Covered in dust and smoky clothes, Kaoru climbed the mountains wearily. His body was not accustomed to the vigorous hiking he had just completed within the hour. Please don’t let it be too late, thought Kaoru. He followed the dried blood and broken twigs. Aside from his own footsteps, he heard the cawing of a crow above his head. The crow cocked its head and looked at Kaoru from the branch of a dying tree.
“Why hello there …” a sly voice hissed.
Kaoru quickly turned around. Mavros had removed his hood and stood with arms crossed.
“It’s you!” Kaoru said angrily.
“Yes, it’s me. Your pursuer,” Mavros said in accented Japanese. “I’m so glad you made it this far into the game. Everything went according to plan. Well, sort of.”
“Your plan? More like your murder spree,” spat Kaoru. “You chased us all this way from America and involved so many innocent lives. All these meaningless deaths to challenge us for no reason!”
“Meaningless deaths? No death is meaningless. All death is meaningful and calculated. They had a part to play in my plan.”
Mavros put his hands around his back and circled the dying tree.
“I did extensive research on your band. I watched your performance videos, your interviews; just how did you manage to captivate so many fans? You have a huge following in the States. Your fans are a cult. Your frontman is known for his violent stunts on stage. Wouldn’t it be great for him to go out like the band for all his fans? It’s such a beautiful narrative to end leaving the world to speculate, why did he have to die?
I used my sister as an inspiration. I used the townspeople. It caused some hysteria for some time, but no one is going to care if one or two people go missing from some hick town. At best it will end up on someone’s top ten list of mysterious deaths.”
Mavros stopped walking and faced Kaoru. His eyes looked calm as if he was confiding in a friend. His hands were put to his sides. The black sleeves swayed to the autumn breeze. Kaoru looked for any concealed weapons under the sleeves. Mavros appeared to be unarmed. Wary of his surroundings, Kaoru dare not approach within three meters of Mavros. However something struck Kaoru as unanticipated. Compared to the gaunt portrait on television, Mavros’ face didn’t appear to be lifeless. In fact, he could very easily pass off as an ordinary person on the streets. The strangely friendly face masked all the malicious intents aimed at them.
“Mavros. I’ve been figuring out how you have been able to track us. You’re always one step ahead of us including this time,” said Kaoru. “You’ve waited one year to begin your plan.”
“You’re right. I had been tracking you all along. I had help from an unsuspecting friend of yours,” said Mavros.
“Friend?” asked Kaoru.
“Your band’s frontman, Kyo.”
“Kyo? That’s impossible! He’s been helping us all this time.”
“Or so he thought. Did it ever occur to you that the visions he had been receiving were purposely implanted by me?”
Kaoru’s heart skipped a beat.
“Even when he parted from his body after death, he didn’t know he left something behind. That’s right, he doesn’t even know I have possession of his body,” said Mavros.
“After killing him, I planned to make use of his body to recreate something, but in order to do that, I needed a bit of his soul. Having a small fragment of his soul meant that I could always locate wherever he went. Thus, Kyo unintentionally betrayed all of you by leading me to you.”
That would explain why Mavros appeared in Iwate so quickly, thought Kaoru.
“Because I had a fragment of his soul, it meant I could control what I wanted him to see. This is child’s play for a necromancer like me,” said Mavros. “Sneaking a body into Japanese territory was the tricky part. It took me a year to prepare everything including the smuggling which is why your friend appeared to you a year later.”
“Spirits travel by latching onto objects or people. Kyo’s soul may have been split, but the remaining part was latched onto the original body. That would mean he’s bound to the earth and unable to move on even if he wanted to,” said Kaoru.
“Ahh. So you figured that part out. You’re quite learned in this area. It makes me happy to know that I’ve been going up against a formidable opponent. Makes the challenge more fun,” said Mavros.
“You intentionally let us live each time, didn’t you?” said Kaoru.
Mavros was silent for a bit and looked to the ground as he spoke. “I originally planned to kill all of you off one by one. But seeing that you were all so resilient, I decided to let you all get a taste of pain before finishing you off in one big show.”
Out of thin air, a machete appeared from Mavros’ empty hand. Kaoru’s eyes grew large with fear. Mavros casually tossed the machete at Kaoru’s feet.
“All of my predictions have come true so far and all of you had fulfilled them wonderfully each time. I guess it would be wrong to call it a prediction,. It should be called your fate. I will tell you right now that with that machete, you will kill Kyo with your own hands and you will watch your entire band die,” said Mavros.
“What did you do to Kyo’s body!” shouted Kaoru.
“I made it into a monster that craves the flesh of humans. I guess you call it a rasetsu in your culture. Hold on …”
Mavros stopped awkwardly and stared into space.
“I see … spirit Kyo is making his way here to stop me, but let’s see i you are all quick enough. My rasetsu is entertaining the rest of your band. Maybe if you’re lucky, you might see an arm or two left,” said Mavros.
Kaoru threw the machete from the ground at Mavros. The shiny weapon went right through Mavros and embedded itself into the trunk of a tree.
“Did you really think I was stupid enough to let you do that?”
Mavros’ image flickered and disappeared. The crow on the dead tree flew away.
“My real body is somewhere else,” echoes Mavros’ voice. “Let’s see if you can make it past this trial.”
A withered hand burst out from the ground. The putrid odor of corroding flesh hit Kaoru’s nose. From the upturning soil, animated corpses of men and women of varying degrees of decay climbed from their unnatural sleep. Some clothes were still covered in rusty bloodstains. Kaoru tried to pull out the machete, but it was firmly lodged in the tree trunk. His hands desperately pulled on the handle. The corpses turned their crooked heads mechanically towards Kaoru and hobbled clumsily to him.
With a swift pull, the blade was released from the tree. Kaoru swung it on the corpse of an old man with knobbly knees. The blade cut through the rotting flesh like soft cheese. The body tumbled and parts of his entrails spilled from his ribcage. Kaoru swung the machete again knocking the old man to the ground. He lost mobility of his legs, but continued to crawl with a remaining left arm. Kaoru took the blade and plunged it downward severing the head from the body.
The wave of incoming corpses flooded the mountain. Kaoru scanned his perimeter. There were at least thirty of them coming for him, some of which he recognized as the recent missing persons on the news. A young woman with a half eaten face came looking for Kaoru. Her jaw was no longer covered with skin and her hollow sockets were spewing with writhing worms. Kaoru swung the machete and lopped her head off. He made a run for the deep forest. As he ran, the thicket grew darker drawing very little sunlight to illuminate the foliage covered floor. The sound of rattling bones and raspy gasps tagged behind him.
One of the faster running corpses latched onto Kaoru for an unwanted piggyback. The foul stench invaded the senses. The corpse tried gnawing on Kaoru’s ear with its missing teeth. More of the corpses caught up looking for a piece of Kaoru to gnaw on. The machete was lost in the crowd of the undead. The suffocating miasma filled Kaoru’s lungs as he felt the weight of so many piled on him. He was helpless in the sea of decay, unable to move a finger or scream. He could no longer see the sunlight or the trees, only the hungry undead. Kaoru prayed hard like he never did before. He prayed for the noise of rattling bones to cease. He prayed for the dark to go away. He prayed for the pain to end. He prayed to be in a better place.
The pain began to lessen bit by bit. Kaoru thought perhaps he was finally dying. The voices that came from the corpses were quieted down. The bodies were scattering apart. Thick tree branches coiled around the corpses and crushed them into mush. More tree branches sprung from the roots and forcefully dragged the corpses into the dirt. Kaoru watched the nearby branch smashed the undead against the tree trunks. The final corpse was brought high above the forest and then pounded into the floor. Kaoru watched in awe as the surface was strewn with bodies.
Some tendrils of leaves and vines handed Kaoru his machete. The violent branches retreated to the main body to which Kaoru recognized as the same one from his dream. The majestic tree shifted its branches creating a new doorway. The leaves gave Kaoru a little push towards the path.
“Thank you.”
Kaoru ran towards the sunlight. As he ran, the branches moved and guided him along. Some of the trunks purposely carved themselves before reverting back to their original shape. With each aching step Kaoru took, he could feel himself coming closer to something sinister.
A shrill screech sounding a lot like Kyo echoed in the mountain. Kaoru’s heart skipped a beat. He ran as fast as his tired legs could carry him. He saw a super bloody Kyo aggressively attacking Shinya. Toshiya and Die were trying their best to pull him off. In one fell swoop, Kyo was removed. Kaoru ran over to drag Shinya away. Shinya jerked as he noticed that Kaoru had suddenly appeared beside him.
“God damn Kaoru! You’re alive!” aid Die. “We need to get the fuck out of here!”
“Jesus Christ. So this is what Mavros meant when he said rasetsu,” said Kaoru.
“You mean crazy man-eater over here?” said Toshiya. “Fucking Mavros has some sort of grudge for us.”
“Not grudge. Just a penchant for death,” said Kaoru.
“What are we doing now? We need to leave,” said Die.
“In my dream, it said to find a sleeping rock. It has to be around here somewhere.”
“What sleeping rock? We have no time!” said Die.
“There’s something important about it. I know it. It can help us with this and Kyo,” insisted Kaoru.
“What! He’s trying to kill us! It isn’t even Kyo!” argued Die. “Give me the knife and I’ll stab him with it.”
“Now’s not the time for a squabble,” said Mavros.
They all turned to glare at him. Kyo came galloping towards them at full speed. They dispersed and headed down the mountain. Maybe now is not the time to look for the sleeping rock, thought Kaoru. Just then he saw Toshiya contort his face painfully.
“SHINYA!”
Kyo caught up with Shinya and lodged his fangs deep into Shinya’s neck just as a lion would with a fleeing antelope. As Kyo arched his own neck backwards, the blood from Shinya flowed dangerously from the wound. Shinya fell headfirst against a tree. Snap! His neck turned irregularly and the fountain of blood spouted onto the nearby shrubs. His glossy eyes dilated and remained that way as Kyo dug for entrails.
Mavros smiled and watched with relish, “One down. Three to go. The deed has been done.”
*****
BGM: Akatsuki by Dir en grey
I must be the worst person now making Shinya die like that. There will be more deaths to come, but whose will it be? If you found this chapter and the author morbidly disgusting, stay tuned for the next chapter. Leave a comment below.
