— Prologue —

  "Sweet Bun and a Light in the Dark"

  Friday evening, autumn, 7:52 PM.

  An ordinary day, one of hundreds that had blurred into each other. Haruki Minami sat in his dimly lit apartment, staring at the ceiling. Silence.

  A book lay open on page 276. The words no longer meant anything.

  He got up and walked to the window.

  Outside: withered leaves, gloomy neon, wet asphalt.

  “So boring. Not even sad. Just... empty.”

  He threw on a black sweatshirt, sweatpants, and sneakers. His short black hair was slightly tousled, but he didn’t bother with a mirror.

  His mission was simple — a bun and something to drink.

  He walked the usual streets, not even glancing around. Darkness was settling in — autumn never shows mercy.

  But where a vending machine used to be, now stood workers, barriers, and blinking cones.

  “Perfect,” he muttered, turning into a narrow alley he hadn’t visited since childhood.

  Damp. Moldy. A single flickering streetlamp, dying like everything else.

  Footsteps.

  Muted, rustling leaves. He was almost at the exit when a shadow appeared in front of him.

  “Wallet and phone. Now.”

  Haruki stopped. The guy was younger, shaking — from fear or substances, hard to tell.

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  “You sure you picked the right guy?” Haruki asked calmly.

  “I SAID HAND IT OVER!”

  A knife. Movement.

  But Haruki wasn’t ordinary. Years of quiet home training had built his reflexes.

  Dodge. Grip. Wrist lock. The mugger hit the ground, knife skidding away.

  “P-please… I didn’t mean…”

  Haruki was about to let him go.

  But then…

  Pain.

  Cold, sharp pain in his back. Then worse.

  He collapsed to his knees. Hands trembling. Ringing in his ears.

  “Shit! You killed him?!”

  “I… I didn’t know he was like that! We gotta go!”

  Footsteps vanished into the night.

  —

  The rain came harder. Cold, autumnal — like the world spitting on him.

  Haruki lay on the wet asphalt. Blood spreading beneath him, soaking into the leaves.

  His eyes stared at the sky. No happy flashbacks.

  Only pain.

  —

  “Aya…”

  He remembered holding her hand when she was six, and he was nine. Summer. Meadow. Flowers.

  She laughed as he told her about dinosaurs. She loved T-Rexes but was terrified of bees.

  “I’ll protect you,” he said, waving a stick like a sword.

  But he couldn’t protect her when she got sick. A rare form of leukemia.

  Hospitals. Quiet parental whispers. Then… her bed was empty.

  “Why didn’t I say goodbye properly?”

  —

  “Haruki, go to your room.”

  “But I just asked—”

  Door slam. Walls shaking from shouting.

  Father — tired, bitter. Mother — empty, like a husk. They drifted apart.

  And Haruki sat in the corner, headphones in, pretending he heard nothing.

  One day, his father didn’t come home. His mother faded into silence.

  —

  He was always taller. Slim, quiet, smart. That irritated people.

  One boy called him “book nerd,” then started hiding his shoes.

  Once, he found a live frog in his locker.

  Laughter. Echoing down the halls.

  And then — solitude in the cafeteria, eating slowly so he wouldn’t arrive first to an empty table.

  “Why didn’t anyone stand up for me?”

  —

  He could feel it — the end.

  His body wasn’t his anymore. Hands limp. Breathing jagged.

  “Honestly… I’m tired.”

  “But I didn’t want… to die. Like this. Alone. Over a bun…”

  His eyes dulled. Everything darkened.

  Darkness.

  Complete. Absolute.

  …

  And then — light.

  A tiny, warm spark. Somewhere ahead.

  Like a candle in eternal night.

  “What… is that…?”

  He reached for it, not knowing why. Just… wanting to.

  — End of Prologue —