Secrets, Lies, and Betrayal
"I'll be in my room. It was good seeing you Jin, and don't sweat the whole ring stuff too much. I'll be there for you every step of the way." Karin said. Jin took comfort in that. "Thank you." He said as he hugged her. He could feel Kazune burning holes into him with his glare. He didn't care though. Until he knew more and as far as he was concerned, this was fair game.
After Karin went back to her room she decided to lay down on her bed, contrary to what she had said. She was afraid to close her eyes though and go through another three days or even more. If anything all she did was stare at the ceiling and think about that dream she had.
She couldn't shake that feeling if there really was someone out there who needed her help. Or maybe it was she who needed their help? Either way, who was this person? When and how would she meet them?
After what seemed like forever, though in actuality was only 3 hours, Karin felt her eyes getting heavy. She groaned a little. Sleep was something she didn't want. After a while though it just overcame her. You'd think it wouldn't for someone who slept through 3 days straight. But when you're in bed doing absolutely nothing in the dark, what's a person to do?
Finally asleep, Karin found herself in the middle of town. How she even got there was beyond her. Everything seemed dark, not only because it was late, but everything around her seemed a little gray. There was no one around. It was all deserted. Karin started walking around. She got a sudden chill, not because it was cold though. It felt more like an eerie type of chill. The kind you get before something horrible happens. Something just felt really off.
She figured she was dreaming again. Karin mentally cursed at herself for falling asleep. As she kept walking it only reminded her of how alone she was. There was absolutely no one in sight. Would future her come to see her again? She knew Kazune wouldn't show up. This was like a complete 180 from her pretty meadow dream. This place seemed more like a nightmare.
As Karin walked further down the street she saw a shadow up ahead. 'Finally someone here...' She thought. "Excuse me? I'm Karin, are you here to tell me something?" She couldn't help but ask considering her last dream. The shadowy figure didn't move nor say anything. Karin kept walking towards him or her but lessened her pace. "Hello? Can you hear me?" Before she could get any closer the shadowy figure turned the other direction and ran away. "Wait!" Karin shouted. She tried running towards that person but she couldn't keep up.
Giving it a rest she noticed a bunch of people walking around her. When did they all get there? The streets were literally empty a minute ago. Like her surroundings, the people around her seemed bleak as well. Most of them walked around with a blank expression on their face. Karin tried asking a few of the people for help but they all carried on as if they hadn't heard her. Not knowing what else to do she she tapped an old lady on the shoulder. The old woman turned to her with that emotionless face like everyone else had. Before Karin could say anything the old lady grabbed Karin by her arms. "Can you help me? I seem to have lost my way. Would you be a dearie?"
The elderly woman released Karin and held her arm out for Karin to guide her. She thought about it and almost did till she heard a voice telling her not to. "Don't touch her! Get away from her!" It was a male voice... It didn't sound like any voice she recognized. Karin scanned the crowd trying to find whoever it was that was warning her. The elderly woman in front of her started to get impatient. It was the first time Karin had seen someone actually display emotion since she's been there. "What's going on?" Karin asked herself.
She felt the elderly woman's fingers wrap around her arm. Karin tried gently freeing her arm from the woman's clutch, but the more she did so, the more the grip on her arm got tighter. "Y- you're hurting me..." Just how strong was she? At one point the grip on her arm had become so strong Karin could feel her blood not circulating around that area anymore. What little blood there was still flowing in her arm was slowly seeping out in drops when the woman's nails dug into her skin. The woman now looked like a different person. Not the confused seemingly innocent little old lady she looked like before, but an angry demented person. Very sinister looking. "You walk among the living don't you..."
Karin wasn't sure if it was a rhetorical question but either way it was something she'd rather not answer. Especially when she noticed everyone around her that were once moving in a robotic routine-like manner were now very still. An eerie kind of silence now filled the air. If she wasn't scared before, Karin was now scared shitless. She wanted to make a run for it but couldn't seem to get the message from her brain down to her feet. She was paralyzed in fear.
Just when she thought this was the end for her dream self, out of nowhere Karin felt another hand grab her other arm and pull her away. Karin winced when she felt the sharp nails pull out of her arm. More drops of blood were now trickling down her arm, not that she noticed. She was still in a state of shock, in a daze. Karin didn't even realize she was running now with her mystery hero. It must have been the same person whom had warned her minutes earlier. She didn't know where they were running, but it was definitely better than looking back.
She was tempted to turn her head quickly to see if they were being followed, but Karin wasn't so sure that she wanted to know. Before she knew it they had came to a stop in an abandoned flower shop. She recognized this flower shop. She had come here a few times with Himeka. Well, in the real world that is.
Karin felt her eyes getting heavy as she tried processing what had just happened. Everything around was getting blurry. Luckily the other person had caught Karin before she hit the ground. He placed her gently down on the ground and sat down on the floor beside her, waiting for her to wake up. After a few minutes Karin came around and opened her eyes.
She sat up but must have done it a tad too fast since she felt a little dizzy. "Are you okay?" She heard someone ask her. Suddenly it all came back to her. Someone had helped her get away from the old demon hag before she could do lord knows what to her. She turned to her mysterious hero stranger. He was a spitting image of Kazune. Had it not been for the eyes, she could have sworn it were him. He looked around her age. Though his clothes, a long white sleeved thin sweater with a simple bunny face on it- which seemed one size too big for him, and jeans may have said otherwise.
"Who are you?" Karin groaned a little as she attempted to sit up again. Slowly this time though, not wanting to get another dizzy spell. The boy averted his gaze to the ground. "I'm here to help you. If you're okay, can we go now?" He asked shyly. Karin noticed just how cute he really was. "Where are we?"
The young guy fidgeted a little with his sweater. It seemed like he was contemplating whether or not to tell her. "Well, this is called the Spirit Realm. It's that place in between heaven and hell. That's all I know." He responded. Karin wasn't sure if she should trust him or not. But then again, he did save her butt a while ago. She decided to take his word for it. "Okay. How did we get here?"
He thought about it. "It's the bad thing you have to stop. This is only the beginning." "What do you know about this bad thing? Is it a person? Can you tell me about it?" Her curiosity over this was only getting bigger. Kirio, that dream she had. Just what exactly is going on? The signs were there, but what were they pointing to? "I'm sorry, I can't. I don't know too much about it." The mystery hero seemed rather distracted. He seemed to be looking for something in his pockets. "Where did I put it... ?" He mumbled.
Karin knew she wasn't going to get much out of him anymore. She sighed. "Hm?" Karin felt as if she was floating. She was disappearing. Was she finally waking up?
"Karin? Kariiiin." Kazune was lightly shaking her. Karin stirred a little. She opened her eyes and found herself in her room again. It was morning already. "Hey, I came in to check on you and you looked like you were having a bad dream." He said. Karin sat up in her bed. "It was weird. Ah!" Karin felt a sting on her arm.
The wound from her dream...
She touched it a little. Some of the blood was already dry. How was this even possible? Did she do this to herself while she was asleep? Kazune noticed the nail marks on her arm. "What'd you do to yourself?" Kazune asked as he got the first aid kit from her bathroom. "I'm not sure. In my dream I remember getting this. The... Spirit Realm."
Kazune almost dropped the kit when she said that. "What did you just say?" Karin looked at him strangely. "I had a dream about some place called the Spirit Realm. Is something wrong?" The Spirit Realm was something he had read about in Kazuto's journal. How did Karin know about it? 'I should talk to Micchi about this...'
After bandaging her arm up, Kazune went to go call Micchi. He decided not to go to school and stay with Karin to make sure nothing else happens to her. Himeka went to school though. She'd bring them today's assignments. After informing Micchi about Karin's dream, he too found it odd and said he'd drop by during lunch. Kazune stayed with Karin in her room. They didn't do or say anything.
Karin was in bed eating some soup Kazune had made her. He just sat in a chair next to her bed with his arms folded, staring at the ground. Karin couldn't tell what he was thinking about. She decided not to bring it up and just ate quietly. A while later there was a knock on the door. Kazune already knew who it was so he went down to get it. Micchi walked in. "Hey. How is she doing?" He asked. "She seems okay now." Kazune answered.
They both went up to her room. Karin smiled when she saw Micchi. "I wasn't expecting to see you. How are you?" Micchi chuckled. "I should be asking you that. Are you alright? What happened to your arm?" He noticed the bandages. Karin lowered her sleeve. "Just... a bad dream. This is gonna sound weird, but I got this wound in my dream and when I woke up, I really had it."
Micchi listened intensively. "Kazune told me about that. He said you dreamt about the Spirit Realm?" Karin nodded. "Yeah. It's just some place I must have made up in my dream, no big deal." Micchi frowned. "It is a big deal, Karin. The Spirit Realm isn't just some made up place. It's real."
Karin didn't know where this was going, but she listened anyway. "The Spirit Realm is a place stuck between heaven and hell. It's like the spiritual mirror of this world. It's where people who have passed on go to before it's decided whether they're going to heaven or hell." Micchi said. Karin recalled her mystery hero saying something like that beginning part. Does this mean she wasn't dreaming?
"You're probably wondering if you were actually dreaming or not, I don't think you were. That wound should tell you. Karin, the Spirit Realm isn't something to be taken lightly. Even though it is neutral ground- for the most part, there are still some exceptions. Some of the people who go there are really bad. There's a system in that realm, but those were really bad in life tend to find a way around it and go rogue. They will stop at nothing to cling onto something or someone living and come back to this realm. You're lucky you got away when you did."
'Very lucky...' Karin thought. "Someone saved me. I don't even know if he got out safe. How does one go there?" Micchi shrugged. "I'm not really sure. There's still a lot about that place a lot of people don't know of." She nodded. "How do you know so much about this?" She couldn't help but wonder. "Professor Kujyou did some research on it. He told me a thing or two about that place when I was younger. Just promise me you'll be more careful if it happens again. The whole time you're there, don't venture about and don't interact with anyone."
Karin thought that seemed like a good plan if she ever found herself back in that place again. She wished it were that simple though. Go and come back unharmed. But she knew like everything else in life, nothing ever is simple. She got the feeling that wouldn't be the last of that place she'd see.
There's a reason for everything, and there's a reason she was sent there.
END OF CHAPTER 10
Can anyone guess who the Kazune look-alike was? ;D
I know this chapter was a bit on the short side but I thought it'd be better to end it on this note. I've been merging some chapters but the length of chapters should still be about the same as it was before. As for the story itself, I've been giving it a lot of thought over how I should go about the changes. You know, what to take out, what to change, etc. At first I was going to keep it at minor changes but I remember someone telling me that I had introduced too many characters and that it had been difficult to follow at one point since there were too many characters to keep up with. So most likely I'm going to be removing some characters, replacing only 2 or 3, and just mainly focus on the core characters of the story. Of course I will let you know who made the cut and who got cut when they're introduced, and I will give some background information on the replacement(s) as well.
And a thank you to SecretGurl and dhldr for the reviews and a big thank you to NabilahAnanda for not giving up on this story. :) I know the first time around I was close to ending it and then to start all over from the beginning after a long hiatus must have been "Ugh..." XD But thank you again all of you!