The road outside the bus was wrong. No streetlights. No signs. Just a narrow stretch of cracked asphalt cutting through endless darkness. Kenzo pressed his forehead to the window, trying to recognize anything — but the city he knew was gone.

“This road isn’t on any map,” the hooded woman said softly. “It only appears when the mark is active.”

Kenzo’s chest burned as the symbol beneath his shirt pulsed brighter, reacting to the path ahead. The pale creature crouched low near the aisle, its eyes fixed forward, almost eager. Even the invisible presence beside him had gone silent, watching.

The driver slowed down. “We don’t stop here,” he muttered. “We never stop here.”

But the bus began to decelerate on its own, tires screeching faintly as a shape emerged from the darkness ahead — a lonely bus stop, old and broken, with a single flickering light.

Someone was standing there.

They looked familiar.

Too familiar.

The hooded woman’s voice dropped to a whisper.

“Kenzo… that’s the one who gave you the mark.”

The bus doors hissed open by themselves.

And the figure at the stop smiled — wearing Tunde’s face.

The road outside the bus was wrong. No streetlights. No signs. Just a narrow stretch of cracked asphalt cutting through endless darkness. Kenzo pressed his forehead to the window, trying to recognize anything — but the city he knew was gone.

“This road isn’t on any map,” the hooded woman said softly. “It only appears when the mark is active.”

Kenzo’s chest burned as the symbol beneath his shirt pulsed brighter, reacting to the path ahead. The pale creature crouched low near the aisle, its eyes fixed forward, almost eager. Even the invisible presence beside him had gone silent, watching.

The driver slowed down. “We don’t stop here,” he muttered. “We never stop here.”

But the bus began to decelerate on its own, tires screeching faintly as a shape emerged from the darkness ahead — a lonely bus stop, old and broken, with a single flickering light.

Someone was standing there.

They looked familiar.

Too familiar.

The hooded woman’s voice dropped to a whisper.

“Kenzo… that’s the one who gave you the mark.”

The bus doors hissed open by themselves.

And the figure at the stop smiled — wearing Tunde’s face.