Izumi jolted up, every blood vessel in him still echoing with that blinding light. His breath came in ragged. The cave was different now alive, humming with a low vibration that crawled beneath his skin. The faint green veins along the walls pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat. The cave had created something. Something thrummed behind his eyes, a whispering static that wasn't just in his head. Then words, clear as if spoken out loud. "System function: Thanatophoric Rebirth dormant state active." Izumi froze. "What… what the hell does that mean?" His voice cracked in the silence, swallowed by the echoing dark. He looked down at himself. The scar on him glowing faintly, veins of crimson light chasing through it. It didn't hurt, it felt aware, alive even…. watching. Izumi stumbles onto his feet, panicking and disbelief in his chest. "Dormant? Rebirth? What are you talking about?" The silence that followed was heavy, suffocating. But deep beneath it, in the small median between his own heartbeats, something answered not with words but with hunger. It wasn't done with him. Not yet.
The light pulsed once then left
Darkness emerged back in thick and heavy, clinging to him like glue. His body started shaking uncontrollably, adrenalized, pain finally catching up. He could hear his own heartbeat, loud and frantic in his ears, and underneath it, something wet dragging itself closer.
"Izumi…"
That voice again Elena's tone wrapped around something hungry. Every word hit him like a knife to the abdomen . He turned his head just in time to see the thing crawl toward him, its arms folding backward, limbs bending wrong, bones clicking into horrifying actions. The half that resembled his sister blinked slowly with warmth almost.
"Why… are you running from me?"
He tried to speak, but his throat constricted. The cold in his chest spread upward, his body forgetting the warmth. His hand touched the floor again, slick with rot, and slipped. The impact made his vision blurry. When it cleared, the creature was already at his side.
Its hand or Elena's hand pressed against his face, cold Ice.This wasn't the warmth Elena had but something dead. The nails traced his jaw, dragging thin lines of cuts across his skin. Izumi's breath came in heavy gasps.
"Let me in," it whispered, and then the other half of its face split open. The skin peeled back with a wet tearing sound, revealing rows of uneven teeth, too many, each coated with black saliva that hit the floor.
Izumi screamed.
It didn't matter. The thing climbed onto him, its weight taking the air from his lungs. He beat against it weakly, but it moved with slow, deliberate purpose, almost savoring the fear radiating from Izumi. Its mouth came down on his shoulder, and the pain was explosive, ripping, alive. Blood poured hot against the creature's cold flesh as it bit deep, not tearing—no, chewing.
Izumi's body convulsed. He felt everything. Every drag of its teeth scraping bone, every drop of blood sucked from the wound. His scream broke into dry sobs.
"Stop… please…" The words barely came out.
It leaned close, their faces inches apart. One eye a deep blue, the other bottomless black stared right through him. "Don't cry," it whispered, and its breath smelled of iron and soil. "You said you'd never leave me."
Then it bit into his neck. Slowly. Precise. Flesh parted under each tooth. Izumi thrashed but there was nowhere to go, the weight pressing him down, the darkness swarming around him. The only sound was wet crunches, the sound of his weakening heart, and the faint hum of the cave.
His vision pieced into red. He thought he heard her voice again "E l e n a" but maybe it was just the whisper of his soul deflaming.
The creature's teeth sank deeper. His nerves screamed, then started to go numb. His heartbeat slowed.
One final sound reached him, distorted in his dying mind "Thanatophoric Rebirth initializing…"
Izumi's fingers twitched once, then stilled as the monster devoured his last breath. Warm blood pooled beneath him. And then silence.
But deep inside his hollow chest something changed.