The Erased Monastery

The last train to Kyoto left at 04:42.

Ren and Aoi stepped into the final carriage as if they had always done this together.

The train was an old model, the kind that still had red velvet seats and windows that opened. Only, the windows didn't show the same landscape twice.

In the blink of an eye, a forest of cherry blossoms would pass by (Spring 2025).

In the next, the same forest was on fire (Summer 2047).

Then snow falling in reverse (a Winter that never existed).

Ren sat near the window. Aoi sat beside him, her white scarf occupying the armrest as if it were alive.

“How long until Kyoto?” Ren asked.

“It depends,” Aoi replied. “If the train decides today is 2047, we arrive in forty minutes. If it decides it’s 838 A.D., we get off at Mount Hiei before Kyoto even exists.”

Ren looked at her.

“You talk as if time were a dog choosing where to pee.”

Aoi laughed. It was the first time Ren had heard her laugh. It sounded like a wind chimes.

“Exactly,” she said. “And we are the backyard.”

The train jolted. The internal lights flickered. When they returned, the carriage was empty. Just the two of them. And a note stuck to the ceiling:

Jion-ji – destroyed in 820 A.D. – Next stop.

Ren felt a chill run down his spine.

“I grew up in this monastery,” he said, quietly. “Until I was 12. I had calligraphy class at six in the morning. Master Hōzen would hit the table with a bamboo stick when I messed up a stroke.”

Aoi turned her face to the window. Her reflection was crying, but her real face was smiling.

“You really remember,” she whispered. “But the world doesn't.”

The train stopped with a screech that sounded like old metal screaming. The doors opened by themselves.

“We’ve arrived,” Aoi said.

Outside: fog so dense it swallowed sound. A partially toppled red torii gate. A stone plaque beside it, letters faded by time:

Jion-ji – founded in 784 – destroyed in 820 – never rebuilt.

Ren stepped out first. The ground was made of moss-covered stones that glowed faintly, as if they had their own light.

“This can’t be right,” he murmured. “I used to play tag right here. There was a giant cherry tree…”

He pointed to the emptiness. There was no tree at all. Only fog.

Aoi ran her hand over the gate. Her fingers passed through the wood as if it were a hologram.

“The monastery was erased,” she said. “Along with all the memories that didn't fit into the new version of the world.”

Ren took a step forward. The fog parted like a curtain.

The main courtyard was there. But wrong.

The main hall was just ruins. Collapsed roof. Buddha statues broken in half.

And on the inner walls, thousands of pergaminhos floating half a meter above the floor. Spinning slowly. Like leaves in an invisible whirlwind.

Ren walked to the center. A scroll stopped in front of him. It opened by itself.

His handwriting. Unmistakable. The same he used to sign TSD reports.

Day 1 – I met Aoi in Shinjuku. She gave me a photo. I kept it.

Day 2 – She saved me from the guards at the market. I said thank you.

Day 3 – I killed her. I didn’t want to. But I killed her.

Ren let the scroll drop. It didn't fall. It remained floating at chest height.

“This hasn’t happened yet,” he said, his voice shaking.

“Not for you, it hasn't,” Aoi replied. “Not for this version of you, it hasn't.”

Another scroll opened. More recent.

If you are reading this, you have already killed me three times. Stop repeating the mistake.

Ren recognized it. It was the phrase from the cassette tape he had bought at the market.

He took a step back. He tripped over a stone. He fell onto his backside.

“I haven’t killed anyone,” he said. “I… I’m the hunter. I protect people.”

Aoi crouched down in front of him. Her clear violet eyes were full of pity.

“You protect the world that remains,” she said. “But that world doesn't protect you back.”

The communicator in Ren's pocket vibrated. A blue hologram appeared between them.

Robotic female voice:

“Agent Ren Kaito. Status updated: Alpha level deserter. Orders: Eliminate Immediately. No judgment. No record.”

The hologram showed Ren's face with the word ELIMINATE pulsing in red.

Ren slammed the communicator off so hard the screen cracked.

“Now we are two ghosts,” Aoi said, smiling slightly. “Two mistakes looking for the right place.”

She held out her hand again.

Ren looked at her hand. Then at the scrolls. Then at the gate that no longer existed.

“Fine,” he said. “Let’s get out of here.”

They stood up. The scrolls began to burn by themselves. One by one. No smoke. Just golden light rising toward the sky.

When they reached the gate, Ren looked back one last time.

On the stone floor, where he had fallen, a new sentence was engraved. As if it had always been there:

Voice Market – Shinjuku, platform 13⅓. Bring the tape. She still believes in you.

Ren stored the phrase in his head. Aoi held his hand tighter.

The fog closed behind them like a curtain.

The train was gone. But the path back to Shinjuku was drawn in the fog: footprints of light that vanished as they walked.

Ren gripped the cassette tape in his pocket. The one he had bought with the coin Aoi "found."

“If they sell voices,” he said, “maybe I can find mine again.”

Aoi looked at him. The white scarf fluttered even though there was no wind.

“Maybe,” she replied. “Or maybe you’ll discover you never lost it. You just forgot where you put it.”

They vanished into the fog.

Behind them, the monastery finished burning in silence.

Only a stone remained with a phrase that no one ever erased:

The monastery that never existed awaits you.

But now the phrase was scratched out.

Someone had written over it, in a child’s handwriting:

I waited. You came. Thank you.

The fog swallowed everything.