The hour is late as rain slices the old woods outside Kaibara, a rural village where secrets rot just below the moss. Yuta, our main lead, picks his way along a muddy path, holding an old lantern. Grief sits heavy on him. He has lost a sister to the woods, and those woods don’t give up what they take. Why do so many kids slip, vanish, retreat into those trees? But Yuta can’t let what happened slide. Would you chase the dark if it called loved ones home?
He crushes a root and lifts his light, revealing Makiko. Pale, shadow-headed, but next in line for Yuta’s trust. “I saw your sister by the water last week. She isn’t gone. The pines won’t let go.” Yuta demands she guide him, bitterness slicing through the wet chill. “If this is a joke, you’re sick.” Makiko grits her teeth. “Do you want to know the truth or not?” They vanish into silence. The village grows distant, and that mist doesn’t… quite clear.
Behind these two trudges Shun, stoic boy from the southern home, scrawling sigils onto his skin. He says it wards him from “Them.” Who are they? Eyes catch the movement, jaws in black boughs. The deeper they go, the air thins, muffled with old echoes. Bark gives way, showing glyphs that weren’t there on Yuta’s last walk.
The three find a water mirror, a pond ringed by black pine stumps and old toys. Makiko whispers, “Close your eyes or they’ll see you see them.” Is this spot real, or a memory forced upon them? Someone—or something—skirts the shore, and Yuta snaps his neck to see. Is it his sister’s thin braid behind the mist?
Shun shudders and croaks, “This pond isn’t right. There’s too much hunger here.” Bold as the moon-skinned trees, Makiko snaps back: “It’s always hungry. That was our cost.” Yuta wrestles stillness as voices spill out from under the water’s glassy face. “Help us… stay with us, lost little ones.” Goosebumps? You know what I mean. 
They kneel, hands out, and the mirror-water rolls, flickering scenes from village history—cults, night rites, villagers tied and masked. Words have teeth here. An old priestess appears beside Makiko’s shape in the shine, whispering names only Yuta knows from his grandfather’s old tales. Suddenly, white roots snake toward the pond. Shun builds a sigil with old honey and sticks. It cracks, but just for a breath. Screaming starts. Makiko is dragged across the slick, and Yuta lunges—but the woods swallow both her and the water’s face.
Reeling, Shun dares not run. “Your family… you both have old dirt with this place. The woods hold bargains.” Yuta chokes on breath, his lantern flame snapping short. “You’d leave her?” Shun shakes his head. “They’re giving us a choice. Go left—save her and stay. Go right—leave her and never come back.” Which would you pick, reader?
As the episode draws to close, Yuta takes three steps toward the pond, chanting his sister’s childhood rhyme. By the crooked trees, a pair of hands push upward through the soil.
Cliffhanger: His sister’s voice croons: “Brother, don’t look away… I’m almost here.” Rain lashes, lights die. What’s real here—the wish, or the woods themselves? 
