The morning after Shitsubo unearthed the rune-stone, the survivors rose in uneasy silence. Their eyes were not the same as before. Once, they had looked at him like a figure on the horizon—dangerous, distant, unknowable. Now, they looked at him as if he were a torch dragged into their cave.
Useful.
But liable to burn them alive.
Shitsubo could feel it in the way they gave him space. Even Nare, bold as she had been, kept three steps behind, her voice caught between awe and wariness. The stone had bound them tighter, but it had also placed a gulf between them.
It always did.
---
By midday, rain had begun to fall—thin, needling sheets that slicked the ground into mud. They found shelter in the hollow ribs of a collapsed dwarven hall. Stone arches jutted like teeth, and broken forges lay rusted where the ceiling had caved in.
The group huddled together. Someone produced a packet of dried barley, rationed it out with trembling hands. The girl Nare took her portion without complaint, but her gaze flicked toward Shitsubo, who had set himself apart on the edge of the hall, the rune-stone balanced in his palm.
It pulsed faintly with a rhythm like a heartbeat. Not his own.
Finally, one of the older men broke the silence. His name was Itaru—a smith before the Rift opened. His hands were scarred, burned black at the knuckles, but steady as he spoke.
"You shouldn't keep that thing," he said, voice low. "There are stories of cursed stones. Things that feed on men until nothing of them remains."
Shitsubo did not look up. "Stories are for children."
Itaru's jaw tightened. "And what are we? Children left behind by gods, waiting for men like you to play with powers they don't understand?"
The survivors stirred, glancing nervously at one another. Tension rippled like a rope pulled too tight.
Shitsubo closed his fist around the stone. Its hum crawled up his arm, settling into his veins. He welcomed the discomfort—it reminded him he was awake.
"Say it plainly," he said, his voice cutting through the rain. "You fear me."
Itaru hesitated, then nodded once. "Yes. We fear you. And if you cared for us even half as much as you pretend, you would cast that thing back into the dirt."
At that, Nare spoke up. Her voice wavered but carried strength. "He's the only reason we're still breathing. Do you want to go back out there without him? Back into the mud, the fire, the things waiting in the dark?"
"It isn't about survival," Itaru snapped. "It's about what kind of monsters we let lead us. You've seen what he does. The way his eyes change when he fights. The way the air bends around him. That's not strength. That's rot wearing a man's skin."
The words hung heavy.
Shitsubo let them settle, let the group choke on them. Then he rose slowly, stepping into their circle. His shadow stretched long in the half-light.
"You are right," he said. "This is rot. This is curse. And it will never leave me."
The honesty stunned them into silence. Shitsubo's voice was cold, but there was no denying its truth.
"You follow me because you hope I will carve a path through the Aggressors. But know this—whatever I touch will break. Whatever stays too close will rot with me. That is the price."
Nare's hands clenched at her sides. "Then let us rot, if it means we keep living a little longer."
Itaru turned on her, aghast. "Child—"
But she cut him off. "You think he doesn't know what he is? You think he doesn't feel the way we recoil from him? He told us the truth. That's more than I can say for the gods who abandoned us, or the generals who command us from their towers."
The rain hammered down. In the silence that followed, the survivors looked at one another, torn between the comfort of her defiance and the sting of Itaru's warning.
Finally, Itaru spat into the mud. "So be it. If we're damned, let it be with eyes open."
---
Later, when the others had drifted into uneasy sleep, Nare sat beside Shitsubo. The rune-stone glimmered faintly in his lap, its light painting both their faces.
"You didn't lie to them," she said quietly.
"I don't lie," Shitsubo replied. "Lies are for those who can't bear their own reflection."
She studied him for a long moment. "Do you hate it? The curse?"
He considered. The hum of the stone crawled under his skin, mingling with the older whispers that had haunted him since the first trial.
"Hate?" His lips twisted into something sharp. "No. Hate implies I want it gone. But it cannot be purged. It cannot be cut away. So I will not waste time hating what I am."
"Then what?" she pressed.
"I endure it," he said. "And if others endure me long enough to gain something from it, then so be it. If not, they can leave."
She looked at him with something between sorrow and resolve. "Enduring isn't living."
Shitsubo turned his gaze to the storm. "It is for me."
---
The following days tested them harder. They crossed into lands where the Aggressors had begun their settling—pits carved into the soil where humans were herded like cattle, their bodies altered by Dagon's experiments. The survivors gagged at the sight: men with stone creeping up their limbs, women whose eyes had turned to glowing shale, children whispering in voices not their own.
The Aggressors called them Transplants. Failed hybrids.
One night, while scouting ahead, Shitsubo returned to find the survivors gathered in furious argument.
"It isn't right!" Nare was shouting. "We can't just walk past them like they're already dead!"
"They are dead!" Itaru snapped back. "You saw what they've become. You think they can come back from that? You think he"—he jabbed a finger at Shitsubo—"would even allow it?"
Shitsubo's shadow stretched across them before he spoke. His voice was low, even. "They cannot be saved."
Nare rounded on him, fury flashing. "You don't know that!"
"I know," Shitsubo said simply. "Because I carry the same curse. And unlike them, I was given the strength to walk with it. They weren't. They're already lost."
The silence was brutal. Nare's breath hitched, but she said nothing. Itaru, grim and vindicated, turned away.
Shitsubo left them to their grief. But when he closed his eyes that night, he dreamed of faces sprouting from stone, whispering his name.
---
By the time they reached the ridge where the earth split into a chasm, Shitsubo knew Dagon was near. The soil itself pulsed, veins of granite spreading like infection.
The survivors stood at the edge, staring into the dark fissure below. None dared speak.
Until Nare whispered, voice trembling but fierce:
"If the ground remembers, then so will we. You may carry a curse, Shitsubo… but it doesn't mean you walk alone."
For the first time in years, something stirred in his chest—not warmth, but an ache sharper than his curse. He said nothing.
But the stone pulsed brighter, as though it too had heard.