The snow, which had begun as a soft whisper, thickened into a steady curtain of white, blanketing the shrine grounds in muted stillness. Each flake spun like a slow, dying star, falling from a sky so heavy it seemed ready to crush the earth.
Raito stood near the shrine's cracked torii gate, arms folded loosely across his chest, his breath misting in front of him. His sharp gaze stayed fixed on Seigi as she moved across the stone courtyard, her steps soundless even against the old weathered stone.
She looked almost too perfect for this world. Like something that should have remained carved into ancient myths, untouched by time.
Kurai, so often a constant snide presence in his mind, had gone silent, retreating into a rare kind of watchfulness. Even the demon knew this was not a moment to disrupt.
The chill in the air wasn't just from the weather.
It was from Seigi herself.
"You're not a demon," Raito said at last, voice low.
The words hung in the air like a weight.
Seigi stopped mid-step. Her silver hair drifted around her like mist, and she turned her head slightly, meeting his gaze with an expression too composed to be called cold—but not warm either.
"No," she answered, after a moment. "I'm not."
She faced him fully, and the air between them grew even heavier.
"You sensed it," she said.
"Kind of hard not to," Raito said.
Kurai's presence burned like a wildfire—chaotic, wild, dangerous.
Seigi was something else entirely. Her power wasn't raw violence. It was an immovable mountain buried under centuries of snow. Ancient. Dignified.
And somehow... heartbreaking.
"You're an angel," Raito said, more certain now.
Seigi inclined her head slightly, almost imperceptibly. "Unlike Kurai."
Raito's mouth twisted into something that might've been a smirk. "You don't exactly look holy."
A ghost of amusement flickered across Seigi's lips. Barely there, but real.
"I've never claimed to," she replied. "And no, I don't sing hymns or grow wings at will, if that's your next question."
He could have let it end there.
But curiosity was gnawing at him.
"And yet," he said, voice sharper, "you were sealed. Angels don't usually end up imprisoned, do they?"
Her smile faded.
Annoyance prickled across her perfect features.
"That," she said with careful restraint, "is none of your concern."
Raito didn't flinch.
"I broke your seal," he pointed out, tone matter-of-fact. "I think that makes it a little bit my concern."
For a long second, he thought she might simply walk away.
But then she exhaled—one long, weary breath that seemed to tug at the very sky above them.
She turned from him, walking slowly to a low, moss-slicked stone at the edge of the shrine. She sat with a grace that wasn't practiced, but innate, folding her hands neatly in her lap.
"My sealing was voluntary," Seigi said quietly.
Raito blinked.
Voluntary?
That wasn't the answer he'd expected.
She lifted her face toward the heavy sky. Snow collected faintly in her hair, but she didn't brush it away.
"I came to this region centuries ago," she began, voice steady. "Before cities, before empires. When this land was still wild, when gods and monsters were the same thing to human eyes."
Raito listened, silent.
"I believed," she continued, "that humanity was worth saving. I believed they needed protection—from themselves, from things lurking beyond their sight. I thought... kindness could build something better."
There was a sadness to her words, but not the kind that begged for sympathy.
"And so I gave them blessings. Quietly, at first. Rain when they needed it. Dreams of warning before a flood. Healing the dying when no hope was left."
Her pale hands curled slightly in her lap.
"They noticed. They named me a kami. Built shrines. Left offerings."
The tiniest crack appeared in her voice.
"It wasn't what I wanted. But I accepted it."
Raito watched her intently, not interrupting.
"But then," she said, voice sharpening like frost underfoot, "there was a man. A priest. Clever, respected. And utterly corrupted. His soul reeked of greed and rot. He trafficked lives, desecrated sacred places in secret. And when I confronted him... he didn't even flinch."
She lowered her gaze to the snow between her feet.
"He called me a witch. A demon in disguise. He poisoned their hearts against me with fear. Every misfortune became my fault. Every tragedy my supposed wrath."
Raito's hands tightened into fists without him realizing.
Seigi laughed then—a bitter, empty sound.
"They wept as they burned my shrine," she said. "Begged me to forgive them even as they set their torches to the walls."
"You could have destroyed them," Raito said quietly.
Her silver eyes flicked to him, sharp and knowing.
"Yes," she said. "I could have. I could have reduced their village to ash. Showed them what real divine fury looked like."
"But you didn't."
"No," she said simply. "Because their fear would have been justified. Because part of me still pitied them. Their stupidity. Their weakness."
"And so," she finished, voice dropping even lower, "I sealed myself. I buried my power here, deep beneath the mountain. I thought maybe... maybe in another age, humanity would be different."
She looked up again, and there was no pretense left.
"Tell me, Raito. Was I wrong?"
He didn't answer right away.
He didn't know if he could.
Instead, he watched her.
Her aura wrapped around her like a cloak—not one of light, not one of fire—but something colder. Something older.
It wasn't hatred she radiated.
It was disappointment.
Something worse.
"You don't pity me," she said again, watching him carefully.
"No," Raito said simply.
"Why?"
"Because you don't want pity," he replied.
Seigi smiled faintly—a real smile, small and sad.
"Correct," she murmured.
The snow blurred the world around them, turning the shrine into an island of gray and white, adrift from time.
Raito stood there, rooted, feeling something stir inside him he hadn't felt in years.
Not sympathy.
Not admiration.
Something heavier. A wordless understanding.
Kurai's voice crackled finally in his mind again, dry and exasperated: "She's always been like this. Drama queen."
Before Raito could stop it, the words slipped out of his mouth.
"I heard that," Seigi said without even turning her head.
Kurai let out a huff in his mind, grumbling to herself.
Raito ignored them both.
He kept looking at Seigi.
At the loneliness she wore like armor.
At the unspoken grief of someone who had seen the best and worst of humanity and been left with nothing but disappointment.
He didn't know what he was supposed to say.
He just knew he didn't want to leave.
And so he didn't.
The snow continued to fall. Silent. Relentless.
The two of them—angel and human—remained where they were, caught between two eras, between two choices neither of them had fully made.
And for the first time in a long while, Raito allowed himself to simply be still.