The funeral was held on a Tuesday, because Tuesdays were cheapest in his area.
Four-year-old Hoshino Kagayaku sat in the front row wearing a black suit tailored just for him, his sky-blue eyes—still flickering occasionally with those black stars—fixed on his mother's photograph. The picture showed Rina at her peak, mid-performance, eyes bright with joy, arms outstretched as if embracing the entire world.
She'd never embrace anything again.
The funeral hall was packed. Former fans who'd loved her, industry people who'd worked with her, fellow idols who'd considered her a friend. They all cried, spoke in hushed tones about what a tragedy it was, how senseless, how unfair.
In the back row, partially obscured by a pillar, stood a kid with distinctive features—sharp eyes that held too much knowledge for his age. Aqua Hoshino had come to pay respects to his mother's former colleague, understanding loss in ways most people couldn't fathom.
Their eyes met for just a moment across the funeral hall—four-year-old Kagayaku and Aqua. Two reincarnated souls recognizing something in each other without understanding what. Aqua's expression flickered with recognition of pain that mirrored his own before he looked away, disappearing into the crowd.
Kagayaku turned back to his mother's photograph. His small hands, still scrubbed raw from trying to wash away her blood, clenched in his lap.
Beside him sat Kasuke, his father, who hadn't stopped crying since finding Rina's body. The police had arrived to find Kasuke collapsed in the doorway, hugging his wife while their son sat in her blood, black stars burning in eyes too powerful.
"She was the light of my life," Kasuke said, voice breaking on every word. "And Kagayaku's too. I don't—I don't know how to do this without her. How to raise our son alone. How to explain to him that his mother isn't coming back."
I know she's not coming back, Kagayaku thought, his adult consciousness screaming. I watched the light leave her eyes. I've seen death many times now—once in my other life through reports of my fans who hated me, once in this new life. I know exactly what permanent means.
But he couldn't say that. So he sat silent and still, the perfect picture of a traumatized person, while his mind calculated and planned and remembered every detail of the three attackers' faces.
Incense smoke curled toward the ceiling. And Hoshino Rina's life became memory, scattered to the wind like she'd never existed at all.
[TWO WEEKS LATER]
The apartment felt like a mausoleum. Kasuke had removed most of Rina's things—too painful to see her idol stuff, her fans gifts, anything to do with her. Kagayaku had stopped talking almost entirely. What was there to say? So he stayed silent, watching his father slowly collapse in on himself.
Kasuke still went to work—bills didn't stop because your heart did—but he'd become mechanical. Wake up. Make breakfast neither of them ate. Drop Kagayaku at daycare. Work. Pick up Kagayaku. Microwave dinner. Stare at the wall. Sleep. Repeat.
They were both drowning in the same house, too lost in their own grief to reach for each other. That's when the package arrived.
Thursday afternoon. Kagayaku was playing with blocks—actually planning, his adult mind using the blocks to map out scenarios, probabilities, ways he could protect himself—when Kasuke came home early from work.
His father's face was ashen. In his hands, a manila envelope with no return address. "Kagayaku," Kasuke said, his voice strange. Flat. "Go to your room."
But Kagayaku had learned in his previous life that the most important conversations happened when people were told to leave. So he went to his room, left the door slightly opened, and listened.
He heard Kasuke open the envelope. Heard paper rustling. Heard the click of a USB drive being inserted into a laptop. Then silence. Long, horrible silence.
Then a sound Kagayaku had never heard his father make—a low, sound of rage and anguish combined. "No. No. NO. Those bastards. Those BASTARDS!"
Kagayaku crept to his doorway, peered out. His father was watching something on the laptop screen, his face twisted in an expression that transcended grief into something darker.
On the screen: security footage. The apartment building's hallway camera, the angle the police said had been "malfunctioning" that night. But it had been working perfectly.
The footage showed everything in grainy black-and-white. Natsuki arriving with her two accomplices. But there, in a corner of the frame that the police report had conveniently omitted—two other figures. People who'd waited in the stairwell, who'd watched the murder happen, who'd fled immediately after.
Kasuke paused the footage, zoomed in on the faces. His hands started shaking. "Hiroshi," he whispered. "Takeshi. My own brothers."
Kagayaku's black stars flared in the darkness of his room. He understood before his father explained. Understood with the cold clarity of someone who'd been betrayed by family before.
Kasuke scrolled down to read the note that had come with the footage:
"Your brothers orchestrated everything. Natsuki was just the weapon. They hired her, fed her obsession, gave her your address. Hoshino Rina's life insurance policy was worth ¥50 million. With her dead and you as sole beneficiary, they planned to 'help' you through your grief, get access to the money. Your brother Takeshi claims to have more evidence. Find him before he finds you and your son. He has a kid the same age as Kagayaku. Four years old. Do you understand what that means? — A Friend"
The implications crashed through Kasuke's mind like an avalanche. ¥50 million. His brothers had murdered his wife for ¥50 million. Had hired a mentally unstable fan as their weapon. Had watched as Rina bled out in her own doorway.
And Takeshi's kid, same age as Kagayaku. A cousin who would now grow up believing he had a claim to that blood-soaked inheritance. Kasuke stood, his movements twitching with rage. He grabbed his phone, dialed a number with shaking fingers.
"Takeshi. We need to talk. Now. Tonight. I know what you did." Kagayaku couldn't hear the response, but he saw his father's face harden. "I don't care. My apartment. One hour. Come alone."
He hung up. Stood there breathing hard. Then called a neighbor—an elderly granny who sometimes watched Kagayaku. "Mrs. Tanaka? I need a favor. Can you watch Kagayaku tonight? Something important came up. I'll drop him off in thirty minutes."
No. Kagayaku's adult mind screamed warnings.
Don't separate. Stay together. This is a trap. He had tried anyway before. And had failed because he was to weak to change anything. But that would never mean he should just give up.
"Papa," he called out, stepping from his room. "Don't go."
Kasuke looked at his son—really looked at him for the first time since the funeral. Saw the black stars flickering in those sky-blue eyes. Saw something too wise, too aware, looking out from those eyes.
"It's okay, Kagayaku," Kasuke said, kneeling down and pulling his son into a fierce hug. "Papa has to fix something. Has to make the bad people pay for hurting Mama. You understand? I'm going to make them pay."
No, Kagayaku thought desperately, his small arms wrapping around his father's neck. Revenge is a poison. I know. I lived thirty-six years seeing it for myself. Don't do this. Don't leave me.
But again, he couldn't say it. Kasuke pulled back, kissed his son's forehead. "I love you, Kagayaku. You're my shining star. Just like Mama said." Twenty minutes later, Kagayaku was at Mrs. Tanaka's apartment two floors down, watching from her window as his father returned to their unit alone.
Waiting.
[3:47 AM - THE SECOND DEATH]
Kagayaku woke to screaming. He'd never actually ever fallen asleep, actually. Just layed in Mrs. Tanaka's guest futon staring at the ceiling, his adult consciousness running through scenarios, probabilities, ways this night could end.
None of them were good.
Mrs. Tanaka was sleeping soundly—elderly people slept through anything with the right medication. But Kagayaku heard everything. The sound of the apartment door slamming open two floors up. Voices raised in anger. His father's roar: "YOU KILLED HER! YOU KILLED HER AND NOW YOU'RE GOING TO PAY!"
Glass shattering. Bodies hitting walls. The specific sound of violence that Kagayaku knew too intimately from his first life. He slipped from the futon, his body moving with purpose. Out of Mrs. Tanaka's apartment, up the stairs, following the sounds of destruction.
The apartment door was ajar. Kagayaku pushed it open.
The living room was destroyed. Furniture overturned. Broken glass everywhere. And his father had someone pinned against the wall by the throat—not Hiroshi, but Takeshi. The younger brother. The one who'd waited in the stairwell.
"Please!" Takeshi was choking out, blood running from his nose where Kasuke had struck him. "Please, Kasuke, I didn't know they were going to kill her! Hiroshi said we were just going to scare her, convince her to do one more tour, the insurance policy would—"
"Insurance policy?!" Kasuke's grip tightened. "You killed my wife for MONEY? For INSURANCE?"
"The family business was failing! We needed—Hiroshi said Rina was the answer, if she just did one more comeback, but she refused, and then he said—he said if something happened to her, you'd get the payout, and we could—"
Kasuke's fist connected with Takeshi's jaw. Once. Twice. Again. "You watched her die! You watched her bleed out! And you KILLED HER!" The words hit Kagayaku like physical blows. His black stars blazed so bright they illuminated his small face in the darkened apartment.
Takeshi's eyes, swollen and bloody, suddenly focused past Kasuke's shoulder. Saw Kagayaku standing in the doorway, black stars burning.
And Kagayaku watched his uncle's expression shift. Saw the calculation. The same look Yumiko had worn in his previous life when she'd decided to destroy him.
"The kid," Takeshi gasped. "Kasuke—the kid is why—with Rina dead, the insurance goes to Kagayaku as next of bloodline, right? Your son inherits everything."
Kasuke's hands loosened slightly in shock at the implication. That's when Takeshi moved. The knife—the same knife Natsuki had used, still stained with Rina's dried blood, a trophy Takeshi had kept—appeared from inside his jacket.
He lunged not at Kasuke but at Kagayaku. "If the kids dead, the money defaults to you, and then to the extended family, and my son gets his share—" Time seemed to slow. Kagayaku saw the blade coming, his mind calculating trajectories and knowing he was too small, too slow, too slow to dodge. But Kasuke was faster.
He threw himself between the knife and his son, his body becoming a shield the same way Rina's body had tried to shield Kagayaku from seeing her murder. The blade entered Kasuke's back, between his ribs, straight into his lung.
The sound he made was bloody, surprised. Like he couldn't believe this was happening, that his own brother had just—"DAD!" Kagayaku screamed, the English word erupting from him—because in his previous life, that's what he'd called the father who'd beaten him, and now here was another father dying for him, the cosmic irony too cruel to bear.
Kasuke collapsed forward, blood spreading across the floor in a pattern Kagayaku had seen before. Six months ago. His mother's blood in the hallway.
Now his father's blood in the living room. Red on white tile. Red on his hands again. Always red. Takeshi stood frozen, staring at the knife in his hand, at his brother bleeding out, his face cycling through horror and panic and desperate calculation.
"No—Kasuke, I didn't mean to—I was aiming for the kid, you moved—Kasuke!"
But Kagayaku was already on his knees beside his father, his small hands pressing against the wound the same way he'd done with his mother. As if pressure could push life back in. As if willpower could reverse death.
Not again. Please not again. I can't lose another one. I can't.
Kasuke's eyes found his son. Blood bubbled at his lips when he tried to speak. His hand, slick with blood, reached up to touch Kagayaku's face the same way Rina had.
"Kagayaku... run..." "Dad, no! DAD! Help is coming, just hold on—"
"Your... uncle..." Kasuke choked, his eyes unfocusing. "Takeshi... has a son... Makoto... four years old... he'll come for you... for the money... when he's older... when he understands..."
His breath was rattling. The same sound Rina had made. The sound of life becoming absence. "Run... hide... or become strong enough to..." The sentence died unfinished. So did Kasuke.
His last breath was a sigh, relief and regret mixed together. His hand fell from Kagayaku's face, leaving a red handprint on his cheek. Silence. Terrible, absolute silence.
Kagayaku knelt there, covered in his second parent's blood in six months, his black stars pulsing so bright they seemed to have their own heartbeat. Behind him, Takeshi was making sounds—prayers or curses or apologies or pleas, it didn't matter. Words were meaningless. Words had failed to save anyone.
Kagayaku turned slowly to look at his uncle. And for just one moment, Takeshi saw not the normal Kagayaku, but something reaching for revenge. Something that had died twice and been reincarnated into vengeance. Something that would remember this moment forever.
"I'll find him," Kagayaku said, his voice carrying the weight of two lifetimes. "Your son. Makoto. I'll find him before he finds me." "Kagayaku, I—I never meant—it was supposed to be just the money, just business, nobody was supposed to actually—"
But Kagayaku was already moving with purpose that seemed wrong for a regular person. He grabbed his mother's phone from where it lay charging in the kitchen—the passcode was his birthday—and dialed emergency services with hands that barely shook.
"Help," he said when the operator answered, his voice perfectly calm despite being covered in blood. "My father is dead. My uncle Takeshi Hoshino killed him. The same uncle who helped kill my mother Rina Hoshino six months ago. The address is—"
He recited it perfectly. The operator was asking questions, but Kagayaku hung up. Sirens were already approaching. Someone in the building had heard the screaming, called it in. Tokyo at 3:47 AM was never truly quiet.
Takeshi was crying now, hugging his brother's body, muttering about how it was an accident, how he never meant to actually kill anyone, how the money had just seemed so important when Hiroshi first suggested it.
Kagayaku walked to his room—stepping around blood pools with practiced care—and sat on his bed. The bed with star-pattern sheets his mother had bought. The bed in the room his father had painted sky-blue.
Both of them gone now. Both murdered by family for money.
The same story as his first life, just with different details. Different weapons. Same result—Kagayaku alone, covered in blood, surrounded by the debris of destroyed family.
But this time, he had names. Faces. A target.
Makoto Hoshino. Four years old, like him. A cousin who would grow up hearing his father's version of events, who would believe he was owed something, who would eventually come for the inheritance soaked in his parents' blood.
I'll be ready, Kagayaku promised the darkness, his black stars burning steady and cold. I'll become strong enough that when you come—when my "brother" finally reveals himself—I'll destroy you the way my sister destroyed me. The way your father destroyed my parents.
I'll shine so bright you'll burn just from looking.
The police burst into the apartment. Footsteps, shouting, controlled chaos. They found a kid sitting calmly on his bed, covered in blood, black stars glowing in his eyes.
"Son," one officer said gently, kneeling down. "Are you hurt?" Kagayaku looked at him with those ancient eyes, and the officer actually flinched. "No," the kid said quietly. "I'm not hurt. I'm never hurt. It's everyone around me who dies."
The officer didn't know how to respond to that. How could he? They picked up Kagayaku, led him past his father's body, past his sobbing uncle being handcuffed, out into the Tokyo dawn that was just beginning to break.
Social services would come. Foster care. Therapy. But none of it would matter.
Because Hoshino Kagayaku, the child who'd died twice and been loved once, had just learned the final lesson that would define his second life: Love was real. Love was possible. Love was the most precious thing in existence.
And love got you killed.
Better to burn cold. Better to shine like a black star—beautiful and deadly and consuming everything that came close. His orange stars were gone. From that night forward, they would only flicker black when they appeared at all.
Somewhere in that same Tokyo dawn, Aqua Hoshino was probably waking up for school, carrying his own grief, pursuing his own revenge. They were parallel lines now—two people with reincarnated souls, two revenge quests, two futures written in blood. The difference was Aqua still had Ruby. Still had family. Kagayaku had only ghosts and a name: Makoto. The black stars pulsed.
Let the performance begin.
TO BE CONTINUED... [Next Episode: "Twelve Years of Waiting"]