The ocean never slept anymore.
Not since the Abyssborn began to sing.
They say their lullabies can pull your soul out through your ears if you listen too long. That's why no one sails at night – no one who wants to live.
But tonight...someone was screaming over the sound of the sea.
"REN! REN, THEY'RE HERE!"
Ren kaido joltedup from the crate he was sleeping on. The harbor fog was thicker than usual, swallowing even the moonlight. Cries echoed from the direction of the fishing docks – then a sound like wet bones being snapped.
He didn't run.
He had learned not to run three years ago – when the Abyssborn had taken his mother, his brother, his home, and left only fire, salt, and silence.
Now, he walked.
Past blood - smears. Past empty clothes still warm. Past a fisherman's hand twitching alone on the dock.
And then he saw it.
An Abyssborn.
It had once been human –at least the top half. The rest was a crawling slide ofscales, jaws, and leech –like limbs, Eyes covered it's chest like barnacles, and from each one ,a faint hymn hummed into the fog.
It hovered over a buy, maybe ten years old, still breathing.
Ran didn't shout. Didn't panic.
He walked in the edge of the pier ...and whispered, "I curse you."
The air bent.
From behind Ren, the book opened on its own – black leather, soaked and chained, yet somehow floating mid-air beside him like it had a will.
A page turned.
Words glowed:
"Sin Engraved: Vengeance."
Curse Activated: Hollow Flame."
Ren raised his hand.
From his palm, a small black fire flickered to life – silent, cold wrong.
The moment it touched the Abyssborn, it shrieked like it had been dipped in boiling guilt. The hymn cracked. It's flesh curled inwards. The demon thrashed, trying to claw away from the boy – and from Ren.
But the flame followed. It didn't burn the body.
It buried the soul.
Within seconds, the creature crumpled into smoke and drifted back into the sea, lifeless.
The boy started at Ren with wide, terrified eyes.
"you're safe," ren said flatly.
"That... That fire... It's not normal,"the boy whispered.
Ren didn't answer. He never did. He just turned back towards the warehouse where he slept.
But tonight, the sea had one more gift.
Floating near the edge of the dock was a box. Old, sealed, covered in rusted chains...and floating.
That shouldn't have been possible. The Grimoires never float. Once claimed, they sink forever – tied to their owner's soul.
Ren knelt and fished it out. The moment his fingers touched the lock, the chains snapped and fell away like dead vines.
The book opened.
" Write the name of a sin... And take it curse."
But he had already done that. His sin had been chosen the day his family died. The book shouldn't be showing this again ...
Unless ..
"This isn't my Grimoire," he whispered.
"It's... new?"
From the shadows, a voice purred,
"congratulations, Ren kaido."
He spun, but saw no one.
The voice continued, echoing from nowhere – and everywhere.
"you have been chosen as a keybearer.
The sea remembers your pain. It recognizes your wrath."
"who are you?" Ren snapped.
"I am the Abyss....and this is only your second beginning."
Suddenly, the book's pages flipped on their own, Revealing a new chapter titled:
"sin unlocked: Nothingness."
Below it, a question appeared, written in red ink:
"what do you truly wish to drown?"
Ren felt a cold wind rise from the ocean itself. From far beyond the fog, dozens of Abyssborn were surfacing – not attacking. Watching.
Waiting....
Ren closed the book.
He'd ask the crew in the morning.
Yes – the crew.
He didn't have one yet.
But after tonight, he would start finding them.
People with grimoires.
People with sins.
People ren had seen something no one else had. Something he never told the order, or the survivors, or even his own grimoire.
He'd seen the first Abyssborn.
And had been smiling.