By midday, the forest thinned, giving way to open land. The wind carried a strange smell—dry, sharp, and heavy, like old iron. Shino slowed his steps, sensing that he had crossed into a place where time itself seemed to stand still.
Before him stretched a vast field. The grass was short and brittle, as if it had been burned long ago and never fully recovered. The soil was dark, scarred with blackened patches that refused to grow anything.
He knew this place without ever having been here.
This was where the elders whispered of a great battle from long ago—the day the warlords clashed, the day the hills themselves turned red.
Shino walked slowly into the field. The air was unnervingly still, as if the world was holding its breath. Here and there, half-buried in the earth, he saw the broken shapes of rusted weapons—sword hilts jutting like bones, shattered helmets, splintered spears.
He knelt beside one such relic, brushing away the dirt. Beneath his fingers lay the outline of a breastplate, so fragile it might crumble at a touch.
The wind shifted.
And suddenly he was no longer alone.
Voices rose in the air—faint, distant, like echoes from another age. The clash of steel, the thunder of horses' hooves, the cries of men locked in combat. His breath caught as the vision unfolded before his eyes.
He saw them—warriors charging, their faces smeared with blood and fear. He saw the flash of blades, the fall of bodies, the desperate struggle for victory that neither side would truly claim.
And then silence.
Shino dropped to his knees. His hands trembled as he pressed them against the ground.
"These were men," he whispered. "They fought… and they died here. All of them."
The weight of their deaths pressed down on him, so heavy he thought it might crush him. He bowed his head until his forehead touched the earth.
For a long time, he stayed like that, breathing slowly, feeling the cold soil beneath him. The dead had no one left to mourn them. No graves, no names. Only the battlefield itself, and now him.
"I'm sorry," he said softly. "For all of it. For what you had to do. For what you had to lose."
The wind stirred again, softer this time, almost like a sigh. The air felt warmer, and for a moment he thought he heard something—faint words, like gratitude.
When he finally stood, his knees were stained with dirt, but his heart felt strangely lighter.
He understood now why the hermit had given him the talisman. Why the visions came to him. Why he could not run from this path.
If no one remembered these dead, then they would be forgotten forever. And if no one learned from what happened here, then the world would repeat the same mistakes.
Shino turned to leave, but before he did, he gathered a small handful of earth and tied it in a corner of the cloth Aika had given him. It was a small gesture, but it felt right—carrying with him not just her hope, but the memory of this place and the people who had fallen here.
As he walked on, the field faded into the distance, but its silence stayed with him. The voices of the dead were quiet now, but they had left something behind—an understanding that what lay ahead of him was not just a journey for himself.
It was a journey for them, too.