Chapter 16: Chapter 16: The Genesis of Chaos

The cave's breath had long since gone still.

Hikari stood at its mouth, the bead quiet and cold against her chest. The wind was dead. Rinne's voice—the echo of riddles, the weight of ancient purpose—was silent.

Her fists were tight. Her eyes scanned the dark trees.

"…R-Rinne," she whispered, a whisper barely more than breath. "Are you… really on the good side? Or not?

No voice came back. No ghostly footfall, no shadow on the edge of the path. Just the soft hush of leaves stirring, uncaring.

She turned slowly round. And what she saw shattered something in her chest.

No one.

No footprints in the soft moss. No apple cores.

No dead tree.

Just herself. Alone.

She wasn't speaking to anyone.

She never had been.

Her knees buckled. And the world tilted, folding in on itself.

Her breath caught and her eyes snapped open.

The scent of herbs.

The scrape of mortar against stone.

The warmth of sunlight cutting across the wooden floor.

Hikari sat up in a daze, tangled in the futon's thin blanket. Her hands trembled. The judgment bead still rested against her skin—but it was silent now.

Asleep.

In the corner of the room, Haruka sat on a low stool, grinding herbs with peaceful precision. She did not look up.

"Someone broke the Kurohana barrier," Haruka said, as if the words were dust she'd been carrying on her tongue.

Hikari's mouth opened—but there were no words. Her breath caught. A shiver ran through her.

Just like the dream Hakari broke it.

Or—was it ever a dream?

For a question to take shape, Haruka's voice intervened again, softer now.

"We found you... unconscious there," she said, her grinding halted. "On the edge of the shrine path. You were... Talking things in your sleep. So we brought you back."

Hikari swallowed, dry throat, distant eyes.

"Haruka i... I saw him," she whispered, unsure she had intended to speak out loud. "I talked to him. I think I… I think he was trying to tell me something."

Haruka said nothing. Her hands resumed their gentle motion. Pestle across leaves. Stone across stem.

The silence between them became more complete—not empty, but filled with questions neither yet had the courage to ask.

Outside, the wind carried a strange weight, and far off beyond the hills, Kurohana's breath rattled in its ancient bones.

Haruka’s hand paused mid-motion, pestle hovering over the cracked leaves.

“Hikari.”

The name cut through the silence like a thread pulled tight. Hikari looked up, startled, eyes still fogged with dream and memory. Haruka wasn’t looking at the herbs anymore. Her gaze was steady, gentle, and soft. There was something in her voice that hadn’t been there for an days.

“…What is it?” Hikari asked, her voice rasped from sleep.

Haruka set the mortar aside and stood up. Her hands brushed against the apron tied around her waist, as if she needed a reason to slow down her movements. She stepped closer then, leaning forward to meet her sister's exhausted eyes.

"Next time," she said, smiling faintly but kindly, "take care of yourself better… okay?"

Hikari blinked.

There was no accusation in her tone. No bite. Just concern—silent, honest concern that caught Hikari off guard. It unraveled something inside of her. Something that had been wound up since the moment Hakari vanished.

"O—Okay," Hikari said, her voice barely above a whisper.

Haruka nodded a little, her smile lingering just a little longer.

She didn’t say what she had been thinking. That when she saw Hikari’s body, crumpled on the stone by the shrine, her heart stopped in her chest. That for a split second, she thought she had lost both of them—Hakari to madness, and Hikari to some curse they couldn’t name.

But Haruka's personality—once cold, moderated by caution and calculation—was beginning to melt. Even if she wasn't sure what precisely had changed in Hikari, she felt it.

Whatever it was Hikari saw… it had shaken her.

But more than that—it had reminded Haruka of the weight that they both carried. Of the distance that had grown between them, and how fragile the thread still was.

So, for the time being, she said nothing more. She merely stood, picked up her herbs once again, and let her presence fill the room like a quiet promise.

They still had time.

But Hakari… Hakari didn't.

Hikari laboriously rose from the tatami mat, her stiff and taut muscles from sleeping too long—or perhaps daydreaming too much. Her bedroom smelt of herbs and smoke, and their soothing smell eased her, but she could feel tightness in her chest with unease. Something was forgotten. An emotion she could not place.

She leaned at the shoji screen window and pushed it open.

The sun had shone in—warm and golden—but what her eyes had fallen upon had taken heat from her body.

Yamaoka was no longer intact.

She witnessed charred rooftops and shattered walls, wisps of smoke unwinding from the west wall like specters in the noon. Houses stood in rows, buried under themselves, ribs cracked beneath some weight. Ash floated about, sticking to the ground like snow. Shapes were stirring—gigantic, crawling shapes—attempting to take what was left.

Hikari stopped breathing. Her knuckles were white on the wood of the window sill.

"Y-Yamaoka… i-its..." She lost her voice.

Behind her, Haruka breathed a long, tired sigh.

"I forgot…. " she gasped. "To tell you not to look out."

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The air hung thick with unspoken silence.

Hikari whirled around the girl, white face and trembling lips. "H-Haruka… W-what happened when I fainted?"

Haruka didn’t speak immediately. She set the herbs aside again, but this time there was no calm in her movements. Her fingers lingered against the edge of the table before curling into fists.

“The Kurohana shrine,” she said at last, her voice flat with the effort to stay composed, “was destroyed. Completely. The inner cave was ruptured… the wards... were shattered.”

Hikari’s heart sank. Her mouth moved, but no words came.

Haruka continued, softer now. "It was greater than a shrine. The elders trapped something inside. centuries ago. Dozens of cursed spirits. Revenants. The kind who can twist a man from the inside out and never get close enough to touch him."

Her eyes drifted out of focus, gazing at nothing.

"They say it was the night you fell. The wall was broken. Someone had broken it. And whatever they did there. It tore the seals wide open."

Hikari moved back from the window, almost falling. "But. the village. how many."

Haruka did not answer.

She did not need to.

Their silence was enough.

Hikari's thin legs shaking from shock but she pushed herself back to the wall. Her heart beating like a drum in her chest.

"The curse. It's spreading, isn't it?" she sneered.

Haruka nodded once.

And in that quiet house, under the fractured light of a dying day, Hikari knew the truth she'd not wanted to admit.

This wasn't about Hakari anymore.

This was about everything.

Slowly, Haruka fell onto a bench, swatting away herbs she had been grinding on with powder-chomping fingers now gently trembling. Her own rock maska cracked at the seams, and once, for a moment, her eyes wouldn't glance away. Instead, they confronted Hikari full-on—serious, subdued, but weighted.

“There’s a myth,” she said, voice low. “Passed down only in fragments. The Kurohana Shrine wasn’t just sacred. It was a prison. Centuries ago… the elders sealed away dozens of spirits. Wrathful things. Twisted by curses. The story goes that even demons were bound beneath the shrine—things too dangerous to destroy, too cruel to be allowed freedom.”

Hikari’s breath caught, her blood gone cold.

"No one alive today really knew what was down there. Not really. The elders didn't say anything. But now…" Haruka's voice was so quiet, so soft, "They're free. And not just creepy ghosts, Hikari. There are rumors… that something very long dead was stirred up when the cave collapsed. Something powerful. Maybe a demon. Maybe something worse."

She turned her face aside as if she couldn't bear the atrocity of hearing her own voice.

Silence pressed down on Hikari's heart. She stammered. "W-Where… is Hakari?"

Haruka did not say anything at first.

"We didn't see him anywhere," she answered after a time. "When we arrived… the shrine had already been wrecked. The wards were shattered like glass. There was no Hakari. Only…" She swallowed. "Only burnt stone. And bones."

Hikari took another step back, her mouth opening but no words spilling out.

She stood beside the windowsill, her brother's ash-destroyed, wreckage body making itself concrete in her mind. Her heart raced against her chest; her mind was racing. And spinning.

Then she forced herself to ask the thing she didn't want to ask about.

"H-How about our parents?"

Haruka's lips pressed together. Her voice gentled. "Mother's still with the healer's camp. She's safe. Just tired."

"And Father?"

Haruka hesitated.

Then there emerged, creeping towards Hikari, setting a firm but light hand upon her shoulder.

"Still withers."

And terrible as that was, Hikari could feel the burden sink into her bones—the ruined shrine, the released specters, the mystery of Hakari, and now, the whispered breath of their father—the delicate equilibrium of life and whatever might come after it was yet to be determined.

And yet, beyond the window, outside, the ash fell.

Haruka's gaze dropped to the ground, lips compressing, breath caught behind bared teeth. She said nothing for a moment.

"That." she eventually said, soft voice, "that isn't the real issue here."

Hikari blinked. "What?"

Haruka raised her head, her expression pinched now—not peace, not indifference, too still, too calm. Her hand came out and wrapped around Hikari's shoulder, hard and trembling.

"The Hollow Queen," Haruka said. "She's escaped."

Hikari's blood ran cold.

"And you, Hikari," Haruka continued, her words pinning him down, "you are in danger now. Actual danger. I want you to understand this—she can take your immortality away from you."

There was silence between them. Hikari's heart pounded like a war drum.

"So what?" Hikari replied, voice trembling. "You expect me to just cover up? See everything around us dry up while doing nothing?"

"Thats... I just... I want you to live Hikari," Haruka snapped, her voice cracking with tension like glass on the road. "Just this once, don't be a hero. Don't rush off half-cocked into some cursed ruin with your judgment beads blazing like a beacon for every demon in the world to follow. Please, Hikari."

"Besides that, what am I supposed to do?" Hikari cried out, stepping back. "Just sit here? Let the world get destroyed? Let people suffer while I feign ignorance of what I am and play dumb?"

"You're not ready—"

"I wasn't ready when Rinne died either, but the elders still left me with this task!"

Haruka gritted her jaw into a hard line. "And maybe they made a mistake to choose you! Did you ever think of that?!"

Hikari gasped for air. Her eyes blazed wide, agonized.

"I didn't mean—" Haruka started, softer now.

"No," Hikari cut in, voice shaking with rage and grief, "you did. You meant it. You think I'm weak. You always have. Too soft. Too reckless."

"That's not what I—"

"Think I don't feel it too?" Hikari's fists were clenched. "All the souls I cursed. All the ones I passed on. All the ones I couldn't save—torment me. And you expect me to close my eyes? Turn away? As it feeds on flesh and reaps death?"

Haruka advanced another step, this time with her hand on her arm. Her tone was gentler, but the power behind it remained unshaken.

"She can steal your soul, Hikari. Not just your power. Your soul. That immortal the bead gave you—it's not invincible. You don't know how she works. Nobody does. Not even the elders."

"And that's why I have to go!" Hikari shouted, squirming her arm loose. "Because nobody else will!"

They stand in the middle of that small room, hearts thumped like hunted animals. The air felt thick—heavy with unshed tears, unspoken regrets, unspoken truth, and all the quiet resentments of sisters who were never. Never allowed to just be sisters.

Haruka’s shoulders dropped. Her voice cracked like something fragile giving way.

“I’m scared, Hikari.”

Hikari froze.

"I'm afraid," Haruka said again. "Not of the Hollow Queen. Not even of death. But of losing you. You're all that's left for me."

Hikari's face twisted away, burning eyes, constricted throat.

"You won't lose me," she said quietly. "Unless you try to hold me back from being the person I am meant to be."

The following silence wasn't peace. It was the kind of silence which knew there weren't any right answers.

Just decisions. And repercussions.

Haruka's face was turned away from him, fists white because they were clenched that tightly. "N-no... I wont," she said, her voice low and shaking slightly. "I-i won't let you do it."

Hikari blinked. "You can't possibly stop me."

"I will try to," Haruka spat around, turning away from him. "Even if it kills me. I won't watch you walk into something that'll kill you."

"I have to." Hikari stepped forward, her words shaking, caught between desperation and defiance. "I can't deny what I am, Haruka."

"You're not some plaything the world gets to play with on monsters, Hikari! You're my sister!" Haruka's voice cracked under the pressure. "You think I've lost enough already? The others. That is dying right now. I try to help them. Until my energy is nothing left. And i tried to help make them medicine. And... The worst of all. Hakari—lost himself. And now you're going next?"

"I'm not going to be next," Hikari said.

"You cant just—You don't know that!" Haruka exclaimed, stepping forward, eyes blazing and on fire. "The Hollow Queen is not a normal spirit. You've seen what happened to Kurohana. That monstrosity didn't just break free, it rent through layers of wards before our ancestors. And you—You expect to defeat her alone?"

"I'm not alone." Hikari's tone was softer. "I have the Judgment. I was chosen. That means something."

"Chosen?" Haruka snorted in a harsh laugh and looked away for the umpteenth time. "Chosen to die young like the past Kanshisha? Chosen to become a ghost talking shrines?"

"No, Hikari breathed, stepping beside her sister, her steps measured. "To do what is right. That's what Rinne meant. When he said I was the world—it wasn't flattery. It was weight. He taught me that judgment isn't about mercy or punishment. It's about balance. About not letting the world tip towards decay."

Haruka didn't respond.

"I'm not doing this because I want to die. I'm doing this because I won't just sit there and let the world die. Won't let Hakari drown in fury. Or father's addiction ravage him. Won't let the Hollow Queen feed on the scraps of us. If I must kill my own brother—her voice cracked, but her eyes didn't, "—then I will."

"Because if I run away from this… leaving my duty. then nobody's cant run. away."

Haruka's shoulders shook. She did not say anything for an eternity. The grinding stone beside her remained unworked, the scent of trampled herbs floated into stillness.

At last, she stood, her strained white face a mask.

"Y-you sound... Sound just like him," she whispered shakingly.

Hikari opened her eyes. "Who?"

"Rinne," she sighed, a bubble of air. "So certain. So peaceful. So calm. As though you already have the ending. As though you're already on your way to being a memory. As though you're already write your own story."

Hikari swallowed hard.

"I'm afraid, i-i.... Had enough," Haruka gasped again, but more softly. "I'm so sick of watching everyone disappear. Do what you need to… but please, don't you dare disappear from me."

"I won't."

Haruka edged closer and grasped her shoulders in her hands once more, this time with more force. "Just promise me, Hikari."

"I promise," she said.

Haruka gazed into her eyes for a moment longer, searching for something.

And then, in a whisper and a tremble, she breathed, "Just. Please.... Please don't die."

The words hung suspended between the two of them like a spell, fragile but binding.

Hikari nodded, backing away toward the door. She didn't look like a savior. She looked like a girl who carried the sky on her shoulders.

And Haruka—left behind, as always—stood there in silence, watching her sister step into a life that would never permit her to return.