"So... so the doctors are my family?"
Yuuta's voice was small, fragile, like a bird with a broken wing trying to sing. He looked up at the elf with his red eyes, searching her face for confirmation, for reassurance, for some sign that he had finally understood something correctly.
Her face fell.
All the light drained from her expression, every trace of warmth, every flicker of hope, every memory of kindness she had been trying to hold onto. She stared at him as if the words themselves had wounded her, as if he had reached into her chest and pulled out something bleeding.
"No," she whispered. "No, he is not your family."
Yuuta blinked up at her, confusion replacing the tentative hope in his eyes.
"But he feeds me," he said, as if explaining something obvious to a slow student. "He talks to me. He made me. He said I'm special."
The last part echoed into the silence of the death well, bouncing off the bone walls, absorbed by the darkness. It lingered in the air like a curse, like a prophecy, like a wound that would never heal.
The elf girl's face shifted—shock, horror, understanding, all at once. Her green eyes widened, her lips parted, her hands, which had been resting on his shoulders, went still.
"Wait," she said, her voice barely audible. "Made you? You weren't taken?"
Yuuta shook his head, his black hair falling across his forehead. His voice was quiet, matter-of-fact, as if he were describing the weather or the color of the sky.
"I was born in the lab," he said. "In a tank. I... I don't have anyone else. I was born with the help of the doctors."
He paused, his brow furrowing.
"I think that is why they called me Zero. Because I was the beginning. The first one."
And that was it.
That was the moment.
The weight of it crashed down on the elf girl, on Erza, on Isvarn, on the very air itself. The darkness seemed to grow heavier, the shadows deeper, the silence more absolute.
This boy. This tiny, brave, innocent boy. He had not been stolen from his family. He had not been kidnapped from his home. He had not been taken from a loving mother and father who searched for him in the night.
He had never had a family at all.
He had been made. Created in a tank, born in a laboratory, raised by torturers who called themselves doctors. He had never known a gentle touch that was not followed by pain. He had never heard a kind word that was not a prelude to cruelty. He had never been held, not really, not the way a child should be held.
And now he had been thrown away because he did not grow into what they wanted him to be.
A weapon.
Not a child. Never a child. Just a failed experiment, discarded like trash, left to die in a well at the bottom of the world.
Erza could not move.
She had expected many things when she entered this memory. She had expected to see Yuuta stolen from his family, perhaps, or orphaned by war, or abandoned by parents who could not care for him. She had not expected this. She had not expected to learn that the man she loved had never been loved at all.
He had been created. Designed. Manufactured. He was not the son of a human father and a human mother, born in a hospital, wrapped in a blanket, held in loving arms.
He was a product. An experiment. A number.
Zero Karma.
Erza watched the man she loved—the bravest human she had ever known, the man who smiled at her despite her coldness, who cooked for her despite her cruelty, who searched all night for her ring despite his exhaustion—and she saw him as he had been. A child. A broken, bleeding, terrified child who did not even know if he was real.
The elf girl's voice was shaking.
"You mean... you were created? Not born from a womb?"
Yuuta nodded, his red eyes fixed on her face. He did not understand why she looked so horrified. He did not understand why her hands were trembling. He did not understand why she was looking at him like he was something that should not exist.
"Is that bad?" he asked. "Is that why they threw me away? Because I am not real?"
The silence stretched between them, thick and suffocating.
Then, softly, he spoke again.
"So... does that mean I am not real? Am I fake?"
His voice cracked on the last word.
And then he started to cry.
Not loudly. Not like a tantrum, not like the wailing of a child who had scraped his knee or lost his toy. It was the kind of crying that only a child with no one left to comfort him learns to do. Soft. Scared. Like he was trying to hide it even though there was no one to hide it from.
His small hands curled against his chest, pressing against his heart as if he could hold himself together. His shoulders trembled. Tears ran down his cheeks—thick and slimy, the strange tears the experiments had left him with—but he did not wail or scream.
He just sobbed. Quiet. Shaking. Alone.
He had finally understood what it meant to be real or fake, and the understanding had broken him.
Erza watched.
She wanted to do something. She wanted to break the memory itself, shatter it into a million pieces, reach through time and space and pull that small, broken child into her arms. She wanted to tell him that he was real, that he was not a fake, that he was the most real person she had ever known.
But she knew. She knew that all of this had happened long ago. She was too late to save him. She could not change the past. She could not undo the damage. She could only watch, helpless, as the man she loved suffered in silence.
The elf girl pulled him into her arms.
She held him tight, pressing his face against her shoulder, wrapping her arms around his small, shaking body. Her hand rubbed his back in slow circles, the way her mother had rubbed her back when she was young, before the war, before the well, before everything.
"No," she whispered fiercely. "You are not fake."
"But they made me," he sobbed. "I was born in a tank. I am not—I do not—"
"It does not matter," she said, cutting him off. "You are breathing, are you not? You are warm. You feel pain. You feel scared. You cry when it hurts."
She pulled back and looked down at him, her green eyes glassy but sure.
"That means you are real."
Yuuta stared at her. His tears continued to fall, but something in his expression shifted. The terror, the confusion, the desperate need for someone to tell him he existed—it began to ease.
"Really?" Little Yuuta's voice was barely a whisper, fragile as glass, as if the word itself might shatter if spoken too loudly. His red eyes, still wet with tears, looked up at the elf with desperate hope.
"Really," she said.
She pulled him close again and held him until his sobs faded into hiccups, and his hiccups faded into silence, and his silence faded into the slow, steady rhythm of sleep. His small body relaxed against hers, his breathing deepened, and for a moment, he looked almost peaceful.
Then he stirred.
He sniffled, leaning against her shoulder, his small fingers clutching at her ragged clothes. His voice, when it came, was barely above a whisper, so soft that she had to lean down to hear him.
"If... if I was born in a family..." He paused, his breath catching. "Would I be happy?"
The elf's mouth twitched. She did not know how to answer. She did not know what happiness was anymore. She had forgotten, somewhere between the fall and the darkness and the long, lonely years of survival.
He continued, his voice even softer, as if he was afraid of the answer.
"Would my family have saved me?"
Erza's world shattered.
Every part of her heart, every piece of her soul, every fragment of her being was in agony. The pain was unlike anything she had ever felt—worse than the scars on her back, worse than the loneliness of her childhood, worse than the grief that had consumed her at the port.
She had fallen in love. She had finally, after centuries of coldness, allowed herself to feel something for someone. And she had never imagined that loving him would cost her this much. This unbearable, gut-wrenching, soul-crushing pain.
She wanted to reach into the memory. She wanted to take that small, broken child into her arms. She wanted to hold him, to protect him, to tell him that he was real, that he was loved, that he was not a mistake.
She wanted to kill every single person who had made him suffer. Every doctor. Every scientist. Every being who had watched him bleed and done nothing. She would hunt them down, one by one, and she would make them pay.
But she was helpless. She could not change the past. She could not reach through time and save him. She could only watch, in silence, as the man she loved suffered in ways she had never imagined.
She did not say a word. Not a single word. She watched, calculating silently, memorizing every face, every name, every detail. She would remember. She would find them. She would make them suffer.
Isvarn watched her.
He saw the tears in her eyes, the cold rage on her face, the way her hands clenched into fists at her sides. He saw the pain, the fury, the desperate need for revenge. And he saw an opportunity.
He was not moved by the suffering of these children. He had seen too much, lived too long, witnessed too many horrors to be affected by the pain of a few mortals. But he knew how to use this. He knew how to turn her grief into something useful.
He touched her shoulder.
Erza turned. Her eyes were wet, but her face was cold, ruthless, the face of a warrior ready to fight even a god. She looked at him, and for a moment, he saw the Blade of Atlantis—the woman who had conquered nations, who had crushed armies, who had never once shown weakness.
He smiled. A small smile. A calculated smile.
Then he made his eyes distant, as if he were remembering something painful, something that haunted him still.
"This," he said softly, "is why we fought the war, Erza. So that other species would be beneath us. So that they would stop doing this to children. So that no one would be made to suffer like this again."
He sighed, long and heavy, and looked away.
"I believe that upon seeing this, you will surely take action."
He paused, watching her reaction, measuring her response.
"If you want, we can skip the rest of this suffering and search for the seal's source, my Queen."
"No."
Erza's voice was sharp like steel drawn in the dark. It cut through the silence, through the shadows, through the memory itself.
"I want to watch every second. Every wound. Every lie they fed him."
Her voice dropped, cold as winter, cold as death.
"I will make sure to find those rats myself. And I will put them through the same suffering. Each and every one of them will pay for their sins."
Isvarn smiled. A satisfied smile. The smile of a chess player who had just made a winning move.
"As Your Highness says, it shall be done."
He was happy. Erza was now more eager to return to the throne. Not for duty, not for honor, but for revenge. And revenge would drive her harder than anything else.
The memory kept playing.
Yuuta was silent now, curled against the elf's side, his small body limp with exhaustion. His eyes were open, staring at the fire, but he was not seeing it. He was somewhere else, lost in thoughts that were too heavy for a child his age.
The elf watched him, her heart aching. She had tried to comfort him, tried to reassure him, but she could see that he was still sad. Still broken. Still waiting for the other shoe to drop.
She needed to do something. She needed to cheer him up.
"Wait," she said, her voice brightening with forced enthusiasm. "I forgot to tell you my name."
Yuuta blinked. "Name?"
She smiled—a real smile, though it did not reach her eyes.
"Yes. Do you want to know your sister's name?"
He nodded slowly, his red eyes curious.
She puffed out her chest, trying to look proud, trying to look like the princess she had once been.
"I am Sophia Sylvarion. The daughter of Aerisyal Sylvarion, Queen of the Sylvaris Kingdom."
Yuuta clapped his hands together, a small, tentative smile on his face.
"Sophia... Sy... sys..." He struggled with the words, his tongue tripping over the unfamiliar syllables.
Sophia laughed. It was a small sound, weak and rusty, but it was a laugh.
"Never mind," she said. "Just call me Sophia."
"Sophia," he repeated, tilting his head.
"Now tell me yours," she said.
Yuuta tilted his head the other way. "What is my name?"
Sophia paused. "Did they not give you one?"
Yuuta thought for a moment, his brow furrowing. Then his face brightened.
"The doctor called me by a number," he said, too innocent to understand why that was wrong. "They call me Zero. And the doctor said my second name is Karma."
He looked up at her with his big red eyes.
"Zero Karma."
Sophia froze.
The name hung in the air between them, heavy and cold, like the darkness that pressed against the walls of the well. She stared at him, her mind racing, her heart pounding.
Zero Karma.
They had not even given him a name. They had given him a number and a purpose. Zero. The beginning. The first. And Karma—the cosmic principle of cause and effect, of action and consequence.
They had named him for the suffering they intended him to cause.
Not a child. A weapon.
Sophia's breath caught.
Her burned hands tightened around Yuuta's small shoulders, her fingers pressing into the ragged fabric of his clothes. The firelight flickered across her face, casting shadows that made her look older, wearier, more broken than she already was.
She looked away.
"Those bastards…" she muttered, her voice low and bitter. She spoke in elvish—a curse, perhaps, or a prayer, or something in between. The words were soft, fluid, ancient, and they carried a weight that even Yuuta could feel.
Then she turned back to him.
"No."
Yuuta blinked. "Huh?"
"No more numbers," she said firmly. "You deserve a name."
His red eyes widened. "I do?"
"Yeah." She nodded, her green eyes fierce despite their hollow depths. "I am giving you one. Right here. Right now."
He looked up at her, his small face tilted, and something began to grow in that hollow gaze. A spark. A flicker. A tiny flame of something that had been buried so deep he had forgotten it existed.
Hope.
"You will give me a name?" he whispered.
"Yes."
He smiled. Slowly. Gently. Like a flower opening after a long, dark winter.
"Then… I will have a real name… just like you?"
Sophia looked up at the faint circle of light far above the well—the only glimpse of the sky they had seen in days, weeks, perhaps years. It was pale and distant, a memory of a world she had forgotten.
"Let us see," she said, thinking.
She was quiet for a moment, her eyes tracing the patterns of the bone walls, the shadows of the fire, the cracks in the stone floor.
"You are kind," she said finally. "You are brave. You are too strong for someone so small."
Yuuta's eyes widened. "Strong?"
She nodded. "Yes. So your name will be…"
She looked at him.
"Yuuta."
His eyes widened even further. "Yuuta?"
"Yes. That is your name now."
He sat still for a moment, his small body frozen, his mind processing the gift she had given him. Then—a smile spread across his tear-streaked face. Wide. Innocent. Pure joy.
"Yuuta," he said again, testing the sound, rolling it around on his tongue like a new flavor. "Yuuta… I am Yuuta! That is me! I have a name now!"
He clapped his hands together, his laughter echoing off the bone walls, filling the darkness with something that had not been there before.
Sophia smiled faintly, brushing a trembling hand over his hair.
"Yuuta," she repeated softly. "That suits you."
He looked up at her, his red eyes bright. "What about my second name? The doctor said I have a second name too. Karma."
Sophia's smile faded. "No. No, do not say that. Karma sounds absurd. That is not your real name."
Yuuta tilted his head. "But karma is my second name."
"No," she said firmly. "That is not your real name."
She looked away, thinking. She needed to give him something else. Something better. Something that would erase the stain of what the doctors had called him.
Isvarn watched, his ancient eyes sharp. He saw something that made him pause—a flicker of shadow behind Sophia, a figure that was not there, a presence that should not exist. It leaned close to her ear, whispered something, and then vanished.
Isvarn rubbed his eyes. Had he imagined it? He was not sure.
Sophia touched her cheek, as if someone had whispered a secret into her ear. Then she spoke.
"Kounari."
Yuuta's face lit up. "Kounari?"
She blinked, startled. "Wait, no—that was not—"
But Yuuta was already smiling, already laughing, already clapping his hands together.
"My name is Yuuta Kounari!" he announced to the darkness, to the well, to the world. "I am Yuuta Kounari!"
He clapped his hands together and laughed—actually laughed, despite the pain, the bruises, the rot around them. It was the laugh of a child who had just been born for the first time.
"Thank you, Sophia sister!"
Sophia smiled faintly, brushing a trembling hand over his hair.
"You are welcome, Yuuta."
He looked up at the faint circle of light above the well, whispering to himself.
"Yuuta… I am Yuuta…"
And for a moment—he forgot where he was. Forgot the blood. Forgot the pain. Forgot the endless darkness and the hunger and the fear.
Because someone had finally given him something the lab never could.
A name.
A place in the world.
A reason to believe he existed.
To be continued...