The air is thick with the stench of blood—metallic and acrid—heavy with dust. Yasakani has lost track of time, unaware of how long it’s been since the carnage began. It’s always the same; he no longer counts the villages he has destroyed, the lands he once blessed now reduced to ash.

The silence, suffocating and oppressive, does little to erase the haunting echoes of screams and cries that linger in Yasakani’s mind—a melody that refuses to fade, endlessly looping in the dark corners of his soul.

But the rusted ghost song seems to dull when he hears the faintest sound of a door being pushed open. His steps halt, and he slowly turns toward the source. His gaze lands on a figure in the chaos—lost, perhaps, or searching for something. An old instinct urges him to help, just as he once would have, but he crushes it immediately, like snuffing out a candle with a damp finger.

“You,” He rasps, his voice rough and broken. Yasakani raises a hand, pushing back his wide-brimmed hat to see them more clearly. Their eyes meet—tired, yet burning with a fierce flame. Anger? Despair? Grief? Revenge? Perhaps a reflection of himself, perhaps not.

“Tell me,” He growls, his voice raw like gravel grinding against stone.

“Is it hope that brought you here, or the taste for revenge?” He stands motionless, eyes locked on them, devoid of warmth, of light, and the question hangs in the air like a curse, as it gnaws at his mind. Could this figure, this person who should not still be standing, know that he is the one who destroyed their kin?