He wiped his face on his sleeve again. This time, slower. Calmer. The crying had stopped, though his body still hiccupped with the aftershocks.
His eyes burned. His chest was hollow.
But the coal glowed steady.
"I'm going to figure it out," he whispered.
His voice was hoarse.
"I don't care if it takes forever. I'm going to figure it out."
Shinji's words hung in the cold morning air, a quiet vow swallowed by the mist. His hands, still trembling from the nightmare, clenched into fists. The warmth inside him pulsed faintly, like a heartbeat buried deep beneath layers of fear and grief. He exhaled slowly, watching his breath curl into the fog.
Then, the door behind him slid open with a soft creak.
Shinji turned. His father, Jiro, stood in the doorway, silhouetted against the dim light of the hearth. He was already dressed for the day, worn trousers tucked into sturdy boots, a thick woolen coat draped over his shoulders, and a hunting knife strapped to his belt. His face was shadowed, but Shinji could see the tension in his jaw, the way his knuckles whitened where they gripped the doorframe.
For a moment, neither spoke.
Then Jiro stepped onto the porch, his movements slow and deliberate, as if the weight of the village had settled onto his shoulders overnight. He didn't look at Shinji right away. Instead, his gaze swept across the fields, the mist-shrouded paths, the silent forge where Goro's hammer would never ring again.
Jiro's voice broke the silence, quiet but firm. "You been cryin'?"
Shinji blinked. His throat was dry. "Yeah," he admitted.
Jiro turned slightly, eyes narrowing just a little, not in judgment, but in concern. "Why?"
Shinji looked down at his hands. "The nightmare again."
Jiro was quiet for a moment longer, then gave a single nod, as if that answered something he hadn't dared ask out loud.
"Another child's gone missing," Jiro said finally, his voice low and rough. "Tsubaki's boy. Vanished from his bed last night."
Shinji's breath caught. Tsubaki's son was barely six years old.
Jiro's hands flexed at his sides, then stilled. "We're not waiting anymore. The men are gathering at the square. We're going into the woods."
Shinji stared at him. "You're going to hunt it."
A nod. "We're ending this."
There was no hesitation in his father's voice, no room for argument. But beneath the steel, Shinji heard something else, something raw and unspoken. Jiro had always been quiet, a man of few words, but Shinji had never seen him like this. Not even when the rains ruined the harvest, or when Hana had fallen ill two winters ago. This was different. This was fury, honed sharp and silent.
Shinji swallowed. "What if it's not just an animal?"
Jiro's eyes flicked to him, dark and unreadable. "Then we'll kill it anyway."
The certainty in his voice sent a shiver down Shinji's spine.
For the first time, Shinji really looked at his father. The scars on his hands, old burns from forge work and fieldwork alike. The streaks of gray threading through his black hair, premature for a man not yet forty. The way his shoulders, usually bowed from labor, were squared now, tense with purpose.
This wasn't the quiet, patient man who taught Shinji how to mend a fence or plant rice. This was someone else. Someone who had buried friends in the war. Someone who had survived.
Shinji hesitated, then asked the question that had been gnawing at him. "Did you ever see anything like this? During the war?"
Jiro went very still. For a long moment, Shinji thought he wouldn't answer. Then, softly: "Yes."
A beat of silence. The mist curled around them, damp and clinging.
"Not this," Jiro continued, his voice barely above a whisper. "But things just as bad. Things that didn't belong in this world." His fingers brushed the hilt of his knife. "They all bleed the same, though."
Shinji's pulse quickened. He'd never heard his father speak of the war. None of the villagers did. It was a shadow they all stepped around, a ghost too heavy to name.
Jiro exhaled sharply, as if shaking off a memory. "Stay inside tonight. Bar the door. And keep Hana close."
Shinji nodded, but the words stuck in his throat. *What if you don't come back?*
As if sensing the unspoken question, Jiro turned to him fully. For the first time since stepping outside, his expression softened, just a fraction. "Listen to me, Shinji." He placed a hand on Shinji's shoulder, grip firm. "Whatever happens, you look after your sister. You understand?"
The weight of those words settled over Shinji like a cloak. This wasn't just an order. It was a trust. A passing of something deeper than duty.
Shinji met his father's gaze and nodded. "I will."
Jiro held his eyes for a moment longer, then released him. "Good."
He turned to leave, but Shinji blurted out, "Wait."
Jiro paused.
Shinji hesitated, then reached into his pocket and pulled out the bent nail he'd kept from Ren's forge. He held it out. "Take this."
Jiro frowned. "A nail?"
"It's from Goro's smithy." Shinji's voice was steadier than he felt. "For luck."
For a long moment, Jiro just looked at him. Then, slowly, he took the nail and tucked it into his coat. "Thank you."
The words were simple, but they carried something unspoken—a recognition, maybe, of what Shinji was really offering. Not just a piece of metal. A piece of hope.
Jiro adjusted his coat, then stepped off the porch. "I'll be back by dawn."
Shinji watched him go, his father's figure fading into the mist until he was nothing but a shadow, then nothing at all.
The village felt emptier without him.
Inside, Hana stirred by the hearth, her eyes bleary with sleep. "Shinji?" she murmured. "Where's Father?"
Shinji didn't answer right away. He stared at the door, listening to the distant sound of men gathering in the square, their voices low and grim.
Then he turned to his sister. "He's going to kill that thing."
Hana's face paled. She opened her mouth, but no words came.
Shinji crossed the room and sat beside her, staring into the dying embers of the fire. The warmth inside him flickered again, faint but persistent.
Outside, the wind picked up, carrying with it the faint, metallic scent of rain, and something else, something sharp and wild.
The hunt had begun.