The shrine sat sunken in the green, half-eaten by moss and time. Its wooden frame leaned into the forest like it was tired of standing, beams weathered soft-gray by rain and age. Whatever color it once wore had long since faded—now it was a skeleton of itself, quiet and forgotten beneath a canopy that filtered the afternoon light into slanted gold and heavy shadow.

The air was thick, damp with soil and leaves, faintly sweet with the memory of long-burnt incense. Dust hung in the sunbeams like tiny ghosts too slow to leave. At the center of the shrine rested a squat stone altar, worn smooth by centuries of weather and silence. Three objects flanked it: a rusted katana, its hilt nearly fused with age; a cracked clay bowl, stained dark with something that might’ve been blood; and between them, a sphere of obsidian no larger than a grapefruit, etched with golden sigils that pulsed like embers buried deep in glass.

It didn’t belong there. It didn’t belong anywhere.

A young man stood at the threshold, sneakers scuffing lightly against the warped floorboards. He didn’t move. Arms folded tightly, fingers dug into his sleeves. He wasn’t afraid of the dark, or ghosts, or cursed swords, or ruined forest temples. But this—this he was afraid of.

The air pressed back. Not with weight, but with something else. Expectation. Like the shrine was waiting for him to speak first.

“Takahashi Jin, you gonna stand there forever, or are you just building suspense?”

The voice echoed from deeper inside, amused and effortless. It belonged to none other than Tachibana Reika, stood by the altar already, framed by shafts of light and shadow like she belonged to both. She moved like she owned the silence, boots silent against the boards, her black jacket catching the light like liquid ink. Her grin came easy, her eyes sharp as ever.

Jin didn’t answer right away. He was too busy watching how the shadows bent around her, how the sigils on the sphere flickered when she stepped too close. “Reika, this place is—” He hesitated, frowning. “Off.”

She shrugged, circling the altar like it was some forgotten relic in a museum. “It’s old. That’s what you’re feeling. History.” Crouching beside the sphere, she rested her elbows on her knees, head tilted like a cat inspecting something just out of reach. “Besides, don’t you think it’s kind of beautiful?”

Jin stepped inside reluctantly, the floor groaning underfoot. Every instinct told him to leave. “You’ve seen too many ghost movies,” he muttered, hugging his arms tighter.

“And you haven’t seen enough,” she said, still watching the sphere.

He came closer, eyeing the object. “What even is that thing?”

She didn’t answer. Her hand hovered inches from its surface.

The sigils pulsed—just once. A faint breath, like something deep inside it had stirred.

Reika exhaled, slow and quiet. “It’s warm.”

Jin’s blood ran cold. “What?”

“Like it’s breathing,” she said. “Or… remembering.”

There was something different in her voice—soft, thoughtful. Not reverent, but curious in the way she always was, like the world was a puzzle she couldn’t resist breaking open. He didn’t like that. “Things like that shouldn’t feel like anything,” he said flatly.

Finally, she looked back at him. Her expression was unreadable—mischief laced with something deeper. Her eyes, catching the light just right, gleamed like cut amethyst.

“What if it’s waiting for someone?”

He didn’t like that either. “Then let’s not be them. Seriously, Reika. Don’t.”

She smiled. Wider now. Too calm. “You worry too much.”

“And you don’t worry enough.”

“You’re probably right.”

Then she touched it.

Just a fingertip.

The shrine convulsed. A soundless quake tore the silence apart as light erupted from the sigils, flooding the room in blinding gold. The air collapsed inward. Jin shouted, lunging for her—but the floor heaved beneath him. He caught one last glimpse of Reika’s wide eyes, her mouth open in shock—and then she was gone.

The world tore loose.

The shrine. The forest. The air.

Everything unraveled.

Only the light remained—swallowing him whole.

And then—darkness.

Jin woke to cold mud pressed against his cheek and the coppery taste of blood on his tongue. He lay sprawled on his stomach, half-sunk in muck that reeked of rot and iron. Something warm and sticky trickled down the side of his face—blood, and not necessarily his own. Every breath was a ragged gasp that burned his lungs. With a low groan, he forced his eyes open to a world that made no sense.

Above him stretched a bruised red sky that certainly wasn’t the one over Tokyo. Dark clouds hung low, veined with black as if trails of smoke had been frozen in mid-collapse. The familiar shrine where he’d stood moments ago was gone; in its place lay an open clearing blanketed in ash and an unnatural silence. The clearing was ringed by skeletal trees, their blackened limbs reaching toward the bloody sky like gnarled fingers. It was a scene from a nightmare—eerily still, and utterly wrong.

Jin’s head pounded, each heartbeat like a hammer behind his eyes. Fighting panic, he pushed himself onto hands and knees. Mud clung to his limbs, sucking at him, and his palms came away slick with blood—not his own. Whose then? A chill crawled up his spine.

The ground trembled with a distant boom, rippling the stagnant puddles around him. He forced himself to his feet, legs shaking, and grasped a nearby tree for support. The bark was oddly warm, pulsing beneath his palm like a slow heartbeat. Fear tightened his chest. He had no answers, only a fierce, primal urge: survive.

An unnatural silence pressed in, broken only by Jin’s ragged breaths. He opened his mouth, ready to call out—but a thunderous roar shattered the quiet. Jin spun around, heart hammering. Three massive shapes emerged from the swirling fog, twice a man's height, broad-shouldered, their cracked gray-green skin like stone. Monstrous faces with tusked jaws snarled, burning red eyes locked onto him. Oni. Demons from myth, now terrifyingly real, clutching clubs caked with dried blood and flesh.

For a heartbeat, Jin was too terrified to move, mind blank with primal horror. One oni snorted, breaking his paralysis. Run! He bolted blindly through the undergrowth, branches clawing at him, mud slipping beneath his feet. Heavy footfalls shook the ground behind him, rapidly closing in.

Jin’s foot snagged a root, sending him sprawling face-up in the muck. He gasped desperately for air as one of the creatures loomed overhead, club rising for a deadly strike. Frozen, he watched death descend—

SHIIING! A blur of silver flashed into view. The oni’s roar became a shriek, hot blood splattering Jin’s face. He flinched, arms shielding his eyes, as the massive shadow beside him toppled away.

The oni’s massive forearm lay severed on the ground not a foot from Jin, still clutching the broken handle of its club. Black blood gushed from the stump, coating nearby roots and spattering Jin’s legs. The demon staggered back, howling in agony and confusion. Jin stared, struggling to comprehend what had happened, until his gaze landed on a figure standing between him and the wounded oni.

A man clad entirely in black armor had appeared, seemingly from nowhere. A curved sword gleamed in his hand, dark blood dripping from its edge. Before the injured oni could recover, the stranger lunged forward. Swish—the blade flashed once across the creature’s thick throat, silencing its shriek in a wet gurgle. A black line burst open, unleashing a torrent of blood as the demon crashed heavily into the mud, shaking the ground beneath Jin.

Jin gaped, chest heaving. The remaining two oni bellowed in rage and rushed the swordsman, swinging massive weapons with lethal intent. Unfazed, the warrior moved fluidly between them. One oni slammed its club downward, but the armored man sidestepped effortlessly, causing the weapon to crater harmlessly into the earth. The stranger slipped behind the demon, severing the tendons at the back of its knee with a precise strike. The oni fell, snarling in pain.

The third demon swung a massive cleaver toward the swordsman, who met the blow head-on. Steel clashed against steel, showering sparks. For a heartbeat, man and beast were locked in place. Then, swiftly twisting aside, the warrior drove his katana deep into the oni’s chest. The demon convulsed, blade sinking between its ribs. The warrior withdrew his sword and pivoted sharply, delivering a decisive slash across the kneeling oni’s throat. It toppled forward, head at a grotesque angle.

Suddenly, the clearing was quiet. Three monstrous corpses lay still, steaming black blood pooling around severed limbs. Jin stared in disbelief, every muscle quivering with shock. He was alive—miraculously, impossibly alive. He struggled upright, pushing back from the nearest corpse, desperate for clean air.

The man in black armor stood calmly amid the carnage, as if this were routine. He looked like an avenging phantom from a Sengoku-era legend, angular armor splashed with demon blood. A horned helmet and half-mask obscured most of his face, leaving visible only sharp, dark eyes. Though of average height, his poised stance made him appear larger. With practiced ease, he flicked ichor from his sword and sheathed it smoothly at his side.

After ensuring no oni drew breath, the stranger turned toward Jin, demon blood evaporating off his armor in the cool air. Those dark eyes assessed Jin intently. Heart lurching, Jin realized he couldn’t be certain of the warrior’s intentions, even though he'd been saved. Trembling, Jin pushed awkwardly to his feet, wiping slick hands on his filthy jeans.

The armored man spoke first, his voice low and collected, as if they were discussing nothing more exciting than the weather. “You’re fortunate I came along,” he said. “Another couple of seconds and they’d be scraping your guts off the dirt.” There was no boast in his tone, just a flat statement of fact.

Jin opened his mouth, but at first nothing came out except a shaky exhale. “I—” he stammered, finally finding his voice. “I thought… I was sure I was dead.” He swallowed, forcing down the hysterical laughter bubbling in his chest. “Th-thank you. Thank you. I don’t even know how—” His words were tumbling over themselves. He wasn’t sure what to say to the person who had single-handedly slaughtered monsters to save him.

Up close, the man was examining Jin with a mixture of impatience and mild disbelief. “You look like you’ve never fought a day in your life,” he said bluntly. The comment cut through Jin’s babbling. The armored stranger’s eyes flicked over Jin’s attire—sneakers, mud-streaked track pants, a torn hoodie—certainly not the clothes of a warrior.

Jin managed a weak, humorless laugh. “That obvious, huh?” he replied breathlessly. “I-I’ve never… No, I’ve never fought anyone. Or anything.” He rubbed his arms, noticing only now that he was cold. Shock, probably. “I don’t even know what’s going on. I just—” Jin broke off, realizing that he was dangerously close to losing composure. He inhaled deeply to steady himself, the way he might after a nightmare. “I just woke up here. I have no idea where here is.”

The man in armor tilted his head slightly. Though most of his face was hidden, Jin imagined an eyebrow raising behind that metal mask. “No idea?” he repeated. His tone had a new edge to it—wariness, perhaps.

Jin shook his head quickly. “None. I know it sounds crazy, but one moment I was somewhere else, and the next I was lying in that clearing.” He cast a haunted glance back toward where he’d awoken, now partially obscured by haze and the hulking bodies of dead oni. “I swear, I don’t know how I got here.”

Silence hung between them for a second. The armored man’s posture remained rigid and alert, but Jin caught a subtle hesitation in him, as if the stranger was reassessing the situation. Finally, the man gave a short, exasperated sigh. “Wonderful,” he muttered, dripping with sarcasm. “You just dropped into the middle of oni country with no clue where you are. That’s even worse than wandering out from a village.”

Jin’s cheeks burned with a mix of embarrassment and frustration. He bit back a retort—this man had saved him, after all. Instead he asked quietly, “Where am I, exactly? You said ‘oni country’…”

The stranger’s hand rested lightly on the hilt of his sword as he replied, “This is the outer forest of Kagetora.” He nodded in the direction behind him, where the blood-red sky was partly obscured by treetops. “Human territory technically ends back at the warding stones near the wall. Out here, it’s mostly demons prowling. Oni, raiders, the occasional yokai looking for trouble.” He paused, his gaze sharpening. “Not a place you should be strolling around. Especially not dressed like that,” he added, almost as an afterthought.