Nestled in the bend of a river, with wooden bridges that creak. The air smells like wet earth and old paper. One inn. One shrine.
We arrived, no trouble at the gates—this place didn't even really have them.
Just farmers. Merchants. And one shrinekeeper who watched us the second our shadows touched his porch.
Kiyomi kept her hood low, didn't speak unless she had to.
Smart, but it didn't matter, because the old man at the shrine smiled when she walked past.
We found a room at the inn. A small one.
One futon. One cracked window. One very persistent housefly I was going to murder before nightfall.
Kiyomi sat on the edge of the futon, staring at the charm in her hand.
I watched her for a while, then broke the silence.
"You okay?"
She didn't answer right away.
Didn't look at me either.
A knock at the door.
I opened it.
Of course I did, because I'm smart like that.
The old shrinekeeper stood there.
White robes. Blue sash. And eyes that looked at Kiyomi, not me.
"I knew your mother," he said. "And if you've come this far…"
He stepped back.
"You'll want to hear what she left behind."
"I was there," the shrinekeeper said, voice steady. "The night your mother vanished. When they came to bury her memory."
Kiyomi sat still, hands folded in her lap.
Toki, however, was less diplomatic.
"Let me guess," I said, voice dry. "You're the loyal retainer. Secret keeper. Mysterious grandfather figure with a tragic backstory."
The old man didn't even blink.
"I run a shrine."
I tilted my head. "And serve up hot exposition on the side. Handy."
Kiyomi groaned. Pinched the bridge of her nose.
"Baka. Could you not antagonize the one person who might actually have answers?"
I blinked. "Did you just call me stupid in public?"
"Yes" she muttered back, sipping her tea with far too much elegance.
The shrinekeeper cleared his throat. Barely hiding a smile.
"I see the bond between you two is… well-seasoned."
"I'm her bodyguard," I clarified.
He raised a brow.
"Of course."
He turned back to Kiyomi.
"There's something I kept. Something hidden. From the Empire. From the Order. From everyone."
He stood. Walked to a low chest. Opened it.
Inside?
A scroll.
Wrapped in blood-red silk.
"This belonged to your mother. She said it was only to be opened if her daughter survived long enough to awaken."
The air changed.
Kiyomi didn't reach for it.
Not yet.
She looked at me.
"You already know what I'm going to say," I muttered.
"'Burn it and leave,'" she guessed.
I shrugged. "It's a classic."
She smiled and reached for the scroll.
At first, she said nothing, just followed the lines.
One after another, until her fingers began to shake.
I took a step closer.
"Bad news?"
She didn't answer.
Didn't blink.
Then her voice came out.
"It's not about me."
I frowned.
"When the seal breaks…and the three bloodlines fall silent…the pale gate shall open."
"The guardians will shatter.The ink will run dry.And the oldest name will be spoken again—Kaguro."
The name hit the room, even the shrinekeeper flinched.
"You know it?" I asked him.
He nodded. Slowly.
"A demon. A prince of flame and hunger. Banished before the first dynasty. Said to have commanded the winds to devour cities."
"Let me guess," I muttered. "Someone's trying to bring him back."
Kiyomi's voice dropped lower.
She was reading the final line.
"The key to the gate lies in the daughter of the unspoken bond.Half mortal. Half vow.One who walks with fire in her shadow."
She looked up at me, eyes wide.
"It is about me."
That same night, the shrinekeeper receives word—A nearby temple to one of the old guardian sects has been burned to the ground..
"They carved his name into the altar," the old man says.
Kiyomi asks, "Whose?"
The shrinekeeper doesn't answer right away.
He just looks at her, then at Toki.
And mutters:
"The one you're meant to stop."
A second scroll lies open, freshly delivered by courier. Its edges are scorched. Kiyomi reads, slower this time.
"Temple of the Eastern Flame," she read aloud. "Burned to ash three nights ago. Guardians found melted. Altar desecrated. No bodies recovered."
I crossed my arms. "Because there weren't any left to recover."
The shrinekeeper nodded.
"His name was carved into the altar stone, with bare hands, by the look of it."
Kiyomi looked up.
"They're trying to bring him back."
The shrinekeeper's mouth pressed tight.
"They'll need blood. Ancestral blood. A soul that bridges what's human and what was once divine."
He didn't say her name.
He didn't have to.
I stepped between them.
Felt my blade shift slightly in its scabbard like it wanted out.
"Then we make sure they never get close."
Kiyomi didn't argue, but she asked what I didn't expect.
"You think my mother knew this would happen?"
I looked at her.
At the girl with ink in her veins and something ancient clinging to her shadow and said:
"I think she knew the world wasn't done trying to ruin you and she wanted to give you a fighting chance."
The next day on some dusty paths. Smoke in the distance—just a wisp, but Kiyomi sees it first. The shrine. What's left of it and just off the road, sitting on a boulder, a man waits.
He didn't look like much.
Didn't look like anything at all.
Just sat there, dressed in gray robes. Hands folded. Hair neatly tied.
And a smile so wide I stopped walking.
Hand to my sword.
Kiyomi stopped too.
The man looked at her first.
"You're early," he said.
Like we were late for a meeting we never agreed to.
Kiyomi's voice was careful. Calm.
"Do I know you?"
He tilted his head.
"No. But I know your blood. It's been whispering for days now."
He patted the stone beside him.
"Rest a moment. This path grows rougher after this."
I stepped forward.
"Keep smiling like that and I'll rearrange your teeth."
He chuckled, light, unbothered.
"I'm not here to fight."
He looked at Kiyomi again.
"I'm here to offer."
Her eyes narrowed.
"What kind of offer?"
His smile faded, just a fraction.
"One that spares you pain. One that gives you control. Before they twist you into a weapon for someone else's war."
I drew my blade.
He didn't move, just looked up at me like a teacher waiting for a foolish student to stop interrupting.
"Walk away," I said.
"And I won't gut you on your damn rock."
He sighed.
And this time, his smile looked tired.
Almost… sad.
"Very well," he said.
He rose. Brushed off his robes.
Then looked at Kiyomi one last time.
"You won't listen now, but you will. Eventually."
And then?
He was gone.
Kiyomi stared at the space where he'd stood.
Then whispered:
"That wasn't a man."
The temple ruins rise from the scorched hillside like the bones of a buried god. Charred columns, shattered bells, and the stench of fire that never really left.
I stepped in first.
The front gate had collapsed. Blackened timbers choked the path.
I pushed through.
Kiyomi followed, slower. Hood drawn back. Hands flexing at her sides.
We reached the altar or what was left of it.
"Kaguro," she whispered.
The name was carved deep.
The grooves were gouged, not etched. Bits of stone still clung to the edges like splinters of someone's final scream.
She crouched beside the altar, ran her hand just above the carving.
"The guardians fought," she said. "But they didn't die here."
I nodded.
"Dragged off?"
"Worse."
We both turned.
Same moment.
Something moved in the rubble.
Not a person, not quite.
It crawled from beneath the fallen beams.
Twisted. Hooded. Wearing the scorched remains of a prayer robe.
Fingers blackened down to the bone.
And where its face should've been?
A mask.
It didn't speak.
It laughed.
Kiyomi stepped back.
"Come on, then," I growled.
The thing stopped laughing.
It started to scream and the ash rose with it.