Chapter 1: This Environment
Although the cities did not completely fall as expected, the society that we as humans came to live under had fallen under the Youkai advance; this was meant to be punishment for mankind's treatment of the world and its other inhabitants. But it could be debated as to whether Fairy Tale and the Youkai had the power of judgement over all of humanity. The youkai still took control and although they suffered significant losses, mankind fared much worse as the reliance solely on technology could only carry them so far. By about six months after the chilling first transmission, the UN and most (if not all) governments had submitted to the Youkai in an unconditional surrender. The cities remained hubs like before but instead were under the control of the Youkai, and humans had instantly become second-rate citizens since then. The areas in between however, became lawless and mostly deserted as the more dangerous and uncontrolled forms of Youkai used these areas as a place to riot. The only way to survive was to conform to this new lifestyle living as lesser beings, or end up being an outcast and easy targets.
Similarities with science fiction metropolises could be drawn from an image of a regular city environment, as the streets were crowded with a variety of different species and neon lights of many colours- people would walk past each other and one could tell that every person was thinking about themselves rather than anyone else. On this day, it was no different as a black-haired teenage boy walked through the crowd; his face was covered as he was sporting a slightly ripped jacket with his hood up and a matching set of black trousers that swayed lightly against the small air resistance. Tsukune Aono was a pretty normal human being in the sense that he had no mysteries about him, although calling him average was a bit far-fetched now as he had picked up some physical and weapons training from some army people he'd met here and there; however, he doubted he could do anything against the majority of Youkai species (who tended to be more physically superior)- Tsukune kept a set of guns at his flat just in case. His vision turned to the right where he saw a large burly red-haired man dragging across a bunch of dishevelled bodies; his eyes slightly widened when he saw that these 'bodies' were still alive. On a guess, it seemed like they were human teenage girls only a few years older/younger than him. Being referred to as dishevelled might be surprising but these girls looked emotionally dead, as if their minds were long gone, and their hollow eyes looked back at any onlookers. Their clothes ripped, their lives no more, they were used for mere entertainment by the likes of the Youkai as well as the corrupt humans who'd sold out their own race; their faded make-up and messy uneven hair portraying that they had been 'used' many times. In an ideal world, Tsukune would jump in and save those poor girls like a prince, and liberate the world from inequality… however, in the real world, Tsukune couldn't do anything of that sort- he did not have the power nor the jurisdiction. Forgive me Otou-san, okaa-san, for ignoring the injustice all around me, Tsukune thought to himself as he closed his eyes. Even though there was no direct evidence of it, Tsukune thought that his parents were long gone, because there was no evidence to suggest the opposite- no hidden letters, no neighbours coming to tell him… nothing.
He had somehow managed to have a decent job in a world where that was difficult, as the vampire manager at the café he worked at seemed to enjoy employing humans at the café. Of course, this wasn't without a hidden motive as he recalled many of his co-workers 'disappearing'; he had no doubts that they were merely being sold to customers. It was merely a guise of a café whose true business was human trafficking- not that anything could be done about it anyways. The strained smiles of his co-workers would speak volumes in the silence- because of the tense atmosphere at his workplace, he rarely spoke to any of the others who worked there.
"Oi, meat, get this coffee to table five," the manager said to him in a commanding tone; there is no sense of an employer-employee relationship here, Tsukune thought with a sigh as he picked up the tray of coffees and walked over to the corresponding table to hand the coffee. Putting on his best smile, he said to them, "Thanks for your order, would you like anything else?" the customers were three people: two men and one woman. The two men were very hairy and quite large as well, and wore a sleeveless jacket on top of a short sleeved top; the woman on the other hand, wore a short top showing more than it covered and a denim miniskirt- the men were probably in their twenties while the female was a bit younger. Tsukune glanced at them as they took a sip of their coffee and maintained his work mask; he turned more alert when one of the men started smiling. Tsukune's face could no longer keep on smiling when he felt a hot sticky liquid on parts of his body- he had been lucky that he'd reacted quickly enough (thanks to training from before).
"What kind of coffee are you serving your customers?! And I don't like the way you were eyeing my girl up!" the man who was smiling from before shouted as his face contorted into a more twisted form as Tsukune stood there covered in coffee.
"You human bastard- I'll teach you your worth!" the enraged male grabbed Tsukune and pushed him against the wall, causing the wall to dent back partially. Rather than helping, he could see the other customers smirking seeing the situation in front of them. Out of the corner of his eyes Tsukune could see his manager coming in with a worried look.
"Good sir, what seems to be the problem here?" the manager asked with fake worry.
"You need to clean up your human workers- these little shrimps are nothing but target practice- especially the smartasses like this," the man said with a little grin as he looked down at the boy.
"I assure you that whatever wrong my worker has done, that we would gladly correct it," the manager tried to reason as he placed a hand on the aggressive man's shoulders.
"Ok, you know what? I'll let you off…" the man said as he threw Tsukune to the ground like trash.
"After all, your café is normally one of the good places out here Mr. Gourmandise. Your workers are obedient like they should be and the food is better," the man continued, looking above towards the ceiling.
"Yes, we pride ourselves on having human workers who work like they should- no questions asked," the manager replied with a smile as he patted the man's shoulders. Tsukune limped out of the seating area holding his back and neck as his thoughts left a bitter taste. I just don't have the resolve anymore, Tsukune thought painfully as he gazed at the orange fading evening sky.
Hi everyone, another chapter for you all. This chapter was meant to add some more setting to the current time of the story and Tsukune himself, hopefully it wasn't too much of slice of life. I've got some more ideas on the story's progression so let's see how this all goes. Thanks for reading/support (and the guest review as well) and leave me some feedback if you can. Until next time (and BB's new album omg)!
