#there’s too many names to add skkdkfv

[xxlady-lunaxx]

Seventeen. Seventeen whole, wonderful, beautiful people. Gone. Lost. Seventeen people until Sanemi finally joined them, putting his mind at rest. Out of seventeen, he buried six. Out of seventeen, five were lost forever. Out of seventeen, he watched six be buried. Out of seventeen, he killed one. Out of seventeen, he felt the impact of each and every one of them like a train hitting a wall at full speed, his world crumbling around him. Out of seventeen, he loved seventeen, in so many different ways it hurt.

Shuya. Hiroshi. Koto. Teiko. Sumi. His mother. Masachika. Kanae. Kyojuro. Kagaya. Shinobu. Muichiro. Genya. Gyomei. Obanai. Mitsuri. Giyuu.

Seventeen.

He watched his mother disappear into thin air before him after driving a knife to her side. He felt the still pulses of each of his siblings, pressing a shaky finger to their wrists, their necks, feeling nothing but cold skin. He held Masachika in his arms as the life poured out of him in deep, red blood. He stumbled during his mission, hearing the news of Kanae’s death. He watched the bamboo thump to the ground after his katana sliced clean through, like the fist that pierced Kyojuro’s stomach. He froze, dust and plants flying into the air as he saw the blazing orange of the explosion that ended Kagaya’s life. He stiffened when a crow flew overhead, naming Shinobu as the first to die in the Infinity Castle. He fell unconscious as the last of Muichiro’s breaths disappeared. He sobbed, clutching onto what was left of Genya’s body, hunched over as yet another turned to dust. He watched as Gyomei was lowered into his grave, eyes focused on the engravings on the tombstone rather than the body. He looked away, nails digging into the palms of his hands as a blanket was topped over Obanai and Mitsuri’s bodies, neither willing to let go of each other just yet. He held Giyuu’s hand, sitting across from Tengen as the haggard breaths that filled the room diminished, until it was deathly silent. And finally he lay, a boy and a man by his side, letting himself drift into the emptiness of death, a feeling akin to relief sending him away.

Eighteen. He became the eighteenth.