Aika didn't sleep that night.
Every time she closed her eyes, she saw the envelope in her drawer—the way the wax shimmered like something wet. It felt heavier now, like it had roots crawling through her apartment, anchoring itself into the floorboards.
At 3:17 a.m., she gave in.
She shuffled barefoot to the kitchen, her steps slow and uncertain. The old wooden planks creaked beneath her like they always did—but this time, the sound didn't feel familiar.
It felt watched.
She poured herself a cup of tea with trembling hands. The steam rose weakly, curling into the still air like it didn't belong there. The moment felt like one of those dreams where you think you're awake, but nothing around you behaves quite right.
On the counter was a photo she didn't remember placing there.
Old, frayed at the corners. Her father stood beside a rusted car, squinting into the sun.
Renjiro Hoshino.
She hadn't seen that photo in years. She thought she'd buried it in the box beneath her bed—beneath her past.
She stared at it, her mouth dry.
There was something in his eyes she hadn't noticed before. Not warmth. Not pride. But something colder.
Something almost… frightened.
She walked slowly back to her bedroom. Sat on the edge of her mattress. The drawer beside her creaked open under her hand. The envelope was still there, untouched—but it felt closer now. As if it had shifted in the dark.
Her fingers hovered. Then closed around it.
The wax seal was deep crimson, pressed with a symbol she didn't recognize—an ouroboros coiled around a dagger, its blade piercing its own eye.
She didn't know why her fingers were shaking.
She didn't remember picking up the letter.
She only knew she couldn't pretend anymore.
⸻
The knife from the kitchen drawer did the job.
The wax cracked with a sound like a bone snapping.
Inside was one sheet of ivory paper—thick, textured, old.
No sender. No date. Just six words, handwritten in ink darker than night.
He wrote your name in blood.
Aika stared.
Her stomach dropped.
Beneath that line, a second phrase. A name.
Renjiro Hoshino.
Her breath caught.
Her father's name.
A man she hadn't seen since she was five. A man who disappeared without goodbye, leaving behind only rumors and a mother who refused to speak his name. A man who was now whispering back to her from beyond the grave.
She hadn't spoken his name aloud in years.
Why was it here?
Why now?
And why did reading it make her want to run?
⸻
Elsewhere
A ledger lay open in Daizen's office.
Its pages were yellowed, the ink so faded you could only read it under angled light.
Hoshino, Renjiro — DEBT OPENED.
Condition: Blood for blood. Paid in silence.
Below it, a second entry, handwritten in neater, more modern ink:
He's dead. But the girl lives.
Daizen's fingers traced the margin slowly.
"She doesn't know," his second-in-command said from the shadows.
"She will," Daizen replied. "When the letter opens."
⸻
Later, another voice came quietly through the dark.
"She opened it."
Daizen didn't smile. Didn't blink.
He simply whispered, "Good."