(CONTINUED FROM CHAPTER 5)
Another day at Mounagiri Gakuen. The birds chirped, and the sun beamed gleefully on the lush hills.
The students all played in the ground, some of them clashing with one another as they ran around.
Tamara played her sport on the field. She wanted to take a breather. She walked to the common water area for a quick refresh.
Across the ground, she noticed the boys playing their games.Meanwhile, Kodokuna sat alone on a thread footpath with his sketchbook.His posture was calm, but his physique showed no weakness.
She watched him quietly for a while. Then she approached with courtesy.
"Hey, why don't you join the others for some sports, huh?"
Kodo startled—but didn't flinch."Well, it's not that I don't want to," he replied."They just make it seem like I'm not even playing there."
She could hear the crack in his voice. His white threads shimmered beneath the loneliness.
Tamara, concerned but composed, replied, "You're not broken like you think you are, Kodo. You're just untrained. You might even be stronger than me."
He looked up at her, feeling once again the gentle warmth of her golden threads. The white threads around him began to fade, and faint greenish threads flickered in their place.
Tamara smiled. Then she said, softly, "There must be a reason your threads—the vibrant golden ones—aren't showing yet. You just have to remember the roots, Rohan."
Usually, he only felt warmth from Tamara.But hearing his real name from her lips, spoken so gently—something inside him stirred. And then— his memories ignited.
A childhood memory. A hospital corridor. Greyish hue, dimly lit across the corridor.
He stood there, small and silent. A boy nearby was screaming—his thread broken, his cries filled with sorrow. Then, for the first time, Kodo saw it— deep blue threads, heavy and pouring out from that child like rain.
He remembered a nurse in that corridor. Her thread was soft pink, tinged with green. It curled and engulfed as she took the boy's hand. The moment she did, the boy calmed, as if her thread had woven directly into his fear.
Back then, Kodo thought it was madness. He thought he was cursed to witness such things.
But now, Tamara was saying it was something else. A sense of purpose. His pulse throbbed.
Another image flashed across his mind:
A fire.
A scream.
A thread turning to ash.
But the memory slipped away like mist. Suddenly, his threads jolted.
White wobbly threads became violet pulsating threads. A sharp green spike lashed out—uncontrolled.
Tamara flinched. One of his threads had scorched her wrist. She didn't say a word. She bore the pain anyway.
But her eyes had widened. She recognized the danger. His memories were consuming Kodo.
Tamara moved quickly—intertwining her green threads into her gentle golden ones, she wrapped Kodo in a field of warmth. Her threads reached him and engulfed him completely. Something unexpected happened.
One of Kodo's green threads moved on its own. It gently wrapped around hers. He didn't even notice.
But Tamara did. For the briefest moment, he was healing himself.
She steadied the remaining purplish threads, soothed them with her green ones, then sealed the rest with golden light.
Kodo blinked. His pulse calmed. His body relaxed. He had returned.
Tamara stood up slowly, still watching him. She could feel it now— there was more to Rohan than anyone knew.
She helped him up and guided him gently to lie down on a thread-woven bench inside the sports room. Kodo tried to sit up, to thank her. She raised her hand, signalling him to lie down.
"Rest," she said. Then, her voice lowered. "We need to go to Saradzkuri. The Hidden Order. They might be interested in you. And they might have a solution to your problem."
As she said it, her eyes caught something dark. Black-crimson threads. Slithering away into the shadows. Something about them felt wrong.
She leaned down and whispered into Kodo's ear:
"This school. This class. This place. It no longer feels safe. Something's coming."
They exited the sports room slowly. Tamara walked beside him, carefully taking Kodo to the infirmary of Mounagiri Gakuen. She stayed close, worried he might again be swallowed by his mind.
In the silence of the infirmary room, a faint black sigil pressed itself into the ceiling above—as if something was watching them from the dark.
Somewhere else, high above Mounagiri Gakuen, on the Astronomy Tower—
A figure crouched. His threads didn't glow. They hissed.
Nyahl whispered to himself, "So the boy hasn't broken yet."
Then he vanished into the shadows.