Old Hanasakura Shopping Arcade
6:17 PM
April 12, 2005
Ren doubled over, hands on his knles, lungs burning like someone had lit a fire inside his chest. The sprint from school had taken everything out of him, every last reserve of energy he had been hoarding through detention.
Beside him, Shiinchiro somehow looked worse. His face was tomato-red, wheezing like he had just run a marathon in the summer heat. Sweat dripped down his temples.
"Never... doing that... again..." Shiin gasped between ragged breaths.
"You... said that... already..." Ren managed, his own voice barely more than a wheeze.
They had arrived at their destination. The Old Arcade.
It was derelict—a relic from another era. 1980s architecture crumbling into itself like a dying giant.
Faded signs in Japanese hung at odd angles, some barely clinging to their moorings. Broken windows gaped like missing teeth.
