Karula Lefaire comes to Senchai chasing answers that exist only in fragments—names half-erased from records, stories dismissed as folklore, and a family history that ends in fire. Raised far from her ancestral homeland, she looks as though she belongs… until she speaks. In Senchai, that difference matters. Officially, Karula is here to complete her graduate research on regional folklore. Unofficially, she is searching for the truth behind her mother’s past—a woman given away as a child during a troubled era, whose origins were never fully explained, and whose life ended in a blaze she could not walk away from. The archives of Nandijao offer order, silence, and centuries of carefully preserved truth—but also gaps. Missing names. Redacted details. Stories that stop where they should begin. As Karula follows a paper trail from the capital to the coastal city of Chofu, and finally to a forgotten fishing village called Bangji, the lines between scholarship and lived experience begin to blur. The villagers are polite but guarded. Children vanish without explanation. Old stories linger where the government insists nothing supernatural has ever existed. And everywhere Karula goes, fire follows her—through dreams, memory, and a pull she cannot explain. In Bangji, folklore stops being theoretical. A “protector” is spoken of in lowered voices. Offerings are made. Sacrifices are accepted as necessity. And a perceptive, unsettling child watches Karula far too closely, as if recognizing something she herself has yet to understand. What Karula uncovers in Bangji is not simply the truth of her lineage, but a reckoning with power, responsibility, and the cost of survival. Some legacies are inherited through blood. Others through flame. And some truths, once uncovered, demand to be answered—no matter the price. Because in Senchai, myths do not stay buried forever. And fire remembers.