Chapter 28 - Eiji HoshinoHollow Night“You’ll understand when you’re older.” Father dismissed. “You’re not like them, Eiji. You’re made for bigger and better things.”

  Bigger and better things? I felt a fresh fire begin to bubble up in my chest.

  All I wanted was to join the other girls by the benches, and listen to them gossip about the trendiest new idol, or everyone’s favourite candy, or what boys they liked.

  All I wanted was to join the boys trying out those awesome new shots I’d seen in that one soccer anime, shouting out things like “Fire Tornado!” while kicking the ball as hard as we could muster, our imaginations filling in the gaps.

  I remember my vision getting glossy and unfocused, my indignation rising up to new heights.

  I looked to the other adult in the room, crying “Mom! Please! I want to go outside!”

  She grimaced, her eyes fixed on some inanimate object elsewhere. If she wanted to say something, she’d already resigned the power to do so a long time ago.

  “Until you’ve completed the remainder of these books I’ve assigned, you are staying here. That is final.”

  The coldness in his eyes extinguished the fight in my own. It was over.

  Squeezing my eyes shut, I ran upstairs without a word, and neither of them came after me.

  I didn’t read anything that day.

  As I continued to stand there, some kind of spiritual onlooker to my past self, the memories of my st moments in life slowly began to rise to the surface, like a bucket being filled by drops of water.

  Considering where I was, my gambit must have failed in the end. I wonder what -

  The world was now spinning. The mencholy of my bedroom was being sucked away, out of my reach, sending me tumbling through an empty void.

  “Welcome back, dearest comrade. Your bravery shall be spoken of in legend.”

  To call it exhaustion would be a gross understatement. I practically had one foot in the grave at the point.

  Kozuki, her eyes equal parts tired and relieved, was crouching in front of me. The tingling of my skin in response to the night’s chill was a sensation I, for once, sincerely appreciated.

  “What happened?” I groaned as the redhead helped me to my feet, my bance still shaky.

  She looked at me for a while and pointed in a direction. My eyes followed, and before I could control myself, I spat “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Reaper turned around slowly, the darkness of their hood spilling into my very soul. Their head then craned downward, as if pondering something, before they continued fiddling with an item that was out of my sight.

  I made eye contact with Kozuki, and given how quickly she broke it, I must’ve had a fiercer expression that I intended.

  “The Samurai.” She began. “It seems our friend here was able to defeat it before it could finish us off.”

  “Yeah, after Katoru did most of the-“

  Shit. How could I have forgotten?

  “Katoru! And Furusawa!” I shouted. “Where are they?”

  Miharu grabbed her elbows to help calm the trembling of her body. Reaper didn’t move.

  “I asked you a damn question!”

  As if having grown tired of me, Reaper breezily turned in my direction and tossed something. The familiar wooden staff rattled against the floor, its elegant yet intricate engravings bereft of the light they once exuded. My heart sank.

  “…A-Are they…?” I stammered. “Did you see it?”

  I exhaled a sigh of relief in response to Reaper’s head shaking, but we weren’t out of the woods yet. I was looking to the side, noticing Kozuki’s tearful eyes – but also her strangely shocked expression, as if having just witnessed someone’s –

  Oh. I thought, as I felt a fist sm into my back.

  I will say one thing; crashing into a building is nowhere near as fun (or painless) as it looks on television. If not for the weird boosts in physicality I got from this pce, I don’t think I’d be walking again anytime soon.

  With a groan, I pulled myself out of the second story I’d been sent up into, falling on my feet onto the street below with a plop, bits of dust and debris accompanying me.

  “…Do you wanna expin all that or…?” I asked Reaper. They were holding the treasure I’d caught a glimpse of before, the prize we’d risked our lives fighting that monster for. Reaper had now unsheathed the rapier, which was gleaming seductively, and brandished it dangerously. The bckness under the hood was now had two shining white orbs peering out of it.

  "'Tis the artefact!" Kozuki, who had materialized next to me at some point, observed. "'Twas inspecting it before. Now, it seems to have taken them over completely! I sense an insatiable bloodlust emanating from them."

  Great. Looks like we were out of the frying pan, and into a fucking volcano. We still didn’t know what Reaper’s ability did – as I’m sure you’ve learnt by now, they weren’t exactly talkative.

  "How fares thy EXS?"

  “I’m all out. You?”

  "I deem I still possess a remnant."

  “Good – you’re gonna need it. Here it comes!”

  “Up!” Kozuki shouted, and together we leapt into the air, avoiding Reaper’s downward ssh of their rapier. Before they could react, we nded a swift kick to their hood.

  Soon enough, the ravaged streets of Molco became a maelstrom of kinetic energy. Reaper, her bde gleaming with ominous intent, surged forward with a storm of sshes, each strike aimed at us like bolts of lightning. But we were too quick – too synchronized – and countered her onsught with perfect precision.

  Mixing together all the different combat styles I’d trained over the years, I set my body free, unleashing rapid barrages of punches, each strike feeling as though it would explode on impact.

  Reaper, a blur of calcuted movement in their own right, danced between the punches, her bde a shield against the onsught. The air crackled with each impact, a symphony of cshes reverberating through the arena.

  Surprisingly enough, Miharu complemented my assault with a whirlwind of kicks, her legs blurring and creating a cyclone of rapid, acrobatic attacks that forced Reaper to constantly shift their focus. Since when could she move that fast?

  Even though they were managing to parry my thunderous punches with the grace of a seasoned warrior, and weave through Miharu's kicks with an eerie elegance, I could feel the pressure mounting.

  In one swift movement, I feinted with my left fist, using the force to instead deliver a resounding spin kick with the back of my right heel. While it didn’t nd as directly as I’d hoped, only sending her backwards somewhat, Miharu seized the opportunity and aimed a series of lightning-fast kicks at Reaper’s fnk.

  It was now or never.

  While Reaper was still dealing with the hurricane that was Kozuki, I dashed in their direction, and leaped. Landing on their back, my arms wrapped around theirs, and I pulled with all my might, opening up their stance.

  “Ko-Kozuki!” I grunted, struggling to keep the beast in pce. I should’ve already known this from the fact that a single punch had sent me soaring through the air, but their physical strength was off the charts. Just having to hold their deceptively slender arms out in pce was probably the most difficult thing I’d had to do that day.

  “Hurry!”

  With that, Kozuki lowered her stance, eyes focused…

  And ran in the opposite direction.

  Eventually, I couldn’t muster the strength to keep them in pce, and Reaper sent me falling onto the floor behind us with a violent headbutt.

  Holding my maybe broken nose, disoriented, I looked up to find Reaper pointing their rapier skyward.

  “deAtH tO tHe HeREticS.” They spoke in a mangled, distorted voice that sounded like five people speaking at once. Even so, there was something remarkably familiar about their tone.

  As dire as the situation was, I felt no fear. Hell, you could even say I was pretty happy. Aside from the nosebleed, anyway.

  “You’re not half bad,” I confessed, pointing at the rapier they were flourishing. "But it only took one second – one second where you didn’t have your eyes on the both of us...”

  I saw the white beads under the hood widen in horror, just as the sound of metal swiping through air began to echo dangerously across the space. With a csh, Reaper’s scythe met the exposed rapier, sending it sailing out of Reaper’s hands and crashing onto the tarmac.

  Instantly, I leapt up, my arms wrapped tight across Reaper’s upper arm and back.

  With all the might I could muster, I picked Reaper up and hurled them onto the floor in the most forceful hip toss I’d ever performed. I knew they felt this one by the deep cracks that the impact created in the tarmac, and the resulting boom piercing through the air.

  “Victory belongs to those who seize the moment!” Kozuki cried as she grabbed my hand, holding it up as though I’d just won a heavyweight title.

  I smiled, before joining her in staring down our fallen opponent.

  “And we just did.”

  When Reaper came to, the first thing they did was reach for the scythe we’d id back out in front of them.

  “Easy, easy!” I affirmed, my palms held out in surrender. Kozuki and I were sitting on the floor, cross-legged, the white rapier now sheathed and ying behind us while we scrutinized our previous assaint.

  "We beg pardon for the ungentle handling – behold, this artifact had seized control of your wits fleetingly. We were left without recourse."

  In all honesty, part of me still wondered if Reaper really did want us dead, though I soon enough judged that saving us from the Samurai would have proven counterproductive to that aim.

  “Hey.” I called out after they’d risen to their feet. “Just who are you, anyway? You’ve gotta be a student at Tensei too, right? Why haven’t you shown us your face?”

  Kozuki looked at me quizzically, but there was no way she wasn’t curious too. The enigma in question stood still for several moments, and it seemed to me as though they were trying to weigh up their next actions. In the end, they simply shook their head, and leaped to a nearby roof.

  It seemed our conversation was over.

  “Wait!” I cried, jumping to my feet. “We need your help.”

  At my genuine plea for help, Reaper seemed intrigued. I gnced at Kozuki, and she nodded.

  I decided to continue.

  “Please,” I began, pointing in the direction of the main road that was heading south-east. “Katoru and Furusawa – they were in real bad shape when st we saw them. They headed over that way, toward Miyashita Park. Could you go over there and make sure they’re okay?”

  At their complete and utter silence, I felt more words spilling out.

  “…We’d go ourselves, but that’s a red zone. Between the Samurai Noise earlier, and this whole debacle, we wouldn’t st a second in there. We’re too spent. But you – I know how strong you really are. You’re the only one that can do this, Reaper.”

  My hands had curled into fists at some point. Truth be told, I felt uncomfortable putting their safety into the hands of someone who a) had just attacked us, b) was probably working with Daisuke to kill us all, and c) I knew absolutely nothing about, but the safety of those two came before anything else.

  Not to mention that if something happened to Furusawa in particur, I’d be in imminent danger myself.

  Reaper sighed, and turned back down at us, as if to say, “Fine, but only just this once.”

  In a fsh, they disappeared into the shadows of the rooftops, weaving and wefting through them, moving toward Miyashita Park.

  “Think the other two shall make it?” Kozuki inquired softly.

  I folded my arms.

  “I don’t know what I’ll do if they don’t.”

  Nodding, Kozuki rose to her feet, sheathed white rapier in tow.

  “Ah, I forgot to ask what the purpose is behind this object. Strange… it seems quite simir to the weapons we were gifted, no?”

  My eyes were locked onto Akio’s sceptre, so I muttered an absent “…Yeah, I guess.”

  Perhaps sensing my unease, Miharu rested a firm hand on my shoulder.

  “Worry not. We will see them again – I’m sure of it.”

  “…I hope you’re right. Anyway, we’d better get back to Center Street. Let’s stick to the back streets, and change the person who’s holding this weird piece of junk every three or so minutes.”

  Kozuki assumed a thinking pose, thin fingers stroking her chin.

  “Two comrades on a journey with an object of corruption in tow, having to stay vigint to watch over one another to make sure they do not succumb to its temptations? Where have I heard that before?”

  I pushed her pyfully on the shoulder, a gesture so carefree it surprised even me.

  “Oh, just can it, will ya?”

  I remember ughing in that moment. It would be a sound I would not hear again for quite some time.