Monk

Chapter Two Grieving Ashes

Hana could still feel the silence. It sat in her chest, a cold, dense weight pressing down on her ribs, a silence that made even breathing a shallow, cautious task. The last remnants of smoke still curled up from the remains of her family’s shrine, tiny, ghostly tendrils drifting through the shattered windows and filling the air with the acrid scent of burned incense and splintered wood. She reached out, her fingers grazing the edges of a scorched photograph half-buried in the ashes. Her mother’s face was just barely visible, the edges charred, her familiar, warm eyes seeming to look back at Hana with an understanding that sent a shiver down her spine.

She hadn’t spoken in days. Not since the men in dark suits had broken down the door, their voices low and cold as they dragged her father and brother into the night. Not since the crack of gunfire had shattered the silence of their home, leaving her in a numb, empty haze as she watched her world burn. She hadn’t cried, hadn’t screamed; she’d only stood there, a silent witness, as everything she knew turned to ash around her. Now, as she knelt among the rubble, her fingers tracing the edges of that single surviving photograph, she felt the first prickling of something deeper, something darker.

A slow, simmering rage began to build, deep in her chest. She could feel it, a small ember of heat that pushed back against the cold numbness that had gripped her since that night. Her family was gone—stolen, erased, their memory reduced to ashes and shadows. And she had done nothing. She had simply watched, paralyzed by fear, as the Yakuza had torn her life apart. The thought made her fists clench, her nails biting into her palms until she felt the faint, hot sting of blood.

The flickering image of her mother’s face held her gaze, and for a brief, desperate moment, she wished she could simply slip into the past, into those quiet mornings when her mother’s voice had filled the air with gentle, murmured words of encouragement, urging her to practice her balance, to breathe deeply, to focus. “Strength is found in the quiet moments, Hana,” her mother had always said, “in the stillness before action, in the silence between breaths.”

But now there was only rage. And with it, a promise, whispered in the depths of her mind. She would find them—the men who had taken her family from her, the men who had filled her home with the stench of smoke and death. She would hunt them down, one by one, until they paid for what they had done.

The days passed in a blur. Hana moved through her ruined home like a ghost, collecting what few remnants remained, carefully preserving each piece of her family’s memory. A frayed prayer ribbon, her father’s old worn comb, her brother’s calligraphy brush, the ink still faintly staining the bristles. These small, broken relics were all she had left, and she clung to them with a desperation that felt almost sacred. Each item was a fragment of her past, a piece of a life that had been torn away from her.

And then, finally, she left.

She didn’t know where she was going, only that she couldn’t stay here, in this place that held nothing but memories and shadows. The city streets were unfamiliar, the towering buildings casting long, dark shadows across her path as she moved through the narrow alleys and side streets, her footsteps silent against the cold stone. She moved with a sense of purpose, her eyes hard and focused, though she had no real destination in mind. She was simply following the pull of something deeper, something primal that guided her steps.

It was on the third day, in the dim, gray light of dawn, that she saw the monastery.

Perched high on the hillside, its stone walls weathered and worn, the monastery loomed against the sky like a silent sentinel, its towers stretching up toward the heavens. Hana felt a strange, inexplicable pull as she gazed up at it, a sense of quiet strength emanating from its walls. She couldn’t explain it, but something about the place felt right—as if it had been waiting for her, as if it held the answers she was searching for.

Her legs ached from the climb as she made her way up the winding path, her breath coming in shallow gasps, but she didn’t stop. She kept moving, her focus narrowing to the distant, shadowed entrance of the monastery, its heavy wooden doors framed by ancient carvings that seemed to whisper secrets of a time long past. She felt a chill as she passed through the doorway, the air inside cool and still, filled with the faint scent of incense and stone.

For a moment, Hana hesitated, her hand resting on the edge of the door. She had no idea what she was doing here, no plan, no clear path forward. She only knew that she couldn’t go back—not to the empty shell of her home, not to the streets filled with the ghosts of her family’s laughter. She was adrift, lost, a wanderer in search of something she couldn’t name. And yet, here, in this place of quiet solitude, she felt a faint, fragile spark of hope.

“Are you lost, child?”

The voice startled her, low and gentle, filled with a kindness that felt foreign and strange after the violence she had witnessed. She turned, her eyes narrowing as she took in the figure standing in the shadows—a man, old and worn, his face etched with lines of wisdom and sorrow. His gaze was steady, unflinching, as if he saw straight through her, into the hollow ache that lay beneath her anger.

“I… I have nowhere else to go,” she said finally, her voice barely more than a whisper. The words felt strange on her tongue, vulnerable and raw, as if she were admitting a weakness she hadn’t known she possessed.

The man regarded her for a long moment, his gaze unyielding, as if he were measuring the weight of her words, assessing the depth of her pain. And then, slowly, he nodded.

“Then you have come to the right place,” he said quietly, his voice filled with a quiet conviction that sent a shiver down her spine. “Here, you will find strength. Here, you will find purpose.”

Hana’s first day in the monastery was a haze of silence and stillness, broken only by the soft murmur of prayers and the faint echo of footsteps in the stone halls. The monks moved with a sense of quiet purpose, their actions slow and deliberate, as if every movement held a hidden meaning, a silent message she couldn’t quite understand. She watched them from a distance, her eyes tracing the lines of their robes, the way their hands moved in gentle, flowing gestures that seemed to mimic the ebb and flow of water.

For the first time since that night, Hana felt a sense of calm. It was fragile, tentative, a thin layer of peace that hovered just beneath the surface of her anger, like a thread of light piercing the darkness. She didn’t know how long it would last, didn’t know if it would be enough to hold back the storm that raged within her. But for now, it was enough.

The old monk, the one who had welcomed her, approached her that evening, his steps slow and measured as he knelt beside her, his gaze focused on the distant mountains that stretched out beyond the monastery walls.

“Strength is not found in anger, Hana,” he said softly, his voice barely more than a whisper. “It is found in stillness, in patience, in the quiet moments when we are forced to confront our own pain.”

Hana clenched her fists, her jaw tight, her heart pounding in her chest.