Chapter Text
Memories rose, bleeding through frost and fog.
His younger self, fierce and alive—
red eyebrows sharp as burning embers beneath black goggles kissed by blood-red light.
The gothic long coat billowed like a raven’s wing,
two collars guarding his throat like a knight’s prayer—
small one front, towering one at the back, a cape torn by battles yet unforgotten.
His shoulder pads, black and red, jagged like dragon scales—
mirroring the spikes of his raven-black hair,
each strand a razor slicing through the cold air.
Beneath the coat, the heavy black armor held the Mark of Dräkk—
a crimson dragon etched by a child’s trembling hand,
born in distant France, a symbol of defiance and destiny.
His left ear, now delicate as a fairy’s,
a replacement after wolves tore it away in a cruel childhood,
a bitter gift from a world too cruel to cradle innocence.
Black fingerless gloves hugged his hands,
black gems gleaming with silent promise.
His left bang, curved and dark, veiled the scarred eye—
the cruel mark from Kanon’s mother’s blade in a rainy alleyway,
where a young Sakurā was crushed beneath the weight of torment,
labeled a “Siren,” a cursed soul.
A jagged scar streaked across his right cheek,
red as spilled wine, climbing toward his eye—
a souvenir from a desperate fight with a Siren at dawn’s edge.
His boots, black and gray, bore the bleeding Nike emblem,
fangs snarling around it like the shadows chasing him.
Around his waist, a belt clasped tight—a circle of black and gray fangs,
The Mark of Dräkk resting at its heart.
And strapped to his back—the Devil’s Blade.
Colossal and dreadful,
a monstrous greatsword carved with serrations sharp as a beast’s teeth,
claw-like notches running its spine.
Twin spikes crowned its tip,
a blood-red eye carved above the guard, glowing with sentience.
Runes of fire and despair danced upon the crossguard,
the inscription “悪魔の剣” burned into its soul.
The grip wrapped in stingray leather, cold as death,
the pommel swayed with silent menace.
And there, beside him, she lay—Kanon.
Her hair, a river of black in the moonlight,
cut in the stately Hime style.
Her deep eyes, red as dusk embers, gazed softly.
Sunshine Academy’s uniform draped her slender form,
light gray and crimson, white skirt swaying like fragile hope.
They lay entwined beneath a fragile quilt of warmth,
the world outside forgotten beneath frost and flame.
Their lips met in silence—
a kiss not spoken but carved from memories and pain,
a fragile bloom in the garden of endless night.
Snow fell harder now.
Sakurā’s breath fogged in the cold air as the vision faded.
His hands clenched into fists, the chill biting deeper than ice.
The past was a ghost.
A memory of light in a darkened world.
But the Devil’s Blade waited.
And so did the shadows.
Beneath the heavy shroud of frozen skies,
Sakurā’s vow carved itself into the marrow of his bones—
a bitter flame that no winter could quell.
One day, he whispered to the restless wind,
his breath a ghost in the snow,
I will have my revenge on Tang.
The name lingered like a curse,
etched in every scar that marred his flesh,
in every hollow step that echoed through the endless night.
His hand tightened on the hilt of the Devil’s Blade—
that monstrous eye that never blinked, never forgot.
It thirsted, as did he, for the reckoning that would burn away the past.
I will stake my very life upon it,
he vowed, voice low and unyielding,
for the world that was stolen, the love that was shattered.
And beneath the veil of falling snow,
Sakurā walked on—
a lone wolf stalking shadows,
carrying the weight of vengeance like a second skin.
The cold could break bones,
but it would never break his will.
One day.
One day, Tang will pay.
“We leave something of ourselves behind when we leave a place, we stay there, even though we go away. And there are things in us that we can find again only by going back there.”
― Pascal Mercier