Shivers laced down Katsu's spine as his boots stopped beside the faint imprints of children's footprints—too light for normal vision, but outlined now in glowing blue.
His veins pulsed the same hue. His eyes flickered, and the world blinked.
Color drained from everything.
Greyscale.
Only the footprints remained illuminated—those, and the subtle pulse of Katsu's body. Like he was made of the same thread that stitched the truth into this land.
"…What is this?" he murmured, breath fogging in the cold magic haze.
The Leviathan stepped out of the air beside him, walking as if the ground were hers.
"Truthsense," she said simply, eyes flickering with pride. "An ability of the old blood. You're seeing through the layers—where magic once was, and where it will be. Ancient Magic is its origin. Every atom, every stone in this town remembers what touched it."
Katsu didn't respond immediately. The air didn't move. Even the trees seemed trapped between heartbeats.
"You said I can see the past?" he asked quietly.
She tilted her head, circling him. "The world bleeds echoes. For now, you're only brushing against the surface—days, maybe months before today. But deeper vision requires sacrifice. Or clarity."
She gestured to the prints. "Follow them. Let the magic guide your sight. Don't resist it. Don't blink."
Katsu stared down again.
"Pull into Truthsense," she instructed, her voice low, reverent now. "Not just through your eyes—through your mana. Let it dig."
He inhaled, then closed his eyes.
His pulse slowed.
And the world changed.
The town stirred—not the present town, but one ghosted in memory. A boy ran through the muddy streets. Laughter echoed from empty windows. A child's shadow flickered across a wall.
Blue light rippled with every step Katsu took, each one unlocking more of the scene.
He whispered, "They were happy."
The Leviathan didn't answer.
Because the vision shifted—sharp and jarring.
The sky darkened. Screams tore through the silence. That same child now limped through the alley, bleeding, eyes wide with terror. Magic tore the air above. A figure loomed—twisted, cloaked in something wrong.
Then everything snapped back. Greyscale. Footprints. Katsu swayed.
"What was that?" he hissed. "That wasn't just memory. That was…"
"A fracture," she whispered. "Something this land hasn't healed from."
Katsu clenched his fists. "I need to see more."
The Leviathan's grin was slow, dangerous. "Then go deeper."
"But how—"
"You ask too many questions, little king," she said, vanishing into a breath of fog. "Truth is not gentle. You want to know what happened here? Let it show you."
And the footprints moved.
Away.
Color rushed back into the world, like a held breath finally released.
Katsu exhaled, shoulders loosening as his vision steadied.
Juju and Rei stared, wide-eyed.
Sydney pressed a hand to her mouth, voice caught in her throat.
"Katsu… your eye," Rei murmured. The usual frost in his tone had melted to unease. "It's glowing. Blue."
Juju's gaze narrowed—not with fear, but fascination. "That's Founder's Art, isn't it?"
Katsu gave a slow nod, still watching the faint, glowing prints stretch farther down the path.
"I'll explain later," he said, already stepping forward. "Just follow me."
He blinked. The glow in his pupils lingered—but the trail was fading.
And time was running out.
They followed without hesitation.
No one spoke.
Even the wind held its breath.
The trail shimmered faintly ahead, weaving between alleys and crumbled walls—toward the heart of the ruins. Each step they took stirred the dust of memory. Stone whispered. Doors creaked on hinges that hadn't moved in years.
Katsu's pace quickened.
He wasn't sure why—only that something waited at the end of this path. Not just a memory. Not just a ghost.
Something real.
The prints veered suddenly into a collapsed chapel, its broken archway still clutching at the sky. Moonlight filtered through shattered stained glass, casting fractured shapes across the floor.
There, the trail stopped.
Katsu knelt. The final imprint was pressed deeper than the rest—smudged, like the child had slipped. There was something etched beside it.
A symbol.
Not carved, but scorched.
"Get back," Katsu said sharply, arm flaring blue as he drew a circle with two fingers, ancient glyphs spinning in its wake.
The others backed off.
The glyph cracked open like a lid.
And the world fell in.
A second vision slammed into him—hot, raw, recent.
The same child, older now. Barefoot, eyes wild with power, arms covered in glowing script. Standing right here, inside the chapel ruins. Whispering something to the ground. Something alive beneath it.
A voice—not the child's—boomed in reply. Deep, ancient. Hungry.
Then—
Darkness.
Silence.
Katsu gasped and jerked back.
Rei caught his arm. "Katsu. What did you see?"
He blinked hard, vision re-stabilizing. "It's not just a fracture anymore. Something woke up here."
Juju stepped forward, eyes narrowing at the glyph still pulsing faintly in the dust. "That's a summoning seal. But it's… reversed."
Sydney looked pale. "Reversed how?"
Katsu stood. "Not to summon something out. To pull someone in."
The ground trembled.
Low. Distant. Like something remembering its name.
The Leviathan whispered in his ear, her voice barely tethered to speech:
You should run, little king. But I know you won't.
Jesus
Katsu's eyes lit up—blue and burning.
He turned to the others. "Get ready. Whatever left that glyph… it's not done."
With a flick of his wrist, his blade snapped into existence, crackling with residual mana.
Sydney drew her short sword, grip steady despite the tremor in her breath.
Rei's staff shimmered into his hands, lightning already dancing at its tip.
Juju just smirked, eyes gleaming. "Finally."
The ground lurched.
Then, with a roar of splintering magic, the entire chapel exploded upward.
The earth convulsed—then detonated.
Splinters of wood and jagged stone tore through the air, slicing past like blades. The chapel vanished in a burst of ruin, flung skyward in a storm of debris.
In its place stood nothing but scorched ground and broken markers—stone columns shattered like gravestones, beams jutting up like ribs from a buried corpse.
A graveyard.
Then—light.
Blinding and cold, it flared from the cracked earth, searing through the mist. Katsu's instincts fired. He raised his arm just in time, Truthsense flaring to life as a veil of blue wrapped around his vision.
Color vanished.
The world dimmed to greyscale again.
And there—just ahead, half-lost in the fog—
A girl.
Small. Barefoot.
No older than seven.
She stood alone, clutching a tattered cloth soaked in blood. It dripped steadily between her fingers, too vivid even in monochrome.
She didn't cry.
She didn't blink.
She just stared.