It stood hidden between stone and root, a seam in the colossal wall, just wide enough for a man to pass through if he knew where to press. The man shifted his burden with ease - Raizen, limp and pale against one side, and the girl on the other. With his mechanical arm he touched the stone. Something deep inside the wall clicked. Iron against stone. The seam split open, revealing a narrow passage swallowed in darkness. Before stepping inside in perfect silence, he hesitated a moment, as if he listened to the whispers of the fields. The door closed behind him, erasing the world of grass, wind, and sky. All that remained was iron, damp stone, and a suffocating dark broken only by the low orange glow of old lightbulbs fixed to the walls. The air here was heavy, tasting of oil, rust, and coal smoke. The hum of machinery echoed faintly, like a heartbeat buried deep within the city’s bones.
The passage sloped downward. Soon the walls widened, and the oppressive dark gave way to a vast cavern - the Underworks. It was a world beneath Neoshima, a world for the unwanted. Tunnels and tight back roads spread in every direction, some lit by flickering street lamps, if you could call them that, others lost to pitch blackness. Makeshift bridges of scrap metal and rusted iron reigned between different tall buildings, dripping with condensation. The cavern roof was lost in shadow, though pipes and hanging chains caught glimmers of light when they swayed. People were everywhere - shadows in cloaks, gaunt faces, children darting barefoot between market stalls that sold scraps of food, broken tools and deadly weapons. Voices rose and fell in a constant murmur: bargaining, shouting, crying, whispering.
Life. Harsh, desperate life, but life nonetheless. He moved steadily through it, his boots striking against the uneven stone, each step resonating with quiet authority. Those who noticed him quickly stepped aside. Eyes lingered on his mechanical arm, on the scars across his face, on the way he carried the unconscious boy and girl without faltering. Some lowered their gazes in silence. Others whispered, but none dared to block his path.
A group of children huddled in a corner near a sputtering lamp, their clothes ragged, their hands stretched out to any who passed. Their voices were thin, pleading, almost drowned by the noise of the cavern.
"Please, sir... just a coin... anything..."
A stranger quickly stepped to silence the kids, as if quietly fearing the man’s presence, and not wanting to have anything to do with him.
The human mountain stopped. His shadow fell over them, and the children shrank back instinctively, eyes wide at the sight of his scarred face and mechanical arm. For a long, tense heartbeat he said nothing. Then, with his flesh and visibly strong hand, he reached into his cloak.
A gold coin gleamed in the lamplight. Not just currency, but something rare, the kind that could buy food enough to keep the children alive for weeks. He flicked it toward them with casual precision. One boy snatched it from the air, clutching it to his chest, eyes bright with disbelief. But he was already walking away, his gaze fixed forward, his steps steady and unbroken. He neither looked back nor waited for thanks. The coin was nothing to him. To them, it was everything.
The Underworks shifted as he went deeper. The noise of the marketplace gave way to narrower tunnels, their lamps fewer and farther between. Graffiti symbols rarely covered the stone - symbols of gangs, words of warning, fragments of prayers. The smell of smoke and steam hung heavy in the air. Finally, he stopped before a small door of reinforced steel. Unlike the other shacks and makeshift shelters, this one stood firm, maintained. He pushed it open and stepped inside. The chamber was small but orderly. iron walls patched here and there with scrap metal. A workbench cluttered with tools and weapon parts. A single mattress tucked into a corner. A rack against the far wall held blades of varying length, each gleaming with careful maintenance. A lightbulb flickered softly, filling the room with a warm, muted glow.
The mysterious figure laid the boy gently onto the bed. The boy moved faintly but did not wake. Then, carefully, he lowered her beside him. Her breathing was shallow, but steady. For a long while, the man simply stood there, his scarred face unreadable. His mechanical arm whirred faintly as he flexed it, then went still. He exhaled slowly, the sound heavy in the quiet room. He pulled a chair to the workbench, and he tore his metallic hand apart.
Time passed without measure in the underworks, where there was no sunrise or sunset. But eventually, Raizen’s body began to stir.
A sharp breath escaped his lips as his eyes fluttered open. Pain was the first thing he felt - his arm throbbed with fire, his chest ached with every breath, his body weighed down as if he had been crushed beneath stone. For a moment he thought he was still in the village, still surrounded by flames and shadows.
Then he noticed the ceiling, and the pipes running across it. A faint glow of lamplight. The steady sound of air pipes hissing somewhere in the distance.
He turned his head. Beside him, the girl was still unconscious, but her chest was rising slowly. Raizen, surprised of the small distance between them, immediately looked away, flustered. But she was alive. That single truth steadied his racing heart. Relief surged through him. But as he tried to sit up, it was like thunder struck his whole body. He grunted audibly, crashing back to the mattress.
The man was sitting in a chair, his presence filling the small chamber like a storm cloud. He didn’t pay attention to the two. He was focused on his metal arm, now disassembled, on the workbench. A small screw needed to go back into one of the fingers. The metal was glinting in the lamplight. Leaving his hooded coat, his scarred face was fully visible in the dim light. Half his face, on the same side of his robotic arm, was covered by a big eyepatch, concealing his cheek, too.
The quiet thud caught his attention. But he never turned around. His focus was flawless, unbothered. The silvery finger would just not accept the screw. Frustrated, the man just abandoned his hardware and suddenly got up from his old chair. His eyes met Raizen’s. Dark. Unyielding. They pierced straight through him, weighing, measuring.
For a moment, silence stretched, broken only by the faint hiss of the pipes. Raizen’s throat felt dry, words caught behind fear and exhaustion. His gaze lingered on the boy, then drifted to the unconscious girl beside him. For the faintest moment, something flickered in his expression - recognition, perhaps, or memory. Then it was gone, replaced with the same iron mask.
"I’m surprised you’re still alive, kid. That’s what’s important now."
Without verbalizing anything else, the man turned back to his work. Raizen looked at his bandaged hand and body. His chest tightened. Body screamed for rest, but his mind whirled with questions, with fear. He tried to get up once more, but the efforts were in vain - only managing to lean on his elbows...
His eyes scanned the room, as if they were looking for answers. On a wall, a huge map dominated. It was covered in hundreds of small pins and pictures. Pictures of graffiti, people crossed out with an X, small notes and locations that seemed random. Every one of these locations was tied to another one, in a complex network held together by red string. One word was present more than the others. One word could be distinguished.
Behind him, on a shelf, a small framed picture of a woman, unrecognizable because of a huge crack in the glass. Raizen lowered his gaze, respectfully.
His small search was interrupted by the deep voice of the man, rupturing the silence once more. With a slightly warmer tone, without turning around, he said:
"Rest. You’ll need your strength. Tomorrow you’ll understand more than you might want"
The voice echoed through Raizen’s now empty mind. He turned, glancing at the girl sleeping one last time, but deciding to obey. Facing back up, with his healthy hand covering his forehead. Raizen smiled. His vision blurred. Darkness pulled at the edges once more, though softer now, almost merciful. Eyes shut, covering everything in pitiful darkness. Almost whispering, he added:
"Raizen. My name is Raizen" For more chapters visit novelꜰire.net
The man responded: "I’m Takeshi."