𝙍𝙐𝙄𝙉𝙎 | 𝙃𝙤𝙨𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙖 𝙎𝙤𝙨𝙝𝙞𝙧𝙤

The day it all fell apart didn’t start with screams. It started with silence. A deep, unnatural silence that covered the Defence Force’s Tokyo branch like the hush before a storm. Birds had stopped singing, and distant sirens faded into the background, like the city was holding its breath.

Vice-Captain Hoshina Soshiro stood still in the corridor outside the command center, leaning against the wall, his fingers tapping the sheaths of his blades in a slow rhythm. He kept his eyes closed, not out of calmness, but to focus on the smallest sounds—hurried footsteps, rushed breathing, the hum of flickering lights.

Something was wrong.

Captain Ashiro Mina’s voice barked over the in-ear comms device. “Team Alpha, respond. What’s the status?”

Crackling silence. Then, “—infected—breaking through—a lot of men are down—” The line went dead.

The next moments were a blur of movement. Soshiro sprinted down the corridor past startled officers, his boots thudding like gunshots against the floor. Emergency lights flared red over his head.

Approaching the west wing of the base, he was hit by the screams of men, and eerie, inhuman shrieks unlike anything he had ever heard before. He unsheathed his twin blades, and as he burst into the lower west wing, he was slammed by a vision torn straight from a nightmare.

Uniformed officers clawed at their own faces, their bodies convulsing, shrieking while their mouths stained with black drool and blood. The air stank of blood and rot.

One officer turned towards Soshiro with clouded eyes, his jaw hanging wide. Without hesitation, the infected officer screeched and lunged at Soshiro.

With a single, fluid motion, one of his blades sliced through the infected officer’s neck. The body fell to the floor with a dull thud. Two more infected soldiers charged at him from nearby. Soshiro dodged their attacks with ease, and sliced their necks with no hesitation.

After cutting down more infected officers and civilians, Soshiro heard a familiar voice and rushed towards it, only to find Operations Leader Okonogi Konomi fending off a group of three infected.

Just as he reached her, one of the infected ambushed her from behind and bit her on her upper arm. Soshiro’s eyes widened in horror as he sliced the attacker, killing him instantly. He killed off the rest of the infected around Konomi and kneeled beside her. Seeing the bite mark on her arm, Soshiro wasted no time tearing a piece of fabric from Konomi’s lab coat and wrapping it around the wound. He knew the infection spread fast and hoped that tying the wound off would buy Konomi some time until they could get help. She was pale and sweating, but still conscious and insisted she could still fight.

The outbreak spread like fire through dry grass. Entire squads fell, and communications failed. Captain Ashiro’s last order echoed in his earpiece: Fall back. Head for the evacuation zones. Protect who you can.

Together, Soshiro and Konomi pushed through waves of the infected as they headed for the last known evacuation point. He fought harder than ever, cutting through anything in their path, holding on to the hope that someone at the evacuation zone could help her. Konomi weakened along the way with every step, her speech fading. But she didn’t give up, not until the gates of the evacuation zone came into view.

Soshiro burst into the zone, surrounded by scared civilians and a few exhausted guards. He shouted for medical attention, but before anyone could respond, Konomi’s body fell to the ground and started jerking violently.

Her eyes turned cloudy, her breathing became raspy, and she let out a high-pitched shriek. In a flash, she lunged at a man nearby, biting and clawing the innocent guy. Screams erupted and the place descended into chaos. People were knocking down barriers and trampling one another in panic.

Soshiro tried to reach Konomi, to stop her, to do something—but the crowd was too thick. He was shoved to the ground, nearly trampled over by others. Blood smeared across his hands as he pushed himself up. When he looked up again, Konomi was gone.

Soshiro knew that in a matter of minutes, the evacuation zone would become just another graveyard, overrun with dozens of infected. He clawed his way out, bruised and bloodied, gripped by an immense sense of guilt—not only had he failed to save Konomi, but his actions led to the deaths and infection of countless innocent people.

The evacuation zone now lay in ruins, any promise of escape shattered. Soshiro heard screams and shrieks of the infected in the distance. He wandered aimlessly on the empty streets, avoiding the infected when he could. Minutes passed. Or maybe hours. He didn’t know. But he knew that most civilians were gone, and so was most of the Defence Force. They were all either dead or infected.

Soshiro stood at the edge of the city, blades dripping with blood, his uniform torn. Behind him, Tokyo burned. Before him, the silence returned. And in that silence, he walked.