AN: Yeah, I seem to be tossing fics left and right at the rate I'm going. I'm just very … in a writing mood, you know? Well, I hope this is more of a success than So What? since I'm very … (?) like that. I crave reviews guys. Feed me xD.

Under the New Moon

fallen-anqel


Summary : Under the New Moon, a curse was born and a wish was made. Five hundred years later, the curse came to life and demons inhabit the world once again. Prophecy speaks of the six that will break the curse: a miko, hanyou, hoshi, taijiya, ningen, and youkai. Destiny has bound their lives together and amidst a whirlwind of tears and violence shines newfound love and hope. Realizations are made and with the inevitable end looming overhead, history is made and it is too late to turn back now.

Prologue

Five hundred years ago, they came and took over the world.

No one knew where they came from or why they had come, but they were real and the world was utterly unprepared.

It is said that one day, entire populations just … disappeared.

No one really knows what happened, the stories getting distorted as they were handed down through word of mouth. It had been half a millennium ago and no human had ever been around that long; only a youkai (1) would be able to recall the entire tale.

Throughout my life I have heard several different versions of what had supposedly happened and I have pieced together what I think had basically happened.

Back in the Warring-States period, youkai had been rampant throughout Japan. There was a strict line between the humans and youkai and for the most part, that line was not crossed. The youkai usually kept to themselves and the ones that crossed the line into the human world were rather friendly. However, due to the occasional terrorizing of villages and taking of lives, generations of taijiya (2) were born. Thus, life went on and times were good … and then came the Youkai Wars.

The land had been distributed into four parts; the North, East, South, and West, each with a ruling taiyoukai (3). The Lord of the Western Lands was a very powerful and he was both respected and feared for his strength. He married a very prominent miko (4) and years passed without the birth of an heir until one day, he brought home another woman with a bundle in her arms.

Now, this struck as a controversy not only because the Western Lord had had a mistress on the side, but because she had bore him an heir. Torn between two women, the taiyoukai was stuck between a rock and a hard place. In the end, he made a wise choice in marrying the mother of his son but since he still loved his first wife, he let her remain in his palace, with her own lavish room in the opposite wing.

Well, it just so happens that his second wife was also a servant of sorts of the Lord of the Northern Lands, a greedy demon who butchered his people without mercy. Not long after discovering what had happened, he declared war on the taiyoukai of the west and thus, the Youkai Wars began. The South and East joined the war, afraid that things would get out of hand and also trying to get more land for themselves.

The Youkai Wars continued for years, no side seeming to have the upper hand.

Meanwhile, heartbroken, the first wife started to concoct a plan of killing her husband; she thirsted for revenge and longed to see his blood stain her hands along with his new wife's and son's.

But although she was a powerful miko, she knew that her husband was powerful as well and she was well out of practice. She chose to attack him when he went into his weakest form, on the night of the new moon (5).

On the sidelines, the Lord of the Northern Lands had managed to find a way to get under the second wife's skin and somehow obtained control over her body. He then patiently waited until nightfall to make his move against his foe.

Now, this is where the confusion comes in. The first wife set out to kill the Western Lord the same night that the Nothern Lord forced the second wife to. No one really knows who killed the Western Lord but by morning he was found dead and the two wives were nowhere in site.

No one really knew they disappeared to. Some say the second wife was killed by the first and others that the second wife went back to the Northern Lord while the first wife killed herself, but it doesn't really matter what happened to them. The important thing is that a curse was placed the moment the Western Lord had been killed.

You see, the Western Lord had met several powerful people as he was growing up. When he was younger, he had saved a village by slaying a demon that had been wreaking havoc in the area. In return for his help, the young Western Lord was allowed one question involving his future. The village leader was known to possess many powers and so the hanyou asked about his death.

He was told that he would be killed by the one he held closest to his heart. Upon looking at the hero's troubled face, the village leader smiled and promised that his death would not be in vain and that a curse would be placed once he was killed. Still troubled, the taiyoukai went home with a heavy conscience and when he woke up the next day, he had no memory of what had happened.

This is when the Shikon no Tama had come into play.

Somewhere amidst all the chaos, with the Western Lord dead and all and the wives missing, a powerful, pure-hearted miko had wished upon the Shikon no Tama that the fighting would seize … that peace would be restored. And with that, the youkai vanished and as it was wished, peace settled upon the land.

As this piece of history got passed down from generation to generation, it became a bedtime story, a fairy tale. There was no such thing as youkai and they had never roamed the earth. They were simply make-believe creatures that kept children from staying out late or being bad.

It's kind of sad, really. But as they say, ignorance is bliss, eh?

It is said that the youkai have come back because the curse had somehow been activated. Now, they rule the lands once again and they have learned to show no mercy to humans as they had before, because it only took one of them to lead to the downfall of their kind.

As before, Japan has been cut up between four taiyoukai. The North belongs to Lord Naraku, the East to Lord Menoumaru (6), the South to Lady Kaguya (7), and the West to Lord Sesshoumaru. They have learned to imperialize and have squadrons on youkai in all of their colonies.

No one is safe anymore.

A thousand years ago, they flourished the land and disappeared without a trace. Five hundred years later, they came back and they weren't going to make the same mistake as before.

end chapter

(1) demon

(2) demon exterminator

(3) demon lord

(4) priestess

(5) you should know why he would be weak then … turns back into a human

(6) the moth youkai from the first movie

(7) the villainess in the second movie with the mirror and all that

AN: Haha. Done with this chapter and ready for the next. What do you think guys? Leave reviews! Bye now.