Echoes in the Crystal

A week had passed in the outside world since they entered the cave. But inside the Eternal Glass Forest, where the laws of physics bent under the pressure of an alien essence, more than a month had gone by.

For Ken, that month had been the literal definition of hell.

His routine had been reduced to the most basic and brutal aspect of human existence: survival.

He slept barely five hours, always with one eye open for fear of the Obsidian Wolves. His body, once athletic, was now a map of bruises and scratches. His clothes hung a bit looser; any fat had disappeared, consumed by constant exertion, leaving only fibrous, tense muscle.

Natasha, in contrast, seemed to be on a picnic. Her skin was clean, her purple hair vibrant, and she moved through the crystalline terrain as if she were part of the ecosystem.

What frustrated Ken the most wasn't the hunger or the cold, but the lack of teaching. During the first few days, Ken had erupted. "When are you going to teach me to fight?!" he had yelled while carrying rocks. "All we do is walk and look for food! I'm not learning anything!"

Natasha didn't even look at him. "Survive first. With that 30-kilo backpack glued to your back, just breathing is training."

Ken, stubborn and desperate to get strong to avenge Naomi, didn't listen. He decided that if she wouldn't train him, he would do it himself.

During the nights, while Natasha slept, Ken did push-ups, sit-ups, and shadow-boxed until his arms shook and he vomited from the strain. The result was disastrous. He burned himself out prematurely. His body had no time to recover, and now he moved like a zombie, dragging his feet, consuming his own vital energy reserves.

That night, the cold of the valley was unbearable. Natasha had lit a campfire using dry crystal wood, which burned with a bluish, smokeless flame. The aroma was exquisite: roasted fish. Natasha had speared a Prism Salmon from the river with an improvised lance. The fish's fat dripped onto the fire, making a sizzling sound that was pure torture for Ken.

Ken sat on the other side of the fire, hugging his knees. In his hands was a handful of sour, hard berries he had managed to gather. He hadn't been able to catch anything; the animals here were either invisible or too fast for him. His stomach growled with the force of a caged lion. Natasha tore off a piece of white, juicy flesh and brought it to her mouth, chewing slowly, ignoring her student's pleading eyes.

"Instructor..." Ken began, his voice weak. "Could you give me a little...?"

"No," she cut him off. "He who doesn't hunt, doesn't eat. Rule of nature."

Ken sighed and popped a sour berry into his mouth, grimacing. The silence stretched, broken only by the crackle of the blue fire. Ken needed to distract his mind from the hunger, so he decided to talk. Maybe, if he could soften Natasha's heart, she'd throw him a scrap.

"This place..." Ken said, looking at the trees reflecting the firelight. "You said you knew it well. Did you do this training too?"

Natasha stopped with the fish halfway to her mouth. The question hung in the air for several seconds. Ken tensed, thinking he had crossed a line and would get a kick in response. He was about to apologize when Natasha's expression changed. Her eyes, usually cruel, grew unfocused, staring into the blue flames.

"Yes," she said quietly. "Years ago."

Ken was surprised by the honest answer. Carefully, he shuffled a little closer, drawn in by the story.

"I wasn't alone that time," Natasha continued, setting the fish down on a crystal leaf. "I found this place with my old squad. We were the best of our generation. I joined the organization as a very young girl, you know? My physical abilities were abnormal, but I was too young to be alone. So my older sister joined with me to watch over me."

Natasha smiled sadly, a smile that seemed broken. "There were seven of us in total. Seven promises for the future. We used this place as our secret base, away from the adults and the rules. We felt unbeatable."

Ken listened intently, forgetting his hunger for a second. He saw in Natasha the same glow he felt when thinking of Shinji, Yamato, and the others.

"But one day..." Natasha's voice turned icy. "...a mission went wrong. We ran into something that shouldn't have been there. A creature. It wasn't a beast like the others. It was humanoid. It wore ancient samurai armor, black as the abyss."

Ken's heart skipped a beat. Samurai armor...

"It slaughtered us," Natasha whispered, clenching her fists until her gloves creaked. "It toyed with us, we couldn't touch it. My sister... she charged it to give me time to run. She sacrificed herself to defend me because I was paralyzed with fear. In the end, of the seven, only I survived."

Natasha looked up and stared at Ken, but she wasn't seeing him. She was seeing her ghosts. "Sometimes I dream of that creature again. I dream I go back to that day and do something different. But I know it's useless. The only thing keeping me standing is the desire to avenge my squad... and to avenge my sister."

Silence fell again, heavier than before. Natasha had taken off her mask for a few moments. Ken understood then why she was so harsh, why she had beaten him at the tribunal, why she had brought him here. She wasn't training a Kijin soldier; she was trying to prevent another younger sibling from dying.

"That creature..." Ken said, connecting the dots in his mind. "The Regent. It's the same one that killed my team."

Natasha neither confirmed nor denied. She simply sighed, regaining her cold composure. She stood up and brushed the dust off her pants. "I'm going to sleep. Tomorrow we climb the waterfall. If you fall behind, you'll drown."

With that, she got into her sleeping bag and turned her back. Ken stared at the spot where she had been sitting. He saw the plate of crystal leaves. His heart filled with hope. "Did she maybe leave something?"

He quickly scrambled over to the plate. It was empty. Only fish bones remained, perfectly clean, and the animal's head staring at him with a dead eye.

"...Not a single scrap," Ken murmured, with a mix of disappointment and resignation.

Yet, far from getting angry, Ken felt something new. It wasn't just hunger. It was empathy. He looked at Natasha's back. Now he knew they weren't just surviving. Both master and student were sharpening their fangs to bite the same monster.

His stomach growled again, breaking the moment. "Damn it..." Ken groaned, curling up near the fire. "Tomorrow I'll catch that damn fish even if I have to bite it alive."

A new day was approaching in the Glass Forest. And with it, one more step toward vengeance.