The city looked ordinary at night.
Streetlights hummed, cars passed in lazy intervals, and people moved with the comfort of those who believed the world made sense. From the outside, nothing was wrong. That was always how it started.
He stopped walking.
The feeling came again—soft, almost polite, like a hand brushing the edge of his awareness. Not danger. Not yet. Just… wrong. The kind of wrong that didn't scream, only waited.
He exhaled slowly and kept his eyes forward.
If he stared too long at nothing, people noticed. And when people noticed, questions followed.
The sensation lingered anyway, crawling beneath his skin. It always started there. A faint pressure in his chest, like something pressing against a locked door from the inside. He had learned to live with it. Learned to ignore it. Most days, that was enough.
Tonight, it wasn't.
He crossed the street and passed a narrow building with dim lights and a discreet sign near the entrance. To anyone else, it was just another hotel—quiet, expensive, forgettable. To him, it felt different. Clean. Empty in a way that wasn't hollow.
Neutral ground.
No business. No interference. Rules older than the city itself wrapped around the place like invisible walls. Even the sensation inside him dulled when he walked past it, as if something unseen had turned away.
He didn't stop. He never did.
"Still zoning out like that," a voice said beside him, light and familiar. "One day you're going to walk into traffic."
He glanced over. Kira walked at his side, hands in his pockets, expression relaxed like always. Same pace. Same timing. Kira had a habit of appearing without announcement, as if he knew exactly when he'd be needed.
"I was watching the road," he said.
"Sure you were."
Kira smiled, but his eyes flicked briefly toward the hotel before returning forward. Just a glance. Too quick to mean anything. Too precise to be nothing.
They walked in silence for a moment.
"Did you feel that?" Kira asked casually.
He stiffened before he could stop himself. "Feel what?"
Kira shrugged. "Thought I sensed something weird. Probably nothing."
Probably nothing.
That phrase irritated him more than it should have. He had heard it from angels who refused to intervene, from humans who couldn't see past their own lives, from himself when he didn't want to face what he was.
He let it go. "You're imagining things."
"Yeah," Kira said easily. "Guess I am."
But the pressure in his chest hadn't faded. It was stronger now—subtle, patient, aware. Whatever it was, it wasn't breaking rules. Not yet. That was what worried him most.
They reached the end of the street, where the lights thinned and the noise softened. The city breathed differently here. Slower. Like it was listening.
He paused.
This time, he didn't fight the feeling.
Something noticed him.
Not a presence in the physical sense. No footsteps. No shadow stretching too long. Just awareness brushing against awareness, testing boundaries. The sensation slipped past his defenses as if they weren't there at all.
A voice stirred deep inside him—not spoken, not heard, but understood.
So this is where you are.
His hand clenched at his side. Heat flared briefly beneath his skin, sharp and familiar. He forced it down before it could rise any further. Power answered instinct faster than thought, and instinct was dangerous.
Kira stopped beside him. "Hey," he said, quieter now. "You okay?"
He didn't answer immediately.
For the first time in years, the presence didn't retreat. It stayed. Watching. Measuring.
Half-blood, it whispered, almost amused.
His breath caught.
It knew.
He turned sharply, scanning the street, the rooftops, the dark spaces between lights. Nothing. No sign. No figure. Just the city, unchanged and uncaring.
But he knew better.
This wasn't a passing disturbance. This wasn't another minor shift in the balance he had grown used to ignoring.
This was deliberate.
Kira was watching him closely now. Not smiling. Not joking.
"You felt it too," Kira said. It wasn't a question.
He met his friend's eyes, searching for something—anything—that made sense. Trust had always come easily with Kira. That, more than anything, frightened him.
"Yeah," he admitted. "I did."
The presence withdrew at last, leaving behind a quiet that felt heavier than before.
As they resumed walking, one thought settled in his mind, cold and undeniable:
The rules were still intact.
But someone had just proven they could see past them.
And whoever—or whatever—it was, had found him first.