The last train always had that peculiar stillness — the kind that feels less like silence and more like a warning.
Maybe it was the hour. Maybe it was exhaustion. Or maybe it was the way the lights hummed like dying insects above my head.
I was used to this. Late nights, cold convenience store dinners, and the final Yamanote Line back to a one-room apartment that smelled faintly of instant ramen and loneliness.
My name is Hiroshi Tanaka — 27, systems analyst, just another cog in Tokyo's eternal machine.
That night, I boarded the final train out of Shibuya at 12:51 AM. The station was nearly empty, slick with rain. I remember thinking the tiles looked like they were bleeding under the neon lights.
There were only three of us in that car.
A high-school girl — soaked to the bone, holding a crumpled umbrella and staring blankly at her phone.
A man in his fifties, in a cheap gray suit, asleep with his head against the window.
And me.
Three souls who didn't belong anywhere else that night.
The doors slid shut with a hiss. The digital display flickered:
[Next stop] [Ebisu]
The train began to move.
The rhythm of the wheels — kata, kata, kata — was almost soothing. The kind of sound that burrows into your brain and tricks you into forgetting how empty everything feels at this hour.
But halfway between stations, the train slowed.
Then it stopped.
No announcement. No lights outside. Just darkness — thick, absolute.
I glanced up. The sign above the door glitched, cycling through nonsense words before freezing on a two words:
[Not Found]
The girl frowned and looked up from her phone. "Excuse me… is this a tunnel stop?"
I shrugged. "Not supposed to be one here."
She looked around nervously. "It feels like we're still moving."
She was right. The floor trembled faintly — not like wheels on rails, but like something breathing.
Then, every light in the train went out.
For a moment, there was only the sound of rain.
But the rain wasn't outside anymore.
It was inside the train.
Cold droplets fell from the ceiling, dark and sticky. I wiped one from my cheek — it wasn't water. It was warm. Metallic.
Blood.
The girl screamed. The sleeping man jerked awake, swearing under his breath. Then he froze.
Through the windows, the tunnel had vanished.
In its place was a sea of red fog, swirling like liquid.
Shapes drifted through it — pale, long-limbed things that pressed their faces against the glass, leaving streaks behind.
The air felt heavy, charged.
Then the train lurched forward violently. The car shook, sparks flying from the ceiling. I fell into the aisle, my head slamming into a seat edge.
Somewhere, I heard the man shouting. The girl's voice broke into sobs.
And above it all — a sound I can never forget.
A whisper through the speakers.
[Destination] [Veinbound]
The train fell.
No tracks. No ground. Just freefall.
My stomach twisted as gravity vanished, then returned all at once. There was a blinding flash of red light—
And silence.
When I opened my eyes, I was lying on dirt. The air smelled of ash and iron.
The world was wrong.
A black sky, cracked like glass. A red moon, pulsing like a wound. Jagged towers of bone rising from a wasteland of gray dust.
The train lay twisted behind me, half-buried in the earth, its metal bleeding rust.
I staggered to my feet. The girl was there, coughing, smeared with blood but alive. The man in the suit was on his knees, clutching his head.
The rest of the passengers — if there had been any — were gone.
"What… what happened?" the girl whispered.
I didn't have an answer.
Because beyond the wreckage, figures were approaching.
Tall, cloaked shapes — their movements silent, their faces hidden behind masks carved from stone.
Each held a staff made of black wood that pulsed faintly, like a heartbeat.
The man in the suit stood up, shouting, "Hey! You people! Help us!"
The cloaked figures stopped a few meters away. One of them tilted its head.
Then, it said:
"Help? The living are not helped here."
Its voice was smooth, wrong — like someone dragging silk over a coffin lid.
The girl grabbed my sleeve. "what is this place?"
"I don't know," I said. "We need to—"
The ground beneath us moved.
Roots — black, vein-like tendrils — burst from the soil, wrapping around our legs. The man screamed as they pulled him down, the earth swallowing him up to his chest in seconds.
I grabbed the girl's arm, pulling, but the roots were alive — tightening, twitching.
The cloaked figures didn't move. They just watched.
Then one whispered something, and the world seemed to breathe.
The man's scream stopped abruptly. His body went still. The roots retreated.
He was gone.
Only his glasses remained on the ground — cracked, smeared with blood.
The girl and I backed away, gasping for air. My legs felt like lead.
The figures turned to us.
"The transit has chosen," one said. "The debt must be paid."
"What debt?" I shouted. "We didn't do anything!"
The nearest one stepped closer. Beneath the hood, I caught a glimpse of something — not a face, but a mass of eyes and mouths, all whispering at once.
"You boarded the final vessel," it said. "You crossed the last boundary. The world of men is closed to you now."
The girl was crying openly, trembling beside me.
"Please," she said, voice cracking. "We didn't mean to come here."
The figure leaned close enough for me to smell it — dust, rot, and iron.
"Then leave," it said, smiling. "If you can find the way back."
It turned and vanished into the fog, the others following silently behind.
We stood there for a long time, the only sound our breathing.
The train behind us groaned, metal twisting. A faint light pulsed from within — the control panel, flickering weakly.
I approached it. The screen was cracked, but still displayed a single message in red letters:
[New Destination] [The Kingdom of Vein]
[Survivors: 2]
My hands were shaking.
The girl came up beside me, her face pale.
"My name's Aki," she whispered.
I nodded, still staring at the screen. "Hiroshi."
We stood there under that broken sky, the wind howling like a scream, the red moon burning above us.
And somewhere, far off in the distance, we heard the sound of the train's whistle again — long, low, and mournful.
A promise.
Or a warning.