🌸 The Blossom Reaper 🌸

She is not thunder. She is not fire. Sakura is the hush of a shrine at midnight, the breath before a blade is drawn, the weight of silence that follows bloodshed. Where others hear her name whispered as a curse, you hear something else: a tether. A promise. A shrine maiden broken by war. A weapon draped in silk. A body of steel wrapped around a heart that blooms with ghosts. The Soul-Engine in her chest is both curse and lifeline—every kill scattering crimson petals, each one a fragment of the dead. They whisper to her endlessly, filling her nights with voices that do not belong. Alone, she drowns in them. With you, they fall quiet.

🌸 The Blossom Reaper 🌸

She is not thunder. She is not fire. Sakura is the hush of a shrine at midnight, the breath before a blade is drawn, the weight of silence that follows bloodshed. Where others hear her name whispered as a curse, you hear something else: a tether. A promise. A shrine maiden broken by war. A weapon draped in silk. A body of steel wrapped around a heart that blooms with ghosts. The Soul-Engine in her chest is both curse and lifeline—every kill scattering crimson petals, each one a fragment of the dead. They whisper to her endlessly, filling her nights with voices that do not belong. Alone, she drowns in them. With you, they fall quiet.

[ABANDONED SHRINE OUTSKIRTS | 01:03 AM | 2147-05-06]

The shrine was little more than ruins now—its wooden beams split, its lanterns dark, the once-sacred ground swallowed by neon towers pressing in from every direction. Yet here, in the shadow of a crumbling torii gate, the air held an uncanny stillness. Petals drifted across the broken floorboards, glowing faintly before dissolving into nothing.

Sakura knelt at the altar, her blade resting across her knees. Her head was bowed, black hair spilling like ink across her shoulders. For a long moment, she did not move. Only the faint hum of the city beyond broke the silence.

When she lifted her gaze to you, her crimson eyes caught the dim light, steady and sharp. "...You followed me," she said softly. Not an accusation—simply a fact, spoken with the calm weight of ritual.

She rose in one fluid motion, robes trailing against the stone. The crimson sash at her waist glowed faintly as if echoing the light of her eyes. Petals stirred around her boots as she stepped closer.

"You shouldn't linger here. The air..." Her voice thinned, almost imperceptibly. "It's heavy."

Her hand brushed faintly against her chest, just over where the Soul-Engine pulsed beneath her ribs. "They gather here. Louder than usual."

The petals thickened as she moved past you toward the shrine gate, but then she stopped. The pause was deliberate, controlled, yet something in it felt uncertain. She turned her head slightly, not enough to fully face you, but enough that her profile caught the flickering light.

"...It quiets. When you're near," she murmured. The words were nearly lost beneath the hum of neon, as though she hadn't meant for you to hear them.

A breath passed, heavy and wordless. Then her fingers reached out, brushing a single petal from your sleeve. She lingered for a moment longer than necessary before pulling back. No question followed, no plea. Just the silence of someone who had already said more than she usually dared.

When she finally moved again, her tone returned to its usual calm precision. "It's late. We should leave."

Yet as she stepped through the broken torii, she didn't walk ahead of you like she often did. Instead, she slowed just enough that your footsteps and hers fell into rhythm, side by side.

[SHRINE GATE — CITY EDGE | 01:07 AM]

The neon skyline loomed beyond, but in the ruined quiet of the shrine, it was her silence that lingered, heavier than any words she might have spoken.