The whispers had grown sharper overnight.
Ren kept his head down as he passed through the school gates, the small bandage on his forehead pulling tight with every step. Two days after Yui's death, the entire building felt poisoned. Students parted around him like he carried something contagious. Some whispered behind cupped hands. Others stared openly, their eyes crawling over him as if searching for dried bloodstains that had long since been washed away.
He slid into his usual seat at the back of Class 3-A without looking at anyone. Yui's desk had become a full shrine now — fresh white lilies, handwritten notes fluttering in the breeze from the open windows, candles that had burned low overnight, and even a small volleyball plush keychain someone had placed there. The empty chair stared back at him like a silent accusation.
Ren's stomach twisted. Every time he blinked, he saw her again: the hot spray of blood across his face, the wet gurgle in her throat, the way her eyes had dimmed while she stared straight into his.
Sora Kurosaki was already at her desk — Yui's old seat. But she was no longer alone.
By the end of second period, a lively group of girls had gathered around her, laughing and chatting excitedly. Two boys from the basketball club leaned against her desk, flashing confident grins and trying to impress her with exaggerated stories from practice. Sora smiled at them all — gentle, soft, never loud or forced. Her calm beauty and the quiet kindness in her voice drew people in effortlessly. On only her second day, she had already become one of the most popular girls in the class.
Ren watched from the corner of his eye, hands clenched under his desk. She looked warm. Safe. Normal. Like the horror that had swallowed him whole had never touched her at all.
It made something deep inside his chest ache with a confusing mix of relief and resentment.
The hallway between classes was a chaotic river of bodies.
Ren walked with his shoulders hunched, eyes fixed on the scuffed floor tiles, counting each step to keep his breathing steady. He was almost at the staircase when a familiar soft voice cut through the noise.
"Ishida-kun…"
Sora was walking toward him, surrounded by six other students. Her shoulder-length hair swayed gently as she moved. For one terrifying split second, she turned her head and looked straight at him, her calm eyes seeking his with quiet concern.
Their gazes nearly locked.
Ren felt the familiar pull — the ability stirring like a blade hovering at the edge of his vision, ready to slice open another future.
He jerked his face sharply to the side and kept walking, brushing past the entire group without a word. Behind him, one of the girls muttered loudly enough for him to hear, "Why is he so cold? He didn't even acknowledge her."
Another voice added, "He was the one with Yui when she died, right? No wonder he's acting weird…"
Ren clenched his fists until his nails bit into his palms and disappeared into the crowd.
He couldn't risk it. Not with her.
The decision crystallized during the final period.
He couldn't keep living in this blind, suffocating terror. He needed rules. He needed to understand exactly how far this curse reached and what it would cost him. After the last bell rang, Ren stayed behind on purpose.
Mr. Tanaka, the strict 58-year-old math teacher who had been at the school for nearly thirty years, was packing his bag in the quiet staff corridor. Ren approached with a fabricated question about yesterday's homework. When the older man looked up to answer, their eyes met directly.
The vision unfolded gently, almost kindly.
Three and a half weeks from now.
Mr. Tanaka in his small, orderly apartment. He didn't take his regular heart medication because he had run out, settles into his favorite armchair to watch the news, then moves to bed. He dies peacefully in his sleep — a quiet heart attack sometime after midnight. No pain. No fear. Just a calm, natural end to a long life.
Ren felt a fragile flicker of hope. Maybe some deaths were meant to be gentle. Maybe some could be gently nudged.
As Mr. Tanaka turned to gather more papers, Ren quickly knocked over the small bottle of heart pills on the desk. While pretending to help tidy up, he slipped the bottle into his own bag.
Just get a refill sooner, he told himself. That's all. It should be fine.
He left the school immediately after.
The street leading away from the gates was quiet in the late afternoon sun.
Ren had only walked a few blocks when he heard quick footsteps behind him.
"Ishida-kun… wait, please."
Sora caught up, slightly out of breath, her sketchbook tucked securely under one arm. She slowed to match his pace, walking beside him without crowding him.
"I heard from the other students," she said softly, her voice warm with genuine sympathy. "About what happened to Yui Takahashi. That you were there with her… that you tried everything you could to save her. I'm really sorry. It must be incredibly painful to carry something like that all by yourself."
She paused for a moment, choosing her words carefully. "You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. I won't push. But… you look like you're carrying the whole world on your shoulders. If you ever need someone to just listen, or even just sit with you in silence, I'm here. You don't have to keep pushing everyone away like this."
Her kindness landed like a knife between his ribs.
For one painful heartbeat, Ren remembered Yui — the way she used to drag him out of his silence with bright, stubborn smiles and endless chatter. The only person who had refused to let him disappear completely.
Now she was gone. Cold. Still. Staring at him with empty eyes in that alley.
And here was this new girl, offering the exact same gentle persistence.
It hurt too much.
Without saying a single word, Ren sped up his steps and walked away, leaving Sora standing alone on the sidewalk behind him. He didn't look back.
Later that evening — School Staff Wing
Mr. Tanaka had stayed behind to finish grading a stack of papers.
While descending the concrete stairs to the first floor, the massive heart attack struck without warning. The pain was immediate and vicious — a crushing vise around his chest. He gasped sharply, clutching at his shirt, legs buckling beneath him.
He tumbled violently down the stairs.
His head struck the sharp metal edge of a step with a sickening, wet crack.
When two colleagues found him minutes later, the scene was horrifying.
Mr. Tanaka lay at the bottom in a grotesque, twisted heap. His skull had split open like an overripe fruit on impact. Dark, viscous blood pooled widely beneath him, spreading in slow, glossy rivulets across the concrete. Pale fragments of brain matter leaked from the fatal wound, mixed with shards of bone and strands of hair matted in the gore. One eye was half-open, staring blankly at the ceiling in frozen terror. His mouth remained locked in a final, agonized gasp, blood still trickling from the corner of his lips. Splatter patterns decorated the wall and steps like grotesque modern art.
A peaceful death in his sleep had become a nightmare of pain and violence.
The Next Morning
Ren arrived at school to controlled chaos.
Small groups of students and teachers clustered in the hallways, faces pale and voices hushed. The rumor spread like wildfire through the building.
"Mr. Tanaka died yesterday evening… right here at school."
"Heart attack on the stairs. Fell hard."
"They said his head… it was split open. Blood and… everything. Really bad."
Ren froze mid-step in the corridor. The details slammed into him — the cracked skull, the leaking brain matter, the blood everywhere. His vision of a quiet end in bed had been twisted into something monstrous.
He barely made it to the nearest bathroom.
Locking himself in a stall, Ren dropped to his knees and threw up violently. His entire body convulsed as bitter acid burned his throat and nose. He retched again and again until nothing remained but dry heaves and stinging tears.
"What have I done?" His hands shook uncontrollably against the cold tile floor.
He had changed one tiny thing.
And reality had answered with pure horror.
Mr. Tanaka was supposed to die peacefully.
Instead, he had died screaming in terror, his brains spilling across the school stairs.
Ren slumped against the stall wall, breathing hard, wiping his mouth with a trembling hand. The metallic taste of bile lingered on his tongue, just like the taste of Yui's blood had lingered two nights ago.
That night, alone in his room with the lights off, Ren opened a new notebook.
On the first blank page, he wrote in shaky, uneven handwriting:
Rule #1: Any interference makes it worse.
His hand trembled as he closed the book.
Yui. Mr. Tanaka.
How many more people would he break simply by trying to help them?
Ren buried his face in his arms, the crushing weight of guilt and fear pressing down until he could barely breathe.
The curse wasn't just showing him death.
It was forcing him to become part of it.