Aoi stood at the foot of the old shrine, her figure barely lit by the lantern she carried. The night air in Hiraizumi was sharp, and the cicadas had long gone silent.
"This is where it began," she said. "You used to come here when you were small. With her."
"My mother," I murmured.
Aoi nodded.
We entered the shrine grounds—abandoned now, the torii gate faded and the prayer bells rusted. Yet the moment I stepped past the threshold, something stirred within me. A memory, buried and brittle, pushing its way to the surface.
I could feel the heat of my mother's hand in mine. Hear the hum of her voice.
"Hikari," Aoi said, breaking the silence. "You've sealed away something important. If you want to protect Hanabi, and yourself, you need to remember it."
"How?"
"By opening the door you locked shut."
She knelt before the shrine's inner sanctum and began drawing a circle of salt and ink on the wooden floor, symbols forming that strange language from my mother's notebook. She handed me the charm—my mother's charm—and gestured for me to sit inside the circle.
"I'll guide you. But once you're inside… you're on your own."
Inside the Memory
The air changed.
Suddenly, I was no longer sitting in the shrine.
I stood in a house long gone—my childhood home, before the fire. The walls were warm with sunlight, the scent of lavender drifting in from a nearby window.
I heard laughter. My own. And a voice I hadn't heard in years.
"Be careful, Hikari."
She was there—my mother. Her long hair tied back with a red ribbon, her eyes soft with warning.
I watched, unseen, as my younger self ran through the hallway, chasing a spinning paper charm.
Then the scene twisted.
Darkness spread across the floor like ink in water. The charm slowed in midair and hovered before the child-me's face.
Then—
A door.
A door in the hallway that shouldn't have existed. Wood black as coal. No handle. Just an old symbol etched in silver.
The child reached for it.
My mother screamed.
But the door opened anyway.
And behind it—
Eyes. Endless, unblinking eyes. A shapeless presence breathing cold across time.
Then the memory cracked apart, and I was back—gasping, sweat slick on my skin, Aoi's hands gripping my shoulders.
"You saw it," she said.
"The door," I whispered. "I opened it. I let it in."
Aoi was silent for a long time. "That creature—the Ikiryo—it didn't come to you randomly. It's been waiting. Watching you grow. Feeding on the wound."
"I gave it a way in."
"And now it's using the people around you to stay alive. That's why it's following Sakura. Why Hanabi's dreaming of the woman. It's no longer content to remain hidden."
Meanwhile, at home where Hanabi stay.
Hanabi hadn't slept for more than two hours in days.
She'd drawn the woman again and again—her faceless figure looming in the background of every nightmare. The place she was taken to felt more real each night. Cold stone walls, a flickering light, and whispers that echoed in languages she didn't understand.
It wasn't just a dream.
She knew that now.
Her friends had noticed too. Miho had asked why Hanabi stopped answering texts. Kazue mentioned the strange smell that followed her—like burnt incense and earth. And the new transfer student, the girl who arrived just last week, was watching her in class. Always watching.
That girl didn't speak much. But Hanabi saw her once, smiling faintly at the window… talking to someone who wasn't there.
That night, Hanabi tried staying awake. She drank bitter tea, chewed mint leaves, held cold stones in her hands.
But sleep claimed her anyway.
And she woke up in the room again.
Only this time, the door opened.
And the woman—tall, veiled in long black hair—reached out.
"You don't belong to her," the woman whispered. "You belong to me."
Hanabi screamed.
Back in Aoi's house.
I woke with a start, my body tense, breath shallow.
Aoi sat beside me, eyes closed in meditation. The room felt colder.
"She's in danger," I said aloud.
"Yes," Aoi replied. "The creature is pulling her in. You two are more connected than you know."
I looked at the charm in my hand, and for the first time, I felt it burn—just slightly.
I would go to Hanabi.
But first, I had to find that door again—truly find it—and close it.