Mabushi lunged forward, stretching out his hand to grab Ann's arm as it was pulled backward into the darkness.
Ann screamed:
"M–Mabushi!!"
He took two quick steps, dropped his body low, and caught her arm with all the strength he had.
"Stop screaming. I'll cut this thing if I have to."
His voice was dry and cold, but his grip didn't waver. His hair whipped around him from the strange wind, his eyes widened, yet he showed no fear, only tension. He pulled with everything he had, dragging Ann, who kept struggling and yelling.
Mabushi exhaled sharply:
"Stop flailing. You're dragging me down."
Suddenly… the force pulling them lost its interest and went still. Both of them fell onto new ground that appeared beneath them as they dropped.
Akio stood on the land the place had created just moments ago… his eyes were unfocused, darting sharply as if it's searching for something that wasn't there.
Shadows began to stretch around him, taking shape as faceless figures. One appeared behind him, tall and thin, its voice was drifting past his ear like wind.
"Akio… do you think you know yourself?"
He froze. Then he tried to step back, but his feet wouldn't move, the darkness was gripping them. Another shadow took shape before him, its features gradually forming into his own face… but with pitch-black eyes.
The shadow smirked with a tilted grin, speaking in his exact voice:
"You don't even know who you are. You imitate the Shogun… you imitate heroes… you imitate anyone you admire."
It reached out and touched his forehead lightly. Heat surged through him, and he suddenly saw a six-year-old version of himself… crying in a dark place, surrounded by voices insulting him and screaming at him.
"This is the real you."
The shadow said.
"A frightened child trying to fill the emptiness with applause."
Akio's breath trembled. He lifted his hand to push the image away, but the vision moved closer, inches from his face. Then a third shadow appeared small, and it circled him with a wounded laugh.
"Do you remember when you tried to look strong? How many times did they laugh at you? How many times did you cry alone? How many times did you tell yourself you'd be someone great?"
Akio clenched his teeth hard, his chest was rising and falling.
"Shut up…"
He whispered.
But the voices didn't stop. They grew louder, overlapping:
"You're just a boy searching for a role… for a title… for eyes to look at you."
"You… are nothing."
"Even this trial… isn't yours."
"You're a burden… a burden to everyone."
His hand tightened on his chest, his face twisting as if he couldn't breathe. The shadows gathered around him, waiting for him to collapse.
Then he suddenly lifted his head. His eyes trembled, but a spark of defiance flashed within them.
"I… am not… nothing…"
The shadows laughed together, then said:
"You don't know anything… not even yourself."
They advanced, ready to swallow him whole. Akio was running… then he stopped. Nothing around him was stable. Everything shifted, breathed, cracked, devoured itself. Light pulsed then dimmed. Sounds became words, then whispers brushing against his ears from every direction.
"Who are you…?"
"What are you hiding?"
"Is that your real face, or the one you wear to make people laugh?"
"Do you sleep at night without crying?"
Akio's eyes widened. The footsteps behind him weren't echoes, they belonged to something real. He turned and saw… himself. A darker version. No smile. No trace of the childish innocence he always pretended to have.
The copy sneered.
"Enough acting, Akio. You're not the cheerful fool… you're just afraid of being alone."
Akio charged without thinking, drawing both of his wooden swords.
"Shut up!"
He shouted.
He fought the shadow like he was fighting himself. Every strike he delivered, the shadow mirrored. Every step, every shout, every breath. A platform shattered beneath him, and he leapt onto a suspended pillar, then down onto a slanted wall to regain balance. He fought wildly, yet something shifted in his eyes, not just anger… but doubt.
'Am I… lying to myself?'
The shadow launched a black wave at him. He blocked it with crossed blades and roared:
"Maybe I don't know myself yet… but I'm not a liar!"
A burst of lightning exploded from his left sword, ripping half the shadow apart. It screeched as it faded.
"You still lie… and you'll return to me… when you break…"
Ken walked through the endless darkness, hearing nothing but his own heavy steps and breath. Then he stopped. The void split open before him into floating screens, each one was showing a moment from his life. He raised his head slightly, staring at the memories.
The first scene:
Yoko's older brother falling backward as a bullet pierced his chest. Yoko was screaming. Ken was reaching out… failing to catch him. His eyes didn't shift… only his brow tightened.
The scene shifted to fire… to the house that used to be his home. His mother's corpse was lying on the ground, holding his little sister Emily. Both suffocated by gas and smoke. Ken's eyelid twitched. A faint breath escaped him.
Then Dan appeared. The bullet entering his head. His body collapsing. And Ken stood there, helpless, staring with eyes that couldn't understand why he was the one who lived. This time… he clenched his teeth hard.
Then his father Akako lying on the floor, his chest was drenched in blood, his hand was trembling as he held Ken's.
His fading voice came out:
"I wanted you to live in peace… to stay a child untouched by hatred. But now… peace is gone."
Another scene… little Yoko crying, gripping Ken's hand with all her strength while her aunt pulled her away.
"Ken!! Don't leave me!! Keeeen!!"
Ken stood powerless as the door closed between them, her cries was echoing for years.
The final scene… old Laud on his deathbed, smiling despite the weakness, raising a trembling hand to pat Ken's hair one last time before his head fell. Ken touched the body growing cold beneath his fingers.
Ken's body trembled for the first time. His fingers shook even though he was clenching his fists tightly. All the scenes vanished at once, swallowed by darkness.
A non-human voice echoed around him.
"Stop pretending you don't care."
Ken slowly opened his eyes.
"Stop burying everything in your chest and acting like nothing hurts."
"Every death… every loss… you ignore them so you won't break. But that's the real source of your weakness."
Ken lifted his head, his gray eyes gleaming strangely… half pain, half anger.
When he spoke, his voice wasn't loud… nor sad. It was steady, unnervingly steady:
"I never claimed I didn't hurt… I only learned that pain doesn't bring anyone back."
He paused, glancing toward the empty space where the memories had been.
"I learned that what dies… stays dead. And what's taken… never returns. But if I let myself fall, more people will die. I don't have the luxury of collapsing."
His voice lowered, drawn from a deep place inside him:
"I walk… so the things my father left me don't vanish forever."
Then he raised his chin, the gray in his eyes glowing with a dim ember.
"And every step I take… is a price I pay for the dead ones, and preparing for the revenge that the perpetrators deserve.
A faint sound echoed behind him, followed by slow clapping:
"Wow… wow…"
Mabushi stepped out from the shadows, his hands is behind his head, swaying mockingly.
"What a serious speech. So wise. So deep. Who knew the emotionless genius had all that theater inside him?"
He leaned closer, whispering as if revealing a secret.
"You don't look strong… you look arrogant, trying to seem deeper than you are."
Ken didn't look at him. He spoke calmly with a fixed eyes:
"The way you talk… comes from how you were raised. From what I've heard, you were raised by nothing but a drained gang on the streets."
Mabushi froze, as if the words struck something buried inside him.
Ken continued:
"You mock others… because you never carried a corpse on your back. You mock… because you never survived as the last one standing among the bodies of people you loved."
Then he turned, meeting Mabushi's eyes with an unreadable expression, one that couldn't be mocked.
"I don't want your sympathy. Or your concern. Just don't tarnish what you don't understand."
Mabushi's eyes trembled, not with anger this time… but memory.
A flash came to his mind:
An 8 years old boy with messy half-black half-blond hair, his small body covered in scratches. His shaking hand was clutching a blood-stained knife. Two bodies are before him in the ground… a man and a woman bodies. The child cried without a sound, but his body shook violently.
Reality snapped back. But Mabushi wasn't the same. His breathing quickened. His shoulders shook. His eyes widened with a kind of madness no one had ever seen in him.
Then he screamed with a sharp, furious, painful scream, like something was bursting after years of pressure:
"You… you don't know anything!!!"
He charged at Ken without thought, moving like a provoked beast, fist raised, teeth clenched.
"You don't know me!! You don't know what I saw!! You don't know what I did!! You don't know what I lived through!!"
His voice tore through the darkness:
"Don't talk about me like you understand!!! You don't understand anything!!! SHUT UP!!!"
He leapt at Ken, hands reaching to grab his shirt or his throat. In that moment… Mabushi wasn't reckless or arrogant. He was someone protecting something broken inside him.