Skorvald stood like a statue carved from ice and shadow, deep within the cold crypt beneath the forest.
"The ritual is incomplete," he said, his voice like glacial fracture. "You have awakened the Draugr's form — now you must awaken its will."
Eiríkur stood opposite him, the runes on his shoulder glowing faintly in the torchlight. His frost-kagune shimmered with quiet menace, twitching with restrained power. He looked colder than ever — but it was a quiet, deliberate cold. Not apathy. Purpose trying to take shape.
"I've already killed," he said, voice low.
Skorvald's laugh was short and bitter. "Fools. Strays. Half-grown things. That is not how the Draugar claimed their name."
He stepped closer, and the temperature dropped.
"You must slay a true predator. A ghoul whose name is feared. Drink from their core. That is how we earned our right to rule the dead. That is how you stop losing control."
Eiríkur turned away.
But inside him, the wyrd stirred — a hunger older than thought. It didn't argue with Skorvald.
It agreed.
Two days later, his burner phone buzzed — a single, untraceable text.
"Found something. Meet me north of Mt. Kumotori. Remote. Secure. Come alone."
Akira.
He didn't hesitate.
Hours later, the wind clawed at his coat as he ascended through the pine-draped slopes, far from the city's reach. The snow thickened the higher he went, muffling every sound except the crunch of his boots.
There, hidden in the white silence, stood a half-collapsed shrine house. The roof sagged, one wall had rotted through, but a thin plume of smoke told him someone waited.
Inside, Akira sat surrounded by makeshift lab equipment — some stolen from CCG stores, others clearly hand-built. Her silver hair was tied back, her coat black against the fading light.
"I need to know what's happening to you," she said without looking up. "And to me. Because if the CCG finds out what we're doing... we're both dead."
Eiríkur nodded. No argument came. Just quiet agreement.
For the next three days, she studied his blood. His RC pattern. His kagune.
She said little, but never flinched. Not when he bled frost. Not when his voice, mid-sleep, echoed with words in tongues long dead.
She watched everything.
And sometimes, when he was half-asleep, too weak to notice, she sat beside him — silent and still — just long enough to pretend it meant nothing.
On the fourth night, she brought out a half-empty bottle of plum wine and two dented metal cups.
"I always hated silence," she said softly, pouring a drink.
Eiríkur took it, watching her. "You don't strike me as someone who drinks."
"I don't," she said. "But I wanted to see what you're like when you're not... cold."
He stared down at the liquid, the warmth already evaporating against his skin.
"I'm always cold," he said.
And for the first time since they met, she almost smiled.
But then—
Footsteps in the snow.
They stood at once, wine forgotten.
She emerged from the trees like a storm — soaked, furious, trembling from exhaustion and emotion.
Touka.
"I followed your scent," she spat, her eyes locked on Eiríkur. "I knew you were hiding something. I just didn't expect… this."
Her gaze shifted — to Akira, to the wine, to the flickering fire.
"Working with the CCG? Drinking together? What the hell are you now, Eiríkur?"
He opened his mouth, but she cut him off.
"No. You listen."
Her Ukaku burst to life — jagged blue wings of light slicing the night.
"You disappeared. You froze a ghoul in the middle of my ward. Then you come back looking like a corpse in armor and now you're hiding in the mountains with her?"
Eiríkur felt the wyrd surge.
The old power. The call to dominance.
"I'm trying to stop something worse," he said. "There are others like me. And something's coming. I can't play the weak, friendly half-ghoul anymore."
Touka's voice cracked — pain laced with fury. "So you really are becoming one of them."
A long silence.
Then she charged.
Snow exploded beneath her feet. Ukaku bolts tore the air as she struck — fast, precise, wounded.
Eiríkur met her with restraint. Ice-blades formed around his arms. He didn't attack — he blocked. Dodged. Defended.
Her fury was beautiful — and tragic.
He formed ice-armor over his chest, parrying her attacks until the cold slowed her wings and exhaustion took hold. Her breaths grew shallow. Her stance faltered.
He stepped back.
And she fell to her knees.
"I wanted to believe you were still… you," she said, voice small against the night.
"I am," he answered.
"But I'm not just that anymore."
She looked up at him, tears in her eyes, but her strength unbroken.
"Then stop pretending and choose who you're going to be."
And before he could respond, she vanished into the trees — swallowed by snow and silence.
Later, Eiríkur sat beside the fire again, frost still curling from his shoulders.
Akira sat across from him, watching.
"You didn't kill her," she said.
"No."
"You could have."
"I know."
She stared at him for a long time.
Then, softly — "You're not like the others."
He said nothing.
Just watched the flames as they flickered against the frost steaming from his skin.