Kaneki Ken had always believed that ordinary was safe. That life—predictable classes, quiet afternoons in the library, evenings spent lost in books—was all there was to know. Ordinary was simple, manageable, and… unremarkable.
And that was why he never expected the world to rip itself apart on a Tuesday afternoon.
The library was nearly empty, save for the soft scratching of pens and the occasional whisper of pages turning. Kaneki, glasses sliding down his nose, hunched over a novel he'd read dozens of times. He didn't care about the world outside these walls—it moved too fast, too loud, too unpredictable. He preferred the rhythm of sentences, the quiet intimacy of ink and paper.
Then she appeared.
Rize.
He noticed her before he consciously did. Violet eyes that seemed too sharp for any human, hair like a river of midnight silk, and a presence that made the air itself feel colder. She smiled at him—not a polite smile, but one that pressed into his chest like a warning.
"You like books?" she asked, voice soft, yet with a subtle weight, a pull that made his heart stutter.
Kaneki swallowed. He wasn't sure why, but he nodded.
"Good," she said, and leaned slightly closer. "Because I like them too."
It was a simple exchange, almost mundane. Yet something about it twisted the ordinary into an impossible tension. The room felt smaller, the walls closing in. He couldn't take his eyes off her, and the rational part of his brain—the part that knew nothing good could come from strangers with unnatural eyes—was screaming.
But before he could even process the warning, the café opened. The smell of coffee, of baked bread, warmed the small space. Kaneki followed her, silent, drawn as if by some invisible tether.
They sat at a corner table. It should have been ordinary. It should have been safe. And for a fleeting heartbeat, he allowed himself to think it was.
Rize laughed softly. The sound was melodic, delicate… and somehow wrong. It laced itself into his chest, twisted into a feeling of both fear and curiosity.
"Do you want to see something interesting?" she asked.
Kaneki nodded, unsure.
Her smile widened, just a fraction too much. And then—movement.
It was fast, impossibly fast. Before Kaneki could react, Rize lunged. Fangs flashed in the dim light. The world slowed, a cruel paradox: every nerve screamed in terror, yet every muscle betrayed him, frozen.
Pain exploded. Sharp, searing, primal. Kaneki felt himself lifted, thrown, the ground sliding away. His vision fractured—blurred faces, stretching walls, the surreal dance of violence that didn't feel like reality.
The last thing he saw before darkness claimed him was her eyes. Wide, unblinking, and terrifying.
He woke to the sterile scent of antiseptic and the unrelenting beep of machines. Pain radiated through his body, deep and insistent, but not just from injury. Something else throbbed beneath the surface—a gnawing, crawling, unnatural need.
Kaneki tried to move, but the body beneath him felt alien. Limbs didn't obey. He tried to speak, to call out, but even his voice betrayed him—dry, rough, strange. Panic bubbled up. He clawed at the sheets, at the walls, at anything, desperate for normalcy.
Then he realized the hunger.
Not the hunger of a student skipping lunch. Not the hunger of a late-night craving. This was deep, sharp, primal. It gnawed at his mind, twisted his gut, whispered a terrifying promise: you need to feed. Feed… or die.
A nurse entered, or someone who appeared human enough. Kaneki recoiled, instincts screaming, heart hammering. He saw her not as a caregiver but as… something else. A target.
"You're safe," she said, stepping back, hands raised. But her voice didn't reach him. The monster inside him—a part he hadn't yet understood—was awake, and it didn't care about reassurances.
Memories and sensations he'd never known flashed in his mind: speed, hunger, instinct, strength. Fear twisted into something darker, something intoxicating. Kaneki's reflection in a monitor caught his attention: black sclera, red iris. Eyes not his own.
I'm… not human.
The word tasted like ash.
Time blurred. Hours, days—he couldn't tell. Every moment was a struggle, a battle between what he remembered as Ken Kaneki and the gnawing, ravenous hunger demanding control. Normal food felt empty, meaningless. His mind screamed, and the world—once simple, safe—had cracked into jagged shards.
And then she appeared.
Touka. Fierce. Sharp. Beautiful in a dangerous, unsettling way. She did not scream. She did not flee. Instead, she watched him with a cold, assessing gaze, as if measuring the depth of his soul.
"Control it," she said, voice steady, cutting through the chaos. "Or it will control you."
Her words struck harder than any punch. Kaneki nodded, though inside, he was crumbling. Every shadow whispered temptation. Every moment of silence pressed against his mind like a weight. Hunger, fear, confusion—every instinct screamed for surrender.
But somewhere, buried beneath terror and nausea, a seed took root. Survival.
I have to survive. No matter what it takes.
Kaneki Ken's ordinary life was gone. Erased. Burned to nothing by one encounter, one impossible event, one monstrous truth. In its place was something new, something terrifying—and terrifyingly alive.
The world outside the hospital room waited. Unforgiving. Brutal. Full of secrets and monsters. And Kaneki Ken, student, dreamer, reader of books, would step into it a changed man—or not at all.
This was the first step. The moment when ordinary shattered. The moment a monster awakened.
And somewhere, deep and silent, a whisper promised pain, struggle, and the first taste of what it meant to be a half-ghoul.