The Iris and the Ouroboros

The print shop sat between a boarded-up hardware store and a parking lot choked with weeds. Its sign was in kanji so worn that even Mayu had to squint to read it. The shutters looked like they hadn't moved in months, but the bell above the door jingled crisply when they entered.

The interior was dim, smelling faintly of ink and old cedar. Wooden drawers lined the walls, each one labeled with delicate brushwork—characters for weddings, funerals, family names, crests.

A man in his seventies stepped out from behind a folding screen, wiping his hands on a rag. His eyes lingered on Mayu for only a moment before settling on Ryunosuke.

"You're his boy," he said, without a question mark.

Ryunosuke bowed slightly. "I was told my father came here. Years ago."

The old man nodded and turned without another word, beckoning them to follow. He led them through a narrow hallway into a back room cluttered with scrolls, stamps, and stacks of yellowing parchment.

"He was meticulous," the man said, opening a drawer and pulling out a wrapped bundle. "Wanted something old, something sacred. Said it had to feel like it came from blood and soil."

He unwrapped the bundle and laid it flat on the table.

There it was—the iris and the serpent. But it wasn't the version Ryunosuke had always known.

The serpent wasn't coiled gently around the bloom. It was wrapped tightly, fangs bared, its mouth open over the petals.

"It was one of the early sketches," the man said. "Your father rejected it. Said it looked too violent. Too close to something else."

Ryunosuke leaned in, studying the lines. The style was refined. The symbolism unmistakable.

"He didn't want the crest to scare people," the man continued. "But he also didn't design it from scratch. Said he found it carved into a door somewhere. Gave me a sketch and asked me to clean it up."

Mayu spoke for the first time. "Where did he find it?"

The old man shrugged. "Didn't say. But he wasn't the first to bring in something like this. Few years earlier, a foreigner came in. Quiet man. Hands like a piano player. He had a pendant with the same serpent. No iris though—just a ring eating its own tail."

Ryunosuke froze.

"Did he give a name?"

The old man scratched his head. "Navarro, maybe? Or something like it. We didn't speak much."

Ryunosuke looked down at the crest again. The serpent's eye stared back at him.

This wasn't just a symbol.

It was a thread—older, deeper, and already wrapped around his life long before he was born.

Ryunosuke studied the crest as Mayu talked to the old man. Once he was done, he came back to the front and continued to follow Mayu.

The izakaya was nearly empty when Ryunosuke arrived. It sat beneath an overpass near the edge of town, its windows fogged with steam and cigarette smoke, its lamps glowing faint amber like distant stars.

Kenji was already there, seated in the last booth with a bottle of shochu and two small cups. He didn't look up when Ryunosuke slid into the seat across from him.

"I heard you found the original crest," Kenji said, voice low.

"I didn't know there was one," Ryunosuke replied. "Well, I didn't really find it."

Kenji poured them both a drink. "There always is. That's the problem with symbols. People forget they were born from something uglier."

He handed Ryunosuke the cup, then reached into his coat and pulled out a folded sheet of notebook paper. Yellowed. Frayed at the edges. Ink bleeding slightly where time had soaked through.

He placed it on the table between them.

Ryunosuke unfolded it carefully.

A sketch.

The iris at the center—its petals drawn with delicate care—but this time, the serpent didn't wrap it. It circled it entirely, mouth devouring tail.

An ouroboros.

At the bottom, in English, was his father's handwriting:

The flower doesn't bloom forever. But the snake never dies.

Ryunosuke read the line twice, then looked up.

"He found this?"

Kenji nodded. "Years before you were born. He was tracing family roots. Found ruins in southern Spain—old trade networks, temples swallowed by modern roads. Symbols that predate both our name and our country. Navarro's people were already there."

"You're saying Victor used the same symbol?"

"Not exactly. But close enough to make your father nervous. He thought the serpent was older than any family. Older than any nation. Not evil. Just… enduring."

Ryunosuke traced the ink with his thumb.

"He didn't want it to be a threat," he said.

"No," Kenji replied. "He wanted it to be a reminder. That power without understanding is just another form of extinction."

They sat in silence for a while, the shochu untouched between them.

Finally, Ryunosuke asked, "Why didn't he tell anyone?"

Kenji stared into the glass. "Because people don't listen to warnings. They only listen to fear. And your father—he was trying to be something better than the crest he inherited."

A pause.

Then Ryunosuke folded the page again, carefully, like something fragile. He slipped it into the inside pocket of his coat.

He didn't say thank you.

But Kenji nodded anyway, like he'd heard it.

They left without ceremony.

Kenji walked the opposite direction without a word, disappearing into the static of the city like he'd never been there at all. Mayu was already waiting near the curb, leaning against the passenger side of a black sedan with tinted windows.

"You got something?" she asked.

Ryunosuke nodded once.

She didn't ask what. Just opened the door and said, "There's one more place you need to see."

The drive took them through narrower roads, up into the western hills where the streetlights grew sparse and the air turned colder. They passed shuttered houses, an old tram station, and finally turned down a steep gravel path that ended in front of a rusted gate hidden behind trees.

"This used to be a university annex," Mayu said as she unlocked the chain. "Now it's just us."

They entered a wide, slanted building that had once been a gallery or archive. Inside, the walls were lined with crates, steel cabinets, and stacks of covered canvases. It smelled like dust and oil paint, ink and old secrets.

A single lamp flickered on near the back.

"This is where we store what survived," she said. "Everything the Family couldn't protect publicly. Things too symbolic to burn. Things worth remembering."

She led him past sealed scrolls and faded photographs until they reached a cloth-covered frame resting upright on a metal easel.

Mayu pulled the cover away.

The painting beneath was striking—thick black brushwork over gold leaf, stylized in a way that felt both modern and ancient. The iris bloomed wide and wild at the center, its petals edged in red. Encircling it, elegant and consuming, was the serpent—but not coiled. It formed a perfect ring.

An ouroboros.

Near the bottom, painted into the corner in the same metallic ink as the serpent's scales, was a small monogram.

V.N.

Ryunosuke's breath caught.

"It's his," he whispered.

Mayu nodded. "We found it in a shipment bound for a private collector in Zurich. Hidden behind forged permits. We intercepted it just before the Family fell apart."

He stared at it for a long time.

It wasn't just the imagery. It was the tone. The same philosophy echoed through Victor Navarro's investments, through Kanda's reforms, through the silence that had crept over Kyoto's neighborhoods like a second skin.

The idea that some things never die. They just change their names.

He stepped back.

"It's not ours," he said quietly. "It never was."

Mayu looked at him. "Then maybe it's time someone changed what it means."

They didn't speak on the ride back.

Mayu dropped him off near the guesthouse just before midnight, the streets bathed in sodium-orange light, the air heavy with the scent of old rain and cold concrete. She didn't offer advice. She didn't ask how he felt.

She just said, "You know where to find me," and drove off.

Ryunosuke climbed the stairs to his room slowly, each step quiet, deliberate. Inside, he removed his coat, sat at the low table, and pulled out his sketchbook.

He flipped past the walls. Past the swords. Past the faceless men in suits and the ghosts of family crests.

Then he stopped on a blank page.

The paper looked different tonight. Not empty—waiting.

He picked up his pencil.

And began to draw.

First the iris. Not curled or delicate. Open. Blooming with defiance, not fragility.

Then the serpent. But not wrapped around the flower, and not devouring it. It lay beneath the petals, coiled in a resting shape—still circular, still eternal, but not constricting. Not consuming.

A symbol of protection. Not dominance.

He paused once, unsure.

Then shaded the space between them—just enough to show distance. The flower and the serpent didn't need to touch. They simply needed to exist without destroying each other.

When he finished, he stared at it for a long time.

Then he tore the page out—cleanly, without hesitation—and folded it twice.

He didn't frame it. Didn't sign it.

He just slipped it into his wallet, behind his ID, where no one else would see it.

Not a crest.

Not a flag.

Just a reminder.

This wasn't about reclaiming a legacy.

It was about rewriting it.