Ren didn't argue. He turned and sprinted into the warping corridor, the air rippling around him like liquid glass. The hallway shifted with every step—walls bending, doors yawning open into black, furniture flickering like dying stars—but Ren didn't stop. He couldn't.
He felt the realm trying to close, trying to trap him too. He pushed harder.
And then—
There.
He skidded into the final room.
Yui.
The little girl was curled on the tatami, knees drawn to her chest, buried in shadows. She looked smaller—like fear and hunger were eating her from the inside out. Her hair clung to her cheeks in dirty mats, and her arms trembled around her legs.
"Yui," Ren said, breath short. "Hey. Hey—it's me. It's okay."
She looked up. Just barely.
Ren stepped forward—and stopped cold.
Corpses.
There were bodies in the room. Desiccated. Mold-eaten. Slumped against the walls and folded under collapsed beams. Their faces were sunken, twisted mid-scream. A child's toy lay in one's lap—fused into rotting skin. A mother. A father. Maybe neighbors.
Ren's chest seized. His vision swam.
And then—flashes. Not from this place.
His own house.
The trail of blood across the floor.
His mother's scream.
The monster's teeth.
His father's head—gone. The stump still jerking, twitching, as if trying to speak.
Ren's breath caught, nausea rising like acid in his throat.
But then—Yui whimpered.
He looked down at her. Fragile. Barely clinging on.
Still alive.
And he moved.
Ren dropped to his knees, arms circling around her like they could shield her from everything. "It's okay," he said, his voice catching in his throat. "It's okay, I've got you. You're not gonna die here. I'm taking you out. Right now."
Yui trembled violently, her fingers curling in the fabric of his coat. She couldn't have weighed more than a bundle of blankets—feather-light, too light. Her lips were cracked, and when she spoke, her voice rasped like dry leaves on pavement.
"M-Mama… I want… I want… Mama…"
Ren froze.
Yui looked up at him, her eyes huge and glassy and so tired.
"Wanna… say bye…"
His throat tightened like a noose. "Yui," he whispered, shaking his head slightly. "I—I don't think…"
"I promised…" she mumbled. "I said… I'd be good… I promised…"
He squeezed his eyes shut. He could still hear Andre's voice ringing in his head:
"Your only job is to save that lil' girl."
But this wasn't just a rescue.
It was a goodbye.
And maybe… maybe a seven-year-old didn't care about monsters or logic or right and wrong. Maybe she just wanted her mom.
Just once more.
Ren's heart pounded. The weight of her in his arms. The smell of blood and rot. The screams still echoing from the room Andre and Celia were holding the Ubume in.
He could run—make it out now, save her like he was told.
Or he could listen to what she needed.
His fingers clenched tighter around her. His breath trembled.
"…Yui," he said softly, "I don't know if she can hear you. I don't know if she can still see anything through what she's become."
The house creaked. The walls shimmered.
Yui's tears rolled silently down her cheeks.
"…But if you need to say goodbye," Ren murmured, "then we'll say goodbye."
He looked back over his shoulder toward the heart of the realm—toward the screaming, the pulsing hatred, the mother twisted into a monster.
He made his choice.
And turned around.
The hallway split like flesh, warped wood curling into screaming mouths and splintered teeth. Celia slammed a seal against the wall, holy chains bursting out in jagged arcs of gold and white. The Ubume shrieked—sharp, glass-shattering—its form unraveling and reforming in rapid, convulsive pulses. A thousand limbs slithered across the ceiling. A dozen weeping faces blinked from its chest, all mouthing the same thing.
"My baby… my baby… my baby…"
"I'm about two seconds from losin' it!" Andre barked, back-to-back with Celia as another wave of spectral limbs shot toward them. He spun the heavy exorcist spear in a wide arc, its edge catching one of the grasping arms with a sizzling flash of silver-blue flame. The limb hissed and crumbled into black ash.
"You said it wouldn't get this big!" Celia shouted, panting, a crackling charm between her fingers. Her hands were trembling, her knees buckling.
"I said I didn't know, sugar!"
The Ubume reared back, stretching grotesquely until its head scraped the rafters, a parody of a mother towering over a cradle. But there was no warmth—only rot. Its face split open in a jagged howl.
Andre planted his feet. "Alright, ma'am. You need to go on and rest now. Ain't no children left for you to bury."
He lunged forward, the spear glowing with a death blow—
"Wait!"
Ren's voice cracked through the chaos like a thunderclap. He stumbled into the open with Yui at his side, her small hand in his, her face lit with something fragile but bright—hope.
Andre froze mid-swing, just inches from the Ubume's center mass. The monster paused, twitching. It tilted its head, those many faces flickering in confusion. One face blinked.
Yui's.
The little girl stepped forward.
Her legs buckled beneath her with each shaky step, her bare foot dragging, but she didn't stop. Ren's breath caught as he slowly released his hold. He didn't try to stop her. He just stood behind, hands trembling, ready to catch her if she fell.
"M-Mama…" Yui's voice was barely more than air.
The Ubume jerked at the word—flinching like it had been struck. Some part of it, buried beneath blood and rage, recognized the sound.
Yui wobbled forward another step. Her tiny fists were clenched at her sides. "Y-you… you used to…" Her words caught. She choked back a sob, teeth digging into her lower lip. "Y-you used to braid my hair. B-before school."
The Ubume's claws twitched. Its head tilted slowly, impossibly.
Yui's knees shook violently, but she didn't stop.
"E-even when… even when your hands were tired," she stammered. "Even when you hadn't… hadn't slept for days…"
The monster twitched again, breath rasping in jagged, unnatural jerks—but it didn't retreat.
Tears spilled down Yui's cheeks. She coughed as she tried to speak again, the words stuck behind dry sobs. "Y-you used to tuck Kenji between us. At night. Said we… we were your little stars…"
The Ubume froze.
Its many eyes—if they could even be called that anymore—blinked erratically.
Yui took one final step, then another, until she was right in front of the trembling creature.
She lifted her arms. Shaking. Barely able to reach.
And then, slowly… she wrapped them around the creature's tattered middle.
Her head pressed into what remained of a once-soft robe, into the spot where her mother's scent had long since been smothered by decay.
"P-please…" she whispered, her voice breaking apart. "Please, Mama… c-come back…"
Then—
Stillness.
The world went completely, eerily silent. No breath. No wind. Just the aching quiet of something too old to name.
The Ubume stood still.
Its claws didn't lift.
Its mouth didn't open.
Its body shivered.
Like something inside it was breaking loose from years of pain.
And somewhere, in the deepest, most hidden part of her monstrous shape—something cracked.
And remembered.