CHAPTER 75: CHAPTER 75 – THE HUNGER STRIKES BACK

The spiral ended.

Ren’s boots pressed down on solid ground, but it didn’t feel like ground—it felt like standing on the surface of a vast mirror. Beneath him, endless layers of distorted skies and shifting cities moved like reflections in water, breaking apart and re-forming with each second.

Every breath he took echoed, like the air itself wanted to repeat him.

The girl with shard-wings stepped forward, her hair swaying in a current of unseen wind. Her eyes glowed faintly, not entirely human anymore.

"This place..." her voice was soft, but the echo doubled it, making it sound like another version of her was speaking from beneath the glass. "It’s hungry."

Ren frowned, scanning the horizon. Fragments of people stood at the edges—mirror silhouettes, faceless, their bodies flickering in and out like unfinished sketches. Some were tall, others small, some warped beyond recognition. Their silence was oppressive.

"What do you mean hungry?" Ren asked, tightening his grip on the shard-blade.

She looked at him—hesitant, as if weighing whether to tell him the truth. Then her lips parted:

"This world doesn’t just show reflections... it devours them. It’s why your memories bleed when you stay too long."

Ren’s stomach knotted. He remembered the whispers. The faces in the glass. The way his chest tightened when fragments of his past—things he wanted buried—bled through.

As if on cue, the mirror-floor rippled beneath him. From the shifting surface, an image began to form:

—A younger version of Ren, standing in a classroom, fists clenched. His reflection-boy was trembling, surrounded by sneers, whispers, eyes filled with ridicule.

The faceless crowd of mirror-figures stirred, twitching like predators catching scent of prey.

The shard-winged girl’s expression hardened. "Don’t look too long. That’s how it starts."

But Ren’s eyes were locked on the younger version of himself, trembling and angry, swallowed in helplessness.

The hunger of the mirror pressed in.

The mirror-world pulsed.

Every ripple of the ground carried weight, like his very heartbeat was syncing with the glass beneath his boots. The reflection of his younger self—the boy trembling in that classroom, fists clenched, surrounded by laughter—didn’t vanish this time. It stayed. It breathed.

And then it looked up.

The younger Ren’s eyes, wide and glassy, met his. There was no barrier between them—only a thin layer of mirror, shimmering and ready to break.

The shard-winged girl moved beside him, her feathers trembling faintly with each flicker of light. She stretched one hand toward him as if sensing danger. "Don’t let it pull you in. That... isn’t just memory. It’s the hunger shaping itself into you."

But the glass cracked with a single, sharp sound.

The boy’s trembling fists unclenched, his reflection trembling into something warped—his eyes hollowing out, his grin stretching too wide, his body jerking like a marionette pulled by cruel strings. The laughter of his classmates became distorted, repeating endlessly like a broken record.

Ren’s throat tightened. "That’s—"

"Not you anymore," the shard-winged girl cut in sharply, stepping forward. Her wings spread, shards glowing faintly, casting harsh light against the faceless silhouettes now edging closer.

The figures had begun to move—sluggish at first, then faster, jerking in strange angles, their featureless faces snapping toward Ren as if scenting fresh prey.

Ren’s reflection—the boy in the mirror—lifted a hand. His warped grin widened, and suddenly, every faceless silhouette whispered at once:

"Stay. Stay. Stay."

The sound was suffocating. A thousand voices, yet all in his own voice.

The shard-blade in Ren’s hand pulsed faintly, alive with his heartbeat. He gritted his teeth and swung downward, smashing the mirror where his reflection-boy stood.

The glass shattered, light erupting like fire. The warped reflection screamed—not like a boy, but like something hollow being torn apart.

But the shards didn’t fall. They twisted upward, reshaping into a storm of fragments, each carrying slivers of faces—some his, some strangers, some warped with monstrous teeth.

The girl leapt in front of him, wings snapping outward, her shards cutting through the air. They clashed against the storm of glass, sparks flying in jagged bursts of silver and black.

"You see now?" she shouted over the storm. "The mirror doesn’t just show! It eats, reshapes, and throws it back to you twisted!"

Ren’s boots skidded on the glass floor as he steadied himself. He looked around—the faceless figures were closer now, only a few steps away, their whispers blending into a chant.

"Stay... Stay with us... Stay..."

And then—he saw something that made his blood run cold.

Among the faceless crowd, one figure didn’t flicker. One didn’t blur. It was crystal clear. A girl with dark hair tied neatly, her uniform pressed and proper. Her eyes sharp, calculating, filled with the kind of brilliance Ren had once admired but now feared.

"Kaito?" Ren whispered before he could stop himself.

No—this wasn’t Kaito. This was impossible. But the figure smiled in a way that was too familiar.

The shard-winged girl noticed it too. Her eyes widened, her voice dropping to a whisper. "The mirror... it’s learning your fears."

Ren’s hand trembled on the blade. The hunger wasn’t satisfied with his past—it wanted to reach into the present. It wanted to twist the people he knew, the bonds he clung to.

And the worst part?

For a split second, Ren couldn’t tell if what he was seeing was false—or if it was something real the mirror had stolen.

The storm of shards closed in. The whispers grew deafening.

The hunger pressed against his chest like a vice.

And Ren realized:

If he stayed still, if he faltered even a moment, this world wouldn’t just show his memories.

It would rewrite him.

The storm pressed closer.

Shards of mirror screamed through the air like a thousand razors, each one carrying distorted images—his face twisted with rage, his laughter when he never laughed, his tears stretched into rivers. They weren’t just reflections. They were accusations. Fragments of every doubt, every shadow.

Ren raised his blade, its jagged edge thrumming with his pulse. The storm rushed in.

The shard-winged girl planted herself at his side, her wings flaring wide. The feathers weren’t feathers at all—each was a blade of glass, sharp enough to split light. They beat once, and a gust of cutting wind erupted, scattering the nearest swarm.

But it wasn’t enough.

The broken faces in the shards laughed, screamed, begged—all at once. The voices drilled into Ren’s skull. Stay with us. Stay in us. You are us.

Ren’s hand clenched tighter. No.

With a surge of motion, he swung the shard-blade, and arcs of silver tore through the storm. Each strike shattered images—memories that weren’t his, lies born of his pain. Sparks exploded, shards collapsing into dust.

Yet the hunger didn’t weaken.

It reshaped.

The dust reassembled into figures—faceless at first, then given stolen details: a hand he remembered grabbing his wrist, an eye from his classmates, a mouth whispering his name. And in the center stood that same girl’s figure—sharp eyes, dark hair, her expression as calm as Kaito’s ever was.

"You can’t fight it forever," she said, though her lips never moved. The voice came from everywhere at once. "You’ll shatter, just like us. You’re only delaying what’s inevitable."

Ren’s chest burned. It’s lying. It has to be.

The shard-winged girl’s hand brushed his arm. Her voice was low, steady. "Don’t let the shape fool you. Strike anyway."

He hesitated. Only for a breath.

That was enough.

The mirror-ground beneath him lurched, rippling like water. Hands shot out of it—cold, jagged hands of glass, clutching at his legs, dragging him down. He stumbled, teeth gritted, as shards pierced into his skin. They didn’t draw blood—they drew memory. Every stab made images flicker before his eyes.

The classroom.

The laughter.

His own reflection crying.

"No—" His grip on the blade tightened until his knuckles whitened. "I’m not—yours!"

He drove the shard-blade downward, stabbing through the grasping hands. Light burst outward, splintering them into fragments. He surged back to his feet, gasping.

The shard-winged girl didn’t hesitate. With a cry that was half fury, half despair, she leapt into the storm. Her wings folded, then snapped outward, scattering glass in a dazzling spray. Each strike carried echoes of her own pain—Ren could feel it, like her soul was bleeding into every motion.

Ren followed.

Together, they cut through the hunger. Every strike shattered voices, broke apart faces, silenced whispers. The storm howled in defiance, fragments clawing at them, but the two didn’t falter. They carved a path forward, step by step, refusing to stop.

And then—

The storm recoiled, collapsing into a single point. The shards swirled into a mass, condensing into something larger. A figure rose from it—towering, jagged, its body made entirely of blackened glass. Its face shifted constantly—Ren’s, the shard-winged girl’s, strangers’, and sometimes no face at all.

Its voice rumbled like an earthquake of broken mirrors:

"Strike all you want. Hunger never ends."

The ground shuddered. Cracks split outward, releasing light that pulsed with unbearable heat. The very air vibrated as though the mirror-world itself had chosen to fight back.

Ren raised his blade, his chest heaving. His eyes locked on the colossal figure. Despite the ache in his arms, despite the voices still gnawing at the edges of his thoughts, a flame burned in him—stubborn, reckless, alive.

He wasn’t going to let this world eat him.

Not now. Not ever.

"Then I’ll starve you."

The shard-winged girl stepped to his side, blood—or something like it—trickling from her lips. She smiled faintly, a sad but unyielding smile.

"Together, then."

And as the giant of black glass roared, shattering the false sky above, Ren and the shard-winged girl charged.