Category: novels (Page 7 of 7)

In a position trying desperately to keep her modesty intact, Otsune’s hand felt a tempo beating beneath her breast. Increasing in speed, it was all she could feel as her body refused to move. She felt trapped. Her glasses were left in the changing room, her eyes displaying her surroundings blurred, the remaining four senses enough to tell her the truth lying naked in front of her, as equally naked as it was unequally woman.

“Who the hell are you?” she shouted at the top of her voice directly at the intruder. Mentally she tried to stay calm. Situations like these were best controlled by keeping your aggressor unbalanced. Screaming may look like an emotive response. But it changed the game that was being played, even if that game was apparently the intruder attempting to go back to sleep. Not willing to take any crap from him, she stood up, lifted her fist and began to lunge forward, her fist flying at high speed towards the now unconscious boy.

It didn’t matter apparently. The boy vanished as her fist hit rock. Clearly the weaker substance of the two, sharp pain erupted from her knuckles as they collapsed into the stone before her, adding to the bruises already self-inflicted earlier that day. It lifted back up of its own accord. Her hand screamed at her, causing her to respond in kind.

Her mystery opponent had jumped about seven feet away from the her, landing on a rock at the edge of the water. He seemed ready for a fight, a fist just in front of his head and the other arm in front of his chest. Then, just as sudden, he dropped his hands.

“Hey calm down,” he called over to her, waving more than just his hands in her direction. “All I asked for was for you to save my place.” Looking towards the floor of the pool, she swore she could feel the blood rushing through her temples. She just wanted a peaceful day. A nice, relaxing day to just fall into the Springs for a few hours- even ten minutes would have been nice. Now there was a guy in the pool. This was the last thing they needed. If rumours of a man here got out, it would like be confirming all the stupid townspeoples’ paranoid rumours. It was something like this being exactly why she was trying to convince Gen to sell off in the first place.

She was reminded in the bluntest possible way that he was naked.

“What’s wrong?” he asked calmly.

“Help!” she shouted again. “Somebody, help!”

“Why?” he asked, looking round. “What’s wrong?”

With a clatter of footsteps on the wooden floor, out rushed Natoko and Fujiko, two of her fellow residents. The second wasn’t the best to see come out as Fujiko, the resident girl who prided herself on gossip, would blab by accident if she wasn’t careful, and with half the internet knowing by sunset if she were careful.

Natoko though was perhaps the most helpful person to appear at this moment. Upon seeing the man, Natoko charged forwards, the water unable to stain even the bottom of her hakama dress. She rose to meet the intruder, katana blade unsheathing in one silent stroke.

“Oh.”

Striking downwards, Natoko’s blade stuck the air in front of the boy’s forehead, looking to leave a nice cleave there. Trying his best to lean to the left, the blade slicing down without him, the intruder was just able to dodge by a fraction, the sharpened edge appearing to nick a few strands of hair, before getting his hand on the hilt of the sword and slamming Natoko forwards. Poor momentum, padded clothing, slippery floor, the girl couldn’t stop herself.

The boy took advantage of this situation immediately, his left foot slipping under her right, it pushed upwards, causing the girl to further lose her balance as her weight was used against her, her polished steel swinging wildly in the tight clutch of her hand as she began to fall back. Not yet finished, he grabbed the inside of her wrist, punching her sword hand with his other, knuckles against knuckles, flesh against flesh. With a sharp piercing cry her sword dropped to the floor, even as her body readjusted its balance and remained on both feet, be it one step back. Seeing her eyes following the blade, as if a hand had been cut off, his fist slammed into her stomach, causing a brutal cough to surge from her throat, taking her to the floor of the springs.

The intruder stopped immediately, standing up straight and quickly backing off.

“Ah, sorry sorry sorry,” he quickly apologized. “Forgot I wasn’t at home. Mom told me not to attack people around here.” He extended a hand to her, waiting patiently for her to accept it, the scowl on her face saying that may take some time. Wanting to help, Otsune stood as far back as possible, too afraid to approach the intruder, a force clearly to be reckoned with and preferably shot at long distance. He looked towards them, and she almost fell back at his serene face. She went to say something, maybe to scream at him again, when she was interrupted by a foot.

Turning out of reflex, the smallest slight redirecting his attention, the intruder must have felt regret at doing so as a small, dark-skinned girl wearing a loose grey shirt and baggy black trousers directed her foot into the limp jaw where the back of his neck had been a second. Head twisting, his body went with it, the force of the attack carrying on through him and throwing him into the water, the attacker landing in the spring at the same time his face did.

“Aki?” Otsune questioned the girl’s sudden appearance, forgetting temporarily who she was talking about. The young African girl specialized in being unexpected, appearing without warning to strike and annoy as only she could, only to quickly return to where she was. She seemed impossible sometimes.

“You leave Natoko alone!” the girl shouted, her accent exploding with immature anger. The boy was looking at her the same way most people did when their mother shot them, blood dripping from his lips, looking to it like he had never seen it before, watching it pour down his chin and into the water, diluting within the murky liquid.

“But she attacked me first, I did nothing wrong,” he explained, his voice still sounding bright and careful, causing Aki’s face to drop back almost instantly, as she had realized the truth of the situation. Otsune felt her face cringe, jolting her neck at the same time. Aki would believe him as well.

“Done nothing wrong? You were staring at me in the nude,” Otsune interjected. Her voice trembled at the end there, her mind quickly deciding to omit the parts that would have given him a semi-decent right to watch. The intruder looked shocked for a moment, and his blinking seemed to shake his entire head. “Huh? I was sleeping. You were the one who sat by me, remember? You started saying stuff and I mumbled. Then there was an urge for juice, and I think I fell asleep.”

Aki was helping Natoko stand up.

“That’s because I couldn’t see who you were,” Otsune’s argued back across the water, her anger justifiably high in her opinion. “And you were so obviously not sleeping, you were just pretending so you could get a look? You’re just a trespassing pervert!”

“But why would I even want to look at you naked?”

Otsune went to answer, but Fujiko’s sniggers stopped her. Her eyes still showing her the boy blurred. She felt a growl coming on. It actually felt like he seemed honestly confused at her anger. This was stupid. He had been naked in their pool of all things! Her thoughts stopping again, she quickly realized that he was still naked and turned; hiding her eyes from the blurred mosaic he had no intention of covering up.

“What are you doing here?” Fujiko asked beside her, now standing besides her friend with a towel and trying to sound like she was in control. “This is private property-well…sort of.”

“Oh that, I was invited by…”

“Liar!” Otsune interrupted, her anger flaring, not allowing him a chance to explain. Give anyone a chance to explain and they’ll rationalize anything. “You’re just another pervert. Aki. Keep him here while I call the police.” Turning, she made her way towards the entrance where her clothes, and more importantly, her glasses were. Aki pulled her fist back, more than happy to follow orders.

“I was invited by my cousin,” the boy shouted, making sure he was heard. “My name is Sagara Futabatei.” Everyone in the pool froze, Otsune turned back, looking at him in shock as, five feet away from them, the fence collapsed with a small detonation that boomed through the vicinity, a whirring sound tearing into the whole conversation as the DoomWheel tore into the pool.

Gasping loudly as she turned towards the even newer interruption, Otsune’s mind threatened to break upon itself. She just wanted a quiet afternoon! Then she got an intruder thrown in her face and now… now she wasn’t exactly sure what she was looking at.

It looked like a giant wheel, but with ancient, rusted hubcaps and tires that belonged on monster trucks. Spiky protrusions stuck out of every direction possible, some with bits of wood and metal hanging off of them, implying that a fence and lamp post had felt its wrath.

“Ah, there you are,” Sagara said, now completely ignoring those around him. “I’ve been looking for you. Well, not completely.”

“And I have been waiting!” the giant wheel said, with a voice that demanded respect despite the fact it was coming out of rubber. It somehow reminded Otsune of an ear test that she had decided she didn’t need to go to. “Your pursuit of me has not been very active, Demon Hunter. The time I have had to wait for you to wake up is insulting.”

“Sorry,” the original intruder apologized with a nervous grin. “But Hot Springs are so nice. You should join us before we try to kill each other.”

In response to the invitation, the giant spiked tire only swore, before spinning on the spot like a buzzsaw. Otsune’s brain failed to figure out how it was doing it, watching the spikes scratching the same area of rock over and over again as it sped up. It was revving, but common knowledge told her it was the gearbox that did that, not the wheel. A spinning wheel should still travel!

She felt Fujiko slowly back off behind her, pulling her arm to urge her to do the same. Natoko was standing back up, looking like she was about to slowly slide up to her friends, but ended up rolling over to catch her sword instead. The roll looked forced and, as she stood up, she held her free hand to her stomach, breathing heavily. With a mighty roar of an engine (which considering the lack of a car didn’t make sense either!) the giant tire sped forwards, screeching as it sent water flying in all directions.

The intruder just stood there, waiting with a smile on his face that looked like it wanted to become roadkill.

Then he was gone, the tire crashing over him and crushing him before Otsune could even see him disappear. Turning with a squeal, Otsune kept to the side, years of cartoons telling her that running straight back would only lead to doom.

But that was when the screeching stopped.

Her leg felt like it had landed in cement, her entire body stiffening as she turned back round to see what had caused the monster to stop, but there was only Natoko, standing right in front of it, her sword jammed below one of the spikes.

“What is this?” the machine shouted angrily, its invisible engine revving a few times. “What are you?”

“I will not permit any danger to my friends,” the girl muttered weakly, her breathing still haggard from the punch. Despite the scene in front of her, Otsune could only find herself thinking how, if her friend was able to stop this, an event surely impossible in itself, then how could the boy, who had just been a bug on a windshield, be so easily stopped.

Then she saw the boy.

Standing perfectly still- and not at all like a bloody stain for that matter, the boy’s smile seemed to hit harder than the fact he was still here. His hands now clutching what looked to be a beautiful piece of silk, Otsune’s eyes followed until she realized the long piece of rope had punched a hole through both the rusted hubcaps, streaming firmly through the middle of the monster and out the other end to where Sagara held onto it.

“Why couldn’t you have shown up in private?” the boy called Sagara said shouting loudly for the wheel to hear him over the noise. “You’re making me break the rules here.” It growled, trying to spin again, but unable to, both Natoko and the intruder jamming it. Water splashed violently throughout the spring, lightly showering most of the people there, but the intruder only looked like he enjoying it. He waited for the monster to stop revving, the engine now panting as it ground to a halt again, before looking over to Natoko. “Could you get out of the way please?”

“What?” Natoko muttered, looking pissed that the intruder was even daring to speak to her.

“It’s already defeated. It just needs to fall apart,” he explained, like a teacher telling a student they had forgotten their bag. Natoko looked forwards, looking a little unsure of whether she could let go without it crushing her, before quickly skimming off to the side, her sword the last thing to leave it.

From twelve o’clock to three o’clock, the wheel screamed as a quarter of its upper body just broke off, Otsune realizing for the first time that the silky cord had actually roped itself around the wheel twice and in different directions. Not speeding on as it looked like it might, the strange contraption rolled forwards once, before trapping itself in its gap, its innards falling out of the empty space, a mix of needless cogs and springs tat looked like they couldn’t possibly be the buoyancy the tire needed to continue being a tire.

“Is it broke?” Fujiko asked, when the deafening crash subsided.

“Are we broke?” Otsune mumbled off hand. “It’s beginning to feel like that.”

“It can’t die like that,” the intruder explained, the strangely silky rope now completely gone. “You can’t kill a demon properly in this realm, you can only break the connection it’s made to the object, destroy the connection of the kotodama.”

Otsune glanced to Fujiko, to see that the girl had the same expression that must have been on her own face, before turning back to the boy, who had muttered something about waking him up later, before crashing back down into the pool. “Who on earth are you?” she screamed at him. “Wait no, I don’t care about that. What was that thing? And that rope you have. How did it fall apart? And where did the laws of physics go?” Before anyone could answer, a high-pitched squeal resonated from the other side of the springs, turning all heads to the doorway where another young girl stood. Dressed in her regular hoodie, Sakura stared at the boy, an innocent look of horror plastered over her face as she stared at the naked intruder.

***

 

Late. Late. Running late. The sooner I’m there, the better. Sooner I’m there, the sooner I can ask.

But i can’t reveal myself here.

Crap! Right. Need to ask elsewhere. Where? The InBetween Realm. That’s the only safe place.

Need to get him there. Can’t just ask.

Uninjured.

Need to get him there uninjured.

How do I do that?

***

 

Everyone had quickly moved to the foyer, partly because it was the nearest open space in the hotel from the Hot Springs, and partly so they could kick the intruder out as fast as possible once it had been decided that they should. Sagara was now fully dressed and not embarrassing the impressionable young children around him. He was still soaked, as the girls had not allowed him the usual allocated time required to dry one’s self, instead throwing his clothes at him and insisting he do it whilst still in the Hot spring, before pushing him into the changing rooms. They had also barely given him any time to put his clothes back on, not wanting to risk the chance that he would just run away. Although Fujiko had pointed out that the best way to prevent him running away would be to not have let him get dressed at all, none of the others seemed too keen with this suggestion.

Otsune had been allowed the allocated time to dry herself and was currently in another room doing so. The girl he had punched was currently sitting opposite him, her arms folded, staring at him with an intensely grim look on her face, her sword held against her shoulder. It probably wasn’t helping his position much that he was staring right back at her with the same grin upon his face that he had when he hit her. Aki was doing nothing now to conceal her presence, as she tried her best to distract Natoko without actually getting in her friend’s field of view.

The small black haired girl whom he had made such a memorable first impression on was sitting quietly on her own on a separate chair, mainly looking down at the floor, but with an occasional glance in Sagara’s direction.

“So…you’re a demon hunter?” Fujiko asked him in a ‘so much conversation happened when you weren’t looking’ sort of way, sitting with her feet on the table, thus preventing his most obvious escape route long enough for the others to stop him.

“Demon hunting ninja,” Sagara corrected.

“As you say,” Fujiko agreed naturally. “And that thing was a demon?”

“Not the tire,” he corrected. “The tire had just been warped by the long term effects of a Possession of Kotodama, but the demon was controlling it.”

“Ah, of course,” Fujiko said, with a loud air of sarcasm. Fifteen seconds clicked loudly on the clock, before she realized he hadn’t noticed. “What the Possession of Kotodama?”

“You don’t know?” he asked back, looking confused.

“No.”

“Well,” he started to explain. “You know how everything has a voice, right?”

“Everyone?”

“No. Everything.”

“No.”

“Oh…” he said, clearly surprised. “Well, everything does have a voice, although I guess humans can’t hear them.” He took a moment to process his own statement. “And the demons hijack that voice, gaining the right of possession over the object. And, over time, it can deform the object and do what it wants with it, often going around to perform acts of evil, in this case, making challenges to strong warriors and then humiliating them.” He paused again. “Though I guess it didn’t get chance to do that this time. Normally it would use the item to make its mark on the human world, usually through acts of evil. I think this one was based on pride or something like that. Do you know what pride is? Tell me if I’m confusing you.” Fujiko remained staring at the interrogatee for a moment, nodding her head in time to his words, before turning to the others with defeat on her face.

“Help,” she whimpered, but no one responded. No one knew exactly how to. Their first thought had been to call the police, but calling attention to such a scene would probably cause more problems than the ones they were currently suffering.

“What are we going to do about the tire?” a sixteen year old called Junko pointed out, scrutinizing the newcomer like he was a badly created piece of art. She had passed by the scene just minutes after it had happened, and was suffering the obvious cognitive difficulties involved in seeing a massive pile of rubber, springs and cogs. “It’s too big for any of us to pick up.”

“And it’s in the Hot Springs…”

…

…

 

Silence reigned a peaceful dictatorship for a few moment, only Aki still moving about, still trying to annoy her friend.

“Oi you,” the intruder said without warning, catching everybody’s’ attention. “Sorry.” The apology was so bland and unexpected, that it seemed to take a moment for Natoko to realize he was talking to her. The response she gave could only be considered a growl. Standing up impassively, she secured her sword in her belt, before turning around and walking away, leaving out of the main entrance as another girl entered it. Sagara looked around a little confused, waving his head side to side, like he was trying to figure something out.

“Hey, Tina!” Aki called out, as she ran past the girl coming in, following Natoko out of the room. “Ew, you stink.”

Fujiko coughed in response to this, her hand covering her mouth. “Oh, she’s right, girl. Where the hell have you been?”

Tina, a ginger haired girl who wasn’t Japanese, possibly German, but irrelevant to the main storyline nonetheless, looked down at the floor, frowning for a second. “I…I fell into the lake.”

“You got pushed again?” Fujiko nearly shouted, now standing up and giving Sagara the opportunity to rush for freedom, which he didn’t do. “You have got to show me these people sometime, girl.”

“No, no, really, I just…”

“I can’t believe some of the people around here,” she said as she approached the girl, getting two feet away from her before lurching back. “You don’t treat foreigners like this. You shouldn’t treat anyone like this…”

“It’s okay, Fujiko,” Tina tried to say reassuringly, convincing no one. “I just need to wash up and then…” Her eyes darted to Fujiko’s side and she quickly followed out of the room, her bag full of clanking glass as she did so.

“What? She hasn’t bought more perfume, has she?” Junko exclaimed, as she caught sight of the disappearing bag.

The point became mute as Otsune entered the room, along with the landlord of the dormitory, looking around vaguely confused. Otsune was strangely calmer now, almost appearing giddy at being able to get rid of Sagara as soon as possible.

“This is the guy,” she said, indicating Sagara. “He claims he’s your cousin, so you should know him right?”

“I haven’t seen my cousin in years, so…” but he was cut off as the girl pushed him in front of the intruder, who stared at him like he was a giant pillow made out of hamsters.

“I don’t know you,” Sagara stated, Otsune’s face instantly curling up into a grimace at the intruder’s own confession.

“I’m…” Gen stuttered, eyes darting around like he wasn’t sure he should say anything or not, “Futabatei Gen.”

“Oh,” Sagara said, his face brightening up as he fumbled in his pocket. “Here.” Passing him a letter, Sagara backed off, giving the feeling it would explain everything.

As Gen went to open it, the letter tried with all its might not to let him. There was no way it was going to let a weakling like this beat it, and it resisted with all it might to stop the massive finger from ripping open its glue trapped confines. But try as it might, there was no way for the paper to prevent the fact that it was a lifeless inanimate object, and it tore apart accordingly. Inside was a letter.

 

 

Dear Gen

               It’s your aunt. How are you? Would like to say it’s nice to see you but unfortunately I am talking through the interdimensional fabric known as a sheet of paper, so I  can’t. Your mother tells me that you somehow inherited the old hotel. I guess your grandmother must have realized that it was the place where you had the most fun as a child, so yeah, congratulations on that. Be careful, that old place has a trick or two to it. There’s also possibly some booby traps and sealed demons still lying around j/k lol. Remember. Demons don’t exist.

There’s a family get together in the works, but in MHO, it won’t happen for a year, since no one can really be bothered with scrounging up travel money. We might end up invading the hotel if need be, but we’ll give you some warning in advance. Until then, I hope to see you soon. TTYL

 

 Futabatei Tenma

 P.S- Do you have e-mail or Messenger. ?f so, my account’s supersamuraininjagal@hotmail.com I’m really getting into at the moment, so I’ll be on all the time

 P.P.S- Sagara should be coming over next week.

“Well…” Gen said as he finished reading the letter that Sagara had handed him. “That’s my aunt’s signature. I remember it from the Christmas card last year.”

“Very well,” Otsune replied, sounding dejected. “Wait. She signed a Christmas card?’

“Well,” he muttered. “Yeah.”

“I guess that means he is your cousin?” the student asked rhetorically, her own head just above Gen’s shoulder.

“I suppose so,” Gen replied, looking over the letter irksomely, as if there were supposed to be something else on it. “At least, I assume so. She…barely mentions him…” His head shot up, his face doing its best to brighten itself, like a match that was about to go out. “Long time no see then, it’s been about ten years since we last saw each other here.”

“One of us cheated at cards the last time we met.”

Gen failed to suppress a nervous smile. “Er, we did?”

“No. Only one of us,” continued Sagara. “Anyway, I’m staying in Japan for the next few weeks so I can…”

“Shut up,” Otsune interrupted with a harsh shout. “Why did you lie to us?”

“What?” came in Gen. “When did he lie?”

“He said,” Otsune thrust her face towards Sagara’s, “that you had invited him over to stay.” She turned to Gen. “Yet you didn’t recognize him. Why did he lie?”

“Because you were being scary at me,” Sagara explained. “You would have kicked me out if I had said I was just here to see him, so I said he had invited me to stay indoors. It’s taken me ages to get here, and sleeping in streets gets people poking me and stuff late at night.”

“See, Miss Tsunade?” Gen said. “His explanation is reasonable, he would have to go on the streets again.” This stuck in Gen’s head for a few seconds, and his brain waited patiently as the landlord absorbed the information. “You’ve been living on the Streets?”

“Bet you a hundred he’s just a hobo,” Fujiko commented to Sakura.

“Yeah,” Sagara said with a small smile. “Mom didn’t give me much money. She wanted me to learn how to survive without relying on her or the family. The Initiation Ceremony of the Enforcer of the Balance or something. Anyway, the plane trip here sucked out all of my cash funds, so I had to walk from the airport to your parent’s house. It took about five days and I ended up missing the bridge on the first day and going in the wrong direction. And then I found you were here. Your parents were kind enough to pay for the taxi from there to here. That’s a point, I should tell them I’m here. Can I use the phone?”

“You missed the bridge?” Otsune muttered. “But it’s right by the airport.”

“Sure,” stuttered Gen, still going over in his mind what Sagara must have been through. “Actually,” he interrupted as Sagara picked up the reception phone. “Why don’t I show you to your room first? There’s plenty to spare. Then we can get you some food. You can call my parents later.”

Sagara stomach rumbled at this like a deep rumbling sound that would have come from his stomach, was he very hungry, which he currently was.

Otsune followed, more curious than suspicious of the boy now. The possibility that he was just stupid rather than a pervert had become more probable, though the childish part of her mind was also playing with the idea that he might be some kind of perverted evil genius that used this act in order to get off being caught. If this was the case, they were all in grave danger.

“Hey,” Gen started. “Why are you here anyhow? You didn’t get to say.”

“Oh yeah,” Sagara replied, only just remembering himself. “I’m going to a martial arts tournament being held in the city.”

“Huh? You came all this way just to see a tournament?” his cousin replied confused.

“To enter,” he quickly corrected. “Well, it’s not in the city as such, but I need to go there to register.”

“Are you even any good?” Otsune asked, apparently amused.

“I beat your friend, didn’t I?” He pointed out, still with a smile on his face. “What was her name?”

“Natoko,” Otsune answered. “But you got your ass kicked by Aki. She’s not skilled at all. She’s just hyper.”

“These things happen, plus I was in the Hot Springs.” Otsune stared at him again, not quite sure how this was a factor in the subject. Gen spoke up during the silence.

“But still, coming all the way to Japan, just for a tournament?”

“Well, I have ninja stuff to do as well,” Sagara admitted, lowering his voice a little as he said it. It sounded like he was joking.

“Ninja stuff?”

“Yeah,” Sagara said, before moving his mouth closer to Gen’s ear. “I’m not supposed to tell anyone this, but you’re family,” he whispered, apparently forgetting Otsune. “You see, I’m a demon hunting ninja on a quest and I have to go to this tournament to handle them ‘as I see fit’.” Gen just laughed nervously, Sagara quickly joining him, but for different reasons. Behind them and able to hear everything, Otsune mused to herself whether or not she should tell Gen about the giant tire that now inhabited the hot springs.

***

As Sagara was led to his new room, where he would then test the room for pushups potential, Yamanaka Natoko stood directly above him on the roof of the Dormitory’s East Wing, sword unsheathed and pointing in front of her. Swining the blade again and again, its polished edge coming back down in front of her each time, she exhaled violently, trying to release her frustrations with each strike. Each stroke cleaner than the last, almost as if a cleaning lady was polishing the blade with each stroke, each time just avoiding mutilation, which was good since she couldn’t afford the medical bills. The seventeen year old never wavered, trying to focus on everything and nothing at the same time, even as her emotions took up all her attention.

It had been her first fight.

Her first proper fight. Not a kata duel, nor a sparring session, not even a tournament duel or scaring off some bratty punk that had tried to get more than friendly with any of the residents since the new landlord arrived. A proper, real life fighting situation, where some stranger had intruded and was attacking her friends.

And she lost.

Not just lost, but utterly beaten. Her reactions had been good. She hadn’t hesitated in the slightest. She judged the situation, determined the interloper’s intentions, the distance between and the initiative of attack. She even had a sword. Everything should have been right.

Yet he did one better. She cursed herself- him as well. Didn’t she already get past the transition from dojo to street? Didn’t she understand real life situations, and how they were different from the training? She thought she would be ready, yet she wasn’t. He cheated and took advantage of her slight slip when she landed in the water. It was a cowardly tactic, but it had worked. If she was supposed to be a proper swordswoman, she should have been above such cheap tricks.

She didn’t care about the demon, save for him taking the victory when she had the win. It was the image of the boy that kept popping up in front of her, and she imagined herself cleaving him in half each time with her beloved Iziz. The thoughts of her sword caused her to pause for one moment. That was the worst bit of all. He had disarmed her, not only leaving her defenseless, but away from Iziz, her life and blade. No one saw it as she rolled to pick it up, but she felt the embarrassment of scrambling towards it as fast as possible, like a child crawling for its favourite toy. She had faded out of everyone’s sight, and now the boy was the center of attention.

It wasn’t jealously, she told herself, as she began swinging again. It was rage, pouring through her body like boiling liquid. To think that that creature could install itself a place in the dorm as fast as that. It was one thing to have the new landlord being male. He inherited the place, it wasn’t entirely his choice, but to have a boy beat her, kick her when she was down and then ask for a room, was totally unforgivable. Wasn’t she supposed to be the guardian of this place?

Train hard for now, she decided. Tonight and tomorrow, the entire day at school had been spent doing nothing, so there should be no excuse for tardiness. Then, she would challenge him again. If she won, she would take his tournament ticket and have him thrown out of the dormitory. That was justice.

Above her, something came to mind, a presence. Looking up and expecting Aki, a drop of water splashed directly into her eye. As she recoiled from the liquid, more drops followed as a massive downpour started its assault on the dormitory. She looked back up, her Hakama starting to lose its mass in the rain.

The rain felt like it was burning reaching into her. Suddenly, she felt something, striking through her brain and pushing through, a face screaming profanity at her  as the weight of her body doubled in seconds, bringing her to her knees. She tried to resist, her mental faculties awash as this strange, sudden sensation. She coughed and cried without realising, the torrential downpour distracting all of her senses.

But it did not matter, and she ignored this harmless attack upon her fort. She stood  up, feeling suddenly refreshed , even in the dry summer’s night.

Natoko continued her training, her strikes continuing with a little extra zeal behind them. Tomorrow would be a good day. She would remove the vermin from her home. She would protect her friends from his lecherous advances. She would humiliate him. She would kill him.

 

 

The kid got out of the taxi, seeing his destination off in the distance. A large building, standing on top of the tallest hill in the region, situated behind many other, totally irrelevant houses and apartments that belonged to the small, rural village that was a few miles away from the intentionally ambiguous city. The large building had been a hotel in the old days, complete with Hot Springs, but had recently become a Youth Dormitory because of a nearby series of schools two stops away and an estimated net profit higher than what the hotel was earning beforehand.

As his body got used to not having to sit down for three hours in a taxi with broken air conditioning, the teenager took a moment to admire the view, kicking and shaking his legs to get the feeling back in them. Since he had only been in the city areas so far since entering Japan, these more traditional areas were a breath of fresh air, one that didn’t cause him to double over and choke the smeg out of his lungs that the supposedly clean city was filled with.

Instead of car pollution and factory works that were constantly spouting black death into dirty water supplies, there was just fresh air and fields that would be nice to sleep in if they weren’t filled with water and plants. Confirming his path in his head, the mysterious boy who was doubtlessly a main character got moving, guessing there to be at least a mile left to walk and three bridges to cross over to get to where the hotel was waiting for him.

The whole village ahead of him was surrounded by trees, which would have seemed idyllic if not for the implication that the village was created when a group of people walked by, wanting to build a small rural area, with at least three bridges, a youth dormitory, a whole bunch of houses and dirt roads, and determined that the middle of the forest where they were would have to be sacrificed to achieve this. Of course they knew the trees wouldn’t mind, as trees tended to like dirt roads.

The boy stretched his arms out, yawning, even though it was his legs that were aching after being in a taxi for so long with a man who was as polite as he was obnoxiously talkative, Then, slinging his bag over his shoulder, the boy headed towards the direction of the hotel. As he walked, nothing really interesting happened, so we can take this moment to take in his appearance and get that particular detail out of the way.

The young man was still enjoying the years one would enjoy as a teenager, which made sense in a chronological sort of way since he was seventeen years of age. He was as tall as a 5ft 9inch hedgehog and weighed around the same as a lion would if it weighed 175lbs, which it did. The boy wore what looked like a green army T-shirt which stretched on him thanks to his toned chest and a right arm that was slightly bulkier than his left, so it was clear that the lad was well muscled and drank a lot of milk, even though milk does not actually have muscle increasing qualities. His hair was a light brown, with enough ruffle to it to suggest that it hadn’t seen a comb for the last few days, and his chin shone proudly with a layer of stubble from a long time of journeying without remembering a razor. The scruffy little shit also had bright, green eyes which stood out more than other eyes would, unless they happened to be on display and still covered with the blood of the previous owner, and showed themselves to be an important plot detail.

Unaware that he had just been pointlessly scrutinized, the boy continued walking, reaching the bridge with the strangest feeling that someone was examining him. He looked around halfheartedly, not realizing that it would be the first of many times, squinting as the sunshine bounced off the water and into his eyes. The bridge was empty of everything that day, with the fortunate exception of a breathable atmosphere. Being as hot as it was, there weren’t even any puddles in the little bumps that covered the old tarmac, let alone any cars, humans, stray cats or plot devices. The boy yawned, his body lightly bouncing as he plodded cross the long  bridge that passed over a gushing river, his eyes closing slowly as he got halfway across.

Opening quickly, as their owner heard the start of a low rumbling, the two eyes caught sight of a dense misty fog that was surrounding the bridge. Watching with a casual eye, the boy watched as it spread over the bridge until only a few feet in front of him were visible. By the time the mist had covered the structure, it had caught his attention enough for him to stop moving.

He heard footsteps; several sets of them, all at once and all around him. His hearing wasn’t as good as his eyesight, but he could tell it had to be around ten or fifteen people, all sneaking around him in various places and doing a bad job of it considering all the fog. As he heard the hiss of a small engine that couldn’t have been a car, the mist began to move, a haze of distortion dancing around him, showing the beings that were apparently trying to sneak into prearranged places a moment ago. Nine old men were standing there now, looking paradoxically dignified while wearing purple robes with blue trim. Some were wearing straw hats to keep off the heat of the sun. One had gone all the way and had a full wicker basket over his head, hiding his features save for a small barred window that he could see out of. The boy noticed one of the men had been too slow to get to his spot and, realizing that he was out in the open, had quickly changed to a standing position and pretended like all the rest that he had just appeared out of nowhere.

The young man looked at all the old people surrounding him, trying to figure out what their intentions were. They were old, and therefore useless to society, so it probably wasn’t an attack, nor an attempt to sell real estate, an event that had already happened to him two or three times already.

“A new warrior enters the fray,” a man to the right said silently, yet loud enough so people on the other side of the bridge could hear him. “Welcome, Sagara.”

“Huh?” the boy tried to interject, being interrupted straight away.

“Both good and bad times are heralded, and he shall stand in the middle, as his lot have always done.” The boy swung around again. This time it was an old man to his left, but by the time he pinpointed which one it was, the man’s mouth had already closed, making it hard to tell if he had said anything at all.

“Excuse me!” shouted a young delivery girl on a bicycle as she passed through the group, nearly ramming into one of the old men and completely ruining the atmosphere. All the old men glared at her, anger seeping from their pores at the ruination of their one main scene. Although the cyclist was unaware of it, tonight she would be eaten by fire termites and burned alive for her unforgivable actions, though for now she would have to settle to being pushed into the water by the last old man. At the girls sudden scream was silenced by a splash, one of the men found the moment to regain his composure, continuing to speak once again.

“Losses shall be made, and experience gained,” he mumbled quietly, but his words still appeared to be louder than most klaxons. The youth found it very confusing for his eardrums. The other old men had snapped back to attention and finished off by saying all at once:

“It is their path, the only one they can take, and the one only they can take…” All bowed their heads and fell still.

The teenager stood confused as they proceeded to do nothing else whatsoever. The only one left moving, he hovered for a few seconds, briefly wondering if they had all just inconsiderately died without explaining their actions to him. Watching on, waiting for anything to happen, it took him a few seconds before he realized that he had let his bag drop to the floor. He knelt down to pick it up, keeping an eye on the old men, feeling that if he was to look away they would disappear forever, like some bad special effect. Eyes skimming around the bridge, a small box caught his attention.

“Wow, a smoke machine, cool,” the boy we shall now call Sagara stated, rushing up to the small, hissing box past the group in front of him. His outburst knocking them off guard, the old men turned their attention back towards the teenager, mouths falling open in mild bewilderment, all signs of immobility gone as they looked at each other, glancing at each other in uncertainty. Observing the small box for a few seconds, Sagara giggled to himself, blocking the hole and releasing it, getting a huge puff of smoke in his face for his efforts.

“Cool…” he said after doing it again, still sniggering to himself. “But I gotta go. Well, not really. But…y’know.”

The old men continued to stare, the one closest to the boy hadn’t realized that his hat had fallen off and trapped a cat underneath it.

“See ya.” The teenager walked off, leaving them standing there, the ache in their jaws going unnoticed even by the ones who still had teeth. It would take them a few minutes to do anything practical. The old man with a mustache was first.

“Is that…really him?”

“I heard he was somewhat… special” another one, with wrinkles where his mustache should have been, had he not bet it away the other week, began to say, stopping in mid sentence to prevent a coronary.

“Did the cards make a mistake?” the man whom he had bet it to said, trying to scratch the part of his head where he had fitted the mustache only to realize there was a basket in the way.

“We shall have to see,” a fourth stated, thinking it over carefully. “Let us wait here, to see if another teenager fitting the description comes past.”

They would wait the rest of the day. No other seventeen-year-old, tall as a five foot six hedgehog, heavy as a one hundred and seventy pound lion, light brown haired boy who was irrelevantly American with emerald green eyes and a scar down his back would come by that day.

They were more than a little disappointed.

***

 

It’s here! He’s here. At last the stoolie comes.

He’s different from what I imagined. American, definitely American. If the old men hadn’t shown up, I would have passed him off completely. Bloodlines I guess. He must be the first white Futabatei ever. Now I have to wait. Stick to the plan. That’s what’s important. I made the plan and I’ll stick to it. The plan is good, I’ll stick to it the whole way. Making new plans takes too long. Bad enough I had to make a second plan. Old people shouldn’t die so early! They ruin things when they do that.

Stupid. I can’t strike here. Such a shame. It would be easy, but weak I am in body at present time. I need him alone. Totally alone. With that girl following him, and this village defending him, it may take months, when I only have weeks.

But there will be a moment, I know that much. The puppets are already dancing.

***

Finally reaching the top of the steps that led to his destination, the boy called Sagara exhaled as hard as he could, the carbon dioxide being evicted from his body by the nasty landlord of his lungs.

The dormitory that was to be his new home looked nice close up, almost looked like an old castle. It might have even been considered one a few centuries back, except a lot of the outside was made of wood with wide ground floor windows and would have probably been easy to invade on a weekly basis. Casually striding towards what appeared to be the main entrance, still panting from the stair climb, his lungs now throwing out the other tenants that were constantly appearing within its investment, he looked to the wooden doors, which were large and overbearing, making it look even more like an easy to invade castle. Reaching the wooden frames, he wondered if he should knock. It was a hotel, but from what his mother had told him, there might not be a receptionist at all times.

“Mind you, if there was a receptionist, it would be pointless to knock when I didn’t have to. Then again, if there is no one there then knocking would be worthless.” Ignoring the voice telling him this probably counted for trespassing, he pushed the door aside. Peeking inside, he slowly scanned the surrounding area with brown eyes.

“Phew, it’s empty,” he muttered aloud, ignoring the fact again that he probably seemed more and more like a burglar now, especially with the large brown bag on his shoulder. Stepping inside, he began to slip his shoes off on the porch, and then paused with a look of annoyance on his face.

“Am I supposed to have indoor shoes?” He had forgotten them. “I’ve forgotten them.” It would appear that he would have to go barefoot. “I’ll have to go barefoot. Lucky my socks are clean.” Leaving his trainers besides a box containing many other pairs of white shoes, he stepped carefully onto the heavily polished, wooden floor. Being careful not to slip, he pondered his first course of action, deciding in a millisecond to ruin everyone’s day with attention seeking.

“Is anyone here?” he shouted into the air of the hotel. He waited as a small period of uneventful time passed “Hello?” Another small period of time passed and he found himself looking hard at the surrounding furniture, to see if he had somehow mistaken residents for pieces of upholstery. A short period passed again, much longer than the previous one. He gave up waiting.

“Ah well,” he said, dropping his bag in the middle of the empty floor lobby, assuring himself that it wouldn’t disappear until he returned. “Might as well explore.” Picking the first opening to the left, he started to walk down it, sliding against the polished oak as he got moving. Above him, the boy was unaware he was being watched by a certain mysterious girl, of whom importance won’t be realized until around page eighty, but whom much speculation should be made about in the meantime.

His exploration continued for two minutes and, despite finding nothing, boredom was nowhere on the boy’s face. With all the corridors looking the same there wasn’t anything special about the place to see. There was also no sign of any of the inhabitants. He couldn’t have been fully aware of what the situation here was, but he knew there were some people here by the shoes that had been left by the front door.

As he walked, his socks swishing beneath him, his nose suddenly caught a pungent whiff of nostalgia. Memories of humid rose traveled through his nostrils and told him to follow the aroma blindly, threatening to beat him with fruitcake should he refuse. Immediately growing excited, he pushed the doors aside to see a pool of water ahead of him, steam rising from it like anxiety from a poorly written metaphor. Eyes beaming with excitement, he rushed out to the hot springs, his clothing being magically discarded in multiple piles across the rocky floor as he rushed for the nearest pool of water. Slowly, with great anticipation, he placed his toes slowly into the pool below him, the lukewarm feeling accompanying it confirming his wishes.

Sighing with glee at the mere touch of the water soothed his big toe, his body melted further into the pool. Without a towel or any clothing left on, he had no reason to be slow and was soon in the middle, dropping to his knees to enjoy the experience as much as possible. Pretty soon the warm water had covered his body, bubbles emerging from under the blue waters. When he would next come up, it would be by a rock on the far side, where he would lean against before quickly falling asleep.

***

Tsunade Otsune. A beautiful young girl (by her own opinions of course, which was of course the most important opinion of the all, as she had deduced through both scientific equations and a bout of solipsism) at the age of nineteen walked through the same corridor the boy was in a few moments ago, completely unaware of the situation that had previously happened and more importantly, unaware of the situation that was about to happen. Opening the door to the hot springs, she slowly began to remove her clothes from her stunning young body and place them in a small basket. Seeing the other baskets empty, she smiled at the prospect of having some time to herself, grateful for any peace she could get in this place.

Ever since the new manager had shown up a few months back, and had shown himself to be more hormonally challenged than the last owner had been (though only by default), things had been hectic. The number of occupants was small anyway after the guy’s grandmother had died and had now diminished significantly because of him. She couldn’t entirely place blame on the young man. She had already ascertained that he wasn’t that bad of a guy or anything. He was just at that cliché age where he spoke to a girl’s chest instead of her face.

“Stop,” she sad to herself. “Relax. Enjoy yourself.” She took her glasses off and placed them on top of her clothes, not wanting them to break whilst in the springs. Her vision immediately became blurred as she stepped out into the springs, but she was more than used to it by now. They had gotten significantly worse over the last six years, down to 20/50 at the last check up, but it was bearable.

It was a beautiful day, just the perfect time to be in the soothing warm waters, the sun reflecting directly into them, bringing them to a high temperature. As long as no one interfered her for at least half an hour, she’d be content. Carefully testing the grip of the ground with her feet, she slowly approached the pool in her own time tested method. Going to step in, she caught a glance of something that threatened her sanctity, and, through blurred eyes, peered to make out what it was.

“That’s weird,” she muttered to herself, remembering there were no other clothes in the changing room. A brief flicker of anger passed over her face, as the idea of Gen sneaking in to cop a look. She stopped it quickly. He couldn’t have beaten her home.

“Oi, Futabatei. That better not be you down there,” she shouted, waiting for the figure to move. It did not. She considered going back for her glasses, to confirm whether it was the landlord or not, even though she had already placed him under strict instructions not to use the Hot Springs at is leisure (as they were for guests first). Seconds before she did so, the answer was given.

“Puhh…” a rather embarrassing, grunting noise came from the unconscious body in the pool. The noise itself told her nothing, but it caused her to spin back round to look as she saw the unidentified human readjust its sleeping position. Not allowing her eyes the chance to properly register the clothes strewn all over the outside of the building, the girl calmed down, realizing that only one person would be lazy enough to fall asleep in the hot springs.

“Oh it’s just you, Fujiko,” she said walking over, not really expecting an answer from her sleeping friend. With towel in hand she sat down next to her probably inebriated companion, placing the cloth over the rock to keep her back from being scratched. Looking towards her friend, the girl’s face was still blurred and, to be honest, it was hard to tell if she was awake or not. Fujiko’s eyes were heavily squinted and always seemed closed, but from her light breathing it seemed the girl had been out for some time.

As much as she hated to admit it, Fujiko was Otsune’s best friend. The two had known each other since the Doll festival five years ago, and though it was by extreme luck the two found themselves at the same dormitory at the start of senior high, it had been Fujiko’s extreme persistence at being annoying and constantly drunk that caused the two to stay together.

The sun reminded her of its presence, and she found herself cupping her hand over her eyes to appreciate the beauty of the summer’s day. It would be autumn soon and, although they would still use the springs, it wouldn’t be this peacefully mellow. It was definitely a time to appreciate things. Especially after all that had gone on, a little rest would be sought out by anyone in her position.

Grandma Futabatei had died, leaving the entire estate to some offshoot grandnephew. At only sixteen years old, the boy’s line of sight fell half a foot any time a girl was in the room, resulting in the hotel’s alienation of everyone in the village after he made a scene in the town center.

He was being, by definition, a natural jerk, catching a glance whenever he could and finding inappropriate excuses grab their shoulders or hold their hands. It only took a few of the old gossip ladies to turn the whole situation around from quiet, studious girls into some apparent whore den. Bad enough the rumours started. What was worse was that everyone had believed it, and no matter how much she went over it in her head, Otsune just couldn’t understand how it had been accepted so fast. She had actually punched him that first time he did it, and in public. Everyone had seen it. It wasn’t until Tina got attacked that she even realized that people were thinking such things, and it was all that guy’s fault.

But that’s what happened in a village like Heavenly Springs where the key demographics were retired elderly couples and young students aiming between middle school and University. With no middle ground (save perhaps herself, Fujiko and the guy who ran the church) in the age brackets, divisions was bound to occur in the most stupid unjustified xcuses imaginable.

And it didn’t matter how just a few months ago it was old Granma Futabatei’s sweet little dormitory for well behaved girls in the middle of their studies, now it was a veritable whore den full of cigarettes and drugs and possibly even boys.

Village folk could be so stupid.

“He could at least try to be, I don’t know, nice about it. Not trying to hide it like a guilty little pervert.” Fujiko replied by tossing and turning a little, showing her bare, if not still highly blurry, chest to her friend. “Though I suppose it is what they do at that age, the whole breast staring thing.” She looked down down to observe her own features and could completely understand the appeal. “Although still not as big as yours, ey Fujiko?”

“I would say mine are a bit smaller,” claimed the voice next to her, one deeper than what she would expect from her squeaky female friend. “Though this is more likely because I only have defined pectoral muscles, whilst yours are large bags of fat”.

Otsune squealed in horror. Her ‘friend’, who was clearly no longer asleep, was looking at her with half open eyes. All of a sudden feeling very exposed, she watched as the person in front of her sat up, moving to stand over her, their chest looking very flat and muscular than previously as her vision chose to switch back to agonizingly painful clarity. “Could you save my place? I’m going to get some juice.”

Her heart slammed into her chest. This was not Fujiko.

“Actually,” the voice continued. “I think I’ll just fall back asleep.” He did so, collapsing into the rock beneath him almost immediately.

This was a man.

“This story starts like all other stories about good and evil. Good fights evil. Evil fights good. Darkness absorbs light. Light casts away darkness. Symbols dramatically affect other symbols in very dramatic ways. Then, in the middle of all this, we have actual humans. Fragile water containers sloshing from one side of the planet to the other, with no real care for good or evil save to not be a complete jerk ass and yet still get a good piece of the pie. It had been this way since he had first shown up. Even before then, when He had first come about.

“And everyday the sun would rise with its light and the people whom the light shined for were all happy and stuff. They would bounce around singing their songs, dancing through their fields, having their banquets and declaring their bloody wars on each other. This was of course as it should be and everyone was all for it apart from the old folk, who couldn’t bounce around so much, or sing through dry throats, dance on bad backs, eat as much as they used to, or understand the need to adapt to a defensive strategy when being attacked by a garrison of 40 horses, 80 spear men, 100 archers and 200 swordsmen, all armed to the teeth in the latest of Roman weaponry.

“So as the days went on the people continued to be joyous and happy and thinking ‘why not?’ and just doing it right there in the field. Afternoons would come about and then the evenings, and still there were good reasons to dance and bounce and pillage with all those around them in awesome ignorant happiness.

“It was only when the darkness of the night came their happiness would be cut abrupt.

“The night was when the Onikage would come to them.

“That was when the dancing and the eating and most of the sex stopped, and everyone rushed inside their houses making sure each and every light was snuffed out, doing their best to hide themselves in the absence of both light and shadow. There, in the dark, they would all huddled around each other with their eyes closed, tight as could be. Mirrors would be covered with the oldest, dirtiest rags they could find. Even their fingernails they would hide within their fists to prevent any simple refraction of the light. It was there, in the dark, they would wait for it to pass, holding their children tight, fearing the presence of the Onikage. For it was a terrible thing for the Onikage to approach you. Even more so for the children. After all, they were the ones who the Onikage came for.

“Now no one knew why the Onikage wanted the little ones, or why it took them away. But it did, any time it could, any time just enough light existed to create a shadow in the darkness. It wasn’t just children though. Sometimes it took older teenagers, even a few young adults. The eldest that it took was twenty-three, but he was never that grown up in the first place.

“No one knew what it did with the children, though the evidence presented itself soon enough. That terrible scream heard throughout the village, the blind dash in the darkness and a child gone again for three nights.

“When the child finally did return, it would be a confusing sight. He or she would be covered head to toe in a mix of different coloured face paints and a funny clown wig. They would also look like they had gained a few pounds, mainly in the stomach area, like someone had been feeding them sweets non-stop those past three days. Some, though not all, would even be found wearing shoes that were three sizes too big for them.

“But all would be dead. Not a single one able to tell of the wonderful time they had with the Onikage, only their fixed grins able to spin the tale.

“Now, no one knew what was really happening at first. Hell, the entire situation was boggling. I mean, clown wigs didn’t even exist back then. Even so, it encouraged the legend to always keep all lights off at night, since the creature that was doing it was said to be a shadow demon – that was where the name came from, by the by. Because it was a shadow demon, it needed just a little light to reflect a shadow. Just an absence of darkness, a little place to call its own, and then it could come out and snatch all the children it could.

“This would go on forever, but as with all demons, especially those one never actually sees, the village folk would rationalize its existence away with their own problems. Bandits, runaways, that drunk who always had stories around him attacking someone but no one could never say that they themselves had been attacked. And in recent centuries: communism, drug peddling and angst suicides. Whatever was available to blame really.

“It doesn’t take long for a demon to be thrown into myth and even worse, obscurity, but when it happens, there are very few who are able to stop it, and the demon is able to continue on for eternity. As is the case of the Onikage, who has now been at murder for two thousand years to this very night.”

Futabatei Tenma fell silent, bringing her water bottle to her pursed lips. She had already forgotten what question had prompted the story.

“…And how much of that is actually true?” said Jez from ahead of her, keeping an eye out down towards the hill, the moonlight reflecting in the paddy fields. Despite his bulk, the young man was a step too far away from the fire to feel its effects and was shivering through his anorak.

“Hhhmmm, probably none of it,” she replied, leaning back and resting the matchbox on the top of her forehead. “There were the bits the elders told me that are kind of believable, but then there’s the contradiction that there’s no legends about keeping lights turned off at night. And then you have to take into account I made a significant portion of the whole story up as I went along. So I’m guessing… the last third bit? That was kind of true.”

Lighting another match against the coarse edge of her knuckles, she stared at the spark combusting on top of the stick, watching it as it flickered from blue to orange before slowly started to eat away at the wood. She silently asked it if it could burn away her boredom as a small favour for bringing it to life. She tossed it to the roaring embers when it refused.

“Now, my love…” he said, his voice a mumble in the wind as he continued to canvass the darkness.  “You know better than that. The elders have always shown themselves right before,”

“Shut up, yer dick,” she replied, watching the flames as the heat bounced off her face, keeping her yellow painted cheeks uncomfortably warm. “I know how this goes already. I say the elders are wrong. I go out to prove them wrong. I come back the next morning with broken arm and a dead demon. Rinse and repeat; different limb each time.”

“Well,” he muttered, coughing to himself in a failed ploy to hide his discomfort. “As long as you understand, then we can stay prepared.” He began to vigorously scratch the back of his head, tracing the line of short hair above where his backbone resided.

“For what?” she snapped, keeping a sharp edge to her voice, angry more out of boredom than anything else. “Just because the demon may or may not probably exist doesn’t mean it’s gonna come tonight. Just because we’re ‘children’ and we have a fire doesn’t increase the probability of a demon appearing. We’ve been sitting here for hours, and nothing has shown up. Why are you even here anyway? You’re rubbish company unless you’re naked.”

Counterfeit anger really, but for good reasons. Her favourite show was on tonight, and she had to tape it on the half broken video recorder.

“B-because I am the youngest in the clan that can take care of himself,” Jez said timidly, trying to keep his resolve. The wind picked up, pushing the flame in his direction. He didn’t look young. He was around six and a half feet tall with sexy, muscular arms that would have glinted off the fires if he wasn’t wearing that dorky coat, yet he was only a month younger than she was. “Plus… w-we are married and all,” he said, sounding like he had proposed a joint suicide completely out of the blue. “Aren’t we supposed to watch over each other like this?” There was an uncertain apprehension in his voice this time. He honestly wanted an answer- but more importantly, she wanted to piss him off.

“Pfft, stupid clan and their stupid arranged marriages,” she mumbled, leaning back and trying her best to ignore the crickets, playing with the yang amulet around her neck. “Just because we started sleeping together didn’t mean they had to do this to us. It’s like reading a book y’know? Once you get told you have to read it for your final exam, you don’t want to touch it.” She grinned as he used a sudden coughing fit as an excuse to look the other way, becoming suddenly fascinated in the endless layer of black blanketed above them. The flames flickered a little too long and she braced herself. She must have been quite the distraction. He hadn’t noticed it at all.

“Listen, Tenma, I…”

“Shut up and be get ready,” she said calmly, flipping her legs forward, the momentum allowing her to stand up. “We can come back to your stupid angst half hour special after demons have been beaten up.”

“Demons? What? Where?” he said, now fully alert, his body instantly moving into a fighting stance, his calm nervousness leaving as the adrenaline flooded his body, ready for action. Tenma took her time to stretch the kinks out her back, wipe the grass off and yawn as he looked around. Always far too serious.

“Behind you.” she called out with a yawn to back it up, seeing him turn to face the nothing in front of him and gawking when he finally caught a glimpse of it. It must have looked kind of impressive, to eyes that sucked so bad that they didn’t even have magic installed into them as a mystical birthright- a shadow dancing in the darkness. He reached for a log off the fire, scorching his protected hands, to confirm that the demon was really there.

Even with his eyes, which were sharper than the hawk’s in boring normal human terms, he would only just be able to make it out. It was part of the ground, which seemed obvious now, seeing that it was a shadow. The only thing that made it different from a regular shadow was the way it was shifting, more like a plague snake in the desert sands than an absence of light, yet still confined to the light of the flame, dancing around in its changing margins.

“Want sssssome candy?” it asked with a ghoulish, high pitched hiss. The two lovers watched as three caramel fudges rose out of the ground and fired at them. Tenma caught all three, her hands moving in a blur that surprised even her. Opening her hand to look at the sweets it quickly dawned on her what had just happened.

“Hey, don’t do that!” she shouted at him angrily.

“Er…sorry, but I was holding the torch. I couldn’t catch them myself.” She threw them at him harshly, holding back a laugh as the third one stuck to his forehead and stayed there.

“If I want you to take control of my body, I’ll order it, understand?” she shouted though clenched teeth, bringing the commanding tone to her voice. “Now, keep the torch focused.”

“You’re not like the other kiddies, aren’t you not?” the shadow hissed again, flowing in a circle around the girl, as she closed her eyes and concentrated. “You were waiting for me. You’re more mature. I. Don’t. Like. That.”

“Zip it, freak,” she mumbled, bringing her hands together and beginning the prayer to a god only she could worship. Her breath slowed down, mentally shutting out the cold that had rushed in with the demon’s presence before reaching deep inside.

This was the bit to be annoyed by. It took time. She carried on her silent meditation and hoped that her movements would amuse it long enough for her to finish, the emerald crystals already starting to tear through her skin, droplets breaking out and growing down into the land below. She felt the twinge of pain that came with her eyes losing their natural green to the power, the life energy draining out of her.

“You kids should be more innocent. More playful. You don’t fight. That’s not right. You shouldn’t play in bed with others. That’s what adults do.” It continued, its voice rasping with whatever words it could, sounding like a helpful suggestion somehow. “Why not come play with me. And my friends. Just forever. Just until you can’t go on no more.”

“Friends?” Jez mumbled. She sensed two creatures pulling themselves from the shadow that was the demon. “Tenma. It’s brought company.”

“Then handle it,” she commanded, her voice sounding oddly distant. It was so easy for her to hate this bit, the loss of control, the choice to sap her own will. The ritual of Kotodama remained insane no matter how many times she did it.

Jez cursed under his breath. She made a mental note to tease him about it all night later. As he stepped towards the enemy, she could just about make out the man slamming the burning log into the ground before walking up to meet the newcomers.

“Greynock and Draynor,” he announced. “The elders will be pleased that we took care of you tonight.” She knew the names instantly. Greynock and Draynor were two of the most mindless, snarling demons one could ever hope to meet, and two of the most famous in her clan’s recent history. It was their mindless nature that must have made it child’s play for the Onikage to control them. Draynor, once but a mix of rusted iron and brand new, shiny steel, now lived with a large eye that filled its shifting body. The demon had no head, merely a hole on the top of its body that looked like you could insert a neck if you had the right size fittings. And its huge, muscular forearms looked like they could destroy buildings by being near them. Only its tiny legs that looked like they should have snapped long ago made it struggle to approach her.

Greynock didn’t have this problem, the velvet rope with pink and purple scales crossing each other a thousand times over darted straight towards her the instant it left the vortex of shadow, intending to pierce her with its arrow-like head. There was no need to even flinch though. An inch in front of her, the serpent rope was yanked back, snarling at her stomach as it failed to reach her smooth skin, jaws snapping as it spat acid at her. Jez had caught it on its way out, now holding it like he was in a tug o’ war. With no hesitation, he slammed his large fist into the nearest part of it, bringing it to the ground, before bringing it back around and whipping it into the Draynor, allowing the two to tie each other up.

She grunted slightly. She didn’t notice why.

Draynor looked to its partner, seemingly annoyed that it would be playing around at a time like this, and flexed its grossly misshapen muscles, causing the other demon to shatter onto the grass in a neon sparkle. Draynor looked around in horror of what it had done to its ally, howling out in fury from a mouth that did not exist.

Not wanting to blame itself, it looked around for the nearest possible cause and charged towards Jez, its tiny feet slowly getting the job done that its arms could do in a flash. Jez was bracing himself, unsure of whether to retreat or not, his own strength being nothing compared to the demon’s. She counted slowly to three.

Then, she stopped everything.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” Tenma said, allowing herself to be cocky, the green emerald now encasing both her hands, shards coming out in all directions as they continued to grow out of her. Draynor looked to her with its one big eye, doing its best to turn around, to show its paralyzed protests through mindless violence, failing when it found its body refusing to move, freezing up, the emerald shards now embedding in its legs. “And just in time too,” she stated, looking underneath her. The Onikage was trapped, its formless mass halfway through absorbing her into the ground before it had been forced to stop, the emeralds embedded within it being quite insistent.

“Excellent work, my dear. Superbly…”

“Sealing demons. Continue to be quiet,” she called out, silencing him. Chanting a small incantation to herself, the words of which were so old and lost in time that not even the elders really knew what they were, her mind cursed those that made her do this every night. She tried to put it aside. The chant sealed demons. That’s all that should matter to her at this point.

Beginning with the two summoned demons, she started pest control. These types were easy to seal. She had done it a thousand times before. It was simple logic, no matter how dumb it was. They were the type of demon that brought themselves into this world through curses on certain objects, and slowly evolved around said object, warping the original forms until there was nothing but a grotesque replacement living in its place. Pulling her hands apart, she concentrated one on each demon. Both monsters started to sizzle away, screaming in ungodly agony as they bubbled and hissed their ways into the crystals that surrounded them. Quickly they soon became nothing but a corrupted form of what they once were. The gauntlet of an old, angry yet strong knight, now transformed with chaotic-looking spikes glistening on the bracer, and a hook that, she figured, once connected a swing to a tree, now a sharpened arrowhead connected to a sturdy, thin yet velvety rope that wasn’t very shatter resistant.

How such mundane items could create such monsters didn’t have time to bother her, and she turned her attention to the one underneath her. This one was nothing special either really. Just a moronic demon that hunted children for dumb, personal reasons. The idea of a demon having psychological issues like this made her laugh, and she pulled its entire form out of the ground without mercy, making the demon feel like it was being torn in two, its existence as much a part of the ground as the darkness and the light. It screamed immaturely in agony, like a child having its precious blanket taken away.

Sighing in annoyance, she prepped herself. The bit she hated most was coming now. The Onikage wasn’t bound to a material possession like the others and so was admittedly a bit more powerful. She’d have no choice but to store it in herself for the time being. It wasn’t the first time, but each time she felt one of these things touch her soul, she wished it were the last. She groaned as it flooded into her like water, pouring into the glass that held her soul, knocking it over and refusing to clean up the mess, staining the ground and revealing all within her to those who cared to look.

She hoped Jez wouldn’t notice. It was her own fault for not telling him sooner, but she still wanted to tell him on her own grounds.

Then it was over, the demon froze within her soul and she let herself collapse. Just for a second though, her foot stopping her descent even before she was halfway down. She couldn’t show too much weakness.

Bleeding from the Draynor, she noticed her hands also had minor cuts on them, but that was expected.

“It got you? But I thought I…” Jez said, full of his usual worry.

“It had an astral form, it looks like,” she grunted, standing back up to her full height, which was about two feet less than Jez. She could see his awe as she ignored the pain. This was nothing. Her bloodline was the strongest in the clan and showing pain, no matter how much she wanted to tell him, was practically forbidden. The man quickly ran to pick up the gauntlet and whip, before running back to her, a large goofy grin on his face that he only allowed during the times he forgot he was supposed to be the serious one.

“Well, regardless,” he said, looking like he wanted to bow like the servant boy he once was. “May I congratulation on another sealing well done. I…” As he reached her, he stopped dead.

“No. No, you may not,” she said jokingly, holding her stomach from the spiritual blow she had received. “I just want to lie down and stare at dreamy rock singers for the next two hours. But before that, I want…” She stopped, now realizing he was staring at her with that more than usual seriousness look.

“What?”

“You’re pregnant?!” he exclaimed, sounding like he wasn’t entirely sure if he was asking a question or speaking a fact. Her eyes must have bugged wide open. He looked bigger for a second.

“Ah crap,” she blurted out, turning around to walk away, not wanting to deal with such a minor thing, tonight of all nights.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked, chasing after her. She couldn’t tell his reaction, but it was probably the usual, a mix of being not sure if he should be happy, or getting ready to accept her decision to abort it.

“Because dreamy rock stars are on TV tonight,” she replied, keeping the cockiness going. “I figured it could wait until the morning.”

“Wait until…” he began. “Do you know what will happen if you seal a demon when you’re pregnant, even if it’s only been a few days? Not only will it dilute the bloodline, but…”

“I know what it does, Jez,” she retorted, wishing he would shut up and go away. How dare he see her like this? A momentary slip just because she didn’t get a chance to tell him earlier, big arms wrapping around her and bringing her the warmth only he could? She should remove his eyes for even daring to see the tears fall down her own, showing the side of her she had wanted to show for all these years? He just stared at her, both wanting to help and numb with shock. No one had seen her cry before. She was Tenma! Of course she wouldn’t cry, but now… Something took the legs out from under her.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” she heard him say, trying to reassure her as he grabbed her limp body and held it close to him, clearly trying to reassure himself as well. He was shivering like he was in the arctic and he was a retarded man holding a retarded woman because they had been retarded together for six hours non-stop a few retarded nights ago.

“I can’t be like this, Jez,” she stated. “Not now, my ceremony starts tomorrow. We have to…” He kissed her lightly on the top of her head, feeling her voice tremble into nothingness.

“I know,” he sighed. “We have to get going.” He went to pull away, thinking it was what she wanted. Instead, she grabbed him and pulled him in harder, never wanting to let go. She held him tighter than he could ever hold her. She didn’t want to admit it- given the circumstances, but it felt nice to be the one being held like this for a change, with him comforting her instead of the usual way round. She felt him bring his hand to her stomach, and held hers over his.

“Stupid kid.”