The Void of Souls

Chapter Eight: Breaking the Boundaries

Kazuya felt something strange stirring within him, as if the void had become part of his heart. After acknowledging that the emptiness was a part of him, a sense of calm began to take hold. He breathed slowly, each breath emerging from an immense abyss. There was no place left to run, and even hope no longer felt real. Everything became hazy—a blend of shadows and faint light, leaving no room for clear truths.

"Is this my fate?" Kazuya whispered to himself, staring into the expanse surrounding him. "Is this all that's left for me?"

Suddenly, the shadows around him burst apart, transforming into human-like shapes—yet they weren't truly human. They were specters, distorted images from the past, each one bearing a name connected to Kazuya. Spirits from his past, perhaps victims of his actions, or representations of parts of himself. These phantoms crept closer to him, as if inviting him to confess.

"You are part of all this," one of the spirits said, fluttering through the air in front of him. "You are the reason for all of this."

But to Kazuya, these apparitions appeared as twisted, meaningless reflections. He tried to ignore them, yet they continued to emerge from every angle.

"How could I be the cause?" Kazuya replied quietly. "I tried to run away from everything, and yet here I am... lost."

Another spirit answered sharply, its words piercing him like shards of ice.
"Running doesn't bring you back to life. Running is not the solution."

This was the truth Kazuya had avoided his entire life: running away didn't mean forgetting. He had been fleeing from his past, from his actions, but nothing could undo them. Every choice he had made left a mark. Now, he had to accept that he was part of this void.

"I can't go back now," Kazuya said softly as the spirits moved closer. A deep sense of detachment from himself began to grow, as if his mind was fracturing under the weight of the truth looming before him. "If this is my fate, what's the answer?"

Suddenly, a strange vision unfolded before him—a scene that didn't seem to belong to this world. It was the city, but it was drowning in dense shadows. Kazuya saw himself, but this version of him was darker, more ominous. He was witnessing a moment from the past, one he had either forgotten or deliberately buried.

"This is where it began," the voice said again, but this time it was clearer, as though it was coming from within Kazuya's own heart. "This is where it all started."

Kazuya watched the scene as something inside him began to crack. He was reliving the first moment—the moment he took his first soul, the moment he chose to abandon his humanity. He was the reason for it all, and there was no one else to blame but himself.

"But what if that moment is what shaped me?" Kazuya asked in a trembling voice. "What if I've been searching for this void all along?"

Suddenly, something inside Kazuya shattered, as though a mental wall had collapsed. A mix of pain and relief surged through him simultaneously. He realized something profound: had he created this void, or had it always been within him, waiting to be discovered?

"If I created it, then I must face it," Kazuya said, feeling an unfamiliar strength rising within him. "I won't run anymore."

As the spirits watched him closely, faint threads of light began to appear before him, shimmering in the darkness. The shadows that had surrounded him started to retreat, as if Kazuya was reclaiming control over what remained of himself. This was the turning point—the moment he decided he would no longer be a victim of the void he had created.

"I can't just be a part of the void," he said with growing confidence as the threads of light expanded. "I have to be more than that."

Then, in an unexpected moment, something remarkable occurred. The spirits began to vanish, one by one, as if each was a fragment of his past now being laid to rest. The city around him started to shift, the shadows dissipating little by little. Was this the beginning of life returning?

But just as Kazuya began to feel a sense of peace, a new sensation stirred within him. A faint pulse, a new rhythm. Had he reached the end? Or were there still more secrets waiting to be uncovered?