Prologue : The Broken Boy

Chapter 0 — The Broken Boy

✦ One Second Before Death ✦

One second before the truck hit me, I smiled.

 Thank...you. Finally. My life's come to an end.

✦ The World Began with Rain ✦

Not the soft kind that lulls you to sleep.

This was the other kind—iron-grey sheets that devoured streets, lightning carving scars across the sky, thunder shaking every window like war drums.

Inside a cramped hospital room, my mother’s cries rose above the storm. 

Then—my first scream answered hers. Thin, fragile, yet defiant enough to silence thunder.

My father’s hands trembled as he lifted me. He looked like one wrong move would break me.

 Pale, wiry, nervous—but in his eyes, awe glimmered.

Through sweat and tears, my mother whispered my name.

“Hatoru.”

And so I was born—into rain.

For a few years, life almost felt whole. Small meals in a small kitchen.

My grandparents’ laughter.

My mother humming without knowing.

My father trying too hard to laugh at radio jokes.

 My older brother daring me into races down the hallway. Imperfect, but together.

For a while, that was happiness.

✦ Cracks in the Ordinary ✦

Happiness never lasts.

As I grew, I learned that silence was not peace. 

My mother left each morning in a hotel uniform and returned at night with another man’s warmth clinging to her skin. 

She smiled at the table, but her eyes never once found mine.

Sometimes I caught them acting—soft words over dinner, a forced laugh from her, a nod from him.

For a moment I’d think they were trying to patch things.

But the next morning, the silence came back thicker than smoke.

My father sat at the table like a man already sentenced. Jobless, hollow, shrinking with shame.

I learned those moments weren’t healing—they were theater.

He knew of my mother’s affair—did nothing. Pretended. A coward.

My mother had already chosen someone else, and in her eyes, my father was a failure she had to feed.

I started to hate her for it.

Hate how she smiled when he spoke.

Hate how she looked through me like I was the proof of a mistake.

Every lie she told him felt like it was being told to me too.

My brother and I both suffered her temper. Sometimes she struck me; sometimes she lashed out at him until he stormed out, wandering the streets until the rage cooled.

He was older, stronger, but even he couldn’t hold the house together.

Even as a child, I understood: love could not stop the rot.

She tried to cover her guilt through anger — every slap, every word, just another way to bury what she’d done.

But she never realized her fury didn’t hide her weakness; it passed it on.

Each outburst chipped something deeper in me — not bones, but whatever keeps a mind standing.

Home wasn’t safety anymore. It was the place where I learned to hold my breath — wondering which version of her would answer the door.

Home didn’t mean peace anymore — it meant guessing which hell waited behind it.

At school, my notebooks were neat, my marks clean. Too clean. Perfection made me a target. By the fifth year, classmates mocked my patched sleeves, shoved me into lockers, stole lunches. I swallowed it in silence.

I had no courage. I had no one—

Until Ray.

✦ Ray — The Brother I Chose ✦

Ray.

My cousin. Two years older. Reckless. Loud. Impossible to ignore.

The brother I didn’t ask for—but the brother I needed.

He found me cornered one afternoon, my bag in the mud, older boys sneering. Ray stormed in like fire, voice sharp:

“Oi! Pick on someone who can swing back.”

The bullies scattered. He shoved the bag into my chest, smirked.

“You’re pathetic. But you’ve got me now.”

From then, he was orbit and gravity all at once.

We spent our days chasing light.

Running through backstreets and arcades, sharing one drink, one slice of bread, one laugh at a time.

We’d stay out until the streetlights hummed on, pretending the world was ours for one more hour.

At the plaza’s game center, he’d always check his pockets first — coins barely enough for one play.

But he’d grin and hand them to me anyway.

“Your turn. I like watching you win.”

That was Ray — loud, brave, and always spending what little he had to keep me smiling.

His happiness lived through mine.

Those moments were sunlight after years of rain.

He was warmth in human form — the only place the world stopped hurting.

One evening, orange sunset bleeding across the roof, he ruffled my hair.

“Don’t lower your head, idiot. You’ve got me. Always.”

That word burned into me like armor.

Always.

And yet… Sometimes his grin slipped when he thought no one watched — a storm behind the sunlight. His eyes stared too long at nothing.

I thought it was just fatigue. I never asked.

✦ The Day I Said No ✦

It was an ordinary day—ordinary enough that I still hate it.

Lunch break. A park bench. Ray nudged me.

“Come home with me today. Mom cooked extra.”

I was tired. Distracted. Wanting silence.

“Not today. Maybe tomorrow.”

He grinned. “Tomorrow, huh? Fine. Don’t be late.”

Tomorrow never came.

That evening, whispers spread like cracks in glass. A locked door. A body swinging in silence.

“The last message on my phone still read ‘See you after school.’

It kept lighting up for days, as if tomorrow was still trying to reach me.

Ray was gone.

I thought it was a prank. He’d jump out laughing, call me an idiot. But the box at the funeral was too still. Too cold.

✦ The Loss ✦

At the wake, his grandmother clutched my shoulders, her voice shattering into sobs:

“Why, Hatoru? You were always with him! Why did you leave him alone?”

Her fingers dug into my shoulders like she was trying to hold onto the living through me.

I wanted to say I’d trade places—but the words stuck, afraid he might hear and take the offer.

Her grief bled into blame. My uncle’s voice followed, quiet and heavy as stone:

“If you had been there, maybe he would still be alive.”

They weren’t wrong. They weren’t right. They were grieving.

But their words lodged inside me like splinters I could never pull out.

Later I learned the truth: Ray had carried battles I never saw. Parents at war.

A girl who mocked his love. Relatives who spat names until he shrank.

He was saving me while he was breaking.       And I never even noticed.                            Simple. Human. Shatters hearts.

I whispered the same words every night after:

“If I had gone… If I had said yes…”

Regret became my shadow.

I hated him for leaving me. Then hated myself for hating him.

Some nights, I prayed he’d forgive me. Other nights, I begged the rain to forget we ever existed.

“Every sunset looked like the color of the rope they found him with.

I hated the sky for remembering what I begged to forget.

But grief never comes alone. While Ray’s warmth faded, another light stayed beside me—quiet, steady, and human.

✦ My Brother — The Last Light ✦

Through everything, one person still stayed beside me.

My brother — Ren, two years older, quiet where Ray had been loud.

He wasn’t a hero—just someone brave enough to stay when staying hurt.

When our mother’s anger cracked the house open, he’d pull me behind him.

When silence filled the rooms, he’d turn on the old radio just so I wouldn’t hear it breathe.

He never said I’ll protect you. He just did.

For a while, that was enough to believe life might still listen.

I told myself, as long as Ren’s here, I can keep moving.

He became the only thread I didn’t want to snap.

My last promise to the world was simple —

I won’t let him break the way I did.

✦ The Growing Darkness ✦

Ages eleven to fourteen blurred grey.

Family shame. My mother’s betrayal. My father’s silence. Ray’s death. The poison of it all.

I hated my life. I hated myself. I begged the rain to end me. Rope. Roads. Blades. Every attempt failed.

Each failure felt like another proof of my weakness.

Day by day, my heart was turning numb.

Inside, my soul had already died; outside, I just kept moving — a body pretending to be alive.

My brother drifted further away. He stopped talking much, carrying his own silence, leaving the house for hours.

We were two brothers under the same roof, each trapped in our own prison.

School only deepened the cracks. Bullies circled. Laughter echoed. One day, they cornered me.

“Your cousin’s gone. Nobody’s here to save you. Cry—it won’t matter.”

Their laughter thundered louder than storms.

During exams, they shoved me into a wall, twisted my arm—

CRACK.

Pain lit my wrist like fire.

The teachers didn’t care. To them, I was still “the boy with good grades.” My cast was my problem.

A week later, I sat in the exam hall. Pens scratched all around me. My right hand useless, I gripped the pen with my trembling left. Each letter burned. Sweat and tears blurred ink.

“I won’t let them win… I’ll endure. Even if it kills me.”

Line by line, I wrote. When the bell rang, my arm was numb, but I had endured.

That was all survival ever was—endurance.

✦ The Mask ✦

By tenth grade, my parents split. My father crawled back to his parents. My mother dragged my brother and me to another city.

A new school. A new mask. I laughed when others laughed.

Answered when called. Pretended to be normal.

But bullies always find weakness. Again whispers. Again shoves. Again silence.

After school, I worked part-time jobs. At night, I walked alone under flickering lamps, whispering to the rain:

“Please… let me die tomorrow.”

Sometimes, quieter:

“Please… let it end.”

But the rain kept falling—as if someone above still wanted to keep the rhythm, even if I couldn’t.

If this was punishment, it was gentle.

For the first time, the darkness didn’t hurt.

The rain felt different that night — heavier, almost listening. Like the sky was waiting for my decision.

Some nights, I’d look out the window and wonder if anyone would cry if I disappeared.

The thought didn’t scare me anymore — that’s what terrified me most.

I had one wish: if I ever died, I wanted no one to come to my funeral. And if they did — I hoped they wouldn’t cry.

I wasn’t living. I was dissolving, heartbeat by heartbeat.

I’d forgotten how laughter felt on my tongue, how warmth sat in my chest.

Even the stars felt indifferent — watching, but never reaching back.

And yet, some small, fragile part of me still whispered,

“Maybe tomorrow will hurt a little less.”

I never realized that was hope — the last flicker still refusing to die.

✦ The Storm Returns ✦

The storm answered.

The night was the same as my first. Black clouds piled high. Rain in sheets. Thunder like war drums.

I pedaled my bike through it. Clothes soaked. Body trembling.

Headlights flared through the curtain. A truck bore down, horn screaming.

And I… didn’t move.

It wasn’t an accident. It wasn’t surprise. It was my choice—and fate colliding with it.

Eyes closed. Mouth curved into the smallest smile.

“…Finally. It’s over.”

Impact swallowed the world.

✦ Before the Light Went Out ✦

The moment the headlights filled my eyes, one thought cut through the noise.

Ray — my sun — already set.

Ren — my brother — you are my moon.

If the world still has any light left, it’s you.

So please… don’t lose your hope.

Even if mine stops breathing, let yours keep burning.

I smiled into the storm, not for myself —

but so he’d remember me that way,

a fool who still believed the moon could outlast the night.

✦ Rebirth in the Void ✦

But death was not the end.

Darkness surrounded me. No pain. No fear. Just quiet.

Then—something flickered inside that quiet.

A pulse. Not mine. Not human.

Violet-gold light cracked through the dark, pulsing like a heartbeat that refused to die.

Then—
A voice. Ancient. Calm. Unavoidable.

“Born in rain. Died in rain. You cursed your gods, your family, your fate. The world ignored your prayers… but I heard.”

Above me, a black sun ignited. It bled light and shadow both.

My body dissolved. Bones, blood, soul—reforged in fire that wasn’t fire.

Light and shadow swirled, colliding until they became one.

Something within me—small as a spark, endless as breath—awoke.

It moved through me like memory learning to live again.

“You begged for death… yet your wound remembered how to breathe. Rise, not as mortal flesh—but as one bound to the Divine Vein.

The scar that defied silence shall become your light.”

“Raindrops still fell in the void—but now, they fell upward.

And my heartbeat was no longer mine — it was Etherus learning to speak.”

My eyes opened. Golden irises burned inside the void, ringed with shadows that moved like they had their own breath.

The broken boy was gone.

But somewhere, a little boy still waited under the rain, wondering why I never came home.

And something new—radiant, terrifying, born from Fracture—had taken his place.

✦ Epigraph ✦

Born in rain. Died in rain. You cursed your gods, your family, your fate. The world ignored your prayers… but I heard.

✦ Teaser for Chapter 1 ✦

The storm had ended, but the world would soon learn it hadn’t vanished—it had been reborn, inside me. The broken boy who prayed for death had died that night on the asphalt. What rose from the void was no longer prey.

And when the gods finally looked down, they would realize too late—
their hunter had already awakened.

The storm wasn’t weather. It was the first Vein opening.

Raindrops still fell in the void—but now, they fell upward.

And my heartbeat was no longer mine—it was the echo of something divine remembering itself.