The back garden of the Kato house had that specific quiet of sunsets in towns where silence is part of the landscape and not an absence of something.
The ten-year-old boy stood with his feet apart and his hands extended in front of him, with the visible concentration of someone who is trying to make something happen and still does not entirely understand why sometimes it does and sometimes it does not.
"Ginjiro," said the man behind him.
Kato Ginjiro, ten years old, dishevelled hair and the energy of someone who has never been completely still in his life, turned his head towards his father.
Kato Hiroshi was around forty, with a build that suggested he had spent decades doing exactly the kind of work he did — not imposingly large but solid, the kind of solid that comes from years of real use. He had the same hair as his son, a little more orderly, and a way of looking that combined direct attention with something warmer underneath.
"Don't go looking for it," said Hiroshi, coming closer. "Mana isn't something you look for. You already know that."
"But if I don't look for it, it doesn't appear," said Ginjiro.
"It appears when you stop looking for it," said Hiroshi, positioning himself behind him. "Put your hands like this."
He adjusted them — palms facing upward rather than forward, with the fingers slightly apart.
"Now close your eyes."
Ginjiro closed them.
"Don't look for anything," said Hiroshi. "Just listen."
The back garden was silent except for the wind in the trees at the far end and the distant noise of the town being the town. Ginjiro listened. He tried not to look for anything and just listen, which was harder than it sounded because his mind always had something moving inside it.
The mana appeared.
Not with the intense glow that sometimes came when he forced it — with something softer, more distributed, like something that had been there all along waiting for people to stop looking for it so it could show itself.
"There it is," said Hiroshi.
"I can feel it," said Ginjiro, without opening his eyes. "It's different this way."
"Yes," said Hiroshi. "That's how it's supposed to feel."
Ginjiro opened his eyes and looked at his hands. The glow was faint but steady — orange, the same colour as his father's, the same colour it was going to stay for decades.
"Can I hit something?" said Ginjiro.
"Not yet," said Hiroshi.
"But—"
"Not yet."
Ginjiro exhaled with the specific resignation of a ten-year-old who has just been told no when the obvious answer should be yes.
"Let's continue," said Hiroshi, with the patience of someone who has had this conversation before and knows how it ends. "This time keep the flow going while you walk."
Ginjiro concentrated the mana and began to move around the garden — slow steps first, then faster, without the flow cutting out entirely, even though it became more unstable when he sped up.
Hiroshi observed him with his arms crossed and something in his expression that was not exactly pride, but came fairly close.
"Better," he said.
"Better than before or better in general?"
"Both."
Ginjiro smiled.
"Hiroshi! Ginjiro!"
The voice came from the back door of the house with that specific authority that mothers' voices have when they have decided that something is going to happen and the only variable is when.
Kato Michiko appeared in the doorway still wearing her apron and an expression that combined genuine affection with the firmness of someone who is not prepared to let dinner go cold for a training session that has already gone on too long.
She had the same black hair as her husband, pulled back, and that way of looking that both Kato males recognised as the signal that negotiation had ended before it began.
"Dinner's ready," she said. "Both of you. Now."
"Five more minutes," said Ginjiro.
"Dinner. Now."
"Mum, I was just—"
"Hiroshi," said Michiko, without changing her tone. "Your son."
Hiroshi looked at Ginjiro.
"You heard your mother," he said.
"But—"
"Ginjiro."
Ginjiro lowered his hands with the mana still faintly active and walked to the door with the specific expression of someone who is yielding, but wants it on record that they disagree.
The kitchen table had that scale of family tables that are neither too large nor too small — exactly the right size for three people who know each other well and do not need distance between them.
Michiko served while Hiroshi and Ginjiro washed their hands at the differential speed of two people with different levels of urgency about reaching the table.
"Maestra Kana spoke with your father this week," said Michiko, once the three of them were seated.
Ginjiro looked up from his plate.
"Kana? The Maestra?"
"The very same," said Michiko.
"About what?"
Michiko looked at Hiroshi with the gesture of someone passing the floor to someone else.
"About you," said Hiroshi. "She says you're one of the most interesting students she has seen in a long time. That your development is unusual for your age." He paused. "They're interested in taking you to Tokyo so you can learn from the best instructors at the central headquarters."
Ginjiro processed that for exactly two seconds.
"I want to be the most powerful hunter," he said, with the certainty of someone who decided that long enough ago for it to no longer be an aspiration but a fact that has not yet occurred.
Michiko looked at him with something between tenderness and the specific concern of a mother hearing her son say something she knows is true and which at the same time has a cost he cannot yet fully calculate.
"You probably will be," she said.
Ginjiro nodded with the conviction of someone for whom that was simply a matter of time and effort.
"When are we going?" he said.
"It's not decided yet," said Hiroshi.
"But are we going?"
"Eat," said Michiko.
Ginjiro ate. But the question remained in the kitchen air with the persistence of questions that do not yet have an answer but have already taken shape and are not going to stop being there.
"No," said Michiko, in the corridor.
Ginjiro was at the kitchen doorway with the expression of someone preparing the correct argument.
"Just ten more minutes," he said. "The flow was coming out well and if I stop now tomorrow I'll be starting from scratch again."
"It's already late," said Michiko.
"Dad," said Ginjiro, turning towards Hiroshi with the energy of someone changing interlocutor because the first one is not yielding.
"Maybe a little while wouldn't be bad..." said Hiroshi.
Michiko looked at Hiroshi seriously. He understood perfectly and looked back at Ginjiro.
"Your mother said it's already late," said Hiroshi.
"But—"
"We'll continue tomorrow."
Ginjiro looked at both of them with the resignation of someone who has assessed all available options and reached the conclusion that none of them leads to ten more minutes of training tonight.
He went to his room.
The bed had that specific discomfort of nights when there is too much moving inside the mind for the body to settle properly.
Ginjiro was looking at the ceiling thinking about what Kana had said to his father — an incredible future, interested in taking him to Tokyo — with that mixture of excitement and something harder to name that was the ten-year-old version of understanding that something important is about to change, even though you do not yet know exactly what.
The most powerful hunter, he thought. That's what I'm going to be.
Voices came from the corridor.
Not loud — ordinary conversation, the kind parents have when they think their children are asleep. Ginjiro did not pay attention at first. But something in the tone made him turn his head towards the door.
"...Ryuichi again," said his father's voice.
Ginjiro frowned.
Ryuichi. The name that came up from time to time in the conversations his parents had when they thought he was not listening.
"Every time he gets in contact with that person it's because something dangerous is happening," said his mother's voice, lower but audible. "And if this time he's asking both of them to go, it's because something more serious is going on. We can't go and leave Ginjiro alone."
"That's exactly why we have to go," said his father. "I understand about Ginjiro, but we could leave him with his aunt and uncle."
"His aunt and uncle aren't in town this week."
Silence.
"I don't know," said his mother.
Ginjiro looked at the ceiling.
Ryuichi again, he thought. Every time that name comes up they're gone for weeks.
He did not know him in person. Only the name, said in the specific tone his parents used when they spoke about something that was important and that they preferred to keep separate from the part of life that included having dinner together and training in the garden.
He closed his eyes.
Not to fall asleep — to stop listening, which was harder than falling asleep.
The following day Kana's training space had that morning light that made everything seem more possible than it seemed in the afternoon.
The other two students were already there when Ginjiro arrived — Nori Hasegawa, eleven years old, with that precision of movement of someone who had been training longer than him, and Sae Ōta, ten like Ginjiro, with an energy that resembled his own, even if expressed differently.
Kana watched them from the centre of the space with that presence of hers that required no announcement.
The class began.
Ginjiro was not completely there.
Not in any visible way — he followed the exercises, responded when asked, did not pause at the moments where he should have kept moving. But there was a delay between what he saw and what he processed that was not present on his better days, and that delay was enough for Nori to anticipate him in two exchanges where he normally would not have been anticipated, and for Sae to reach a position before him that was usually his.
When the class finished, Kana looked at him.
"Ginjiro," she said.
The other two headed towards the exit. Ginjiro stopped.
"Is something the matter?" said Kana, in her usual direct tone, but without the hardness she used during the training moments.
"I'm fine," said Ginjiro. "Just a bit tired."
It was not completely untrue. After what he had heard in the corridor he had not slept well — his mind had kept moving long after his parents' footsteps in the corridor had gone quiet.
Kana looked at him with that attention she had — of someone who registers what is said and also what is not said, and does not confuse one with the other.
"If you need anything," she said, "let me know."
"I'm fine," Ginjiro repeated. "Just tired."
Kana nodded.
Ginjiro left.
Kana remained looking at the empty space where he had been with that expression that was difficult to read from outside — not exactly concern, but the specific attention of someone who has noticed something and is deciding what to do with that information.
The house was silent when Ginjiro arrived.
Not the silence of when his parents were in another room or in the garden — the silence of when there was nobody. No footsteps, no voices, no sound of the kitchen that was always there at that hour.
"Mum?" he said.
Nothing.
"Dad?"
He walked through the entrance, through the corridor, through the living room. Everything in order — nothing out of place, nothing to suggest anything bad had happened. Only the absence.
On the dining room table there was a note.
Ginjiro picked it up.
The handwriting was his mother's — neat, with that specific care she put into writing something she knew would be read in her absence.
Ginjiro: we had to go to Tokyo because Inoue Ryuichi asked us to come. The deputy head of the headquarters needs us. Your aunt and uncle are not in town this week so you'll be on your own for a while. There's food in the refrigerator. You train with Kana tomorrow as always, don't train too late. We love you. Mum and Dad.
Ginjiro read the note twice.
Then he set it down on the table.
Again, he thought.
He sat in the chair in front of the table with the note in front of him and the silence of the house around him.
Not with sadness exactly — with something closer to the resolve of someone who has just made a decision that had been forming for some time.
I want to be a hunter so I can go with them, he thought. So I don't have to stay waiting for notes on the table.
He looked at his hands.
The mana appeared without him looking for it — faint, steady, the kind that appears when one stops looking and simply listens.
Orange.
On the other side, in Tokyo, two figures were arriving at the entrance of the central headquarters.
Kato Hiroshi and Kato Michiko walked along the main corridor with the familiarity of people who know that place even if they do not frequent it habitually — without the hesitant step of visitors, but without the completely automatic ease of those who work there every day.
At the end of the corridor, in front of the deputy head's office door, there was a figure.
Standing. With the posture of someone who has been there a while and does not mind continuing to be there. With that specific calm of people for whom waiting is simply another form of doing the work.
It looked at them when they approached.
It recognised them.
It opened the door without saying anything.