Disclaimer: I don't own Owari no Seraph, its plot or characters, or any other mentioned books, songs, or series. They belong to their respective owners. I only own my OCs and the plot that deviates from canon or doesn't exist in canon. This is a non-profit fan fiction just for fun.

Beta reader: haelyeon

A/N: I want to thank MCRDanime, kuroneki, J4ck 0n Cr4ck, Kara-Fire21, and javonn919 for following my story! I also want to thank Seithr-Kairy, J4ck 0n Cr4ck, and javonn919 for adding Between Two Worlds to their favourites list, and of course, all the other readers of this story! You can thank my lovely beta reader haelyeon, for making this chapter a better read. Thank you so much, haelyeon! I think we all appreciate it that I won't butcher the English language and grammar anymore ⁄(⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄)⁄.

The plot thickens... This chapter will be somewhat dark, but I hope you will still enjoy it! - Saya Tsukihime

Edited on 04.06.2019. I had to add a few things because I changed a lot in chapter 4. Hopefully, I'll be able to upload it soon!


Chapter 3 – When The Final Bell Tolls

In September, I gifted Mako-chan with a durable dark blue hair tie on his eleventh birthday because he always complained about his hair wrecking all the normal hair ties he'd use. I didn't know why he didn't simply cut it short if it bothered him that much. Boys.

Fall came, and with it came my thirteenth birthday. I received many books, CDs, manga merchandise revolving around ninja and samurai (my passion), plush owls (I loved owls for an inexplicable reason), obscure games and chocolate from my friends.

Even Hasegawa-kun gave me some chocolate. He still hadn't given up on me, and I found myself flattered that he had stayed persistent for this long. The teen had some serious determination that I couldn't help but respect; hence, I was infinitely more conscience-stricken that I couldn't return his feelings...

Despite my stage fright, I had two public piano performances in the following weeks as my music teacher had encouraged me to participate in a music competition. I had become first place in spring, and I was proud of my achievement; yet, I somehow felt even more like a cheater since I had competed against children and won when I was actually an adult trapped in a young teen's body.

My conscience was acting up, but I tried to deal with it as well as I was able to and see things in a more positive light.

Now, my dream of becoming a pianist was within my grasp at least. I gave a ticket to each of my friends, and everyone managed to attend since the third of November, called Culture Day by the masses, was a national holiday that was held annually for the purpose of promoting culture, the arts and academic endeavor. So even Shinya was somehow able to make some time.

I was also searching for a high school that I'd have to attend in the following year, and I came to the conclusion that I wanted a major in music again. While I was sad that I would most likely not visit high school together with Kaori and Akira, I would do my best to clear my schedule for them as much as possible and to spent our remaining time together to make unforgettable memories.

On his birthday in November, I gifted Shinya with a key chain in the form of a cute white tiger. His reaction was rather… unusual. Shinya stared at the small, blue-eyed plush feline with a quizzical expression on his face.

"How…?"

"Don't you like it? I was shopping with Kaori when I saw it and thought that it somehow suited you… You can take it with you as a good luck charm..." I trailed off. Shinya's eyes were boring into mine.

"Why would you think that a white tiger suits me?" he asked in an intrigued tone.

"I don't know. Maybe because your hair is white, too, and you have blue eyes… it just seemed to fit. Do you not like it?" I didn't really know myself why I thought that this present was perfect for him. It was like one of those weird déjà vu again, a feeling I couldn't explain.

"No, no, I like it. It just… surprised me," he smiled.

I eyed him with suspicion. "Really…?"

"Yes. Don't be so suspicious all the time, Vivi-chan~."

"If you say so…" I was still not convinced. "Let's have a training fight next week. It's been a while."

"Ah, alright. You want to lose that badly?" Shinya inquired jokingly, making me slap his arm.

"Don't be so arrogant," I chided him.

"Ahaha~."


I lost the match; Shinya seemed to be even stronger and faster than before, and I could tell that he had even held back... How was he so freakishly strong?!

After he had made me drop my sword, a martial art spar ensued and we landed on the ground. Eventually, I had to surrender when Shinya used his superior strength to sit on me, subsequently pinning my arms into the soft grass beneath us, only to announce my loss with a smile on his face.

I was not pleased with my own incompetence and decided that I had neglected my karate training for too long in the past months. Because of ballet training and my preparations for the piano performance, I had only been able to drop by the dojo once a week. I was determined to train even harder now so I could someday wipe that smug smile off his face...!


A few weeks later, I met up with Kaori and Akira on the 25th of December inside a mall. It had a crepes stand and a karaoke bar which we would visit later. My parents had some "special business" to attend to and were away for the day. They had been acting somewhat secretive over the past weeks, and whenever I had asked them about it, they simply replied that they were preparing a surprise. I couldn't help but wonder what they were planning.

"Crepes, crepes, I love desserts~!" Kaori sang whilst trying not to get squished in between the masses of people inside the shopping mall.

"I know, Kaori, I know. They're the gods' food. I'm so glad that we finally have a holiday…" I was getting a bit exhausted from school, club activities, kendō competition, ballet lessons and the piano performances. Maybe I was trying to bite off more than I could chew. But this time around, I wanted to do more worthwhile things so that I wouldn't have to die with regrets.

Maybe I was overcompensating because I had missed out on so many things in my first life. Yes, I was definitely overcompensating.

Akita hummed in understanding, "That's understandable, you're doing too many different things at once."

"Freaking overachiever," Kaori commented good-naturedly. I sighed in response, but I couldn't deny it. Was this what dying with regrets had done to my psyche?

"Let's go into that jewellery store first if you don't mind. I need to find something for my grandma in Russia," I proposed. Kaori and Akira agreed.

I found grandma Darya a pair of earrings that she could wear to work or to an evening dress; I would be going to visit her and grandpa Mikhail with my parents on New Year's Eve. It was the only time during the year in which I saw them in person. Yoriko-baa didn't really celebrate Christmas, so my parents and I would just visit her in the next few days and bring her some of the local sweets.

Shortly after, I found a present for my granddad, too, and we decided to spend the rest of the day looking for things we might enjoy.

"We're going to go to different high schools soon…" Kaori suddenly changed the subject and revealed what had been on her mind for weeks.

"Yeah…" Neither me nor Akira enjoyed the idea of being separated from each other.

"But it's not like we're never seeing each other again, Kaori. We can still meet up and have lots of fun together. And each of us will have their own crazy stories to tell!" I cheered her and Akira up, or at least attempted to.

"I know… but it won't be the same."

I pulled her and Akira into a hug. "We'll still remain friends, no matter how far apart we are from each other. And it's not like we'll never see each other again." Kaori began to sniffle. Akira tried to comfort her and rubbed her back in a soothing motion. I watched their interaction with a sly smirk.

I hoped that they would get together one day. I didn't want to interfere and would let things play out the natural way. I wasn't very well-versed in romantic matters and would most likely just ruin it.

"Vivi-chan~, you and Akira are my bestest friends, ever!" Kaori exclaimed with a bright smile on her face, a few tears still lingering in the corner of her eyes.

"Of course. We are the 'Odd Trio' after all!" I replied haughtily. We got something to eat after that and sat down on a bench that was facing the tall Christmas tree in the middle of the mall. While we conversed, I munched happily on my crepe and watched the colourful crowd of people flutter around like a horde of moths in the search for light. They were minding their own business; however, I started to notice that many people were beginning to cough. Was there a virus going around?

There had been no warnings of a flu outbreak on the news earlier. It had to be nothing but a weird coincidence.

"Somehow, I-I don't feel well," Akira's voice pulled me out of my thoughts. Kaori and I watched him with growing concern as he began to cough just like the many other people surrounding us. I turned back around to face the crowd. More and more people fell to their knees or collapsed on the floor, pain encompassing their faces.

It was surreal, and I watched everything with frightened eyes before snapping out of my trance.

"What's going on here?!" Kaori was just as shocked as I was, terror pushing her voice.

"We have to call an ambulance, this is not normal!" I finally declared, pulling out my phone to call an ambulance, but the call somehow didn't get through. How could that be?! There always had to be someone there to receive emergency calls. I tried to call a local hospital, but I didn't get through on that number either. No one picked the phone up.

What in the world was happening?! My heart started to pound faster and faster in my growing panic while Kaori tried phoning some other numbers, too, but she also didn't have any success reaching them.

Akira was writhing in pain now and violent coughs were shaking his body. To my horror, Kaori had begun coughing violently, too. Then, out of nowhere blood poured from Akira's eyes, mouth and nose, forcing him to collapse. My heart seemed to stop at the sight of the red liquid. What the heck was happening?!

I shook him by his shoulders. "Akira?! I can't get through! We have to get you to a hospital!" I turned to my other friend. "Kaori, can you..."

Kaori looked up into my eyes. "Vivi-chan…" she whispered weakly before her blood started oozing out of her eyes, nose and mouth, and she fell to the ground before I could take a hold of her. Just like Akira. Just like all the people around her. It was like I was stuck inside a horror film.

"Kaori!" I tried to feel her pulse and check her breathing, trying to ignore the crimson blood covering the ground… but there was nothing. I started giving her a heart massage while tears streamed down my face, but she didn't react.

My head snapped back to Akira, who was still sitting crouched on the bench with his head buried in his lap, but he didn't cough anymore. He was eerily still.

I jumped up and moved him around to see how he was. Blood drenched the whole front of his clothes, and it was smeared all over his face. Never before had I seen something so gruesome. He didn't seem to be breathing. With shaking hands, I searched for his pulse… nothing.

Suddenly, I heard loud crashes and explosions from outside the building.

"Akira...! No, this can't be happening! This is all some kind of secret joke, right? Hey! Kaori, Akira! Come on, wake up, you can't be… dead." My voice broke at the end. This all had to be a nightmare! I must have fallen asleep, right?

I faced the crowd, but there was no crowd anymore. There were only masses of people lying on the ground, motionless, seemingly asleep in their own blood puddles. They were everywhere.

The sound of my blood pumping through my body was becoming incredibly loud, drowning all other noises, and the world around began to spin. Mechanically, I attempted once more to call an ambulance.

I couldn't believe what I was seeing. I didn't know what I should do. I couldn't stop my hands from shaking. They were slick with blood, Kaori's and Akira's blood.

The overwhelming, metallic smell of more blood filled my senses, so intense that I could taste it on my tongue.

The call did not connect. I felt sick.

Frantically I tried calling both of my parents, their workplace, some of their colleagues, my school office and my music teacher who I still had contact to.

Anyone... But there was no response. No one answered their phone. This was not… this couldn't be real... This... It had to be a nightmare. One last time I called Shinya, but his phone was off, so I spoke something on his mailbox just in case. I couldn't reach Mako-chan or Shū either. It was the same with Kenta, Emi, and my classmates. What was happening...?!

I... I had to get out of here… to get help. I stumbled outside the building and stepped carefully around and over people… corpses.

Outside, a picture of utter destruction and death greeted my eyes. Cars had crashed together or into buildings and were ablaze with unmoving people still inside them. More people were lying lifelessly in their own blood on the walkways. One of the skyscrapers in the area was burning because a helicopter had seemingly crashed into it. This was... It was the apocalypse.

Even the dark sky was the colour of crimson flames. A menacing wind blew the stench of ash, charred flesh, blood, and burning plastic into my face, making me choke from the revolting, overpowering smells and causing more tears to well up in my eyes. My stomach churned and I felt incredibly nauseous. Not even a second later, I threw up on the side walk.

"...Help! Someone! Anyone! HELP! PLEASE!" I cried out once my mouth was free of barf, but no one replied my desperation. What should I do?! How should I get help?! An idea struck my mind. If I couldn't get the help via phone, I should just get it in person, right?

Without paying attention to directions, I had wandered out onto the street, so I tried to orientate myself first. Then I saw the street sign. There! The next hospital wasn't that far away. I started jogging into its direction, avoiding... people on the ground and cars. My mind became numb, I was unable to think anything other than 'GET HELP'. All the while a haunting feeling of déjà vu overcame me as I staggered through the devastated city.

Then and there, the screeching of tires on the ground pulled me out of my trance-like state. Two military cars had stopped in front of me and men in strange but oddly familiar black uniforms rushed towards me.

"Sir, this girl seems to be unaffected by the virus. How should we proceed with her?" one of the men asked another one whose eyebrows reminded me of a villain, immediately raising suspicion in me. He looked too young to already belong to the military elite.

"Oh, this one is... Capture her. We are not sure how many people survived and the labs want to stock up on test subjects." What? Labs? Test subjects? What was this all about?

"Yes, Sir!" the men saluted him and came closer.

What... what was going on here? I shook my head, I could ask questions later. I needed medical aid for my friends. "Wait! I need help! Please! My friends… they were bleeding and they're not..." Breathing. I couldn't say it out loud. "We have to do something! I can't get into contact with anyone!" I moved away from the men on instinct.

"They are already dead then. The virus has killed everyone out here in this vicinity and the vampires are starting to overrun the city. You'll be safe with us, come," the young higher ranking official with monster eyebrows tried to persuade me. I shook my head in denial.

"No! That can't be! I don't believe you! I won't go with you! I have to help them!" I took a few steps back again, but someone grabbed me from behind. I was stiff from shock for a moment, but then I went right into my self-defence regime. I knocked the soldier who had unknowingly moved behind me with my elbow into his stomach and crouched down a little to catapult him over my shoulder right into another man who had come too close. I had the advantage of surprise.

A short fight between me and the soldiers broke out; however, they had the advantage of numbers and they were grown men while I was just a young teen. I was nowhere near close in fighting them off, even if my karate assisted me greatly. Managing to kick another man in a momentum of surprise, the other soldiers succeeded in securing me, despite my struggle.

"Stubborn girl. She will be a good test subject", Evil Eyebrows growled from behind me before something hit me on the back of my head. Faintly, I could hear something similar to a bell toll in the distance; yet, it might just be the ringing inside my head. It was the last sound I picked up before everything went dark.


I woke up with a pounding headache, disorientation disabling my senses. Waiting a few moments until my eyes got used to the bright light of the room, I was able to smell the sterile stench of disinfectants and bleach. I didn't die again did I?

Slowly but surely, the memories came back. Kaori, Akira, blood, people lying everywhere, fire, destruction...

Death.

Bile threatened to come up my throat again at the mental imagines. As soon as my hazy thoughts managed to realise that soldiers had captured me, I quickly opened my eyes again – this time, I didn't close them but took in my surroundings, alarmed.

I was inside a white room that resembled a hospital, medical supplies and syringes laying on tables next to me. The soldiers... they had mentioned something about test subjects, hadn't they? Fear crawled up my spine.

I shouldn't stay here. I wanted to sit up and get away, but my arms and feet were strapped down on the stretcher I was lying on. Noticing that someone had changed my clothes and had put me into a plain white hospital gown, I struggled just a bit more.

A door opened and people in green surgeon attires entered, setting their sight on me as they did. My heartbeat accelerated in panic and fear at the cold looks they were giving me. No. This couldn't be happening for real! I wasn't inside a science fiction film! People didn't just get experimented on in real life...! I struggled with all my might against the straps.

Kaori, Akira, my parents, Shinya, Mako-chan, Shū, Kenta, and Emi, all those people in the mall and on the streets. They couldn't be dead, right? Wake up! This is just a nightmare! I'm going to wake up soon...!

But I didn't wake up.

"You can struggle all you want, but you won't be able to escape. We've already lost the other Seraphs to the bloodsuckers. We're not going to lose our new test subjects," one of the male doctors with glasses told me.

"L-Let me out of here right this instant! You... you are violating my human rights! You'll go to prison when this comes out!" I tried to scare them off with logic, even though I knew that if they already went so far as to capture me and strap me to this stretcher, they would most likely go through with the other things they had planned for me.

But I couldn't just stay still and do nothing; after all, I was afraid. Very afraid. Afraid that all the people I loved were dead, and afraid of what these doctors were going to do with me. Please let me wake up...!

One of them grabbed a smaller syringe with a translucent liquid and poked it into my side. I wasn't able to evade it.

"This will make her stay still for a while."

"Start the injections on the test subject 004 of the new batch," a male voice commanded coldly over speakers.

I could feel the effects of the liquid they had injected me with. My arms and legs got heavier and each movement of them became more sluggish until I couldn't move my limbs anymore and was unable to utter coherent words. My mind, however, was as sharp and awake as ever, and I took in every movement the doctors made.

Each of the four doctors took up one of the biggest syringes and injected me with their contents. To say it was painful would be an understatement.

It was the purest and most horrific torture. It was pure agony. It felt unlike anything I have ever felt. It felt as if someone was slicing up every inch of my body and poured scalding hot bleach through my veins… again and again. Again and again.

I screamed for an unfathomable amount of time until my throat felt like it was on fire. It could have been seconds, it could have been hours, I didn't know. Just as my heart and head felt like they were about to explode, the pain subsided ever so slightly, leaving me panting, crying, soaked with sweat, and sore behind. I felt absolutely miserable.

The doctors injected me with some kind of IV bags and then rolled me out of the room. Only now, I saw the window separating the room and the spectators that had been watching my torture from behind it.

I felt something I had never once felt in such intensity as I laid my eyes on their emotionless, unimpressed faces – as if they hadn't just ordered to torture a thirteen year old girl. I identified the emotion as the deepest hatred I had ever felt for anyone – pure loathing, mixed with an equal amount of anger, fear, and despair.

Then, I finally lost consciousness and fell into a blissful, painless sleep.


I didn't know how much time had passed when I woke up the next time. This time, I was in a small white cell, and I was lying on a tiny bed that stood in one of the corners. On the wall opposite of me was a door with a small look-through window. Next to my bed was a small table; the room also had a toilet and washbasin behind a partition wall.

Otherwise, my room was completely bare. It looked like a prison cell.

As if someone had watched me the whole time and knew I had just awoken, the door opened and a metal tray with food and water in a bottle were shoved into the room. Quickly, I contemplated my situation and options and almost refused to eat, simply because it would be as if I was accepting my fate of becoming a human guinea pig.

But then my rational side took over. If I ever wanted to get out of here, I needed to eat nutrients to stay strong and endure this until they slipped up. Yes, the procedure was beyond painful, and if I didn't eat, I would someday be too weak to get experimented on.

However, I didn't know if that would stop them – I doubted it. I had the feeling that they would continue with whatever they were trying to achieve, even if I starved myself. Most likely it would only end up with me dying again. I wouldn't have to endure these... medical procedures if I just died earlier, but I didn't want to die. This life had just started!

I still had things I wanted to do – I wanted to see the people I loved again and that could only be done if I held on and survived. My past life had been ripped away from me, and I didn't want this life to end even earlier. Even if death was definitely more peaceful than getting experimented on.

No, I had to stay strong and endure, survive for my family, my friends and myself. I swore to myself that I wouldn't give in. This was my resolve.

With every bite I ate, I mentally repeated what I had told myself to steel my mind and body against the torture that would surely continue soon. The water soothed my hoarse throat.


Hours later, someone retrieved the tray, and I started exercising inside my room – I wouldn't let my body get too weak to escape and there was nothing better to do anyway. My body still hurt a little from the liquid they had injected into me with, but I ignored the pain. At least my headache had gotten better.

At some point in time, the light inside my room went out, and I was left in darkness. That most likely meant that I should sleep. Again, I did as I was told and got into bed, pulling the blanket over me.

I couldn't sleep at first because my thoughts kept reminding me of the torture I would certainly have to endure again; pictures of my friends dying before my eyes were floating through my mind. To counter that, I imagined myself playing my favourite songs on the piano and concentrated on my breathing. After some time it worked and my mind got calmer and calmer, sending me off into a dream.

I woke up several times due to nightmares reminding me again of that blood covered mall with the corpses or the screams of other children that confirmed that I wasn't the only test subject here.

But unlike me, they were real children who got tortured by them. Not that being tortured as an adult was any better. But this was even more unforgivable. Thus, my hatred towards those people who had captured me – those monsters – only continued growing.

When the lights went on again, I stood up from my bed to perform a short morning routine, waiting for them to get me. I was going to try to escape for the first time today.

However, my plans were halted when some sort of fog seeped from somewhere up on the ceiling.

Covering my mouth and nose with my blanket, I held my breath as if I were about to drown, but in the end, the paralysing fog won. My body slumped over, unresponsive. My mind, however, was wide awake.

Two men came in when I was fully out of commission and placed me on a wheelchair before they rolled me out into another room. They placed me on some kind of seat and held onto my arms to make sure I wouldn't collapse.

Then a woman joined them and took off my hospital gown. I protested but to no avail – I couldn't talk. The woman started washing me with a shower head and some liquid soap that smelled weirdly antiseptic. After washing me like a lifeless doll to the point of absolute detest, she dried me with a towel and put on new white underwear and a new hospital gown.

No thoughts were spent on my privacy.

The men placed me back into the wheelchair and rolled me into the great white room – the torture chamber. Together, they heaved me onto the stretcher and strapped me down just when my strength started to return. The same men from last time were watching me from behind the glass window or whatever it was made out of.

'I will get out of here! You'll see!' I declared inside my head, a fire of determination burning inside me that battled with my overwhelming fear. The other four doctors came into the room and looked expectantly at the men standing behind the window.

"Start the injections on test subject 004 of the new 'Seraph of the End' transfer project." The same man who had spoken last time commanded via loudspeaker.

The doctors picked up the syringes and started the injections. This time, I knew what was coming; although, that didn't make it hurt any less. If anything, the anticipation of pain made it worse. I screamed and screamed – it was a reaction I couldn't control. Again, I was subjected to the ultimate pain and did only fall unconscious once the pain started to subside. My new mantra was repeatedly chorused inside my mind.

Endure the pain.

Stay strong.

Don't give up.

Survive for your family, friends, and for yourself.


The next time I woke up, I was in my cell again. I guessed that they let me have a one day pause in between the torture sessions. I hadn't really thought about it when I heard it, but what the guy who was in charge had said about the 'Seraph of the End' project, made my mind almost burst at the impossibility of everything.

I have had inexplicable déjà vu before, but I hadn't really found the reason as to why... and yet, here in this facility, it became as clear as day.

Somehow I had been reborn into the world of 'Owari no Seraph', the last anime I had watched before I died. A story about a post-apocalyptic world where vampires and humans fought against each other and monsters roamed the earth. A world where children were used for experimentation or as livestock.

And I was right in the middle of it.

These men were trying to turn me into a seraph, a weapon of destruction, and they had somehow caused the virus if I remembered right… and the death of many people in the process. Because they were lusting for power.

For them power was worth the death of millions of people, and Kaori and Akira, my parents, and other friends who were older than me were most likely dead because of them. The virus had affected people above a certain age.

Kaori and Akira… they had gone to the mall because of me. Would they have survived if they had been away from large crowds of people that spread the virus faster?

That sobering line of thoughts made my heart clench together in pain and guilt… tears began to trail down my face as I accepted the truth I didn't want to see back then. They were dead. They had died on that day. And my parents… where did they even go and what surprise had they been planning? Would I ever find out? Were they still alive? What about my other friends?

Were they alright...?

In the story, the virus had affected most people over the age of thirteen. But why hadn't I been affected then, too? I had turned thirteen two months ago. Was I somehow… spared because I had already died once? Or was I just lucky and a freak of nature? Maybe only people the age of fourteen and above had been affected?

Why had I even been reborn? I knew a bit about the story of 'Owari no Seraph', but only had realised now, when it was too late to stop the apocalypse, that I was in it. Could I even have changed that if I had recognized the signs much earlier?

Doubtful.

No matter what knowledge I possessed, I still had been only a child without power or influence, even if someone had believed my story of rebirth. I couldn't have possibly prevented a worldwide disaster.

Was I sent here to change things after the apocalypse? That thought seemed presumptuous. Aside from getting reborn, there was nothing special about me. I was probably here for no reason at all. Maybe I had just been unlucky to be reborn in this parallel world.

No matter how much I thought about these things, right now I was a prisoner here. The most important thing at the moment was to find a way to escape; then, I would look for my precious people, and then I could think about my future actions and the story. This wasn't a story, this was my life after all.

I didn't know much about the story in the first place and many things had been forgotten. Thanks to one of my friends who'd always try to spoil the whole plot, I remembered vaguely that the experiments of the Hyakuya Sect on Yū and Mikaela had been continued under the Japanese Imperial Demon Army. It had been my last conversation with her, so it was still lingering in my mind.

The Demon Army was experimenting on me and other children, though I couldn't understand the reason for that. I remembered hearing a spoiler from her that only children with a special seraph gene were experimented on. Or was that false information?

Were the things from the anime/manga even accurate in this world? Did I perhaps have that ominous seraph gene? Or was I just a random person who got involved in this mess by sheer bad luck?

…Who could really tell?

I wiped away the rest of my tears and decided that it would be best for now to try and remember as much as possible about the show, even if there was no guarantee that the same would happen in this world.

For the whole day, I was thinking about the story and the characters, even when I ate my two meals of the day and exercised. I repeated that for the next days, while the morning after each break started with fog entering the room again, and once I had no more control over my body, the two guys with the wheelchair came, brought me to the shower room where the woman would wash and clean me and redress me, and then came the torture room.

Day in, day out for the first month: it was the same routine. One day break, torture with injections the next.

However, at some point the time between the injections was prolonged to a week, then to two. That didn't mean that they didn't do other examinations or tests. Often I was sat on some kind of strange seat with wires and pipes attached to it, that got loaded with electricity. I didn't remember much of that procedure in particular. Other times I was placed in the middle of some kind of magic circle with talismans attached to me. My mind became dizzy and unfocused whenever they did that and sometimes I had mental blanks that lasted for days afterwards. If I didn't know better, I would have thought that I was the victim of some occult sect.

Or rather, this was an occult sect. As a result it was impossible to fathom how much time had passed here, I had given up to count after day seven hundred thirty three, which was also just a guess, simply because it was too depressing to think about how long I had already been here and had never had a chance to escape.

I tried to make plans how to get out, and what I would do when I got out. Both weren't very convincing. There had never been an opportunity for me to even try to sneak out. Even when I tried to pry the door open with parts of furniture during the... what-I-assumed-to-be night, I didn't succeed.

In my frustration, I destroyed my room and the things in it more than once. Destruction was a way to get rid off my built-up frustration, desperation and anger. I've never had a destructive urge until now...

My captors brought me a radio, keyboard, paper, books, and console games to keep me somewhat sane and from destroying the furniture for the nth time; however, that didn't stop me from planning all their deaths in the most painful way possible. My thoughts were drifting off into the darkest corners they had never been to inside this facility.

Sometimes, one of those shithead doctors came to my cell to talk with me, tried to evaluate me and brainwash me by saying that I would become a hero who would save all of humanity and kill all the monsters if I held out for longer. They told me lies that vampires were the ones who started the apocalypse and how they were at fault for everything, to make me want to eliminate them.

But I knew the truth, or at least what I thought to be the truth. I didn't believe a word the doctors chanted, even if I would get rewards like a dog whenever I'd do their bidding.

A new book, for example, or different meals if my request wasn't too exotic. Most of the time I would remain completely silent, glaring at the doctor in my room with pure hatred, but one time I just couldn't bear it anymore and even attacked the man who was always spouting nothing but nonsense. As if my friends and parents would want me to endure this, so I would one day be able to save mankind, and other garbage.

Certainly, I was enduring this for them, but only to escape from here and not to become a bio weapon for these men. I didn't want to be their saviour and I didn't ask for any of this. It wasn't my responsibility to clean up the mess they have made. I wanted to study music, become a pianist. I wanted to search for my parents and friends, not become a bio weapon for the sake of these people.

The infuriated man tried many different approaches to make me more compliant and that arsehole made me so incredibly furious with his self-righteous nonsense and attempts at brainwashing me that I just... snapped one day. I launched myself at him like a wild beast and beat the man down before I used the chair and brought it down on his head. Why couldn't he just shut up?!

"How about saving mankind yourself?! How about injecting yourself?! Stop using others for your own gain, you pretentious piece of shit!" I growled, heavy huffs stopping me from speaking coherently.

Before I was restrained in my anger-driven daze, I managed to kick him a few times until he stopped moving and blood spread on the ground underneath him. It gave me satisfaction to see one of those 'doctors' injured and unmoving on the ground, coercing a cruel and twisted smile to spread over my face.

Then I calmed down and realized what I had done... I had beaten up bullies before but not like this... And this time around, I didn't even feel sorry for it.

I wondered what the time in captivity did to my personality – my sanity… refraining from dwelling on that line of thought. I had never been one for violence or aggressive behaviour in both of my lives; as such, I had never really hurt someone outside a training fight or other than to scare off some bullies... until now. And didn't even feel sorry this time..

It frightened me, to say the least, so I tried to bury those thoughts, the whole incident, as one would bury the dead – deep into my soul.


I didn't care if there were any consequences for my actions, until another doctor began talking to me a week later while I was restrained with handcuffs. That had seemed to be the only repercussion for my actions.

Even more depressing was the fact that I heard fewer and fewer children scream over the time here. It wasn't a good sign – screaming meant they were alive. I didn't know if they had died, or if the doctors had been successful and they were brought somewhere else where they didn't have to endure the injections or other experiments and procedures anymore. With all my heart I hoped for the latter.

Nightmares of the day of the apocalypse and the deaths of the other children as well as my torture kept haunting me, in spite of the 'therapy sessions' here. It was more attempts at brainwashing than anything else.

With each day that passed, I got angrier and more frustrated at my own inability to do anything to help the other children or to get out myself. It felt as if I wasn't even trying, although I was trying; I trained, ate, slept, made plans and watched each and every detail I saw when I would be brought out of my room.

I already knew that downstairs was a morgue and that there were stairs that led up to the rooftop. As I only passed the stairs with the respective signs on it whenever I'd be brought outside with the wheelchair, everything else was pretty much a mystery.

Every time I went to bed and heard other children screaming, the guilt came. If another person had come to this world, could they have changed it for the better?

Of course, I never received answers to these questions I asked myself over and over again until I came to the conclusion that 'what ifs' wouldn't help me nor them. They would only drive me crazy... or more crazy than I already was. It was what it was.

The seemingly endless routine of tests repeated itself over and over again, my mantra being the only thing keeping me sane – my conviction that I would get out of here and find my remaining friends if I only stayed strong and endured.

I took refuge inside my mind during my time here. I composed many new piano pieces and played them and other songs that reminded me of friends, family, and happier days on the keyboard I had received, as well as inside my mind. Although I was working out every time on my spare day to stay fit and strong, the experiments made me weaker and weaker.

At some point in time, my chest started to hurt, and I even coughed up blood. That couldn't be good. Scared, I told the men that came with the wheelchair, but it seemed that they didn't care. Panic and fear were towering over me, leaving their shadows of impending doom. I didn't want to die here, not after everything I had to endure!

I tried to protest and struggle as they brought me into the torture room for my injections and bound me to the stretcher once more.

"NOOO! LET ME GO! I DON'T WANT TO DIE!" I screamed at the top of my lungs.

"It seems that the last one still has some fighting spirit inside her," Evil Eyebrows commented to one of the doctors, Nakahara, the one with the glasses.

"She's a truly vicious little thing, Sir. You should have seen what she did to Ishida," the doctor replied in his nasal voice. A new doctor I had never seen before, perhaps this... Ishida's substitute, injected me with something while the other ones were preoccupied with preparing everything. Probably to make me calm down.

Evil Eyebrows – Hiiragi Kureto – smirked as if this was funny to him. "I know. I've seen the records. Maybe test subject 004 will survive. We really need the power of the seraph. We've come too far to give up." He glanced once more at me before he, together with the blond woman that followed him around like a dog, went into the other room behind the glass windows. There were some more soldiers of higher ranks judging from the uniforms standing watch next to them that I had never seen before. I didn't care about them anyway. I knew that no one would help me.

An overwhelming feeling of dread and despair settled in my heart. I was the last one? The thought made me feel nauseated. I knew that it had been rather silent for some time, but I didn't think that…

Dangerous, deadly hot wrath bubbled up inside my body and I snapped.

"You murderers! You MONSTERS!" Didn't they care that they had the lives of innocent children on their conscience?! "I swear I will get out of here and then I will kill you all!" I glared at the persons donning the JIDA uniforms behind the safety glass – Kureto and the blond woman.

I had never wished for the death of someone, no matter how vile and evil; hence, I had never been able to truly comprehend how someone could want to kill another person, yet in this moment, I understood. I truly understood why people did it. I felt it… bloodlust and the deepest hatred I had ever felt. I wanted each and every one of these monsters here DEAD, but before that they would SUFFER. I wanted to rip all of them apart.

The doctors who pushed the syringes into my skin, Kureto who commanded them, the guys with the wheelchair, the woman who washed me, and the people who just stood by and watched. Each and every one inside of this accursed facility. I wanted them all dead! They deserved all a spot in the deepest part of Hell!

Still, my death threat had no effect and they injected me with the familiar liquid. I was powerless.

"Increase the dose," came Kureto's voice from the speaker and the doctors did as told. I screamed and screamed as the pain was even worse than usual and then everything suddenly stopped and I fell into the familiar abyss.


Shinya woke up in the hospital after... fighting someone? His memory was somewhat hazy, but he knew that he and his friends had been in trouble. They had tried to prevent the apocalypse. Guren visited him a few hours later to tell him everything: how Shinya and the other four had been seriously injured by Mahiru when they interrupted the ritual that she wanted to use to start the apocalypse, and how a virus had killed many people over the age of thirteen worldwide, and that the vampires had emerged from their hiding place and had taken human children with them.

Shinya couldn't believe that he had just slept through the literal apocalypse. That they had failed to prevent it and that Mahiru had died and replaced the demon in Guren's sword. Shinya had failed to save Vivian, her parents, her friends, everyone. Everyone, who was over the age of thirteen and didn't have a demon in their bodies like Shinya or most of the people from magical syndicates like the Order of the Imperial Demons or the Order of the Imperial Moon, was dead. All ordinary people the age of fourteen and above had been annihilated by the virus, that had been the result of Mahiru's ritual according to Guren.

Worry grew in his heart for his oldest friend and secret crush – he had done everything in his power to keep her a secret from his family, the leaders of the Order of the Imperial Demons – so Shinya charged his phone, that had gone out at some point, in the hopes of finding a message from Vivian on it. Shinya hoped that the soldiers of the Order of the Imperial Demons had evacuated her with all the other orphaned children close by to Shibuya or to Shinjuku, which was closer to her home, or that she was intelligent enough to stay at home, so she wouldn't get caught by vampires or killed by the Horseman of the Apocalypse, which had begun to turn up everywhere.

He didn't want to believe that she could have been affected by the virus; she had just turned thirteen years old two months ago.

When the phone was finally charged, Shinya saw that Vivian had indeed called him and had left him a message. Anxiously, with a pounding heart he listened to it. The phone line had still been working at that time, unlike now. The vampires had destroyed their means of communication.

The message was from the 25th of December – almost three weeks ago, right around the time when the virus had spread. Scared what he would hear, his heartbeat quickened, but Shinya wanted to know what had happened to her.

"Sh-Shinya-nii! No one is answering my calls somehow... I'm at a shopping centre. I-I'm trying to call for an ambulance, but... no one is answering! Shinya, everyone around me... they're all...!" Shinya could hear a sob on her end before she continued in that shaky and utterly scared tone that made Shinya's heart ache. "Kaori and Akira, too... t-they just... collapsed. There is blood everywhere... they're not breathing! I'm scared... What is happening?! Please call me back if you can and be okay, Shinya-n-," the message was cut off because it was getting too long.

"Oh God, Vivi-chan... You're alive..." Short-lived relief flooded through his body and mind that changed to sympathy and worry. She had seen the deaths of countless people and the deaths of two of her best friends from up close. Shinya never wanted her to see the dark side of humanity, which is why he had never told her her about his past or details about his life.

As soon as he was healthy enough to be out of his hospital bed, Shinya rushed down the stairs and left the building after informing his friends Goshi, Sayuri-chan, Mito-chan, and Shigure-chan who were fortunately all alive, too, about it. They all had demon weapons and superior healing abilities because of them, but it seemed that whatever Mahiru had done to them to knock them out prevented the demon from healing them. He couldn't remember what exactly had occurred, but Guren must have somehow saved them all. Said person was the one he ran into at the entrance of the hospital.

"Shinya?! What the fuck are you doing out of bed?! You're not well enough yet!" His friend stopped him and grabbed his arm to stop him from running outside.

"Guren! Vivi-chan is still out there somewhere! I'm sure that she survived the virus! I could hear her on voicemail after the outbreak," he informed his male best friend.

"Vivi-chan? Ah, that girl you like?" Comprehension dawned on Guren's face. Shinya had told his friends reluctantly about his crush after Guren had figured it out when he had caught Shinya staring at her picture on his prepaid phone a few days before the apocalypse. They all knew that they had to keep her a secret from the Hiiragi. Unlike them she was just a normal girl without any magic abilities.

"Psst! What if someone hears?!" They were inside a hospital that was staffed with people belonging to the Order of the Imperial Demons.

"Right... But you're not well enough yet to search for her. You can't go out there now. You're just going to get yourself killed, Shinya. Wait for a little longer until your body has properly healed... and then we'll all help you search for her."

"But-"

"No buts. You can't search for her if you're dead. She's smart for her age, isn't she?" Guren asked him.

"...She is."

"Then she'll be able to survive. Rest for a while longer until you're better. She would want the same for you, too, wouldn't she?" His friend eyed him sternly.

Shinya couldn't help but sink his eyes in shame... Yes, Vivi-chan wouldn't forgive him if he died while searching for her. She had explicitly told him not to die. He let Guren help him back into his room and bed.

'Soon, Vivi-chan. I'll find you. Stay strong for a while longer.'


Almost a week later Shinya and his friends were well enough to go searching for Vivian and they left for Vivian's home in Shinjuku. The Hiiragi Clan had only pardoned the squad for betraying their Order of the Imperial Demons two days before the apocalypse, because they needed every capable man and woman with high-ranking demon weapons to fight against the vampires and to keep the Horsemen at bay. A barrier was being errected in Shibuya and in Shinjuku.

Shinya and his friends had left under the pretense of wanting to clear the area of enemies, which wasn't entirely a lie. They had to kill two Horsemen of the Apocalypse on the way to Vivian's apartment. Otherwise they made it there by car without any other disturbances.

Shinya figured that this was one of the places she could have gone to if she wasn't in the refugee camp in Shibuya or Shinjuku. They had searched in these places first and checked them, but Vivian wasn't there. Someone with her light hair colour would have gotten noticed, but no one had seen someone like her.

The electricity was still on in this part of the city, so Shinya didn't have a problem with entering Vivian's apartment – he knew the code to the electric door panel by heart. Shinya, Goshi, Mito, Sayuri, Shigure, and Guren searched for the blond girl, but it looked like no one was there... or had been there for a while.

Everything was orderly but slightly dusty. The beds of the family of three had been made and it didn't look like any supplies had been taken either. Shinya peered into the fridge to check if someone had added new things, but only found bad food. He put everything into a rubbish bag and took out the rubbish, too, to dispose of it when they left. Maybe Vivian would return to her apartment sometime...

With a heavy heart they left the place but Shinya left a message for her on the living room table – the one she had to pass to get to her room.

"Don't worry, Lord Shinya. I'm sure that girl is fine," Goshi patted him on the shoulder.

"I hope so..."

Shinya decided that the shopping centre was their next stop. He knew which one she had talked about on the phone because they had gone there for Karaoke once or twice and it was the closest one to her home.

He knew that the Demon Army wasn't done yet with disposing of the millions of corpses in the city and wouldn't be done in a while or ever... but to see the bodies of hundreds of people strewn on the ground, that was covered in puddles of dried blood, was truly an image out of a nightmare. They were lucky that it was in the midst of winter, so the bodies still were in a good condition and didn't smell or rot much... yet.

Sayuri began to cry at the sight, Mito had tears in her eyes, too. The faces of his other three companions were stony. They all felt guilty that they had been unable to prevent this.

"Your friend was right here when all these people died, Lord Shinya?" Sayuri inquired. Shinya just nodded with his lips pressed into a thin line.

"Damn. That's the worst place the girl could have been at at that time," Goshi mumbled, being careful not to step on a body. They were literally everywhere.

Shinya couldn't agree more. He didn't want to imagine what it was like for his younger friend to see the people all around her drop like flies and die in puddles of their own blood. Because he had failed to prevent the apocalypse. The teen balled his fists, continuing to look around for something, anything that pointed into Vivian's direction, but he found nothing.

Wait, she had said that she couldn't get through to call for an ambulance. If she wasn't able to call for help, she surely would have gotten it herself.

"I have an idea where she could be... Follow me," Shinya told his friends and left the building. The white-haired teen began to walk into the direction of the nearest hospital, his friends trailing behind him. Shinya thought that Guren was oddly silent, but didn't comment on it. He was beside himself, too. Then something crunched under his shoe and Shinya looked down to see that he had stepped onto a mobile phone; a very familiar one at that.

He bent down to take the blue phone with a plastic sword-strap from an anime series attached to it – it was Vivian's.

"Lord Shinya, is this...?" Mito peered at the small contraption in his hands.

"Yes, it's Vivi-chan's. I wonder why she let go of it... " Swiftly, they searched the surrounding areas, but could fortunately not find a corpse with blond hair. But they also didn't find signs of life.

He and the others took the car and drove down to the hospital Vivian had tried to reach, keeping their eyes closely on their surroundings. However, they didn't find anything else of her and the hospital was a dead end – literally. It had burned down and was in a very bad condition. It looked like a large transporter had crashed into the building... or maybe a horde of Horsemen. They were running all over the place since the apocalypse.

"Shit," Goshi cursed, voicing the mutual thought of the group. Shinya couldn't agree more. It felt as if he was in some kind of fever dream. He still couldn't believe that he lived in a post-apocalyptic world now and that Vivi-chan was somewhere in this nightmarish world, all alone... if she survived. No, she had to be alive!

"We should get back to Shibuya for now. It's getting dark and the street lights don't work properly in this area, so we won't be able to continue the search for today," Guren announced, talking for the first time ever since leaving Shibuya.

Shinya didn't want to stop searching, but he knew that his friend was right. Staying here any longer would endanger all of them. Some of the vampires could still be around. Had Vivi-chan been captured by them? No, Shinya didn't even want to think about it. What those bloodthirsty monsters could do to her...

"Fine," Shinya agreed.

The small group of humans took a different route on the way back and Shinya was spacing out as Goshi was driving, but then a familiar sight hit him.

"Stop the car, Goshi!"

The other teen was startled by his friend's outburst, but hit the break. Luckily, they had all worn their seatbelts. Shinya hurried out of the car and rushed to another one that he recognized. Inside, he found the bodies of two people who had always been very nice to him and who had treated him like their own son... Vivi-chan's parents. Kido Hayate and Irina. Their faces were covered in dried blood, especially around the eyes and mouth.

"Do you know these people, Shinya-sama?" Sayuri asked him with concern shining in her eyes. Next to her, Guren seemed to be staring at a nearby building.

"They're... Vivi-chan's parents. They always treated me well... Could you help me to...?" They had been more like parents to him than his own parents who had sold Shinya to the Hiiragi family when he was young to improve their own social standing.

"I'll help you to take out their bodies," Guren broke out of his thoughts and offered his help, which was another thing Shinya found strange. Perhaps he was just interpreting too much into it – Guren could be nice if he wanted to.

The squad returned to Shibuya without Shinya's friend, but with the dead bodies of her parents in their car trunk.


A/N: Thank you for reading this chapter! I would love some reviews. Are the chapters too long? Do you think I've kept everyone in character?

I hope you will return for the next chapter!