The morning was soft, and too quiet to be safe.
It had rained the night before. Not the kind of rain that comes with thunder, but the slow kind, that seeps into everything. The rooftop tiles glistened. The grass was heavy. The air was thick with scent—iron and moss and the faint heat of old stone catching sun again.
Mazanka's coat fluttered as he stretched, arms high, back arched, the smirk already tugging at his lips like it had been waiting all night.
"Alright, my little misfits," he said. "Time for your daily humiliation."
Teruko sighed, her fingers tightening around the bandage at her wrist. She stood near the edge of the park'd grass, blade tucked behind her back, robes damp from dew.
Rakan flopped down on the grass, still chewing whatever toast his mother had forced into his mouth before he left his house this morning.
"Do we have to call it that?" he muttered.
Mazanka leaned toward him, pointing the crust of his own half-eaten rice ball like a divine wand.
"When you graduate from tripping over your own Ka'ro, we'll rename it 'Practice Time with Blossoms.' Until then—yes. Humiliation."
Teruko rolled her eyes. "You're not even a teacher."
"Exactly why I'm qualified," Mazanka said, grinning. "Real teachers are dangerous. They care about form. I care about flow."
He stepped into the centre of the green patch of land. With a flick of his wrist, Ka'ro shimmered from his fingertips—not projected, not forced—just present, like mist rising from a still lake.
It swirled gently along his arm, spiraling around his fingers as if pulled by some invisible music.
"Now watch. First thing: Ka'ro does not obey the body. It listens to intention."
The Ka'ro followed his palm as he turned it, and then—he snapped it forward.
The swirling tendril coiled outward and struck a distant tree trunk with a hollow thud.
"That was the basic Ikū-Ka'ro: Jōtō no Yūkai. Breath of Dissolving Motion. Not an attack. A breath. You move Ka'ro like fog trying to remember how to be rain."
He turned, expression unusually serious.
"You don't force Ka'ro. You persuade it. Like asking a spirit to dance."
Rakan blinked.
Teruko scoffed.
"What does that even mean?" she muttered, stepping forward.
Mazanka grinned again.
"You're the one who flings your Ka'ro like you're mad at it."
"I am mad at it!" she snapped. "It won't do what I tell it to!"
"Maybe because you sound like you're yelling at a dog you never fed," he said, chuckling.
She charged forward, eyes sharp.
"Shintei-Ka'ro Art: Renjin no Hōyō!Embrace of Honored Blades."
Her tattoos flared, lighting along her forearms, and two ribbons of sigil-marked Ka'ro burst from her shoulders, twisting outward in a double arc. She swung, trying to wrap the ribbons around Mazanka's form like binding silk.
Mazanka vanished between her strikes.
He reappeared behind her.
Flicked her forehead.
She stumbled, growling.
"Your Ka'ro's clean," he said, now walking backward like she was a schoolchild. "Your movement is not. Your body doubts the rhythm. You second-guess the flow."
"I do not—!"
"You do. You yell before you sing."
Rakan couldn't help but laugh, still lying down.
"She yells even when she's breathing."
Teruko spun.
"You want to try?! Get off your lazy—"
"Okay, okay—chill," Rakan said, waving his hands as he got up, chewing the last bite. "Let's dance with spirits or whatever."
He took a stance, mimicking Mazanka's loose-footed posture. He let his Ka'ro drift outward—and at first, it responded. Then it flickered, warped, and suddenly backfired, slamming him to the ground with a pulse of recoil.
"Ow."
Mazanka clapped once. "See? Poetry. Humiliation. Breakfast."
The day went on like that.
Mazanka pacing. Teruko fuming. Rakan learning through pain.
When they stopped for water, Mazanka finally sat, brushing crumbs off his lap and gesturing toward the sky.
"Aithērya," he said quietly, "isn't power. It's a revelation. A scar deep enough that your Ka'ro starts remembering what you are."
Teruko froze.
He saw it in her eyes.
"You want it bad, huh?" he said gently.
"Any respectable Kenshiki-no-Kage needs it," she said. "If I unlock it, I can become a One-Eye. Prove to everyone that I'm worth it."
Mazanka leaned forward.
"Aithērya isn't a promotion, little Koko. It's a mirror. And mirrors don't lie."
"Then I'll polish it," she said stubbornly, ignoring the ridiculous nickname. "Even if I have to bleed into the glass."
For a moment, the grassland was quiet.
Rakan looked between them.
Mazanka scratched his chin.
"You kids are way too poetic," he muttered. "What happened to just wanting to be cool?"
"You were an kid too," Rakan murmured suddenly. "Your teachers probably thought the same about you."
Mazanka paused.
Then grinned—but smaller.
"Yeah. Which is why I can say: stop trying to be someone for someone else. Just be the version of you that wins."
The second morning came cold.
The mist hadn't yet risen from the stone, and the world still smelled like damp earth and cracked roof tile. Rakan stood barefoot in the centre of the small courtyard behind his house, arms loose, shirt forgotten somewhere by the door. His mother was out today, wouldn't be coming home for a long while.
Teruko stood across from him, legs steady, breathing through her nose, Ka'ro coiling lightly around her fingertips.
Mazanka watched from the roof, sitting cross-legged, eating a peach. Not watching like a teacher. Watching like a cat waiting to see which bird crashes first.
"We're doing pair-forms today," he said, chewing. "Don't hold back."
"I never do," Teruko muttered.
"I was talking to Rakan."
"Hey," Rakan said, rolling his neck. "I'm trying."
"Trying," Mazanka echoed. "That's what you say when your Ka'ro looks like a drunk moth in a thunderstorm."
Teruko snorted.
"You're so encouraging," she said.
"I'm alive, aren't I?" Mazanka said. "And alive Kenshiki are rarer than flowers in a wildfire these days."
They began.
Teruko moved first—light on her feet, arm carving a downward arc.
"Shintei-Ka'ro Art: Senjō no Kōhaku! Crimson Seal of the Battleground."
Her tattoos lit, peeling upward off her skin like spirit ink, forming a floating shield of compressed Ka'ro symbols in front of her strike.
Rakan blocked with a grunt, Ka'ro bursting from his forearm to dampen the impact, but he staggered.
"Your stance still bends at the waist," she muttered. "You're leaking pressure."
"Thanks," he said, "but I don't remember asking."
"I don't remember caring," she replied.
They clashed again. Rakan's Ka'ro pulsed too fast—raw power with no direction. He used:
"Ikū-Ka'ro: Ketsurui Hazumi! Tear-Surge Release."
The words came innate from his soul, like they had always existed even before he had first heard the words.
A blast from the elbow, raw and sharp, meant to stagger an opponent. But the recoil nearly buckled his arm.
Teruko pivoted, countered with a short-range glyph-palm strike that lit his shoulder with searing Ka'ro.
"That hurt," he winced.
"Good."
Mazanka whistled.
"Children, children," he called. "This isn't war. It's foreplay."
Both turned to glare at him.
"You said not to hold back," Teruko said.
"I also said not to get sloppy," Mazanka replied, leaping from the roof. He landed between them, brushing dust from his sleeves.
He gestured at Rakan.
"Your Ka'ro is like smoke with no fire. You push too hard before you ask if it wants to be pushed."
Then to Teruko.
"And you—you wrap every move in pride like it's armor. That works until someone smarter stabs you with your own expectations."
"You're insufferable," she snapped.
"You're learning," he said, and his grin softened—for a second. "That's enough."
Mazanka raised his hand.
Ka'ro danced between his fingers—not wild, not bright, but precise. It flowed like water searching for a riverbed, then flared into a shape: a slowly blooming flower of radiant energy.
"Let me tell you something no One-Eye will admit," he said quietly. "Mastery of Ka'ro has nothing to do with rank."
A pause.
"It has to do with honesty."
The flower trembled.
"Ka'ro is memory. Sorrow. Choice. It reacts to who you are, not what you know."
He let it fade.
"That's why Aithērya comes to you only after your lies fall away."
Rakan looked down.
Teruko said nothing, but her jaw tensed.
"I'm not lying," she said after a long silence.
Mazanka turned to her.
"You're not," he said softly. "But you're afraid; you think if you don't earn it soon, no one will believe in you anymore."
She froze.
Rakan looked at her—really looked.
For a moment, she seemed less like the order-obsessed Kenshiki and more like a girl who'd been told all her life that love had to be earned.
"That's not true," Rakan whispered quietly.
Teruko didn't respond.
They trained until dusk.
Rakan's arms burned. Teruko's voice cracked from calling technique after technique. Mazanka broke up their last fight by dumping water on both of them.
"Enough," he said. "Go eat. You smell like despair and tofu."
𓁿𖧼𓁿
They stood at the gate for longer than necessary.
Rakan shifted the bag on his shoulder, eyes flicking to the small, wooden house behind the low wall. The lamps inside were already lit—warm yellow spilling out against the dusk, catching on the wind chime made of seashells that his mother had hung last spring.
Teruko stood beside him, arms crossed, her eyes fixed straight ahead.
"You're hesitating," she muttered.
"I'm thinking," Rakan replied.
"Same thing."
He gave her a glance.
"You're nervous too."
"I'm not nervous, dumbass. I'm just… not used to this."
He didn't push her on it. She didn't need to explain. She'd grown up surrounded by rituals, strict halls, the cold calculation of Kenshiki training. This—small homes, soft lights, the scent of miso and laundry soap—was foreign terrain.
He pushed open the gate.
Inside, the house felt too quiet.
His mother stood at the stove, back turned, sleeves rolled. Her hair was pinned up. There was music playing low on the radio, an old song Rakan remembered from childhood—something about waiting for spring.
She turned as he stepped in, her eyes soft but sharp, already scanning.
And then they landed on Teruko.
The air shifted.
"You didn't say you were bringing someone," she said, setting down the ladle.
"It's just for a little while," Rakan said quickly. "A few days. Maybe less."
"A few days?"
"She's… a friend."
"I'm not—" Teruko began.
"She's just quiet," Rakan cut in, stepping forward.
His mother's eyes didn't leave Teruko.
She didn't speak, not yet.
Rakan felt the silence pressing like weight on his ribs.
"She saved me," he added, quieter now. "When I needed it most. "
That wasn't a lie.
Even if the story between them was sharp around the edges.
His mother studied Teruko for a moment longer. Then turned and set a second pair of chopsticks beside a bowl already placed.
"Wash your hands before dinner," she said.
Teruko sat at the edge of the table like the furniture might reject her.
Rakan moved easily, familiar with the creak of the floor, the way the cushions dipped. He glanced at his mother—watching her move, watching her watch.
She always noticed more than she let on.
The food was simple—vegetables, rice, soft egg folded in layers. The smell was nostalgic enough to make Rakan feel ten years old again.
Teruko didn't touch hers at first.
"It's safe," he whispered.
"That's not the issue."
"Then what is?"
She didn't answer.
She stared at the meal like it might ask her to stay.
Halfway through the silence, his mother finally spoke.
"You're not from here."
"No, ma'am," Teruko replied softly.
"Your parents?"
A pause.
"It's a bit complicated."
A pause.
"Mm. Are you in trouble?"
Rakan hesitated.
"No," he choked out.
"Not yet," Teruko murmured, the words just seeping out.
Their eyes met briefly.
Rakan's mother didn't blink.
"I have one rule," she said, setting her bowl down. "If someone's hurt, we help. If someone brings danger, they leave it at the door."
She looked at Rakan then—not angry, but tired. Worried.
"Do you understand?"
"Yes."
"Then she stays. For now."
Teruko finally lowered her head.
"Thank you," she said.
His mother rose, brushing past them toward the kitchen, where the water had begun to boil again.
She paused.
"What's your name, dear?"
"Teruko," she said.
"Then Teruko," his mother replied, "you're safe here. Until you choose otherwise."
They finished dinner and a half-hour later, Rakan found himself laying on his futon, staring at the ceiling.
He could hear Teruko in the other room, quiet, talking with his mother.
He wondered what about.
He wondered what she was like when she wasn't trying to prove something.
He wondered if she'd ever be his friend.
He wondered if Mazanka ever stopped pretending.
The wind moved gently through the paper screen, brushing the edges of the floor with a hush like breath. The light inside the house had dimmed to candle-yellow. Outside, the sky was painted in deep indigo, with the first stars blinking like they'd been waiting all day to open their eyes.
Teruko sat alone at the table, hands folded, posture ramrod straight.
She wasn't used to sitting still like this.
Not in silence. Not in homes that creaked when you shifted your weight. Not in places that felt like they had memories woven into the fabric of the walls.
Across from her, Rakan's mother knelt beside a kettle, pouring tea into two small cups.
She moved without excess. Every motion quiet, deliberate—no display, no posture. Just lived grace.
The kind of poise that Teruko had been taught to perform.
But here, it was real.
"You don't have to sit like that," the woman said softly, without looking up.
"Like what?"
"Like the floor offended you."
Teruko blinked, then lowered her shoulders a fraction.
The cup was slid toward her without fanfare.
"It's just barley tea," she added.
"Thank you," Teruko said, too formal, too late.
They drank in silence for a while. The tea was warm. Bitter at first, but gentle once it settled.
The kind of warmth you could carry.
"Rakan said you saved him," his mother finally said, not as a question.
"He exaggerates."
"He does that when he's afraid of being taken seriously."
Teruko looked up and cleared her throat.
"You know him well."
"I raised him."
That shut her up.
The Kenshiki didn't speak of parents like that. It wasn't shame, just… absence. They weren't orphans, there was just a gap which stretched from the moment you became a Kenshiki, one you had no choice but to accept. They were raised by halls, instructors, old philosophies scribbled on stone.
Love was a reward.
Not a fact.
"He's… interesting," Teruko said eventually.
"So are you," his mother replied.
Teruko stiffened again. The woman smiled.
"You walk like someone used to being watched."
"I was trained to be watched."
"Then I hope someone taught you how to be seen, too."
The tea cooled.
Outside, a cicada cried, alone in the dark.
Teruko stared into her cup like it might answer something.
Teruko looked at her.
"Why are you being kind to me?"
The woman reached across the table and gently touched her hand—fingers warm, not forcing anything.
"Because someone was kind to me when I needed it most."
The silence that followed was different.
It didn't weigh on her like duty.
It wrapped her like a blanket she didn't know she needed.
Later, when she stepped into the small spare room, the futon neatly laid, she stared at the walls and realized:
There were no scrolls.
No emblems. No codes. No commandments carved in glass.
Just books. Photos. A painting of a lake with no name.
She didn't understand it.
Not yet.
But it made something ache in her chest.