Aira didn't sleep.
She sat on the edge of her cot in the Drift Chamber, arms wrapped around her knees, back turned to Rei.The stars outside the dimensional window pulsed like slow, ancient heartbeats.
Rei had finally passed out — exhausted from the earlier surge.
And Aira?
Aira waited for the silence to start screaming.
She pulled out a small charm from around her neck.It was old. Paper, sealed in resin.On it, faded ink:
"To protect. To remember. To return."
She pressed it to her chest.
And, as if summoned by the memory, her mind slipped back.
⟡ Flashback: Years Ago
Aira was twelve.The temple burned.
Smoke swallowed the night.Her family — gone.Her master — bleeding out at the altar.
And the thing that emerged from the fire wasn't a god.It was a broken fragment of something older. Something that called itself:
"Shadekin.""The eye left behind by a Shadow that did not weep."
It found her crawling through ash.
"Do you wish to survive?" it whispered."Then wear me."
And she had.
For years, Aira thought it made her strong. Untouchable.
Until she realized she'd stopped remembering her mother's voice.Until she realized she couldn't sleep without hearing it in the walls.
She'd clawed it back — control — but the scars never left.
"I never chose this," she whispered into the dim chamber.
"But I made the mistake of not saying no fast enough."
She looked over at Rei, sleeping.
"He reminds me of me.Just more… stupid."
She smiled to herself. But it didn't reach her eyes.
⛧ Inside Rei — The Mind Crucible
Far below the surface of his thoughts, Rei drifted through a void.
His dreams were colorless — until it appeared.
The Smiling Shadow didn't walk. It emerged.A silhouette made of laughter and teeth and velvet-black blood.
It sat across from him at a table that hadn't been there before.
"They want to weaken you," it said."To dilute us. To chain me to threads of lesser minds."
Rei stared, unblinking. "You're not supposed to be talking to me yet."
"And yet here we are," the Shadow grinned.
It tilted its head.
"You're changing, Rei. Not faster. But... deeper.That girl — the one with the scar in her soul — she would've let me in."
"But you? You're still fighting. Still bleeding."
It leaned closer.
"That's why I like you."
Rei opened his mouth to reply —And woke up gasping.