Episode 0 - An Urban Legend

Narr. Koa Ruruka
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There are people with strange abilities in this world, and many of them are really cool. The most popular class of humans are ninjas, or shinobi! They are stealthy shinobi who carry out missions and mysterious activity thanks to their unique abilities: shadows, weapons, and keen sight. They often rely on their acute sense of detection, as they operate in the dark.

There are also spies, assassins, demis, youkai, androids, elemental majin, and shifters.

Hold on, what is a “Shifter,” you might ask? Shifters come from a line of wealthy demi-wizards, who are able to topple dragonkins. They call themselves shifters because they can change their appearance to fit their animal parallel they deem symbolic. There was this one popular urban legend of a shifter, which came from the 18th century.

It was called The Quiet Crow, and it goes by many different titles: The Silent Crow, The Crowless Crow, and The Soundless Crow….? These are all different names under the same legend.

The title, however? It’s a curse. And it came from the Reinishi Family in 1855. The curse belonged to an evil wizard, Karasu Reinishi, a powerful figure of his time. His powers deal with the cold and the ice, and he has a unique skill called Keen Sight, able to see the details of a person with the glow of a red eye.

This glow appears with a cold, blank gaze, staring into the soul of a person, reading their history. However, using this type of power makes the body extremely cold, freezing even.

One day, he vanished. People thought he died to a mysterious illness, or if his powers tragically killed him. But no, his corpse magically poofed, not one care in the world. Although he no longer lived, his spirit wandered, unable to pass on.

It took on the form of a black crow, a sign of bad omen. It never crows or caws.

Its eyes glowed a crimson color, and it was called The Quiet Crow.

As time passed, future generations of the Reinishi Family grew larger and larger, until one generation split from the name to become The Reina Family. The gaze of the crow kept lingering. With such harboring guilt, it cursed the family that split, passing what remained of its spirit into the world once more. The powers of the quiet crow became that of a baby, who was about to be born into the world.

She had dark crimson eyes that shone brightly under the moonlit night.