And then it began.
A low hum. A pulse of wrongness.
Ren felt it before he saw it—the air changing, thickening with invisible pressure.
Outside, in the far distance, the corrupted Tree at the heart of Shibuya Sky pulsed again. Its influence spread like a stain through the city's Essence field.
And even here—blocks away—the effect was undeniable.
The child gasped, clutching her rabbit tighter. Her breathing turned sharp, shallow.
Then her skin began to shimmer.
"…Nn—no…" Ren rasped. His voice was barely there—more breath than sound, shredded by pain and blood.
"P…please…"
He could barely raise his head. Every muscle in his body screamed. His lungs burned. But his eyes—his eyes stayed fixed on her.
The girl whimpered, clutching her rabbit tighter—but it began to smoke in her grip.
Essence surged violently beneath her skin.
Glowing cracks split across her small arms like fault lines.
Her pupils dissolved into flickering light.
Her body seized once—then again—as something monstrous clawed its way to the surface of her soul.
Trickstarr knelt beside Ren, unaffected, immaculate. Calm. Patient.
"She never had a chance," he said softly. "Just like your mother. Just like your father."
Ren's body trembled. His fingers, bloody and splintered, dug into the broken floor. He couldn't look away.
"And now?" Trickstarr continued, voice a whisper laced with venom. "You get to watch her become a monster."
The girl screamed.
The sound was sharp, jagged—unnatural.
Her jaw cracked and stretched, distorting into a shape no human should wear.
Tiny fingers gnarled into claws.
Her skin split at the seams.
Veins pulsed with red-black corruption, writhing like worms beneath the surface.
Bones snapped.
Wings began to tear their way free from her back.
"No—stop—" Ren choked out. The words tore from his throat, dry and broken. "She's… just a kid…"
He reached out, dragging himself forward inches at a time, leaving a smear of blood behind him.
Then Trickstarr's hand pressed down between his shoulder blades.
The pressure was effortless.
Crushing.
"You fail everyone," Trickstarr whispered.
Ren's breath hitched. His vision blurred with tears—hot, heavy, searing down his cheeks.
The child—no longer a child—shrieked again. Her feet lifted from the ground, limbs contorted. Her eyes glowed brighter now, pulsing with unstable Essence. Her rabbit doll fell to the floor and instantly incinerated.
And then others around them began to change.
From deeper in the building, more cries echoed.
Groans.
Screams.
Doors slammed.
Walls cracked.
The Tree's influence had reached them too.
A woman stumbled from a nearby room, clutching her stomach. Her skin bubbled, her hair fell away in clumps. She collapsed as her spine twisted, and when she rose, her eyes were wrong.
Another man screamed as his arms turned to claws mid-reach.
It was spreading.
Fast.
The monstrous child lunged toward Ren—mouth wide, claws raised, eyes glowing with ravenous hunger.
And Ren—shaking, bleeding, throat torn raw—reached instinctively for his blade.
But it wasn't there.
His right arm wasn't there either.
Just a torn, blood-crusted stump at the shoulder, cauterized at the edge, twitching uselessly.
The realization hit him like another punch—he hadn't even processed the loss until now.
His breath stuttered. His vision blurred again—grief and pain and exhaustion crowding him like a noose tightening around his skull.
But the monster that had been the little girl was lunging again.
No time.
Ren rolled sideways, gritting his teeth through the agony as he pushed himself up on one knee. His one remaining arm—his left—swept low and caught a broken steel rebar jutting from the rubble.
Crude. Heavy. But sharp.
It would have to do.
He turned and drove it upward.
The bar pierced the creature's chest clean through.
Black blood sprayed across his face.
The monster shrieked, thrashing in midair—its claws raking the ceiling as it began to disintegrate from the core out.
A moment later, all that remained was ash.
Ren collapsed back, panting, the metal bar clattering from his grip.
From across the cracked floor, Trickstarr stood now—taller than before, his silhouette lengthening, shifting.
A crown of glowing, jagged cards now hovered around his head, rotating like a corrupted halo.
Red and black.
Ember and void.
His grin stretched impossibly wide, a rictus of madness.
"Yes…" Trickstarr hissed. "Yes. That's it."
Ren didn't move. Didn't speak. He just stared at the small pile of ash where the girl had been.
His teeth clenched.
His body trembled.
Tears still streamed down his face, hot and silent, but something had changed.
Something had shifted in the center of his chest.
Not grief.
Not horror.
Not anymore.
A slow, steady burn began to rise—deeper than rage, sharper than despair.
"This… is what Trickstarr wants."
"To break me."
Ren exhaled once, slow and deliberate, letting the pain pool around him.
And then he let it go.
He emptied himself of fear, of grief, of guilt.
He let it all burn down to a single blade's edge of focus—sharp, precise, cold.
But not calm.
"If I'm going to end this, I need to think properly before fighting him."
He looked up at Trickstarr.
The cards shimmered behind him—familiar patterns now, burnt into memory from every exchange, every dodge, every loss.
"His essence ability includes a deck of cards. Black for defense. Red for offence. Spades, diamonds, hearts and clubs—each have different attacks."
"Aces are burst techniques. Freeze-frame shields and cleaving finishers."
"Jacks trigger monster transformations—Diamond and Club are already spent. Queens are realms related."
"Joker is active now. His transformation."
"That leaves the two remaining Jacks… and the Kings and the regular cards."
His gaze flicked to the spinning crown of cards. He couldn't tell which ones remained unspent—but he'd seen enough.
Trickstarr wasn't invincible.
He was just... ahead.
And now he was running out of tools.
But Ren had one problem.
"I suck with fists."
He glanced down at his severed right side—just a ragged stub. His dominant arm. His blade-hand.
He grimaced.
"I need to get him away from here. And I need my sword back."
Trickstarr cocked his head.
"No comeback speech? I'm almost disappointed."
He took a slow step forward, cards rippling behind him like dragonfly wings.
Ren didn't answer.
He moved.
A blur—his body surging forward with all the Essence he could channel in one burst.
Not toward Trickstarr—
Past him.
Straight out through the wall behind.
The shockwave shattered stone and steel, debris raining down behind him. Dust exploded outward.
Trickstarr blinked once.
Then grinned.
And followed.
The ground tore open beneath him as Trickstarr launched after Ren, a crimson blur lined with spiraling cards.
With a sharp twist of his wrist, he flung his arm outward.
"You cannot run, Ren Kurose!"
A barrage of diamond-shaped slashes exploded from his sleeve—razor-thin cards whirling like shrapnel—slicing through buildings, vehicles, even the unlucky figures still caught in the street.
The street erupted in chaos.
Civilians screamed and scattered—those who hadn't already turned into snarling, twisted monsters.
Ren gritted his teeth and ducked around a corner, legs burning, every nerve alight.
His eyes scanned frantically—this alleyway's empty, turn left here, that building already evacuated—
He zigzagged through Tokyo's wreckage like a blade cutting air.
And behind him, Trickstarr followed—gleeful, relentless, theatrical chaos in human form.