"When the moon bleeds, the world remembers its sins."
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⚔️ Prologue
The world was silent when the moon bled.
No wind dared whisper, no creature dared breathe. The mountains of Elyndra burned in crimson light, their peaks veiled in storm and sorrow. Below them, upon an altar carved from obsidian and time, the last of the Yorimashi stood — cloaked in ash, bathed in the dying light of a world on its knees.
At the altar's heart, a man knelt. His armor was fractured, his blade slick with blood and grief. Around him, the bodies of both spirit and mortal lay scattered like discarded prayers — a battlefield where gods and beings of Echo had fallen together, their souls dissolving into the trembling air.
His name was already forgotten, yet every being who would ever touch the Echo would inherit his curse.
"Seal it…" he rasped, voice trembling against the windless silence. "Before it wakes again… before it learns to breathe our air."
The ground shuddered in answer.
From the shattered altar, a storm of Echo erupted — black, cold, alive. It writhed like a wounded god, coiling into a shape that defied form — neither man nor spirit, but both, and something beyond either.
The Yorimashi raised his shaking hands. Chains of silver light burst forth, etched with the language of creation — rings of burning scripture that wrapped around the storm, pulling it down, inch by inch. Each sigil flared like a scream swallowed by eternity.
And then, it laughed.
Its laughter wasn't sound — it was memory.
A thousand voices whispering through the bones of the planet.
"You seal me with light… but your blood carries my name. The vessel is prepared. In the womb of your descendants, I shall wake."
The Yorimashi's blade flared, its dying glow reflected in hollow eyes. His oath was his last weapon.
"Then may my blood never rest."
He plunged the sword through his chest — through flesh, bone, and altar alike. The Echo exploded outward, consuming the night in agony and light. The ground split like a screaming wound. Mountains sank into shadow, oceans roared in rebellion, and the moon — pale and broken — wept fire.
When the silence finally returned, there was nothing left of him but a whisper.
The first Yorimashi was gone.
And the cursed spirit, though sealed, was not slain — only buried beneath centuries of prayer and ash, waiting for a heartbeat that would echo its own.
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Centuries later, beneath that same moon, a boy dreamt of the bleeding sky.
Kairu Ryoku lay on his narrow bed, his sheets tangled, his skin cold with sweat. The dream returned — as it always did — thick with the taste of smoke and sorrow.
He saw the altar again. The kneeling man. The chained storm.
And behind them all, a shadow — vast, formless, and eyeless — whispering his name through the cracks of his mind.
"Kairu…"
He jolted awake, the sound of his name still hanging in the air.
Darkness greeted him — not empty, but alive. The faint hum of Echo beyond the window trembled against the walls. The night pressed close, heavy and electric, as though something unseen had followed him out of the dream.
His hand found his chest. His heart thundered beneath his palm — not with fear, but with recognition.
He could still feel it — that storm. That ancient pulse buried beneath mountains and time.
The words from the dream carved themselves into the quiet:
> When the moon bleeds again, the chains will break.
He didn't understand them. Not yet.
But somewhere far away — deep beneath the same mountains that once burned in his vision — something stirred.
A heartbeat. Slow. Patient.
Alive.
The seals that had held the cursed spirit began to fade, one by one.
The runes that glowed with the prayers of a thousand souls flickered and dimmed.
And though no one in the waking world yet knew it, the boy who dreamed of ancient chains would become the key that unbound them.
Moonlight crept through his window, soft and silver.
Outside, the air shifted — a faint wind carrying the scent of ash and something older than death.
A whisper rode upon it, low and cruel:
> "Bloodremembers."
Kairu's breath caught. His eyes, wide and trembling, searched the dark for something that wasn't there.
And then, as the whisper faded, the world exhaled.
The leaves rustled. The wind stirred.
And somewhere, far beyond his sight —
the world began to bleed once more.