Ghoul: Re Insanity

Noroi's eyes lingered. Dark. Indiscernible. Then, finally—

"Your name is Amatsu, right?"

A nod. No words.

The silence stretched, taut as a pulled wire. Then—

"Your mother made me promise to take care of you… if anything happened to her."

No softness in his tone. No hesitation. Just a fact. Cold. Final.

Noroi's words settled in the air, heavy, like the weight of something inevitable. Amatsu's fingers curled, the movement almost subconscious. A promise? That word didn't belong here. Not in this place.

Noroi exhaled, low and quiet. "Hina…" The name felt weightless in his mouth. Something distant. "Fate did something to her." He paused, gaze unfocused. "She only wanted to build a happy, normal family. But life as a ghoul... that's not something you can shape into happiness, is it?"

The silence was heavier this time.

Noroi turned. His movements fluid, effortless. "Come. Let's talk while we walk."

A slow breath. Amatsu exhaled, measured, steadying. Then—without a word—he followed, his small frame swallowed by the shadow that moved ahead.

Amatsu's first impression of Noroi was simple—he was terrifying.

The way he moved, the weight of his presence, the emptiness in his eyes. Everything about him felt like a shadow with teeth. And yet… there was something else, something Amatsu couldn't quite name. It wasn't warmth, not exactly. But there was a weight behind his words, behind his actions.

Noroi wasn't kind. But he wasn't cruel either.

Maybe it was because of his mother. He didn't know yet.

"There's another like you," Noroi said, voice steady as they walked. "Her parents were killed. Now, I'm watching her grow."

Amatsu glanced at him, but Noroi didn't look back.

"I'm rarely here," he continued. "Too much to do."

His tone was matter-of-fact, uninterested in sympathy.

"At my place, you'll have a friend. Take care of her for me." A pause. "I'll provide food."

Amatsu kept walking, processing the words.

He knew this place wasn't the entire world. He had heard things, bits and pieces. But he wanted confirmation. He needed to hear it from someone who knew.

He hesitated, then asked, "Is there a place outside of here? Do… humans exist?"

Noroi didn't answer right away. His gaze flicked to Amatsu, unreadable.

"I don't know how you got that idea," he finally said. "Not even most people here know that." A short exhale. "I guess you heard a lot when we talked with your father in the past."

Amatsu said nothing.

"Yes, it exists," Noroi continued. "But the outside world isn't much different from here. Cannibalism—every ghoul out there does it. Ghouls are hunted. If you're hoping to find something better out there, I won't say you will."

Amatsu let his gaze drift over the world that had shaped him.

It was the same as always. Filthy. Rotten. But tonight, it felt heavier. As if the air itself had thickened, pressing down on him, sinking into his skin like something diseased.

Dark. Oppressive.

Everywhere, the streets writhed with hunger. A fight broke out just ahead—no reason, no hesitation, just the gnashing of teeth and the wet crunch of splitting flesh. Somewhere farther, a scream rang out, thin and sharp, before cutting off mid-breath.

The stench of blood clotted in his throat, thick and metallic, layered with something worse—the sour stink of bodies left too long in the cold. Rot and damp fur. Old urine soaking into stone. The scent of breath that reeked of starvation.

Shadows moved in the alleys, shifting, twitching. Ghouls huddled like feral animals, bones pressing against skin, eyes sunken and flickering with a dull, feverish glow. In one corner, a skeletal figure gnawed at something too small to be human—until he saw the fingers. Tiny. Limp. A child, half-eaten, ribs cracked open like a gutted fish.

The ruins of homes loomed around him, not places to live but places to hide. Their walls sagged, eaten by time and hunger. The wind whistled through broken windows like a dying breath. Some had doors, but they were useless—kicked in, splintered, covered in smeared handprints, black and red.

Shelter. That's all they were. Just walls to curl up against before something found you.

Before something decided you weren't meant to see another sunrise.

A shriek, close by. A girl's voice.

A wet slap. Then another. The sound of flesh breaking under force, dull and sickening in the stale air.

A choked gasp, then a sob, ragged and desperate.

"Please—" Her voice trembled, high and thin like something fragile about to snap. "Please, I—I'll do anything, just don't—"

A boot drove into her back, pressing her down into the filth. Her arms buckled, elbows scraping against the uneven ground. She coughed, breath hitching as her face was ground into the dirt.

The fabric of her clothes tore, the sound sharp, too loud against the silence.

"Shut up."

The voice was low. Unbothered. The kind of tone that carried absolute certainty—this would happen. It had already happened a thousand times before.

She whimpered, hands clawing at the dirt, nails breaking as she struggled. Her legs kicked out weakly, but there was no strength behind it.

A fist closed around her hair, yanking her head back. Her throat arched, exposed. Her eyes—wild, unfocused—caught the dim glow of the ruined streetlights. Her mouth opened, gasping, but no words came out. Just air. Just a strangled wheeze.

"Think she'll last long?" Another voice. This one was amused. Footsteps shifted against the ground, slow and deliberate.

A chuckle. "Doubt it."

Another sound—movement, a shift in weight. The man holding her down adjusted his grip, knee digging harder into her spine.

He took in the scene without flinching. The girl, small and shaking, ribs pressing against her skin with every panicked breath. The men above her, relaxed, as if this was nothing more than routine. The way her fingers twitched, trying and failing to find purchase in the dirt. The weak, pitiful struggle of someone who had already lost.

Amatsu stood still, watching.

It meant nothing.

His stomach twisted.

Not with pity. Not with disgust. Something else. A reflex—an old, useless instinct. A memory buried in muscle and marrow.

The scent of blood was thick, cloying. Too much. The iron tang clung to the back of his throat, but it wasn't hers that made something curl tight in his chest. It was the way it mixed with sweat, with the stink of starvation. That particular combination—copper and salt, fever and dirt.

He had smelled it before.

The first time his body had been too weak to move, too broken to fight back.

His fingers twitched.

He forced them still.

It didn't matter.

That was then. This was now.

The girl's eyes flicked upward, dazed, unfocused. For half a second, they landed on him. Pleading.

His breath slowed. The moment passed.

He exhaled—emptiness.

His eyes lingered for another moment—then he turned away.

He had learned that lesson himself.

No one had helped him. No one had saved him.

Why should he care?

He kept walking.

It wasn't his problem.

He was not a hero.

There was nothing to gain from saving people.

Had anyone saved him?

Had anyone helped when he was in danger? When he was in pain? When he was tortured? When he was dying?

No. Never.

Only himself.

That was all that mattered.

They walked for what felt like hours. Or maybe it had only been minutes. Time blurred.

The stench of rot lingered in the air, thick and unshaken, sinking into his skin like a second layer of flesh. The distant sounds of violence still echoed—somewhere behind them, somewhere ahead. It was endless.

But then—something shifted.

Amatsu slowed. His body knew this feeling. An absence where there should have been presence. A tension drawn too tight.

Then, movement.

A whisper of fabric. A fleeting shadow against the dim, rotting structures.

The world seemed to pause.

Not silence, not quite—but something was missing. The wind, the distant shuffle of footsteps.

It was as if the city itself was holding its breath.

Amatsu barely had time to react before two figures dropped from above, landing without a sound.

Masked.

Fast. Strong.

His instincts screamed. His body tensed. His gaze flicked to Noroi—who didn't even flinch.

A pause.

Noroi finally turned to him.

"Find the house yourself," he said. "Most of them are just shelters anyway. You'll figure it out."

Amatsu nodded. He understood.

Noroi's gaze lingered for a second longer. Then, almost as an afterthought—

"There's a green-haired girl there. Younger than you. Tell her I might not come back for a long time."

A beat.

A shift in the air. A faint, almost imperceptible breath.

"You'll figure it out."

And then, without another word, he pulled on his mask—his face vanishing into something faceless, unreadable—and disappeared with the two figures.

No directions. No reassurances. Just the certainty that Amatsu would survive. Or he wouldn't. Either way, it wasn't Noroi's concern.

And just like that, he was gone.

The emptiness he left behind felt heavier, as if the space itself had swallowed his absence.

Amatsu watched the last trace of him dissolve into the dark.

He hadn't said when he'd return.

Or if he ever would.