The city had stopped sounding like a city.
No cars. No chatter. No drunk salarymen stumbling home.
Only the creak of broken steel and the far-off shrieks of the Aggressors, echoing through the hollow ruins like wolves calling across mountains.
Inside the shelter, no one spoke above a whisper anymore. Their voices had been eaten by silence and dust. The air clung to tongues like chalk. Every cough scraped like knives.
Shitsubo leaned against a cracked pillar, his pipe lying across his lap. His knuckles were bruised, bleeding from holding it too tight. He hadn't struck anyone with it since the last Aggressor, but the wood seemed heavier each hour.
The Insight refused to fade. Even with his eyes shut, fractures glowed faint beneath his lids—soft at first, then sharper the longer he stared. Every man and woman around him was a diagram of failure waiting to happen.
And the whispers in his skull wouldn't let him forget.
"Weak things fall. Strong things take. You know this. You always knew."
By morning, the food was almost gone.
Daigo dumped the last of the rice into a cracked bowl. His voice was hoarse. "This is it. After this, nothing."
The words were like black oil on fire.
Voices snapped through the shelter.
"We can't starve in here!"
"Then go outside and get eaten!"
"He's the reason we're still alive—"
"He's the reason we're cursed!"
Eyes turned to Shitsubo. Dozens of them, sharp with desperation, suspicion, and bright with untethered fear.
He didn't move. Didn't argue. No reason to.
He only stared back until they looked away.
Even Daigo looked at him too long before dropping his eyes.
Genji tried to speak, his voice shaking. "If we fight each other, the Aggressors won't need to kill us. We'll do it ourselves."
No one listened.
They were past listening.
That afternoon, the tremors started again.
Soft at first, like something shifting deep underground. Then harder, rattling the walls, dropping dust like rain.
The survivors pressed to the floor, hands over their heads.
Shitsubo stood, pipe gripped, eyes locked on the crack in the barricade.
Through it, he saw the street outside.
And what he saw was not just another patrol of Aggressors.
It was order.
Dozens of them moved in tight formation, not like beasts but soldiers. Their claws scraped the pavement in unison. Their eyes burned with the same pale light.
And at their center walked something larger. Taller than the others, its shoulders jagged with stone, its stride deliberate. The ground cracked beneath its steps.
Shitsubo's breath hitched. His body tensed, every nerve warning him.
This one was not a scout. Not a drone.
Something had taken command.
When night fell, the survivors whispered about leaving.
"They're organized now."
"They'll tear this building down."
"We have to move. Find the military. Something."
But no one volunteered to lead. No one was that brave. But one.
All eyes slid back to Shitsubo.
It wasn't a request. It was an unspoken order.
And he hated them for it.
They wanted his strength but spat at his shadow. They whispered "monster" by day and begged for salvation by night.
The hunger growled in his chest, furious and sweet.
"They do not love you. They never will. But they will follow, and then they will feed you."
He closed his eyes. The voice lingered like a hand on his throat.
Daigo found him later, away from the others.
"You hear them, don't you? You hear the things they're too scared to say out loud."
Shitsubo didn't answer.
Daigo's jaw clenched. "They want you gone. They think if you leave, the curse leaves with you."
Shitsubo turned his head, pipe balanced in his hand. "And you?"
Daigo looked away, shame flashing across his face before he buried it. "I don't know anymore."
The silence stretched too long.
Finally, Daigo muttered, "You're scaring even me."
Then he left.
The Rift pulsed again at midnight.
This time, the light was so bright it painted the shelter walls. Survivors woke screaming, clutching their heads.
And with the light came the voice.
"He comes."
Shitsubo staggered, the words splitting through his skull. His vision blurred with violet cracks, his chest heaving.
"Stone-walker. Flesh-binder. The traitor of his brood. He comes."
He collapsed to one knee, blood dripping from his nose, the pipe clattering across the tiles.
Genji rushed to him, panic raw in his voice. "Brother! What is it? What's happening?!"
Shitsubo's lips trembled, but no sound came.
Only the hunger, only the voice.
And through the crack in the barricade, he swore he saw eyes—two pale embers glowing from the street.
Watching. Waiting.
The shelter didn't sleep again.
Some prayed. Some muttered to themselves, rocking back and forth.
Shitsubo sat apart, staring at the violet glow seeping through the cracks. His hands shook. The hunger purred like a chained beast, stronger than ever.
Genji tried once more, voice cracking. "Brother… please. Tell me what you're becoming."
Shitsubo didn't answer.
Because he didn't know.
All he knew was this:
Something was out there in the streets. Something leading the swarm.
And sooner or later, it would come for them.