Kaen's hand trembled, but his voice did not. "Not another word."
Kriya stood frozen, the sting blooming across his cheek. The sharp crack of the slap echoed faintly through the trees… and Ryoma stopped.
"Jie—" Kriya's voice cracked.
"Don't call me that!" Kaen snapped, the words cutting deeper than any blow.
Kriya flinched not from fear, but from the weight of it.
"Akira…" Kaen's voice broke the tension, low but pleading. "Why don't you just stop this already?"
"Because I can't… you understand me better than anyone after all."
Kaen's gaze shifted between them—between Ryoma, who had already turned away. Without a word, Ryoma walked on, Astra still cradled gently in his arms, fading into the smoke-filled woods where the fire was dying down.
Kaen sank to his knees, the weight of the moment pressing down as he unclasped the pendant at his neck, returning it to her true self.
"There are things forbidden," she murmured, voice low and steady. "Things you cannot carry… because they will only bring suffering." She paused, eyes distant, then spoke as if to herself, or perhaps to the shadows themselves.
"Life and death cannot sail on the same boat—it will sink beneath the weight of their opposing tides. Either there must be darkness… Or light. Both cannot exist in the same place."
Kriya stepped closer, voice barely more than a whisper. "Some boats sail against the tide. Some souls bear the weight. If darkness and light never touched, how could beauty be born?"
Kaen's eyes darkened, her breath heavy. "It will ruin you, Akira… completely that you won't be able to come back. You'll be lost, swallowed by the depths of the water. Once you sink there, there's no coming back. Leave now, before everything here falls apart."
Kaen's gaze softened just a fraction as she gestured toward the fading fire. "This isn't right." Without waiting for a reply, she turned and disappeared into the shadows of the forest.
Kriya stood still, his hands curled into fists at his sides. Then, softly almost like a confession to the wind he spoke.
"Even if it ruins me… I want to be with her—like a thron to the rose, built to bleed beneath its beauty."
Kriya slowly reached up and untied the cloth from around his eyes, letting it fall through his fingers. The world came into focus—dim, fractured, quiet. He moved through the scattered ash and embers, searching the ground until his fingers brushed against the broken remains of the mirror.
He knelt, gathering the shards with care.
"She destroyed it…" he murmured under his breath, voice low. "A divine relic, shattered without a second thought… after all the trouble Daita went through to steal it. Poor him… his efforts, all for nothing." His gaze fell to the jagged shards, where his reflection stared back in fragments distorted, multiplied. A soft, rueful laugh escaped his lips.
"Had I known the truth sooner… none of this should've happened."
His fingers curled tightly around one shard, the edge biting into his skin—but he didn't let go.
"I only brought her pain. Caused more trouble than I was ever worth…" He paused. The weight of guilt hung for a breath. Then something shifted in his eyes.
"No…" he whispered, a new clarity settling in. "This wasn't all a waste." He placed a hand against his chest, eyes narrowing slightly as if feeling something unfamiliar stir within.
"I've learned something now. And that… is a gain." He stood slowly, the broken pieces still in hand, blood trailing down his palm. The forest around him felt colder. Still.
"I need to be careful with my actions… from now on."
———
Mo Yeyan drifted through the void like a torn wraith, his spirit form flickering with instability. He muttered and cursed under his breath, seething with rage.
"Pathetic—burned, humiliated, tossed aside like smoke! A thousand years for this?!" His voice warped around him like wind clawing through trees, bitter and broken.
As he swirled above the ground, something strange caught him. Something… stirred. A scent. Not divine. Not cursed.. but Oddly grounding. He turned drawn by instinct. Not toward light. But warmth. Something human.
A few miles ahead, perched casually on a rooftop, a solitary figure sat cross-legged, lazily eating dumplings from a bamboo basket. The steam curled into the air, rich with the scent of garlic and spice—but that wasn't what caught Mo Yeyan.
It was the man himself.
His aura.
Mo Yeyan drifted closer, circling like smoke in the cold wind.
"…Interesting."
Without hesitation, he surged forward, slipping into the man's body in a ripple of shadow. The man stiffened, fingers freezing mid-bite. His eyes fluttered once, then opened again—sharp, wrong.
Mo Yeyan smirked through borrowed lips. His gaze dropped to the basket in his lap.
"…You were eating this?"
He picked up a dumpling delicately, turned it once between his fingers, then took a bite. Heat and flavor filled his senses strange, but grounding.
He blinked.
Chewed again.
A slow grin crept across his face.
"…Maybe this won't be so bad after all."
Mo Yeyan spoke through the man's voice, savoring the sound like venom on his tongue. He licked the oil from the man's fingers and turned toward the glowing streets ahead.
"Let's try this again."