**Chapter 1: The Night the Earth Screamed**
"History's a bedtime story told by people who didn't die. Let me tell you how the world actually ended—not with some noble last stand, but with a fucking hashtag."
The first time humanity collectively shit itself was March 15th, 2045. I know because I was watching cartoons when the emergency broadcast cut in. One minute it was some dumb anime about magical girls, the next there was this sweating news anchor trying not to piss himself on live TV.
"We're receiving confirmed reports that...that the entire Eurasian landmass..."
The screen flickered. For half a second, I saw it—this massive shadow blotting out the satellite feed, something with too many wings and eyes that looked wrong, like they weren't really eyes at all. Then static.
Granddad's wheelchair screeched as he lunged forward, his bony fingers digging into my shoulders. "Vritra," he whispered, and his breath smelled like cheap sake and death. "They've come to collect the debt."
Outside, Tokyo was losing its mind. People ran through the streets screaming about Judgment Day. Some idiot set a police car on fire. My mom shoved a protein bar in my mouth and locked me in the storage closet. "Don't make a sound," she said, and I didn't—not even when the screaming got real close, not even when the whole building shook like something big was walking past.
Three days later, when they finally dug me out, Eurasia was just...gone. Not destroyed. Gone. Like someone took an eraser to the map. Eight billion people reduced to a trending topic. #RIPEarth. #EndTimes. #GodzillaWasRight.
That was ten years ago. Now we live in the sky, because apparently kaiju don't like climbing. Neo-Osaka Arcology dangles from a bunch of stolen kaiju-tech balloons, all shiny spires and neon lights if you're rich, rusted metal and despair if you're me.
The Undercity smells like piss and fried circuitry. I sleep in what used to be an air duct, listening to the defense grid hum its shitty lullaby. Every night, same routine: check the knife under my pillow, ignore the black veins crawling up my arm, try not to dream.
Because when I dream, *it* talks to me.
"You're special, Kazuki."
A voice like oil sliding over broken glass. Vritra—not the monster that ate a continent, but something not so different, something that lives in the dark behind my eyelids.
"You survived for a reason."
I wake up choking on smoke that isn't there, my sheets soaked with sweat. Granddad's journal lies open beside me, pages covered in his crazy scribbles. *Vritra symbiosis. Cycle of extinction. The bridge must be willing.*
I tear the page out. Burn it. Watch the ashes swirl down into the Undercity where the cultists will probably snort them for kicks.
They worship the kaiju now. Walk around in robes made of shredded hazard suits, waving chunks of kaiju flesh like holy relics. "The Leviathan cleanses!" they scream. "The Calamities are divine justice!"
I kicked one last week. Felt good.
But here's the thing no one wants to admit—the cultists aren't entirely wrong. The kaiju didn't break the world. We did that just fine on our own. The monsters just held up a mirror and showed us how ugly we'd become.
And the Leviathan?
It's still out there.
Watching.
Waiting.
And when it comes back, I have this sick feeling it's gonna be looking for me.
"Monsters don't kill you,"Granddad used to say. "They just show you what's already dead inside."
Turns out the old bastard was right about something after all.