Taro's cabin stood on the edge of the world. From there, Rinz watched the seasons change: the thin grass sprouting after a rare rain, the sky burning red at dusk. Months turned into years. The boy who had once been carried home from battle drills learned again how to live with a body that no longer obeyed him.
At first, recovery meant only survival.Taro taught him to move with the stumps of his arms, to shift his weight, to crawl to the door and back. Later, when the wounds sealed into scars, the old man began to craft. The master craftsman specialized in creating prosthetic arms and legs for soldiers, but these were no mere replacements; they were weapons forged by loss.
He measured what was left of Rinz's limbs and forged fittings from metal dark as river stone. He lined them with leather and whispered to them as he hammered.
"These are not to make you whole," he said, sliding a brace over what remained of Rinz's right arm. "They are to remind you that you were never broken."
Rinz's first steps on the new legs were a war. The metal bit, the joints screamed. But he pushed until he could cross the cabin floor without falling. Pain was familiar now; it no longer frightened him. He learned to balance again, to lift, to strike, to breathe.Each movement added fuel to the quiet fire growing inside him.
Sometimes at night, Taro would find him standing before the forge, staring into the flames."You're thinking of going back," the old man said once.
Rinz didn't answer.
Taro sighed. "Vengeance is a long road. The end of it is never what you imagine."
"I'm not imagining the end," Rinz said softly. "Just the walk."
The old man nodded. "Then walk carefully."
Three years after the offering, Rinz left before dawn.Taro woke to find the bed empty and the prosthetics gone. Outside, he saw footprints, one of steel. leading east toward Majinwa. He didn't chase them. Some roads a man must walk alone.
The plains greeted Rinz with the same dry wind that had watched him bleed. The world had moved on, but not forward. The drought had ended, but not the faith that had damned him. Villages still prayed to a god that never answered.
By the time he reached Majinwa, night had fallen. The gates creaked the same way they always had. No one recognized the hooded man with the faint metallic rhythm in his steps.
He passed through the market square, empty now, and walked toward the house that used to smell of bread and laughter.
The house was silent. Dust gathered on the table. His mother's shawl hung on a chair, untouched, faded to gray. On the wall, an old prayer cloth fluttered, torn and brittle.She was gone.Not taken by age or time, but by grief.Neighbors had whispered that Sari Izen had stopped eating the day her son was offered. Some said she prayed until her voice vanished. Others said she simply walked into the plains one morning and never returned.
Rinz stood in the empty house for a long time, the silence pressing against him like a weight. Then he turned toward the temple.
The temple loomed like a wound on the land. Its torches flickered, casting long, trembling shadows across the cracked walls. The same altar that had drunk his blood still stood in the center.
And at its base, kneeling, was Faran Izen.
His father looked smaller now, the proud shoulders bent, the hair silvered, his voice hoarse from years of prayer.He whispered to a god that hadn't answered in years.
Rinz stepped through the doorway, his boots clinking softly against the stone.The man didn't look up.Not at first.
"Who dares to enter the house of the god without permission?" Faran asked, still kneeling.
"The god's mistake," Rinz said.
The voice hit him like a ghost.Faran looked up, and for a moment, the years melted away. He saw his son, older, scarred, eyes cold and hollow.
"Rinz…" His lips trembled. "It can't be…"
"It is," Rinz said. He walked closer, the firelight glinting off his metal limbs. "You wanted to give the god something precious. You did."
Faran stumbled back, shaking his head. "I did it for us! For our people! For the god"
"The god never asked," Rinz snapped. "He was silent. You were afraid of the silence, so you made me your voice."
Faran's knees hit the floor. "I was wrong… I"
Rinz unsheathed his blade. It sang with the sound of Taro's forge, a low hum like a storm waiting to break.
"You killed everything good in me," he said quietly. "And now, you will see what's left."
The strike came fast, faster than a man should move. Faran raised his hands, but the blade sliced across his chest. He staggered, clutching the wound, gasping for breath.
"Fight me," Rinz growled. "Pray while you still can."
The old man drew his sword, shaking, eyes wet. "If this is my punishment, let it be in your hands."
Faran enabled his Untra-instincts and was shocked. Rinz did the same.
Rinz trained for years to unlock the UI mode and knew that without it, he would never defeat his father.
Their blades met, steel against faith. Sparks burst, echoing through the hollow temple.Faran fought like a man desperate to erase a lifetime of guilt, but his strength had long since left him. Rinz moved like wind, precise, ruthless.
A swing. A clash.The second strike tore through his father's arm.The third pierced his side.
Faran dropped his sword, blood spilling down the altar steps, the same steps where his son had once lain.
"Forgive me…" he gasped.
Rinz's blade stopped inches from his throat. His jaw trembled, rage and grief twisting into something unrecognizable.
"Forgiveness," he whispered, "is for the living."
He drove the blade forward.
The temple bells cracked from the force.Faran Izen collapsed at the feet of the god he'd worshipped, the light in his eyes fading as his blood soaked the floor.
Rinz stood over him, breathing hard, smoke curling from the torches.He looked up at the idol, lifeless, watching, and laughed, low and bitter.
"Your faithful servant," he said to the statue, "has finally offered you something real."
He kicked the brazier. Flames spilled, catching on the drapes. Within seconds, the temple was burning.
By dawn, the village was gone.The fire spread through the village, devouring wood and prayer alike. People screamed, but Rinz didn't stay to watch.He walked through the smoke, silent, the flames dancing in his reflection.
When he reached the edge of the plains, he turned once.The temple collapsed behind him, sparks rising to the clouds like souls finally free.
Taro's words echoed in his head. "Vengeance is a long road."
Rinz adjusted the straps on his prosthetics, blood and ash still clinging to the metal. "It's not vengeance," he murmured. "It's balance."
The wind answered, dry, endless, carrying the faint crackle of fire.
He was no longer the boy who cried for mercy.He was Rinz Izen, the shadow that walks where the wind stops.