The Veil had alleyways the human world didn't. That was the first thing I noticed.
They weren't shortcuts or secret tunnels. They were…folds. Places where the world had doubled over on itself and quietly decided, Yeah, this makes sense now. Mira walked through them like she'd memorized the wrinkles in reality.
I jogged behind her, trying not to think about the fact that I was dead. Or about the faint ache in my chest where the chain had emerged. Or about the invisible something that had smiled at me from the sky crack like I owed it money.
"Keep up," Mira called.
"Trying," I gasped. "Some of us don't have 'spatial adjustment legs.'"
"It's your afterlife body," she said. "It's literally optimal. Try using it."
"Yeah, well, optimal doesn't come with a manual."
She didn't slow down.
The alley bent sharply, then widened into a courtyard. The buildings around it weren't buildings—more like sketches. Outlines of apartments, drawn in pale pencil, flickering between solid and not. Shadows moved differently here, stretching in ways they shouldn't.
A sign floated above an arched doorway at the far end:
VEIL AGENCY — EASTERN WARD
Field Registration Office
A bureaucracy existed even in the afterlife.
Truly the universe hated me.
Mira pushed the door open. It didn't swing—it dissolved like smoke, reforming behind us as we stepped through. Inside, a cramped lobby looked like someone tried to copy a government office from memory and forgot half the details.
Chairs were mismatched. Papers drifted on their own between desks. A bored-looking receptionist floated three inches off the floor, stamping self-moving forms with a rubber seal that squeaked loudly.
Mira approached the counter.
"New file," she said.
The receptionist glanced at me. "Crashed in sideways?"
"Yes."
"Awakened chain already?"
Mira nodded.
The receptionist clicked her tongue. "Unstable type. Rare. Messy."
"Tell me about it," Mira muttered.
I raised my hand. "Uh, hi. Still in the room. Also still processing that I died five minutes ago."
"Twenty-eight minutes," Mira corrected.
"Please stop keeping track like this is a cooking timer."
The receptionist slid a glowing sheet toward me. "Name."
"Ren Katsuragi," I said.
The paper absorbed the sound of my voice and lit up with text. The receptionist frowned. "Strong resonance imprint. This one's going to attract trouble."
"Already has," Mira said quietly.
"Lucky you," the receptionist said. "You're assigned to Mira's squad."
"Assigned?" I asked. "I didn't exactly sign—"
Mira grabbed my paperwork and walked off.
"—up," I finished weakly.
I chased after her.
"Look," I said, "if this is some kind of cosmic work-study program, I appreciate the opportunity, but maybe we take a second to assess my grief levels or something?"
Mira handed me the sheet. "You're not being forced into service. You're staying with me because you're too unstable to leave alone."
"That's…somehow worse."
"Consider it rehabilitation."
She led me down a hallway dotted with doors, each one humming with spiritual pressure. One door rattled like something inside was trying to get out. Another whispered faintly in a language I didn't know.
Mira stopped at a normal-looking door at the end.
She tapped it.
It opened.
Inside was a training hall.
Not a dojo. Not a gym.
It was a vast, dim-lit chamber that looked like someone took a storm cloud and gave it walls. Shadows drifted along the floor like mist. The ceiling stretched too high, disappearing into pale fog. In the center stood a small circle made of glowing sigils.
And someone sitting on it.
His legs were crossed. His eyes were closed. White flames curled lazily around his shoulders like they were bored.
The boy opened his eyes as we approached.
They were pale. Colorless. Like someone had lowered the brightness too far.
"Back," he said.
"Sato," Mira answered. "We have a new recruit."
Sato blinked at me slowly, as if I were more of a suggestion than a person.
"Hmm," he said. "He feels loud."
"I—loud?" I protested. "I haven't said anything yet!"
Sato pointed at my chest. "Your memories are shouting."
The chain inside me pulsed faintly, like it hated being called out.
I clutched my sternum. "Please don't make my trauma sound like it needs volume control."
Sato stood. The white flames drifting around him snapped into shape—pillars of light rising behind him, like angel wings made of static.
Up close, he looked even less human. Or maybe too human, stripped of everything except essence.
He tilted his head at me. "You manifested early."
"That keeps being brought up," I said. "Should I apologize?"
"Not to us." Sato stepped closer and sniffed the air around me. "To the world, maybe."
"Can we stop diagnosing my existence? I'm already overwhelmed."
Mira cut in. "Sato, you will help Ren stabilize his resonance. He needs a baseline before we add him to field work."
Sato gave a slow nod.
Then pointed at the glowing circle.
"Step in."
The circle flickered, its sigils rearranging like a living equation.
I stayed rooted to the floor.
"What is that?"
"A calibration ring," Sato said. "It measures emotional weight."
"That sounds incredibly personal."
"Yes," he said. "Go stand in it."
I swallowed hard.
Mira folded her arms. "You can't control your chains if you don't understand what's inside them."
I couldn't argue with that.
I stepped into the circle.
The air shifted.
Everything went quiet.
Then—
A memory slammed into me without warning.
I was ten.A small apartment.Rain hammering the windows.
My father stuffing clothes into a suitcase, refusing to look at me.
"Ren," he said, voice tight, "don't make this harder."
I stood in the doorway, fists clenched. "Please don't go."
He froze for a moment.Just a moment.Then kept packing.
Mom was in the kitchen, crying silently.
The sound of the zipper closing felt like a door slamming on my chest.
Pain flared deep inside me.
The chain roared into existence, a burst of white light exploding from my chest, wrapping around my arms, coiling like a serpent made of memory and heartbreak.
Sato's eyes sharpened.Mira took half a step forward, watching closely.
"Ren," Sato said quietly. "Breathe."
"I—I can't," I gasped. The chain constricted tight, the links scraping against my ribs. "It hurts."
"That's normal," he said. "You're fighting it."
"Of course I'm fighting it! It's pulling me apart!"
Mira stepped closer. Her voice was calm but stern. "Ren. Listen to me. Pain doesn't mean stop. Pain means look."
"I don't want to look!"
"You already did."
The circle brightened.
And suddenly I wasn't choking anymore.
The chain loosened.
Not fully—but enough to breathe.
Sato nodded. "Good. You accepted the memory instead of pushing it away. That calms the chain."
"I didn't accept anything," I muttered.
Mira raised a brow. "Your resonance disagrees."
I looked down. The chain's glow had softened. The links shimmered gently instead of sparking with violent light.
My chest still ached, but not as sharply.
"It's tied to him," I whispered. "My dad."
"Your first chain always is," Sato said. "It comes from the wound you spent the longest running from."
My throat tightened.
Mira placed a hand on my shoulder—lightly, but real.
"You're not broken," she said. "Just untrained. And unstable. And very inconvenient for my schedule."
That last part was definitely a joke. Probably.
Before I could respond, the ground trembled.
Not a small tremor.
A full, rolling quake that sent dust raining from the invisible ceiling.
Sato snapped his flames into full form.
Mira's rings lit up like miniature suns.
"What was—?" I began.
A voice echoed through the chamber.
Low. Warped. Familiar.
Ren…
My blood ran cold.
The chain around my chest tightened.
Sato's face hardened. "It found him."
Mira swore. "Already? Impossible."
"Someone explain what's happening!" I yelled.
Mira grabbed my arm and pulled me toward the exit.
"The creature you met earlier," she said. "The thing made from your suppressed memory?"
"The Corrupted?"
"No," she said sharply. "The one that smiled at you through the crack."
The tremor hit again—harder. The walls flickered. Shadows rippled violently across the room.
Sato's flames formed a barrier behind us as the entire chamber groaned like a living thing under pressure.
Mira turned to me, eyes suddenly fierce.
"That thing is not a Corrupted."
"Then what is it!?"
She exhaled.
"A Chain-Eater."
My heart stopped.
"That sounds…extremely not good."
"It isn't," Sato said.
"Can it be killed?" I asked.
Mira hesitated.
A long, terrible second.
"…Not by us," she said. "Chain-Eaters can only be killed by the person whose memory birthed them."
I stared at her.
"You mean me."
"You," she confirmed.
The tremor hit one final time—cracking the training hall floor from end to end.
A jagged tear split the far wall.
Something moved inside it.
Something shaped like a person.Something with my silhouette.Something smiling—
just like before.
The world dimmed around us.
Sato whispered, "It's early. Much too early."
The creature stepped out of the crack, head tilted, eyes empty.
Found you, it whispered.
My chain rattled violently.
I couldn't breathe.
Mira shoved me behind her, her rings blazing with raw power.
"Ren," she said, voice cold and sharp, "welcome to your second day in the Veil."