*CHAPTER 1: THE FIRST TOLL*

Kurogane Night Academy didn’t look cursed from the outside.

It looked old.

Stone walls.

Iron gates.

A bell tower in the center that was taller than it had any right to be.

Kaze Ryuto stood in front of those gates with one duffel bag and a lie in his mouth.

“I’m here for a fresh start,” he’d told the admissions office.

What he didn’t say: _I’m here because everywhere else I see her die._

_Echo Sight._

That’s what the doctors called it before they stopped calling him back.

Nine seconds.

Nine seconds before someone dies, Kaze sees it.

The fire.

The fall.

The knife.

The blood.

He saw his sister die 9 seconds before the fire took her.

He didn’t move fast enough.

He wasn’t going to be late again.

The gates opened by themselves.

---

*ARRIVAL*

“New transfer?”

The boy leaning against the gate had black hair, a bandage around one hand, and a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.

“Ren,” he said. “Class 3-A. You’re late.”

“Kaze.”

“I know.” Ren pushed off the gate. “They told us to expect you. Come on. Headmaster wants to see you before curfew.”

They walked.

The courtyard was empty.

No students.

Just the tower.

The bell in it was big. Dark. Silent.

Carved under it, in stone worn smooth by years:

`The Bell Tolls 9 Times. The 9th Toll Takes One.`

Kaze stopped walking.

Ren noticed.

“Yeah,” Ren said quietly. “That’s the rule.”

“What happens on the 9th toll?”

Ren didn’t answer.

The Headmaster’s office smelled like old paper and tea.

Headmaster Hoshizaki was not old.

That was the first wrong thing.

She looked maybe 30.

Black hair.

Red eyes that didn’t blink enough.

She was writing when they came in.

She didn’t look up.

“Kaze Ryuto,” she said. “Echo Sight. Survivor of the Hachino Fire. Sister died. You lived.”

Kaze’s jaw locked.

“How do you—”

“I know everything that happens in my school.” She finally looked up. “Sit.”

He sat.

Ren stayed standing by the door.

“You’re the ninth,” Hoshizaki said.

“The ninth what?”

“The ninth student chosen this year.” She slid a folder across the desk. Inside: eight photos. Eight names.

Mizuki Aoi.

Ren Kuroda.

Yui — no last name.

And five others Kaze didn’t know.

“Nine students,” Hoshizaki said. “Every nine years. One dies before graduation. That’s how the school stays alive.”

“That’s murder.”

“That’s tradition.” She smiled. It wasn’t kind. “You’ll get used to it.”

The bell tower tolled once.

_DONG._

Ren flinched.

Hoshizaki didn’t.

“First week,” she said. “First toll. You have eight left.”

Kaze stood.

“Where’s my room?”

“Room 32,” Hoshizaki said. “With the others.”

---

*ROOM 32*

It was supposed to be a dorm for two.

There were nine beds in it.

Mizuki was braiding someone’s hair.

She looked up when Kaze came in.

Her eyes were too calm.

“Kaze,” she said. Like she’d been expecting him.

“How do you know my name?”

“I saw you in a dream,” she said. “You were standing in the garden. Alone.”

Ren dropped Kaze’s bag on an empty bed.

“Don’t mind her. She’s like that.”

In the corner, a girl was folding paper.

She didn’t look up.

Yui, Kaze assumed.

The one the school didn’t know existed.

She was folding cranes.

Hundreds of them.

Hanging from the ceiling.

“Don’t talk to her too much,” Ren muttered. “She talks back.”

The bell tolled again.

_DONG._

Everyone in the room froze.

Except Yui.

She kept folding.

“That’s two,” Mizuki whispered.

“Two weeks,” Ren said. “Two tolls.”

Kaze felt it then.

The cold.

In his chest.

Like someone put a hand over his heart.

_Echo Sight._

He saw it.

Nine seconds.

A hallway.

Dark.

A girl with long hair.

A shadow behind her.

A hand.

A scream cut short.

Then it was gone.

Kaze was on his knees, gasping.

“Who—”

“Who was it?” Mizuki was beside him immediately.

“I don’t know her face,” Kaze said. “I’ve never seen her before.”

Ren looked at the door.

“Then we have nine seconds to find her when it happens.”

The bell didn’t ring a third time.

Not yet.

---

*NIGHT ONE*

Kaze didn’t sleep.

None of them did.

At 3:17 AM, the bell tolled.

_DONG._

Third toll.

Kaze shot up.

_Echo Sight._

Hallway.

Second floor.

The girl from before.

Long hair.

She was turning a corner.

The shadow was already there.

“Second floor,” Kaze said, already running.

“Which hall?” Ren was right behind him.

“East wing!”

They ran.

Nine seconds.

That’s all they had.

The hallway was empty.

Too quiet.

Then —

A sound.

A choked gasp.

Room 14.

The door was open.

Inside: the girl.

On the floor.

Breathing, but barely.

A dark shape standing over her.

It didn’t have a face.

Just a shape where a face should be.

Ren moved first.

He grabbed a desk and threw it.

The shape turned.

Looked at them.

And smiled with no mouth.

Then it was gone.

Like smoke.

The girl was alive.

Barely.

Mizuki was already there, hands glowing faintly as she pressed them to the girl’s chest.

“Hold on,” Mizuki whispered. “Hold on.”

The bell didn’t ring again.

Headmaster Hoshizaki was in the doorway when the ambulance people came.

She looked at the girl.

Then at Kaze.

Then at the empty corner where the thing had been.

“Interesting,” she said. “The Veil missed.”

“What was that?” Kaze demanded.

“The 3rd toll,” Hoshizaki said. “It always takes something. Tonight it took a little life instead of all of it.”

She turned to leave.

“Oh. And Kaze?

Good job.

You have six tolls left.”

---

*MORNING*

The girl lived.

Her name was Aoi.

Not Mizuki.

Another Aoi.

She didn’t remember anything.

Class 3-A didn’t go to class.

They sat in Room 32 and didn’t talk.

Until Yui spoke.

She hadn’t spoken before.

“ It’s not the bell,” she said.

Everyone looked at her.

“The bell doesn’t take anyone,” Yui said, folding another crane.

“The Headmaster does.

The bell just counts.”

Silence.

Ren swore.

Mizuki closed her eyes.

Kaze looked at the ceiling, at all the paper cranes.

_The Bell Tolls 9 Times. The 9th Toll Takes One._

“But we can change it,” Mizuki said suddenly.

“How?”

“We take the 9th death ourselves,” Mizuki said. “One of us.

So no one else has to.”

“No,” Kaze said immediately.

“You don’t get to decide that,” Ren said.

“Neither do you,” Mizuki shot back.

The bell tower was quiet outside.

For now.

Kaze looked at his hands.

They were shaking.

_Echo Sight_ had shown him 9 seconds.

But it didn’t show him how to stop it.

Not yet.

He looked at Mizuki.

At Ren.

At Yui and her cranes.

Eight tolls left.

Eight chances to be wrong.

One chance to be right.

“Okay,” Kaze said.

“We figure it out.

Together.”

Ren nodded.

Mizuki exhaled like she’d been holding her breath.

Yui just kept folding.

Outside, the bell tower stood silent.

Waiting.

_DONG._

Somewhere, far away, the 4th toll was coming.

And Kaze had 9 seconds to be ready for it.

*END CHAPTER 1*

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