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Chapter 21
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Rin sat on top of his covers, staring at the note left for him from Miyuki. It was nearly impossible for him to get her off of his mind but it wasn't like he had tried very hard. He missed her and was left disappointed and confused by their last interaction. His dull eyes reread the script-written note for the umpteenth time. She was gone and didn't want to be found but he refused to believe it.
His hand absentmindedly moved to the fading mark she left on his neck as his mind wandered back to that night. He was always a bit bold and eager but then he just couldn't help himself from trying to get closer to Miyuki.
He couldn't recall when he realized he loved her but he knew that he wanted to protect her with his entire being. She was special, she was beautiful, she was powerful, she was Miyuki.
A gentle knock on his dorm's door snapped Rin out of his thoughts.
"Rin? Are you in here?" Shiemi called politely. She peeked inside the poorly lit room and managed to spot the outline of the boy's form. The entire cram class then filed in one by one. Suguro flipped the light switch on and sighed at Rin's startled reaction to the sudden luminosity.
"You've gotta get ahold of yourself, man," he snapped, taking a look around the messy room. There was no question as to why Yukio had refused to stay in the same room as his brother for the past few nights.
"What do you want?" Rin grumbled.
"We have a mission from the headmaster and you need you to come with us," Konekomaru explained reservedly. Rin huffed.
"I'm good. You guys go on and I'll help with the next one," he muttered. Kamiki rolled her eyes.
"We're going to find her, dumbass. Are you coming or not?" she barked harshly. Rin went silent for a moment, eyes scanning the room and the faces of his classmates.
Each of them knew that finding Miyuki could mean having to cross her path as enemies instead of friends. Obviously, none of them were going to tell Rin that. The Cram Class students hoped he would convince her to come back without putting up much of a fight because they weren't sure that they could stop her if she wouldn't.
"Of course, I want to go! What do you think I've been doing in here besides thinking of ways to get her back?!" Rin's outburst startled the teens before him. Shima smirked.
"That was corny but hell yeah," he nodded approvingly.
"I say we leave tonight," Suguro ordered sternly. The others agreed, each of them watching Rin with careful looks as if he was going to say something. Instead, he stayed quiet. His fingers tapped the top of his bed as a subtle sign of anxiety and contemplation but besides that, he made no indication of what emotions were.
"Alright. I'll find us a way out while you guys get ready," he said in an equally indifferent tone. They all shared a look before nodding sharply. Each of them had different feelings towards the situation and how to handle Miyuki but they all knew that no matter what, they would bring her back.
Dead or alive.
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Mika let out an indignant huff as she sat down the letter she had been reading. Miyuki sat a little ways away from her, scouring the contents of her mother's box. There was quite a bit of information to go through yet most of it seemed redundant at the moment. If they were going to find her, they'd need to hit the jackpot.
"Anything yet?" Mika raised an eyebrow. Miyuki narrowed her eyes a fraction and shook her head.
"Well, apparently my father was a genius. Some of these notes are just plans for inventions of his. Kaiya never mentioned it but I did get the sense that he was smart whenever I talked to him," she explained, picking up the next item for her to scan for clues. She sat in thoughtful silence for a moment as Mika mulled over her words.
"Tell me again what happened in this vision of yours," she leaned against the back of her chair calmly. The library the girls had stationed themselves in was nearly empty except for maybe a few stray villagers wandering about.
"My father was possessed by Satan and told my mother to come back with him. When she refused, he killed my father. Then, she came all the way here to talk to Kaiya, only to have her get possessed, too. Satan threatened her with the death of everyone around her and she caved, leaving me with Kaiya," Miyuki summed up what she had seen as simply as she could.
After blurting out all the information rather quickly, an awkward silence grew between the two women. Mika's lips formed a fine line, a thoughtful expression on her face. Her eyes lit up once a few seconds passed.
"Is there a way she could have lost her powers?" she began rummaging through the box. Miyuki raised an eyebrow.
"I mean...I guess it's possible. We can overwork ourselves and have to regain energy so I assume we can lose our powers, too...Why?" she asked hesitantly, unsure of where Mika was taking this. The swordswoman grinned, pulling out a photo of Arai and Ichiro.
She pointed to the woman who was the spitting image of an older Miyuki, "If she's no longer a Yuki-Onna, you wouldn't be able to summon her. Maybe Satan found a way to bind her or take her powers."
"Mika...when did you become smart?" Miyuki failed to hide her smile. Mika stuck out her tongue in response. The girls laughed at each other for a moment before returning to the serious mood. "I've got to find a way back to Gehenna, then. If I can snoop around some, I'll be able to find where she's being held."
"Yuki, they'll kill you if you go back!" Mika snapped, jumping up onto her feet. Various eyes turned in their direction and one woman, probably the librarian, shushed them. They, of course, went ignored by the brunette. "I won't let you die. Your mother wouldn't want that, the devil's brat wouldn't want that, and Saki sure as hell wouldn't want that!"
Miyuki stayed silent. For a moment, she almost became bitter, thinking about how Mika couldn't read minds and didn't know what anyone else thought. She quickly brushed off the thoughts, however, and caved in with a sigh. Putting all the papers and books back in the box, she nodded towards the door.
"Let's find a place to stay then we can worry about who wants who dead," she quipped. Mika scoffed but followed her out of the library anyway. The two friends made their way to a nearby inn, where they got a room under an alias just in case anyone came asking about them.
Once everything was said and done, the girls sat on their beds in silence. Neither of them knew what to say but they didn't want to be alone, either. Mika focused on Miyuki's concentrated breathing as she closed her eyes and tried to meditate. The rhythmic sound lulled her to sleep and eventually, Miyuki was left alone in the darkness.
Her eyes kept drifting over towards her mother's box, almost as if the silver contraption was calling out to her. After about five minutes, she finally succumbed to her urges and got up to grab the box. It was a decently-sized chest with a snowflake-shaped latch on the front. The metallic edges nicely framed the painted wood that depicted a picture of a delicate Periwinkle flower blooming out of a beautiful snowy landscape. When tracing the designs, Miyuki found that a message had been neatly etched into the base of the box. She furrowed her eyebrows, knowing for a fact that it wasn't there earlier.
To our beautiful snowflake, Miyuki. We'll love you until the stars empty the sky.
- Arai and Ichiro Toshiko.
"Until the stars empty the sky…?" Miyuki repeated absentmindedly, slightly confused by her family's poetic use of words. A startled gasp escaped her throat when the box suddenly began to shake.
"What the hell…?"
