"Another nightmare?"
The voice was quiet, weary. Noir turned his head. Piers was sitting up in the next bed, back against the headboard, moonlight from the high window cutting across his face. He wasn't looking at Noir, but at his own hands resting on the blanket.
Soo Ah, in the bed beyond, was curled under her covers, snoring softly.
Noir tried to speak, but his throat was tight. He managed a shaky nod, then realized Piers wasn't looking. "...Yeah."
"I get them too," Piers said, his voice low so as not to wake Soo Ah. "Not dreams, just… memories. They don't let you sleep either."
The memory of the void was still crystalline: the pillar of light, the darkness that whispered in his own voice, the silver-haired man in the smoke giving him the candy and the ruby. The feeling of ancient, cold certainty that was not an invasion, but a recollection.
"It wasn't a nightmare," Noir heard himself say, the words leaving him before he could stop them. "It was a memory. But… not mine."
Piers finally looked over. In the dim light, his green eyes were shadowed, but intently focused. "What do you mean?"
How could he explain?
I died, and when I died, I remembered I'm an ancient being who's been reborn with amnesia.
The words sounded insane even in his own head.
Instead, he grasped for the closest parallel he had. "That first night… in our room. You told me about your grandfather. About the Ashima Clan."
Piers's posture stiffened almost imperceptibly. "Yeah."
"You said there were reasons for their strength. Buried reasons. Things that got people killed." Noir's voice dropped.
"What if…" Noir pushed himself up on his elbows, the medical cot creaking. "What if there are other sins buried like that? Not just in a clan, but in a person"
The room was very still. Soo Ah's soft snoring was the only sound.
"Are you saying you have one?" Piers asked, his voice barely a whisper.
Noir looked at his own hands. For a second, he imagined they were stained with ancient ash, holding a red ruby that pulsed with a sinful light. "I think I was born with it."
The confession hung between them. He had told Piers he was looking for his mother's killer. That was a motive, a goal. This was different. This was an identity, and it was rotten at the core.
Piers's breath hitched slightly. He swung his legs over the side of his bed and sat facing Noir. The space between them felt charged.
"You asked me then if I'd tell you what my grandfather said," Piers began, his voice carefully measured.
"I said I couldn't. Not yet. Because knowing could be dangerous." He paused, then seemed to come to a decision. "But if you're carrying something like that… maybe it's time you knew."
Noir sat up slowly, listening.
Piers took a steadying breath. "My grandfather told me the Ashima Clan's power doesn't come from blessings. It comes from a pact."
His voice grew quieter, more grave. "Their ancestors, desperate for power, did something unforgivable. They worshipped evolved rippers."
Noir felt the words land like stones in the pit of his stomach.
"It was a sacrificial ritual," Piers continued, his eyes distant, as if seeing the ghost of his grandfather's face. "Every hundred years, members of the clan die. Everyone calls it a curse or a cycle. But it's not. It's payment. Blood to maintain the power their ancestors begged for."
He looked up at Noir, the full weight of the truth in his gaze. "When some of them tried to expose it, their own kinsmen killed them. Wiped out every witness. My grandfather… he survived. He carried that knowledge alone for decades. And the night he passed it to me, he died. Like passing the burden finally let him rest."
The horror of it sank in—not just the sin, but the cost of knowing it.
"And now you're telling me you have a buried reason, too," Piers said softly. He hesitated, his next words careful. "On the mission… when you died. Something happened. Soo Ah and I… we saw it. We were afraid of it. Of you."
He met Noir's eyes, and there was no judgment there, only a search for understanding. "What did you become, Noir? When you came back?"
The question Noir had been dreading. The one Shin Jin had asked the darkness. Now Piers was asking him directly, not as an accusation, but as someone sharing the weight of a terrible truth.
Noir looked at his own hands. "I don't have a name for it," he whispered, the memory of the void's cold voice echoing in his mind.
"It was… ancient. It felt like me, but not the me I know. It felt like waking up from a dream and realizing the dream was just a small room inside something… vast. And dark."
He forced himself to look at Piers."The man in my memory... he knew what I was. Like I was meant to guard something. Or maybe keep something locked away. He gave me a candy to make me forget. A suppressant. And a ruby he said he'd come back for. An anchor."
He took a shaky breath. "You were right. My death was a trigger. It didn't bring something into me. It… pulled back a curtain. On what was already there."
Piers listened, his expression shifting from concern to a grim, analytical focus. "An ancient presence. Sealed by a candy. Anchored by an object. Awakened by death."
He paused, connecting the horrific dots. "It's a different kind of pact… but it follows a similar terrible logic. A ritual tied to a person, not a bloodline. You're a living covenant."
He didn't say it with horror, but with a grim, clarifying certainty. "That's why we were afraid. We weren't looking at Noir. We were looking at the thing the ritual was meant for."
Noir nodded, a shudder of relief and dread moving through him. To have it spoken aloud, framed and understood, was terrifying… and liberating.
He leaned forward, his gaze intent. "But that means we understand the shape of it, even if we don't know the artist. Rituals have rules. Rules can be broken." His voice firmed with resolve.
"We're both carrying truths that could destroy us. Mine could destroy a clan. Yours could destroy you. But you're not carrying it alone. Not anymore."
The weight in Noir's chest didn't vanish, but it shifted. From a solitary doom to a shared burden. Piers wasn't offering empty comfort; he was offering alliance — the kind forged in the recognition of mutual damnation.
"Thank you," Noir said, the words thick. "For telling me. For… trusting me with that."
Piers gave a faint, weary smile. "You trusted me with your secret first. And besides… if we're both cursed anyway, we might as well compare notes."
From the other bed, Soo Ah mumbled in her sleep and rolled over.
The heavy silence settled around them again, but it was different now—not isolating, but united.
"Try to sleep," Piers said softly, lying back down. "The memories… they're quieter when you know you're not the only one awake."
Noir lay back, staring at the ceiling. The pillar of light in his mind's eye still felt fragile, but the darkness around it was no longer just a void.
It was a mapped territory. A known enemy. A shared one.
He wasn't just not alone.
He was understood.
And for a soul holding an ancient, monstrous truth, that was everything.