Paper lanterns alight and in just about every open space in the inky night sky, chaos broke out in celebration. Multicolored flames were lit on pillars, lighting the scene with glimmering spectrums of cobalt, cherry, and emerald. Demons danced under torii, drinks pouring and food plentiful; the festivity showed no signs of stopping. The new Queen found herself right in the middle of it all, cheering out triumphantly at the mess, enjoying the discord that rang out in celebration of their marriage; the new reign of Hell.
But it was loud. Uncomfortably loud. And she had more than enough drinks to be a bit past buzzed.
Wandering away from all the noise, her head aching, Totoko found Osomatsu overlooking everything. He was watching the celebration over a balcony, focused intensely.
"Hey," she slung her arms against the railing too, looking up at him, "That's some scary shit, ain't it?"
Osomatsu's concentration broke after a minute. "You think it's scary?" He brought a thumb up and pressed it against the back of one of his canines, the freshly-sharpened teeth sore. "I don't think it's scary."
"Then again, I guess you spent half of your life like this, right?" Oso looked over at her. "Because you were raised as the prince?"
He shrugged. "I mean, I guess. There usually aren't festivals like this, though; it's just crime and chaos and bad stuff happening. But they worship their monarchy like it's the only thing left they can do."
Leathery red wings twitched as he leant forward. "Like, the fact that I'm King of Hell? They're eating that up. They remember me as that terrified little boy with the bullet in my head that bled everywhere all the time and was constantly screaming and wailing that I wanted to go home. I've grown up a lot, I think, and they think so too." He ran a finger under his nose.
Totoko let out a whoop. "Hell's sweetheart."
The two of them laughed at this, Totoko adjusting the grip on her drink so she didn't drop it.
"Ugh," she remarked, tilting the blood-red wine it as if inspecting it, "I didn't even want this. They just keep refilling it the moment they see it goes empty and I'm too new to be confident enough to tell them no."
"Tell them no," Oso interjected, glancing over at her, "You're their Queen. If you told them you didn't want another drink, but wanted them to slaughter each other until only one of them was left, they would do it- no questions asked."
Totoko ignored the odd statement and cleared her throat, watching everything unfold below them. On the first night she spent in Hell, Oso excitedly informed her on the basics of how things worked on the other side. Mirrors acted as windows to the world where mortals lived, but demons couldn't break the glass to get through unless they were given the privilege of learning how to do so. Only divine beings were allowed to do that, which meant Osomatsu would eventually be the only one. Earning his horns would be the starting point that would enable him to begin gathering the strength and power to break it.
Whenever you looked into a mirror, you were staring into Hell. Though the reflection of whatever you were looking at was just an illusion. Created to prevent suspicion of the demons' presences, just shortly out of the view of the mirror on the other side was a warped version of the real world that never saw a single sunrise, deemed crime legal and encouraged it, and performed mildly concerning rituals nearly all the time. Turns out, Oso was wrong, and the wedding of a nobody could be forged; somebody as noble and praised as a prince was necessary to be wed publicly. He claimed he didn't know this either, but Totoko absolutely remembered what a sly shit he was. She was proud of herself for only threatening to kill him a handful of times instead of by the minute.
At that point, though, Totoko honestly didn't care. She was already being showered with gifts and could have anything she wanted with a snap of her fingers. (It didn't really bother her that he very likely lied to her to get her through the mirror. Like, at all. He got freebies because he'd been dead for 15 years and she had admittedly missed his company.) The money and gifts she drowned in were just the same.
But, now that it was all said and done, all that was left was to celebrate a new reign of Hell, a young King and Queen set to be on the throne for a while.
The King leant back from the rail, crossing his arms. "I think I'm gonna go back down. Are you coming with me?"
Totoko's temples pulsed grievously. Still, she chose to ignore it, and tilted her wine glass over the rail, emptying its contents out onto the pavement below. A fat, red stain blossomed.
"Sure."
She followed him closely down a winding staircase, through the thick crowds that already flooded the hallways of the palace, people whom she had never met before reaching out and trying to grab her, long nails clawing gently. Frightened, Totoko gripped the back of Oso's shirt between his wings with white knuckles, leaving him nearly no room at all. He turned his head, puzzled.
"Osomatsu, they keep trying to latch onto me!" Totoko cried, eyes flicking from one demon to another, unsymmetrical faces covered in spikes and scales and blood peering back at her, still attempting to grasp the fabric of her kimono. She let out a yelp, shoving her face into Oso's back, causing him to stop. "Oso-kun, I'm scared!"
"There's nothing to be scared of," He calmly reassured her, stepping away, but leaving a hand on her shoulder. "They wouldn't hurt you- they wouldn't dare."
Totoko lifted her head from her hands as she looked over to him, then at the demons that inched closer.
"You're new around here. This is the first time they've seen you up close. They're just curious about you, that's all."
"By trying to grab me?!"
"Just your arms. Plus, they wouldn't really 'grab' you anyway; just place a hand on your shoulder or something." Although he saw nothing wrong with it, Osomatsu picked up on how frightened Totoko was and finally realized that he should probably do something. He tried to put on an act, throwing his fists onto his hips and stiffening his expression. He glared around the room at everyone, hoping it was convincing enough.
"However, who are they to automatically assume they can just casually lay a finger on the Queen like that?" The demons began to step backwards, eyeing their King cautiously and shamefully. He scowled at them in warning, feeling proud of himself when he saw Totoko's muscles loosen in his peripherals.
"Come on," He for beckoned her to follow him, "They won't bother you like that any more."
Upon passing under the doorframe out into the festival, the headache that throbbed in Totoko's brain grew even worse, and the hand that wasn't occupied with an empty wineglass mindlessly shoved itself against the side of her skull. She winced in pain, tears pooling in the lids of her eyes, but not falling.
She glanced up to say something to Osomatsu about it, but was met by no one, the childlike man dispersed deep into the crowd already. Totoko blew out a sigh, rubbing her head as she continued into the courtyard, trying her best to enjoy the party that was going on for her. Truthfully, she just wanted sleep; and an Aspirin, maybe?
She felt wind on her side and lazily turned her head, met by a demon donned in a neat uniform, hastily whisking the glass out of her hands. Totoko's throat felt suddenly sore.
"Ah, n-no," she mumbled, holding out a hand at the demon, who hadn't seemed to hear her small voice, "I don't want any more."
"I'm sorry, your majesty?" The demon leant in closer, pausing the pouring.
"I said I don't want any." Totoko ran a hand through her fringe, trying to find the confidence she boasted on the other side of the mirror. "I don't want any more wine for the rest of the night." Scoffing, she added (hesitantly), "And if somebody else tries to give me wine for the rest of the night, I'll have their head." Her voice squeaked. "Got it...?"
The demon tried to mask their fear, but were terrible at it. They nodded once, expression serious. "Absolutely, your highness. I'll make sure of it." And with that, they turned precipitously and dissolved into the sea of bodies.
Totoko almost felt bad, but at the same time, butterflies tickled the lining of her stomach at the power she had. These people truly were at her feet, weren't they?
She caught a flash of blue in front of her and shifted her gaze, Osomatsu's suit bright compared to the darker shades that everybody else wore. He came towards her, saying something as he was approaching.
Totoko squinted. "What?"
Finally in front of her, Osomatsu grabbed Totoko's hand, pulling her closer so he could hear her better. "Totoko-chan!"
She stumbled forward at his pull, leaning in. "Huh?" The noise was hurting her ears and she hardly had gotten any sleep in the precursory days in preparation for the wedding and her migraine was getting even worse.
"Are you ready?" The teeth buried in Osomatsu's coy smirk twinkled in a pretty off-white from the flames and light surrounding them. Demons began to pay more attention to them, stopping what they were doing to gaze into their direction. Totoko grew confused.
"Ready?"
"Yeah!"
"For what?"
"To get your horns too!"
Totoko nearly choked, her eyes bugged and her hand torn away from his. Demons were closing in on them again. "My what?! H-Huh?"
Oso laughed as if nothing was wrong, rubbing under his nose. His new arrowed tail flicked around behind him playfully as if it was just a bit of fun. "You didn't think you'd get to be the Queen of Hell without getting some of your own, did you?"
Totoko's face flushed ghostly pale. The party around her began to quiet for a second, all of Hell's inhabitants closing in around the two of them, watching them intensely. Suddenly, everyone burst into chaos again, rearranging themselves. Oso took his friend's hand in his and tugged her through the mess to the beginning of a row of torii gates. The music of the shamisen, taiko, and shakuhachi began to shift, the noise growing rather aggressive and resonant, the pounding of the drum vibrating Totoko's insides. She dug her fingernails deeply into the back of Oso's hand, breaking the skin. He sheepishly ripped it away, rubbing it.
"What was that for?" He whined, licking the wound. The already-pulsing vein on Totoko's temple nearly burst.
"What do you mean, 'what was that for'?" She hissed through her teeth, the demons around them nearly finished rushing around. Down the long path of torii, flames on pillars were lit, leading all the way up to a platform that was surrounded by even more pillars. The beat of the taiko grew steady and low now, and the demons around them grew silent, hands at their sides and their eyes glued to their King. A pang hit Totoko's stomach and blood rushed to her joints. There was no backing out of this now, was there?
"It'll be fine, Totoko-chan!" Osomatsu's lighthearted demeanor shone through even the darkness of Hell and the situation itself, rubbing his nose. "Just wait until I give you the okay to walk up to me, alright? I'll let you know. Stay here."
Poor Totoko could do nothing but watch as her childhood friend spun on his heel, hands behind his back - which was now to her - as his wings twitched in anticipation and his tail snapped around his legs. Lifting his chin, she heard a voice; a choice of words; that came out of his mouth that didn't sound anything like him at all.
"Humans, once they die, must bow before two divine beings to determine their fates, no?"
Demons fixated themselves on their King, who began to slink along under the torii, fingertip swirling on the peak of one of his horns. Totoko watched too, the wine in her stomach not sitting very well.
"They'll bow before me and they'll bow before God. They live in a world where religion rules their lives, yet they find themselves questioning whether or not I am actually here, preaching - in a way - to my subjects, about their poor, miserable existences."
A grin spread across his face, one of his fangs catching on his lower lip. He continued on, lolling his head as he closed his eyes comfortably.
"They have nothing to worry about. I am very much real! They spend their whole lives trying to fend me off and get on good terms with God," he scoffed, but returned, "That way they never meet me. But they'll have to meet me anyway. Their efforts are in vain."
The blue flames experienced an upsurge and leapt towards him, the flickering light creating an uncomfortable flash and color contrast on his wet bullet wound that had never healed.
"And when they kneel before God and I, I must be the one to reach within them to rip out their miserable, useless heart now that its ticked its last tock, because God is too clean to want to get His hands a little bloody."
He stopped, throwing out his arms in a frozen shrug. "But you all already know this, right?"
A chorus of yokai screamed out at him in response, causing a smirk to inch across his pink face.
"Right, right, of course you do," Osomatsu humored them, growing further and further away from Totoko and closer to the platform at the end of the gates, "Well, once we've weighed their heart of their evil and their good, we decide who gets to take them. If your heart's heavy, you're mine, correct?"
The chorus yelled out again. Osomatsu was nearly to the steps. The fire danced on his skin.
"And I suppose you all remember when the King before me weighed your hearts and decided you would be who you are right now?"
Totoko's skin grew goosebumps. She didn't like this. Her headache worsened even more.
"I was a prince. I've been coronated today. With my coronation comes new advantages and opportunities."
Oso set one foot onto a step. His heel clicked quietly.
"I want to break the mirror. This small, closet's-worth of a world isn't enough for us."
Another step.
"And I'm going to do it. I'm going to learn how."
He was onto the platform now, the fire pillars of blue fading to red and swallowing his body into crimson. He walked to the center, crossing his arms.
"But while I'm on the other side of the mirror, busy taking over things, you'll need someone to rule over Hell until things are good to cross you over."
Totoko's stomach turned betrayingly. Was that all she was, was a babysitter? She could have the world and more, just as long as she could babysit his subjects for a little while? Is that what he wanted her for?
Osomatsu stretched out an arm towards the direction he had just walked from, fingertips flattened in acknowledgement of her.
"I married today and received my horns, granting me the starting wisdom to discovering how to break the mirror. However, we can't just have some mortal watching over Hell, can we?"
His question was met by silence. The tips of Totoko's ears were red with bubbling hatred.
"My Queen, come here."
Though she didn't want to, Totoko began to approach him, trudging under the torii as innumerable demons watched. If the two of them were alone, she would've been letting him have it for sure; probably would've kicked his ass. But she feared these people. She feared them more than she feared Osomatsu, who was the same as he always was but eerily different in an way that was unable to be placed.
The flames were blinding her, but she kept going. Everyone stirred in the odd silence. Osomatsu tried to break it.
"She's a beauty, is she not?"
The chorus rang out. Strangely enough, instead of feeling flattered like she would have at home, Totoko felt objectified. She didn't feel like a real person here more than she did a decorative doll. Even under the heavy plumes of color, her skin was porcelain white from the makeup they smothered her with. She knew very well she was a beauty; nobody had to tell her, especially creepy-ass demons that were undeniably terrible people in life. Why else were they there?
Finally, she reached who was technically her husband, but didn't think of him as anything more than her old best friend, who took her hand in his. He guided her next to him, and she followed his lead as he turned to face her.
She found it much easier to stare into the depths of his gory bullet hole rather than the pools of his eyes.
"I'm going to give you horns like myself. You'll also have a tail and wings, too, but that goes without saying." Osomatsu ran a thumb along the top of Totoko's skull, which was almost ghostly, feeling for appendages that weren't there yet. Under him, Totoko fumed, the blood on her cheeks starting to show even under the caked makeup she was doused in.
"Matsuno Osomatsu, you said nothing about this when you were in my bedroom," Totoko's voice was a low rumble, trying to make sure her aggression was known without cueing in on it to the demons around her. The man looked her over for a second before speaking, surprisingly calm.
"...I didn't. I know. And I'm sorry. But just imagine what you'll be able to do once you have these." Osomatsu shifted his hand from the top of her head down to the crown, twisting one of the brunette hairs around his long, sharp fingers.
"You won't be able to break the mirror, unfortunately, but you'll have magic literally at your fingertips. So many abilities you couldn't possibly have on the other side you'll have for the rest of your life." A dark grin reminiscent of what Totoko remembered Ichimatsu wore at times washed over his face. "Which, once this ritual is performed, will be until you're killed."
Okay, magical powers did sound pretty nice. (Secretly, ever since she was little, she had been waiting for her magical compact to fall from the sky so she could begin her role as a magical girl.) But magical powers or not, she was still furious with him. The plebeians of Hell just watched their royalty stand on the platform, skin warm with the heat of the flames, staring each other stiffly in the face. The Queen puffed her cheeks a little, wanting nothing more than to go back home. Inheriting a fish market and never finding love ever sounded a little better than this, she realized.
But there was no going home. She was stuck here.
"It'll be fine," Osomatsu repeated, cupping her face in his hands. She felt the pointed tips of his claws brush against her jawbone.
"Are you ready?"
"Just do the fucking ritual." Totoko seethed. Getting the hint, Osomatsu looked her in the eye, face still in his hands. The flames around them grew heavier, drenching them in red and bouncing off of the wet of their eyeballs. It grew hard to see Osomatsu through the greatening color, Totoko realized, or was that supposed to be happening?
She felt the gentle poke of his nails on her chin grow from sweet to increasingly vexatious, skin breaking as blood trickled out of new pinprick wounds he was inflicting. The tendons in Totoko's knees turned to jello as she hovered her hands over his, resisting the urge to tear them off. Her cheeks squished closer and closer together the harder he dug his claws into her face, the makeup rubbing off onto his skin as he dragged them down, creating thick scratches. Totoko winced in pain.
"Hell sees a new Queen, who stands before me and spills her blood for you already," She heard Osomatsu say through the thick red, and he took his hands away, softly taking her wrist and guiding her further onto the platform, in front of a single pillar of blue. She could see him clearer now, the contrast in color of the outside flames and the blue hurting her eyes, but being able to see him in the storm of maroon brought her back onto the ground, even by just a little bit.
"The spilling of her blood symbolizes her dedication to you." Oso held his hands above the flame, the stuff that wasn't caked under his claws or dyed pink after mixing with the white base he had scratched off.
He lifted his elbow and held his hand at a downward angle above the fire, blood slowly running to collect at the tips of his fingers. "Upon making contact with this flame, she is forever sworn to you and can then be engulfed in the magic that will provide her an appearance similar to mine."
Totoko watched in both awe at the ceremony and in terror as her warm blood dripped off of his hands into the fire, which hissed and sizzled at the sudden liquid smothering minute sections of its flames. Osomatsu, hands still bloody, walked over onto the other side of the pillar next to her, the taiko rumbling even deeper. Instinctively, Totoko took a step backwards.
"It'll be alright. You're almost done. Come here."
"No," Totoko shook, the blood on her face trickling down her neck and collecting on the fabric of her kimono. She took another step backwards.
"Totoko-chan."
"Don't call me that. Only a handful of people can call me that, and you're not one of them. You're not Osomatsu. I don't know who you are, but you're scaring me, and I want to go home."
"You're just tired. I'm the same Osomatsu I always was, we're just in a bit of a serious situation right now. That's why I seem different." Demons all leant in between the torii, glancing up further at their monarchy, confused as to why the ritual was paused. Oso grew quiet. "Just a little longer and this'll be over with. Won't you do this for me?"
A childlike plea in his voice made Totoko lift her head, searching his face. He didn't look as old as he was, but didn't look like he had when he was ten, either. He just looked younger, but the bullet grabbed her attention more, staring into her soul as if it were the eyes of God. In the back of her skull, she heard Karamatsu banging on her family's door in the mid-afternoon, his voice like lead. She heard the five of them collapsing on her porch, knees instantly bruising on the wood, hearts weighed down with agony. She heard the six of them hanging onto one another and sobbing at his funeral. All because of that single slug, a family experienced unbearable pain.
Totoko realized that his brothers would do anything to have Osomatsu in front of them like she did. She had the privilege of reuniting with him. And she was whining about going home.
Maybe the horns wouldn't be so bad. She supposed that he already tore his claws down her face, so the horns probably wouldn't hurt much worse.
Totoko answered his question a little late, but at least she answered it. Taking his hand and closing her eyes, she felt him pull his away and place them on top of her hair.
He splayed his fingers as far as he could, raising his palms but leaving the tips of his nails connected to her scalp. Suddenly, Totoko was overcome with a flash of heat, her eyes jolting open. Borrowing the flame next to him, Osomatsu's hands were engulfed with the azure fire, still touching the top of Totoko's head. As he lifted them upwards, she was met with a searing pain, letting out a yelp, but found she was unable to move her arms from her sides. As her best friend spoke quietly in tongues, she felt keratin roughly force itself through the skin of her scalp, a burning shooting across her head and spreading down to behind her ears. She forced her eyes shut; her teeth clamped down, the clacking of the enamel spiking the nerves and sending the signals up to her headache, which didn't seem like much of a problem anymore.
She felt the pain shift from her scalp to her spine, pulsing and shooting from her tailbone up to her shoulder blades, where the feeling rippled off deep into her back. She could hear him continue to calmly speak in tongues as she convulsed in misery, squeezing her eyes closed as sweat poured down her face from the unbearable fever she felt, wondering what the fuck made her accept his invitation to come to Hell with him. Greed wasn't always such a good thing, was it? This pain was enough to make her nearly black out.
After a minute, the temperature began to slowly decrease and the pumps she felt up her spine subsided. She opened one eye, the sweat that collected on her lids making them sting. She realized she had the ability to move her arms again and brought a shaking arm up to wipe her eyes clean with her thumb. In front of her was a grinning Osomatsu, who took a step backwards and whirled around - holding a hand out to the side in her direction - to face the kingdom of Hell, who let out roars of approval.
Totoko's makeup had gone to complete shit, but nobody cared about that anymore. Her top gums ached terribly. In the midst of the cheering and booming of the yokai, she shifted her eyes down between her nose, trying to see inside her mouth. Carefully, she slid a thumb over one of her top canines, the now overgrown and sharp teeth sore to the touch. She recoiled with an intake of breath. She felt a heaviness on her back and the skin between her blades pulling outwards. A hand that was so numb it felt like a phantom limb was brought up to the top of her head, where she was able to barely feel rough horns, the pointed feeling of the apex remaining on her fingertips even as she pulled them away. She was robbed of her voice in disbelief.
Though she couldn't see it, the smile in Osomatsu's voice was audible.
"Inhabitants of Hell, your Queen."
