NuraMago: Celadon, chapter 1, part 1/2
Wrestled from the teeth of the plunnies at great cost to my personal equilibrium, I present the first chapter of a Nurarihyon no Mago fic for your (hopeful) enjoyment! Warnings for blood, a bit of ick and some fairly mild language.
A few things that may help if you haven't read/watched the canon:
[Left-click the fake link to see pics and explanations]
A picture of Shouei (mmmmmmmmmm :3~)
Kyousai (creepy but not bad-looking)
This fic is set at around chapter 165 of the manga, during the 'Tokyo Tag' arc; this is after the end of the second anime season. Enemy youkai (the Hundred Tales clan) have launched an attack on Tokyo (the home ground of the Nura clan), deliberately involving humans.
When characters refer to "the Third", they mean Rikuo(-sama), the third head of the Nura clan.
The Kantou Oozarukai (the Kantou Great Ape Alliance), also known as the Hihi-gumi after its founder, is a sub-clan of the Nura-gumi made up of -- you guessed it -- ape-youkai. :P
/nerdfistbumps to you if you can identify Naoko's book and the game it comes from! (/nerdfistbumps to Nemi-chan, who got it right away.)
Celadon
A Nurarihyon no Mago fic
by Mel the Redcap
[--Kyousai.]
“Well. That was annoying.”
Kyousai scowled, shielding his eyes against the cold wind that blew in the shattered window. Some of his crafted youkai were still clustered at the edge, peering downwards into the dark and chaos below, and a couple of the stupider ones had followed the escapees out through the glass -- either too focussed on pursuit to notice the drop, or forgetting that they couldn’t fly. A couple of the youkai leaning out the window had wings, too, but it hadn’t occurred to them that they could.
“I suppose she had a point,” he muttered, scratching his scalp with the shaft of his paintbrush. “If I want them to be anything more than extra targets, I should start making smarter ones… but not too smart. So. Off to the next building. I wonder if I’ll find any inspiring women there?”
As he turned towards the stairwell, though, Kyousai couldn’t suppress a faint, admiring grin. That last vision of her, elaborate braid and long robes whipping in the wind as she leapt, one final glimpse of jade-green eyes and the sweep of her sleeve as she cast fire in her wake… she’d been magnificent.
Truly appropriate for the picture of Hell he was creating, painted on the living canvas of Shibuya.
* * * * *
[About half an hour earlier…]
[--Shouei.]
Shouei snarled, punching a buglike youkai into the ground and crushing it. “Get inside!” he shouted, gesturing at the humans cowering nearby. “Get behind doors and hide! This lot can’t follow you indoors without an invitation, so get off the streets and out of our way!”
“Yeah! We’re the Nura clan!” Aotabou bellowed from half a block away, mowing down zako-youkai with something that looked like half a light pole. “We won’t hurtcha, but you gotta get outta the way and let us fight or we can’t protect you!”
I don’t know whether he’s wasting his breath or not. I suppose if even one human rethinks that idiotic panic about the Third, it’s worthwhile, Shouei thought, looking around for his next opponent as the humans scrambled towards a restaurant that hadn’t lowered their security shutters yet. Not that there was any lack of targets, the streets (and alleyways, and walls, and skies above) were literally crawling with enemy youkai, but --
These are just distractions! Small fry, no brains, no strength; the only thing they’re good for is scaring humans and getting in our way. Half of them can’t even talk. They’re not worth drawing my sword on, but there’s no end to them. If we can’t find where they’re coming from we might as well be trying to bail out Kappa’s pond with a tea strainer!
Something made a chittering noise behind his shoulder, and he backhanded it without looking, shaking bits of shell and gore off his hand after the crunch. There had to be some way to tell…
I think they’re moving east, he decided, eyes narrowing. Well, more like they’re milling around aimlessly and sort of drifting east, but if I head westward… It’s better than hanging around here squashing bugs.
Patting his jacket to make sure that his father’s mask was still safely tucked away inside, he strode up the middle of the road, searching for any sign of the enemy youkai’s source.
Two blocks later, he found it.
Huh. Not really trying for stealth, are they?
The building in front of him, one in a row of multi-storey department stores, looked like it was oozing. Streaks of something black were running down its walls, great chunks of stone and glass were missing, and a slow but steady stream of animalistic youkai slithered or flew out of the holes. Down at ground level, more youkai were dragging half a dozen struggling humans inside.
All women, Shouei noticed, and all fairly young. This doesn’t look good…
The electricity was out for the whole block, making following them an easy task; there were youkai hanging around inside the building, probably meant to be guards, but even the emergency lights in the fire stairs were out. What was one more shape squeezing past in the darkness, so long as it didn’t attack? It was nearly pitch-black, but something above was generating enough youki for there to be faintly glowing fog trickling down, highlighting each stair and puffing up around his sneakers with every step he took. He had to bend his head and hunch his shoulders to fit, feeling the hood of his jacket brush the underside of the next flight of stairs, but he was used to it. Human buildings were never big enough.
I must be getting near the top. The youkai were climbing faster than him, scrambling up the stairs with no concern for noise, and Shouei paused for a moment, cocking his head to listen and taking a deep breath. Footsteps and sobbing above him, creaks and the rattle of rubble all around, shuffling noises below him as more youkai left; mingled scents of human and youkai blood, shattered concrete, something oily and foul that he mentally filed as zako-youkai B.O., ink-- Wait. Ink?
He frowned, taking another deep sniff to confirm the scent. That’s what it is. The scent of ink is all over this building, mixed in with everything else. Sumi-e ink… ah. Didn’t Kurotabou mention something about an enemy who can paint youkai--?
There was a horrified scream from above, and Shouei swore, drawing his sword as he leapt up the last flights of stairs.
----------
[--Kyousai.]
Kyousai turned away from his latest creation, already focussed on his next work. The girl screamed again, voice cracking as she shifted from horror at what had happened to her friend to terror at what was about to happen to her, and he sighed. There was no inspiration here, no spark, just a succession of cheap canvases to turn into ordinary minions. His brush flicked over her back, compensating automatically when she squirmed, finished in just a few strokes, and he sighed again. This was so boring.
It was understandable, therefore, that his mood actually brightened when the seven and a half foot tall swordsman kicked out the fire door and charged straight for him.
He could feel a grin spreading over his face as he rolled to one side, throwing the sobbing girl at his attacker. The swordsman slashed through two youkai who had the misfortune to be in the way and then checked, blade jerking to the side and narrowly missing the human as she fell against his chest, and Kyousai had a moment to study him. He fumbled for paper and inkstone without looking, eyes taking in every detail. Pale skin; blood-red eyes; white hair with red streaks; a haori matching his eyes draped over his shoulders on top of a dark maroon hoodie, the exact shade that would coordinate without clashing. What a shame I didn’t bring my coloured inks. A composition in blood tones-- wait, I can literally paint him in blood! Yes, that would be magnificent! He can provide both the inspiration and the pigment for the work. Finally, something worth calling art!
Then the girl shrieked, eyes going vacant as she changed, and Kyousai’s grin sharpened as the swordsman’s red eyes widened in shock. “Hadn’t you noticed?” he asked mildly, slapping the paper down in front of him and dipping his brush. “I’ve been turning humans into youkai all night, and you Nura clan fools have been killing them. So much for your commander’s principles.”
----------
[--Shouei.]
That bastard!
The girl had become something rat-like, swinging long claws towards Shouei’s face as she-- it-- yowled mindlessly, and he shoved it away hard. His first instinct was to follow through with a sword strike, one quick slash to cut down this enemy and then move on to the main target, but--
She’s an innocent. There’s got to be some way to turn her back-- kami, I’ve killed hundreds of these youkai tonight, we’ve all killed them--
Aotabou’s voice rang in his memory. “We’re the Nura clan! We won’t hurtcha!”
--Rikuo-sama must have-- when-- when he finds out--
He could feel horror slowing his reactions, and the rat-girl was far from the only crafted youkai in the room.
…If I’m not willing to risk killing them, they’re going to kill me.
Shouei punched the rat-girl off him, wincing internally at the feel of bones breaking under his fist, and managed to shift his grip on his swordhilt so that he could strike with the back of the blade. There was a sudden weight on his back, pushing him off-balance, something twining around his legs, and as another youkai with far too many legs scrabbled at his sword arm the damn painter was smirking at him--
Smirking, and lifting his brush away from a large sheet of paper.
Shit.
The painter-youkai grabbed the bottom edge of the paper and flapped it almost casually in Shouei’s direction, as if shaking crumbs off a tablecloth or dust out of a carpet, and ink boiled off the surface in roiling black swirls. It looked exactly like the painted clouds in a sumi-e landscape, and for a moment that was all he could see, nose and mouth full of the metallic taste and smell of ink. Something yanked his sword out of his hand and he heard it clatter on the concrete floor as he struggled against the force pushing him back, buffeting him from side to side as the painted swirls rushed by.
When his vision cleared, he couldn’t move.
“That should keep you out of the way until I have the time to deal with you properly,” the painter said cheerfully, turning the paper around to display the drawing. It was himself -- Shouei -- caught in something like a giant spiderweb, held spreadeagled with his oodachi lying on the floor beneath his feet and an expression of helpless exhaustion on his face. Twisting his head, he could see the thick webbing wound around his arms and legs. It looked real, and certainly felt real, but at the same time looked and smelled like a painting… and suddenly, he felt so tired it was an effort just to raise his head.
“Now then,” the painter went on, flicking the paper to one side. “Work before pleasure, I suppose,” he sighed, and turned back towards the four remaining human girls. They were on their knees, hands tied behind them, and their blouses had been ripped open down the back to bare skin from shoulders down to the waist. The closest girl cringed back, whimpering as he reached for her, long black hair escaping from her barrettes and half-hiding her face.
“Wh-what are you, s-some kind of idiot?!”
The painter blinked in surprise, then turned to look at the girl who’d spoken. She was dressed fairly plainly, shoulder-length hair scraped back under a plain headband and wearing no makeup; it was clear she was trying to glare defiantly at the painter, but she was shivering and her voice was unsteady. “Oh?” he asked, voice surprisingly mild. “You have a complaint?”
“Y-yeah!” She lifted her chin defiantly, biting her lip. “You’re turning people into youkai. Fine. If I’ve gotta become a m-monster, then I d-don’t want to be a weakling, okay?”
“Nao-chan, what are you doing?!” one of the other girls squeaked, horrified.
“What does it sound like I’m doing?” she snapped in reply, then turned back to the painter. “You said it yourself, you’ve been turning people into youkai all night and he--” her chin jerked towards Shouei “--and his friends have been killing them. He t-took down two with one cut right there, so they’re weak, right? And I saw plenty of them while I was hiding, and on the way here, and most of them looked stupid. Weak and stupid means they’re p-pretty useless, doesn’t it? All they can do is bumble around and get killed. Well, if I’m stuck turning into a youkai, I want to be one that’s smart enough and strong enough to do better than that!”
The painter blinked again, eerie pale-green pupilless eyes looking almost bewildered, and the girl hurried on with her argument.
“It’s better f-for you too, isn’t it? If you have youkai that are smart enough to understand c-complicated orders, smart enough to fight smart instead of just charging straight in to bite? If you turn me into a dumb youkai, all I’ll do is get killed. If you let me stay smart, I might be able to do something useful!”
A slow grin spread over the painter’s face as he crouched down beside her, gripping her chin in the hand not holding his brush and tipping her face up for a better look. “Useful, hmm? The Nura clan aren’t pushovers, you know. You think you can defeat a youkai, little girl?”
“I can’t.” Anger seemed to be getting the upper hand over fear as she stared stubbornly back at him. “B-but that’s not the point, is it? How about you turn me into something that can?”
“Oho, I think I like you,” he chuckled. “Yesssss… you’re a bit more inspirational than I thought at first. So? Got any ideas?” he added, already turning away to reach for his inkstone, clearly not expecting an affirmative answer.
“Yes.” The girl’s mouth firmed into a hard, determined line, and she jerked her head towards where a couple of shoulder bags and purses had been dumped, presumably tossed out of the way when their owners were tied up. “There’s a book in my bag.”
----------
[--Kyousai.]
Kyousai paged through the softcovered book, frowning at the small black-and-white illustrations, then closed it to look at the cover. A robed creature, something insect-like yet still humanoid, was pictured sitting on a throne, raising a beckoning hand towards a young woman wearing a glowing diadem. “I don’t recognise any of these.”
“It’s about Western demons, not Japanese ones,” the girl said shortly. “Which means that nobody here is likely to know how to fight them.”
“And I suppose that also explains why I can’t read it?”
Something flickered in her eyes for a moment, then was gone. Relief? “It’s written in English. I can tell you what it says.”
“Heh. Happy to have a bargaining chip, hmm?”
Astonishingly, she managed a thin smile. “Wouldn’t you be, in my position? I’ll happily translate the whole book for you -- if I survive the night.”
In other words, it’s in my best interests to see to it that she does. Definitely interesting. It’s a pity I don’t have time to create a whole new story just for her… well, I’ll just have to content myself with saving the other one for later, Kyousai told himself, glancing over towards the webbed swordsman to make sure he wasn’t making any progress towards escape. “All right, then. Which one did you have in mind?”
“There are some papers tucked in between the pages, about a third of the way in.” The girl watched as he flicked the book open where a couple of folded papers were forming a bookmark, then nodded at the page. “They’re called ‘Bales’. That paper is… research, kind of, on one particular Bale; her strengths and weaknesses, skills, personality, everything. There’s a picture, too. I want to be like her, if… if you can do that?” Her voice was uncertain again. “Or… if you can only pick the type of youkai, not individual traits, then--”
“Like her?” Kyousai snorted. “Don’t make me laugh. I can turn you into her. What does all this say?” he demanded, turning the book towards the human. “Summarise it.”
She swallowed hard, then nodded, looking down at the book. “Bales usually look like tall, slim, beautiful humans, except for their eyes and hands. They’re intelligent and magically talented…”
----------
[--Shouei.]
Breathing hard, Shouei sagged against the strands holding him up. It’s no good. I’m well and truly stuck, and it feels like I’ve been fighting for days, not less than an hour.
Head down, he watched the painter-youkai and the human girl talk, peering through his fringe. The painter seemed absorbed in what the girl was telling him, pointing at a picture in the book and asking questions; the girl was concentrating more on him than on the book she was supposed to be translating, shoulders hunched, tongue darting out to moisten dry lips as she watched his face.
…She’s lying to him.
He wasn’t sure whether it was her posture, her expression, or something in the faint scent he could discern through everything else, her sweat acrid with fear but somehow hinting of calculation more than panic. Whatever it was, though, somehow he knew. Something about what she’s telling him is a lie, or at least misdirection. She’s not collected enough to be making it all up on the spot, and she couldn’t be sure ahead of time that he wouldn’t be able to read the book himself, so a lot of it must be true… but she’s trying to fool him somehow.
And at the very least, while she’s distracting him like this he isn’t making more youkai.
Gathering what strength he had left, Shouei settled down to watch and listen.
“…so they’re vampires?”
The girl shook her head. “No; they’re alive, not undead, and sunlight doesn’t hurt them.”
“But they are immortal?”
“As long as they can get blood, yes. They’re very hard to kill.” The girl gestured towards one of the pages with her chin. “You can’t poison them, they don’t catch diseases, they don’t bleed, and it only takes them about a day to heal most wounds.”
“Mmh.” The painter looked unimpressed. “Fine, but what are they like?”
“Uh… what do you mean?”
“How do they act? What do they do?” He looked up from the page and smirked at her. “Since you actually want to be one, I’m guessing they’re nice,” he added sarcastically, voice practically dripping syrup on the last word.
The human girl stared back at him. “Bales are evil,” she said flatly. “Almost all of them are sadistic megalomaniacs. Their most respected occupations are ‘necromancer’ and ‘torturer’. Their racial defence policy is basically ‘Kill your enemies, drink their blood, raise their corpses as your undead slaves, then send them to kill their former friends’. They’re pretty, but they’re definitely not nice,” she almost spat, then took a deep breath and visibly controlled herself, biting off her tirade. “Ought to fit right in with you,” she muttered, looking away.
The grin on the painter’s face was practically blinding, a scythe-shape of white against his tanned skin. “Oh, I do like you,” he crooned. “Do try not to get killed. I like your ideas. I want to keep you around. I want to play with you.”
“Not getting killed is the whole point here,” she said under her breath, nearly inaudible.
“This one, the one that you want to be,” he continued, unfolding the papers he’d taken from between the book’s pages. “Is she a necromancer?”
“A bit,” the girl shrugged, eyelashes dropping to shield her eyes. “She specialises more in illusions and hypnotism, but she knows a lot of other spells too. She’s… very good at seeming harmless.”
“Oh? That could be useful.” The painter looked at the first piece of paper, covered with columns of numbers and English words, and grimaced, flicking to the second page. One eyebrow went up. “Did you draw this?”
“Yes.” The eyebrow went up further, and she blushed. “I’m not an artist!”
“I can tell,” he snorted. “It’s enough to give me the gist, though. What’s her name?”
The girl paused, licking dry lips again. “…Celadon. It means ‘Aoji’, like the porcelain.”
“Right,” he muttered. Still holding her drawing in one hand, he stuck his paintbrush in his mouth and reached for the inkstone with the other. “Hol’ still.”
----------
[--Naoko.]
please let this work
oh please kami, let this work, let me become her and not something that will do what he wants
Her forehead was pressed against the dusty concrete floor, tears that she could no longer hold back welling up between tightly-closed eyelids.
I don’t want to die
I don’t want to let my friends die
please
The bristles tickled on her back, and the ink was cold.
please
----------
[--Shouei.]
The girl didn’t scream. Somehow, that made it worse.
Her eyes and mouth went wide, breath huffing out in a quiet little “ah” of surprise and pain as the lines of ink on her back bubbled up and spread over her skin, but she didn’t scream and her eyes never went blank the way the rat-girl’s had. Shouei watched as the ink swept over her, changed her, and right up to the moment when it covered her face and blotted out her features her eyes were still awake and aware.
Then the ink ebbed away, wet black surfaces drying into pale green and white silk, and the girl was gone.
The new youkai sat up slowly, bringing one cloth-covered hand up to her face, and blinked open cat-slit green eyes that were just a shade darker than the painter’s. She had skin as white as milk, knee-length hair as black as the ink that had created her in a wrist-thick complicated braid, and was wearing vaguely Chinese-looking layered robes with overlong sleeves that hung loosely at least a foot past her fingertips. Gold and jewels glinted in her hair and dangled from her earlobes.
“…Nao-chan?” one of the other girls asked tentatively. “Nao-chan, are-- are you--”
“That girl is dead,” the youkai -- Celadon -- said coolly, pale lips curving in a faint, meaningless social smile. Her expression didn’t shift as she stood and rearranged her robes, flicking away dust, even when the girl who’d spoken began to sob hopelessly.
“You can translate this, right?” the painter asked, already flipping through the book’s pages in search of another interesting subject. “It’ll be a bad joke if I’ve turned my translator into someone who can’t read it.”
“I speak and read English,” Celadon confirmed. “Anglish, actually, but the formal mode is similar enough. If you don’t object,” she went on, in the sort of politely firm tone that means ‘this will happen whether you object or not’, “might I suggest you find the next section you would like to read while I get a drink? I’m… quite thirsty.”
“Go ahead,” the painter told her, absently waving her towards the remaining humans with his brush; then his head jerked up and he frowned as she instead turned and began to walk towards Shouei. “Hey! Not him, I’m saving him for later! Take one of the girls instead.”
“I shan’t harm him,” she objected, pausing. “He’s large and strong enough that he’s unlikely to even get dizzy. If I take enough to satisfy me from one of those undernourished waifs, though, I’ll probably kill them,” she said, swishing one trailing sleeve dismissively, “which will mean that you have one less to play with. Unless you don’t mind that?”
He hesitated for a moment, then grumbled under his breath, turning back to the book. “Fine, go ahead.”
“Thank you,” she purred, smile widening as she turned back towards Shouei.
Whatever that girl was trying to do, I don’t think it worked, he thought grimly, tensing his muscles. His eyes narrowed as he studied the approaching youkai, watching her walk. I can’t feel more than a trace of youki from her. She doesn’t move like a fighter, and she doesn’t look physically strong, though you can never really tell… and not that it really matters, with me stuck like this. If she’s careless, though, I should be able to do some serious damage with a headbutt, he mused, darkly amused despite the situation.
Celadon paused just out of arms’ reach, studying his face. “Oh, aren’t you handsome,” she murmured, voice low and warm. “So young to be so large and strong.” Her eyes widened, gleaming, and suddenly he couldn’t look away.
~Shall I show you a pretty dream, pretty boy?~ He heard her voice, but her lips hadn’t moved.
“She specialises more in illusions and hypnotism--”
“Get out of my head,” he choked out, voice slurring as a chill spread through him. “Get-- get out--”
~Hush. Let me show you.~ His vision was going dark as she stepped forwards, cloth brushing his cheek as she reached to push his hood back.
“--out--”
Shouei blinked. He was standing in the courtyard garden at home, gi tucked down around his waist and bokken in his hands.
…was I practicing? he thought, looking around. I… don’t remember how I got here…
His father’s bonsai trees were arranged neatly on their shelves, leaves sparkling with droplets from a recent watering. The newest bonsai, barely more than a sapling and still being trained into its basic shape, was out on the table. Pruning snips and wire lay next to it as if Hihi had just laid down his tools and stepped away for a moment, and Shouei grinned. When his father came back, he’d have to tease him about acting like an elderly retired human again.
Something was wrong, but he couldn’t tell what.
“What a beautiful garden,” a woman’s voice said from behind him, and he spun around, bokken lifting to strike. Celadon was perched on the biggest decorative boulder, slippered feet neatly together and sleeve-draped hands wrapped around her knees, and Shouei remembered.
--he’s dead my father is dead you bitch--
“Stop that,” she said reprovingly, and the bokken stopped mid-swing, inches away from her head. All his strength couldn’t shift it.
“How dare you--!”
“I didn’t choose this location,” she said, tone somewhere between offended and apologetic. “I left it up to your subconscious to pick a place and time where you felt comfortable.” She paused, then continued, definitely apologetic now. “I can change it, if you would prefer?”
“Just get out of my mind!” he snarled.
“Not yet.” She looked up at him from beneath her lashes, green glint in her eyes matching the jewels in her hair. “If I can get you free from that web and distract the artist, do you think you can get the humans to safety?”
“…What?”
“I want to escape,” she explained patiently. “All of us. Will you help?”
Shouei took a step backwards, eyeing her suspiciously, and nearly dropped his bokken as whatever force had been holding it let go. “Why? That painter made you, why are you going against--”
“He did not,” she hissed, fabric crumpling as she fisted her hands inside her long sleeves. “He did not create me, I do not belong to him and I will not obey him!” There was a faint chiming sound as her hair ornaments rattled together, and Shouei realised she was trembling slightly -- fear or anger, or both, he couldn’t tell. Her expression was a mask, as cool and unreadable as the porcelain she was named for, and he couldn’t smell anything from her but a faint floral perfume.
Not that it would mean much if I could, given that this is an illusion, he thought wryly, and lowered the bokken. “I’m willing to try,” he said grudgingly.
She smiled, the first genuine-seeming expression he’d seen on her face.
Another blink, and he was back in the web, sagging forwards with his cheek resting on a silk-clad shoulder, cool lips pressed to his throat. There was a slight twinge of pain as she swallowed and pulled away, soothed almost immediately by a couple of dabs from her tongue; he shivered at the sensation, and her hands tightened warningly on the back of his head and shoulder. He played dead -- unconscious, whatever -- and her grip relaxed again as he stayed carefully limp, eyes closed, breathing controlled and slow.
“You haven’t broken him, have you?” came the painter’s voice, sounding annoyed.
“Of course not,” she chuckled, right in Shouei’s ear. “He’s delicious; I wouldn’t want to waste him. I’m just going to let him sleep until you have time to play.”
“Good. Get over here and translate this bit, would you? It looks interesting.”
“Certainly.” She let go, tugging the hood back into place over his bowed head, then turned and walked a few feet away; he tracked her by the sound of her footsteps, noting with approval that she’d moved a little to the side, out of the direct line between him and his targets.
She’s got at least some battlefield awareness; that’ll help… Eyes slitting open, he checked to make sure that his sword hadn’t been moved in the minute or so he’d spent unaware of the room.
“By the way, may I know your name? You never did introduce yourself,” Celadon asked, sounding only mildly curious.
“Hm? Oh. Kyousai.”
“Thank you. I always like to know the name of anyone I’m trying to kill.”
----------
[--Kyousai.]
“--huh?”
A ball of flames shot past Kyousai’s shoulder and exploded, throwing flaming papers everywhere and blasting him with heat. He could feel the short hairs on the right side of his face crisping as he ducked and scrambled away from the next fireball; it struck the book of youkai square on the front cover and engulfed it, and he swore.
She missed me?
A sudden burst of light at the other end of the long room, behind her -- well away from anything she’d just set on fire -- told him otherwise. The webbing holding the tall swordsman flashed into momentary flames and evaporated, and Kyousai knew that one particular piece of paper had just burned to ash.
Exactly what she was aiming at. Which means she isn’t missing. Which means she aimed at the book, too, and now she’ll be aiming at me!
He swept up his hand, not bothering with the brush, and ink leapt from his inkstone to follow the gesture, forming into a hulking oni barely in time to intercept the next blast of flames. Another gesture sent every crafted youkai in the room after Celadon, and he grinned.
That should give me a moment to draw something more personalised--
A sword smashed down only a hair away from his reaching fingertips, shattering his inkstone and carving a gouge into the floor. Blood-red eyes glared at him over the hilt, and the follow-up stroke sliced into his left sleeve as he used an ink-formed claw to yank himself backwards with desperate speed.
She put him to sleep! How-- oh, don’t be stupid, of course she was lying, idiot!
The swordsman bared short fangs in a silent growl, then spun away, flaring his youki and growing even larger as he swept the three screaming human girls up in his arms. A flick of Kyousai’s hand spattered ink across the wall and floor near the emergency door, welling up into a crowd of youkai and blocking the exit, but the swordsman didn’t even pause; he charged straight for the cracked wall of windows, spinning as he leapt so that he met the glass shoulders first, vanishing into the darkness outside in a cascade of shards.
The fires were already dying, extinguished by a combination of lack of fuel and spattered ink, and Kyousai turned to glare at Celadon. She was pressed back into a corner, cut off from following after the swordsman by several large youkai, hands raised ineffectually to ward them off. As he watched, one leaped for her throat as she screamed, cowering--
--and the youkai passed straight through her, hitting the wall with a hollow sound as her image evaporated into nothing.
Eh?
“Goodbye, Kyousai,” her voice said from near the shattered window. “Let’s try not to meet again.” Shadows rippled as she stepped out of nowhere and jumped, glancing back at the last moment to cast one final arc of fire, incinerating the closest youkai and driving several others back a few steps. The wolflike youkai that had jumped through her illusion came charging back past him at the head of a small pack of predatory-looking beasts, leaping into the darkness after her without a second thought; Kyousai winced as it vanished downwards with a surprised yelp, and wondered if the soggy *thump* several seconds later was his imagination or not.
“…Well,” he said eventually, blowing out his breath in an aggrieved sigh. “That was annoying.”
----------
[--Shouei.]
Finishing his spin in mid-air as he sailed across the street with his terrified passengers, Shouei lashed out with his sword and stabbed it into the façade of the nearest building. It carved a broad furrow down through reinforced concrete and steel, scattering rubble around them and slowing their fall, finally bringing them to a halt dangling two storeys above the street below.
Two of the girls were held in the crook of his left arm, squashed uncomfortably against his chest and sobbing; the third was dangling from his left hand by her belt, probably even more uncomfortable and definitely not happy about her position, making quiet choking noises that indicated either difficulty breathing or a desire to throw up. She twisted to look up at him, paling visibly as she saw his face, notably less human-seeming in his true form.
“Now what--?” she began, and screamed again as he pulled his sword free of the building and let them all drop. He landed with only a slight stagger, fatigue making him clumsier than usual, and set all three gently on their feet. They promptly collapsed to the ground again, but he’d at least made the gesture.
A loud, animalistic yelp from above brought Shouei’s head up, searching for the source of the noise, and he sucked in a hissing breath as he saw Celadon tumbling towards the ground in a swirl of hair and fluttering robes. He started forwards, aiming to catch her, but her arms spread out as if to cup the air and she suddenly slowed, drifting down the last twenty feet or so like a leaf on the wind. The two youkai plummeting after her weren’t so fortunate, landing heavily enough to ensure that nobody would need to finish them off.
Celadon’s eyes widened as she touched down and got a good look at Shouei. “And I thought you were tall before,” she murmured, then shook her head slightly, glancing up at his face. “Where to now? Is there somewhere safe we can go?”
As her eyes turned up towards his, he jerked his head to the side almost by reflex, avoiding her gaze. Feeling slightly embarrassed, he shifted back to his usual nearly-human shape, bringing his height back down to ‘only’ somewhat over seven feet. “If we head east, there should be several Nura clan members nearby we can join up with. I can check--” Pulling out his cellphone, he stared for a moment at its cracked screen and ‘no signal’ indicator, then sighed, putting it away again. “Or not. Still, heading east would be a good start. We should move fast, though, before that Kyousai guy comes after us.”
“I can delay him a little,” she said, and began to turn towards the building they’d jumped from; then she checked, looking uncertain. “Oh. Might there be more humans still hiding on the lower floors?”
“I doubt it,” he said grimly. “I didn’t smell any other fresh human scents on the way up the stairs… just stale fear and blood.”
“…Very well then.” Lifting her hands, she narrowed her eyes in concentration.
----------
[--Kyousai.]
When the stairwell belched a gout of flame up from ground level and blew him out through the fourth-floor fire doors -- which had been locked -- Kyousai decided that his half-formed plans to chase after Celadon and the blood-coloured swordsman would just have to be abandoned.
Let them go join up with the rest of the Nura lot, he scowled, limping over to a window and looking gloomily at the billows of smoke rising from all the windows on the ground floor of the building. Encho and the others can have them!
----------
A few things that may help if you haven't read/watched the canon:
[Left-click the fake link to see pics and explanations]
A picture of Shouei (mmmmmmmmmm :3~)
Kyousai (creepy but not bad-looking)
This fic is set at around chapter 165 of the manga, during the 'Tokyo Tag' arc; this is after the end of the second anime season. Enemy youkai (the Hundred Tales clan) have launched an attack on Tokyo (the home ground of the Nura clan), deliberately involving humans.
When characters refer to "the Third", they mean Rikuo(-sama), the third head of the Nura clan.
The Kantou Oozarukai (the Kantou Great Ape Alliance), also known as the Hihi-gumi after its founder, is a sub-clan of the Nura-gumi made up of -- you guessed it -- ape-youkai. :P
/nerdfistbumps to you if you can identify Naoko's book and the game it comes from! (/nerdfistbumps to Nemi-chan, who got it right away.)
Celadon
A Nurarihyon no Mago fic
by Mel the Redcap
[--Kyousai.]
“Well. That was annoying.”
Kyousai scowled, shielding his eyes against the cold wind that blew in the shattered window. Some of his crafted youkai were still clustered at the edge, peering downwards into the dark and chaos below, and a couple of the stupider ones had followed the escapees out through the glass -- either too focussed on pursuit to notice the drop, or forgetting that they couldn’t fly. A couple of the youkai leaning out the window had wings, too, but it hadn’t occurred to them that they could.
“I suppose she had a point,” he muttered, scratching his scalp with the shaft of his paintbrush. “If I want them to be anything more than extra targets, I should start making smarter ones… but not too smart. So. Off to the next building. I wonder if I’ll find any inspiring women there?”
As he turned towards the stairwell, though, Kyousai couldn’t suppress a faint, admiring grin. That last vision of her, elaborate braid and long robes whipping in the wind as she leapt, one final glimpse of jade-green eyes and the sweep of her sleeve as she cast fire in her wake… she’d been magnificent.
Truly appropriate for the picture of Hell he was creating, painted on the living canvas of Shibuya.
* * * * *
[About half an hour earlier…]
[--Shouei.]
Shouei snarled, punching a buglike youkai into the ground and crushing it. “Get inside!” he shouted, gesturing at the humans cowering nearby. “Get behind doors and hide! This lot can’t follow you indoors without an invitation, so get off the streets and out of our way!”
“Yeah! We’re the Nura clan!” Aotabou bellowed from half a block away, mowing down zako-youkai with something that looked like half a light pole. “We won’t hurtcha, but you gotta get outta the way and let us fight or we can’t protect you!”
I don’t know whether he’s wasting his breath or not. I suppose if even one human rethinks that idiotic panic about the Third, it’s worthwhile, Shouei thought, looking around for his next opponent as the humans scrambled towards a restaurant that hadn’t lowered their security shutters yet. Not that there was any lack of targets, the streets (and alleyways, and walls, and skies above) were literally crawling with enemy youkai, but --
These are just distractions! Small fry, no brains, no strength; the only thing they’re good for is scaring humans and getting in our way. Half of them can’t even talk. They’re not worth drawing my sword on, but there’s no end to them. If we can’t find where they’re coming from we might as well be trying to bail out Kappa’s pond with a tea strainer!
Something made a chittering noise behind his shoulder, and he backhanded it without looking, shaking bits of shell and gore off his hand after the crunch. There had to be some way to tell…
I think they’re moving east, he decided, eyes narrowing. Well, more like they’re milling around aimlessly and sort of drifting east, but if I head westward… It’s better than hanging around here squashing bugs.
Patting his jacket to make sure that his father’s mask was still safely tucked away inside, he strode up the middle of the road, searching for any sign of the enemy youkai’s source.
Two blocks later, he found it.
Huh. Not really trying for stealth, are they?
The building in front of him, one in a row of multi-storey department stores, looked like it was oozing. Streaks of something black were running down its walls, great chunks of stone and glass were missing, and a slow but steady stream of animalistic youkai slithered or flew out of the holes. Down at ground level, more youkai were dragging half a dozen struggling humans inside.
All women, Shouei noticed, and all fairly young. This doesn’t look good…
The electricity was out for the whole block, making following them an easy task; there were youkai hanging around inside the building, probably meant to be guards, but even the emergency lights in the fire stairs were out. What was one more shape squeezing past in the darkness, so long as it didn’t attack? It was nearly pitch-black, but something above was generating enough youki for there to be faintly glowing fog trickling down, highlighting each stair and puffing up around his sneakers with every step he took. He had to bend his head and hunch his shoulders to fit, feeling the hood of his jacket brush the underside of the next flight of stairs, but he was used to it. Human buildings were never big enough.
I must be getting near the top. The youkai were climbing faster than him, scrambling up the stairs with no concern for noise, and Shouei paused for a moment, cocking his head to listen and taking a deep breath. Footsteps and sobbing above him, creaks and the rattle of rubble all around, shuffling noises below him as more youkai left; mingled scents of human and youkai blood, shattered concrete, something oily and foul that he mentally filed as zako-youkai B.O., ink-- Wait. Ink?
He frowned, taking another deep sniff to confirm the scent. That’s what it is. The scent of ink is all over this building, mixed in with everything else. Sumi-e ink… ah. Didn’t Kurotabou mention something about an enemy who can paint youkai--?
There was a horrified scream from above, and Shouei swore, drawing his sword as he leapt up the last flights of stairs.
----------
[--Kyousai.]
Kyousai turned away from his latest creation, already focussed on his next work. The girl screamed again, voice cracking as she shifted from horror at what had happened to her friend to terror at what was about to happen to her, and he sighed. There was no inspiration here, no spark, just a succession of cheap canvases to turn into ordinary minions. His brush flicked over her back, compensating automatically when she squirmed, finished in just a few strokes, and he sighed again. This was so boring.
It was understandable, therefore, that his mood actually brightened when the seven and a half foot tall swordsman kicked out the fire door and charged straight for him.
He could feel a grin spreading over his face as he rolled to one side, throwing the sobbing girl at his attacker. The swordsman slashed through two youkai who had the misfortune to be in the way and then checked, blade jerking to the side and narrowly missing the human as she fell against his chest, and Kyousai had a moment to study him. He fumbled for paper and inkstone without looking, eyes taking in every detail. Pale skin; blood-red eyes; white hair with red streaks; a haori matching his eyes draped over his shoulders on top of a dark maroon hoodie, the exact shade that would coordinate without clashing. What a shame I didn’t bring my coloured inks. A composition in blood tones-- wait, I can literally paint him in blood! Yes, that would be magnificent! He can provide both the inspiration and the pigment for the work. Finally, something worth calling art!
Then the girl shrieked, eyes going vacant as she changed, and Kyousai’s grin sharpened as the swordsman’s red eyes widened in shock. “Hadn’t you noticed?” he asked mildly, slapping the paper down in front of him and dipping his brush. “I’ve been turning humans into youkai all night, and you Nura clan fools have been killing them. So much for your commander’s principles.”
----------
[--Shouei.]
That bastard!
The girl had become something rat-like, swinging long claws towards Shouei’s face as she-- it-- yowled mindlessly, and he shoved it away hard. His first instinct was to follow through with a sword strike, one quick slash to cut down this enemy and then move on to the main target, but--
She’s an innocent. There’s got to be some way to turn her back-- kami, I’ve killed hundreds of these youkai tonight, we’ve all killed them--
Aotabou’s voice rang in his memory. “We’re the Nura clan! We won’t hurtcha!”
--Rikuo-sama must have-- when-- when he finds out--
He could feel horror slowing his reactions, and the rat-girl was far from the only crafted youkai in the room.
…If I’m not willing to risk killing them, they’re going to kill me.
Shouei punched the rat-girl off him, wincing internally at the feel of bones breaking under his fist, and managed to shift his grip on his swordhilt so that he could strike with the back of the blade. There was a sudden weight on his back, pushing him off-balance, something twining around his legs, and as another youkai with far too many legs scrabbled at his sword arm the damn painter was smirking at him--
Smirking, and lifting his brush away from a large sheet of paper.
Shit.
The painter-youkai grabbed the bottom edge of the paper and flapped it almost casually in Shouei’s direction, as if shaking crumbs off a tablecloth or dust out of a carpet, and ink boiled off the surface in roiling black swirls. It looked exactly like the painted clouds in a sumi-e landscape, and for a moment that was all he could see, nose and mouth full of the metallic taste and smell of ink. Something yanked his sword out of his hand and he heard it clatter on the concrete floor as he struggled against the force pushing him back, buffeting him from side to side as the painted swirls rushed by.
When his vision cleared, he couldn’t move.
“That should keep you out of the way until I have the time to deal with you properly,” the painter said cheerfully, turning the paper around to display the drawing. It was himself -- Shouei -- caught in something like a giant spiderweb, held spreadeagled with his oodachi lying on the floor beneath his feet and an expression of helpless exhaustion on his face. Twisting his head, he could see the thick webbing wound around his arms and legs. It looked real, and certainly felt real, but at the same time looked and smelled like a painting… and suddenly, he felt so tired it was an effort just to raise his head.
“Now then,” the painter went on, flicking the paper to one side. “Work before pleasure, I suppose,” he sighed, and turned back towards the four remaining human girls. They were on their knees, hands tied behind them, and their blouses had been ripped open down the back to bare skin from shoulders down to the waist. The closest girl cringed back, whimpering as he reached for her, long black hair escaping from her barrettes and half-hiding her face.
“Wh-what are you, s-some kind of idiot?!”
The painter blinked in surprise, then turned to look at the girl who’d spoken. She was dressed fairly plainly, shoulder-length hair scraped back under a plain headband and wearing no makeup; it was clear she was trying to glare defiantly at the painter, but she was shivering and her voice was unsteady. “Oh?” he asked, voice surprisingly mild. “You have a complaint?”
“Y-yeah!” She lifted her chin defiantly, biting her lip. “You’re turning people into youkai. Fine. If I’ve gotta become a m-monster, then I d-don’t want to be a weakling, okay?”
“Nao-chan, what are you doing?!” one of the other girls squeaked, horrified.
“What does it sound like I’m doing?” she snapped in reply, then turned back to the painter. “You said it yourself, you’ve been turning people into youkai all night and he--” her chin jerked towards Shouei “--and his friends have been killing them. He t-took down two with one cut right there, so they’re weak, right? And I saw plenty of them while I was hiding, and on the way here, and most of them looked stupid. Weak and stupid means they’re p-pretty useless, doesn’t it? All they can do is bumble around and get killed. Well, if I’m stuck turning into a youkai, I want to be one that’s smart enough and strong enough to do better than that!”
The painter blinked again, eerie pale-green pupilless eyes looking almost bewildered, and the girl hurried on with her argument.
“It’s better f-for you too, isn’t it? If you have youkai that are smart enough to understand c-complicated orders, smart enough to fight smart instead of just charging straight in to bite? If you turn me into a dumb youkai, all I’ll do is get killed. If you let me stay smart, I might be able to do something useful!”
A slow grin spread over the painter’s face as he crouched down beside her, gripping her chin in the hand not holding his brush and tipping her face up for a better look. “Useful, hmm? The Nura clan aren’t pushovers, you know. You think you can defeat a youkai, little girl?”
“I can’t.” Anger seemed to be getting the upper hand over fear as she stared stubbornly back at him. “B-but that’s not the point, is it? How about you turn me into something that can?”
“Oho, I think I like you,” he chuckled. “Yesssss… you’re a bit more inspirational than I thought at first. So? Got any ideas?” he added, already turning away to reach for his inkstone, clearly not expecting an affirmative answer.
“Yes.” The girl’s mouth firmed into a hard, determined line, and she jerked her head towards where a couple of shoulder bags and purses had been dumped, presumably tossed out of the way when their owners were tied up. “There’s a book in my bag.”
----------
[--Kyousai.]
Kyousai paged through the softcovered book, frowning at the small black-and-white illustrations, then closed it to look at the cover. A robed creature, something insect-like yet still humanoid, was pictured sitting on a throne, raising a beckoning hand towards a young woman wearing a glowing diadem. “I don’t recognise any of these.”
“It’s about Western demons, not Japanese ones,” the girl said shortly. “Which means that nobody here is likely to know how to fight them.”
“And I suppose that also explains why I can’t read it?”
Something flickered in her eyes for a moment, then was gone. Relief? “It’s written in English. I can tell you what it says.”
“Heh. Happy to have a bargaining chip, hmm?”
Astonishingly, she managed a thin smile. “Wouldn’t you be, in my position? I’ll happily translate the whole book for you -- if I survive the night.”
In other words, it’s in my best interests to see to it that she does. Definitely interesting. It’s a pity I don’t have time to create a whole new story just for her… well, I’ll just have to content myself with saving the other one for later, Kyousai told himself, glancing over towards the webbed swordsman to make sure he wasn’t making any progress towards escape. “All right, then. Which one did you have in mind?”
“There are some papers tucked in between the pages, about a third of the way in.” The girl watched as he flicked the book open where a couple of folded papers were forming a bookmark, then nodded at the page. “They’re called ‘Bales’. That paper is… research, kind of, on one particular Bale; her strengths and weaknesses, skills, personality, everything. There’s a picture, too. I want to be like her, if… if you can do that?” Her voice was uncertain again. “Or… if you can only pick the type of youkai, not individual traits, then--”
“Like her?” Kyousai snorted. “Don’t make me laugh. I can turn you into her. What does all this say?” he demanded, turning the book towards the human. “Summarise it.”
She swallowed hard, then nodded, looking down at the book. “Bales usually look like tall, slim, beautiful humans, except for their eyes and hands. They’re intelligent and magically talented…”
----------
[--Shouei.]
Breathing hard, Shouei sagged against the strands holding him up. It’s no good. I’m well and truly stuck, and it feels like I’ve been fighting for days, not less than an hour.
Head down, he watched the painter-youkai and the human girl talk, peering through his fringe. The painter seemed absorbed in what the girl was telling him, pointing at a picture in the book and asking questions; the girl was concentrating more on him than on the book she was supposed to be translating, shoulders hunched, tongue darting out to moisten dry lips as she watched his face.
…She’s lying to him.
He wasn’t sure whether it was her posture, her expression, or something in the faint scent he could discern through everything else, her sweat acrid with fear but somehow hinting of calculation more than panic. Whatever it was, though, somehow he knew. Something about what she’s telling him is a lie, or at least misdirection. She’s not collected enough to be making it all up on the spot, and she couldn’t be sure ahead of time that he wouldn’t be able to read the book himself, so a lot of it must be true… but she’s trying to fool him somehow.
And at the very least, while she’s distracting him like this he isn’t making more youkai.
Gathering what strength he had left, Shouei settled down to watch and listen.
“…so they’re vampires?”
The girl shook her head. “No; they’re alive, not undead, and sunlight doesn’t hurt them.”
“But they are immortal?”
“As long as they can get blood, yes. They’re very hard to kill.” The girl gestured towards one of the pages with her chin. “You can’t poison them, they don’t catch diseases, they don’t bleed, and it only takes them about a day to heal most wounds.”
“Mmh.” The painter looked unimpressed. “Fine, but what are they like?”
“Uh… what do you mean?”
“How do they act? What do they do?” He looked up from the page and smirked at her. “Since you actually want to be one, I’m guessing they’re nice,” he added sarcastically, voice practically dripping syrup on the last word.
The human girl stared back at him. “Bales are evil,” she said flatly. “Almost all of them are sadistic megalomaniacs. Their most respected occupations are ‘necromancer’ and ‘torturer’. Their racial defence policy is basically ‘Kill your enemies, drink their blood, raise their corpses as your undead slaves, then send them to kill their former friends’. They’re pretty, but they’re definitely not nice,” she almost spat, then took a deep breath and visibly controlled herself, biting off her tirade. “Ought to fit right in with you,” she muttered, looking away.
The grin on the painter’s face was practically blinding, a scythe-shape of white against his tanned skin. “Oh, I do like you,” he crooned. “Do try not to get killed. I like your ideas. I want to keep you around. I want to play with you.”
“Not getting killed is the whole point here,” she said under her breath, nearly inaudible.
“This one, the one that you want to be,” he continued, unfolding the papers he’d taken from between the book’s pages. “Is she a necromancer?”
“A bit,” the girl shrugged, eyelashes dropping to shield her eyes. “She specialises more in illusions and hypnotism, but she knows a lot of other spells too. She’s… very good at seeming harmless.”
“Oh? That could be useful.” The painter looked at the first piece of paper, covered with columns of numbers and English words, and grimaced, flicking to the second page. One eyebrow went up. “Did you draw this?”
“Yes.” The eyebrow went up further, and she blushed. “I’m not an artist!”
“I can tell,” he snorted. “It’s enough to give me the gist, though. What’s her name?”
The girl paused, licking dry lips again. “…Celadon. It means ‘Aoji’, like the porcelain.”
“Right,” he muttered. Still holding her drawing in one hand, he stuck his paintbrush in his mouth and reached for the inkstone with the other. “Hol’ still.”
----------
[--Naoko.]
please let this work
oh please kami, let this work, let me become her and not something that will do what he wants
Her forehead was pressed against the dusty concrete floor, tears that she could no longer hold back welling up between tightly-closed eyelids.
I don’t want to die
I don’t want to let my friends die
please
The bristles tickled on her back, and the ink was cold.
please
----------
[--Shouei.]
The girl didn’t scream. Somehow, that made it worse.
Her eyes and mouth went wide, breath huffing out in a quiet little “ah” of surprise and pain as the lines of ink on her back bubbled up and spread over her skin, but she didn’t scream and her eyes never went blank the way the rat-girl’s had. Shouei watched as the ink swept over her, changed her, and right up to the moment when it covered her face and blotted out her features her eyes were still awake and aware.
Then the ink ebbed away, wet black surfaces drying into pale green and white silk, and the girl was gone.
The new youkai sat up slowly, bringing one cloth-covered hand up to her face, and blinked open cat-slit green eyes that were just a shade darker than the painter’s. She had skin as white as milk, knee-length hair as black as the ink that had created her in a wrist-thick complicated braid, and was wearing vaguely Chinese-looking layered robes with overlong sleeves that hung loosely at least a foot past her fingertips. Gold and jewels glinted in her hair and dangled from her earlobes.
“…Nao-chan?” one of the other girls asked tentatively. “Nao-chan, are-- are you--”
“That girl is dead,” the youkai -- Celadon -- said coolly, pale lips curving in a faint, meaningless social smile. Her expression didn’t shift as she stood and rearranged her robes, flicking away dust, even when the girl who’d spoken began to sob hopelessly.
“You can translate this, right?” the painter asked, already flipping through the book’s pages in search of another interesting subject. “It’ll be a bad joke if I’ve turned my translator into someone who can’t read it.”
“I speak and read English,” Celadon confirmed. “Anglish, actually, but the formal mode is similar enough. If you don’t object,” she went on, in the sort of politely firm tone that means ‘this will happen whether you object or not’, “might I suggest you find the next section you would like to read while I get a drink? I’m… quite thirsty.”
“Go ahead,” the painter told her, absently waving her towards the remaining humans with his brush; then his head jerked up and he frowned as she instead turned and began to walk towards Shouei. “Hey! Not him, I’m saving him for later! Take one of the girls instead.”
“I shan’t harm him,” she objected, pausing. “He’s large and strong enough that he’s unlikely to even get dizzy. If I take enough to satisfy me from one of those undernourished waifs, though, I’ll probably kill them,” she said, swishing one trailing sleeve dismissively, “which will mean that you have one less to play with. Unless you don’t mind that?”
He hesitated for a moment, then grumbled under his breath, turning back to the book. “Fine, go ahead.”
“Thank you,” she purred, smile widening as she turned back towards Shouei.
Whatever that girl was trying to do, I don’t think it worked, he thought grimly, tensing his muscles. His eyes narrowed as he studied the approaching youkai, watching her walk. I can’t feel more than a trace of youki from her. She doesn’t move like a fighter, and she doesn’t look physically strong, though you can never really tell… and not that it really matters, with me stuck like this. If she’s careless, though, I should be able to do some serious damage with a headbutt, he mused, darkly amused despite the situation.
Celadon paused just out of arms’ reach, studying his face. “Oh, aren’t you handsome,” she murmured, voice low and warm. “So young to be so large and strong.” Her eyes widened, gleaming, and suddenly he couldn’t look away.
~Shall I show you a pretty dream, pretty boy?~ He heard her voice, but her lips hadn’t moved.
“She specialises more in illusions and hypnotism--”
“Get out of my head,” he choked out, voice slurring as a chill spread through him. “Get-- get out--”
~Hush. Let me show you.~ His vision was going dark as she stepped forwards, cloth brushing his cheek as she reached to push his hood back.
“--out--”
Shouei blinked. He was standing in the courtyard garden at home, gi tucked down around his waist and bokken in his hands.
…was I practicing? he thought, looking around. I… don’t remember how I got here…
His father’s bonsai trees were arranged neatly on their shelves, leaves sparkling with droplets from a recent watering. The newest bonsai, barely more than a sapling and still being trained into its basic shape, was out on the table. Pruning snips and wire lay next to it as if Hihi had just laid down his tools and stepped away for a moment, and Shouei grinned. When his father came back, he’d have to tease him about acting like an elderly retired human again.
Something was wrong, but he couldn’t tell what.
“What a beautiful garden,” a woman’s voice said from behind him, and he spun around, bokken lifting to strike. Celadon was perched on the biggest decorative boulder, slippered feet neatly together and sleeve-draped hands wrapped around her knees, and Shouei remembered.
--he’s dead my father is dead you bitch--
“Stop that,” she said reprovingly, and the bokken stopped mid-swing, inches away from her head. All his strength couldn’t shift it.
“How dare you--!”
“I didn’t choose this location,” she said, tone somewhere between offended and apologetic. “I left it up to your subconscious to pick a place and time where you felt comfortable.” She paused, then continued, definitely apologetic now. “I can change it, if you would prefer?”
“Just get out of my mind!” he snarled.
“Not yet.” She looked up at him from beneath her lashes, green glint in her eyes matching the jewels in her hair. “If I can get you free from that web and distract the artist, do you think you can get the humans to safety?”
“…What?”
“I want to escape,” she explained patiently. “All of us. Will you help?”
Shouei took a step backwards, eyeing her suspiciously, and nearly dropped his bokken as whatever force had been holding it let go. “Why? That painter made you, why are you going against--”
“He did not,” she hissed, fabric crumpling as she fisted her hands inside her long sleeves. “He did not create me, I do not belong to him and I will not obey him!” There was a faint chiming sound as her hair ornaments rattled together, and Shouei realised she was trembling slightly -- fear or anger, or both, he couldn’t tell. Her expression was a mask, as cool and unreadable as the porcelain she was named for, and he couldn’t smell anything from her but a faint floral perfume.
Not that it would mean much if I could, given that this is an illusion, he thought wryly, and lowered the bokken. “I’m willing to try,” he said grudgingly.
She smiled, the first genuine-seeming expression he’d seen on her face.
Another blink, and he was back in the web, sagging forwards with his cheek resting on a silk-clad shoulder, cool lips pressed to his throat. There was a slight twinge of pain as she swallowed and pulled away, soothed almost immediately by a couple of dabs from her tongue; he shivered at the sensation, and her hands tightened warningly on the back of his head and shoulder. He played dead -- unconscious, whatever -- and her grip relaxed again as he stayed carefully limp, eyes closed, breathing controlled and slow.
“You haven’t broken him, have you?” came the painter’s voice, sounding annoyed.
“Of course not,” she chuckled, right in Shouei’s ear. “He’s delicious; I wouldn’t want to waste him. I’m just going to let him sleep until you have time to play.”
“Good. Get over here and translate this bit, would you? It looks interesting.”
“Certainly.” She let go, tugging the hood back into place over his bowed head, then turned and walked a few feet away; he tracked her by the sound of her footsteps, noting with approval that she’d moved a little to the side, out of the direct line between him and his targets.
She’s got at least some battlefield awareness; that’ll help… Eyes slitting open, he checked to make sure that his sword hadn’t been moved in the minute or so he’d spent unaware of the room.
“By the way, may I know your name? You never did introduce yourself,” Celadon asked, sounding only mildly curious.
“Hm? Oh. Kyousai.”
“Thank you. I always like to know the name of anyone I’m trying to kill.”
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[--Kyousai.]
“--huh?”
A ball of flames shot past Kyousai’s shoulder and exploded, throwing flaming papers everywhere and blasting him with heat. He could feel the short hairs on the right side of his face crisping as he ducked and scrambled away from the next fireball; it struck the book of youkai square on the front cover and engulfed it, and he swore.
She missed me?
A sudden burst of light at the other end of the long room, behind her -- well away from anything she’d just set on fire -- told him otherwise. The webbing holding the tall swordsman flashed into momentary flames and evaporated, and Kyousai knew that one particular piece of paper had just burned to ash.
Exactly what she was aiming at. Which means she isn’t missing. Which means she aimed at the book, too, and now she’ll be aiming at me!
He swept up his hand, not bothering with the brush, and ink leapt from his inkstone to follow the gesture, forming into a hulking oni barely in time to intercept the next blast of flames. Another gesture sent every crafted youkai in the room after Celadon, and he grinned.
That should give me a moment to draw something more personalised--
A sword smashed down only a hair away from his reaching fingertips, shattering his inkstone and carving a gouge into the floor. Blood-red eyes glared at him over the hilt, and the follow-up stroke sliced into his left sleeve as he used an ink-formed claw to yank himself backwards with desperate speed.
She put him to sleep! How-- oh, don’t be stupid, of course she was lying, idiot!
The swordsman bared short fangs in a silent growl, then spun away, flaring his youki and growing even larger as he swept the three screaming human girls up in his arms. A flick of Kyousai’s hand spattered ink across the wall and floor near the emergency door, welling up into a crowd of youkai and blocking the exit, but the swordsman didn’t even pause; he charged straight for the cracked wall of windows, spinning as he leapt so that he met the glass shoulders first, vanishing into the darkness outside in a cascade of shards.
The fires were already dying, extinguished by a combination of lack of fuel and spattered ink, and Kyousai turned to glare at Celadon. She was pressed back into a corner, cut off from following after the swordsman by several large youkai, hands raised ineffectually to ward them off. As he watched, one leaped for her throat as she screamed, cowering--
--and the youkai passed straight through her, hitting the wall with a hollow sound as her image evaporated into nothing.
Eh?
“Goodbye, Kyousai,” her voice said from near the shattered window. “Let’s try not to meet again.” Shadows rippled as she stepped out of nowhere and jumped, glancing back at the last moment to cast one final arc of fire, incinerating the closest youkai and driving several others back a few steps. The wolflike youkai that had jumped through her illusion came charging back past him at the head of a small pack of predatory-looking beasts, leaping into the darkness after her without a second thought; Kyousai winced as it vanished downwards with a surprised yelp, and wondered if the soggy *thump* several seconds later was his imagination or not.
“…Well,” he said eventually, blowing out his breath in an aggrieved sigh. “That was annoying.”
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[--Shouei.]
Finishing his spin in mid-air as he sailed across the street with his terrified passengers, Shouei lashed out with his sword and stabbed it into the façade of the nearest building. It carved a broad furrow down through reinforced concrete and steel, scattering rubble around them and slowing their fall, finally bringing them to a halt dangling two storeys above the street below.
Two of the girls were held in the crook of his left arm, squashed uncomfortably against his chest and sobbing; the third was dangling from his left hand by her belt, probably even more uncomfortable and definitely not happy about her position, making quiet choking noises that indicated either difficulty breathing or a desire to throw up. She twisted to look up at him, paling visibly as she saw his face, notably less human-seeming in his true form.
“Now what--?” she began, and screamed again as he pulled his sword free of the building and let them all drop. He landed with only a slight stagger, fatigue making him clumsier than usual, and set all three gently on their feet. They promptly collapsed to the ground again, but he’d at least made the gesture.
A loud, animalistic yelp from above brought Shouei’s head up, searching for the source of the noise, and he sucked in a hissing breath as he saw Celadon tumbling towards the ground in a swirl of hair and fluttering robes. He started forwards, aiming to catch her, but her arms spread out as if to cup the air and she suddenly slowed, drifting down the last twenty feet or so like a leaf on the wind. The two youkai plummeting after her weren’t so fortunate, landing heavily enough to ensure that nobody would need to finish them off.
Celadon’s eyes widened as she touched down and got a good look at Shouei. “And I thought you were tall before,” she murmured, then shook her head slightly, glancing up at his face. “Where to now? Is there somewhere safe we can go?”
As her eyes turned up towards his, he jerked his head to the side almost by reflex, avoiding her gaze. Feeling slightly embarrassed, he shifted back to his usual nearly-human shape, bringing his height back down to ‘only’ somewhat over seven feet. “If we head east, there should be several Nura clan members nearby we can join up with. I can check--” Pulling out his cellphone, he stared for a moment at its cracked screen and ‘no signal’ indicator, then sighed, putting it away again. “Or not. Still, heading east would be a good start. We should move fast, though, before that Kyousai guy comes after us.”
“I can delay him a little,” she said, and began to turn towards the building they’d jumped from; then she checked, looking uncertain. “Oh. Might there be more humans still hiding on the lower floors?”
“I doubt it,” he said grimly. “I didn’t smell any other fresh human scents on the way up the stairs… just stale fear and blood.”
“…Very well then.” Lifting her hands, she narrowed her eyes in concentration.
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[--Kyousai.]
When the stairwell belched a gout of flame up from ground level and blew him out through the fourth-floor fire doors -- which had been locked -- Kyousai decided that his half-formed plans to chase after Celadon and the blood-coloured swordsman would just have to be abandoned.
Let them go join up with the rest of the Nura lot, he scowled, limping over to a window and looking gloomily at the billows of smoke rising from all the windows on the ground floor of the building. Encho and the others can have them!
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