Since she was a little girl, Ryoma found herself with troubling dreams, and abilities which she keeps hidden. She is also plagued by demons, another thing she hides from her team until she gets a fateful invitation...

Relentless Attacks

Every single night since the Prefecturals...

Ryoma has been slaying demons every night...and ends up going to school extremely tired and sleepy. Days pass by and she gets worser everyday. Noticeable in her Tennis as they were gradually getting points from her.

'O-oy oy Echizen! Are you alright? Do you have a fever or anything? I mean, people are starting to get even two games from you!' Oishi asked her in concern but Ryoma was unresponsive. 'Echizen? Oooy?'

'Hime-chan? Nee!' Kikumaru called out as Ryoma had an odd half-lidded expression on her face. 'Hime-chan?' he tapped her forehead...

She fell backwards to their disbelief and soon, she was fast asleep.

'Nyaaa! Hime-chan collapsed! Sensei!'

xxx

'Yare yare, she's not responding to what we do to wake her up! It's like she shut down after running out of batteries or something.' the nurse sighed as she scratched her head. 'You boys are not pushing her too hard, are you?'

'Ehhh no. We only do what's on the Menu and stop after that.' said Oishi as he, Ryuzaki and Tezuka were present in the infirmary with the nurse, while looking at their sleeping teammate who was fast and heavily asleep. 'But we always end training at 8 pm!'

'8 pm huh? Well she must be staying up late at night for who-knows-what.' the Nurse deadpanned. 'She should stop whatever it is she's doing after club and sleep early. She's stressed out from lack of sleep!'

xxx

'No, but she always goes out for some reason every time she goes home.' said Nanjiroh as he was scratching his head as the Regulars brought home his sleeping daughter, put her in her room and they talked downstairs. 'And she always had something to bring home as proof she went there so we didn't say anything and always comes home at ten! And you're saying she collapsed from lack of sleep?'

'Well yeah...' said Oishi. 'But that's weird! 10 pm isn't that late and she's that tired?'

'That's what I want to know too!' Nanjiroh griped. 'This case is impossible!' he moaned as Tezuka sensed several presences and her power.

"Don't tell me...!" he gasped. Ryoma had been fighting demons?

'Well what could she possibly be doing that she gets so tired from lack of slee...UWAAAAHHH!' Fuji yelled as he pointed at the window behind Tezuka, Oishi and Inui as he saw a decapitated monster head that soon crashed into the windows.

'What was that?' they all cried as they went to see...what Fuji saw. They all went pale as the head soon vanished.

'A-A monster's head?'

"This is bad...if they're fighting nearby, they'll figure it out! What should I do?" Tezuka swore frantically.

'What's going on? What's that thing?' Kawamura squeaked as next thing they know, Ryoma crashed into the next window, holding a pair of chain sickles and fell on the floor roughly, causing her to throw up blood, causing them to gasp in horror before she got up and went out.

'R-Ryoma?' Nanjiroh choked out. 'What bi the nine hells is going on here? She's fast asleep upstairs!'

'Not anymore...' Inui sputtered out as Tezuka went to the medicine cabinet and calmly took out the first aid. 'Tezuka?'

'...she'll need this soon enough. It's almost over.' his teammates and Ryoma's father gave him a curious look. 'You'll know the truth soon enough...to be honest, I thought she was just practicing late at night but to think this was the real reason she was tired...it's no wonder.' Tezuka sighed. 'I will tell you everything because she won't be in a condition to.'

'You mean...you knew...?' Fuji choked. 'What's going on?' Tezuka calmly walked to the table in the living room and put the medicine kit on the table, and ran outside as he sensed that the fighting was over. Indeed, it was over. Ryoma was in the middle of the road, exhausted and injured. She was also pale from overusing her powers.

'Echizen, are you alright?' Tezuka cried as he picked her up.

'I...I'm...fine...' Ryoma coughed. 'I need...to...rest...for a...week.' she coughed as she struggled to talk. 'I guess...we got...some explaining...to...UGH!' she gasped as she coughed up blood again.

'Go to sleep to save your strength. I'll explain to your father and our team. Go to sleep!' Tezuka ordered worriedly as he carried her bridal style back into the house and Ryoma slowly closed her eyes.

xxx

After half an hour of cleaning her up and patching her injuries... 'I'm done with cleaning her, what is it that you need to do next?' Nanjiroh asked Tezuka. Tezuka insisted on seeing Ryoma after he fixes her up so he could help her.

'I don't know if I can do it since I awoke my potential ten days ago and no training just yet...but I have to try.' said Tezuka as he knelt on one knee by the bed and took Ryoma's hand. 'Right now...she almost has no Reiki left. She's in a critical state.' he said gravely. 'Reiki is the power that comes from our souls itself. Without it...we may as well be dead.' Nanjiroh and his teammates gasped in horror at this. 'That is what she told me.' and he began to focus while trying to tune out their panic and Nnajiroh crying for his daughter not to die.

"Please work...I want to send my Reiki to her but how?" Tezuka thought frantically when Ryoma's room window slid open, and Hiei came in.

'Hiei-kun!' Kawamura cried in recognition as the boy came wearing all black.

'Hn. With your level right now, you can't even feed a mouse.' Hiei grunted as he placed his hand over Ryoma and transferred some of his energy to her. "And she's a youkai. Incredible amounts of Reiki are needed to sustain her life if Youki is not available." Her deathly pale color improved and her condition became alright. If she was struggling to breathe earlier, she was breathing normally again.

'Hiei-kun, you too...?' Kawamura croaked. 'Are you...fighting those monsters too?'

'An important event has started, thus I am invited. So no youkai will annoy the hell out of me.' Hiei said tersely. 'But the committee is fully aware of Ryoma's existence and her power and are trying to recruit her into the Guest Team but time and again, she kills the Scouts. They won't stop sending scouts until she says yes. I'll be around for a week.' and he disappeared.

'Echizen, Minamino, Setsuno and Yukimura...then Urameshi and Kuwabara from Sarayashiki and now I'm included. We're all spiritually-aware and spiritually-gifted humans.' Tezuka told them. 'The others are fully trained and are powerful fighters unlike myself. Only spiritual humans can harm youkai and each of us have unique abilities only we can do and nobody can copy our skills. That's what I learned from her at least.' Tezuka told them as he faced them. 'She told me this because I awoke my potential and could see ghosts but right now, she will not train me.'

'But why? Isn't more better than just one?' Momoshiro demanded. 'It's obvious she can't do it alone!'

'Yes but they all had their territories in Tokyo to cover. And Tokyo's a huge city with many districts.' said Tezuka grimly. 'Normally, one of them can watch over their station but more and more youkai are coming to ningenkai because of an event that occurs every fifty years. The reason why she wouldn't train me. It's so I'm not powerful enough to be scouted and forced into a bloody tournament to satisfy the bloodthirsty youkai and I'll be left alone. My training will start when the tournament starts and no scouts by then.'

'And Yukimura...?' Inui asked him.

'It's a long story. A few days after the Echizens moved to Japan...a few days after that hostage-taking in a restaurant where her mother was held hostage, Echizen used her power to conjure throwing knives to cut the wires linking to CCTV Cameras, unaware that she left a residue of her power there.' Nanjiroh squawked at this. 'This led to Reikai discovering her and Koenma recruited her as a Reikai Tantei, on the condition that she is only to be called if she was really needed...considering she's busy with school and the club that takes up most of her time...that and she's surrounded by very sharp people.' Tezuka snorted.

'When did Ryoma get her power?' Nanjiroh asked him.

'She awakened her power when she was seven years old...learned how to control it and when she was eight, she started fighting and killing demons.' Well, of course they'll be horrified that Ryoma started killing young, judging by their expressions. 'She said that a spiritually gifted human can pass on this ability to their child. But in the case that their children and so on could not awaken the dormant power, a descendant will be born who's powerful enough to awaken their potential can use the inherited power so someone up in the family tree has Reiki and passed it down...and your daughter awoke the potential. Who knows where or from whom she learned how to control her power, that's one thing she never told me.'

'Upon recruitment...she has been to Makai with Urameshi, Kuwabara, Setsuno and Minamino to stop an uprising by four Youkai Lords who wants entry into our world...then the mission that got Yukimura involved. The thieving of three artifacts from the Reikai Vaults. The three items were the Koma no Ken, Ankokukyo and the Gakidama. Minamino-san was one of the thieves who targeted the mirror to use it on a full moon for a wish to save his critically ill mother who happened to be on the same hospital as Yukimura. But the price of one wish...was the wisher's life. To prevent his death, Urameshi and Echizen pitched in to share their life force to create the equivalent of one soul for the Mirror to take. But it turns out that the Mirror only takes lives for selfish wishes and does not take lives for selfless wishes. Yukimura who often goes to the roof for fresh air...saw everything.'

'Remember the day Niou came to school?' Tezuka asked his teammates who nodded. 'Not even Niou knew why Yukimura wanted to see Echizen and stressed out the need to see her in private. When she came, he revealed he saw what happened on the hospital rooftop and was since worried that he thought she gave up years of her lifespan away to create that 'one soul' only for her to tell him that the mirror let them keep their lives. She then offered to train him to harness his power. They're on a teacher-student basis. She trained him for his safety. But now that this tournament came up...she must be worried that they might discover and recruit him for the human-only Guest Team. And Yukimura's numbness is getting worse...'

'Which means she fights overnight, lures the scouts to her to protect him and she kills them?' Fuji frowned as Tezuka nodded.

'That's what I think she's doing these past few days.' Tezuka sighed. 'She will not let anything happen to Yukimura who can't fight.'