"Yes, he won't be coming to university anymore. I'm sorry, Ma'am,"a woman around forty said over the phone. After ending the call, she quietly made her way to her son's room. Inside, she found him sitting by the window, staring out blankly.
"Ren, do you want your breakfast?" she asked gently.
"No, Shira… my tongue's acting up again. I can't eat anything," he replied without turning around. He always called her by her name—never mom. She had long stopped being someone he could look up to.
"Alright… I'll prepare some milk. At least that should go down," Shira offered.
"Not now. I want to sleep," Ren muttered, already exhausted.
"You've slept enough. You should be studying—your classmates are getting ahead of you," she insisted.
"SHIRA, I'VE TOLD YOU—STOP COMPARING ME TO THEM!" Ren exploded. "DO THEY STRUGGLE TO EAT? TO SLEEP? NO, THEY DON'T!"
"Why can't you be… just normal?" Shira whispered, her voice cracking.
"Leave, Shira," Ren said coldly.
"I'M TIRED, REN. I'm tired of serving you every single thing. I can't go to work, and your father—he doesn't make enough to keep this house running! We can't even afford a maid to tend to your fucking needs. Just… toughen up and eat or rot!"With that, she stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.
Ren returned to the window. Outside, kids his age were playing football. They weren't good—clumsy, awkward—but they were laughing. Alive. Free.He couldn't watch anymore.
He crawled back to bed, curling into himself.
"W-why me, God… why can't I b-be n-normal…"He looked up at the stained ceiling, his voice breaking as a sudden outburst of sobs escaped him.
Ren suffered from cachexia—a disease that wasted his muscles and drained his body, no matter what he ate.He had a name for it: Null Energy.In his unique case, no amount of food helped. His body rejected nutrition itself.
He survived on water, specialized liquid supplements, and the sheer will to exist.Every single day was a battle. And he was always losing.
Eventually, his thoughts blurred into sleep.
While Ren rested, Shira threw herself into housework. She scrubbed each room with the last mop she hadn't sold. Cooked a bowl of fried rice for Harry, her husband. Squeezed out a glass of orange juice for Ren.She filled all the empty bottles scattered around the house, then sat down to complete invoices on her old laptop.
During an online meeting, her boss scolded her for not being at the office.Afterward, she cleaned the plates, folded laundry, and barely sat down before the front door creaked open.
Harry walked in, visibly irritated.
"Shira! Come quick, I need to talk to you," he called out.
"Yes, dear? What's the matter?" she asked, emerging from the kitchen.
"I'm just… exhausted. My boss chewed me out again for being 'unreliable,' even though it's my damn teammates who slack off. But do they get punished? Nope. Classic nepotism."
"It's probably because they're stronger than you," Shira said with a tired sigh. "The boss is scared of getting murdered."
"They shouldn't have hired murderers in the first place," Harry muttered. "Swindlers were already a stretch."
In Marijuan City, the government had pushed a bold, reckless initiative—rehabilitating criminals by giving them jobs. With the population at an all-time low, and a misplaced faith in redemption, the system was falling apart.Strength might inspire people. But cruelty? Cruelty controls them.
Shira spoke up again, more bitterly now:"The world may clap for the strong... but it kneels before the cruel. Because cruelty doesn't ask for respect—it demands it. Through fear, threats, and violence."
"Woah there, getting philosophical on me, huh?" Harry chuckled. "Come on now. Gimme a kiss, your husbo's tired."
She stepped toward him, barefoot on the hardwood floor, her eyes never leaving his. The faint creak beneath her toes broke the silence. Then her hand pressed firmly against his chest—right over his heartbeat, steady but fast beneath her palm.
"You're always chasing storms," she whispered, voice trembling slightly. "What if one day you don't come back?"
Harry didn't answer with words—he just leaned forward, his forehead brushing hers. His breath was warm and slow against her skin.
"I'll come back broken, bleeding, whatever it takes," he murmured. "As long as you're still here to put me back together."
Her breath caught. Her fingers fisted his shirt and yanked him a step closer, until there was barely room for air between them. The hallway felt too small, the world too quiet. Only the soft ticking of the wall clock dared interrupt.
"I hate how much I miss you when you're gone," she breathed, voice breaking with honesty.
"And I hate how easy it is to forget everything else when I'm with you."
He cupped her face, but this time his hands didn't tremble. He kissed her hard—no hesitation. The kind of kiss that said he needed her. Not just loved her. Needed her like breath.
She melted into him instantly, her arms wrapping tight around his neck as her body pressed flush to his. His hands roamed—down her back, over her hips—pulling her impossibly closer. Her blouse shifted under his touch, rising with every brush of his fingers against bare skin.
Harry broke the kiss for a heartbeat, lips brushing hers as he whispered against them.
"No crying. No dishes. No alarms. Just us."
Shira smiled, her voice husky, low.
"You always say that... and then you pass out in two minutes."
"Tonight's different," he said, lifting her with practiced ease.
She gasped softly, wrapping her legs around him, clinging to the heat of his body. Her lips found his neck, his jaw, desperate and slow. He groaned into her touch, his hands under her thighs, carrying her toward the bedroom as if the weight of her was the only thing keeping him grounded.
They pushed the door open.
And froze.
There, curled up like a dream between crumpled blankets, was Ren—peacefully asleep on their bed, mouth slightly open, his small hand resting on a stuffed animal.
Shira knelt beside him first, brushing his hair off his forehead.
"He's out cold," she whispered, her lips curving into a quiet smile.
Harry leaned against the doorway, arms crossed loosely, watching them.
"He gets that from you."
But under Ren's dream it was contrary to what was happening beside him.
The bed vanished. The warmth drained from the world.
Ren stood barefoot on a cracked floor. The walls of the room loomed like giants, peeling and gray. A single overhead light flickered, buzzing like a dying insect.
His parents stood at the far end of the room—but they weren't them. Not really. Not the ones he knew. Their faces were hollow, carved in cold stone. And their voices…
His mother's voice first—razor-sharp and venom-laced:
"I should've ended the pregnancy when I had the chance."
She stood tall and terrifying, her rose-pink cardigan stained dark like blood.
"I never wanted a son. I wanted freedom. You ruined that."
Ren took a step back, shaking.
His father's voice followed—distant, cold, cruel:
"You cry too much. You are too much. You're a constant mess."
They circled him now, slow and deliberate.
"Do you think we wanted to hold you when you were born?""Your first words weren't a joy—they were a curse.""Everything you do is loud. Ugly. Pointless."
His mother again, shouting now:
"I WISH YOU HAD DIED."
Her voice split the room. The walls cracked.
"I wish you had never been born!"
Ren screamed—but no sound came out.
His father's face twisted, filled with loathing.
"You don't deserve love. You drain it. You poison it."
They were both towering now, their shadows stretching like claws across the floor.
Ren dropped to his knees, clutching his chest.
"I'm sorry… I didn't mean to…"
But they kept screaming. The words turned to echoes. Sharp, violent echoes:
"You are a failure—""You are a burden—""We hate you."
But in reality,
Shira was sitting on the floor beside the bed now, her head resting against Harry's leg. She was staring at their sleeping son with eyes full of memory.
"Do you remember… his first win at that tiny art competition?" she whispered.
Harry smiled, kneeling beside her.
"He was four. Scribbled a dragon with a crayon. It looked like a deformed lizard."
They both laughed quietly.
Shira shook her head, her smile trembling.
"But he was so proud. He held it up like it was the Mona Lisa."
Harry looked down at Ren, his eyes softer than ever.
"That was the first time I saw him glow. I mean really glow. Like he believed in himself."
Shira added,
"Remember his first words?"
Harry chuckled.
"'No, no, no, no.' Repeated four times like a warning. To a watermelon."
They both chuckled, stifling the sound not to wake him.
Shira's voice turned tender, almost cracked.
"I've never loved anything the way I love him. Even when he tests me. Even when he hides and cries and won't tell me why... I feel it. He's this... this tiny storm we created. Beautiful and loud and so fragile."
Harry nodded.
"He made me better. I didn't even know I was broken until he started fixing me."
Shira rested her hand on Ren's back, watching the slow rise and fall of his breath.
"He's the reason we still try. The reason we haven't given up."
Harry looked at her.
"He's everything we never knew we needed."
They were quiet again. Just the three of them. Their little world.
But in his dreams there was constant arguing, he couldn't handle it anymore and woke up covered in sweat. Beside him were his mother and father sleeping peacefully but he saw an evil grin in their face. He jumped from his bed and rushed to the kitchen, he pulled the cold water in refrigerator and drank it and fell crawling. Then he started crying, he didn't know that the dreams were not the reality. After drinking the bottle, he threw it towards the window and it cracked the glass. He quickly rushed towards the damage and opened the window door. Luckily no shards had been broken but then he saw the view from the little balcony in the window. It was all yellow, but he hated the color yellow because it reminded him of someone.
By this time his parents had heard disturbance so they came to see what had happened and then Shira saw, her child, standing at the narrow edge of balcony railing, arms outstretched. They both rushed and screamed but he let himself fall from thirteen floors. He dropped into the silence below.
For a second—just a second—it felt like flying.The air punched against his chest.His stomach twisted into a knot and climbed into his throat.His heartbeat pounded like a war drum, louder than anything else.
The thirteenth floor dropped away beneath him, and the world became a blur of vertical lines—windows, walls, rusted railings flying past like ghosts of other lives.His hair whipped against his face. His shirt flapped violently in the wind, like it was trying to hold him back.
The ground rushed upward with cruel determination.
But then—nothing.
The world froze.Clouds stopped drifting. A bird mid-flight hung motionless in the sky.Down below, a woman crossing the street hung in mid-step, her scarf forever caught in the breeze.A dog mid-bark stood suspended, mouth open, soundless.
Cars and people far below were locked in place, as if someone had paused a film.
Ren's fall became a drift. His limbs stopped flailing.It felt as though he had been caught in a moment so still, so perfectly silent, that even gravity dared not speak.
His descent slowed unnaturally, as though the air itself had thickened into syrup.His arms still stretched wide, his breath stuck in his throat.Then, without warning, something yanked his attention sideways.
His head turned sharply—not by choice, but like a compass drawn to magnetic north.There, across the gap, was another balcony. Another apartment.And on its railing stood a figure.
A tall silhouette cloaked in shadow, pale and still.
A figure draped in black that swallowed light.
It wore no face, yet its presence was heavy, watching.
The figure's face was hidden beneath a deep hood, but its presence pressed down on him like a cold wave.
The figure raised a skeletal hand and made a slow, deliberate motion—a wave, but not the friendly kind. It was a warning, a summons. Then it lifted a bony finger to its lips and shushed him, a soundless "sssh" that seemed to echo inside Ren's chest.
A sudden chill ran down Ren's spine. Goosebumps erupted over his skin, prickling like icy needles. His breath hitched. Every instinct screamed at him to let go, to run, but he was frozen—caught between fear and disbelief.
The grim reaper's shadowed eyes locked onto his, unblinking and absolute. Time still hung heavy around them, the world silent except for the pounding of Ren's heart.
His hands shot out, fingers scrambling to grip the cold metal railing. The rough steel bit into his skin as he caught himself mid-fall, muscles straining against gravity's pull. The grim reaper's silent shush echoed in his ears, but Ren didn't hesitate.
With a fierce burst of energy, he shoved off, launching himself toward the next balcony. His body twisted through the air, limbs flailing as he aimed for the railing. Glass shattered instantly beneath his weight as he crashed through a window, shards spraying like rain around him.
He tumbled inside, landing hard on the floor. The air knocked out of his lungs, but he pushed forward, eyes darting.
A couple sat frozen on the couch, eyes glued to the flickering TV, watching a soccer match. Their startled gasps filled the room as Ren scrambled to his feet, heart hammering, breath ragged.
He was alive—barely—but the chase wasn't over.
The couple scrambled to their feet, fear twisting their faces. The man lunged forward, grabbing a heavy vase and swinging it toward Ren. With no time to think, Ren dove backward, crashing through the room toward the front door.
"Get out!" the woman screamed, her voice sharp and desperate.
Ren burst through the doorway and into the night, pounding down the stairs, every breath ragged, every muscle screaming. He didn't look back—until a cold, terrible presence froze him in place.
Behind him, the grim reaper stood, tall and silent, its hollow eyes burning with an unnatural light. The air around Ren turned icy, his skin prickling with dread.
"You love your parents," the figure whispered, voice like dry leaves scraping across stone. "Especially your mother."
Ren's heart thundered, the words twisting in his chest like knives.
"But what if," the grim reaper leaned closer, voice dropping to a chilling hiss, "you killed her?"
The world seemed to darken. Shadows thickened, creeping closer, swallowing the faint glow of the streetlights.
Ren's breath caught. His fists clenched, nails digging into his palms. Panic surged, but something darker —a raw, primal fear—rooted him to the spot.
The grim reaper's presence pressed down like a weight, unyielding and cold. The question hung in the air, unbearable and alive.
Ren's chest heaved, eyes blazing with desperate fury. "I'm not scared of you!" he shouted, voice cracking but fierce. "I won't let you—"
Before he could finish, the air around him thickened, cold and suffocating. The world blurred, the streetlights warped and snapped like broken glass.
In a heartbeat, Ren was ripped from the night and thrown into darkness.
He landed hard on a cold, unforgiving floor. The room was silent—too silent.
Dim light flickered, revealing the nightmare around him.
Bodies. Countless lifeless forms piled high in grotesque heaps, faces frozen in silent screams.
And on top of the pile—his mother and father, their eyes closed, pale and still.
A scream caught in Ren's throat as he staggered backward, heart pounding like a war drum.
The grim reaper's voice echoed, hollow and cruel: "This is what happens when fear takes root."
Ren's breath caught in his throat, heart breaking as he stared at the lifeless bodies of his parents. His voice trembled, raw and desperate. "How… how can I save them? What can I even do?"
The grim reaper stepped closer, its shadow swallowing the room. "You hate the world, don't you?"
Ren swallowed hard, pain sharpening his voice. "Yeah… I do."
The figure's lips curled into a slow, terrifying smile—twisted and cold. It was a smile that didn't just promise doom but invited it in.
Around them, the delicate flowers and algae tangled among the corpses froze mid-bloom. Petals blackened, curling into rot. The air grew thick with decay.
"I'll give you my power," the grim reaper whispered, voice like a knife's edge. "Do whatever you want. I will do nothing to stop you."
Ren's heart pounded, caught between hope and horror.
"But," the shadow leaned in, voice dropping to a deadly growl, "if you refuse… if you don't accept this gift, I will execute your mother and father myself."
The words slammed into him like thunder.
Ren's fists clenched tight, nails digging into flesh. The room seemed to pulse with dark energy, the weight of choice crushing him.
Time slowed—his whole world hanging by a thread.
Ren's voice was steady, cold as ice. "No. I won't take your power."
The grim reaper's hollow eyes narrowed, confusion flickering like a dark flame. "But you hate the world. They've done nothing but torment you. Why refuse?"
Ren's jaw clenched, the weight of his pain heavy on his shoulders. "Because I'm not yours to control."
Without warning, he raised his hands, dark energy swirling at his fingertips. He summoned the figures of his mother and father—ghostly, trembling apparitions, bound by his will.
Their eyes pleaded silently as he moved closer. Then, with cold precision, he struck—shadows wrapping around them like chains, crushing, tearing.
Then piercing through his mother's chest. The fragile bones shattered beneath its grip, ribs cracking like dry twigs, the sound sharp and sickening. Her body convulsed violently, eyes wide with silent horror, as dark, icy shadows poured from the wound, snuffing out the warmth of life in an instant.
Before Ren could react, the reaper turned its bony hand toward his father, slashing through flesh and muscle as if slicing through air. Tendons tore, organs ruptured, blood bubbling from shattered veins in slow, crimson rivers. The man's mouth opened in a silent scream, eyes rolling back, as his body crumpled into a broken, bloody heap.
The reaper's grip was merciless, squeezing and crushing what little remained—bones splintering, skin blackening under the cold touch. With a final, cruel twist, it snapped their necks clean, the sound echoing like a death knell in the stillness.
Their lifeless bodies dropped to the floor, shattered and cold, leaving a heavy silence thick with dread.
Ren's laugh broke the silence—cold, bitter, and sharp. "You'd do anything to prove your point, wouldn't you?"
His eyes gleamed with a hard truth. From the start, he knew. The grim reaper never planned to kill them. It wanted him—to join its dark cause. But Ren wasn't a fool. He knew better than to shake hands with the devil.
Anger flared like wildfire. Without warning, Ren struck—a brutal blow to the reaper's skull, shattering its composure and clouding its mind. The creature staggered, confused, its eternal wisdom dimmed, its cold facade cracking.
In an instant, Ren twisted the air around them and teleported to a place of stark contrast—Maya, the angel.
She smiled, serene and knowing, eyes glinting with unspoken secrets. "You thought we couldn't kill your mother. You were right. But we can trap her in the Abyss."
With a graceful gesture, Maya sent Ren hurtling back to his apartment.
Dazed, Ren shook off the haze, wondering if it was all a nightmare. But the sight that met him was worse than any dream.
His father sat slouched, beer in hand, his body grotesquely obese, surrounded by cigarette butts piled like ruins.
Ren's voice cracked as he asked, "Why… why are you like this?"
His father's reply was venomous, a scream that cut deeper than any blade: "Go kill yourself, you worthless kid."
Heart pounding, Ren pushed further. "Where's Mom?"
A bitter, cruel laugh tore from his father's throat. "She left ten years ago. For another man. Don't you remember, you fucking child?"
A cold shiver ran down Ren's spine. The timeline—his reality—had shifted.
Everything he knew was unraveling.