Intro

The non-existent foreign one will fade away as the truth is revealed.

When the time comes, memories are suppressed.

Their lives are repeated, and they are forgotten by loved ones.

Nonetheless, stories rise and fall into ashes, creating a cycle that is lost with time.

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"Not this time..." A young man in his twenties stood in the centre of a room, looking up at the silhouette of a man surrounded by black smoke, crawling on the wall like a lizard. He sighed and exited the room when he saw this. These kinds of things had been happening to him on a daily basis since he was a child.

He was able to see supernatural beings that normal eyes could not see. He had no idea how he acquired this strange ability, but he grew accustomed to it as he grew older. He even began conversing with some ghosts because they couldn't leave him alone. He then made it a habit to converse with them and with ordinary people. He appeared to be talking to himself as if he were insane. As a result, no children approached him to talk to him, and he was treated differently by others. As a result, he became an outcast.

His mother died when he was a child, and his father abandoned him soon after. He was basically an orphan. He only had family members. Despite the fact that he was a hindrance to them, they were forced to accept him. But he didn't stick around with any of them for long. He had to move from place to place because they were going to kick him out in less than a month. It was all because of his peculiar behaviour. They eventually sent him to an orphanage because no one wanted an oddball in their home.

He makes his way to his room. He enters his bedroom and lies down on his single-sized bed, closing his eyes. He begins to reminisce about his past.

When he thinks about it, his family is quite strange. His mother, Ayumu Katsuo, was a very kind and cheerful woman, but she was also quite short-tempered, according to his relatives. His mother was the polar opposite of his father.

Takeru Katsuo is his father's name. He's a man of few words. He never speaks unless it is absolutely necessary. He sometimes wonders how they met.

Takeru has paid little attention to him since his mother, Ayumu, died of cancer. When Haruki's mother died, he was five years old. He was nothing more than a gullible child.

Takeru looked after him until he was eight years old, at which point he gave him to his aunt to look after. He never explained why he left him with his aunt, and he never asked him why. He was aware that his father required some space. Before leaving with his aunt, he said goodbye to the little creatures and ghosts he had befriended, as well as his father.

His brief recall of those memories was quickly interrupted by his focus on the present. He raises his eyelids to reveal a silvery-gray eye.

A smile appears on his face, and a humourless laugh escapes his mouth.

Everyone will forget him once he's gone, just as the prophecy predicted. He sighs as he muses. What had he done wrong to deserve this? Why can he see them when other people can't? Why can he hear and touch them as if they were real, but other humans cannot? Is it a blight? He'll never find out.

"What are you up to, Haruki?" A foreign voice approaches him and asks him a question. The raven-haired man screams and falls out of bed. In the background, one can hear laughter.

"Don't just appear out of nowhere, Yotsu!" Haruki yelled. Yotsu snickers at his expression. "You shriek like a girl!" exclaimed another foreign voice. Haruki's face flushes with embarrassment.

Haruki grabs the nearest object, a pillow, and throws it at Yotsu, who bursts out laughing. The pillow lands on Yotsu's face. Haruki yells at Yotsu, who was hit.

"Don't laugh!"

Unfortunately, the laughter does not stop, but instead grows louder as more ghosts and creatures join in on the fun. Haruki huffs angrily, but then a small smile appears on his face. The gloomy atmosphere has vanished. Yotsu, he realises, wants to lift his spirits.

Haruki sighs softly as the laughter fades. He gets up from the ground and walks over to his study table. He takes a book from the bookshelf on the study table, grabs a pen, and begins to write. "Are you still working on your story, Haruki?" A tengu appears next to him. Haruki responded with a hum.

[ A Tengu is a mythical creature from Japanese folklore. ]

They are classified as yokai or Shinto Kami. Originally thought to take the forms of birds of prey and monkey deities, the tengu are traditionally depicted with human, monkey, and avian characteristics. [Wikipidea]

"Haruki, what are you going to write?" Yotsu inquired, peering over his shoulder.

"I'm writing about how we all met for the first time, beginning with you, Yotsu." Haruki responded.

"Eh?!" Me? Yotsu asked, surprised. "Yeah, you're the first mythical creature I befriended, and you're the most irritating creature I've ever met."

"I'm not bothersome!" Haruki yelled back, but Haruki ignored Yotsu and kept writing.

'I wish this moment would last forever.' Haruki sighed and smiled sorrowfully.

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