Mio was walking toward the old road.
She was not running.
She did not seem to be in a hurry.
That made everything worse.
The night in Hisayama was still, with the kind of silence that did not fully belong to the town or to the forest. The houses remained behind her, dark, sunken beneath their black roofs. Higher up, the mountains looked like a single shadow stretched against the sky.
Mio kept walking with the folded paper in her hand.
Her feet touched the earth with an almost perfect softness.
Too perfect.
As if she were not walking by her own decision, but following a line drawn on the ground that only she could see.
"I have to open my eyes," she whispered.
The sentence left her lips without force.
Without fear.
Without emotion.
That made it sound less human.
She kept moving.
The old road began where the last houses ended. Beyond it, a row of trees marked the entrance to the forest. During the day, it probably would not have looked especially threatening. At night, however, the trunks rose like motionless figures, and the branches blocked what little light came from the moon.
Mio reached the edge.
She took another step.
"Mio."
The voice stopped her.
Not because she recognized it.
Not because it moved her.
It stopped her the way a sharp sound stops an animal that does not know whether to run or attack.
Hina Tsukino stood a few meters behind her.
Barefoot.
Her hair slightly disheveled.
Her breathing only a little faster than usual.
In one hand, she held her small axe. It was not expanded. Not yet.
Her eyes were fixed on her sister.
"Mio," she repeated. "Come back home."
Mio turned her head slowly.
Too slowly.
She looked at Tsukino.
For an instant, she did not seem to see her.
Then her lips moved.
"I have to open my eyes."
Tsukino tightened her grip around the axe handle.
"No. You have to come back with me."
Mio blinked.
Once.
Twice.
"I have to go."
"Where?"
Mio did not answer.
She looked at the forest.
Tsukino took a step toward her.
"Mio, listen to me. I don't know what they did to you, but this isn't you."
Mio looked at her again.
Her eyes were open.
But Hina felt, with a slow coldness sliding down her back, that those eyes were not looking at the same world she was.
"Don't close me," said Mio.
Tsukino went still.
"What?"
Mio tightened her fingers around the paper.
"Don't close my eyes."
Her voice was still low.
But something changed in the air.
Tsukino felt it too late.
Pressure.
Not a complete presence. Not the clear, recognizable mana of a trained hunter. Not the contaminated weight of a remnant either.
Something in between.
Broken.
Forced.
A pale current appeared around Mio's fingers, so faint at first that it looked like vapor. Then it tightened.
And struck.
Tsukino moved by instinct.
The axe grew in her hand with a flash of mana and took the impact head-on. The blow was not large, but it was abrupt. The force pushed her one step back, her heels sinking into the damp earth.
Mio did not move.
Tsukino looked at the edge of the axe.
Her sister's mana had left a thin mark on the metal.
A real mark.
"No," she whispered.
From the house, a second figure appeared, running down the road.
"Tsukino!"
Mei arrived a few seconds later, her hair loose and her fans in her hands. She was not wearing her full uniform. She had only had time to throw something on before running out.
She looked at Hina.
Then at Mio.
Then at the axe.
"What was that?"
Tsukino did not answer.
Mio slowly raised her free hand.
The air around her fingers trembled again.
Mei opened her fans.
"Tsukino."
"I don't know."
"What do you mean, you don't know?"
Mio attacked again.
This time, the mana came out in three irregular lines, like malformed cuts that could not decide whether they wanted to be whips, needles, or claws. Tsukino blocked the first with her axe. Mei cut the second apart with a gust of wind. The third passed between them and struck a tree behind them, tearing splinters from the bark.
Mei looked at the tree.
Then at Mio.
"Could she always do that?"
Tsukino shook her head without taking her eyes off her sister.
"No."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
Mio took a step forward.
The pressure began growing around her again.
It was not much.
But it was there.
And that was impossible.
Tsukino swallowed.
"In my family, besides my parents… I was the only one who could use mana."
Mei understood.
Her expression changed.
She was no longer only worried.
Now she was afraid.
"Then someone did this to her."
Mio lowered her head.
The paper crumpled in her hand.
"Don't close me," she murmured.
"Mio," said Tsukino, taking a step toward her. "It's me."
"Don't close me."
"I'm Hina."
Mio looked up.
For a second, something seemed to move behind her eyes.
Not recognition.
Something smaller.
An echo.
Tsukino saw it and took another step.
"Mio, look at me."
Mio's mana burst.
Not like an explosion.
Like a rejection.
A pale wave came out of her body and pushed the air outward. Tsukino crossed the axe in front of herself, but the impact forced her back. Mei planted one foot on the ground and opened both fans to cut through the pressure before it hit them fully.
"Tsukino, don't approach her from the front!"
"She's my sister."
"That's exactly why."
Mio began walking toward the forest again.
Tsukino moved to block her path.
Mio turned.
The movement was clumsy.
Too wide.
Like someone who did not know how to fight, but whose body was being forced to attack anyway.
Mana gathered in her right hand.
Tsukino saw the blow coming.
She could dodge it.
She could knock her down.
She could expand the axe, immobilize her, strike the ground and cut off her advance.
But it was Mio.
It was her little sister.
The girl who used to run barefoot through that same house. The girl who complained whenever Hina left to train. The girl who asked why their parents always seemed to be looking at places where she could not see anything.
It was Mio.
And the blow landed.
Tsukino managed to cover herself with the axe handle, but not enough. The pressure scraped her shoulder and opened a shallow line beneath the fabric. It hurt less than it should have.
Maybe because something else hurt more.
Mei released a wind cut.
Not toward Mio.
Toward the ground in front of her.
The earth split in a thin line, and Mio stopped by instinct.
"I don't want to hurt her," said Mei.
"Then don't."
"I'm trying not to."
Mio looked at the line in the ground.
Then she looked at Mei.
For the first time, her expression changed.
Not much.
Just enough for her mouth to tense.
"You don't see."
Mei frowned.
"What?"
Mio raised her hand.
"You don't see what's behind."
The mana formed again.
This time, around her eyes.
Two pale lines descended from her forehead to her eyelids, as if something invisible had drawn a path beneath her skin.
Tsukino felt her stomach tighten.
"Mio…"
"They see," said Mio.
Her voice was not hers.
Not completely.
"They open."
The attack shot straight toward Mei.
Mei reacted late.
Not because she did not see it.
Because she had not expected Mio to aim at her with such precision.
Tsukino stepped in between them.
The axe grew suddenly, wide and heavy, forming an improvised barrier between both of them. The impact made the metal vibrate and shook her arms all the way to her shoulders. Tsukino clenched her teeth.
Mio did not stop.
Another blow.
And another.
And another.
They were not clean attacks. They had no technique. No rhythm of training. They were bursts of mana thrown with borrowed rage, as if someone had taken the closed door inside Mio and was pounding on it from the other side.
"Mio, stop!"
Tsukino pushed with the axe.
Mio stepped back twice.
Mei moved from the left, trying to circle around her.
"Tsukino, if we keep letting her move forward, she'll enter the forest."
"I know."
"And if she enters, we don't know what's waiting for her."
"I know."
"Then decide."
Tsukino looked at Mio.
Mio raised her head.
Her eyes were open.
Too open.
"I have to open them," she whispered.
Tsukino breathed.
Once.
Deeply.
The kind of breath someone takes before doing something they do not want to remember afterward.
"Mei."
"What?"
"Cover me."
Mei did not ask.
She opened her fans and sent two wind cuts, one to each side of Mio. Not to injure her. To trap her. The cuts lifted dirt and dry leaves, forming a brief pressure that limited her movement.
Mio turned toward Mei.
Tsukino used that second.
She ran.
The axe shrank in her hand until it was small again.
Mio tried to react.
Her hand rose.
The pale mana began to form.
Tsukino arrived first.
She turned the weapon.
She did not use the blade.
She used the handle.
The blow struck Mio on the side of the head.
It was not an elegant blow.
It was not heroic.
It was desperate.
Strong enough to stop her advance.
Not strong enough for Tsukino to forgive herself for doing it.
Mio fell to her knees.
The mana around her eyes flickered.
Once.
Twice.
Then went out.
The folded paper slipped from her hand.
Tsukino dropped the axe and caught her before she hit the ground.
"Mio."
Mei closed her fans immediately and ran to them.
"Is she all right?"
Tsukino did not answer.
She had one hand behind her sister's head and the other holding her shoulder. Mio was breathing. She was conscious. But her eyes moved differently now.
Confused.
Human.
Mio blinked.
She looked at the ground.
Then at Tsukino's hands.
Then at the forest.
"Hina?"
Her voice was weak.
But it was hers.
Tsukino felt something inside her chest loosen all at once.
"Yes."
Mio frowned.
"What…?"
She tried to stand, but dizziness took her.
Tsukino held her.
"Stay still."
Mio looked around.
The road.
The trees.
The night.
Mei.
The axe on the ground.
The earth marked by cuts.
Her own trembling hand.
"Why are we here?"
Tsukino and Mei looked at each other.
Neither said anything.
That answered too much.
Mio swallowed.
"What did I do?"
"Nothing we can't fix," said Tsukino.
The sentence came too quickly.
Too defensively.
Mio knew her well enough to understand that.
"Hina."
Tsukino looked away.
Mei crouched and picked up the folded paper from the ground.
She looked at it without opening it.
"She had this in her hand."
Mio looked at the paper.
Her face changed.
She did not remember everything.
But something, somewhere in her body, recognized it.
"No…" she whispered.
Tsukino looked at her again.
"What do you remember?"
Mio closed her eyes.
Not like before.
Not like someone receiving an order.
This time was different.
It was the gesture of someone trying to find an image among too many shadows.
"I don't know."
Her voice trembled.
"I don't know what happened."
Tsukino said nothing.
Mio brought a hand to her forehead.
Her fingers touched the space between her eyes.
She froze.
"There was… someone."
Mei tensed.
"Who?"
Mio opened her eyes.
"I don't know."
The forest moved with the wind.
Leaves whispered.
Far away, a branch cracked.
Tsukino looked toward the trees.
For a moment, she thought she would see the man from the square.
Or someone dressed in white.
Or something worse.
She saw nothing.
That did not calm her.
Mio lowered her hand.
"I remember a voice."
Tsukino looked back at her.
"What was it saying?"
Mio tried to answer.
She could not.
Her breathing quickened.
Tsukino took her hand.
"Slowly. You don't have to force yourself."
"No, I…"
Mio looked at the paper in Mei's hand.
Fear filled her eyes.
Not the empty fear from before.
Real fear.
Her own.
"I left the house," she said, as if she had just understood it. "Again."
"Yes," said Tsukino.
Mio looked at her sister.
"Did I attack you?"
Tsukino did not answer immediately.
Mio saw the shallow wound on her shoulder.
The answer was there.
"Hina…"
"I'm fine."
"No."
"Mio."
"I'm not fine."
The sentence came out low.
Broken.
And for the first time since she had returned to the house, Mio seemed completely present.
That was almost worse.
Because now she understood that something had been missing.
That something had moved her.
That something had used her body while she had not been looking.
Mei closed her hand around the paper.
"We have to go back to the house."
Tsukino nodded.
"Yes."
She helped Mio stand.
Mio was trembling. Not from cold. Or not only from cold.
She took one step.
Then another.
Before they walked away, she looked at the edge of the forest.
The darkness between the trees seemed the same as before.
But now Mio looked at it with terror.
"There," she whispered.
Tsukino went still.
"What?"
Mio barely pointed.
Not toward one specific point.
Toward the inside.
"I think I went there."
Mei looked at Tsukino.
Tsukino did not take her eyes off the forest.
"Do you remember why?"
Mio slowly shook her head.
Then she hesitated.
"No."
She pressed her lips together.
"But I remember how it started."
Tsukino looked at her.
Mio's eyes were wet.
Her face pale.
Her body still weak.
But when she spoke again, her voice no longer sounded empty.
It sounded afraid.
And alive.
"I'll tell you."