Chapter Text
“Disobedience is a sin.”
They soaked their hands in lustral water, they say it's for purification purposes. Same water that you got splashed by before they got you here. You're not sure what to call them, they say that they have no name worth uttering, to whom they are but mere participants.. yet they wore the same blinding white rag over their whole appearance, hiding everything for you to know as little of their form as possible. As if they're not humans just like you are, maybe you should be more concerned with how they seem satisfied with the concept of being less than a human. Even so, you cannot seem to find the words when they comb your hair with a wacky brush, they say its teeth were made out of tusks.. it takes you a while to keep the sickness from going any further behind your throat, hoping to get the imagination of them ripping a being tusks brought you to the edge.
“Disobedience is a sin.”
They say in your ears over and over, like a broken cd playing on repeat. Their parched fingers give you goosebumps every time they scare your skull as they fondle your hair with uneasy gentleness. They say it's from the devotion of praying they've been destined since the day you graced this hopeless place of a world. They compel you to wear a fancy piece of cloth that leaves you cold, they say it took them years of years to gather enough bombyx mori moths, the infinite variety of toxins that they had to endure for the sake of the needed heat to loosen the natural fibers to make it usable for you to apparel you a pure silk fabric. They tell you that they were at least hundred of thousands of them to make it possible, but only two with jagged hands kneel weeping at the sight of you一it makes you divert to think of how many died just for this one piece of cloth, and mostly how these two cry like it's worth it.
“Disobedience is a sin.”
They decorate you like a doll, fancy jewelry hanging from the slop of your ear to your rough shaped ankles. You don't feel beautiful, you don't think any less of yourself either, all you could think about is how this just.. is not you. They tell you the paint is a pure blood of a fawn, an utter divine alignment of how that extinct creature is but a sole myth representation of sacred transitions such as you. It makes you recoil, you don't know what a fawn is.. you've never seen one. And its blood is all over you like a paint in expenditures of another's lineage carnage. It takes you a spell to quaff the urge to cry and retreat from the smell of lethal iron, forasmuch as they'll just recotate all over again.
“Disobedience is a sin.”
There's a smell of burnt that almost makes you wonder how firewood can smell so herbal and sweet instead of gagging bitterness in your chest, they say it's olive tree branches. It makes you pause for a second and hitch your steps, olive trees were only known to grow in a cursed landslide that had its few share of people that managed to survive on peas of one among last bits of nature this wrecked ground has to offer一it was later indicated that the people of the land all faced the slow pained death of starvation after the forfeiture of the only tree that kept them alive. People said it was the price of dependency, your neighbor lady seethed of the hell guard lack of action, and your mother told you to hear no more and close your ears. The participants had to hold you still when tears came rolling, having to reapply the steps of their ritual yet again after your wets of empathy ruined the precious blood of the fawn.
“Disobedience is a sin.”
They keep chanting a name that isn't yours: ‘acardiacs’ time after time. You never came across that term in the long journey of reading endless tasks of books, let alone recognize it as a name. ‘Acardiacs is back,’ whatever it was, they deemed you duplicitous of the contemporary presence. For a moment, you think they're trading you for another life一in which you weren't wrong to assume. Yet the more they clutch their hands at your presence, when they’d kneel down at your mercy or even chorus psalms in your name- if you didn’t know any better you’d think you were more than just a passive human instrument, a mere vessel for the actual miracle maker. For either way answers are not for whom under beleaguered plight like you currently are.
“Disobedience is a sin.”
There’s so many of them that it almost makes you nauseous all over again, just like the prophesy had told- ‘like moths to flame they seek the heartless’ - if it weren’t for those worn out rags of theirs you could’ve felt their gazes upon you like pierces on your skin. There is a linear path that does not deviate; they make you walk through the second they release you. Just like a baby deer's first wobbly steps you make your way onto what seems like a gimmick that has a sphere-like shape and some radiating lines poking circles around its full glory, it looked awfully acquainted, almost too affiliated for your liking. With tottery motion you make a seat of the uncomfortable edges. There is a pellucid set of orbit that warps around you, you reach slightly to realize that you cannot go any further of its now firm set of boundaries. It’s hard to ignore the downturn of your gut at the cognizance; this was it, the prophecy of your fate ends here.
You stop hearing the chants when the shell makes itself clear, the soundproof shell makes you realize how ear numbing they were making you that you didn't even hear your own thoughts for a long while.
Now looking at them from here- there’s a sense of pathos emerges, they seem to need this more than you. And it shows in the discomfort they implant that they are utterly, completely hopeless to their very last bone- there doesn’t seem to be much difference within, a desperate man is not any less different from a pious one. In their beliefs they conflict, in their despondency where they're surrounded by lack of agency do they come to believe that sacrificing a child born without a heart would be enough fulfillment to bring what was once their beloved apostles; acardiacs.
It makes you wonder, why did you agree to this? You cannot even recall a memory of you approving your consent to all of this. You remember the lines of the prophecy and how it lead them to you一anything else fell of the edge of oblivion. It makes you realize, you didn't really have a say in that matter.
It’s strange, you lived most of your life through the window of your room and the records of your mother’s singing in the background. days aren’t much dissimilar for one another in a place like the ground. Yet you cannot help but wonder if it’ll be time for it to snow like in the south ward like you always hoped for, if rain is a real pure water drops and not just a tale in the stories you read- if you’ll get the chance to finish your favorite book you’ve been preventing yourself from reaching the lingering bitterness of coming terms with the end, that it’ll never feel the same like it did the first read. It makes you wonder that now you have been granted a heart just the like the prophecy told, if it's finally time you start savoring the sapidity of living like any other ordinary human being would, to the world it is seems like a page of destiny that awaits you- but instead of your tales, that page is the prophecy, the same lines that deems the heartless must pay the price of reincarnation.
Disobedience is a sin, therefore daring to think anything else of what’s already written is one if not the greatest wrongdoing you could do. Everybody knows that, you most of all should know that一where all these beings kneel in hopelessness for you to bring them a better tomorrow to look for, mustn't you have nerves to ruin this for them..
[for shall the heartless be selfless, be kind and giving just like the sphere sun that gives its light to all beings unconditionally, shall the heartless not want, not need, not feel. for being request must they kneel and obey]
And yet, and yet… you dare to muster the courage of wanting to see what tomorrow holds for you一the heartless.
[children of rebellion have no place in the nova era.. for they will pay for their defiance by facing fate worse than death, for their doubts will their flesh melt away, for their fear will they not remember a past, feel the presence, see the future]
This cannot be all there is for you, right? You still didn't get as tall, you still have some baby teeth to pull out- you didn't even reach the appropriate age to finally attend the doll festival. You didn't want to be the nourishing flame to anybody’s deprive of clarity moths一you didn't even choose to be born like this, you wanted一
[ skepticism has no place within the heartless, ]
It was no fair, everyone will live on to see the nova era adorns一while you’ll be the play the crucial role of dying for the goods of it. You were taught to never second thought of the prophecy一but must doom be all there's to your fate一you weren't old enough to have a say in your own destiny but old enough to be sold for a better future一it unfair, unfair, unfair. This is injustice, you were human just like anyone else, humans are kind, humans are cruel, humans have wills, humans have desires, humans can wish, humans can twist fate, humans are selfish一and you most of all, when they tear open your flesh and see you tarnish your bones had become they'll wonder how selfish a being can be一
[ ███ said the greatest sinners will be those who stand against our say with reservations ]
It's then when your steaming teary eyes saw him, when your hands are bloody from grinding against the shell一you see him, his black rag stands among all of them, while they all kneel and weep he stand and grins. He most likely isn't able to hear your snivels aiming at him, yet he sees you. A look you’ll never be able to read makes its way to his worn out face beneath the darkness of his shred. Out of all of them devotions that they false promised you, only he stands to actually see your resentment一it’s like he he knew this’ll end this way, that you’ll eventually have your moment of epiphany and see it for yourself how blinding salvation can get.
[the sun must rise.]
“Mister…”
You don't hear him, but you can see the tattered edges of his mouth moving.
’’ ████ ████ ███’’
There's a moment you swore everything stopped moving, it's for the first time since you gained this heart beneath your flesh has it been loud enough for you to hear its pulse. And somehow that very one pulse felt like a Blood rushing through your head like the steaming hot air is suffocating you and crushing your skull, it's painfull一it hurts, an anguish sensation of your eyes melting beneath the surface of its holes, the bones of your jaw twist in an unruly stretch across your head, your teeth dissolve into shreds that jagged your insides. It's like every bit of your brain has been blasted to gooey pieces that stained the pure shell surrounding you.
You're not sure if it's already reached your throat or was it already elongating from your ear numbing screeching. It goes to every edge of your body, from your head down to your abdomen一this tight burning wonder is cutting through your skin like thin-paper, every organ within you presses woefully into the inside of your flesh, the hard muscles being stretched through your entire inner tissues to the sensing veins of yours being torn to threads. You feel it from the surface of your skin to the inside ounce of your smallest arteries, except your deceitful heart that remains stationary entrails in your rib cage. Maybe that's why every second feels so intertwined一it's keeping you alive.
It makes no sense for you to form anything in such state, but you were sure一so sure, that in this heart that isn't yours一that it can feel you more than you feel it, it's giving you what you’ve wished for the second your death was written in the lines..
You wanted to live.
“Child of ███ , rejector of apostles, the deity remains of us. Grant me your final act of mercy, answer the question of my misery, the last tugging thread of life, what separates humans from. ████ ?”
“The sun?”
A small cracked noise from little zanka's throat, it always felt belittling when he had to voice his failure to understand something. especially displaying it to someone as high in regard as his sister out of all people. It makes him painfully aware of his smaller frame and fidgeting fingers compared to her mature grace and all knowing nimbus.
The scarlet feathers of her hair left only one eye visible, in that way it maintained her unreadable expression in check. outspreading her superiority widened, that way it wouldn't take another glance to set certainty that she was a member of the nijiku kindred. Yet Zanka doesn't let himself think so far about it, since it makes him gain the unfortunate conscience of how far the range between him and his sister led一he’d like to muddle it through thinking of how hard he’ll work to follow her exact footsteps and eventually find a seat beside her, maybe then they’ll talk about how nice the weather is instead.
Maybe so, it'll be a time where he doesn't have to worry about distinguishing any means from his older sister deadpan. Maybe when he gets tall enough, he’ll feel as completely autonomous as she probably does. Maybe he’ll truly meet the stature and feed his starvation for a fundamental drive of equality when he loses the gleam of his eyes and sees the world behind her own, maybe that's why she tends to aim ruthless bullets for his eyes at training一then one out of three outcomes would mean that they’ll share a vision of forthcoming, and he’ll live up to be worthy of the nijiki blood in his veins.
Until then, he’ll try not to look up too much. Only if he reaches that height, when he gets stronger and vigorous can he savor the benefits of being privileged.
There’s a tense moment when zanka reaches the end of his thoughts, the unreadable look kyoka gives him makes his skin crawl. She was more tense than usual, something that he wasn't used to. Usually people become clumsy or anxious at the prospect of being put in an impassioned position, but his sister manages to make it so… uncanny, radiating this adverse sense of uneasiness to his bones. But again, maybe zanka is just wrong about it一or maybe the likes of his sister are above the norms, so much that they have their own version of retorts.
To think of how his sister's refrain was melting off so much that he can feel her agitation is something that could be the straw to set everything to panic. He manages to swallow how effective the possibility is. After all he seemed to make something out of the eerie feeling of optics expectations that’d been living under his skin since he ought to be a hell guard. At least it doesn't itch like it used to一so he’ll try to refrain just as she does and follow behind her.
Kyoka lets the burden of her eyes travel elsewhere, then with carefulness that almost makes zanka have that itchy feeling again, a lengthy weary piece of paper is wide spread unfolded, she sets it neatly on the table and waits for zanka to scoot over, not too close but not far from hearing her mouth each word in utter secrecy.
[A heaven painted with the liquid gold and scatters light across the world, it chases lingering dark away, a fierce rebirth into us. When it fuels the delicate dance of sunlight, all the forbidden zones are sanitized from the toxins. The rubbish skies of trash fumes will be cleansed and we’ll see the true blues of the sky. And by tilting the ground on its axis, we'll experience the four seasons of nature. When there’ll be the might of illumination, it’ll breath in the oceans of the west and free them to the sky, form a distilling clouds that carries life-giving rain of pure clean water that saves even the driest ditches of this trash land.]
[And even though, the rays may fry us and we might seek the shadows from its lack of knowledge of measurement. It may melt our eyes from the socks and take our visions if we stare too long. It may make the well known desert of no man’s land, penta, into a hell in this ground. The red dust of decaying trash will lose its reddish appearance and become a burning sensation to the human skin and cause permanent dehydration and inflammation, there’ll be fierce sandstorms threatening any close up eras that’ll cause great chaos and stretch the space of the sandland. There’ll be new illnesses to come, diseases and unavoidable death.]
[Thus, the power of balance ceases to exist.]
[It’ll shed warmth down on us, it’ll bathe us in that same warmth, it’ll embrace us with that warmth, it’ll save us with that warmth, it’ll love us with that warmth. Unconditionally, incontrovertibly, everlastingly. ]
[ Therefore we kneel down to our ancient ruler's reincarnation, our fifth apostles, the sun. ███ is back.]
Zanka is not sure what to make out of this when the last words are wretched out by his sister, whether he should be concerned about the agitation sense swirling in his guts or the anticipation of his elder sister. She didn't seem to like this and yet is completely compelled. His utter confusion doesn't seem to bug his sister off as much as it does to himself. She instead offers a look full of mildness, which is a bit unsettling among her apathy attributes.
“Zanka, my dear. This is the day that the sun will finally grace us,” kyoka breathes out, whatever attempt of gentleness she made to sooth him and make this easier, it carried little to no genuine assurance of warmth. It perplexed him, he doesn't know where and how to interpret it. It's like she's saying something she doesn't even believe in. But for the most part he will accept it, he will take just like a bone to a starved puppy. This is all he’ll ever know of love, all that he’ll get of it. And zanka thinks he's fine with it, he thinks..
“It's a drastic alternative, scary to some, but not to us. This is the only miracle anyone would ever spare us. That's why we’ll accept it.”
She seems to want to add something, but she doesn't. Instead she turns to him.
“you too, shall accept it.”
Zanka doesn't argue back, doesn't bother to voice his objections because he isn't even given the chance to think of any under the demanding submission of the pair of eyes he shares and is remained of at the sight of anything that offers a reflection of himself. His back hurts from bending down, his mouth is itchy from the unsaid protest laying under his tongue, the palms of his hands are held hostage under his digging nails. He still bows in acceptance.
Why does it feel like this? Why does this feel so wrong that it makes his bottom lip tremble? Orders and demands aren't a new concept to shudder at the thought of. Yet, there's something deeply ingrained within this notion that grinds his disciplined gears. Everything from his family is a must fulfilling augury, there's no place for second thoughts and even doubts are considered a form of betrayal.
And yet, zanka doesn't seem to shake off the cold sweat even when he feels the distinctly textured paper on his hands. He just hopes he didn't stain it for the sake of his pride.
The younger boy fathomed his courage and sat straight to read what his sister tendered to him, making an attempt to fix his dubious face and sit in a firm position. The slightly worn edges against his fingers feel odd, not like any educational books he’d cross his fingers across. It felt heavy and unbearable to even look at. It's clear what part his sister aimed for it to read, but his instinct shifts to another set of lines.
[The day that the heart lays down on the ground is the same day the heartless will be born into this world. Their empty chest is the vacuum, nature abhors a vacuum. The child has the perfectionism of a cosmic receptacle to hold the volatile mass of the sun. The lack of human frailty is the allowance to withstand the crushing gravity and heated diverter required]
[The child has no will of their own, no human warmth of their own, they're incapable of everything an individual human does, they don't have desires, The solar heart will save them, give them a chance to have a lifespan of a toddler, it’ll give them the ability to love, to breathe and to see the cruelty of the world we live in]
[The heartless must endure, suffering is essential, dying is a cycle. The sun must rise.]
“Don't get sentimental, zanka. We're all destined to serve a purpose.”
Whatever face zanka made, it must've mimicked how he felt reading within these lines.
He tries to shake it off and get back on track, the second his eyes fell on the supposed verses一it’s.. gone? In a set of early panic, he tries to roll more of the sheet only to be met with flawless white mocking him. He makes a noise of shambles when his little fingers reach nothing, like he's trying to pick up the words back to its place. Did he mess this up? Was his heart too weak to take in such a big step? Did it sense his depraved lack of strength and rejected him as a witness?
For a moment, it terrifies zanka to think of his own mind. So much so that he thinks kyoka senses it, so he doesn't look up. There's an unbelievably salty taste in his mouth he cannot seem to get rid of no matter how much he swallows back, a deep gutting loathsome makes its way to his stomach. A jingling bell sound vibrates every inch of his body, his first instinct is to try to muddle the pain and cover his ears一only to feel a sharp torment of every single pulse of his throbbing in a rhythm of brittling agony. So much that if he lets himself, he may just use his teeth to tear the flesh of every pulsing point of his just for any chance of easing it.
Zanka’s not sure if it's just an extra side effect or the ground felt like shaking.
There's an iron aftertaste on his puds when he sees his sister gazing out of the window. He doesn't see most of her face, where she mumbles something he can barely hear, and yet he can feel it - the no longer masked does the fury last, now for it to seethe between the tight clench of her teeth.
“The prophecy has failed, just as I thought.”
“Should we do something about the situation in the west ward?” Semiu finally voices her overtaken concern. Something particularly absurd about this just wouldn't wash off with a few flips of her pornographic magazine, and the option of lazily setting her anticipating upon the boss like she does just seems to her more worked up because the man just keeps acting like this is another day一when it isn't.
“That wouldn't be necessary.” Corvus shrugs off, the last thing the woman in front of him wanted to hear.
It's been three days since the incident happened, a great detonation has occurred on the west wards. The whole thing had set the ground shaking for a whole day, the already fragile buildings dissoluted and caused mightily damage to every unfortunate fated villages and towns that was nearby. Leading the trash monsters of all the way down to forbidden zones were summoned like dogs perking up at the sound of a whistle一setting the whole hq to work overtime and completely cram the receptionist office to the brim, as if semiu hair couldn't get any whiter.
And for her greater dismay, tamsy had reported back that the canvas town was facing an emergency lock down till things were mellowed down under the mayor's orders, and if the most advanced city on the ground was on restrain- that meant no more special addition of the weekly magazines that would bring her back into task-oriented mindset.
Sue her一but It was hard for her not to get provoked by the unbothered utterance of her boss. This whole thing was just an abruptly bizarre thing that just came out of the blue on a random Friday afternoon and suddenly everyone needed to be in a certain place on every corner of the ground. The entire branches from southern to central had been in a huge tangled wire mess as they were all set to convert as much as the ground era as possible一you can imagine how hard it was that as every branch had the rough minimum amount of barely a hundred cleaners clenching each other's way, this whole thing was a hot burning mess.
“Boss一doesn't this just tick you off as well?” The hoarseness of semiu's voice surfacing the clear sleep deprivation that the whole thing left her in, yet the confidence in her posture remains lofty. “Something clearly peculiar happened in the west ward, things might've calmed down since then but this isn't just a thing to disregard.”
An acknowledgment hum from corvuse is heard, yet his eyes were glued on the cup of bitter coffee by his desk. The drink seemingly loses its identifying steam, becoming a haze of a lukewarm liquid. It doesn't seem to irritate semiu as much as his earlier insouciance一 she always assumed it was a lazy eye.
“You're right. Seems like this isn't a thing we could just point fingers at the raiders for. Seeing as the incident happened on the west ward and not to mention the sudden death of the raiders leader, it's less likely for them to commit any vile act especially where the hell guard nerve center served. They might be reckless but definitely not stupid.”
His gloved hand reaches to scoot away the additional cream and sugar away from his cup, stirring the now warm coffee around the edges. He doesn't take a sip, but instead gives a look of understanding.
“Your frustration is nothing if not understandable to me.”
Semiu doesn't know what it is, maybe the soft assurance of his voice just makes her shoulders fall in a rhythm of relief, how he can simply just voice an understanding point to the other person even if they were intricate in the depth of doubt. He's definitely not her type but surely he just knows his way around words一in others way he just has it.
She finally finds her way to sit down on the chair he’d been offering her since her entrance, the gentle smile of his is predestined but never seems to rub her the wrong way, so she leaned his elbows to rest against the wooden table.
“Even though it was set right under their nose, the hell guard doesn't seem to do much about it.” Semiu mentions, taking the offered sweets that corvus inclined to her. She picks a simple powdered sugar biscuit between her fingers.
“That would be too suspicious, turning a blind eye has always been the method for them.”
She thinks for a while, a gesture of stroking her chin in deep thought is interpreted by the view of an empty cup and the approach of a gloved hand offering coffee. She nods lightly in rejection, not something she's particularly in the mood for, plus they were too bitter for her liking.
“...you think this has something to do with that delusional cult?” Semiu finally said, like she's been trying to put the right words for it. No wrong in saying that she has very little to no liking for them or even bringing them up tasted disgustingly sinister一luckily the sugary biscuit does it job and washes the taste off.
it's insane to think that they've been walking around free of law abiding for generations, they were undeniably a bunch of excused criminals walking around and committing foul acts in the name of ‘the prophecy.’ Not to mention this generation of them all had the most leftover misdeeds from them. And for whatever reason, they had the hell guard under their belts to protect them from every possible protest that may come their way一‘we have no command over religious activities, we cannot limit devotion of others, it's a form of free speech.’
If you ask semiu, it was a sore thumb act of favouritism. People in any other state get executed for far more less. The lack of censorship had gone too out of line that these people were actively transgressing right in front of everyone’s faces, vigorously mocking them in the face一if the cleaners were to even think of perpetrating the slightest act of violence they had committed every branch located on the ground would've been shut down and every single active cleaner will be haunted down for the sake of the law. They were already a feather on the edge of a cliff, as they waited for the merest whiff of the wind to just hold it against them.
and lo and behold; when the people actually stood on business for once and demanded answers for what the hell happened to cause such a violent earthquake that might've shook even the miserable ends of the ground一and all they had up their sleeves is a simple 'trash storm.' What a lame sorry of an excuse. Worst of all, ground people were if not preserved of the minimum peace they can get一not all gullible, but more rather resigned.. sadly enough. Something that hell guard knew better than anyone and knew how to capitalize on.
Believe it or not, they've had this conversation before. There's even still running rumors about it to this day. And that is that the hell guard falls under the line of believers alongside that shall-not-be-named cult. It's beyond to think about, what possibly could this prophecy have contained that it was enough to seduce a whole law force to fall right into the center of their palms?
A hum from Corvus pulls her back into the office, “Wouldn't be too far to assume, after all一even when they publicly showed off putting rituals and beliefs, they were still set free from charge.”
A brief tch leaves semiu, “Would've been so much nicer if the so-called guardians of the ground actually bothered to keep it guarded.” She seethes between her teeth as her fingers tap more frequently.
“Then, we wouldn't have this job.”
“I suppose.”
Semiu munches on the crumb of the biscuit, the bits of the buttery leaves a slight salty aftertaste she liked. It gives her the nudge to take a deep breath through her nose, through her mouth she lets her back slop on the comfortable rag of the seat. The ends of her thumbs meet as her hands intertwine above her knee. “There's a belief of a suspect involved in the era where the explosion happened.” Without looking at her boss, she says. Making sure not to drive attention of the source of that 'belief'
“An alive one.” She quickly adds on.
The boss sings an approval note, she waits a bit before adding. “should we send someone just in case?” A small tilt of her head as she asks, she's a bit surprised that the man infront of her actually halts to give it a thought, even for just a moment it gives semiu the tiniest glimpse of hope that this may be the first and only time she’d be able to even to predict his response.
“Nah, don't worry about it.”
Aanddd he waves it off, typical.
She must've made a face for him to let out a chuckle, as he leans forward with knowing gaze. "Don't let it get to your head, semiu. the time will come for us to intervene. By that time, someone will take care of it, eventually.”