「Knowledge is power.」
It had been three hours since the saber-tooth monster had crumbled into ash and blood. Three hours since Tatsuya had faced death and somehow walked away.
He wandered aimlessly down the crumbling, dark hallway, the sound of his footsteps echoing off the damp stone walls. The air was thick, laced with decay and the musty scent of rotting fabric. But his mind was elsewhere, floating in and out of focus. What gnawed at him wasn't the eerie quiet or the ancient ruin—it was the surreal feeling of having no hunger, no thirst. That absence was more unsettling than anything else.
What the hell is happening to me? he thought, rubbing absently at his chest, where the knife was still lodged in his body. He couldn't feel the wound anymore, but a strange, hollow sensation lingered there. No hunger, no thirst... just empty.
He stepped over a pile of decayed curtains strewn across the floor, barely noticing them. The walls around him were ancient, marked by time's slow destruction, and each step felt like walking through the remnants of a forgotten world.
His thoughts drifted back to Ms. Nagima, his old teacher from grade school. He wasn't sure why she came to mind now. Maybe it was the way she had carried herself, always so calm, so steady. Her hazel eyes and motherly aura had always made the class feel like everything was going to be okay. Why the hell am I thinking about her now?
He slapped his cheeks, trying to shake himself out of the fog. "Focus," he muttered under his breath.
The hallway opened up into a large, dimly lit chamber, different from the rest of the ruin. Tatsuya paused, taking in the sight. The stone floor had been carved into a massive basin—an old bath, its edges weathered and cracked. The air felt thicker here, more humid, and the faint sound of trickling water echoed in the distance. The bath was empty now, but it wasn't hard to imagine that, long ago, this had been a place of luxury.
People used to clean up here? Tatsuya thought as he walked carefully around the stone edges, eyes tracing the faded carvings of long-forgotten figures. Their stories had eroded with time, just like the rest of this place.
On the far side of the room, the walls opened into a jagged cliff. Tatsuya approached cautiously and peered through. His breath caught at the sight—a vast forest stretched below the ruin, its trees painted in greens and golds, the sky above glowing in the dim light of dusk. The air was cooler, fresher. It should have been peaceful, but instead, it filled him with unease.
I'm on top of a mountain, he realized, feeling a twist in his stomach as he looked down at the steep drop. A decaying structure with monsters roaming it and I'm stuck here at night... Great.
A shiver ran down his spine, and he quickly turned away, hurrying back the way he came.
When he reached the altar room, his breath was ragged. The familiar sight of the bloodline on the floor brought a twisted sense of comfort. He paused at the altar, his eyes drawn to the same horned rat he had unknowingly aged when he leaped over the bloodline, clutching it tightly. Its fur was now white and brittle, and it lazily licked blood from the stone. Blood that had come from him.
Tatsuya looked down at his chest, his hand automatically moving to the knife still lodged there. The weathered black handle stuck out against his worn coat.
I... forgot about this, he thought, staring at it for a moment before gripping the handle and yanking it free.
The pain that should have followed was dull, distant. He looked at the knife, its blade slick with congealed blood, and felt a strange static sensation crawl across his mind. His body was already numbing itself to pain, and that realization made the crawling feeling even worse.
As the last rays of sunlight faded, replaced by the cold glow of moonlight seeping through the cracks in the walls, Tatsuya sank down next to the altar. The knife clattered to the floor beside him, but he didn't care. His body felt heavier now, exhaustion weighing him down.
He wrapped his arms around his knees, curling up against the altar's shadow. "This is so embarrassing," he muttered into his sleeves. "Everything about this is just... pathetic."
Despite the frustration, despite the fear gnawing at him, his eyes began to droop. The exhaustion from the last few hours finally pulled him into sleep, and the sounds of the wind outside faded into the background.
Tatsuya woke with a start, his head resting awkwardly on a piece of rubble. Groaning, he blinked and rubbed the sleep from his eyes, stretching his stiff arms. Oddly enough, he felt... refreshed, like he'd just had the best sleep of his life.
Then something in the corner of the room caught his attention—horned rats, scurrying around, locked in a vicious battle with oversized spiders. The rats gnawed and dodged, their sharp teeth flashing as they darted around the spiders' long, razor-like legs. The spiders shot webs at their opponents, trying to trap them.
Tatsuya flinched at the sight. "That's... creepy." He watched, unsettled, as one of the rats narrowly escaped a spider's strike.
But something about the rats nagged at him. Wait... they're different. They weren't the same rats he'd seen before. These ones were similar, but their shapes, their fur, something was off.
He stood slowly, taking in the chaotic scene with cautious eyes. The room was still as dilapidated as ever, but against one wall, something caught his attention—a collapsed bookshelf, barely visible in the dim light.
"Books?" he muttered, walking over to inspect the pile. Curiosity tugged at him as he crouched down, brushing away the thick layer of dust that covered the old tomes. Most of them were too far gone, crumbling at his touch, but a few were intact.
The pages were filled with strange symbols—foreign, unreadable. Tatsuya frowned. "Great," he muttered, flipping through one of the books. "As if things weren't confusing enough."
Still, something about the books felt important. He tucked a few under his arm and glanced around the room one last time before heading back toward the hallway.
A month passed.
Tatsuya sat on a cracked ledge near the cliff, the cool night air brushing against his skin. Over the last few weeks, he'd pored over the books, slowly piecing together the language. It had been tough at first, but the more he practiced, the clearer things became. The symbols began to make sense, forming words, then thoughts.
He flipped through one of the books, his finger tracing the outline of a detailed diagram. It was a drawing of a body—one disturbingly similar to his own. The fangs, the eyes, even the way the muscles were shaped... all of it matched him.
Tatsuya's heart sank as he read aloud, his voice barely above a whisper. "I'm a ghoul..."
His eyes widened as he continued reading. "Injuries that would kill a human won't kill me, but I'll die slower. No need for food or water, but I need... monster flesh to keep myself from rotting. Sunlight weakens me."
He closed the book, frustration tightening his grip. So this is what I am now.
But even as that realization settled in, something else sparked inside him—a small flicker of determination.
He stood up, looking out at the night sky, the silver moonlight reflecting in his eyes. "This is just the start," he muttered, a smirk pulling at his lips. "I'll show that skull. I'll prove I can be more than this."
For the first time since waking up in the ruin, Tatsuya felt something new—determination.