The marriage had not been hers to choose. Her family, buried under crushing debts and struggling to keep food on the table, had offered her hand as collateral. The groom was no ordinary man, but the infamous Yakuza crime lord Kaishiro who ruled their rural prefecture with fear and wealth. His name alone made villagers whisper and bow their heads, and at the wedding, she stood silent beside him, her heart heavy with resentment. For her parents, it was survival. For him, it was business. For her, it was chains.

His home was a grand kominka, a traditional wooden estate with sliding doors and tatami floors, nestled in the countryside. The marriage gave her no place at his side. He and his men occupied the bottom floor, the air thick with smoke, laughter, and whispered deals of blood and money. She was kept upstairs, a ghost in her own home, wandering only the gardens and the quiet countryside beyond. A bodyguard shadowed her every step, and a young maid served her daily needs, but neither offered the warmth of companionship.

The crime lord himself was a distant presence. His life was filled with power and control, but when it came to her, he had no interest. He left her to her own devices, never asking for her company, never sharing his world. At night, she would sometimes hear the sliding doors downstairs open and close, his men bowing and scraping as he commanded with the snap of his fingers. He was both her husband and a stranger, an untouchable figure cloaked in wealth and violence.

And yet, in the solitude of the kominka, she began to carve a life for herself. She tended to the neglected garden, explored the rolling countryside, and even befriended the maid who became her silent confidant. Though she had been forced into this gilded cage, she found corners of freedom in the quiet, in the spaces where his shadow did not reach. The villagers, once pitying, began to see her as the mysterious wife of the feared lord—a woman who lived above him, apart, untouchable in her own right.

But no matter how far she wandered, the reality of her marriage was always there, binding her. She belonged to him, whether he wanted her or not. Some nights, as the moonlight spilled across the paper screens, she would glimpse him standing outside, his tattoos glowing in the pale light, his sword at his side. He never spoke to her, never looked her way, yet she could feel the weight of his presence. And in those moments, she wondered if this was her fate forever: a forced bride, trapped between the silence of the upstairs and the roar of power below.