same blade. Same scar.
But his eyes burned black, not blue. His voice was hollow as a tomb.
"You seek vengeance," the echo said. "But you don't deserve it."
I raised my blade. "And who decides that? You?"
The revenant smiled — the same cruel half-smile I'd seen in Kaito's face the night he betrayed me.
"I am what you buried. I am the coward that survived."
The world shuddered. The sky wept ash.
Then steel met steel.
The first clash rang like thunder. Sparks burst like dying stars.
He was stronger. Every blow carried the weight of my guilt. My body moved on instinct, blade parrying, twisting, slashing. But each strike tore open the wound in my chest.
Each heartbeat was agony.
Each breath tasted of smoke.
The revenant's speed was unreal — an echo of every mistake I'd ever made.
"Still running," he taunted, driving me back with merciless precision.
"Still hiding behind her light."
The shrine maiden's voice cut through the clash. "Ren, stop! The flame is consuming you!"
But I couldn't stop. Not now. Not when the ghost of who I was sneered before me.
Our blades collided again and again, until my arms burned, my shoulder split, my vision blurred. He pressed me harder, each strike slamming down like a judge's gavel.
"Do you remember when Haruto died?" the revenant hissed, blade sparking against mine. "He called for you. You didn't answer."
The words froze me. His blade slipped past and carved across my ribs. I screamed, blood splattering the ground.
He leaned close, his breath colder than ice. "Weak. Always weak."
I struck wildly, desperately, but every swing only widened my wounds.
The voices of my clan joined him now:
"Betrayer."
"Coward."
"Ghost."
My oath beneath the blood moon twisted into mockery.
I roared, channeling everything — rage, grief, shame — into one desperate strike.
The Yomi Flame erupted from my arm, wrapping my sword in violet fire.
Our blades met — and the world broke open.
A shockwave ripped through the battlefield.
The ghosts screamed as the fire devoured them. The ground split, vomiting ash and blood. Faces flickered in the smoke — familiar, accusing, burning.
The revenant stepped through the blaze, untouched. His eyes were endless voids.
"See what you are," he whispered.
Then his blade pierced my side.
The sound I made was raw, torn from my throat. The flame faltered. Pain swallowed everything.
I staggered back, knees buckling. Blood soaked my armor.
I swung again, but he deflected easily, cutting me across the ribs. The Yomi Flame tried to surge, but I could not control it. It lashed out in wild arcs, burning the ground, scorching the sky.
The revenant laughed — my laugh, twisted. "Even your flame betrays you."
I fell.
The Yomi Flame burst from me, wild and uncontrolled — a storm of light and shadow clawing at the heavens.
It devoured everything: ghosts, soil, even the air.
The revenant reached toward me, expression unreadable. His shadow stretched across the broken battlefield like a second sky.
Then the Maiden's chant split the storm.
Her voice rose like a prayer — ancient, desperate, burning.
Her hands bled as she pressed talismans into the soil. Each charm seared against her skin, glowing crimson and gold, the paper burning as though inked with her veins.
Her words tore through the chaos, binding, forcing, commanding. Each syllable rang like iron striking stone, each breath a wound she endured willingly.
"Ren Kagemura!" she cried. "By my blood, I bind you — return!"
Her voice cracked, but she did not stop. Her knees buckled, blood dripping freely onto the glowing seals. Her skin split, her shoulders shook, but still she chanted.
The circle of light she birthed flared beneath me, spinning outward until it devoured the shadows. The revenant howled, retreating into the dark.
The storm bent inward, flame howling like a beast denied its prey.
The last thing I saw was her face — pale, eyes wet with tears, lips moving with words she no longer had the strength to voice — before the world collapsed.
Darkness folded in on itself.
The flame flickered once, twice, then guttered out.
I floated. Weightless. Wordless.
Somewhere far away, a bell tolled. Deep. Hollow. The same sound that greeted me when I first awoke in Yomi.
Then a whisper.
Not hers. Not mine.
Something older.
You have been chosen once more.
I tried to speak, but the voice drowned me.
But every return has its price.
The world fell away.
When light returned, it was not light at all.
It was blue — pale and cold, seeping through cracks in a stone ceiling.
I lay on a floor carved with runes I did not know. My body was torn, burned, but whole.
The maiden knelt beside me, trembling, exhausted. Blood streaked her sleeves, dripping onto the runes to feed their glow.
"You should not be alive," she whispered.
I coughed — the taste of ash still thick in my mouth. "Then why am I?"
She looked at me with eyes too heavy for her years.
"Because Yomi will not let you die."
I raised my hand. The faint flame glimmered there — weaker, but still pulsing with my heart.
"I lost," I said quietly.
"Yes," she said. "And for that… you may yet be saved."
She rose unsteadily, framed by the glow of the runes.
"Rest, Ren Kagemura," she murmured. "The Thousand-Eyed Gate awaits."
Her words lingered — a promise and a warning both.
The flame curled back into me like a beast retreating to its den.
And for the first time since death, I felt truly cold.