Seven Scars of Heavens

Choices

The night had grown heavy.

Rain hammered relentlessly against the windowpanes of Ren’s dorm room, drumming like a thousand restless fingers. Outside, gray storm clouds swallowed the moon, and streetlights flickered in strange rhythms, their glow stretching shadows unnaturally long across the soaked pavement.

Ren stood by the glass, watching thin rivulets of rain carve patterns across its surface. His reflection was blurred, fractured by droplets.

“…Hmm,” he muttered. “Doesn’t look like it’s letting up anytime soon.”

He pulled the curtains shut with a muted thud and turned away, his breath fogging faintly in the cold air.

The room behind him was chaos incarnate. Books stacked in precarious towers. Papers scattered like snow across the floor. Clothes draped half off the chair as if forgotten mid-motion. A battlefield of neglect.

But Ren didn’t care. None of it mattered.

Tonight, there was only one purpose.

Find that book.

He moved quickly—ripping open drawers, tossing aside old receipts, scattering notebooks, flipping cushions, even crawling beneath the bed. Thunder rumbled as dust and forgotten objects flew in every direction.

And then—

He saw it.

A worn, dark-blue tome.

Its cover was cracked and weathered, the once-proud symbol etched upon it now faded, almost invisible.

Ren’s breath hitched. Slowly, reverently, he lifted it into his hands.

“…Finally,” he whispered. His lips curved into a small, private smile. “I still have it.”

The book was not an ordinary grimoire. Not a spellbook. Not history.

It was forbidden.

A compilation of Myth Studies—written by scholars who had vanished mysteriously after daring to probe too deep into truths the world wasn’t ready for.

He opened it. The pages were yellowed with age, the ink faint yet alive with weight. And then, halfway down one margin, he saw it—marked faintly in red, the parchment burned as though seared by fire itself.

The words struck him like a blade:

“A WISH WILL ALWAYS TAKE SOMETHING IMPORTANT FROM YOU.”

Ren’s eyes widened.

“…So that’s the price.”

His hands trembled slightly as he copied the words into his notebook, tracing each curve carefully, refusing to let them fade. Then he sat heavily on his bed, the book still clutched in his grip.

Outside, the storm howled. The rain became a static curtain. The shadows in his room seemed to lean closer, as though listening.

Ren closed the tome and let out a long, steady breath.

“So… it is possible.”

His grip tightened on the covers until his knuckles whitened.

“I can win this war. And I can erase every mage from this world.”

Thunder rolled overhead, shaking the window glass.

Ren lay back on the mattress without bothering to turn off the light. His eyes remained open, staring into the sterile white ceiling.

And then—

The dream came.

He was standing in fire.

A sea of flames raged around him, roaring like a living beast, their light painting the world in red and black. The air was suffocating, heat pressing into his lungs until every breath burned.

Through the inferno, he saw a figure.

A man. White coat. Broad shoulders. His back turned.

“Survive,” the man said coldly, his voice stripped of warmth. “Or die.”

And then the man walked away, swallowed by the smoke.

Ren’s throat clenched. “Father—! Don’t leave me! Please!”

But the flames did not care.

They rose higher. Closer. Hungrier.

Lightning split the burning sky—

—and Ren woke, gasping for air.

He sat upright, sweat slicking his forehead, breath ragged. The storm outside was still raging. His room was freezing, every shadow long and jagged.

“…Not these dreams again,” he muttered.

He stumbled toward the mirror. His reflection stared back.

Tired eyes. Calm mask. A frame too frail for the weight it carried.

But within—

A war already raging.

“I’ve been chosen,” Ren whispered, voice steady now. “No more doubts. I have to win. For me. For her.”

He inhaled. Exhaled.

And then—

Louder. Sharper.

“I choose Yamato Takeru.”

The moment the name left his lips, the air around him ruptured.

Something inside him tore.

It wasn’t pain. Not exactly. Not shock, either. It was a disconnection. A tearing away of self.

His soul was ripped from the boundaries of his body and hurled into a sea of endless, black water.

No air. No ground. No sky.

Just an ocean of ink pressing from all directions, dragging him downward into infinity.

Every nerve screamed. His body no longer belonged to him.

He couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t even scream.

But he endured.

His mind clenched tight, latching onto one thought.

“I have to win this war. I must complete my goal.”

The void seemed to mock him, pressing heavier, colder.

Ren roared into the nothing:

“I WILL NOT LOSE AGAIN!”

The sound ripped through the black ocean.

Ripples.

Light.

Cracks in the darkness.

And then—

Images.

A baby’s wail pierced the air.

Ren blinked—suddenly cradled in the arms of a woman, her face kind but blurred. A man stepped forward—regal, commanding. His palm rested on the infant’s head.

“His name will be Ousu no Mikoto.”

Ren gasped.

“That… baby… is me.”

Memories not his own seared into his mind.

Living a life that wasn’t his.

This is Myth Synchronization.

To wield the power of a myth… he would first have to live it. Endure it. Survive it.

Ren’s fists clenched in the void of thought.

“…Then let’s begin.”

Elsewhere, in another room, another storm.

Noah sat slouched against the wall of his small apartment, tapping his fingers idly against the bedpost as rain slid down his window.

Ren’s words still haunted him.

That knife. That threat. That cold smile.

But Noah only smirked.

“Don’t worry, bro,” he whispered. “I’m not letting you kill me that easily.”

He stood, approaching the window. Droplets streaked down like shards of glass. His reflection glared back at him.

“I want love. Real love.”

He pressed a palm to the glass.

“Even if I die, I’ll win this war. I’ll get it.”

His voice hardened.

“I choose King Arthur.”

The moment he spoke, the storm outside seemed to vanish.

An immense pressure gripped him, twisting through every fiber of his being. His soul unraveled, stretched, and scattered through time and space.

But Noah did not break.

He laughed under his breath. “I’ll win. Even if it kills me.”

The world shattered.

He blinked—

And opened his eyes in a warm, candlelit chamber.

The air smelled of herbs and smoke.

He was in the body of a newborn, swaddled tightly, his tiny fists trembling.

A beautiful woman lay beside him, her face exhausted yet radiant with pride.

Then a cloaked man entered, his presence commanding the room. He lifted the child gently into his arms.

“Your name will be Arthur,” the man said solemnly. “One day, you will be the greatest king of all.”

Inside the infant’s body, Noah’s heart thundered. His lips curled in a smile no one could see.

“This… is perfect. I’ll go toward my goal, no matter what.”

And far beyond Earth, beyond stars and galaxies, in the erased zone of existence—

The divine container pulsed again.

The universe itself froze.

Forks hovered in the air.

Birds stalled mid-flight.

Flames froze, motionless in their hearths.

Footsteps locked in puddles.

Every chosen vessel was now inside their myth.

Living it.

Learning it.

Enduring it.

The War of the Stars had begun.

And there would be no turning back.