Chapter One

Daylight barely broke through the limps of the tree as the car drove down the curving roads. At the drivers wheel was a man in his early thirties, though he looked more in his mid twenties. His hair was short and black, slicked back with some gel. His eyes were very attentive to the road before him, though the green color seemed to strike many as dazzling and stunning. On him was a denim jacket of a black shirt, matched with faded jeans.

In the passenger seat was a young girl, around sixteen or seventeen. Her hair was short, in a bob, and colored brown like the majestic trees of a forest. Her eyes were the same as his, a green that just seemed to captivate the attention of anyone to peer within them. Her outfit was a pink, wool jacket and a blue dress made of silk underneath.

The car took another curve before stopping at a light, which the man had almost not expected. He watched the cars going the opposite direction with frustration, wishing the light would change a bit faster.

"What were you thinking Sophia!?" The man said, trying to keep his cool now suddenly, as if driving was his only antidote to madness. "Sneaking out of the house in a god damn foreign country, and then going off to a party with kids you hardly know! God, could you have any other actions I'm unaware of?"

"You wish," The girl, Sophia, mumbled.

"What did you say to me!?"

"The lights green…"

The mans eyes averted back toward the light to see it had changed to he respected color of motion. He grumbled a bit and lightly pushed his foot on the gas, feeling the acceleration cool his mind. The motion helped him focus on something else that didn't boil his blood.

Sophia only sighed and looked out the passenger window once more, watching the forestry pass by without hesitation. She could only think of how wrong she was to leave the house last night, how terrible she was to leave behind her big brother and then even have the nerve to enter a party where no one knew her, drink alcohol, and almost do something she knew she'd later regret. This topped all the things she did since a few years ago.

"Look, I don't mean to be mad at you Sophia. It's just… you can't keep acting like this! You're a teenager now; you have to grow up. Mom isn't-"

"Save your breath Jacob, I know the speech well."

The man, Jacob, looked over at her sternly and then back at the road for another turn into a small dirt road in the forest. The less paved road proved to be rough and bumpy, but that didn't seem to faze either Jacob or Sophia.

"You know I just want the best for you, right?"

"Yeah, I do. You just want me to grow up and be a pretty little girl like all the other valley girls out there."

"Hey now, I never said anything about you becoming something you don't want to be."

"Then why are you sending me to a private university where it's just filled with a bunch of airheads and fashion divas?" Sophia glared at him. "And don't you dare say it's what's best for me because if it was then I wouldn't be complaining."

"You need a good education to get into the colleges here in Japan, they're not going to look at someone like us Americans the same way they would a Japanese from public school."

Sophia rolled her eyes and continued to look out the window at the forest some more. This was the first time her brother and her had taken this path because she had never been out this far, so Sophia didn't exactly know what it looked like. The whole place just intrigued her; back home she remembered how every tree was torn down just to make room for more urban developments, but she could see such beauty in the woods that Japan had offered her.

Suddenly she noticed someone standing on a broken path toward the trees. It was a woman, very tall and in a white kimono. Tying the kimono closed was a black cord that dangled down toward the ground. Her face was covered by some black hair that curved before her eyes. Her lips formed into a smile that seemed innocent enough to lure anyone toward her. She turned and started down the path, her hair tied back with a clip in the shape of a fiery red phoenix.

"Stop the car."

"What, in the middle of the road? We could get hit and-"

"JUST STOP IT!"

Jacob swerved to the side of the road and watched as Sophia jumped out of the car running toward the forest.

"Hey, where the hell do you think you're going now?"

He almost opened his car door but forced it shut as another vehicle came speeding past his. Jacob popped his door open with a lot of force then quickly shut it before looking around for his little sister. His eye caught her turning into the forest down some weird path.

'What the hell is she doing now?'

Jacob rushed toward the path and looked down to see only pitch black. Sophia could've been anywhere now and he knew it, which meant he had all the reason to go find her before she got herself into worse trouble than what he had planned for her. He headed back to the car and opened the passengers side, thumbing through the glove compartments until he found a mini flashlight and some extra batteries for it, which were stuffed in his pocket.

The light proved to show the path continued and winded down the forest trees. Jacob stepped carefully around the area, watching to make sure he didn't trip so he wouldn't be hurt. He didn't want to fall and have a concussion with no one around for help.

About five minutes down Jacob flashed the light around some odd red gate. He didn't really know much about them, the Shinto temples always seemed to have a ton of these around. He remembered something about them being a gate to somewhere or maybe even a doorway that couldn't be opened; he didn't care because legends tended to be false these days thanks to modern science.

"SOPHIA!"

Jacob stepped back the gate, and then he felt a large pressure come down onto him. He fell on his knees panting for some air as he felt everything around him shake intensely, and then suddenly halting. When looking up, Jacob could see that a night sky had blanketed the once evening sky he had been driving through. This wasn't good, had he really wasted so much time searching for Sophia?

"Hey, Sophia; this isn't funny at all! Once I get my hands on you, you'll wish you were still lost, you hear me!?"

He shined the light around the path as he got up and started more down it. Stone stepped seemed to be carved heading up a small hill. Torches were lit up on the sides to light the way, but didn't do as well of a job as Jacob's own flashlight. At the top, he could see Sophia, staring away from him and swaying in an odd fashion.

"I was calling for you back there Sophia! What has come over you!?"

Jacob looked at her and watched as she continued to sway, not making any response toward him at all.

"Hey, I'm talking to you!"

He rushed up the steps toward Sophia and before he could grab her, his eye sight changed. Everything seemed to be fuzzy like TV static, and only showed the colors white and black. Where Sophia once was a woman in a white kimono, a black cord tied to hold it closed. Holding her hair up was some weird clip with a fiery red phoenix that Jacob found rather tacky with her kimono. Her face turned toward Jacob.

"Hey, where is that girl that was just standing there?"

The woman turned completely toward him, elegantly more than hastily. Her lips formed a devilish smile as her hand pointed toward where she had been looking previously.

Jacob took a few steps toward her now and felt the same pressure from before when he passed the gate, taking the breath right out of him. He looked up to now see she was standing over him, the same devilish smirk plastered across her face. She bent down, and Jacob winced away.

Then suddenly everything was color again, and Sophia was touching his back as he lay on the ground. Her face was filled with much confusion, unable to understand why her brother was suddenly on the ground and not on his own two feet.

"Jacob… are you alright?"

He looked up at her, his eyes seemed to be a little frightened but at the same time as confused as she was.

"Where did… the lady in the kimono go?"

"She went this way, there's some weird village over here. I think she is all alone over there because I haven't seen anyone else around here."

"Is this why you had me stop my car then?"

Jacob stood himself and dusted off his shirt with a soft sigh. He looked at her with some regret, wishing he hasn't stopped for her petty curiosity. He always knew curiosity killed the cat.

"Well sorry I wanted to do something right for once Jacob. Doesn't hurt to check if someone is alright, does it?"

"I guess not…"

Jacob stepped up the rest of the way with Sophia following at the same pace. At the top he could see over a ledge, and what a sight it was. There was some village, big houses all around and some large building in the middle; most likely a temple from its structure. Around the village were torches just like the ones he had seen leading up the stone stepped path.

"What is this place?" Jacob asked looking around.

"This is the Go Ishiki Village," Sophia told him. "It's been lost for a few hundred years now brother."

He looked at her oddly. "How did you know that Sophia?"

She bowed her head. "Honestly, I don't know…"