Three weeks.

It had been three weeks since Ariyama Saato had watched four people die in front of him.

The public story was that when the group of ten students from Sasura Academy went on an innocent little excursion to a run-down building in the outskirts of the city, there was some massive sinkhole, which caused the building to crumble, killing Takemichi Yuno, Jack Hayakawa, Yasami Oichi and Yaranagi Yasuke.

The funerals proceeded like normal, with crying family members and prayers that the dearly departed would find heaven.

And as for Ariyama…

He stayed in his room.

The whole three weeks, he locked himself in his room, refusing to go out and only accepting his food from it being left outside his bedroom door and going to the bathroom or washing whenever he thought it time.

His mother had called for help from a physiologist after week two, but the man simply explained to her that her son was just having difficulty adjusting to the horrors he'd seen.

If only they knew that the ‘horrors he'd seen’ were a lot worse than seeing a sinkhole.

He obviously didn't return to school. He couldn't. He got sick everytime he thought about what would happen; what Kazura and Matsuragi and Odomura would say to him, or what anyone else would say to him.

He wasn't sure about Matsune and whether or not she'd gone back. But she had seemed equally shaken from the experience, even if she had some level of knowledge about Shrines and Enchanted Tools and Pilgrims, all things that were still vague to Ariyama.

I didn't matter anyway. He wasn't going to go out, and wasn't going to show his face.

Especially after he'd looked in the mirror.

It had been the morning after the incident.

After he'd stumbled his way home in a state drunk off fear, and had quietly treated his wounds without waking his mother, he'd gone to his futon in his bedroom and fallen asleep the moment his tired body hit the bed.

The next morning, he woke up and instantly raced to the bathroom, nightmares of him covered in blood spurring him on to check if it was happening in reality too.

Luckily, it wasn't the case, but when he had seen himself in the mirror, and noticed it, his blood ran cold.

The hair that usually fell down his forehead, covering his left eye, had a small but noticeable streak of snow white against his jet black hair.

The white.

The white room

The white silhouette.

The white light that poured from the sword.

He had shivered at the thought, but focused back on the streak of white hair.

He knew stress could cause gray hair, but this wasn't that. He knew, instantly, that it was thanks to the power he'd showcased and used to dismantle the beasts who'd killed his friends.

He didn't know how he knew, but he did.

Getting lightheaded, he'd returned to his room and sat there for the rest of the month.

Now, it was coming into December – the winter break that would last until the new year was in just a week – and it was starting to snow vigorously outside. If Ariyama was thankful for anything, he was thankful for the fact his family had installed a good heating system in the house.

After relaxing in a soothing bath – he'd grown to have a liking for baths over the past few days – Ariyama entered his room, locking the door as usual, but only after picking up the plate of dinner left for him by his mother.

His heart swelled with love for her, despite everything that'd happened. He supposed that after witnessing so much carnage, he was glad to just have a home to come back too.

Scrutinizing the plate of rice and an assortment of healthy foods, he sat down crossed-legged on his futon, chewing away at his dinner as he strolled absentmindedly on his phone.

As he expected, his inbox was filled with missed calls, voicemails and unread texts. Kazura? Matsuragi? Odomura? Anyone else at school? He wasn't sure who'd sent them, but he kept them Unopened and planned to keep it that way.

He didn't have the heart to face what they were saying to him, anyway.

Clicking his tongue in frustration, he tossed his phone away and fell back on his futon with an exasperated sigh, crossing his hands behind his hand.

“What a joke…”

He was talking to himself more and more, recently. First sign of madness, wasn't it? He was honestly shocked he hadn't already gone mad. Sure, he rarely felt anything other than sorrow, angst and self-hatred ever since that day, but at least he felt something.

Even if he wasn't happy about it.

It was his fault, after all, for the deaths of those four.

The first week locked in his room was the worst. He tormented himself for every hour of each day, hitting, slapping, scratching.

None of it even came close to the pain he deserved to feel, but he thought it was at least a start.

However, he stopped the self-harm when his mom walked in on him. The tears in her eyes and the shaking of her shoulders as she held him and let him cry into her warm embrace had wretched his heart in pain, but a different kind of pain than he'd been experiencing.

He had momentarily made an unfair thought in his head that she was only showing this motherly love to him now when he was at his lowest, and not any other time

But he'd quickly abandoned that thought in his mind. He was getting the affection he wanted, so he didn't much care where it came from.

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After that day, he hadn't hurt himself physically any anymore, but he'd made sure the door was locked at all times.

By the time the second week had come around, Ariyama was getting used to shutting out any outside connection and being holed up in either his room or the bathroom for the rest of his life.

Around that time, however, he began to investigate.

As his mother reckoned he would be in his room for the foreseeable future, she often left the door to her – and Ariyama's father's --bedroom open, as Ariyama had quickly learned.

Once, when she had gone down to the kitchen to make an evening snack for herself, Ariyama had snuck out of his room for the first time in weeks. He snuck to her room, and silently entered.

Rummaging around for just a few moments, he found what he was looking for in the bedside locker; the history that his mother had confiscated: A History of Sumura's Local Legends.

Clutching the book close to his chest, he ran back to his room in the few seconds he had before she returned. He planned on trying to investigate what truly happened that night with the book, then he'd sneakily replace it back in his parent's bedroom.

This did happen, however.

Once he had his back to his closed door, all it took was him opening one page of interest: the Shrine Gate. As he came eye-to-eye with the red bloody sigil engraved in the yellowing paper, bile rose in his throat and he lurched away from the book to stop his vomit from ruining it.

Even glancing at anything to do with that night, he'd found, led to a churning stomach and rising bile. As such, he'd also dumped the set of ripped clothes he'd worn that night, including the shoes and jacket.

It was a shame. It was a nice jacket.

After cleaning himself up, he had quickly returned the book to the proper place, returned to his room, curled up on his futon and cried himself to sleep.

From then on, he barely left his room anymore, even to pee in the bathroom.

And that led up the current date: December first.

Ariyama thought the first of December would be the same nothingness and isolation as the fourth or the third or the second.

But then his mom came to his door…

Ariyama expected her to go with the usual routine: dropping off his breakfast and telling him how much she loved him and all that.

But no.

Instead, she waited by the door until he was forced to ask:

“What?”

To which she responded:

“Dear, there's someone at the door for you. It's Matsune-chan. She said she was here to check up on you. As you know, she is the only… other survivor of that terrible incident, so I think I'd be good if you at least let her into your room.

Ariyama was about to turn her down and tell her to piss off, but he stopped himself.

Matsune was here?

Now, of all times? Nearly a month after the incident?

Ariyama couldn't lie to himself and say he wasn't intrigued, even slightly.

When he spoke, he spoke with a rumbling and raspy voice that hadn't been used properly in weeks.

“Fine. She can come in.”

“Oh, that's great to hear, dear!”

He heard the slight mile in his mother's voice.

“Just keep the noise down, OK, sweetheart?”

“Oh, shut up.”

Harumi chuckled softly, obviously having not done so in a good while. There were the sounds of footsteps dying away as she headed for the stairs, leaving Ariyama alone with his thoughts again.

He tossed and turned the ideas in his mind as to why Matsune would come now of all times. Maybe she finally was going to explain everything…

Suddenly, Ariyama looked up and his heart nearly stopped in surprise as he saw Matsune enter the room and shut the door behind her.

“Hey, Ariyama-kun. I'm finally going to explain everything.”

Ariyama's breathing was fast-paced and unbreaking. It had been so long since a person had been with him in his room, much less the most popular girl in his school.

As for Matsune herself, Ariyama couldn't deny that she looked good.

She was wearing black yoga pants and a slightly-oversized t-shirt with some Pop band on it, along with clean white shoes and a cozy leopard-print jacket that looked expensive in some way. Was it that material?

Her hair was long and black and silky as usual, her bangs styled so not one was out of place, but her eyes…

Despite the perfection of every other bit of her, her eyes carried the weight of her experiences. Her ebony black irises held a deep and sorrowful aura, accented by the bags under her eyes. Every other part of her was spotless, which just made her tired eyes stand out just that much more.

Ariyama finally remembered to respond to her words.

“Is that so?”

She wouldn't didn't want to meet his gaze, and yet he saw her tense her body as she forced her eyes to meet his.

“Yes, and Ariyama-kun… about that night…”

Ariyama set his jaw.

“Just don't bother. That's the reason I've been locked up in my damn room for the last three weeks. I haven't gone to school since then, and haven't seen any of my friends either. I even tried reading a history book about that Shrine we unknowingly entered, but ended up throwing up everything I'd eaten that day.”

He blinked angrily as tears pricked his eyes.

“I can't even… I can't even look at anything to do with that night. Just… Please, tell me what you need and nothing more.”

Matsune looked at his shabby state with an aura of pity behind her tired eyes. “That's just the thing, Ariyama-kun. I need you to know some things, but what I'm going to talk about… Well, it isn't about how you feel, even if I do care about that.”

Ariyama glared at her, then sighed and made his way onto his futon, sitting crossed-legged.

“So, let me guess. You're going to explain all about… whatever the hell happened then. But what do you mean by that last part?”

“Well, you see, I'm not exactly coming to you this morning out of my own personal decision.”

“So someone's forcing you to be here? I'd that's the case, be my guest and leave–”

Matsune adopted that slightly-pouty, slightly-annoyed face of hers that Ariyama vaguely remembered from back when he attended school.

“Not at all, Ariyama-kun! Someone is asking me to be here, yes, but not forcing me. Either way, I myself felt like it was important that I do so.”

Ariyama pursed his lips as he gauged her reaction, debating mentally how to respond.

Finally, he slumped his shoulders and sighed.

“Huh… Fine, OK. You can sit down if you'd like.”

Matsune's face returned to an attempt of a lighthearted smile.

“Why, thank you.”

Carefully, she knelt beside him on his white futon, folding her legs under her. Nervously, she stroked her hair that fell over her shoulder, before flicking it back. It gave Ariyama a moment of clarity, seeing how she was acting. She felt so vulnerable, and in a weird way, it calmed him down slightly.

After surviving Hell on Earth, they had to have some obscure connection, right?

“So, just to start off: Why did you know, even in a miniscule amount, some stuff about what happened? Even just then, you called it a Shrine. How'd you know that?”

Ariyama shrugged nonchalantly.

“It was from that history book I mentioned. I only read it after school on the same day. For some reason, though, my mom got all shaken up when she found me reading it.”

“Really? And what was the book called?”

“‘Sumura's Local Legends’, or something like that.”

Matsune visibly paled slightly.

“Oh… How did you have that?”

“Found it all dusty on that shelf over there. I have a bunch of books that I haven't touched in forever, or ever at all.”

Matsune swallowed and looked past Ariyama at the shelf exposed through the open wardrobe, her eyes narrowing and scanning the contents hastily. Seemingly coming up empty, she relaxed and turned her attention back to him.

“I see. Well, to put it simply, Ariyama-kun, that book you had is a very old and very important book in our culture. As you can see, it contained many of our truths.”

“Our culture? Our truths? God, Matsune, I thought you were going to explain things, not complicate them.”

He hadn't intended to have so much venom in his words, but he couldn't help it. He still needed answers as to what had happened, and especially what Matsune herself knew.

She nodded straight away, her tired eyes focusing on him intently.

“Right, sorry, I'm all over the place. So, I'll start with the basics, then?”

“Sure.”