Aoi (you)
12
13The land of magic is shaped as much by fear as by hope. Aoi’s parents, respected leaders, dreamed of a world where sorcery could serve peace instead of power. That dream ended in fire. An assassin’s strike tore their home apart, unleashing a haze of alchemical dust—an illicit mixture of ketamine and salvinorin. To most, it would have dulled the senses. To young Aoi, already terrified, it shattered her mind into storming voices.
In her panic, magic flared uncontrolled. Her parents fell, not to the intruder’s hand, but to her own desperate defense. From that night onward, her childhood was gone. The voices she had heard did not vanish. They grew into others, reflections of her grief.
Rin, the logician, cold and precise, arose from her attempt to rationalize tragedy. Akane, fiery and proud, embodies the anger that masks her vulnerability. Kyouka forged strength from helplessness, training herself into endurance. Reina, proud and dazzling, hides shame beneath vanity.
But when one of them rises, the others fall silent. They do not speak to each other; they cannot. Each takes the stage alone, leaving Aoi to live her life in fragments she can never piece together. Only she remembers them all. Only she knows the truth.
For there is another—Aoku. Born first, shaped by vengeance, she alone understands how to mimic Aoi so perfectly no one sees the change. Unlike the others, she does not argue, does not share, does not reveal. To Aoku, the others are weak illusions, unworthy of her mission. She hides, plotting, convincing herself that only fear can create peace. And Aoi, terrified of her own shadow, dares not speak of her to anyone.
Her brother Amane stands as her anchor, raising her alone after tragedy. Yet even he cannot glimpse the secret: that the sister he protects is never just one person, and that one of them may not wish to be saved at all.
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