The First Reflection, II

The shop was quiet when we returned.

Too quiet.

Shuji didn't speak on the walk back. Neither did I. The silence between us wasn't restrained—just full. As if both of us knew words wouldn't hold whatever has just happened.

Inside, the clocks ticked softly in their usual chorus. Nothing broken. Nothing wrong. Not on the surface.

I stepped behind the counter, hands still unsteady, and sat down hard on the old stool.

Shuji poured water into two cups. "Drink."

I did. It helped.

Then he finally said, "It's starting."

"What is?"

"The unravelling."

I looked at him. "You believe me now?"

"I believed you the moment the clocks stopped at the same time," he muttered. "I just hoped it wouldn't go further than that."

"But it is."

He nodded. "And it will."

Before I could ask more, the air changed.

The clocks didn't stop. They shattered.

***

The sound wasn't loud—more like a pop. Glass imploding inward, all at once, without force or weight. Once clock then another. Then all of them.

The light dimmed.

Not like a shadow.

Like the sun itself had flinched.

Shuji turned sharply toward the door.

Something was there.

Not footsteps.

Not wind.

But motion. Heavy and quiet.

A presence that didn't belong in our world.

He reached under the counter and pulled out something wrapped in cloth. I hadn't seen it before—a long, narrow case. When he drew it open. I saw the edge of steel.

A short blade. Plain. But polished. Waiting.

"Behind me," he said.

I didn't argue.

The shop door creaked open on its own.

Wind didn't cause that.

What entered was not a person.

At first it looked like fog—low, swirling, hungry. But the fog had a face. Or something like one. A white mask, like the one I'd seen in the ally, floated in the dark shape, painted with a single ink line drawn like a smile.

It slid forward silently, unhurried.

Shuji moved.

The blade sliced through the air—faster than I expected from a man his age. The spirit reeled back, hissing, but didn't flee. Another mask slid in from behind, then a third.

I backed up toward the workbench. There was no weapons. Nothing I could use. Just gears, screws, and time.

And then the wall behind me bent.

The paper screen wrapped like something was pressing from the other side.

Then it burst open.

And Rin fell through.

She hit the ground hard, coughing, clutching something small in her hand—a lacquered charm, old and worn.

She looked up. "Ren—"

Another shadow surged in behind her.

Before I could move, a blur of motion collided with it, knocking it back through the screen.

Tatsuya.

Sword drawn. Face pale. Eyes blazing.

He didn't hesitate. He moved like a solider now—not a boy trying to prove himself. His blade struck the spirit clean across its mask, shattering it in a sharp burst of black vapor.

Two more came forward.

Rin reached for my hand, eyes glowing faintly—not with power, but with recognition.

"They're not just here for you," she whispered. "They're here for all of us."

Tatsuya turned toward another mask, raised his blade—

And stopped.

His body froze. Just for a second.

And in that second I saw it again.

The thread.

It shimmered between us—Rin, Tatsuya, and me—connecting us like a web. Vibrating. Real.

And then Tatsuya moved again—only faster.

His sword struck like it had weight behind time itself.

The mask split. The spirit shrieked.

And vanished.

We were left in silence.

The shop was a ruin of ticking fragments and shattered glass.

But we were still breathing.

And Tatsuya—still holding his blade—looked down at his hands like he didn't know whose they were.