The old man slumped against the cold warehouse wall, blood trailing down his shirt, breaths growing thinner with every second. Sirens hummed somewhere far away, but he already knew they weren't coming for him.
In his fading vision, one name remained painfully clear—Kihoru.
A broken laugh escaped him, part regret, part awe.
"I used to think legends were just stories…" he whispered into the emptiness. "But then I learned about him… a quiet boy I should've seen, should've helped—yet I walked right past."
A flickering light overhead cast shifting shadows across the room as he spoke again, softer now.
"I never believed a child like that could exist in real life… one who swallowed whole storms just to survive. And we… we ignored him when he needed anyone."
His breath rattled, but he continued, as if confessing to the darkness itself.
"I saw only a fat, scared nerd. Not the fire hidden beneath. Not the rage trying to breathe."
His eyes drifted upward, no longer seeing the warehouse ceiling—only memories.
THE BROKEN CHILD
Kihoru had grown up in a cramped room where broken bottles were more common than toys. His father's drunken fury was the soundtrack of his childhood. Shouts echoed through the house every night, followed by the crash of plates and his mother's muffled cries.
Kihoru learned early that silence was safer than words.
At school, he found no refuge.
"Fatty nerd!"
"Hey buffalo, move!"
They shoved him into lockers, tripped him in hallways, stole his notes, laughed at his weight. Teachers didn't notice. Students didn't care. He had no friends—just textbooks and bruises.
But underneath the fear, Kihoru carried something else: a mind that refused to die.
Every night, after his father passed out and his mother quietly wiped tears from her swollen cheek, Kihoru would open his worn textbooks and study with a focus sharper than any blade.
He didn't study for marks.
He studied for escape.
For survival.
For a future where no one could touch him again.
His father hated that.
One morning, the man kicked over Kihoru's schoolbag, shouting, "You think reading will save you? You'll be nothing!"
Kihoru didn't answer.
He simply picked up the books again.
Not because he was weak—
but because he was learning to endure.
Inside, something small and dangerous had begun to stir. A spark born from fear. A promise forged in silence.
The kind of promise that changes destinies.
BACK IN THE WAREHOUSE…
The old man's breaths slowed, his heartbeat stumbling.
He understood now—too late.
"That boy… we pushed him, broke him, crushed him, and thought he'd stay down."
A faint, shaking smile formed on his lips.
"But he rose… higher than all of us. Stronger than monsters. Sharper than blades."
His final words were barely a whisper.
"Maybe… maybe your story was the greatest I ever witnessed, Kihoru… even if I only understood it at the end."
His eyes slipped shut.
The wind outside howled, like the world itself acknowledging the legend being spoken into the dark.
Because this was where it truly began—
not with greatness,
but with a broken child who learned to survive
until the world had no choice but to fear him.