The Cracks of Sorrow (Part 1)
The snow had not stopped for days.
Every corner of the city wore white now. Roofs sagged beneath its weight, streets glittered with frost, and every breath fogged heavy into the night air. It was as if the heavens themselves wished to bury the world in silence, to smother every voice beneath its endless fall.
Yet voices still rose. Angry, raw, breaking through the storm.
"I told you to leave me alone!"
Isshun Shinda's voice broke across the frozen courtyard of a half-collapsed inn. His ragged dark-blue kimono, torn and marked with moon symbols, whipped in the wind. His dagger glinted faintly beneath his sleeve, still strapped to his left arm as though it were part of his body.
Opposite him stood Rūpu Rīpā. The childs red kimono was tattered now, darkened with dried blood from battles past, his one sword drawn and low at his side. His horns caught the moonlight, small against the storm but unmistakable, twin silhouettes of sorrow carved into his head.
"Isshun, stop running!" Rūpu shouted, his voice trembling not with fear, but with desperation. "I'm not your enemy!"
Isshun's lips curled into a bitter smile, though his eyes were tired. "Not my enemy? Then why do you follow me? Why do you keep looking at me like I matter? You don't know me, horned freak. You don't know what it's like to be cursed to survive when everyone else dies!"
The words struck like blades. Rūpu flinched, his grip tightening on the hilt. His voice broke as he answered, "I do know! I've buried everyone I loved! I've stood in the snow with no one but myself! Don't you see? I'm not chasing you to pity you—I'm chasing you because we're the same!"
Isshun spat into the snow. "No. We are not the same. I don't need you. I don't need anyone."
The dagger flashed free from its strap, sharp against the white storm.
Rūpu's heart sank. He had not wanted another fight. He had wanted words, to bridge the void between them. But Isshun's eyes burned too bright, his fury a wall that could not be broken with speech alone.
The storm howled louder, as if it too demanded steel.
Their weapons clashed.
Rūpu's single sword rang against Isshun's dagger, sparks lighting the night. The force of Isshun's fury pushed him back, snow scattering beneath his sandals. Rūpu's sorrow sharpened into defense, his strikes heavy with restraint. He did not swing to kill—he swung to reach.
"Isshun!" he shouted between blows, his voice hoarse. "I know your pain—I felt it too! When I buried my father with my own hands, when I had no one left but these horns and my blade—don't tell me I don't understand!"
Isshun's dagger drove hard against his guard, their faces inches apart, steam rising from their mouths in the frozen air. "Then why didn't you die like him? Why do people like us keep living when the ones who deserved life are gone? Tell me that, Rūpu! Tell me why I'm still here!"
The words cracked open something inside Rūpu. His arms trembled. For a moment, his sword nearly dropped. He wanted to scream that he didn't know. That he asked himself the same question every night when the snow pressed cold against his skin. That surviving had never felt like living—it had felt like punishment.
But no sound left his lips.
Instead, the snow answered.
The world seemed to pause as their blades locked again, the storm slowing into a white curtain around them. And from the edges of that curtain, from the shadow of a broken wall, another figure watched.
A child.
No older than Rūpu or Isshun. Her small frame was cloaked in ragged cloth, her hair matted with frost. Her eyes were wide—too wide for a child—watching the fight with something more than curiosity. There was no fear in her, only silence, as though she had seen too much already for fear to survive.
She crouched low, half-hidden, her breath misting in the air. Neither kid noticed her.
Steel rang louder. Rūpu twisted, his sword arcing with the Makigatsu technique, sorrow shaping the air around his strike. Isshun caught it with his dagger, his sleeve tearing, his arm bleeding again from the strain. But he did not falter. He roared, the sound more wounded than warrior, and pressed forward.
"You think fighting me will fix me?" Isshun spat. "You think if you beat me, I'll suddenly understand your precious sorrow?"
Rūpu's eyes burned, tears freezing on his lashes. "No! I don't want to beat you—I want you to live! To stand beside me!"
Their weapons clashed again, sparks scattering like fireflies swallowed by snow.
From his hiding place, the watching child's small hands clenched around the edge of the wall. She didn't know these children. But something in their voices, in their fury and sorrow, made her gut ache. She had lived long enough to know loss. She had lived long enough to recognize the sound of it in others.
The storm screamed. The fight dragged on. And still Rūpu shouted, voice raw, desperate to reach the kid who refused to be reached.
"Isshun, you're not alone anymore! Even if you hate me—even if you strike me down a thousand times—I'll keep coming back! Because I won't let you drown the way I almost did!"
For a heartbeat, Isshun faltered. His dagger shook. His eyes widened, not with belief, but with the sting of words that struck too close to the heart.
Rūpu pressed forward, his sword trembling but steady, tears streaking his cheeks.
"I won't let you carry your curse alone. Even if you hate me, I'll carry it with you."
The snow fell heavier, swallowing their breaths, their cries, their clash.
And from the shadows, the child watching whispered into the storm, unheard:
"...Why do they fight when they're the same?"
The question hung in the night, unanswered.
Episode 4 had only just begun.
A Bond in the Snow (Part 2)
The courtyard was cracked with footprints and blood. The snow was pocked with melted spots where sparks had burned through, and two children stood in the heart of it all, stomachs heaving, blades still trembling from their storm of sorrow.
Isshun's dagger dripped a thin line of red. His sleeve was shredded, and his face was flushed with fury, shame, and something softer he refused to name.
Rūpu stood opposite, his one drawn sword lowered, the steel fogging from his breath. His kimono was torn at the shoulder, the skin beneath raw and bruised. His horns glistened with a faint frost, and tears clung to them like gems.
For a long while, neither spoke. The storm howled around them, filling the silence that their blades had left behind.
Finally, Isshun broke first, voice hoarse.
"...You're stubborn. Too stubborn."
Rūpu let out a half-laugh that broke midway, heavy with exhaustion. "You're one to talk."
Isshun's lips twitched, not quite a smile, but not a sneer either. His dagger trembled in his hand before he shoved it back into the strap at his arm. He turned away, his shoulders tense. "You shouldn't care about me. I'm... I'm not worth it."
Rūpu's voice came soft, but unwavering. "Neither was I. At least... that's what I thought. Until someone cared enough to teach me how to hold a blade. Someone who should've hated me, but didn't. Maybe I'm just trying to give that back. To you."
Isshun froze. His breath puffed white in the air. For a moment, the storm quieted, as if listening. Slowly, he glanced back. His eyes, once sharp with venom, softened—though only by a fraction. "...You're an idiot."
"Probably," Rūpu said, lowering his sword, the ghost of a smile tugging at his lips.
The storm eased. Their clash was done. Not healed, not completely, but a crack had opened in the wall between them, enough for light to seep in.
And it was at that moment that a new voice pierced the snow.
"Well, this was interesting."
Both children spun, blades half-drawn again, but the voice wasn't hostile. It was lilting, curious, even playful.
From the crumbled wall above, a figure dropped lightly into the snow, her landing a little clumsy, sending her sandals skidding on the ice. She nearly toppled but caught herself with a laugh, cheeks flushed from the cold.
The child couldn't have been older than either of them. Her kimono was deep purple, embroidered with flower patterns that bloomed brightly even against the storm. A wide bow at her back fluttered in the wind, and at her left hip rested a sheathed blade, its hilt gleaming faintly.
Her hair was black, short but curling in playful twists that looked both messy and deliberate, like the snow itself had styled it. From her head sprouted two short red horns, polished and sharp, unmistakably oni.
Her eyes, wide and curious, darted between Rūpu and Isshun, sparkling with mischief.
"Well, don't stop now," she teased, hands on her hips. "That was just getting exciting! You two were really about to kill each other. Kind of a waste, if you ask me."
Rūpu blinked, utterly bewildered. Isshun scowled, crossing his arms. "Who are you?"
The kid tilted her head, her bow bobbing with the motion. "Isshun Shinda, right? And you..." Her gaze fell on Rūpu's horns, and instead of mockery, her lips curled into a grin. "...You must be the horned kid everyone whispers about."
She stepped closer, sandals crunching in the snow. "Name's... hmm." She tapped her chin dramatically, pretending to think. "You can call me Hanae. That's what the last person called me, anyway. I like it. Fits me, don't you think?"
Rūpu didn't answer right away. He couldn't. He was too stunned by her presence. She wasn't afraid. She wasn't mocking. She was... laughing.
Isshun muttered under his breath, "She's annoying already."
Hanae caught it and burst into giggles, the sound cutting through the bleak night like bells. She wobbled a bit in her sandals, slipped on ice, flailed her arms wildly, and nearly fell into the snow before catching herself again. "Clumsy too! But that's alright, keeps life interesting."
Her laughter softened into something gentler as she looked at them again. "You two are strange. You fight like demons, cry like children, and yet..." Her voice grew quiet, thoughtful. "...you don't really want to hurt each other, do you?"
The words sank into the snow between them, heavier than they seemed. Isshun looked away, cheeks tight, while Rūpu's throat closed around the heavy fluttering snow of truth he couldn't deny.
Hanae smiled faintly, folding her arms into her sleeves. "That's why I jumped down. I wanted to see you both closer. You're... interesting."
The storm raged around them still, but the three children stood together now—horned sorrow, cursed fury, and curious laughter—like three threads the snow had braided into one.
Rūpu finally found his voice. "Why... why did you follow us?"
Hanae shrugged, her bow fluttering again. "Because I was curious. And because..." She paused, her face softening into something almost shy. "Because you looked lonely."
Her words struck harder than any blade.
Rūpu's eyes widened. Isshun's fists clenched at his sides. And Hanae, clumsy and laughing, only grinned again, brushing snow from her kimono as if she hadn't just unraveled them both with a single truth.
The night deepened. The snowstorm howled. But in its heart, three lives, once scattered, had touched.
It was the beginning of something none of them could yet name.
TO BE CONTINUED...