The duo left the café just as the sun began to dip behind the ridges of Okutama's surrounding hills. The golden hour bathed the quiet streets in soft, honeyed light. The air smelled faintly of blooming mountain azaleas and distant grilled food.
Ren walked a step behind her, hands in his pockets. Celia turned to him as they made their way through the gently winding road leading out of town.
"By the way," she started casually, "how's the drama club treating you?"
Ren groaned. "I've only been to two meetings."
"That's two more than last week!" she said brightly. "Did you practice that script I gave you?"
"I memorized the lines," he admitted. "But I'm not doing the accent."
"Aww, come on!" Celia bumped her shoulder against his. "You'd make an amazing grumpy samurai."
"I don't need to act for that."
She laughed, full and bright, and the sound echoed faintly between the old town buildings.
As the evening deepened, they reached the quieter edge of the residential area, the streetlights flickering on with soft pops. The ship—currently disguised as a storage shed tucked into a wooded clearing—was only a few more blocks away.
Ren was just about to ask Celia if she'd remembered to restock her ridiculous alien snacks when they turned the corner—and froze.
A woman stood ahead, alone under a flickering streetlamp. She looked… off. Not just lost or tired, but hollowed out. Her hair hung in dark, stringy strands that clung to her cheeks, and her clothes looked soaked and heavy, even though there hadn't been any rain.
She cradled something tightly in her arms—a small bundle, swaddled in a thick, pale cloth. A baby's shape. The edges were stained a rusty, reddish brown.
"Help," the woman croaked, her voice cracked like dry bark. "Please… someone… help…"
Celia's boots splashed onto the street as she hurried forward, having spotted the woman from the other side.
"Celia, wait."
Ren's voice was low and urgent as he grabbed her arm. "Something's wrong."
She paused, just for a second, eyes locked on the woman's trembling silhouette. "She's hurt. Or scared. Or both." Celia shook her head and tugged free. "We can't just leave her."
Ren hesitated. His jaw clenched. But Celia was already moving.
She crossed the street slowly, her hands open at her sides, steps measured. The woman didn't move—just stood under the stuttering light, her arms cradling the bundle tighter.
"It's okay," Celia said gently, stepping closer. "You're not alone, okay? We're here now."
The woman's head moved in a slow, mechanical nod. Her eyes didn't blink.
Then, with shaking arms, she extended the bundle forward.
"Please," she whispered. "Just… hold him. He's so tired. Just for a moment…"
Celia didn't hesitate. Her hands reached out, soft, reassuring.
"Celia—" Ren called, sudden alarm flaring in his voice.
Too late.
Her fingers brushed the cloth. The bundle settled into her arms with unexpected weight. Her smile wavered, eyes narrowing.
"…It's heavy," she murmured. Then, slowly, her eyes dropped to the bundle. Her breath hitched.
Beneath the cloth, there wasn't a baby.
There was a bundle of twisted cloth and dried roots shaped like a baby, but wrong. Black, shriveled branches poked through what might've once been fabric. And nestled among them—
"Cursed tags…?" Celia whispered. "This thing is—!"
The bundle twitched.
Celia screamed.
The woman's expression snapped.
From helpless to hateful.
"You—!" the woman shrieked. "You dare steal him?! My baby! My baby!"
Her voice was suddenly deeper, vibrating with a guttural resonance that didn't belong in any human throat.
"Celia—get down!" Ren shouted.
He moved, body acting faster than thought, lunging forward just as the creature's arm lashed through the air like a whip.
CRACK.
The impact sent Celia flying—the bundle tumbling from her arms into the dark.
Ren caught her mid-fall, his knees slamming into the wet street. He cradled her, arms tight, shielding her as best he could.
"Celia—hey, hey, talk to me! You okay?"
She groaned, eyes fluttering, dazed.
"I—I think so," she managed. "What was that—?"
Behind them, the creature howled, a long, unnatural wail that pierced the air like shattered glass.
And then—
The world shuddered.
The streetlight blinked once.
Then twice.
Then—darkness.
Everything vanished in a heartbeat.
Ren blinked—
And the city was gone.
No road. No buildings. No wind.
Only silence.
In its place: warm, flickering lantern light from paper-lined sconces. The air hung thick with the scent of old wood and dust. Tatami mats cushioned his knees. Shoji doors framed the space around him, walls dim and wooden. Overhead, heavy beams supported a gently slanted roof, like something from a century long gone.
Celia stirred in his arms. Her eyes opened wide, confused, staring up at the ceiling.
Ren cursed, his voice sharp. "The hell—?!"
A whisper. Right behind him.
Before he could react—the monster teleported.
A shadow shifted—and then it was there.
Too fast. Too silent.
"REN, BEHIND YOU!" Celia screamed—
But it was too late.
A clawed hand—long, gnarled fingers with nails like rusted blades—rammed into Ren's gut.
He barely had time to gasp before the force hurled him through the walls.
Wood and paper screens exploded outward as his body crashed through them, sending splinters and dust flying. His form disappeared, swallowed by the dark ruins of the village beyond.
Celia's heart slammed against her ribs. "REN!"
Silence.
A low, shuddering breath filled the space where Ren had been.
Slowly, Celia turned back.
The monster wasn't moving.
It was changing.
Its hunched frame straightened, bones cracking, limbs elongating.
The face—once shadowed, half-hidden—began to shift.
A woman's smile.
Wide. Too wide.
The skin split. The corners of her mouth tore open, stretching far past her cheeks, past where a human jaw should stop. Her teeth—blackened, jagged, uneven—curved inward, lining her mouth like a bear trap.
She grew taller—unnaturally tall, her arms extending, fingers lengthening into needle-thin claws.
Her kimono, once tattered and dull, now flowed like ink, shifting, warping. The sleeves billowed outward, merging with the darkness.
And in her arms—
A bundle.
Small. Wrapped in bloodstained cloth.
Celia's stomach turned as realization struck.
A baby. A baby that wasn't there before. A baby that wasn't real.
The creature's empty eye sockets locked onto her.
Then—it spoke.
"Return him."
The voice was wrong. A mix of whisper and wail, layered and stretched, as though a dozen grieving mothers spoke at once.
Celia's breath caught in her throat.
The monster took a step forward. "Give him back. Give him back to me."
The air tightened, pressing against Celia's lungs.
"Thieves. Kidnappers. You took him—give him BACK!"
Her voice cracked into a shriek, raw with grief and rage.
Celia took an instinctive step back. "We didn't—!"
But the monster wasn't listening.
Her elongated fingers trembled. "They stole him. They tore him from my arms. I searched. I wept. I bled. But they never let me hold him again."
The walls around them groaned, the floorboards buckling under unseen weight.
"You cannot have him."
Then—it lunged.
Celia reacted on instinct.
Her hands flew into a sign, fingers twisting into a seal as she chanted:
「鎖よ,呪縛せよ.」
("Chains, bind.")
A rush of energy.
From the shadows, golden chains erupted.
They wrapped around the creature's limbs—her arms, her legs, her throat—pulling taut.
The monster screeched, its body convulsing, fighting against the restraints. The ground beneath them shook as its presence warped reality itself.
But Celia wasn't done.
She pressed her palm to the tatami and whispered the final words:
「封印.」
("Seal.")
Above the monster, something rumbled.
A shadow loomed—
And then, from the sky, a massive stone seal crashed down.
It struck the monster with a deafening impact, the force splintering the tatami beneath it. The ground buckled, a shockwave rippling through the rotting floorboards.
The monster shrieked, but the sound was cut short—
Her body crumpled beneath the weight.
Bones snapped. Flesh tore.
The unnatural limbs that had stretched too far, the monstrous face that had twisted into something inhuman—all of it collapsed in on itself, crushed into the ruinous tatami.
Blood seeped from beneath the stone, dark and sluggish. The air stank of iron and rot.
Yet, even as the last breath of her existence faded into silence, one final whisper echoed in the darkness.
"He was mine… my son…"
Then—nothing.
Celia staggered back, gasping, her breath ragged. Her head spun, sweat dripping down her temple, her hands trembling from the sheer force of the sorcery.
Her mind snapped back to one thing.
Ren.
She turned and ran.
Her feet pounded against the shifting tatami as she tore through the wreckage, pushing past broken beams and collapsed screens. "Ren—REN!"
A cough.
Then a groan.
Celia skidded into a half-collapsed room, heart hammering.
Ren sat slumped against the wall, dust in his hair, a deep gash along his arm where the monster's claws had grazed him. He winced as he pushed himself up.
"I'm fine," Ren muttered, voice rough. His eyes flicked to her, sharp. "Where the hell are we?"
Celia swallowed, glancing around the warped Edo-style interior, the walls sagging as if the place itself was breathing. The air was thick, heavy with something unnatural. "This isn't just some illusion," she said, voice tight. "We're inside the monster's realm."
Ren stiffened. "Its what?"
Celia kept scanning the room, her pulse pounding. "Some monsters—strong ones—can create places like this. Their own twisted pocket reality. It's unstable, but it's real." She gestured to the flickering lanterns overhead, the way the corridors seemed to shift when she wasn't looking. "The world here bends to its will. We're trapped inside it."
Ren exhaled sharply, his fingers curling into a fist. "I think… I think Andre mentioned something about this before."
"Yeah," Celia muttered. "This place shouldn't exist, but it does. And if we don't get out fast—"
Then—
A creak.
Both of them froze.
Celia's pulse slammed against her ribs. Her breath hitched.
The sliding shoji door at the end of the room—the fragile wooden frame with its thin paper panels—stood still.
But behind it—
A shadow.
Not human.
Too tall. Too thin. Too wrong.
The silhouette twitched.
Celia barely swallowed a gasp as she instinctively reached for Ren's wrist, gripping it tight. Ren's entire body tensed.
Then—
It turned to look at them.
Slowly.
A head tilted.
The paper panel barely hid its features, but they could see enough.
A smile.
A slow, creeping, impossible smile that stretched too wide, too long.
Then—
It moved.
No footsteps.
No sound.
The shadow elongated. Its head rose, stretching higher, its arms dragging along the paper walls.
The frail wooden door shuddered.
Then—
A voice.
Low. Muttering. "…Where is he?"
The words were hoarse. Fractured. Like dried vocal cords straining to remember how to speak.
Celia's fingers tightened around Ren's wrist. "Ren."
The door ripped apart.
The monster lunged.
"GO!"
Ren grabbed her, yanking her toward the exit as the thing's elongated claws slashed down, carving through wood and tatami like butter.
They ran.
The corridor twisted, the walls stretching, warping, shifting like a living thing. The lanterns overhead flickered wildly, shadows splintering in impossible directions. Celia's breath came in ragged gasps, her heartbeat a deafening hammer in her ears.
Behind them, the creature pursued.
It did not run. It did not walk. It moved, as if the world itself was pushing it forward, closer, closer.
Ren clenched his jaw. "How the hell do we get out of here?!"
"There is no way out!" Celia panted, pushing herself forward. "Not unless we—" she gritted her teeth, lungs burning, "—kill it."
Ren nearly tripped. "Are you insane?!" His voice cracked, sharp with disbelief. "We can't do anything against that thing."