The summer night in Kyoto was choking. Cicadas screamed so loud it felt like they were drilling into Renji Arakawa's skull. Festival lanterns swayed in the distance, but here, far from the laughter and the music, there was only silence and the weight of the night.
Renji dragged his feet along the stone path, his jacket slung lazily over his shoulder. He hated the festival—hated the way everyone else smiled, held hands, laughed as if the world existed only for them. He always felt like a shadow in the corner, like something that didn't belong. Tonight, that shadow had led him here: to the edge of Fushimi Inari Shrine.
The red torii gates loomed like a ribcage in the dark. Fox statues stared with blank eyes, their mouths frozen in silent screams. Renji felt a chill, though the summer air was heavy and wet.
Then he heard it. A sound that wasn't natural. Low, like something tearing underground, deep enough to vibrate in his teeth. His chest tightened. Against his better judgment, his feet carried him toward it.
He found an old warehouse connected to the shrine, its doors half-open like a mouth daring him to step inside. He hesitated only a second before pushing them wide.
Inside, the air was wrong. Thick. Metallic, like the smell of blood. At the center of the room lay a talisman the size of a door, nailed to the floor. It was cracked, its ink bleeding away, glowing faintly as if fire was crawling beneath its skin.
Renji's throat went dry. Something in him screamed to run. But his hand moved anyway. He reached out—
The second his fingers brushed it, the world detonated.
Light burst from the cracks, so blinding it carved pain into his eyes. The air roared like a storm, papers slashing his skin as if they had blades. His back slammed against the floor, his breath torn from his lungs.
When the light finally dimmed, two feathers drifted down before him. One burned white, so bright it scorched the air. The other was blacker than night, edges bleeding a smoke that stank of ash.
They hit the ground with a soft sound, but the earth itself groaned as if under unbearable weight.
Renji's chest seized. He couldn't breathe. His vision blurred—and then he heard them. Voices. One warm, one venomous, both echoing directly into his skull.
"Bearer of the Crest."
The feathers sank into the talisman. The cracks sealed in an instant. But it wasn't over. The back of Renji's hand burned like molten iron. He screamed, clawing at it until his nails broke skin. Blood smeared, but the mark stayed. A crest, carved into his flesh.
Footsteps.
Renji jerked his head up. A girl dropped from the rafters like a blade of light. Silver hair spilled down her shoulders, glowing in the dark. Her massive wings unfurled—pure white, each feather shimmering like sharpened glass.
But her eyes. Golden, unblinking. Not human. Too calm, too knowing.
"So it has begun," she said, voice soft but carrying the weight of judgment. "The Crest has chosen."
Renji pressed against the wall, shaking. "W-who the hell are you!?"
The girl drew a naginata, its crystal blade humming with divine light. She leveled it at his chest.
"I am Hikari no Ame, warrior of Heaven. And you—" the blade pointed like a death sentence "—are the chosen bearer of the Future Crest."
Renji opened his mouth, but the air collapsed around him.
Darkness bled from the corners of the room. The temperature plunged. Shadows moved like they were alive, writhing across the walls. Then he stepped forward—a man-shaped thing with jagged black wings, feathers trailing sparks that smelled of burned flesh. His blade dragged on the floor, shrieking against the wood, leaving scars behind.
His eyes burned red. And when he smiled, his teeth were too sharp, too many.
"So Heaven slithered here first," he said, his voice scraping like rusted metal. "Pathetic."
Renji's heart nearly stopped. The man's presence pressed down on him like a hand crushing his skull.
"I am Kurohane," the creature hissed, lifting his weapon. "And that Crest belongs to Yomi."
The room convulsed. Light and shadow slammed into each other with a sound like bones snapping, the floor splitting, the air filling with the stench of ozone and ash. Feathers scattered like razors, embedding in the wood. Blood splattered—Renji didn't even know whose.
His mark seared like fire, the glow spreading through his veins like poison. He wanted to run. To scream. To deny all of it.
But deep inside, he already knew—
This was no dream. This was the death of his old life.
The night the seal broke, Renji Arakawa's world was drowned in blood and ruin.
And the future—Shourai—had begun its descent into hell.