The fires of Dahana had long died,
but the anger they birthed had never cooled.
Even after leaving the Flame Hall and the dying ember circle behind, Ajin could still feel the weight of the valley pressing down on him—
as if the land itself remembered every scream, every betrayal, every flame that had eaten flesh and bone.
The transition from the inner hall to the open courtyard felt like stepping through time.
Every gust of wind carried remnants of the past—ash, burnt memories, and hatred that refused to fade.
Jarot walked beside him in silence.
The unconscious experiment survivor—skin cracked with red fissures, body trembling with unstable energy—lay slung carefully across Ajin's back.
Even Jarot, as large as a boulder, had offered not to carry him.
The man's body radiated an unstable heat that made Jarot's arms prickle.
Ajin took the burden without complaint.
They stepped back into the courtyard of Dahana.
And the smell hit them again.
Not merely the stench of corpses—
but the stale residue of flames that had eaten through innocence, tradition, and the very will to live.
Dahana Satria was destroyed.
Utterly.
Not burned like Rogo…
but erased.
A Valley Carved by Violence
"Look," Ajin murmured.
He didn't point.
He didn't need to.
Jarot followed his gaze and saw it—the unmistakable proof that Dahana had met a fate different from Rogo:
Thick stone walls, a full meter in width, shattered inward like they had been splintered by something massive.
The main training yard was a mess of deep cracks, spiderwebbing the ground.
Some fissures were so deep that faint heat still rose from them—like the earth had once erupted in fury.
"This wasn't fire alone," Ajin said quietly.
Jarot swallowed hard.
"No," he whispered. "This is… rage. Flame techniques fueled by killing intent. Only Dahana's forbidden forms could… do this. But why would our own arts destroy our home…?"
He already knew the answer.
But speaking it would make it real.
Ajin didn't press further.
He simply continued walking, each step sinking slightly into the ashen soil.
The survivor on his back coughed once—blood bubbling at the corner of his mouth—then grew silent again.
As they passed the broken archway, Jarot froze.
His breath hitched.
His lips parted.
"…The kitchen…"
Ajin halted.
Jarot moved toward the collapsed structure like a man in a trance.
He brushed aside burnt wood, revealing blackened pots and shattered clay jars.
"I… used to steal ginger cakes here," Jarot whispered.
His voice was so soft it barely escaped his throat.
"I thought the cooks never noticed… but they always made extra. For me. For Rini."
Ajin remained silent.
Not out of coldness, but because nothing he could say would matter.
Jarot stumbled forward.
His fingers brushed a small scorched bowl.
He trembled.
Then he dropped to his knees.
"Why…"
His voice cracked.
"Why did they do this? We weren't warriors when the soldiers arrived. We weren't resisting. We—"
Ajin stepped past him, eyes scanning the devastation.
He could feel something here that was different from the ruins above.
A remnant of energy.
Residual power lingering in the stones like scars.
Ajin's body—his Angkara—forged from pain—responded to it instinctively.
Like a blade vibrating at the sound of another blade far away.
The Echo of Dahana's Fury
"This place," Ajin said, "is not quiet."
Jarot looked up at him, wiping his face with a trembling hand.
"What do you mean…?"
Ajin turned slightly, letting his senses adjust.
The air felt heavy.
Not like smoke.
But like memory—like the land itself was replaying the agony it had witnessed.
"The anger here hasn't faded," Ajin murmured. "It lingers. Heavy. Thick. Familiar."
Jarot blinked.
Ajin continued walking.
Toward the central courtyard.
Toward the charred ceremonial pillar.
Jarot followed—hesitation turning into dread the closer they got.
When they finally stood before the pillar, Jarot's entire body locked.
His throat worked.
His breath shuddered.
"That's…"
He pointed with a hand that refused to stay steady.
"That's where my sister… Rini…"
Ajin stared at the post—a charred, twisted stump carved with ancient inscriptions, now unreadable.
Jarot squeezed his eyes shut as the memory returned—
Flashback — Jarot, Years Ago
Rini's hair was messy, falling into her eyes.
She was laughing, swinging a stick twice her size.
"You're too slow, Brother! Too big! Too dumb!"
Jarot laughed and chased her, both of them running around the courtyard.
He remembered her warmth.
Her tiny hand gripping his.
Her stubborn little grin.
Then—
Soldiers.
Dozens.
With armor that glowed with unnatural blue flame.
Rini tied to the post.
Her screams.
Those men laughing.
Those flames… the wrong color… too cold, too cruel…
"RINI!!!"
Back to Present
Jarot roared.
Not in memory—
but now.
Stone around him trembled.
Pebbles bounced.
His fist came down on a cracked pillar nearby—
BOOOOM!
The pillar exploded.
Jarot fell forward, panting hard.
Soot clung to his tears.
Ajin didn't approach him.
Grief of this magnitude was its own storm.
No one could stand inside it with him.
Ajin turned instead.
Something near the training ground wall caught his eye.
A Message Scratched in Blood
It was faint.
Barely visible beneath soot and cracked stone.
A smear of dark red—blood long dried—stretched across a section of the wall.
But it wasn't splatter.
It was writing.
Someone had clawed at the stone with their dying strength, dragging blood in deliberate strokes.
Ajin approached.
He brushed his hardened fingertips across the lines—
SHRRRK.
His blood vibrated.
The lines on the wall pulsed faintly in his mind.
He could feel the anger seared into that message.
"Someone… wrote this while dying," Ajin murmured.
Jarot wiped his face and approached slowly.
"What does it say?"
Ajin squinted.
The characters were rough, but he could still recognize the strokes:
"THEY ARE NOT OF FIRE—
THEY ARE OF EXPERIMENT."
Jarot's breath caught.
"And here," Ajin added, tracing the next words:
"RUN… MERAPI… PROJECT…"
The rest was smeared into nothing.
Jarot swallowed.
"Project… the same one the Bayang-Purwa mentioned? Sindewa-12?"
Ajin didn't respond.
He was too focused on the strange vibration under his skin—
the way the dried blood resonated with the Angkara within him.
His pulse throbbed.
DHUG.
His body responded to the message.
To the fury it contained.
DHUG.
The ruins… were speaking.
Ajin closed his eyes.
He felt the anger of a dying warrior—one of Dahana's last—pouring into him through that bloody inscription.
A final warning.
A final defiance.
When he opened his eyes, they burned slightly red.
"This place is heavy with hatred," he whispered. "Powerful hatred."
Jarot looked around, eyes wide.
"You can feel it…?" he asked.
Ajin nodded once.
Jarot stared at him with a mixture of fear and awe.
The Survivor in the Ashes
Ajin took one more step closer to the wall—
and that was when he heard it.
A noise.
Barely a whisper.
Cough.
Then another.
Uhk… uhk…
Ajin whipped his head toward the source.
Jarot tensed immediately.
They weren't alone.
Ajin set the experiment survivor down gently against a broken pillar, then advanced.
There—beneath a collapsed beam and pile of charred wood—
something moved.
A hand.
Skin cracked and covered in soot, fingers trembling like dry sticks in winter.
Ajin crouched.
He grabbed the heavy beam and heaved it aside with a grunt—his anger-fed strength cracking the earth beneath his feet as he lifted.
More debris fell away.
A person lay trapped beneath.
Not a child.
Not an elder.
A man.
Half-buried.
Half-burned.
Barely breathing.
He looked… wrong.
His skin wasn't only burned; it had begun to peel, revealing faint glowing lines underneath—
lines that pulsed with faint red and gold.
Jarot inhaled sharply.
"Is he one of ours?" Jarot whispered.
"No," Ajin murmured. "He's something else."
Ajin pulled away another slab of debris.
The man gasped when the weight left his chest, his breath hitching painfully.
His voice was a hoarse whisper—barely even a breath.
"…Too… slow…"
Jarot's heart dropped.
"Who are you?" Ajin asked, voice cold but steady.
The man opened his eyes.
They weren't the eyes of someone who could still live.
They were hollow, trembling… yet filled with clarity that made Ajin's spine tighten.
"…Rogo… Ajin…"
Jarot froze.
Ajin stiffened.
He leaned in.
"How do you know my name?"
The man coughed, blood spilling from his lips.
"…they… used us… tore us apart… used Dahana's fire… and Rogo's flesh…"
Ajin's eyes darkened.
"Who did?"
The man's breathing grew ragged.
"…Sindewa… Merapi… don't… don't let them finish…"
His head fell back.
Ajin grabbed his wrist.
A pulse.
Weak.
Flickering.
But still there.
"He's alive," Ajin said.
Jarot looked horrified.
"Barely. Jin… we don't know what he is."
Ajin lifted the man into his arms.
"I've seen what happens to bodies used as experiments," Ajin said, voice low. "He's proof of what they're building."
Jarot clenched his fists.
"…you're taking him with us?"
"Until I know everything he knows."
Jarot didn't argue.
They turned to leave the ruins—
when the ground quivered beneath them.
A tremor.
Then another.
Jarot looked toward the distant horizon—toward Merapi.
Smoke rose there.
Not ordinary smoke.
Blue-tinted flame.
The same flame that had burned his sister.
Jarot's voice came out as a whisper.
"…Jin. They're still working. They're still alive."
Ajin tightened his grip on the dying experiment survivor.
His voice was quiet, but it cut like a blade dragged over bone.
"Good."
He stepped forward, toward Merapi.
"Let them be alive—so I can kill them myself."