Darkness.
Then — sound.
It began like the clash of a single piano key, the note stretching, twisting, turning into the groan of metal.
Ayanokōji opened his eyes.
He was standing at the center of a vast intersection — the very same one Ichigo had described.
Only now he wasn't the listener. He was there.
The air was thick, hot, suffocating.
Smoke and blood mixed with the acrid sweetness of burnt plastic.
Every breath scorched his lungs.
Somewhere nearby, fire crackled and distant screams rose, only to be drowned by the thunder of an explosion.
The ground beneath his feet was slick — melted glass and blood fused together.
He took a step forward.
And there — amid the ruin — was Ichigo.
Sitting at a black grand piano, half-buried in rubble.
His fingers moved over the keys with deliberate calm, and the music — fractured, trembling — cut through the chaos like a voice that refused to die.
Each note shimmered with despair, but in it there was beauty, strange and tragic.
Ayanokōji wanted to speak, but the heat choked him.
Pain spread across his skin — not imagined, but real.
Even the air hurt to touch.
"This… can't be a dream," he whispered.
Ichigo didn't look up. He kept playing.
Ash drifted through the air, turning the flames into a storm of silent snow.
The smell of burning flesh was everywhere — cloying, nauseating, impossibly human.
For the first time in years, Ayanokōji felt fear.
It wasn't panic. It was pure awareness — the recognition of being trapped inside something alive.
A sudden flash of light —
The flames surged closer, crawling over Ichigo's body, but he didn't stop.
His hair burned, skin cracked, fingers bled — still, he played.
The music rose, louder, deeper — until it became indistinguishable from the explosion that followed.
Fire devoured everything.
Ayanokōji fell to his knees, heat clawing through his lungs.
Through the blaze, Ichigo turned his head.
His eyes glowed — bright orange, like the heart of the flame.
"You see now," he said quietly.
"You know how it hurts."
The fire roared, swallowing the sky — and the last note struck like thunder.
Ayanokōji gasped.
He woke in his dorm room, drenched in sweat.
His hands were trembling — cold, yet marked with faint red burns, as if he had truly touched the fire.
The smell of smoke lingered in the air.
He moved to the window.
Outside, beneath the dim light of dawn, Ichigo stood near the school gates — looking straight up at him.
In his eyes, the faint reflection of fire still burned.