"Don't look at it, Aira. Promise me."
She had promised. She had meant it.But when the wind began whispering her name every night, she had to know.
Three years ago, Aira Nocté was still a girl who believed monsters belonged in books.
She lived in the ancient Nocté estate — an ancestral mansion buried in the forests north of Kurohana, far from the neon and noise. The house was old. Older than the city itself. And in its courtyard stood a stone well, sealed by rusted chains and old prayers.
Her mother warned her:
"That well is not empty."
But curiosity is louder than fear.
It started with the dreams.
Aira would wake up with dirt on her hands and soil under her nails. Sometimes she was sleepwalking. Sometimes… she wasn't.
Then came the laughter.
Low. Hollow. Not quite human. Not quite far.
And finally — the voice.
"Aira. I remember you."
She opened the well on the seventh night.
The chains had rotted. The seals had faded. The prayers had stopped working long ago.
And from the bottom of the pit, something rose.
No form. No face. Just presence.Cold. Vast. Familiar.
"You are empty," it whispered. "Let me fill you."
It didn't ask. It entered her.
Aira screamed. Her mother came running — blade in hand, seals in her other — and tried to cut the connection.
She failed.
The shadow flared.Her mother burned.
And from that day forward, Aira became the vessel of Umbra Nox, the "First Whisper" — a lesser shadow, one of the old servants once cast out by the primordial Seven.
Umbra gave her visions. Power. Nightmares.In exchange, it lived in her skin.
For three years, she kept it hidden.
She hunted echoes of other shadows in the dark places of Kurohana — libraries with books that screamed when opened, basements where reflections moved on their own, and alleyways that looped forever.
She met others. Vessels like her. Most went mad. One tried to eat her heart.
None had seen a shadow like his.
The one with the grin.
"The Smiling Shadow…"Aira whispered the name like a curse."…why would it awaken now?"
And more importantly…
"…why would it choose him?"