November 2nd. 10:00 PM.

The dim, lifeless glow of the streetlamp flickered just outside my apartment window, casting long shadows across the living room floor. I sat in silence, staring blankly at the wall, my mind replaying the events of the past twenty-four hours over and over again like some cruel, unending nightmare.

Kento was gone.

We’d searched for him the entire day.

From the moment he vanished outside the restaurant, Sasaki had kicked into full gear, calling in every resource, mobilizing his entire unit, and tapping into any contact that might have a clue as to where Kento could be.

But nothing. No leads, no witnesses, no signs of a struggle. Just... nothing.

My body ached from the hours spent running around the city, checking alleyways, questioning anyone who might’ve seen something.

Every lead we chased, every corner we turned—it all led us back to square one.

And now, here I was. Alone in my apartment.

Waiting.

Hoping for something—anything—that would break the silence. But all that filled the room was the low hum of the city outside, and the distant sound of cars passing in the street.

The whole day had been a blur of frantic activity.

I remembered calling Kento’s phone again and again, each time praying that he would answer with that casual, cocky tone of his, reassuring me that everything was fine.

But each call went straight to voicemail, the sound of that mechanical voice taunting me with its cold finality.

“Kento... where the hell are you?”

I muttered to myself, running a hand through my hair, the weight of exhaustion pressing down on me.

I hadn’t eaten.

I hadn’t slept.

I couldn’t.

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw his face—his carefree grin, his stupid jokes.

I kept thinking about our last conversation, how lighthearted it had been.

How he’d teased me about looking sharp for dinner.

How none of us could’ve known that it would be the last time we’d see him.

A sharp, biting chill crept through the apartment, but it wasn’t the cold air that made me shiver.

It was the growing realization that something terrible had happened. That maybe... Kento wasn’t coming back.

Sasaki had kept his calm, stoic demeanor throughout the day, but I could see it in his eyes.

The same fear that gnawed at me.

The same dread that whispered in the back of my mind that maybe we were too late.

I pushed myself off the couch, pacing the room, trying to shake off the anxiety that clung to me like a second skin.

The clock on the wall ticked away the seconds, each one feeling like a countdown to some inevitable, horrible truth.

I walked to the window, needing to clear my head, needing some kind of distraction from the relentless thoughts that chased each other in circles.

And that’s when I saw it.

Kento’s car.

Parked across the street, just beneath the flickering streetlamp.

The engine was running, its headlights casting long, ghostly beams across the wet pavement.

My heart skipped a beat.

I leaned closer to the window, squinting in disbelief.

How...?

I hadn’t noticed it before.

Had it been there all this time?

I pressed my forehead to the glass, my breath fogging up the window.

The street was empty, eerily quiet. The car sat there, like a dark, waiting shadow.

Without thinking, I grabbed my jacket and bolted for the door, my mind racing with a hundred different thoughts.

Was Kento in the car?

Had he come back?

Was this some kind of joke?

Or worse... was this a trap?

My footsteps echoed down the stairwell as I took the steps two at a time, my pulse pounding in my ears.

I stepped out into the cold night air, my breath coming out in visible clouds.

The car was still there, engine idling quietly.

I hesitated for a second, my hand hovering over the door handle.

Something didn’t feel right.

My gut churned with a deep, instinctual fear, but I had to know.

With a shaky breath, I pulled the door open.

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And then I saw it.

Kento’s body. Or what was left of it.

He was slumped in the driver’s seat, his face pale, bloodied, unrecognizable.

His body torn apart, as if some savage animal had ripped him to shreds.

His clothes were soaked in blood, his arms twisted at unnatural angles, and his chest... Oh God, his chest...

It was caved in, the bones shattered, the skin ripped open, exposing mangled muscle and torn flesh.

There was so much blood.

So much that it pooled on the floor of the car, dripping down onto the street below, staining the pavement with dark, crimson streaks.

I stumbled back, my stomach lurching violently as the horror of what I was seeing sank in.

“No... no, no, no...”

I whispered, barely able to breathe.

The bile rose in my throat, and before I could stop myself, I bent over, vomiting onto the ground, my whole body shaking uncontrollably.

This couldn’t be real.

This wasn’t Kento.

It couldn’t be.

But it was.

His face—what was left of it—was still there.

His eyes, wide open, staring blankly into nothing, devoid of the life that had once filled them.

The familiar cocky grin replaced by a grotesque, twisted expression of pain and fear.

I staggered backward, my vision swimming as I tried to make sense of what I was seeing.

Who could have done this?

Who could have possibly inflicted such monstrous violence on someone like Kento?

My knees buckled, and I collapsed onto the sidewalk, gasping for breath, my heart racing, my mind spinning.

The cold night air bit into my skin, but I didn’t feel it.

All I could feel was the overwhelming shock, the horror that had lodged itself deep in my chest, threatening to suffocate me.

I fumbled for my phone, my hands shaking so badly I almost dropped it.

I dialed Sasaki’s number, my fingers trembling as I pressed the buttons.

The phone rang once, twice, and then—

“Sasaki-san, it’s... it’s Kento! He’s here! His car—he’s in his car—”

I could barely get the words out, my voice cracking with panic.

“Keisuke, calm down. Where are you?”

Sasaki’s voice was steady, but I could hear the urgency in his tone.

“I’m... I’m outside my apartment. He’s here, Sasaki. He’s... he’s dead.”

There was a pause on the other end of the line, a silence that stretched on for what felt like an eternity.

“We’re on our way. Don’t touch anything. Stay where you are.”

I hung up, my hand still shaking as I stared at the car in front of me, at the broken, mangled body that had once been my friend.

The world around me seemed to slow to a crawl, the sounds of the city fading into the background as the cold, hard reality of what had happened crashed down on me.

Kento was gone.

And whoever had done this was still out there.

I sat there, alone on the empty street, the weight of the night pressing down on me like a crushing, suffocating blanket.

The cold seeped into my bones, but it wasn’t just the temperature—it was the coldness of the realization that nothing would ever be the same again.

When Sasaki and the others arrived, their faces were grim, their expressions hard.

They moved quickly, methodically, securing the area, taking pictures, gathering evidence. But all I could do was sit there, numb, staring at the blood-streaked car, my mind struggling to process what I had just witnessed.

Sasaki crouched beside me, his voice low, calm.

“Keisuke, I’m sorry.”

His words barely registered.

I couldn’t respond.

I couldn’t think.

All I could see was Kento’s lifeless body, torn apart by something far more dangerous than we had ever imagined.

This was no random act of violence.

This was a message.

And whoever had sent it was far from finished.

As the night dragged on, and the cold November air grew even more biting, one thought kept echoing in my mind, louder and louder with each passing second.

Nagasuki.

This was his doing.

And now... now, I was next.

Days later...

The world had stopped moving.

For everyone else, life went on.

For me, time had frozen on the night Kento’s lifeless body had been found in that car.

His blood-streaked face haunted me.

It had been days, but I was still living in that same, unbearable moment.

The police were looking into every possible lead, every hint of who could have done this, but I could tell them exactly who was.

Sasaki told me to be quiet.

It seems that the whole Nagasuki Incident was a thing that a few people knew.

I locked myself away again.

I couldn’t face anyone.

Even the simple act of answering the phone felt impossible. I ignored calls from everyone—Aiko, Hana and even Sasaki.

I didn’t want comfort.

I wanted Kento back, and that was never going to happen.

The days blurred together in a fog of grief. I spent most of my time staring blankly at the walls of my apartment, unable to summon the energy to do anything.

The apartment felt smaller, suffocating, like it was closing in on me with each passing day.

The silence was unbearable, but I couldn't bear to turn on the TV or the radio.

Even the sound of my own breath felt too loud in the crushing quiet.

I hadn't left the apartment since Kento's body was found.

I didn’t have the will to go outside, to face the world that continued to spin without him.

Every time I looked out the window, the street seemed foreign, hostile.

The place where I’d last seen his car was now just an empty stretch of pavement, but I could still see it in my mind—still see him.

One day, after days of barely eating, barely sleeping, I stumbled across something I hadn’t noticed before.

In a pile of old papers Kento had left at my place weeks earlier, I found an envelope with my name on it.

His handwriting was unmistakable.

The sight of it made my chest tighten, and for a moment, I hesitated to open it.

Inside was a recommendation letter.

My eyes scanned the words, disbelief flooding through me.

It was a letter Kento had written to the police academy on my behalf.

He proposed me joining him on the force, saying I had a sharp mind, that I’d be good at it.

I’d brushed it off, never taking him seriously, but here it was—proof that he’d believed in me, more than I’d ever believed in myself.

His words hit me like a punch to the gut.

He’d described me as someone dependable, smart, loyal.

Someone who cared about justice.

He’d seen something in me that I hadn’t been able to see.

The grief that had been drowning me shifted.

It didn’t fade, not entirely, but it turned into something else.

Something sharper.

I couldn’t just sit here, doing nothing, while Nagasuki was still out there.

He’d believed in me.

And if I didn’t do something, I’d be betraying him.

The letter shook something loose inside me.

I felt my fingers tighten around it as I stared at his words, the ghost of his voice echoing in my mind.

Kento had wanted me to be more than I was, and now… now he was gone.

But I was still here.

I stood up, my body heavy with days of exhaustion and grief, but I forced myself to move.

I grabbed a clean shirt from the closet, found my old jacket, and slipped it on.

My movements were slow, deliberate, like I was relearning how to function.

But each step felt like a commitment—like I was taking back some part of myself I’d lost in the days since Kento’s death.

I grabbed the letter and slid it into my jacket pocket.

My phone buzzed on the counter, but I didn’t bother checking it. It was probably another missed call from Sasaki or Hana, but I’d deal with that later.

There was something else I needed to do first.

I left my apartment for the first time in days.

The cold November air hit me as soon as I stepped outside, but I welcomed it.

It shocked my senses back to life, pulling me out of the fog that had consumed me.

The city was still bustling, the morning alive with the sounds of cars, distant voices, and the hum of life going on.

For a second, I felt like a stranger in my own world, like I’d been asleep and was just now waking up.

But there was a new resolve in me now.

I wasn’t going to hide anymore.

I wasn’t going to let the grief swallow me whole.

Kento had left me with a parting gift—the belief that I could be something more. And I wasn’t going to let that go to waste.

With each step I took, I felt that resolve harden, solidify into something unbreakable.

The police station loomed ahead, its familiar stone walls standing tall against the bright sky.

The place where Kento had spent so much of his time, the place where he had believed I could join him.

I stopped at the entrance.

My chest tightened again, not from fear, but from the weight of what I was about to do.

I reached into my jacket and pulled out the letter, feeling its edges crinkle under my fingers.

This was for Kento.

For everything he had given me.

For the future he had seen for me, even when I couldn’t.

With a deep breath, I walked through the doors, the weight of the past behind me and the unknown future ahead.

Whatever came next, I would face it.

I owed him that much.