Separated Paths.

Finally, the time had come.

There was no prior warning, no time to even prepare mentally.

At 4 a.m., two hours before the usual routine, the door to Squad B's barracks slammed open.

The silence was shattered by the piercing shriek of a whistle that drilled into the ears of the ten sleeping recruits. "Up! Everyone up!" shouted Natasha, her voice amplified by the room's metallic acoustics.

The awakening was pure chaos. Yamato jumped out of bed in a panic, knocking his glasses to the floor and groping for them in the dark while cursing. Ken, trying to sit up fast, slammed his head hard against the upper bunk. "Damn it!" he grunted, rubbing his forehead.

"I want you in the courtyard in five minutes!" Natasha ordered, ignoring the group's disarray. "Full gear or no one eats!"

The same was happening in the barracks next door. Shouts, thuds, and the sound of running boots filled the corridors.

When the twenty-seven surviving novices managed to line up in the courtyard, shivering in the predawn cold, they realized something was off. There were no sandbags or training dummies. Instead, transport trucks were lined up, engines idling.

And worst of all: the instructors. Natasha, Kyosuke, and Asa Sato weren't in their usual gear. They wore full combat armor. Even Kyosuke, who usually looked ridiculous, now radiated a dangerous aura. Though he still wore his red glasses and left his chest bare, the chains on his arms gleamed, freshly polished and sharpened.

"Listen up, novices, because I won't repeat this!" Natasha yelled, her voice competing with the engine noise. "Recess is finally over! High Command has ordered an immediate field assessment!"

A murmur of terror ran through the ranks. Some recruits from Squad C started hyperventilating.

"We are going to the Okutama Ruins," Natasha continued without pause. "Your objective is simple: Eliminate the designated target and survive. As you can see, it will be easy enough even for D-Ranks like you."

"B-But isn't it too soon?" stammered a boy from the back. "We've only had a few weeks..."

"The enemy doesn't wait for you to be ready," Kyosuke interjected. His voice lacked its usual mockery. He was serious, his hands resting on his chains as if expecting an attack. "If you hesitate, you simply die. So get in. Now."

Natasha pulled out a tablet and began reading the assignments. And that's when the second blow fell on the novices.

"To cover more ground, the squads will be divided," she announced. "Squad A and B are too large to operate as a single tactical unit in this terrain."

Ken felt a knot in his stomach. "Squad B, Team 1: Shinji Fukumoto, Yamato Hirose..." Natasha named three more recruits. "You will go to the Western Sector."

Ken looked at his friends. Shinji and Yamato exchanged glances. They looked relieved to be together, but their eyes searched for Ken with worry. He's not with us, their looks said.

"Squad B, Team 2:" Natasha's voice rang out. "Kenji Kurosu. Naomi Nakashima. Kenta. Hiro. Sato. You will go to the Eastern Sector. I will oversee from the central perimeter."

The world seemed to stop for a second for Ken. They were separating him from his trio, from Shinji and Yamato. He was left with Naomi and three boys—Kenta, Hiro, and Sato—with whom he'd barely exchanged more than a greeting in the bathroom.

Before he could process it, the officers started shoving them toward the trucks.

"Ken!" Shinji shouted, pushing through the crowd to give him a hard slap on the back that nearly knocked the wind out of him. "Don't go dying on us yet, okay? Haha! See you at dinner!"

"Take care, Captain!" Yamato yelled, nervously adjusting his glasses.

Ken forced a smile. He knew he had to look confident. If the leader showed fear, the team would collapse. "Relax," said Ken, giving a thumbs-up. "See you at dinner. Save me some dessert."

It was an empty promise thrown to the wind.

Everyone boarded the trucks. The rear tarps were closed, plunging them into darkness. The engines roared and the convoy rolled out of Hachioji's gates, onto the broken roads leading into the dark mountains of Okutama.

Ken watched through a slit in the tarp as his friends' truck took a different road. He wasn't sure if that would be the last time he'd see them. Fate, and the cruelty of war, are sometimes indifferent to friendships.

Inside the truck, anxiety hung thick in the air. Kenta, Hiro, and Sato sat across from Ken, faces pale with fear. Kenta wouldn't stop bouncing his leg, and Hiro muttered quiet prayers. They were terrified. They knew they were the weakest in the group and that, without Shinji or Yamato, their chances were practically zero.

Ken sighed. Remember, you're the leader, he told himself. I have to fix this right now.

"Hey," Ken said, breaking the silence. The three boys looked up.

"Nothing to worry about," Ken lied with a naturalness that even surprised him. "This isn't like being out there empty-handed. Now we have training. We have gear. We know how to kill those things, and most importantly, we have each other."

Sato looked at him doubtfully. "But... we've never killed a real one, Ken."

"Doesn't matter," Ken replied, leaning back with feigned confidence. "Besides, I've got a bet to win." "A bet?" asked Naomi, who was sitting beside him.

"Yeah. I bet my dinner with Tanimoto from Squad A," Ken said, improvising on the spot. "Told him my team would clear our zone before his. So don't make me lose my dinner tonight, I heard it's steak, something really expensive to get, got it? We'll be back by nightfall laughing at them."

The lie worked. Kenta stopped trembling and let out a nervous laugh. Hiro stopped praying and nodded. The idea of a trivial competition made the situation seem less deadly.

"If it's for steak, you can count on me, leader," said Sato, gripping his katana more firmly.

Ken smiled, but then he felt a gaze on him. He turned and saw Naomi. She was staring at him intently. There was a small smile on her lips, soft and warm. It wasn't a romantic look, but it was something deeper. Somehow, Naomi knew he was lying, and yet, she chose to trust Ken.

The truck braked sharply, throwing them all forward. The rear gate opened, revealing a dense forest and moss-covered, fog-shrouded building ruins.

"Get out!" the driver yelled. "We're in the zone!"

The team jumped out. The truck didn't wait. As soon as the last of them hit the ground, it sped off and disappeared into the fog.

"Good luck," was the last thing they heard from the driver before the forest's sepulchral silence swallowed them whole.

They were alone.