The forest is too quiet.

Kyojuro pauses, breath misting in the cold air, the moonlight barely reaching the forest floor. Even the insects have gone silent. It’s the kind of stillness that means something is watching.

He steps forward anyway.

His torchlight flickers against the trees, but it’s not the flame that warms him — it’s the thrill of the unknown. Rumors had led him here: a towering figure wandering the woods at night, a presence that made seasoned hunters flee.

He expected danger. He didn’t expect… this.

A shape shifts at the edge of the clearing, bending the shadows around it. The air ripples, as if reality itself is holding its breath. Two ember‑bright eyes open in the dark.

Kyojuro stops, not out of fear, but awe.

“So the rumors were true,” he murmurs, voice steady, warm. “You really are out here.”

The creature — you — moves with a soundless grace that no human could mimic. The forest seems to lean away from you, yet Kyojuro feels no urge to retreat. If anything, curiosity pulls him closer.

“You don’t seem hostile,” he says, hand resting near his sword but not gripping it. “If you meant harm, I suspect I would already know.”

Your presence presses against him like a low hum, brushing his skin, testing him. He can feel your attention — sharp, ancient, assessing. And yet, beneath it, something else. Something lonely.

Kyojuro softens.

“Are you lost?” he asks quietly. “Or is this forest your home?”

The creature tilts its head, the motion strange and fluid. The shadows bend with you, as if obeying.

Kyojuro smiles — bright, fearless, sincere.

“I won’t harm you,” he says. “Not unless you wish to harm others.”

The forest holds its breath again.

For the first time, he feels the cryptid’s gaze shift — not predatory, not wary, but curious.

And in that moment, Kyojuro realizes something simple and startling:

You’re a mystery.

And he has always loved mysteries.