When Light Returns

The morning drifted in soft silver, clouds stretched in slow-moving sheets above the city. Aihana walked with her hands tucked into the pockets of her jacket, her breath forming faint ghosts in the cool air. She was headed toward the park where she had agreed to meet Ren for coffee. The day felt ordinary. Too ordinary. The kind of ordinary that made her nerves hum.

She brushed back a strand of hair. Something in the air felt… expectant, like the calm before a storm she couldn’t see yet.

Across the street, on a weathered park bench beneath a half-bare oak, Akihiro pretended to read a book. He wasn’t absorbing a single word. His eyes flicked upward constantly, tracking her every step, each movement slicing through him like it mattered too much.

Rei and Kaito stood a short distance behind him in casual human disguises. Their angelic presence buzzed faintly, like static on the nerves.

“She doesn’t sense you,” Kaito murmured.

“She will,” Akihiro whispered. “If she gives me even one sign that her heart is still mine… I’ll make sure she remembers everything.”

But she didn’t look his way.

Aihana reached the café by the pond, where Ren was already waiting. He stood as she approached, giving her a warm smile that usually made her stomach flip. Today… something was off. Not dangerous. Just tense.

“Hey,” she said, sitting across from him. “Sorry I’m late.”

“You look great,” he murmured, his eyes lingering too long.

Aihana forced a smile. That wasn’t like him.

Sora, Mizuki, Kaori, and Hikari sat at a nearby table, pretending to study menus, their energies carefully masked.

At the far edge of the park, something dark pulsed between the trees. Shadows bent inward as Ravukaru inhaled sharply, savoring celestial power. His eyes fixed instantly on Aihana.

Aihana. The Guardian of Love, the one his ancient hunger had been denied once before.

His lips curled.

“So I get another chance… and she’s right here,” he whispered, stepping fully into the world. “Finally within reach.”

His influence spread like cold mist.

Ren froze.

A flicker of red cracked behind his eyes. His hand twitched. His breath stuttered. Aihana felt a shiver crawl up her spine.

Ren leaned forward. “You’ve been… distant lately.”

“Ren, it’s not—”

He grabbed her hand. Too fast. Too strong.

Aihana’s pulse spiked. Something inside his eyes flickered again, darker.

On the bench, Akihiro shot to his feet.

Rei stiffened. “Did you feel that?”

“That’s not Ren,” Kaito said. “Something’s inside him.”

“It’s Ravukaru,” Rei hissed.

Akihiro tried to reach Aihana, but Ravukaru manifested fully, stepping onto the path like a living shadow, blocking Akihiro from getting to her.

“You again,” Ravukaru hissed. “Didn’t I destroy you once?”

“You tried,” Akihiro answered, energy flaring around him.

The peaceful park shattered.

A shockwave of darkness crashed into Akihiro, knocking dust and leaves into a cyclone. Streetlights flickered violently, neon signs buzzed and glitched. Cars rattled. The sky swirled into a spiraling vortex of storm clouds.

And every angel and Guardian moved.

Sora leapt forward first, the air around her spiraling into a sharp, roaring gale.

She swept her arm outward, sending a slicing burst of wind that lifted three shadow demons clean off the ground and hurled them back into the trees.

Mizuki spun like a dancer, water gathering around her arm in a smooth, spiraling ribbon.

She flicked her wrist, and the liquid whip snapped toward a demon crawling out of the swings, the water glowing with sigils that bound the creature before dissolving it into mist.

The earth answered Kaori instantly: cracks formed in the pavement, and thick vines burst upward, coiling around two demons and dragging them into the air before slamming them down.

Hikari stepped forward, heat shimmering around her like a rising sun.

Flames unfurled from her palms and shaped themselves into a blazing barrier that curved around a cluster of civilians.

“Move them out! Go!” she commanded, pushing back a wave of dark energy with a surge of fire bright enough to scorch the shadows away.

Rei and Kaito shed their disguises.

Luminescent wings exploded into existence.

Rei and Kaito flew straight into a pack of demons forming in the basketball court, swinging a blade of compressed starlight that erased them on contact.

Meanwhile Ren rose abruptly, chair scraping harshly. His hands trembled violently.

“Aihana…” His voice came layered now, one human, one not.

She backed away. “Ren, you’re scaring me.”

His pupils expanded into inky blackness. “You feel something for me. I know you do.”

He lunged. She stumbled back, hitting a tree.

“Aihana. Come to me.”

His voice wrapped around her like chains, demonic and suffocating.

“Ren, please,” she whispered. “Fight it.”

For one second, humanity flickered in his eyes.

Then Ravukaru’s voice lashed through his mind:

Take her. She belongs to me.

His aura exploded in red-black flame.

Aihana cried out as he advanced. Her heartbeat hammered against her ribs.

Deep inside her chest, something warm—ancient, familiar—stirred.

Ren reached for her.

And her power answered.

A burst of golden-white light erupted from her chest, blasting Ren backward.

He hit the pavement hard. Unconscious.

His aura shattered like broken glass.

Ravukaru snarled as the connection snapped.

Aihana stared at her hands, trembling.

Energy hummed under her skin.

She looked toward the chaos.

And finally, she saw him.

Her breath was taken away.

Akihiro broke free of Ravukaru’s hold, wings flickering behind him. Memories surged through Aihana—his hand in hers, a kiss like starlight, a blade of light, a love she’d once lost. Akihiro.

“Akihiro,” she whispered, “I will give you my power.”

Light bloomed around her.

Akihiro’s blade flared impossibly bright—celestial, devastating.

His eyes widened, but he didn’t hesitate.

One stroke.

Ravukaru shattered into dust.

Demons dissolved nearby.

The Guardians unleashed their elements, sweeping away the last dark remnants.

From above, faint silhouettes of Erasers and Repairers drifted down, mending shattered pavement, erasing memories, stitching the city back together until the chaos smoothed into ordinary silence.

The sky slowly calmed, clouds parting.

Dawn light spilled through.

In the middle of the silent park, Aihana and Akihiro stood facing each other.

Human forms.

Emotion raw.

World repaired.

For a moment, nothing moved.

Then a soft breeze swept through the park.

Leaves rustled.

Streetlights flickered gently.

Aihana’s hair lifted off her shoulders.

Akihiro’s fringe fluttered across his forehead.

The wind curled around them like the city itself was breathing again.

Their eyes met, full of everything they had lost and everything they had regained.