The Girl of the Vermillion Book
"Where am I? Is this where they sent me to find my partner?"
A young girl walks through the night. Lightning is striking down as it pours down raining.
"I can't see anything it's so dark." She says to herself.
Suddenly lightning strikes down, showing a silhouette of a tall tower before a loud scream is heard.
A week later, in an average house in Japan, young guy is practicing playing a guitar in his bed. This guy is Akito Koizumi, age 14 in middle school, or was in middle school before dropping out.
"Akito are you awake?" A woman walks into the room. "Ah, good morning." She smiles to him.
"Heh, and a good morning to you as well mother." Akito says to her.
"Hehehe. May I ask a favor of you? I need you to do a bit of shopping for me." She tells him.
"No problem. I'll be happy to help." He says before putting his guitar away and standing up.
"So how goes that search for your little band?" His mother asks.
"Poorly so far, not many people here actually know me too well." He tells her as he gets ready to go out.
"You ready to admit you need to go back to school?" She asks him.
"Not yet but getting there." He tells her before smiling.
"Well I won't force you to go back. Besides I appreciate the extra help in my old age." She says before laughing.
"Come on you're not that old." He tells her before taking a list from her. "Be back soon." He says before leaving.
While out shopping, Akito walks into a large man.
"Ngh! Sorry man, my bad." Akito tells the guy.
"Hey be more careful punk!" The man yells back.
Akito sees the man reach down and pick up a light green book he dropped.
'That's a strange looking book?' Akito thinks to himself.
The man stands back up and glares down at Akito.
"Next time I won't let you leave unpunished!" He yells at him before walking off.
"Hmm, where to bastards like that come from?" Akito asks before continuing on.
Akito finishes his shopping and heads back towards home.
Suddenly he ends up running into someone else, causing him to drop his stuff.
"Ngh! I'm so sorry! I don't know what's wrong with me!" He says while collecting all the groceries.
"Oh no this was all my fault!" He sees a girl roughly his own age also picking up the groceries with him.
"I apologize she can be such a klutz." Another girl, one a bit younger, says as she helps as well.
While picking up the groceries, Akito picks up a strange yellow book.
'Huh? This book. It looks almost exactly like the one that guy from earlier dropped.' He thinks to himself.
"Oh! That's mine!" The teen girl exclaims.
"Oh, well here." Akito hands it to her.
"Thanks a lot." She says before taking it.
After another minute or so, they get all the groceries back up.
"Thanks for the help and sorry about bumping into you." He tells them as they all wave goodbye. He then continues to walk home.
He enters his house and sets the groceries down in their kitchen.
"Hey mom! I'm back!" He yells.
"Oh thank you dear." His mother says while walking into the room. "By the way Akito, you have a guest."
"A guest?" He asks.
"Yes, a cute girl came in a while ago and is in your room now. Thought she might have been a friend of yours." She tells him.
"Girl? Cute? Friend? My room?" He asks before running off towards his bedroom.
He opens the door of his bed and finds someone jumping on his bed.
"Weeee!" A young girl half Akito's height, medium-length hot pink hair, lines going from the center of her light-blue eyes down to the bottom of her face, and dressed in a strange dress with diamonds and hearts on it.
"W-What the hell?" Akito says to himself while looking confused.
"Huh?" The girl stops jumping and looks to Akito. "Hey! You must be Akito!" She exclaims.
"Huh? How do you know my name?" He asks, still confused.
"Your mom told me." She says while smiling.
"Uh, right." He says before walking up and crouching down to her. "Now may I ask who you are and why you're here?"
"Oh right, forgive my rudeness." She says before standing on the bed so that she is standing over him. "My name is Seika! Nice to meet you!" She tells him.
'Uh why did she have to stand up? Is this girl trying to be dramatic?' Akito thinks to himself. "Well Seika, why are you here? I can surely say I've never seen you before in my life." He tells her.
"I'm on a mission to find my perfect partner!" She exclaims.
'Her perfect partner? Wait she doesn't mean in marriage, does she?!' He thinks to himself, looking nervous now.
"And I think that partner might be you! Akito Koizumi!" She exclaims before pointing down at him dramatically.
'Oh yeah, she's insane.' He thinks to himself before standing up. "Listen kid, I don't know what this whole partner thing is you're going on about. You mind elaborating it for me?"
"Elaborating?" She asks, now thinking to herself.
"Please explain what you mean by partner." He tells her.
"Oh! Well you see…. Um…" She looks just as confused as Akito is now. "I… don't remember." She tells him.
"You don't remember?" Akito asks with a blank expression.
"Just give me a minute; my memory has been very bad lately!" Seika says before sitting and thinking to herself.
"This girl is so weird." He says to himself. "Huh?" He looks next to her to see a strange vermillion colored book.
'Hey that's another one of those books I've been seeing.' He thinks to himself, recalling the other two books he saw.
He reaches down and picks the book up. Suddenly his hand begins to steam.
"Ngh!" He groans in pain. "This book feels like it's burning my flesh!" He whispers to himself.
Suddenly the pain goes away and he picks up the book.
'Well that was very strange.' He thinks to himself before opening the book.
Each page seems to be filled with strange symbols in a form that looks like an unknown form of language.
'What is all this?' He asks himself. 'I can't read any of this purple text.'
He continues to flip through the pages of the book several times over before stopping on a page.
'Hey this page is different." He thinks to himself as he stares at the page.
On the page is a line of text that is colored vermillion like the book instead of purple like the rest of the text.
'Why can I read this line but not the rest of the book?' He asks himself. "Let's see here."
"Hey what are you doing?" Seika asks, now facing him.
"The first spell, Pykeru." He reads from the book. "What does that me.."
Suddenly he notices a bolt of fire shot at him.
"Gah!" He yells as the bolt hits him.
Akito's mother looks up from the kitchen.
"What are those kids up to?" She asks.
In Akito's room, everything between him and Seika is covered black in soot.
"W-What the hell just happened?" Akito asks, wide-eyed.
"Wow what happened in here?" Seika says before hiccupping and a small trail of fire comes out of her mouth.
'Wait, don't tell me this girl is the one who shot off that bolt of fire I saw.' Akito thinks to himself. 'What the hell is she?'
"Aww! My dress is all filthy!" She cries out.
"Hmm, that's not the only thing; looks like you could use a good washing as well." Akito tells her.
"Hmm?" She looks at her arms and legs. "Yeah I guess so." She says before giggling.
"Are you two ok?" Akito's mom walks into the room. "Oh my! What happened in here?"
After Akito explains what had happen, which takes a bit of time, she tells Seika that she would need a bath. She also mentions how she might need help.
"Ugh. Why am I doing this?" Akito asks.
He's helping Seika, who's currently in a bath full of bubbles, wash off.
"Hehehe!" Seika giggles as she plays with the bubbles.
"Come on! I can't help wash you off if you keep moving around so much!" He tells her.
"Hah!" Seika takes a handful of bubbles and then blows them at Akito.
"Mmmm." He now has a mustache and a beard made of bubbles.
"Hahaha! You look so funny!" She says while giggling more.
"Ugh! How did I get stuck bathing a kid who's only about 4 years younger than me?" He asks.
"Hehe!" She says with a cute childish smile.
"Ugh." He groans. "Why does everything strange happen to me?"
After a while, they are both back in Akito's room. Seika dresses in some pajamas to sleep in.
"Okay I think it's about time for you to start explaining yourself." He tells her.
"Explain myself?" She asks, looking confused and innocent. "What do you mean?"
"Naturally I mean what's your connection to this book?" He asks before holding the strange book from before up.
"Hmm? I could tell you, but you probably won't believe me." She tells him.
"I saw you shoot a bolt of fire from your mouth." He tells her. "By all means, try to make me not believe you."
"Huh?" She looks confused. "I shot fire? OH! You mean you can read the book?!" She asks excitingly.
"Hmm. Yeah I can. Now tell me why that's such a surprise." He tells her.
Seika thinks to herself before nodding.
"Okay then." She says.
They both sit across from each other on Akito's bed.
"I'm not exactly from this world." She tells him.
"Not from this world? Then where are you from?" Akito asks her, looking a lot less surprised than a normal person would react.
"I come from the Mamodo World, a world filled with demons called mamodos." She explains.
"Which means you're one of the demons?" He asks. "So what are you doing here?"
"Every thousand years in the Mamodo World, a trial takes place in order to determine our new king." She continues. "This trial is an all-out war among 100 different mamodos in the Human World."
Akito's eyes widen.
"A w-war?" He asks nervously.
"Though there are a few limitations given to those who participate." She continues on. "We are incapable of casting our spells on our own; we require the assistance of a human partner to cast the spells within the books." She points to the book Akito is holding.
"I see." Akito says. "So that's why when I read that line of text; you fired that strange attack." He looks to the book and then back at Seika. "So what else is there?"
"I.. I don't know." She tells him. "There's more I'm sure, but I can't seem to remember any more."
'That's right. She mentioned that her memory has been failing her.' He thinks to himself. "So now you're saying you want me to be your partner so you can win this war?"
"Well, to be more specific, I want something different from you." She tells him.
"Something different?" Akito asks, confused. "And what would that be?"
"I want to see all of the Human World!" She says with excitement in her eyes.
"All of it?" He asks. "You mean you wish to travel and see everything?"
"Percisely! I've heard so many stories of how beautiful this world is!" She exclaims. "So many landmarks and amazing places! It's a girl's true dream to see it all!"
'It's like I've been saying, she's being overly dramatic.' He thinks to himself. "I see, and you want me to help you do this."
"Yes! Please help me Akito! No one but you can read my book and if I run into another mamado, they're easily send me back to my world!" She tells him.
"Send you back?" He asks. "How do they do that?"
"Simple, by burning the book." She tells him.
"Mhmm…" He suddenly punches her on the head. "I thought you said you couldn't remember anything else!" He yells at her.
"OW! I just remembered! Ow that hurts so much!" She cries.
"So what if I deny to help you?" He ask her.
She turns to him, tears flooding down her eyes.
"…" His eye twitches. "Fine I'll help protect you." He tells her.
Her eyes suddenly gleam with excitement.
"Oh thank you! Thank you! Thaaaaank you!" She exclaims before jumping on him, hugging him.
She smiles to him and kisses his cheek.
"Mmmm heh." He smiles to her. 'How the hell do you say no to a girl this cute?' He asks himself.
It soon becomes night. Seika is sleeping on the bed while Akito lies on the floor.
"Hmmm." Akito is writing inside of a book.
'If I have to deal with 100 demons, might as well turn it into a game for myself.' He thinks to himself.
He closes the book and writes on the cover, The Mamodo Compendium.
The Mamodo Compendium
Mamodo #1- Seika- A young cute mamodo who dreams to see the world. Cheery and playful.
Gender: Female
Alignment: Good
Specialty: Fire-based spells
Known Spells:
Pykeru- A bolt of fire straight shot from the mouth.
Human Partner- Akito Koizumi (Myself) - Laid back dropout looking for something in his life.
Gender: Male
Occupation: Dreamer
Book: Vermillion