The electric bike coughed and died two blocks past Dogenzaka.
Ren coasted into a narrow alley behind a shuttered ramen shop, kicked the stand down, and slumped against the wet brick wall. Rain still fell in sheets. His hoodie clung like a second skin, blood and rainwater mixing into dirty pink rivulets that ran down his forearms.
He lifted his right hand. The black tendrils were gone now, but the skin still felt wrong—too tight, too alive. Like something underneath was breathing.
Level 2, Kurogami's voice purred, lazy and smug. Not terrible for a delivery boy who still flinches at gunshots. You absorbed a fragment of a low-grade vessel. Barely a snack.
"Shut up," Ren muttered. "I didn't ask for commentary."
You didn't ask for immortality either, yet here we are.
Ren pressed his forehead against the cold wall. The sirens were distant now, but he knew better than to relax. That girl—Aoi, or whatever her real name was—had looked at him like she could see straight through to the thing squatting inside his soul.
He pulled out his cracked phone. 12:19 a.m. One missed call from an unknown number. No voicemail. Just the call log staring back at him accusingly.
The screen lit up again. Same number.
He almost swiped to ignore it.
Almost.
He answered.
Silence for three heartbeats.
Then her voice—soft, careful, like she was trying very hard not to sound like someone holding a spear of light to his chest five minutes ago.
"Ito Ren?"
"How the hell do you know my name?"
"You dropped your courier ID when you Shadow Stepped. It's lying on the shrine floor right now. I could return it… or I could bring the entire Third Purification Squad to your door in twenty minutes."
Ren laughed once, short and bitter. "You're blackmailing me with my own laminated photo?"
"I'm giving you a choice. Most Pagans don't get that courtesy."
He glanced up at the sliver of sky visible between the buildings. Neon from a love hotel sign painted the rain purple and pink.
"What do you want, angel girl?"
A small pause. When she spoke again her voice was quieter.
"I want to know why you didn't kill those men."
Ren blinked. "What?"
"You could have. The power answered you. It wanted to consume them completely. But you only took the essence crystal from one—and even then you left him breathing. Why?"
He opened his mouth. Closed it. The honest answer felt ridiculous coming out loud.
"…Because I'm not a monster."
Another silence, longer this time.
"I have to report any active Pagan sighting within grade 3 corruption," she said finally. "You're already past that threshold. If I file the report tonight, a kill-team will be dispatched by dawn."
Ren's grip tightened on the phone. "Then why haven't you?"
"I don't know."
The admission sounded like it cost her something.
Ren pushed off the wall, started walking deeper into the alley toward the flickering lights of Shin-Okubo's Korean district. "Look. I didn't ask for this. Some asshole used me as a delivery boy for whatever cursed relic you people are fighting over. Now I've got an ancient demon doing stand-up in my head and bullet holes that heal themselves. I just want to go home, eat cup ramen, and pretend none of this happened."
"You can't."
"Yeah. I figured."
He turned a corner. Steam rose from grates. Signs in Hangul glowed above tiny soju bars and PC bangs. He headed toward the one place he knew would still be open at this hour.
"I need twenty-four hours," he said. "Just twenty-four. Let me figure out what the hell is happening to me. Then… you can do whatever your holy rulebook says you have to do."
"You think I can just ignore protocol for a day?"
"I think you already did when you called me instead of calling in an airstrike."
A soft exhale on the other end—like a laugh she didn't want to let out.
"Tomorrow night. 11:00 p.m. Rooftop of the old Tokyu Hands building in Shibuya. Come alone. If you run, if you hurt anyone, if I sense even a single unnecessary death tied to you… I won't hesitate again."
Ren stopped in front of a grimy stairwell that led down to "Cyber Haven – 24HR Net Café & Safe Haven (No Questions)".
"Deal."
He hung up before she could say anything else.
The stairwell smelled of instant noodles and cigarette smoke. At the bottom, behind a reinforced door covered in peeling anime stickers, Li Feng looked up from three monitors at once.
"Yo. You look like death fucked a dumpster and had you as the baby."
"Thanks, man." Ren dropped into the empty gaming chair beside him. "I need a shower, a charger, and for you to not ask questions for at least ten minutes."
Li Feng pushed a can of Boss Coffee across the desk without looking away from his screen. "Shower's in the back. Towel's questionable. Charger's under the keyboard. And bro…" He finally turned, one eyebrow raised at the shredded hoodie and faint black veins still visible under Ren's skin. "You're glowing like you swallowed a broken LED strip. You finally get that part-time gig at the yakuza pawn shop?"
Ren cracked the coffee open. "Something like that."
Li Feng leaned closer, voice dropping. "For real though. There's chatter on the dark boards. Some new Pagan popped up in Shibuya tonight. Took out three essenceless hunters like they were paper dolls. Signature was pure void—black fire, shadow movement, the works. People are already calling it 'Kurogami's return'."
Ren froze mid-sip.
Li Feng grinned, sharp and excited. "Tell me you didn't."
Ren stared at the can. "I didn't mean to."
A slow whistle. "Holy shit. You're a walking war crime now."
Ren rubbed his face. "I have twenty-four hours before an angel tries to exorcise me. Or worse."
Li Feng studied him for a long second. Then he reached under the counter and slid over a small velvet pouch.
Inside was a thumb-sized red crystal, pulsing faintly like a heartbeat.
"Low-grade essence shard. Street price is about 80,000 yen. I was gonna flip it tomorrow but… looks like you need the boost more than I need the cash."
Ren stared at the crystal. "You sure?"
"Dude. If you're really hosting Kurogami, you're either gonna die tonight or become a legend. Either way I want front-row seats. Consider this my investment."
Ren took the shard. The moment his fingers closed around it, hunger—not his own—surged up from somewhere deep in his chest.
Take it, Kurogami whispered. Absorb it. Grow.
Ren closed his eyes. The crystal crumbled to red dust and sank into his palm.
Warmth raced up his arm, into his core.
Essence absorbed. Level 3 reached.
New ability unlocked: Shadow Veil (brief invisibility in low light)
Passive improved: Accelerated Regeneration → +20%
He exhaled shakily. The black veins under his skin faded a little. He felt… sharper. Faster. Like the world had been running at 0.8× speed his whole life and someone finally pressed play.
Li Feng watched the whole thing with wide eyes. "That was disgustingly cool."
Ren stood. "I need to think. And sleep. And not die."
"Back room's yours. No cameras. No one will bother you."
Ren paused at the doorway. "Thanks, Feng."
"Don't thank me yet. If the Miracles come knocking, I'm throwing you under the bus and claiming I never saw you."
Ren snorted. "Fair."
He stepped into the tiny back room—mattress on the floor, one flickering bulb, a window that overlooked nothing but brick.
He collapsed onto the mattress without bothering to take off his shoes.
Twenty-four hours.
One rooftop meeting with a girl who was supposed to kill him.
And somewhere inside him, an ancient demon was already planning their next move like it was a particularly entertaining game of shogi.
Ren stared at the ceiling.
Somewhere far above the city, Aoi Mizuki stood on the edge of her dorm rooftop, spear of light dismissed, golden runes on her coat slowly fading.
She touched her lips where she'd almost—almost—smiled during that phone call.
"Why do I feel like I've known you before this life?" she whispered to the rain.
No one answered.
But high above Neo-Tokyo, hidden in the storm clouds, something very old and very patient smiled.
End of Chapter 2