Volume 2 – Chapter 18: Echoes of the Unseen

The words also hovered suspended between us in the fluttering and electrical tension of a storm cloud that had just then passed, and burst from the sky with a kind of vibration and resonance rippling outward in circular waves. It seemed as if the silhouette of a tall man, black as darkness, stood in front of me, its voice rattling in things I’d remember, resonating in my bones. I stood next to Rika, her clammy hand still held tightly in my own, but I could only focus on the twisted vibes emanating off this creature.

“You have a hard time understanding,” it said, the voice quieter now but an authority nevertheless. “But then you are not prepared for the truth.

The weight of its words, and so to me hardly breathing. It was hot and sticky, slimy, and went on to amplify the claustrophobia. What truth? The flood? The world? What was it all leading to? I I wanted to scream, to call for more, choking struggling silence hanging in the air between the two of us and the figure before me denser and bulkier.

Rika’s voice broke through my confusion, firm but tinged with concern. “We have to know,” she said, unflinchingly. “You know what? We’ve been running for too long and we deserve to hear the truth. We have to get into who’s really responsible and why this world has come here.”

It just stood there, looking at me, as if it could peer deep into the deeply recessed notes of my soul. The silence that followed was deafening, but I couldn’t look away. There was something in its eyes — something ancient, knowing — that made me feel everything and nothing at the same time.

“You’re not ready,” it said once more, its tone low but emphatic. “The truth is not for the timid. You have to do now?Flood dropped Understanding why..it will change you. “It’s going to tear the world you think you know assunder.

The flood gave me a cold shiver. The flood had washed everything away. It had laid waste to cities, destroyed innumerable lives and broken the world. But was it truly just a natural disaster — or was there more at play than we had been led to believe? What did that figure have to be so mysterious about? Why did it insist that we weren’t ready for the truth?

Rika clutched my hand tighter, and her pulse quickened. “Tell us what it means,” she commanded, her tone suddenly sharp, wild. In October 2023 you were monitoring us, you told me. You know what’s happening. What is it that we need to face?” ”

The figure did not reply for a long moment. It seemed to ponder deeply, its pale face inscrutable in the chiaroscuro. And then, finally, it spoke.

“The flood was not an accident,” it said slowly, each word loaded, like a slow gathering of poison tears. “It was all well in motion long before it struck. And it was fueled by people who did not appreciate the risk of what they were doing. It’s only the beginning, the first wave of what’s to come.”

I felt my heart race. The flood was intentional? It was no act of nature? It’s words so heavy that my mind couldn’t contain them. How could that be? Who had orchestrated this, and why? What might have driven someone — or something — to cause such destruction?

"But why us?" I asked, my voice a mere thread. What does this have to do with us? What do you want from us?"

The figure tilted its head slightly, staring at me. “You are one of those making it happen,” it said. “You’ve been involved from the inception of it. The flood, the chaos, the destruction — it was started by people like you.” You will do someone else's work that you prepared without story, now you will act to prepare for punishment.

My head shook, whirring thoughts. "I don’t understand. What are you talking about? Just running, just trying to survive. We’re just trying to get through this.”

The expression of the figure did not change, but still there was something in its eyes — something that turned my stomach. “The flood was just the beginning,” it said again. "There is more to come. And you, Kaito, you will need to choose. You cannot escape what has already begun.”

The words struck me like a physical blow, knocking the air from my jaw. I had always thought of the flood as because it was a once-in-a-lifetime event, a disaster we had fought our way out of. But now... now it struck me! That thing that had felt like the first step to the realization apparently had been just a step in a process A HUGE PROCESS that had started long before I had even imagined what I was going to live.

Rika stepped forward, voice tinged with urgency. "What do you mean? What choice? What do we have to do?"

The figure’s lips curled into a slight, almost imperceptible smile. “You can choose to battle or succumb to the dark,” it added as its low, chilling voice echoed. "There is no middle ground. It determines the destiny of all you ever do. You don’t go back from that.' ”

Those words hung like dense fog in the air and seeped deeper and deeper into my mind. I could sense the pressure building, the feeling that everything I had known — everything I had believed — was unraveling at the seams. I had no answers, no sense of what actually was happening, but one thing was clear: I couldn’t keep running. I couldn’t keep hiding from whatever this was.

“You need to face the ugly reality, Kaito,” the figure said, its voice grown quieter, practically a whisper now. “The truth of why you’re here, of the choices you’ve made, of what’s gonna come next. Then, and only then, will you know what your part in all of this is going to be.”

I didn’t know how to respond. I was still trying to wrap my head around what I’d just heard when the sensation hit me like a wave, flooding from the core of my body. The truth. The choices. What role was I meant to be playing? And why, it seemed, were the answers so tantalizingly nearby, as if I was standing on the precipice of an abyss, waiting for something — or someone — to push me over?

Rika’s voice pierced my thoughts once more. “What if we don’t choose? What if we just woke up one day and were like, ‘No more’?

The figure’s eyes shone, and a wrong kind of light danced in them. “You have no choice,” it said, its voice suddenly final. “It’s not a question of whether you’re going to be part of this. It’s your choice whether you fight for what’s left of the world, or whether you turn, and give the darkness everything.’

The weight of its words pressed on me like a shroud. There was no escape. The flood was just the beginning. Now I would have to deal with whatever came next, and the world was already altered.

The figure’s words hung over Rika and me in silence. About the future we had no idea; the way forward was foggy; one thing was clear: our decisions would lead to the end of everything. There was no going back now.

“Come with me,” the figure said again, its voice authoritative, almost desperate. “You have to see what’s been put in motion. At that point, you’ll know what you have to do.”

I have been glad to leave the show behind and have my heart race in my chest as I hesitated. But there was no choice, in the end. My first attempt, and now it was too late.

I glanced at Rika, her face mirroring the same terror and confusion I felt. But there was more to them than that — something that gave me confidence that together we could weather whatever came next.

I inhaled deeply and nodded and we walked on, stepping into the unknown.