Kagome sighed wistfully as she stared at the lush green forest from atop the large stone wall upon which she crouched. She was not supposed to be up here, and if someone found her she'd be in enormous trouble - which was precisely why she was hiding up under a conveniently close building's eves. This was the only structure that had been built this close to the wall, and thus it was the only place where she could climb up to the top of the barricade, using the stone work on the building as handholds and pressing her back against the smooth stone of the 50 foot wall to scale her way up to the top. It had taken her months of practice before she was able to climb the whole way up.
The wall had been built around their small kingdom long before anyone alive today had been born, and now it was simply a way of life. No one was allowed outside the walls, no one except for a select few who had been specially trained. They were mostly game hunters, the rare lumber jack, and the even rarer demon hunters. Otherwise their tiny, little kingdom was utterly isolated, located as it was within the most hostile environment found on planet earth: the dark forests.
Whoever had had the gumption to come and actually try to settle this land must have been insane. Especially when they named the kingdom 'Oceana,' when there wasn't even so much as a lake within the borders.
But through sheer perseverance, and probably many lives lost, an enormous wall had been erected and an area of land was cut off from the rest of the forest. The history books told of how the founding fathers had cut down all the trees within the protected lands, killing any creatures they ran across, to make room for fields and farms. Set within this grid of farmland was a smattering of villages and small towns, in which lived all the people who worked the surrounding lands. None of these small populated country towns were anywhere close to the size of the city around the castle though. That was the highest populated area in the whole kingdom and was set directly in the center of the land marked off by the wall.
The only populated area that came even close to the castle city was the gate city, set near the tallest and sturdiest section of the wall, and also was the location of the one and only gateway out into the outside world.
And this was where Kagome had spent her entire life, in the gate city, so close to the exit but never allowed to leave. Anyone she met who happened to find out about her desire to do so thought she was utterly insane. Most people were terrified of the world beyond the walls. The entire population had been taught of the evils beyond those sturdy stone structures, and for most of them, they didn't even know there was anything beyond the dark woods.
To the large majority of the people living in Oceana, the dark woods went on forever, and the only thing to be found outside of the walls was a horrific death by demons. They knew of no other way of life, and so they were utterly terrified of the prospect of anything else.
Kagome, on the other hand, was curious, and her visits to the top of the wall only increased that curiosity as she watched the incomprehensible amount of trees swaying in the wind. She was fascinated too by the creatures she would occasionally see poking their heads out of the wooded area, and the creatures she occasionally saw flying through the sky above it. None of those creatures ever came inside the walls … not even the flying ones. A magical barrier had been erected in the shape of an enormous dome from wall to wall of the kingdom, and so even flying creatures had no hope of getting past it. Ironically, given her interest in the outside world, her grandfather was the one who maintained that barrier, being the head wizard of the country.
To say that she and her grandfather didn't see eye to eye was an understatement. He was old-fashioned, lived by the letter of the law, and absolutely believed that the wall was the most precious and wondrous thing in this world. And yet, oddly enough, he did have a collection of things from beyond the wall, all of them in glass cases with neat labels. He had dried demon parts, old weapons from other foreign places, artifacts from cultures that no-one had ever heard of, and other objects that Kagome had no name for. When asked, he would simply say that he was a man of science, a man of knowledge who collected specimens that intrigued him. But despite having a passion for collecting odd, rare objects, he had denounced everything beyond the wall as essentially evil.
He had raised her and her younger brother with this mindset, believing that the both of them needed to be knowledgeable, not about things outside the wall, but certainly everything within the wall they should know about. And when they both showed signs of the same sorts of spiritual powers that he possessed, he enrolled them in special training. Sota, her younger brother, was also sent to an academy of learning with other boys his age, while Kagome had to simply be tutored within her own home. Women were not allowed to enter into the academy. And so, she was tutored in such subjects as reading, writing, language, history, economy, and many other subjects, many of which bored her to tears.
While she was very intelligent, and enjoyed learning, she did not like things such as math and economy, and the like. She wanted to learn things about the outside world, a subject which was strictly forbidden to all except a very select few. Her grandfather was one of those select few, and yet despite her begging him, he refused her access to his books on the matter, and locked his collection room, strictly forbidding her from entering.
However, sneaking to the top of the wall and seeing all those strange things had made Kagome so curious that she had sneaked into her grandfather's library, into the section that was forbidden, and had read books about the outside world, learning things that no-one else knew. She knew the names of different kinds of birds, different kinds of plants, even different kinds of trees.
Trees weren't very common inside the walls. There were only a few highly guarded orchards for fruits, and there were no trees used for wood. There weren't that many animals either. All rodents and pests had been eliminated long ago, so the only animals that Kagome had ever seen were livestock, and they were kept on the farms, far away from her. She had only seen them once, on a trip to a farm with her grandfather and brother, which she was only just barely allowed to go on.
Since there were no pests, there were no cats and dogs. The only pets that were allowed were very small fancy fish or very small fancy birds, which were kept in cages and tanks and were rare and very expensive. She herself had owned a tiny yellow canary for a time as a child and named her Bluebell. The small creature had been confined to a small golden cage, which possessed one small golden swing and a small food and water tray.
Kagome had lovingly cared for that little bird, adoring her with every bit of her young heart. She had fed and watered her every day, and had taken her out of her cage, despite the rules, to let her perch on her small finger. The little bird had sat on her shoulders and preened her hair with a tiny beak, and sang such sweet songs to help ease the loneliness the young girl had felt. She had loved the sweet little creature for the short year that she had had her, and when she died after only that short time, Kagome had cried bitterly with sadness, her young heart hurting in a way she had never felt before and didn't understand. She didn't know why her friend had gone limp in her cage, or why she wouldn't make any more sweet sounds and wouldn't eat the seeds Kagome put in front of her.
That was when Kagome learned that pets didn't last long, that they only lived for nine months or so, at the very most. That she had kept Bluebell alive for a whole year was a near miracle. It wasn't until much later that Kagome realized, through the forbidden books that she read, that birds and fish could live for much longer in the wild. The only thing Kagome could think of to explain this discontinuity, was that many years of being bred in captivity, being kept in such tiny spaces, and being out of the environment they were supposed to be in had shortened their lifespan significantly.
And that had only made her desire to leave more concrete. She wanted to experience the world beyond the wall. She wanted to see birds flying above her head, wanted to see fish swimming in a river or lake and wanted to see these things called squirrels that supposedly lived in trees. She wanted to see many things, but the only way to do that, would be to leave the safety of the walls.
So, to prepare for that, she took up archery. It was difficult to convince her grandfather, but since archery was a respectable sport, she was allowed to practice, in the privacy of her own backyard with a private tutor. She was given very light bows, and was outfitted with special gloves and wrist protectors to protect her delicate hands and wrists from the bow and string. She knew, from reading about the sport, that her targets were always placed closer than if she were a boy, and her tutor didn't take her training very seriously at all. He was always telling her how to draw the bow while using the least amount of effort, so that she wouldn't build unsightly muscles, and how she should stand to look more feminine, and not to worry so much about aiming. Everything he told her was in direct conflict with what she read about the proper method for firing a bow. And so, she began to teach herself, under the guise of "practicing" what her archery tutor was teaching her.
As it turned out, she had rather a natural affinity for archery, and when she learned the correct stance and the correct way to draw her bow, it came to her very quickly and her aim and skill increased by leaps and bounds. After only a few months of practice she could hit the target close to the center every time, and she began moving it further and further back. Of course she continued to miss the target during her actual tutoring sessions, just to keep her tutor happy and comfortable. He always seemed to get rather disturbed if she hit the target too often during his lessons.
It was just her strength she had to work on, and she did everything she could to get to the point that she could draw a fifty pound bow, with minimal strain. It took a while, but she stuck with it, knowing that she would need to be able to protect herself if she was going to be sneaking outside of the walls. Of course she had to hide her muscles, wearing looser blouses and long sleeves to make sure her thicker arms weren't visible. But it was a fair price to pay.
Once she had gotten good enough, she commissioned the making of a beautiful bow, a real work of art, which overnight became her priced possession. The wood was stained a deep, gorgeous bright red, and the handle was wrapped with white. From either side of the handle were stylized wings that had been beautifully carved into the red wood, symbolizing her freedom. That had been a special request of hers, and she had been forced to pay many of her saved coins just for the decoration, but she felt it was worth it.
It was a powerful weapon, and not something she would ever be allowed to own, so to buy it she had to disguise herself and go to someone who had the talent and also didn't care who was purchasing as long as they had the money. But of course if her grandfather found out, it would be taken away from her, so she hid it carefully. She likewise commissioned a good number of high quality arrows, ones that were sturdy enough to handle the spiritual power that sometimes overflowed from her into them.
Spiritual powers tended to run in families, and since her grandfather was the head wizard, magic ran strongly in her genetics, which was why both she and her brother had been born with it. However, her brother had less natural affinity for it than her, a fact which she knew since she had the ability to actually sense magic and spiritual powers. However it was a fact she would never be able to prove, or ever really wanted to prove. She loved her brother, and she knew that the knowledge would hurt his self-esteem. He was already a relatively shy boy, he needed all the confidence he could get.
As a woman, she wasn't allowed to use her spiritual powers, and so once again, while her brother trained at a specialized academy for that as well, she had yet another private tutor. Despite being forbidden from using her powers, she still needed training to be able to control it, and all her lessons consisted of how to discharge her powers, how to channel it into crystals at night until she was so exhausted she would simply pass out, how to basically dull all her magical batteries until she was literally incapable of using it in any way. She was never taught how to use it or how to channel it into anything productive.
She was taught only the fundamentals, and sparingly at that, only enough to control her spiritual powers. Aside from that, her lessons included some theory and history, all of which was geared towards impressing how dangerous spiritual powers could be. Mostly Kagome found her lessons annoying and boring as all get out, but she had to attend, otherwise her grandfather would throw a hissy fit. This only served to make her want to explore what else there was to life than this dull, boring existence.
Sure, she was allowed to leave the house, but only if she was accompanied by her personal maidservants, Ayumi, Yuki, and Eri. They were her only friends, ironically, despite technically being her servants. But the four of them had great fun wandering around the shopping district of Gate City. Being the head wizard meant that her grandfather was quite wealthy, and so she was allowed to indulge in shopping on a regular basis.
Outside of pleasure shopping, she also enjoyed shopping with the kitchen staff and learning about various kinds of foods and ingredients. Those excursions were a little iffier, and not necessarily sanctioned by her grandfather, because no-one told him. There was one woman amongst the kitchen staff who was truly like a mother to her, and she thoroughly enjoyed shopping with the woman and learning all about cooking.
But even with these distractions, she still felt confined, like there had to be more to life than this comfortable, relatively boring existence.
And so, it wasn't long before she made her first excursion out beyond the wall.
That evening, she slipped into the narrow alleyway behind that one building and scaled the side in the way she had done so many time before, but this time she did it with a pack strapped to her front, so she could still use her back as support against the wall. She had packed some provisions, her bow and arrows, and some medical supplies. Once atop the wall, she was stymied by the barrier, which would have prevented anyone else from passing. However, given her penchant for going into forbidden places, particularly where there was information to be gathered, she had snuck into her grandfather's office and had copied the magical password for the barrier which would allow her to pass. So, she pressed her hand to the faintly blue glowing wall and whispered the secret phrase.
To her delight, a door opened up, allowing her through. Of course then she was confronted by the fifty foot drop on the other side of the barrier. She had also planned for that though, so with shaking and sweaty hands she tied the fifty foot rope she had hauled up with her to a stone pipe that suck out some from the building behind her. The rope had been knotted, so it was relatively easy to scale down the wall, but stepping off of the edge of the wall to be suspended fifty feet in the air by a rope had Kagome's heart pounding out a frightened rhythm in her chest and her stomach overturned, making her desperately hope that she wouldn't throw up on herself on the way down.
Thankfully she made it to the ground below her with no mishaps, and collapsed onto hands and knees, panting and shivering a little from adrenaline.
After a quick breather, she set off quickly, not afraid of being seen since she was a good distance from the gate. She entered the forest line with a giddy feeling welling up within her, her eyes wide and flicking to and fro as she took in all the sights presented to her. She was shocked by…everything. The feeling of the trees, how tall they were…it was astounding. She had never been allowed in the orchards, so she had no frame of reference, but based on seeing it from a distance she would wager that these wild trees were much, much taller and heftier. There was also lots of shrubbery and scrub bushes, herbs, and plants of all shapes and sizes made her trek a slow one as she waded through the brush. She quickly wished that she had worn pants, since her skirt offered little protection against the rather sharp twigs and branches that scratched her legs.
Her headscarf was quickly torn off by a branch, and she swiftly snatched it back, quick to stuff it into her pack so she could put it back on once she was ready to return home. Women were supposed to cover their heads and hair with long scarfs that were held onto their head usually with a band of cloth or a band of metal. In her case it was held on with a metal circlet, and she placed her circlet carefully in her pack as well.
She didn't venture far that day, but she did stumble across a small cave, one that was quite lovely and set next to a running stream. She found herself enthralled watching the rushing water, seeing small fishes swimming inside the crystal clear water.
Wanting to be able to return to this place, she took a bandage and marked a tree on the way back by tying a small shred to a branch.
She had already possessed a habit of skipping her lessons on a regular basis, and so she doubted anyone would be suspicious if she snuck out during the day as well, which was why she didn't hesitate to slip out the next day for a longer trek through the woods without threat of the sun setting. Aside from being careful not to get caught and wearing a costume made of servant's clothes to stay inconspicuous, she found it relatively easy to sneak out once again. Since everyone, aside from her, was terrified of leaving the safety of the wall, no one would ever suspect what she was up to.
After sneakily scaling the wall, making sure that she wasn't seen, she sprinted across the clear space from the wall to the woods quickly, even though no one would see her from this side. Once in the shade of the trees, she followed her marked path back to the little cave. On the way she began clearing out some of the brush, making a path for herself. It wasn't much; she only needed a small path, so she didn't do too much damage to the vegetation in her creation.
The next day she got a little further; and the path building continued day after day until she had a nice little trail that she could walk, all the way to her little secret hideaway. That became her base of operations. And from there she ventured this way and that into the woods, finding little stones and pieces of bark, and other small treasures which she took with her and placed back in her little cave.
On her excursions she saw all sorts of things. She saw squirrels, and was so intrigued by them that she sat and watched their antics for a full hour one day. She thoroughly enjoyed watching the fish swimming in the stream, and occasionally tried to catch some by scooping them out in her palms. Only once or twice was she able to actually catch one, and after the water had drained from her cupped palms she had let it go back into the water. She also thoroughly enjoyed seeing dragonflies and butterflies for the first time. But she wasn't quite so pleased in finding out about the biting insects that would make itchy and painful bumps on her skin. Those sorts of creatures were inside the walls too, but seemed to be much more heavily populated here in the woods.
The first time she saw a deer it had nearly frightened her out of her wits, but once she had realized what it must be, based on the descriptions of such creatures she had read about before, she had become quite intrigued. It had let her follow it, and as long as she didn't get too close or make any threatening moves it seemed fine with her presence. A few days later she had found a broken antler on the ground and took it back to her cave as a souvenir. She had also found butterfly wings occasionally that she collected, and quite a few beautiful feathers. She was particularly fond of feathers, perhaps because of her one and only pet back when she was a child. In a way, she couldn't help but find her collection amusing, comparing it to her grandfather's back in their fancy house. His was of incredibly rare and expensive items, and yet here she was collecting items that she had found in the woods. Yet, somehow she doubted he was as fond of his as she was of hers, or at least she felt like she was more sentimental about her collection.
And so her adventures went. She was very careful about not getting caught, and told no one about her adventures, not even her maid friends. She did have to be careful not to show any evidence of her adventures, but occasionally she would turn up with some scrapes and scratches that her friends were befuddled about. They questioned her, never guessing that she was sneaking out over the wall. Instead, they seemed to have come to the conclusion that she must have acquired a secret boyfriend that she went to meet, perhaps out in the rural areas around the city, which would explain the grass stains and dirt she sometimes unintentionally brought back with her. She never dissuaded the notion, and they always kept her secret.
Her grandfather was so busy that he didn't notice her absence, as long as she showed up for most of her tutoring sessions he didn't care. But she knew from experience that if she missed too many she would get was a stern lecture on responsibility along with perhaps a grounding in her room with no food for a certain length of time. Those punishments were manageable though, what she really did her best to avoid were the more serious penalties, and if he found out about the grass and mud stains, or caught wind of this secret boyfriend thing, he would undoubtedly inforce one of his capitol punishments. Occasionally he had grown cross enough with her to order a switching, or even worse a caning, which was never a fun time. She typically walked away from those punishments in tears and with red marks on her back, behind, and/or thighs that wouldn't go away for at least a week.
And so, she was as careful as was physically possible to keep him from finding out about her new hobby, balancing it carefully with days where she showed up to all her lessons.
This went on for some time. And then one day, something new happened. She saw her very first demon.
It happened out in the woods, in a little clearing that she had found and had been picking flowers in. After kneeling and picking flowers, she had the pollen all over her, and was thankful that she had a spare set of clothes with her to change into. She had taken to bringing spares to minimize the risks of being found out.
While she was busy wiping halfheartedly at the yellow stains now adorning her, she froze, hearing a large rustling sound fast approaching. Adrenaline rushed through her and she darted out of the clearing, heading for a very thick brush in which to hide. She was lucky, because underneath the bush were some very strong smelling herbs that masked her scent, a fact that went unnoticed by her, but which saved her from being found out by the keen-nosed demon who was approaching.
It wasn't long before she saw through a gap in the bushes, a man enter the clearing she had just been in. Going by what she had always been taught, anyone in these woods was either a demon, or one of the few people from Oceana who were allowed beyond the walls. Looking at this guy, he wasn't carrying any sort of hunting gear or logging equipment. He only carried a sword with him, and wasn't even wearing shoes. His outfit was also different from anything she had seen inside the walls. Most people there favored what was called "western" dress. She had heard a rumor that some foreign brochure or book had managed to get through the cracks of security banning those sorts of materials and the style had gone viral. But this guy looked to be wearing what seemed to be traditional feudal Japanese clothes - bright red drawstring hakama, with a white kosode poking through the holes at his hips, and an equally red suikan that was tucked into his hakama. It was foreign to her, since she had been grown up around the western wear, but she recognized it from the history books.
He was definitely a demon, even if he wasn't anything like what she had thought a demon would look like. They had always been portrayed as evil, ugly, disgusting creatures, but this young man looked like none of those things. He looked relatively normal in fact, except for a pair of fluffy pointed ears on his head. His long hair was also strange, since she was used to men typically possessing very, very short hair and close cut beards. His hair, on the other hand, was down to his butt and was white. He definitely wasn't an old man, so the white color wasn't natural.
In fact, this young man seemed to be about her age, and was actually quite attractive. She was shocked that a demon could look like this, and as she watched she was amazed by the grace with which he strolled through the clearing, that long hair of his blowing back in a breeze.
Her curiosity and intrigue was peeked, and she watched him as he made his way to the other side of the clearing. Being now coated in pollen and the stench of the herbs she had been hiding in, her scent was masked, and when she snuck after him he didn't notice her by smell. He did however, begin to hear small rustles and she froze, hiding once again when she saw his ears twitch in her direction.
After that, she maintained a greater distance and stayed even quieter. He eventually stopped to hop up into a tree, lying down and seeming for all the world like he was ready to take a nap perched 20 feet above the ground on a tree branch. If his ears hadn't been so wolf-like she would have thought he was a squirrel demon.
She watched him for a time, enthralled by everything about him and wishing she could go up and talk to him without risk of him attacking. He didn't look evil, but she was a human, and demons and humans didn't typically get along.
Eventually, she had to sneak away to go home before her grandfather could notice her absence. She did so reluctantly though, wishing she could stay and watch this strange, beautiful creature longer. As soon as she got home she snuck into the forbidden section of the library on demons and began her research anew, trying to figure out what this new person could have been. Eventually she had to settle on either a cat or dog demon, based on the ears, or perhaps a raccoon or something. Having pointy ears wasn't a lot to go on. She did however find out some very interesting things, and realized swiftly that she had been incredibly lucky to be covered in all those smells, finding out that most demons had keen senses of smell. After that, she took care to carry several very pungent herbs to mask her smell whenever she ventured into the woods.
After the first sighting, Kagome saw him one or two more times in the woods, and observed him from a distance, growing more and more fascinated with every sighting.
Sometimes she wondered if he knew she was there, because from time to time he would stop and his ears would swivel in her direction, at which point she would always freeze. She was sure she caught him looking in her direction every now and then too. But he never seemed to be interested in pursuing her, probably because he was waiting for her to attack, at which point he would have undoubtedly swung around and killed her. If she had been a hunter, she would have had to be stupid to not expect that though. Still, whatever the case, whether he knew she was there or not, the fact remained that she was allowed to follow him unmolested, and that was all that mattered to her.
The only problem was that the more she snuck around and watched him from afar, the more she wanted to actually get to know him, talk to him, ask him his name at the very least. And above all else, she was dying to touch his ears, because they were intoxicatingly cute. Of course, even if she ever did have the opportunity to talk to him without risk of being hurt, killed, and possibly eaten, she would undoubtedly never have the gumption to touch his ears. That would likely be highly offensive.
The desire to talk to him grew stronger and stronger, which did dampen her enjoyment of watching him some, but she was still fascinated enough by him that simply watching him walk around, or more often taking a nap, was enough for her to almost always be late getting back behind the wall on the days she had spotted him. Of course there was still that ever-present fear as well, that he was a dangerous demon, and could most likely kill her in a second if he found her and so desired, and that adrenaline rush also became a bit addictive.
After a few months of this, she became very nearly obsessed with this interesting fellow. She grew to look forward to seeing him. Every day she ventured beyond the walls she hoped to catch a glimpse of red and white, signaling that the red robe and white hair of her new object of attention was near.
It was one such day, as she carefully stomped through the brush of the forest, looking around for treasures and interesting animals to watch, that she once again saw red through the branches and leaves. Swiftly concealing herself, she crept closer, until she got a view through the greenery. He was resting against a tree, asleep, or so she thought at first as she took in his leaning posture and slumped head. But on second inspection, she began to note that he wasn't in the most comfortable of slouched positions, which struck her as odd. So, she edged her way closer, trying to get a clearer look at him.
Once she succeeded, she looked, and looked, and looked some more, and soon she realized that there was a strange red stain on his red jacket that was darker and looked glossy, like it was wet. It wasn't long before she made the determination that it looked like blood, and a lot of it.
Her heart dropped, and it felt like she had swallowed a bucket full of ice as her insides froze and her intestines and stomach seemed to cramp up painfully in distress. Biting her lips she inched closer, afraid, both of him and for him as she grew nearer. He didn't wake up, which was both good and bad, since it meant that he didn't attack her, but it also meant that he must be seriously injured.
Eventually, she had crept right up to him, closer than she had ever been before, and she could clearly see that he had been beaten terribly. His face was a mess of blood, spit, and dirt, his clothes in much worse shape, and his claws, which she only just noticed, were also caked in biological matter. She wasn't entirely sure he was even alive, given his pale complexion and his utter stillness.
Hesitantly scooting even closer, she reached forwards, her hand shaking as it neared his skin. She paused, an inch from making contact, and then gulped, taking a deep, steadying breath, before resting her fingers on his neck to check his pulse. She released the breath on a relieved sigh as she felt warmth and a resounding pulse underneath her fingertips. Once she had ascertained that he was in fact still alive, she had to decide what to do next. She wanted to help him, but she wasn't really sure how exactly she should go about it.
It would be risky, any way she decided to act, so after some pondering she decided to try and haul him to her cave, which, as luck would have it, was only a short distance away from where he had collapsed. And so, with this goal held firmly in her mind, she steeled her nerves and reached for him once again, grabbing hold of him firmly this time, and hoisting his arm over her shoulder. She got a weak groan in protest for her efforts and she froze, concerned that he was coming to. When all he did was slump against her, panting into her collarbone and whimpering in pain, she unfroze and hurried to clumsily drag him to her shelter.
He seemed to wake up a little more as she lugged him the short distance, and he muttered a very confused "Wha…?" into her shoulder, sounding a bit drunk with his speech slurred.
In response, she just murmured back as quietly and soothingly as she could, "I'm taking you somewhere safe, to help you. You're seriously injured and need medical treatment."
Her words must have reached him in some capacity, because he settled down some and managed somehow to support just a little of his own weight as he swung back and forth between unconsciousness. With that, she was able to get him to the cave, where she laid him down on a soft reed pallet she had constructed for short naps a while back. Once he was settled, she hurried to find her medkit and go through it, looking for anything that might help him. She grabbed anything that looked useful and set it aside, before kneeling next to him and quickly undoing his shirt to look at his wounds, flushing as she did so.
Her embarrassment eased dramatically when she got an eyeful of the brutal gouges and holes in his skin and torso, which were bleeding profusely. She had no idea how he was even alive, given the extent of the damage, and she had to surmise that demons must be much tougher than humans if he had been able to survive this much physical trauma. She did her very best to not throw up or pass out, as she gingerly tucked the little bit of intestine that was poking out of a particularly deep hole back inside him, after checking to make sure that it wasn't damaged. As soon as that was done she did have to step outside to throw up in the bushes as fast as she could, knowing that time was of the essence, but that throwing up on him would probably give him an infection.
Wiping her mouth off with a spare cloth, she quickly made her way back in after taking a deep breath to fortify herself. Settling back down next to him she worked hurriedly. She cleaned the wounds to the best of her ability, getting some winces and moans from him as she used alcohol to sanitize everything and used a clean rag to wipe the dirt and other stuff out of his gashes. After doing that, she patched him up as well as she possibly could, wincing as she lifted flaps of skin and settled them back into place, piecing him together like a jigsaw puzzle. It looked like he had gotten into a very bad disagreement with something that possessed very long and sharp claws - or maybe several somethings.
As she worked he occasionally winced or whined when she messed with something particularly painful, but overall he seemed blessedly out of it, probably because he had used up what little energy he had left when she had been dragging him here.
After bandaging his front she carefully rolled him to work on his back, which also had a few wounds on it, and then rolled him back to lie on his back, since the majority of the damage was on his front. He also had sustained some wounds on his legs, which she reached by untying the drawstrings at the ankles of his pants and simply pushing his pant leg up to reach the wounds.
It soon came time for her to have to leave, to not raise any suspicion. She had stayed much longer than she should have to tend to him, but she wanted to make sure all the bandages were secure before she left him. And so, she forced herself to return home, going through all the motions of normality to make sure her grandfather didn't grow suspicious. She received a lecture for missing her lessons today, but she apologized profusely and got off with a warning. Waiting in her room for when she could go back over the wall was murder, but she managed to make herself stay put until the house had gone to sleep.
Author's Note:
Hello all!
So, since I'm going to be posting two stories at once, this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to try to post the new chapter of this story every Wednesday (or as close as possible) and then post the new chapter of my other Inuyasha story, 'For Him,' on the weekend.
On to this story!
Before I explain the inspiration for this story, I want to see how many people can correctly guess what the plot is based off. I bet a lot of you will pick it up quick. ;) I'll give hints at the end of every chapter, and then eventually I'll just explain it fully, once I've had my fun.
Also, I'm going to do my best to have each chapter pretty much the same length, but some may be a bit shorter and some may be a bit longer.
As always, please review and let me know what you think. :3