Chapter 8: Smiling Face
Everything is dark. There are no sounds nor light. Only an empty void surrounds Kazuki. Fear strikes him as he doesn't understand what is happening and where he is. In the confusion, he tries to move and navigate through the empty space but doesn't seem to move. Then from nowhere, two old and very narrow dead-like hands emerge. Their very long gray fingers finished by black nails reach Kazuki's throat.They slowly press around his neck, the dry skin leaving scratches where the fingers move. Kazuki tries to move away from the grip of the strange hands but he suddenly feels weak, like those hands are absorbing him. He feels himself fade away, like a simple mirage. The hands are getting blurry and breathing becomes more difficult for Kazuki, feeling a pressure on his chest but also the hands of the void pressing around his neck to strangle him.
In this moment of panic, the darkness around him starts to fade and reveal what seems to be a bedroom similar to his, but darker. This familiar setting brings a sencé of security to the young boy. It lasts until he looks around him and sees, on the ground, is a white circle with other shapes and signs inside it. There is something on the center of the circle but his blurry vision doesn't allow him to identify it. He tries to call for help but nothing comes out of his mouth besides some muffle agonizing sounds. When he opens it, the only thing he can do is to struggle to get some air.
As he looks at the hands,he sees that they are attached to long, gray and thin arms, looking like breaked branches merged together to form a long line with a lot of sharpened angles. The young boy follows the arms, which goes down before going back up, leading to a body. The body to which they belong is very tall and covered by a red hood. The rest of the body doesn't seem very odd, with the exception of the neck. The neck is very long and keep extanding above his head. His eyes follow the long gray and oddly shaped neck. As he looks up to the head, he sees it right above him, close to the ceiling. The thing doesn't wear the hood on its head. It has a perfectly round head with little black hair all around it, like a beard but at 360°. In the middle of the face, the thing possesses a big mouth with 3 ranges of mignature sharp teeth moving in circles in the mouth. The thing seems to smile, if it is even possible. Two tongues emerge from the mouths, looking like tubes with teeth's ranges insides. It has two noses from where his eyeballs get out, hanging by the nerves. However it seems capable of moving them. The thing smiled. It smiled at Kazuki. A deformed green, like someone would have drawn it during an earthquake.
As the smile becomes more intense, seemingly widening to fit Kazuki in it, something changes. A voice is heard. A voice coming from the red hood in front of Kazuki. He slowly turns his face to it. There, the face of a man appears from inside the hood, surrounded by arms coming out around it, like the one around his neck, which grab the monster's head and start to tear it apart. The hands widen its smiles by ripping them open destroying the sides so it would look wider. The face of the man looks at Kazuki, caresses his cheeks with two other hands, while the monster laugh and is being reduced to shreds, and the face says :
"You are beautiful"
The blood from the monster turns out to be purple and leaks on Kazuki's head. As soon as the face finishes its sentence, a black liquid drips from Kazuki's nose. It's not blood. He saw blood. He scented blood. He tasted blood. It's not blood. The black liquid is not blood. The thick liquid is cold and the young boy doesn't sense anything else besides his sight and his hearing. Then, he starts to throw up the same black liquid. The world starts to sway around him. Black liquid keeps coming from his nose and his mouth, but also starts dripping from his ears and his orbit. A weird sensation,a mix of pain and numbness, kicks in his whole head. He can't scream, he is not able to move or make any sounds. His body is just a heavy flesh vomiting the black liquid by every orifice.
As his vision almost disappears in total darkness again, he sees the face turn upside down. The face's eyes start to smile, literally. The two eyes and the skin take the form of a smile, upside down. The skin cracks to join the two smiles into a bigger one. An eye emerges inside of the previous mouth and the same black liquid drips from the two mouths. A long tongue comes out of the new mouth and licks Kazuki's face, cleaning it. The black liquid stops leaking. The first mouth moves as he speaks.
"Impure. What a tragedy."
Then the face laughs. Every arm holding Kazuki starts to rot, making the child fall on the circle. He slowly regains his breath. Next to him, fresh blood covers the ground. It flows from something at the center of it. As he looks at it, he sees a corpse. It's him. Himself. His skull is cracked, open in half like a coconut, letting the brain, with a smile carved in it, to the view of the boy. The rest of the body is disfigured, apart from the below which is bare naked. Kazuki starts to vomit at the sight of his own body destroyed and abused without understanding what he sees and why he vomits. The cracked open face starts to cry. The cries gradually become more high-pitched, going from Kazuki's to weird disfigured baby screams reverbaring all over the place.
On the other side of the circle, there is a door. Kazuki runs without taking the time to properly stands up and opens the door, which was unlocked, while running. Once he reaches the outside, all he sees is an infinity of houses like this one. He starts to clumsily run from the door, among the houses. He searches for somewhere to get out from here or someone to help him. Behind him, a man in a red hood gets out of the house. Kazuki is running from. On the roof, another creature like the one Kazuki faced spots the young boy fleeing. It runs from the roof behind him. This time, it doesn't wear a red hood. The body is very long, made out of feets merged together to give it a human shape.. From it, emerge a pair of long legs and long arms like the previous one, but also four other limbs finished by bare bones. The neck of the thing is made like the arms but the different parts can fold on themself. It possesses a giant vertical mouth with human teeth. It runs on it's eight behind Kazuki.
Acknowledging the atrocity running after him, Kazuki tries to run faster. Knowing it's useless, he cries and calls for the only one who always protected him from the danger.
"Master Yi ! Master Yi ! Please ! Help me ! Master Yi !"
As he keeps on running, he hears someone coming towards him. A human shape can be seen getting closer, and from it comes an old man's voice.
"Kazuki ! Kazuki, my boy ! I'm over here ! I'm coming"
Master Yi, the master of the young boy, stands a few meters away from him with two towels in his hands.. Kazuki stops his race in front of him and falls on his knee.The old man immediately takes the youngling in his arms and holds him tightly. The presence of his master carry a sence of security for the young boy.
"It's fine. It's fine. Everything is alright. Nothing will hurt you. I'm here now. There is no reason to fear or to scream.".
The master whips the vomit and other stains from Kazuki's face and kimono. He looks at the young boy. And he smiled. The eyes of the young boy are wide open. The old man smiles. A big smile. And slowly, the face of Master Yi starts to melt, falling on the ground. Kazuki looks at the bloody skinless head and slowly turns to the face on the ground. The rest of the body starts to rapidly rot.
Kazuki can't think. The only thing he just saw wasn't acceptable. It wasn't understandable. It was just here. But he doesn't know what it is. He starts to shake, as his brain naturally analyzes what he just witnessed. Death. It doesn't understand death. But he does understand that his Master isn't there anymore. His face starts to make a deformed grimace. And then, the only thing coming out from his mouth is a scream. A scream of despair. The Despair. The despair of losing his guide. The despair of not knowing what to do nor where to go. The despair of loneliness in the unknown.
"aah.. aaaah… AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH ! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH !"
While he keeps screaming, something approaches from behind. It casts its shadows over Kazuki even with a sunless black sky. Kazuki turns around and sees it.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone