Rion woke to the sound of… nothing.
It was an absence so profound it felt heavy, a physical weight pressing down on his small chest. In the shrine, silence was never truly silent. There was always the morning song of the mountain thrushes, the rhythmic swishing of Aya's broom against the stone pavers, or the distant, melodic chime of wind bells dancing in the breeze.
But today, the world held its breath.
He stared up at the wooden ceiling, tracing the familiar grain of the cedar beams with eyes that felt gritty and dry. The air in the room was stale, lacking the crisp scent of incense that usually drifted from the main hall.
A dream, Rion told himself, the thought fragile and desperate. Just a bad dream.
He squeezed his eyes shut, willing the scary pictures to dissolve. The storm that had torn the sky apart. The smell of burning wood. The giant shadow that had risen from the earth, staring at him with a hundred red eyes. It had to be a nightmare—a twist of the mind caused by a high fever from playing in the rain.
Any moment now, he thought, clutching the blanket to his chin. Reiko will slide that door open. She'll jump on my stomach and tell me I'm late for breakfast. Father will be waiting in the courtyard with his wooden sword, looking stern until I make him smile.
He waited. One heartbeat. Two. Ten.
The door remained shut. The silence stretched, transforming from peaceful to suffocating. It felt like the house was empty.
Rion tried to sit up.
A gasp escaped his lips as a wave of exhaustion pinned him to the futon. His body felt wrong. It wasn't just tired; it felt leaden, as if his bones had been filled with sand. Every muscle fiber screamed in protest, a dull, aching throb that pulsed in time with his slow heartbeat.
"Reiko?" he called out.
His voice was a tiny, rusted squeak. It cracked in the dry air, sounding so weak it frightened him.
With a trembling effort that left him panting, Rion pushed himself upright. The room spun wildly. He gripped the edge of his bedding, waiting for the nausea to pass. When the spinning slowed, he opened his eyes fully.
The world shattered.
Vertigo slammed into him again, harder this time. He wasn't seeing one room; he was seeing two.
His left eye saw the world in excruciating, hyper-real detail. He could see the dust motes dancing in a shaft of sunlight, not just as specks, but as jagged, individual particles. He could see the microscopic fractures in the wooden wall, the weave of the tatami mats down to the individual straw.
His right eye, however, saw something that made him want to scream. The colors were drained away, replaced by a gray, dead world. But overlaid on this dullness were pulsing veins of energy—jagged lines of white and violet that flowed through the floorboards and the walls like ghost blood. It was messy, chaotic, and it made his head pound.
Rion stumbled out of his futon, his balance destroyed by the confusing sights. He crashed into the small dresser, clutching it to stay upright. Above it hung a small polished bronze mirror.
Slowly, terrified of what he might find, Rion lifted his head.
The boy staring back was a stranger.
The familiar, warm amber of his eyes—the eyes everyone said looked like his father's—were gone. In their place were two pools of deep, piercing crimson. They glowed faintly in the dim light of the room, looking scary and alien.
He leaned closer, his breath fogging the metal.
In the center of his right pupil, a white symbol burned softly, etching itself into the red iris: Alpha (Α).
In his left, its twin pulsed with a rhythmic light: Omega (Ω).
"What… what is this?" Rion whispered. He reached up, his small fingers tracing the skin around his eyes. It felt cold to the touch.
Panic, sharp and sudden, flared in his chest. He instinctively reached inward, trying to summon the warm, golden hum of his chakra. Since he was a baby, that warmth had been his constant companion—a flowing river of light that felt like a hug from the world.
But the river was dry.
In its place, deep in the pit of his stomach, sat something else. It was a dense, cold mass. It felt heavy and ancient, like a cold stone dropped into a deep well. It didn't flow; it coiled. It felt mean.
I'm not me anymore, the realization hit him, tears pricking the corners of his strange new eyes. The cold dread seeped into his marrow. I'm awake. And I'm wrong.
The sound of the sliding door grinding open was like a thunderclap in the quiet room.
Rion spun around, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. For a split second, hope flared—irrational, childish hope. He expected his mother's gentle smile, or Aya's teasing grin.
It was Reiko.
But the girl standing in the doorway was not the sister who had braided grass rings for him yesterday. That girl had been made of sunshine and laughter. This girl looked like a ghost.
She wore mourning robes of stark, heavy black—a color that looked violent against her pale skin. Her hair, usually tied back in a neat, cheerful ribbon, hung loose and messy around her face. Her cheeks were hollow, her eyes red-rimmed and swollen almost shut.
She carried a wooden tray with a bowl of miso soup and a cup of water. Her hands were shaking so badly the ceramic clattered against the wood.
When she looked up and saw Rion standing there—leaning against the dresser, his eyes glowing crimson with strange white sigils—she froze.
The tray tipped.
Crash.
The bowl shattered into jagged shards. Hot soup splashed across the pristine tatami mats, steaming in the cool air. The cup rolled away, spilling water like a miniature flood.
Neither of them moved to clean it up. Neither of them even looked at the mess.
Reiko stared at him, her chest heaving. Rion braced himself. He shrunk back against the dresser. She's going to scream, he thought. She's going to run away from the monster.
Instead, her face crumbled.
"Rion…"
She didn't ask about his eyes. She didn't ask why he looked different. She simply rushed forward, crossing the distance in two desperate strides, and fell to her knees, pulling him into a crushing, desperate hug.
The impact nearly knocked Rion over. She buried her face in the crook of his neck, and he felt the damp, searing heat of her tears instantly soaking through his sleep robe. She shook violently, a silent, agonizing scream racking her small body.
Rion stood frozen, his arms hovering uncertainly over her back. He felt confused. Why was she shaking? Why was she wearing black?
Rion's arms lowered. He wrapped them around his sister's black robes, his fingers clutching the fabric tight because he was scared.
"You're awake," she sobbed into his neck, her voice muffled and thick. "I thought… I thought you wouldn't wake up either."
Either.
The word hung in the air, sharper than any knife. It was a wrong word. A bad word.
Rion held her for a long time. He stared over her shoulder at the empty doorway, waiting for the others. Where was Father? He should be here, picking up the broken bowl. Where was Mother? She should be rushing in to check if they were burned by the soup.
"Reiko," Rion whispered. His voice sounded like grinding stones. "Where are they?"
Reiko stiffened in his arms. The sobbing stopped abruptly, replaced by a terrified stillness. She pulled back, just an inch, her hands gripping his shoulders so hard it hurt. She looked him in the eyes—ignoring the crimson, ignoring the Alpha and Omega—and Rion saw a pain so deep it made his stomach hurt.
"Father…" she started, then choked. She swallowed hard, forcing the words past a throat closed by grief. "The tunnel. He stayed behind to collapse it. To stop the… the things from following."
Rion stared at her. He didn't blink. Collapsed? Stayed behind?
"He didn't make it, Rion," she whispered, the truth finally spilling out. "He's gone."
Rion felt the blood drain from his face. The world seemed to tilt on its axis. Gone? The strongest man he knew? The man who could lift him high above his head with one arm? Dead?
"No," Rion said softly. "He's strong. He promised to teach me the sword tomorrow."
Reiko shook her head, fresh tears spilling over her lashes. "He can't, Rion. He's gone."
"And Mother?" Rion asked, his voice rising in panic.
Reiko squeezed her eyes shut, her face twisting in confusion and fear. "We… we don't know."
Rion froze. "What?"
"We found her in the chamber with you," Reiko whispered, her voice trembling. "The demon was gone. The seal was quiet. But Mother… she was just lying there."
"Is she hurt?"
"There isn't a scratch on her," Reiko cried. "But she won't wake up. Daetsu and the healers… they don't understand. They say her spirit is there, but it's faint. It's like she's lost somewhere inside herself."
"Did she seal the monster?" Rion asked.
"She must have," Reiko said, though she sounded unsure. "The monster is gone. So she must have stopped it. But no one knows how. No one knows what happened in that room, Rion. Only you were there."
The silence that followed was absolute.
Rion looked past her, at the dust motes dancing in the sun. They looked so peaceful. So indifferent.
His mind couldn't hold it. It was too big. It was like trying to hold a mountain in his hands. Father was dead. Mother was sleeping a sleep no one understood. And the demon was gone.
A single tear leaked from his Omega eye, burning a trail down his cheek. It felt hot, like acid.
"I want them back," he whimpered. It was a small, pathetic sound. "Reiko, tell them to come back."
"I can't," Reiko cried, pulling him close again. "I can't."
Rion buried his face in her shoulder. The dam broke. He cried with the total, abandoning despair of a child who has lost his world. They collapsed together onto the floor, amidst the spilled soup and shattered pottery, two small islands of grief in a sea of silence.
Hours later, exhaustion claimed Reiko. She had fallen asleep curled up on the tatami, her hand still clutching the hem of Rion's robe like a lifeline.
Rion sat beside her, wide awake. The afternoon sun cast long shadows across the room, turning the corners into pools of darkness that seemed to watch him.
He stared into the gloom, his new eyes piercing the shadows with unsettling ease. He needed to understand. He needed to know what happened in that room.
I ran into the chamber, he thought, forcing his mind back to that night. The heat. The smell of bad smoke.
He closed his eyes, replaying the fragments. They were like broken pieces of glass in his mind. He saw the inner sanctum crumbling. He saw his father's crimson hair whipping in the wind. He saw his mother's violet light battling the dark.
And then… Mōryō.
The name sent a shiver through him. He remembered the demon. He remembered the sheer scale of it—a mountain of smoke and hate. He remembered the way the battle had stopped. The way the demon had turned its head.
It looked at me, Rion thought, his heart rate spiking. A hundred red eyes. All looking at me.
He remembered feeling small. He remembered feeling a hook in his tummy, pulling him forward.
And then?
nothing...
That was where the movie stopped. There was no white light. Just a sudden, violent cut to black. A thick, oily hole in his head where memory should be.
How did I survive? he wondered, looking at his hands. He turned them over. They were smooth. Unhurt. The temple fell down. Father was crushed. But I'm okay? And Mother is just… sleeping?
He touched his chest, feeling that cold, alien chakra sitting dormant inside him. It felt like a sleeping snake.
Did I do something bad? The thought was a cold whisper in his mind. Did I hurt her? Did the demon put something inside me?
The fact that no one knew—not even the priests—made it worse. It meant there was no medicine. No spell to fix it. It was a mystery, and he was right in the middle of it.
The lack of answers was worse than the grief. It was a gnawing fear that he was bad. That he was the reason Reiko was crying. He was a walking question mark, and he was terrified of the answer.
The next morning, the air was thick with the scent of rain.
Rion stood before the heavy oak doors of the healing wing. He wore a set of black robes that Reiko had found for him—they were too big, the sleeves rolled up twice to free his hands. He looked like a child playing dress-up in a nightmare.
He pushed the door open.
The room smelled of antiseptic herbs and burning sage. It was a sick smell. It made his stomach turn.
Keiko lay on a simple cot in the center of the room. She looked impossibly small. Her long black hair was spread out on the white pillow like a spill of ink. Her skin was the color of old paper, see-through and fragile.
Hundreds of paper tags—fūin seals—were plastered on the walls and floor around her. They glowed with a faint, rhythmic light, feeding a trickle of spiritual energy into her body.
Two healers in white robes stood in the corner, whispering. When Rion entered, they stopped abruptly, bowing their heads and hurrying past him with nervous glances. They looked scared. Not of him, but of the woman in the bed. They looked like people who were trying to fix a clock without knowing how time worked.
Rion walked to her bedside. His footsteps echoed on the wooden floor. He felt tiny in the room.
He reached out and touched her hand. It was ice cold.
"Mother?" he whispered. "Wake up. Please. Reiko says you stopped the monster. You won, right? So you can wake up now."
There was no response. Her chest rose and fell, but it looked mechanical, like a machine was doing it for her.
Rion stood there for a long time, watching the slow rise and fall of the blanket. The silence of the room amplified the dark thoughts swirling in his head.
They don't know why, he thought, panic bubbling in his throat. They don't know how to wake you up.
It felt hopeless. If the adults didn't know, what chance did a kid have?
His gaze drifted to a small metal table near the bed. On it lay a medical scalpel, sharp and gleaming under the light of the seals.
Rion stared at it. He felt so tired. His chest hurt from crying. His eyes hurt from seeing the world in two different ways.
I just want to sleep too, he thought. If I sleep, maybe I can find where she is. Maybe I can find Father.
He didn't understand the finality of it, not fully. He just knew he wanted the confusion to stop. He wanted to go where his parents were.
He reached out. His fingers hovered inches from the cold steel. The darkness in his mind felt so much heavier than the light. It felt like a warm blanket calling him.
Sniff.
The sound was tiny. Barely a breath.
Rion froze. His hand snapped back to his side as if the metal burned him. He slowly turned his head.
Reiko was standing in the doorway.
She wasn't looking at the scalpel. She was looking at him. Her hands were clutching the doorframe so hard her knuckles were white. Her eyes were wide with a terrified desperation.
She looked so small. So defenseless.
She didn't say anything, but her eyes screamed it. Don't leave me.
If he left… she would be truly alone. She would have to bury her father, watch her mother sleep this mysterious sleep forever, and bury her brother all in one week. She would be the last one left in a big, empty house full of ghosts.
The image of her standing over two fresh graves, alone in the rain, hit Rion like a physical blow. It hurt more than the demon's gaze.
Father died to save us, Rion realized, a hot flush of shame burning through his veins. He didn't save me so I could leave Reiko alone.
He turned his back on the scalpel. He turned his back on the easy way out. He reached out and took his mother's cold, limp hand again. He squeezed it hard, grounding himself in the reality of her faint pulse.
"I won't run away," he whispered to the sleeping woman, his voice trembling but firm. "I promise, Mother. I won't let Reiko be alone. I'll be big. I'll be strong. I'll figure out what happened to you."
He wiped his eyes roughly with his sleeve, smearing the tears away. He took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of sage and sickness, and let it out slowly.
He turned to his sister. "Reiko. Come here."
She ran to him, burying her face in his chest. He held her hand, anchoring them both to the living world.
The funeral was held under a weeping gray sky.
Rain poured down in relentless sheets, turning the ash of the ruined courtyard into a slurry of black mud. The mountains were shrouded in mist, as if the land itself was sad.
A small group had gathered near the old cedar tree—the few surviving priests, bandaged and limping; the villagers who had fled the attack; and the two children.
Rion stood next to Reiko. He was draped in a heavy, hooded cloak made of coarse wool, pulled low to hide his crimson eyes from the whispers of the villagers. He could feel their gazes on him—curious, pitying, fearful. The cursed child, they whispered. The only witness.
He ignored them. He was scared of them, but he ignored them. His eyes were fixed on the simple wooden marker driven into the earth.
There was no body to bury. The tunnel collapse had left nothing to retrieve. Instead, they buried his father's favorite robe, a lock of his crimson hair, and his sword.
The sword—a simple katana with a worn leather grip—rested atop the grave marker. It was the blade Ishida had used to teach Rion how to hold a stick properly just days ago.
The sword is not to strike, his father's voice echoed in his memory, soft and kind. It is to protect.
Water dripped from the rim of Rion's hood, running down his face like the tears he was trying so hard not to shed. He bit his lip until he tasted iron. He could feel the cold dampness seeping into his bandages, chilling his skin, but he didn't shiver. He stood as still as he could, trying to be like his father.
Daetsu, leaning heavily on a crutch, finished the final prayer. His voice was cracked with age and smoke. "Return to the earth, Ishida Uzumaki. Guardian. Father."
Reiko sobbed quietly beside him, her body shaking.
Rion didn't cry. He wanted to. He wanted to scream and kick the mud. But he looked at Reiko, shaking in the cold, and he knew he couldn't fall apart. If he fell apart, she would fall apart too.
Goodbye, Father, Rion thought, his heart aching.
The grief was still there, a massive, jagged hole in his chest. But he imagined filling that hole with the cold, heavy chakra in his stomach. He imagined turning the sadness into a wall to keep the bad things out.
Rion reached out and took Reiko's hand. Her fingers were ice-cold and trembling. He squeezed them tight, trying to share what little warmth he had left. She squeezed back, holding on for dear life.
They stood there long after the priests had bowed and left. They stood there as the villagers trickled away, back to their rebuilding.
Two small figures in black, alone in the rain.
Rion looked up at the gray sky, his crimson eyes burning in the shadow of his hood. The Alpha and Omega pulsed, unseen by the world. He didn't know what they meant. He didn't know why his mother wouldn't wake up.
He just knew that the Little Monk who played with rocks was gone. Buried in the mud beneath the cedar tree.
And the boy standing in the rain had to be strong enough to survive the storm.