Dark specks bloom across Ryuu’s vision with every blink, like drops of ink bleeding into clear water. The world around him warps and fades, each breath of reality dimming like a dying candle. He blinks faster, harder—desperately—but it does little. His sight slips away slowly, cruelly, like fingers dragging a curtain over his world. Panic coils deep in his gut. Every instinct in his battered body screams for movement—for escape—for survival.

But it’s useless.

The sharp, measured sound of shoes tapping against the floor slices through the silence, each step a death knell that confirms what he already knows: he is not alone, and he is not getting away.

Each inhalation scrapes down his throat like sandpaper soaked in acid, his lungs clutching at air that feels thick as oil. A coppery tang stains his tongue—faint at first—then surging forward with each wrenching cough like a machine gun firing from within. Blood bubbles up, frothing past his lips, spilling out like beer from a mug tipped too far. His body, though weak and reeling, instinctively rolls to its side. Pain ripples through him, but the relief of having the blood flow freely instead of choking him outweighs it. He knows—deep down, bitterly—that this is all he can do to survive: become a fountain of his own ruin, leaking life to buy time.

Agony wraps around him like a weighted blanket lined with glass. The pain in his side is sharp, searing—like a knife twisted inside molten flesh. Despite the torment and the suffocating grip of his failing breath, his mind wanders. He wonders, almost idly, whether the agony or the lack of oxygen will kill him first. The thought sparks a twisted, gurgling laugh from his throat, coughing more blood as it escapes. He doesn’t know why he laughs. It’s madness—but it feels honest, right in this moment of unraveling.

I deserve it, he thinks bitterly, tears burning tracks down his cheeks, warm and silent.

Suddenly, a splash of cold hits his ribs. It startles him—a jolt of clarity—but with it comes rising panic. He hadn’t noticed the water creeping in, hadn't seen the floor shimmer and ripple. A moment ago, it was dry. Now, it's kissed with a sheen of shallow liquid, blooming red as blood seeps into it. The stillness of the water is the worst part. It reflects nothing but dread. It doesn't move, doesn’t swirl unless disturbed. And that silence—it screams.

Kaito.

Ryuu knows it the moment he feels the spear twist deeper into his flesh. The weapon buries itself slowly, deliberately—not enough to pass through, but enough to draw excruciating pain that radiates through his body like fire licking bone. A cruel chuckle bounces off the walls, echoing back at him like a haunting lullaby. His body jerks uncontrollably, like a worm flailing on dry soil, but it’s useless. Kaito is unmoved. Then, as if performing a mundane chore, the man pulls the spear out with the casual ease of someone opening a cabinet door.

“Shh, little dragon,” Kaito whispers, his voice light and laced with mockery. “Wouldn’t want Lord Yagami to hear you. He wouldn’t allow me to heal you, after all.”

His words drift through the room like smoke—deceptively soft, but every syllable cuts Ryuu like glass.

Water rushes into the open wound, flooding the cavity with a cold, stinging burn. Ryuu hates it, loathes the feeling, but somewhere in his mind, he knows—Kaito is helping. He’s not healing out of kindness, but the coolness soothes, just barely. The sensation swirls inside him, foreign and wrong. His stomach lurches, bile rising in his throat at the bubbling that follows, but he clenches his jaw and wills it down.

“S-stop,” he breathes, barely louder than a ghost. His voice, once velvet-soft, now cracks with pain—a fragile whisper threatening to break entirely.

“Sorry, pipsqueak, but I can’t let you go just yet,” Kaito replies, the teasing tone at odds with the fire in his eyes. He crouches lower, drawing closer. Bitterness clings to him like a second skin. Anger pulses behind his smile—calculated, controlled. His hand lowers the spear to the floor with a sudden splash near Ryuu’s face. The sound is loud in the silence, startling.

“Now, my dear Ryuu, I’m offering you help—not as a soldier, but as a friend.” The word hangs in the air, poisoned and heavy. “I’m going to pick you up. You’re going to keep that sweet mouth of yours shut. Let me heal you... and maybe more.”

His hand slides down Ryuu’s back, slow and deliberate.

A cold shiver rolls through Ryuu. The touch is gentle—almost tender—fingers gliding in soft circles along his spine, tracing paths from his neck to his shoulders, then finally resting between the twin black wings partially unfurled on his back. He’d tried to protect himself with them during the fall—tried to fly away, to escape—but failed. The touch is both comforting and horrifying. The sensation is wrong—not because of the physicality—but because of the context. It’s like petting a spider you know won’t bite... until it suddenly does.

Despite the discomfort crawling over his skin, Ryuu’s body is giving in. The pain—though dulling—and the suffocating weight of blood loss press against him like a collapsing ceiling. He tries to fight it, to stay awake, but it’s futile. It’s like trying to keep a window open in the middle of a hurricane. Drowsiness pulls at his mind, heavy and unrelenting. Darkness spills in like ink in water.

And then—blinding pain.

His left wing sears with white-hot agony, a scream clawing its way up his throat—but it never makes it out. Only the crackling of broken bone and torn muscle fills the room. The pain flashes, all-consuming—and then fades, leaving a dull, throbbing ache in its place.

“Shh, Ryuu... you’ll be okay...” Kaito breathes into his ear. This time, his voice is soft. Gentler than before. A sigh follows as he settles beside the unconscious boy, knees bent in thought.

His eyes remain fixed on Ryuu, unreadable. Calculating. Perhaps even remorseful. Then, with a flick of his fingers, the water surrounding them begins to glow—a faint, otherworldly blue. The light pulses in rhythm with Ryuu’s weak heartbeat. The wound begins to mend, ever so slowly. Not enough to seal completely, but just enough to stop the blood from leaking. Just enough to close the hole in his lung.

Carefully, Kaito slips an arm around the limp body, pulling Ryuu against his chest with the gentleness of a parent holding a fragile child. The gesture is strangely tender, offering warmth where cruelty once lingered. And in that moment, guilt flickers through him—weak, but real. He holds Ryuu closer, almost protectively.

But no... he can't be weak. Not now.

Ryuu is special—dangerously so. People want him dead. Others want to break him, use him, keep him. The Dark Lord included.

And Kaito?

Kaito needs to make sure he survives.

A breath—shallow, labored—parts Ryuu’s lips as his eyelids tremble open, heavy as stone. Darkness meets him, thick and unmoving, with only faint orange flickers licking at the walls. The glow dances like ghosts casting long shadows across the room’s quiet bones, twisting and curling as if whispering secrets to the silence. Somewhere behind him, the low crackle of fire murmurs, warming the chill, but he cannot move—his limbs weigh like sandbags, and a throbbing pulse cages every inch of his body.

Soreness coils around him like a serpent. Every nerve is raw, especially in his wings, which hang useless and shattered against the bed. A dull, icy burn radiates through them—unrelenting, sharp—like dragging broken glass across open skin. They are still there… that, at least, is a mercy. But each attempt to shift them is like waking a nest of hornets in his back, each sting more vicious than the last.

His senses begin to whisper. The scent of cologne, sharp and foreign, clings to the fabric on his skin—a shirt too large for him, too soft to be his. It’s clean and warm, contrasting the sticky bandages wrapped around his torso like the delicate gauze binding a corpse before burial. His stomach is bound tight, ribcage throbbing beneath layers of pain and cloth. His legs, though dull with discomfort, move if he wills it—but every twitch is met with stubborn resistance.

“K-Kaito…” The name slips from his lips like a prayer—quiet, broken, and aching with desperation. He knows, perhaps more than anyone, that Kaito has reason to hate him. He earned it. Yet, the name falls from his mouth out of instinct, not reason. It is something he has always done when on the edge—when feverish or broken, when blood soaked his mouth or his wings hung limp.

But there is only silence in response.

Thick, hollow silence.

It stretches endlessly, folding around him like a second blanket. If Kaito is near, he is hiding behind it. Or perhaps he simply chooses not to answer. But then another thought sinks its teeth into Ryuu’s fogged mind—why is he in Kaito’s bedroom at all?

It would make more sense if he were dead.

Instead, he is tucked in a warm bed, wrapped in clean linens, with a fire breathing gentle warmth into the air. Treated—not imprisoned. Cared for—not condemned. And yet, this comfort unsettles him more than any torture chamber could. It reeks of a trap, of false hope. Like a songbird placed in a golden cage, dangled just outside an open window—freedom so close, it burns to look at.

With a wince, Ryuu forces his body to turn toward the fire. It takes time—too much time—but he manages to shift. The fire greets him with soft, glowing tendrils behind the iron grate. New logs hiss and spark, their embers glowing like tiny dying stars. The cage itself is old, scorched in places, its metal blackened by smoke and time. He remembers the day it was added—his paranoia, his past—how even a gentle flame could rattle him.

Yet somehow, now, it soothes him.

Until a sound shatters the quiet.

Click. The door handle creaks, turning slowly, and Ryuu’s heart skips. He tries to lift his head to see—tries to react—but pain explodes through his skull like a rifle shot, sharp and blinding. His neck gives out, dropping his head back onto the pillow, trembling. But he doesn’t cry out. He won’t. His pride anchors him in the sea of agony.

Then a voice slithers through the air, smooth as satin.

“Hey, sleepyhead.”

That voice. That voice he knows like a blade knows a sheath.

Kaito leans lazily against the doorway, his black hair tousled in effortless disarray, a single piercing glinting from one ear. His shirt is dark and half-unbuttoned, whether from haste or swagger, and his hands rest inside frayed, fingerless gloves. His posture is casual, but his presence is sharp—every movement calculated, every breath heavy with unspoken warning.

“How are you feeling?” he asks, those ocean-blue eyes flicking briefly to the fire. He leans into the wall, arms crossed like a man trying not to care.

Ryuu inhales, steadying the tremble in his voice. “I’m okay,” he lies, the words quiet, laced with a defiant bitterness. The pain burns, threatens to drown him, but he refuses to show it. He’s a traitor, yes, but not a coward. Not yet.

Kaito’s smile fades. “Right, little dragon,” he says flatly, “in that case, mind standing up so I can take you for a bath?”

There’s no amusement in his voice. No humor. Only something darker—something cloaked in indifference.

“I… I will.” The reply is meek, almost childlike, but Ryuu swallows the fear. He pushes himself upward, pain lighting up his spine like a field of fire. He claws forward, limbs trembling. No whimper escapes. No scream. But his body betrays him—the pain in his back crashes through him like a tidal wave breaking against stone.

Kaito watches.

But then his gaze sharpens—he notices it. Blood. Thin, red rivulets snake down Ryuu’s back, blooming into the cloth like ink in water. In one silent stride, Kaito crosses the room and, without a word, lifts Ryuu into his arms.

The world spins.

Ryuu stiffens instinctively, his head resting against Kaito’s shoulder, arms trembling in his lap, legs curled around the man’s waist. It’s not unfamiliar, this hold—oddly reminiscent of childhood piggyback rides. But this… this is different. Intimate in a way that burns hotter than the fire. And his wings—gods, his wings—are folded behind him, limp and twitching with every step.

“What are you doing?” he whispers, stronger now, though his voice shakes.

Kaito does not answer.

He simply walks.

And with every step, panic gnaws deeper into Ryuu’s chest.

Because he doesn’t know where they’re going.

And worse…

He realizes, with horror, that beneath the borrowed shirt, he’s wearing nothing else.

Half-dressed, broken, and cradled in the arms of someone who might love him—or might want him dead.

The halls had become a tunnel of breathless dread, stretching long and narrow like the throat of some ancient beast. Each step Caio took echoed with uncanny rhythm, like the beat of a war drum in reverse—slow, patient, mocking. The stone beneath his feet seemed to whisper secrets from a thousand years ago, and the flickering sconces along the walls cast dancing shapes that twisted into monstrous silhouettes. They weren’t alone.

Ryuu felt it. The way shadows clung to the corridors like parasites, like they had been waiting for his return—for his punishment. His half-lidded eyes wandered, dragged against his will, locking with a figure that emerged like a phantom from a crack in the wall.

She was not human.

Pale as bone ash, with irises the deep gleam of polished rubies, the woman’s body swayed as though water ran through her instead of blood. Her gaze was empty, yet it saw them. Saw him. She moved slowly, a half-dead thing, or maybe something that had never truly lived to begin with. One of Kaito’s experiments. Ryuu didn’t know what she was anymore, only that she was a memory made flesh—a scar from Kaito’s old life that walked the halls as a reminder.

Kaito had been a doctor. At thirteen.

A child surgeon raised beneath a tyrant’s gaze, molded by necessity and survival. His father had taught him how to carve flesh and silence screams with the same detached elegance. And Kaito—he had hated it. Every minute of it. But when the tides changed and Yagami’s rise gave him power, Kaito took that knowledge and twisted it back toward those who had controlled him.

And yet, some shadows had clung to Ryuu too. Ryuu, the boy who had been his patient, his project… perhaps more.

A sharp twinge in his wing cut off his spiraling thoughts.

He blinked. Pain was familiar—like an old enemy pulling him out of a dream. It seared at the edge of his shoulder blade, a spark that refused to die down. Warmth followed. Not soothing warmth, but the kind that comes with blood and old memories. Breathing became difficult—shallow, fragmented—as the ache pressed against his ribs. Still, Ryuu forced his eyes open. He had to stay awake. Weakness wasn’t allowed. Not here. Not now.

Even cradled against Kaito’s chest like something precious, he couldn’t relax. Wouldn’t.

But Kaito’s voice—it melted into his ear like honey laced with venom.

“You’re drooling.”

Ryuu stiffened.

Fingers slid along the sensitive arch of his wing—trailing upward with deliberate slowness, smearing the heat that clung there. The touch wasn’t cruel, but it wasn’t innocent either. It was the same way a serpent curls around something warm and fragile, not yet sure if it wants to keep it or crush it.

“You’re terrible at hiding things,” Kaito murmured, voice a low murmur of breath and wickedness. “Especially with these wings. It’s almost like I’m rubbing your—”

He didn’t finish.

The smirk, however, told the story.

It curled the corner of his mouth with infuriating ease, predatory and amused. That familiar blend of mockery and affection, where Ryuu could never tell if Kaito was trying to make him laugh or break him. The kind of smile worn by someone who knows exactly where it hurts, and presses anyway—because even pain has its uses.

Ryuu’s heart twisted in his chest.

Is this what I am to him? A pet? A project? A collection of injuries waiting to be studied?

Or something more?

Their history was deep, etched in bruises and healing salves. He’d known Kaito since the moment he was old enough to remember, and in that lifetime of memories, the lines had always blurred between cruelty and care. It wasn’t clear whether Kaito had raised him or ruined him, but either way… he couldn’t bring himself to leave.

Then, without warning, Kaito’s hand moved.

It covered Ryuu’s mouth. Not harsh, not forceful—just… firm. Silencing.

The roughness of his palm scraped against Ryuu’s lips, a patchwork of old callouses and healing wounds. These were the hands that had wielded a scythe through blood-soaked battlefields, but also the ones that had steadied him, bandaged him, held him.

“Sorry,” Ryuu whispered, muffled.

The apology didn’t make sense, but it slipped out anyway, raw and trembling.

Kaito stared at him, eyes unreadable. For a heartbeat, he didn’t move.

Then his hand pulled away like a tide receding from shore—slow, inevitable, gone.

They turned a corner.

The air shifted.

A vine-like plant stretched along the archway, strange and unfamiliar. It pulsed faintly as they passed, as though aware. A crimson carpet unraveled before them, rich and plush, leading toward a monstrous door of dark oak. Intricate carvings wove around it—serpents and roses knotted together in a macabre embrace. The golden handles gleamed like the points of a crown, twisted in regal anticipation.

Ryuu swallowed.

“Where… are we?” he asked, the words scraping from his throat.

His fists clenched tight enough to draw blood. The fear in his chest wasn’t loud—but deep. Silent dread. Ancient dread. His body knew before his mind. Knew that danger pulsed on the other side of that door.

Kiryūzan. A place of execution, of pain dressed in ceremony.

Was this it? Was this how they planned to end him?

His mind raced. Broken wings. No escape. No plan. No strength. He was a lamb with no legs, laid at the altar. A rabbit in the snare.

His breath faltered.

Panic slithered into his lungs, slow and cold.

Kaito’s hand tightened on the golden handle—not urgently, but like someone choosing whether to speak or strike. The door did not open.

Ryuu watched, heart thudding.

And then—

Softness.

Unexpected.

Kaito’s lips pressed to his.

Warm. Steady. Unapologetic.

There was no force in it, no dominance. Just silence. A kind of stillness Ryuu hadn’t known Kaito possessed. It tasted like salt and fire. Like memories of sleepless nights and too many unspoken things.

Ryuu didn’t kiss back—but he didn’t pull away either.

He froze, lost somewhere between defiance and surrender.

When Kaito pulled back, their foreheads almost touched. The silence wrapped around them like velvet. No words were spoken.

None were needed.

The door creaked open.

And the light inside was blinding