I couldn't even tell how many years it had been.

Time had lost its shape. Memories had been scorched away.

But one thing was certain.

> I was back here again.

That truth alone brought crushing despair.

Once, just walking on this spiked earth would make my feet scream.

Now… they no longer did.

The pain of the needles, the flow of blood, the grinding of my soul—

I'd grown used to them.

No... not used to.

I’d simply stopped feeling.

---

That day, I was walking the sea of needles as always—

when I saw it.

A figure up ahead.

Someone was walking faster than I was,

stepping through the spikes with unwavering silence.

It was a man.

Tall, with black hair falling to his nape.

Lean, almost gaunt—

but his posture was perfectly straight.

There was a strange clarity and power to the way he walked.

It caught my eye, in a place where nothing ever did.

The dead here weep, scream, collapse—

Everyone is too busy enduring.

But he… he looked like someone moving forward with purpose.

---

“…”

I wanted to speak to him.

I didn’t know why.

But the words slipped out on their own.

“…Hey. How many years… has it been for you?”

My voice cracked like a brittle thread deep in my throat.

He didn’t react.

“…Can you hear me?”

“…What’s your name…?”

Nothing.

He kept walking.

He never turned around.

He didn’t say a word.

It was as if my voice didn’t exist.

Even so, I kept walking behind him.

I didn’t know why.

But I knew one thing—

That back hadn’t broken.

And in this hell,

it was the first time I’d seen someone who still seemed… alive.

---

Days passed.

His back remained as silent as ever.

No matter how I called to him,

he never turned around.

As if he had left emotion and speech behind somewhere long ago.

And yet—

> “Yeah… right now, I’m alive… only because I have that back to follow.”

That’s how it felt.

That silent back,

shone like something real—

like hope.

---

His name?

That would come much later.

For now, this was just the beginning—

of the story of a nameless soul called Kanata Yomi,

and the silent back he followed through hell.

---