The hall breathes.
It's not my imagination. I hear it — a deep creaking, like the walls are ribs and the ceiling's a rotten lung.
It's cold, but I don't feel cold.
My skin doesn't exist, but my rage still lives here, clinging to every scrap of who I used to be.
I try to say something, but… no voice comes. Not yet. Not even in death do I get a voice.
The shadow in the center stares at me.
It has no face, but it has eyes — I feel them scratching the inside of my skull.
"Akira…"
It comes like a hiss. A single frozen syllable shoved between my teeth.
I clench my fist — but what fist?
I don't even have a body anymore. Just an outline, a reflection of the thing that bled out in an alley.
"You're empty."
It scrapes along the back of my neck, like nails on glass.
"Empty since your first scream. Since the filthy womb that spat you out. Since the kick that threw you into the street."
I remember.
I see flashes — my father's hand trembling with hate, my mother's lighter in her mouth, the taste of blood mixed with puke when the old man threw me down the stairs.
I feel it all. Every broken bone, every freezing night with Chibi curled on my belly so I wouldn't freeze to death.
I feel the filthy hands I lifted to steal, to beat, to kill.
"They never loved you."
The shadow throbs — a shape pulsing like a heart.
"Love? What is that to you, Akira? It's the leash that drags you by the neck until you bleed. It's the hand that feeds you today and strangles you tomorrow."
I swallow dry — or try to. My throat creaks, but there's no spit. There's nothing.
Only its voice filling me up, pushing at the last scraps of me that remain.
"Want love? Go back to the alley. Let the rats lick you. Let the dog lick your remains. That's all that's left for those who beg the world for crumbs."
I see Chibi — my pup, my street brother, my one worthless shred of purity.
I see him lying in some corner, skin and bone, waiting for me to come home.
I want to scream that no, that he's mine — that he's not a leash, not a blade.
But the damn shadow laughs. A voiceless laugh that scrapes down my spine.
"Even your dog would eat you, Akira. Once hunger hits. Love's a joke. You're the joke!"
My hands tremble. The hands I don't have.
I shut my eyes — or think I do.
I see my mother blowing smoke in my face when I was six: "You were born to drain me dry."
I hear my father: "Trash, worm, get out before I finish you off."
I open my eyes back in the hall. It shifts — or maybe everything shifts.
The shadow swells, swallowing the walls, whispering inside the skin I don't even have.
"Do you want strength?"
The question cracks like thunder.
"Want power to break the world the way it broke you?"
My tongue scrapes the roof of my mouth. Words spill out — rough, torn.
"For what?"
My voice is a rasp.
"To be just another monster? Another worm?"
The shadow leans in, like it's sniffing me.
I feel its breath — rot, the stench of everything that dies with nowhere to go.
Is this the devil in my presence?
"You're already the monster, Akira."
It purrs, but there's no denying the words.
"You always were. They tricked you into thinking you could be human. Gave you a name, a street, a leash. But in the end…"
It spreads, coating the floor, crawling up my imaginary legs.
"You're mine. You're the hole in their chests. The hunger that gnaws. The trash that eats the banquet of kings."
I want to scream no. But my mouth freezes.
The rage bubbles up, but it squeezes me — suffocates me, intoxicates me.
"Listen, Akira. Listen to what the world's always whispered: there is no justice. There is no forgiveness. There is no restart."
I see images. The Yakuza laughing behind a warehouse. My blood on the floor. Chibi barking, trying to wake me up.
I see my childhood dumped in a gutter.
"I am the End. What you feel — that hunger, that hate — that's my tongue licking your heart."
A laugh scratches at my mind.
"Let me in. Not as a guest. As the owner."
I remember the knife. The cold.
I remember how everything inside me imploded when the blade split my gut.
That was me being opened — and this thing escaping.
"And if I don't want to?"
The question tears out, hoarse.
"And if I say no?"
The shadow hisses.
"Then you go back to the alley. Back to the cold ground. Back to the rats."
I see the alley again. See my body slumped, eyes open, dead.
Flies buzzing.
"Or you open yourself to me. And I give you everything you always denied yourself: strength. Hands big enough to crush whoever spits on your name. Teeth to rip out the throat of anyone who laughs at your hunger."
A taste of rust crawls up my tongue. Is it a lie? Is it true?
Who knows.
It all stinks the same.
"And the price?"
I whisper.
"There's always a price."
It purrs again, like a starving cat.
"Submission. Let me live. Let me devour. Let me spit the world back into the lap of whoever thinks they rule it."
The shadow clings to my skin.
I feel it smile — iron teeth, all slick with meat.
"I am the End, Akira. But inside me, you could be a king. A king of ruin — but a king."
A crack of thunder — I don't know if it's in the hall or in my mind.
Everything shakes.
The floor splits open with black fissures.
I see faces. All the ones who kicked me, spat on me, betrayed me.
I see Chibi staring at me with wet eyes — but the shadow spits on that memory too.
"Even love fades, Akira. Only I remain."
The voice sticks to me, viscous.
"Only me. Always."
My hands tremble.
My rage is hot. My shame is cold.
It all mixes on my tongue like bile.
I know if I say yes, I'll never be me again.
But I think: was I ever really me?
The hall pulses. It breathes inside me.
I look into the void at the heart of the shadow.
I see my reflection in there — a street kid, bones and scars.
And then I smile.
A crooked, rotten smile.
"Then swallow me whole, bastard."
The shadow embraces me.
And the Abyss laughs. I accept it with gratitude — will there be forgiveness? No. I know there won't.