Darkness swallowed the warehouse so completely that Ren couldn't even see the outline of his own hands. The hum of the failing lights vanished, leaving a suffocating stillness that pressed against their lungs like invisible hands.
No one dared breathe.
The air had changed—dense, electric, wrong.
Sora was the first to react. His metallic baton hummed to life with a faint electrical charge, casting a dim blue glow around them. His voice came out low, controlled.
"Everyone stay behind me. Don't run. Don't speak."
Ren had never heard Sora sound afraid.
Kaito whispered shakily, "W-What's happening?"
Yui grabbed Ren's sleeve, pressing closer, her trembling barely contained. "This… this isn't normal."
Tatsuya and Ren's mother stepped forward, already in fighting stance. Tatsuya's hand drifted behind his coat—toward a blade Ren had never seen before. Something old. Something ceremonial.
His mother whispered tightly, "It's too soon. The Second Gate shouldn't be able to manifest yet."
Ren's mouth went dry. "But you said it was reacting—"
"Reacting," she cut in, "not opening."
"But…" Ren swallowed. "Then what is here?"
Silence fell again.
Then—
A sound.
So faint it was almost imaginary.
Scrape.
Like claws dragging across metal.
Kaito's breath hitched. "T-That was… inside the warehouse, right?"
Sora didn't take his eyes off the darkness. "It's above us."
He pointed upward.
Ren felt the hairs on his neck rise.
A shape—massive, crawling, deliberate—shifted across the rafters, barely visible in the faint glow. Not human. Not animal. Something in-between. A silhouette that refused to stay one shape for more than a second, as if its body was made of smoke and bone.
Yui whispered, "Ren… Ren what did you do?"
Ren didn't answer.
Because the creature was staring at him.
Two white, pale, pupil-less eyes peered down like lanterns floating in darkness.
Its whisper crawled through Ren's skull.
"Gatekeeper…"
Ren's knees nearly buckled.
The voice wasn't a sound—it was a presence. A cold hand gripping the back of his mind, dragging its nails across his thoughts.
Sora stepped forward, placing himself between Ren and the creature.
"Stay behind me. No matter what."
Tatsuya moved smoothly beside him, gripping the ancient blade.
Ren's mother circled to the side, her own weapon drawn, eyes locked on the thing above them.
"Don't let it speak to him," she said sharply. "If it marks him, the Gate will accelerate."
Kaito nearly choked. "Mark him? Like—like a curse?!"
Ren's mother didn't break focus. "Worse."
Ren stepped back, heartbeat hammering.
"Why is it calling me Gatekeeper?!"
Sora gritted his teeth.
"Because that's what you are. The Seal doesn't just give you power—it binds you to the Gates. But this—"
His eyes flicked up.
"This thing shouldn't exist yet."
Ren wanted answers.
He wanted explanations.
He wanted to wake up from all of this.
But the creature moved again.
This time, faster.
THUMP.
A sudden landing behind a crate, only a few meters away.
Yui gasped.
Kaito stumbled.
Sora braced himself.
The creature whispered again, closer now.
"Open… the next door…"
Ren felt something burn beneath his skin.
A pulse.
A mark.
Like something inside him was responding to its call.
"No," Ren muttered, gripping his chest. "Stop… stop—"
His mother surged forward.
"Tatsuya! Keep it away from him!"
Tatsuya launched himself toward the creature, blade flashing like silver lightning. In the brief arc of Sora's blue glow, Ren saw it clearly.
Not a beast.
Not a demon.
Not a man.
A shifting distortion in reality.
A shape with too many limbs.
A face that changed every time he blinked.
A body that flickered like static in a broken screen.
The blade sliced through it—
—but went straight through as if through fog.
It reformed instantly.
And smiled.
Ren nearly collapsed.
Kaito screamed.
Yui covered her mouth.
Sora cursed under his breath. "It's a Gate Wraith. An unfinished manifestation."
His mother snapped, "It's not here for us. It's here for Ren."
The creature turned… and began crawling toward him.
Ren backed up quickly until he hit a crate, breath shaking.
"No—no—no—stop—"
The whisper filled his skull again.
"You're bleeding potential… Gatekeeper…"
Sora lunged forward, crackling baton swinging with enough force to shatter concrete.
It passed through harmlessly.
The Wraith didn't even acknowledge him.
Tatsuya tried again—faster, stronger—but again the blade phased through.
Only Ren could see it clearly.
Only Ren could hear it fully.
Because only Ren was being called.
His mother rushed toward him.
"Ren! DON'T LOOK AT IT!"
But it was too late.
The Wraith's two white eyes locked directly onto his.
His vision blurred.
The warehouse faded.
Voices dissolved into static.
The Wraith's whisper echoed through his skull like a prophecy soaked in poison.
"Second Gate… opening…"
Ren screamed.
A burst of white-hot agony tore through his body, as if every nerve was being rewritten at once. His knees buckled and he collapsed, clutching his chest.
Tatsuya grabbed him.
His mother held his face.
Sora knelt beside him, voice steady but shaking.
"Stay with me, Ren. Stay with me!"
Ren gasped, vision splitting into fragments—shards of memories he didn't recognise.
A burning temple.
A man in ancient armor holding a dragon-shaped seal.
A child with his eyes crying in a sea of fire.
And a voice—
A voice that was not the Wraith's.
A human voice.
"Ren… run."
His eyes snapped open.
But the warehouse wasn't dark anymore.
It was burning.
Or at least—it looked like it.
An illusion.
A memory forced upon reality.
Ren's mother yelled, trying to pull him back.
"Ren! Don't give in! FIGHT IT!"
He tried.
But the Wraith leaned over him, its face reforming into a new shape—
A man's face.
A familiar one.
The old man from the alley.
Ren choked on his own breath.
"Grandpa…?"
The Wraith's smile widened, stretching too far to be human.
"Open the door, child."
The world shook—
—and Ren blacked out.