As Obi rounded the final corner, his sneakers scraped sharply against the pavement.
He froze.
His lungs refused to breathe. For a moment, the world seemed to blur-like someone had pressed pause. The streetlights flickered faintly in the distance, but everything else dulled. No more city sounds. No evening breeze. Just... that.
His house was on fire.
Flames licked up the sides of the building like hungry beasts, devouring wood, glass, everything in sight. The windows burst outward with violent cracks, sending shards flying into the street. Thick, black smoke curled upward into the orange-streaked sky, blotting out the last traces of daylight.
Obi stumbled forward, mouth ajar. His heart thudded wildly in his chest.
"No... no, no, no-" he whispered, shaking his head. "How... how did this happen?"
Panic clawed at his throat. Did Mom leave the stove on? No-she's always careful. She checks everything twice. Then why... why is this happening?
His feet edged closer to the curb. The heat kissed his skin even from here.
Then-
"Help... me..."
A child's voice, faint but unmistakable, crackled through the roar of flames.
Obi's eyes snapped wide.
"Kobi?!"
Without a second thought, he bolted forward.
"Hang on! I'm coming!"
The air thickened around him as he sprinted toward the burning entrance. The heat slammed into him like a wall, but he didn't stop. Couldn't stop.
He plunged into the fire.
---
he heat hit him like a punch to the chest.
Obi staggered as he stepped inside, the smoke instantly clawing at his throat and lungs. Breathing was a battle-each inhale seared like fire, and every inch of his skin prickled, like he'd stepped into an oven.
But he pushed forward.
"If I heard Kobi... then Mom and Dad might be okay," he muttered, more to convince himself than anything. "Kanou too. Maybe we'll all laugh about this someday... right?"
He coughed, eyes burning, stumbling through the hallway. The fire crackled overhead, embers dropping like angry stars. The house groaned around him, structure weakening, but he kept going.
He turned the corner into his parents' room.
And froze.
The breath caught in his throat, and this time, it didn't come back.
It was a scene torn straight from a nightmare.
The walls-splattered with blood in looping, deliberate patterns like someone had painted with it. Limbs-his parents' limbs-were nailed to the walls like grotesque decorations. On the floor lay their organs, tossed like discarded trash. And on the bed, set neatly like some sort of twisted centerpiece...
Two heads.
His mother's and father's.
Their faces frozen in a silent scream. Eyes gouged out-clean, drilled, surgical. Apples stuffed in their mouths like they were part of a cursed feast. Their hair was still smoking. Their skin blackened at the edges.
Obi couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. Couldn't scream.
He took one shaky step backward-and slipped.
He hit the floor hard, his hand squishing into something soft and warm.
He looked down.
A heart.
His mother's.
"No-no-no-" Obi scrambled backward, bile rising.
Then he vomited.
Again.
And again.
His body curled forward, retching uncontrollably as he sobbed and gagged at the same time. He wanted to wake up. Begged to wake up. But the heat around him, the stench, the pain in his throat-it was all too real.
His arms trembled as he pushed himself to his feet, staggering toward the hallway.
"K-Kanou?! Kobi?!" he shouted, voice cracking. "Please-someone! Wake me up! Please-!"
Tears blurred his vision. He could barely breathe-the smoke was too thick, carbon monoxide sinking into his lungs. His legs felt like jelly, his head spun. But he didn't care.
His siblings were still somewhere in this house.
And he had to find them.
Even if it killed him.
---
Obi stumbled into the kitchen, dragging one leg behind the other.
His lungs felt scorched. Every breath rasped in his throat like sandpaper. His vision swam-hazy, distorted. Burn marks seared across his hands and the soles of his feet, raw and blistered. The air was thick with the choking stench of soot, blood, and something... sour. Wrong.
Then he saw her.
"Kanou...?"
His sister knelt by the counter, her small frame silhouetted in the dim firelight. Her back was turned to him, shoulders hunched. It sounded like she was eating something-wet, chewing sounds. Sloppy. Rhythmic.
Obi froze.
His heart stuttered painfully in his chest. Relief clashed with panic. She's alive-she has to be. But something was off. Everything was off.
Still, he ran to her.
"Kanou?" he called out again, his voice trembling. "It's me-thank God, it's me-"
He reached out to hug her.
And then he saw what she was hunched over.
Kobi.
His baby brother lay sprawled on the floor-his tiny body broken, his stomach torn wide open. There were claw marks on his chest. Bite marks. His eyes... hollow. Just empty holes where life had once lived.
Obi's mouth opened, but no sound came out.
Kanou slowly turned toward him.
Blood painted her face like war paint. Her lips, her chin-soaked in red. Her mouth twitched unnaturally. Her eyes glowed, a whirl of unnatural, multicolored hues swirling like oil. White streaks split through her once-black hair. She was foaming at the mouth, snarling like an animal.
"Kanou...?" Obi whispered, barely a breath. His legs buckled.
She pounced.
Before he could react, her jaws sank into his shoulder. A scream ripped from his throat, but it felt far away, muffled by shock. He crashed to the floor, her weight pinning him down. Pain exploded through his body, hot and disorienting.
He tried to push her off-his own sister. Her fingers dug into his chest, nails splitting skin. He couldn't believe it. Couldn't understand it.
"Stop-Kanou, please-it's me-!"
His thoughts spun wildly.
Why is this happening? What did I do wrong? Why is she like this? What happened to my family? My life?
Tears streamed down his face, mixing with blood and soot. This couldn't be real. This kind of horror belonged in the fantasy stories he loved, the anime he escaped into-not here, not in his kitchen, not with his little sister trying to rip him apart.
He choked on a sob.
"Please..." he whispered. "Please wake me up..."
---
Obi's body was screaming-every nerve lit on fire. But his mind drifted somewhere else.
Somewhere safe.
He remembered the theme park.
Bright lights. Kobi wobbling around with a cotton candy mustache, laughing like a cartoon villain. Kanou spinning in place, grinning wide, her cheeks stuffed with pink fluff. Their parents smiling. Obi handing Kobi a plush dinosaur he'd won at a game booth, proudly declaring himself the family champ.
They were happy.
Whole.
A sob escaped his throat.
Back in the present, Kanou thrashed wildly in his grip, teeth gnashing near his ear. Her claws ripped into his back. Flames licked the walls around them, roaring louder, angrier. The kitchen groaned and cracked. Smoke coiled like snakes around their feet.
But Obi didn't let go.
"Kanou-" he choked out, his voice raw and shaking. "You have to wake up! This isn't you!"
Her snarl deepened.
"The Kanou I know is sweet. She's smart. She's kind. You helped Kobi with his homework, remember? You always shared your food, even when it was your favorite. You're not a monster! You're my sister! Please..." His voice broke. "Please come back to me."
He wrapped his arms tighter around her, pulling her into his chest despite the searing pain in his shoulder, despite the blood gushing down his side. He clung to her like a lifeline.
Kanou shrieked.
She thrashed violently, bit into his other shoulder, and Obi screamed-but he didn't let go.
And then... she froze.
A tremble ran through her small frame.
Her fingers loosened. Her jaw unclenched. Her breathing shifted-erratic, shaky, like a child waking from a nightmare.
Tears began to fall from her blood-splattered face.
"I..." she whispered, her voice barely audible, broken and dazed. "I think I'm remembering something..."
She blinked, slowly, as if seeing the world for the first time.
Who is this... hugging me?
Why does he feel... warm? Why does he smell... delicious?
She flinched, fighting some invisible war inside her own head. Her claws twitched. Her breathing hitched. The multicolored hue of her eyes flickered like a glitch in reality.
And Obi-trembling, bleeding, burning-held her tighter.
"I've got you," he whispered. "I'm not letting go."
---
It came back in flashes.
Like an old, broken film reel skipping inside her skull. Images flickered in and out-shaky, out of order. Disjointed. Unreal.
Just after sunset.
They were all home.
Dad was humming as he boiled water for tea. Mom had just finished setting out dinner-rice, soup, grilled fish. Kobi sat cross-legged on the floor, coloring his sketchbook and singing a cartoon jingle under his breath. Kanou was at the dining table, chewing her pencil, halfway through her math homework.
It was peaceful.
Then-a knock at the door.
A stranger. A tall man with unnatural red eyes and skin like porcelain. He stood in the doorway, smiling too widely.
"I come bearing a gift," he'd said. "From a secret admirer."
Dad had squinted at him, brow furrowing. "We're not interested in whatever you're selling."
The man didn't flinch. "It's not for sale."
"Well, take it back anyway," Dad muttered, and shut the door.
A few seconds of silence.
Then-BOOM.
The door shattered off its hinges with a single kick.
Kanou flinched as splinters flew through the air.
The man stepped inside, calm and casual, as if he'd been invited.
"I wasn't asking," he said.
Before anyone could react, he was already in front of Dad.
Kanou's eyes couldn't even follow him.
He lifted Dad off the ground with one hand-his fingers wrapped around his throat like a vice.
There was a horrible slicing sound. Something gleamed across Dad's neck.
Then-
Screaming.
Dad's veins bulged, his eyes rolled back, blood gushed from his mouth-and then his entire body burst, spraying hot crimson everywhere.
Kanou shrieked, clutching Kobi's arm as her father collapsed in pieces.
The stranger tilted his head.
"Hm," he said to the twitching corpse. "You weren't compatible."
"STAY AWAY FROM US!" Mom screamed, pulling her children into her arms, trembling.
Her voice cracked, barely above a whisper. "Please... just leave. Please..."
The man's smile widened.
In the blink of an eye, he was in front of her.
"No."
Then he bit her neck.
Kanou didn't understand what she saw next.
One moment, her mother was shielding her.
The next-BOOM-she exploded in a cloud of blood and bone.
Chunks of something warm and soft splattered against Kanou's face and shoulders.
She didn't register what it was-not at first-until she looked down and saw strands of hair, a flap of skin, blood clinging to her sweater in wet, gloppy smears.
"...M-Mom?" she whispered, breath shaking.
Then she screamed. Loud. Shattering. Her whole body trembled as she scrambled backward on all fours, hands slipping in the sticky red pooling around her knees.
Across the room, the man was laughing. His pale face was drenched in blood, like war paint. He dragged a hand across his mouth, then licked it clean with slow, deliberate satisfaction.
Still grinning, he leaned down and plucked something from the ground.
It was an eye.
Their mother's.
He held it up to the light, examining it like a jewel-then popped it into his mouth and chewed.
The squelch was sickening. Like stepping on a slug.
Kanou sobbed, choking on the taste of iron and smoke in the air. She reached out blindly, trying to find Kobi. Trying to feel something familiar.
The man's gaze shifted toward her.
"Now..." he said, voice like silk soaked in rot. "Who's next?"
"No... no, please." Kanou's voice cracked as she kept crawling back, her palms slipping on gore. "Don't kill me... please don't kill my brother-he's only a kid. Please."
She bowed her head low, forehead touching the blood-slick floor, tears streaming down her cheeks.
"We'll do anything. Just don't hurt us..."
The man knelt down slowly, like he was admiring a dying flower.
"I don't want your life," he said, lips twitching upward in delight. "But if your body accepts it..."
He cupped her chin with cold fingers, tilting her face up.
"You'll be part of something much bigger."
Kanou didn't understand what he meant.
She never got the chance to ask.
Fangs.
A flash of white.
Then pain-so sharp, it blinded her. It tore through her neck and shoulders like lightning.
She screamed once, high and raw.
Then the pain turned to fire. Her blood boiled. Every nerve lit up like it was being devoured from the inside.
Her hands clawed the floor.
Her vision blurred.
Then-
Nothing.
Just heat.
Then blackness.
Like a curtain falling over her mind.
Like she'd never existed at all.
---
Kanou's breath hitched as a sharp memory flickered through her mind-Kobi. She whirled around, heart pounding, and froze. There he lay, lifeless, disemboweled and pale in the flickering orange light of the burning room. A cold wave crashed over her. Did I... kill him? The thought twisted in her gut. Why did I do that?
Her eyes snapped to her older brother, Obi, who was clutching her with trembling arms. His shirt was soaked in blood, dark stains spreading across his chest. He looked fragile-like he might crumble at any moment.
Kanou's knees gave way. The sob she'd been holding back shattered free as she collapsed into Obi's shoulder, tears finally spilling over.
Obi?
" Obi... I'm so sorry. I'm sorry," she choked out between shaky breaths. "Obi... please forgive me. It's not my fault..."
Obi stiffened slightly at the sound of her voice, and something softened in his eyes. It's been a while since she called me 'Obi' instead of 'Belt', he thought quietly, a bittersweet smile tugging at his lips.
Pulling her closer, he whispered firmly, "Don't worry. I'm okay. I'm just... so glad you're alive."
Kanou nodded, clinging to him like a lifeline, but her thoughts slipped back to Kobi.
"But Kobi..." she began, voice cracking.
Obi shook his head weakly, struggling to speak. "You... didn't mean it. We'll be fine. You'll be..."
Suddenly, his body sagged. His knees buckled. The smoke thickened, filling their lungs with fire and choking him. His vision blurred as exhaustion and blood loss overwhelmed him.
Kanou barely caught him as he collapsed. "Obi!" she gasped, panic rising.
Without wasting a second, she wrapped her arms around him and sprinted toward the door. The roar of the flames chased them, the heat burning their skin, the smoke clawing at their throats. But Kanou held on tight, determined to get them both out alive.
----
Kanou stumbled through the darkened streets of Shibuya, her brother's weight heavy on her back. Obi's ragged breaths were shallow and uneven, each one a fragile thread holding him to life. Blood seeped through the tear in his shirt, staining her own clothes in a spreading, dark wetness.
But the city-the Shibuya she knew-was gone.
No blaring neon lights flickered against wet pavement. No crowds thrummed along the sidewalks. The usual hum of late-night traffic was dead silent. Kanou's voice cracked as she screamed for help, but no one answered. The streets were empty.
A strange stillness wrapped around her like a suffocating shroud.
Her heart hammered painfully against her ribs. Why was Shibuya so empty? Why now, when she needed help the most? Why would Shibuya be sleeping?
Kanou gritted her teeth, struggling to keep moving despite the fire licking at her skin, the burn wounds trying to stitch themselves back together-but the regeneration was draining every ounce of her strength.
Blood pooled beneath her brother's limp form, dripping steadily onto the cracked pavement. A thin foam began to bubble at the corners of Obi's mouth-signs of oxygen deprivation.
The metallic scent of blood filled her nostrils. But then, through the sick haze clouding her mind, she caught a strange, haunting memory-the scent was like her mother's cooking. Rich, savory, and deeply familiar.
"What are you doing?" Kanou whispered to herself, voice trembling. "Why are you even thinking that?"
For a terrifying moment, she felt the unbearable pull of hunger-of something darker-of the temptation to eat her own brother.
Her stomach churned. She shut her eyes tight and forced the thought away.
But then the memories hit her like a tidal wave-Kobi. His disemboweled corpse. The awful, terrible thought that maybe... maybe she had killed him. Maybe she had done the unthinkable.
Tears slipped down her cheeks. "Did I...? Did I really?"
She wished-desperately wished-that time could rewind. That she could undo everything.
But there was no going back.
Every agonizing step forward through the empty, silent streets of Shibuya was a battle-carrying her half-dead brother, fighting against her own mind.
Finally, the glowing sign of a nearby hospital flickered in the distance. Kanou's breath hitched as she pushed inside, the automatic doors sliding open with a sterile hiss.
She dropped Obi carefully on the cold floor of the emergency room and stumbled away before anyone could stop her. She couldn't stay there with humanity. She felt ashamed of herself and scared of what might happen.
---
Minutes later, firefighters and police flooded the scene.
They found the house-reduced to ashes, the smell of smoke thick in the air.
"They're all dead," one officer said grimly, shaking his head. "The whole family..."
Another voice whispered, "The serial killer strikes again."
The only survivor: the son who'd barged in to try and save someone, now barely clinging to life in the ICU, battling carbon monoxide poisoning and blood loss.
Kanou's sister? No one knew where she was.
One of the firefighters muttered under his breath as he watched the hospital doors swing shut behind the ambulance.
"Poor kid... This world's going to be hell for him once he wakes up."
---
The sterile hum of the hospital was a stark contrast to the chaos of the night before. In the quiet ICU room, Obi lay motionless on the bed, wrapped tightly in white bandages from head to toe. Only the faint rise and fall of his chest told Kanou he was still alive. A clear oxygen mask covered his face, misting gently with each shallow breath.
Kanou stepped inside, her footsteps muffled on the polished floor. She didn't know how long she'd been waiting, but the first pale rays of dawn were already creeping through the tall windows.
The morning sun spilled over her hand as she reached out instinctively, hoping to brush Obi's forehead. But the moment her skin touched the warm light, a sharp, searing pain stabbed through her arm.
She gasped and jerked her hand back, watching in horror as the skin that had been exposed to the sunlight began to bubble and corrode - the surface blistering, darkening, like acid eating through flesh.
She goes to a shady part of the room to recuperate but The pain was unbearable, but almost as quickly as it had started, the damaged skin began to regenerate-knitting back together as if nothing had happened.
"What... what is happening to me?" she muttered, voice shaking. "Why... why is this happening?"
---
Afternoon settled in, casting long shadows across the charred remains of the once-standing house. The fire had long been extinguished, but the scent of smoke and death still lingered thick in the air. Yellow police tape flapped weakly in the wind, stretched across the blackened skeleton of the home like a crude warning: Keep Out.
Three figures dressed in crisp white stepped past the makeshift barrier, each marked by the same crest-an olive branch held delicately in a dove's beak, etched above kanji that shimmered faintly in the sun.
The first was a tall man with wild white hair and piercing blue eyes behind round glasses. His expression was unreadable, but his presence commanded the scene. A white overcoat billowed around his ankles, and the kanji for Balance was stitched boldly across the back.
"Amateurs," he muttered, ducking under the tape without breaking stride.
He stopped to scan the wreckage-burned walls, collapsed beams, soot-coated floors. His eyes lingered on the still-glowing embers, the melted frames of picture portraits, the absence of anything resembling warmth or family.
"No trace of love here," he murmured. "Only death."
Behind him, a woman stepped lightly over the debris. Her strawberry-blonde hair caught the light, wavy strands resting on her shoulders. She wore a floral yukata beneath a flowing white haori, the kanji for Sacrifice stitched across the back. Her eyes were a deep, strange orange-sharp, but not unkind.
The last of the trio was a boy, barely eighteen, with straight black hair that shimmered with blue highlights. His white, long-sleeved shirt hung loose on his frame, but his posture was alert, sharp.
The three of them entered what remained of the master bedroom. Blood had soaked into the wooden floors, blackened now from heat and rot. The smell of decay clung to the walls.
"We were too late. Again." The white-haired man's voice was heavy. "Another victim of these demons... and nothing to show for it."
The younger boy, Hiruki, crouched low, brushing his fingers against the charred flooring. His nose crinkled slightly. "There's a strong sulfuric presence. Stronger than the blood." He stood up slowly. "He was here."
The white-haired man nodded, sighing as he lit a cigarette and brought it to his lips. "It could be him... The Nameless King."
A flicker of something unreadable passed through his eyes.
The strawberry-blonde woman straightened, brushing ashes off her sleeve with a theatrical flair and flashing a bright, almost jarring smile. "We won't stop. We can't. Not until every last one of them is gone." Her voice was cheery, defiant. "It's our right... our duty."
The white-haired man blew out a stream of smoke, smirking faintly. "It's always impressed me, Maki... how you can be so damn cheerful after reaching the same grim conclusion as the rest of us."
Maki chuckled sheepishly, rubbing the back of her head. "Gotta keep the mood up somehow. Darkness spreads quicker when no one's holding a light."
Hiruki tilted his head. "With all due respect, sir... should you really be smoking at a crime scene?"
The man looked over his shoulder at the boy, taking another slow drag before exhaling through his nose. "Hiruki. Focus on the case."
The boy didn't flinch. His voice was quiet, but colder than before. "Soon enough... the hunter will become the hunted."
The wind picked up, rattling the yellow tape. And for a brief moment, the world held its breath.