At the end of this chapter, this is a part on news report. I do not
know how to write about it, so if it sounds funny, please forgive me.
* * * * * *
Chapter Five
"By the goddess he said Sanzo." One of the monks exclaimed when he heard what Goku had said. The monks studied Sanzo and let them in for Sanzo was the holiest monks among all those who practice the faith of the Buddha.
Yohina and her friends didn't say anything because they knew there was no place for them to talk since everything will work out eventually. Soon, they were brought to the abbot of the temple and the monks let them stay since Sanzo said that Hakkai, Goku, and Gojyo were his servants and the girls were his pupils. That angered Goku and Gojyo. If it weren't for Hakkai, the girls were sure that Goku and Gojyo might have killed Sanzo.
"No wonder you guys wanted to dress up like guys. They would've never let us stay here if they see that you guys are girls." Hakkai commented when they were finished with dinner and were let to their room. Much to their dismay, the nine of them were trapped in the same room since this is the only room that is vacant.
"Tell me about this. This is totally uncomfortable with my hair all scrunched up like this." Machi complained as she took off her hat. Then she untied her hair from the bun it was and tied it into a pigtail like it always was.
Almost immediately after Machi threw her hat down onto the ground, someone knocked on the door. Before anyone could do anything, the door opened and a monk that was about 10 or 12 years old entered the room with cups of tea for everyone.
Yohina, Nuriko, Sakura, Vessica, and Hakkai immediately stood in front of Machi to block the monk from seeing her. All of them had the same nervous smile as the monk spoke.
"I hope all of you have found the room to your liking. My name is Yo. I have been given the high honor to attend to all of your needs. Simply ask and I'll provide it for you." The monk said with a smile.
"Dude, I seriously don't think you can provide any of my needs. Not unless you got an older sister." Gojyo said gloomily.
"Watch your mouth! Women are positively forbidden in this temple! Isn't that right, Master Sanzo?" Yo shouted at Gojyo and then turned to look at Sanzo. But Gojyo just rolled his eyes.
"Why are you doing this to me?" Sanzo said carelessly.
"I have to admit that this is the highest honor that was ever bestow upon me. I have never met a holy man that is chosen by Buddha himself. It's men like you that made me dedicate my life to the Buddha. I cannot tell you what this moment means to me." Yo said with envy while Gojyo, Hakkai, and Goku listened with shock.
"If you ever need something, just call my name and I'll be here." Yo then said just before he left. Right after the door was closed, Gojyo, Hakkai, and Goku started laughing as they mocked what Yo had said about Sanzo. "You know what this means, don't you?" Hakkai asked as them laughed.
Then the three of them stopped laughing and answered the question. "He doesn't know you very well." And started to laugh again. Even the girls, who had watched this episode tons of times, started laughing also.
However, Sanzo just sat down and started reading a newspaper as if he doesn't know what they were talking about.
The rest of the night passed quickly. Even though the girls knew about the monster that was going to appear later during the night, they still slept early because they were all worn out during the long walk for a whole day. When they finally woke up in the night, they saw that the Sanzo party had left the five of them alone in the room and had gone down to fight.
"Come on, I want to go down and see!" Machi said as she pulled on her boots.
"Yohina, aren't you going to come?" Vessica asked when she saw that even though Yohina dressed up like everybody else, she didn't seem to want to go down. "No, you guys can go. I don't really want to go down right now." Yohina's answer was in a distant tone as if she was spacing out.
Vessica didn't say anything more but just nodded. She then followed the other three out and left Yohina alone. In the dark room, Yohina wandered why hadn't she gone with her friends. Ever since she the first time here, she'd felt something strange inside of her. It wanted to come out, but something was holding it back.
Even though Yohina didn't go down with her friends, there was really nothing to see after all. When Vessica and the others got down to the fighting ground, the fight was already over. At the end, Machi was sent back to get Yohina down so they could leave.
The monks were surprised that five of them were actually girls. When they saw them, they just pointed at them with shock and they became speechless.
"We are sorry that we have lied to you, but we knew that you wouldn't let us stay if you knew that we are girls." Yohina apologized before anyone could say anything more.
To her surprise, the abbot smiled at her. "You guessed right, young lady. Well, you should get on with your journey now. We will pray that the merciful goddess protects you and bless you on your journey." The abbot said with a kind smile and then they were off.
* * * *
Far away in the west from where the Sanzo party was, in the Houtou Castle where Gyumaoh was slain 500 years ago, Kougaiji watched the progress of the Sanzo party along with his friends Lirin, Yaone, and Dokugakuji. "The Sanzo party is only 7 kilometer from where we are now." Yaone commented as they watched the scenes from a mirror that they have.
Yaone is a pretty demon with purple hair like Yohina's. They are the exactly same color. Her hair was tied high back into one ponytail. Yet, the ponytail split up into two so it looks as if she had two ponytails. She has a pair of orange eyes that showed coldness toward the enemies but caring to those that she cared about.
"They have a dragon that turned into a jeep for easy transportation, which is totally annoying if you ask me." Dokugakuji said.
"What are mother's orders?" Kougaiji asked. He was the leader among the four of them. Yaone and Dokugakuji had sworn their allegiance to him years ago when he saved them and took them into his service. Also, Lirin is actually his younger sister so he really cared about her.
"To send in more assassins of course." Dokugakuji answered carelessly. "It's useless if you ask me."
"Of course it's useless! I'm tired of losing my brothers. She throws soldiers at them as if they were nothing!" Kougaiji said as he punched the wall with anger.
"Maybe we should just go and take care of them ourselves. Or are you nervous about this bitch and her little demonic revival?" Dokugakuji asked.
"Of course I'm not. I know what needs to happen here." Kougaiji said as he regained his coolness. Then, Yaone walked up to them. "My lord, why not you...let me go and take care of them?" She asked carefully.
* * * *
"Man, I'm tired." Yohina complained as she sat down under a tree. They had been traveling for two days in the same forest already and there was still no end to it. Since the trees are too thick for a jeep to pass through, they have to walk all the way.
"Why do we have to endure such torture?" Sakura said as she sat down also.
"Come on, you don't have to and don't be such a drag! I think we'll make it soon." Vessica urged on her friends.
"Whatever you say, Ves. I'm tired of this. It's been two days since we got here. What would happen at home if our parents found us disappearing for two whole days? They would go berserk! I really want to go back!" Yohina said heavily with depression as she stood up again.
"I don't think anything would happen at home. I think the time here is suppose to be faster than our world's. I don't think the person or thing that brought us here want to cause chaos in our world." Vessica answered reasonably.
"I guess you are right." Yohina said with a sigh as she followed her friend.
"Come on! You guys are being such sissies!" Gojyo shouted at them from the front.
However, just as Yohina was about to shout back something mean back to him, three dark shadows jumped out of the bushes and landed between Yohina, Vessica, Sakura, and the others who were way in the front of them.
From one look, all of them could tell that they were demons. As those in front turned back to help the other three girls, the demons attacked. One headed for Vessica, another one headed for Sakura, and another one headed for Yohina.
Vessica had no problem handling the demon. Her samurai blame came out of nowhere and first cut out the demon's arm. However, at that time, Yohina was trapped. The demon was right in front of her while her back was against a tree. "You are mine dinner!" The demon muttered as it raised its claw and snatched for Yohina.
Yohina heard herself screaming as the demon's hand grabbed her throat. Her own hands clutched on the demon's arm as she felt a sudden burn on the palm of her hand. Seconds later, she heard the demon's scream accompanying her own as fire consumed the demon like it did once before. The demon was turned into ashes before anyone could help Yohina. Yohina was shocked. She sat there without knowing what was happening.
At the same time, Sakura was pushed onto the ground by the demon that was attacking her. At the scream from the demon that was trying to kill Yohina, the demon that was attacking Sakura was killed by Gojyo's crescent blade with the chain.
"Are you OK?" Vessica asked as she bent down by where Yohina was sitting.
Yohina looked up to her with an empty expression that Vessica didn't recognize at all. Yet, it disappeared in an instant and Yohina's face was filled with shock. "It hurt. The hotness on my palm hurt. I couldn't control it and it just went out of control!" Yohina muttered when she looked at Vessica. Vessica didn't know what Yohina was talking about at all, but she sounded as if she did.
"Yohina, I know. Don't worry about it." Vessica said with a smile.
For the rest of the day, Yohina seemed to be out of it. She was spacing out a lot of times and when someone tried to talk to her, she always had her barrier up for some reason.
That night, they were again attacked by demons. That time, it wasn't as easy as during the day since the demons seemed to be much used to the darkness than any of them were. It was especially a hard job since the Sanzo party also had to protect the girls, who were defenseless except for Vessica.
When Vessica suddenly fell down because of a demon had slashed on her leg, Yohina pushed her out of the way when the demon attacked again. She felt the burning pain on her back as the claws slashed through her skin. At the same time, the same burning pain came from her palm as if something were waiting to get out.
"Get away, you demon!" Yohina shrieked and then two blasts of fire suddenly shot out of her palm as she shrieked and burned at least 3 demons into ashes and injured another 4. Everyone turned to look at her with shock. Yohina just stood there with the same shock as others. No, she was in more shock. She couldn't believe what she had just done.
"What was that?" She thought with amazement. The palm of her hand still glowed under the darkness as she looked at it. It also felt hot. At that moment, she forgot about the wound that was still bleeding and just looked at her hands. "What's happening to me?" She thought suddenly with fear as she remembered seeing those two fire blasts suddenly coming out of her hands.
No one talked to her as Yohina sat alone by herself during the night after Vessica bandaged her back. They didn't know where the bandages came from since Hakkai just took them out of somewhere. Everyone seemed to be having their own thoughts. Once, Vessica sat down beside Yohina during the night. She wanted to talk since they were best friends in this group and she wanted to let Yohina know that what happened earlier that night was strange but it might just been a hallucination.
"That's impossible. Everybody saw it. I don't get it. Why is this happening to me? None of you guys are having some strange powers. I was thankful because it saved me three times already, but I really want to know why and how to use it. Right now, I feel just like I did before as if I don't have any powers at all. It feels really weird." Yohina answered with depression.
Vessica couldn't argue with her friend. The truth was that she had no idea what was going on either. She just wished that she could come up with an answer.
"Ves, I want to go back." Yohina suddenly said the sentence out of nowhere as she hugged her legs closer to herself. Vessica looked at Yohina weirdly because Yohina seemed so depressed lately. Sure, Yohina is not the kind of cheery person like Machi or Nuriko, but she's not this pessimistic either.
"I miss home. It's been three days already. What if the time here is the same as back in our world? Do you know how worried our parents would be? I don't want to stay here anymore. I don't want to have that weird fire power." Yohina muttered as tears dropped out.
"Yohina, what's wrong with you? You are acting really weird. I thought you don't like to cry." Vessica said, trying to sound optimistic. Yohina just shook her head with pain and anger as she pulled down the necklace.
"I hate this thing! Why does this have to happen to me?!" Yohina cried as she threw the necklace away toward the other wall. With her shouting, the silence of the night was broken as everybody turned to look at her and then at the necklace on the floor. As soon as everybody's eyes were on it, it shone with bright light purple light, which blinded them for a second.
The next thing Yohina knew, she was back in her own world on her bed as if she had just been waking up from a deep dream. She looked at her window and saw the little sunlight coming through the blinds. She wondered if everything that had just happened was a dream. Quickly, she jumped out of the bed, noticing that she was going to be late for school, and rushed to the bathroom to get dressed. As she came out to the kitchen, her parents were still nowhere in sight. She wondered where could they be this early on a Monday morning.
With that thought, she prepared her own breakfast quickly and turned on the TV. As she was heading back to her room to get her backpack, something in the TV caught her eyes, or rather, her ears. She walked backward until she stood in front of the TV. Surely, she wasn't wrong. Her parents, along with Machi, Nuriko, Sakura, and Vessica's were all there, in the morning news. Their mothers were crying as the news people talked in the background.
"Five families are very desperate right now that all of their daughters have suddenly disappeared since this Saturday. The five girls are very best friends. According to one of the parents, four of the girls were together before they disappeared. It has been three days and there is still no sight of the girls. Authorities wonder if the girls ran away from home together. If you have seen one of the five girls, please call 911 to notice the authorities." The announcer in the television said and then the screen showed their pictures.
Without noticing, Yohina had covered her mouth with shock. "So it's true. One day in the Saiyuki world is almost one day in ours."
* * * * * *
Chapter Five
"By the goddess he said Sanzo." One of the monks exclaimed when he heard what Goku had said. The monks studied Sanzo and let them in for Sanzo was the holiest monks among all those who practice the faith of the Buddha.
Yohina and her friends didn't say anything because they knew there was no place for them to talk since everything will work out eventually. Soon, they were brought to the abbot of the temple and the monks let them stay since Sanzo said that Hakkai, Goku, and Gojyo were his servants and the girls were his pupils. That angered Goku and Gojyo. If it weren't for Hakkai, the girls were sure that Goku and Gojyo might have killed Sanzo.
"No wonder you guys wanted to dress up like guys. They would've never let us stay here if they see that you guys are girls." Hakkai commented when they were finished with dinner and were let to their room. Much to their dismay, the nine of them were trapped in the same room since this is the only room that is vacant.
"Tell me about this. This is totally uncomfortable with my hair all scrunched up like this." Machi complained as she took off her hat. Then she untied her hair from the bun it was and tied it into a pigtail like it always was.
Almost immediately after Machi threw her hat down onto the ground, someone knocked on the door. Before anyone could do anything, the door opened and a monk that was about 10 or 12 years old entered the room with cups of tea for everyone.
Yohina, Nuriko, Sakura, Vessica, and Hakkai immediately stood in front of Machi to block the monk from seeing her. All of them had the same nervous smile as the monk spoke.
"I hope all of you have found the room to your liking. My name is Yo. I have been given the high honor to attend to all of your needs. Simply ask and I'll provide it for you." The monk said with a smile.
"Dude, I seriously don't think you can provide any of my needs. Not unless you got an older sister." Gojyo said gloomily.
"Watch your mouth! Women are positively forbidden in this temple! Isn't that right, Master Sanzo?" Yo shouted at Gojyo and then turned to look at Sanzo. But Gojyo just rolled his eyes.
"Why are you doing this to me?" Sanzo said carelessly.
"I have to admit that this is the highest honor that was ever bestow upon me. I have never met a holy man that is chosen by Buddha himself. It's men like you that made me dedicate my life to the Buddha. I cannot tell you what this moment means to me." Yo said with envy while Gojyo, Hakkai, and Goku listened with shock.
"If you ever need something, just call my name and I'll be here." Yo then said just before he left. Right after the door was closed, Gojyo, Hakkai, and Goku started laughing as they mocked what Yo had said about Sanzo. "You know what this means, don't you?" Hakkai asked as them laughed.
Then the three of them stopped laughing and answered the question. "He doesn't know you very well." And started to laugh again. Even the girls, who had watched this episode tons of times, started laughing also.
However, Sanzo just sat down and started reading a newspaper as if he doesn't know what they were talking about.
The rest of the night passed quickly. Even though the girls knew about the monster that was going to appear later during the night, they still slept early because they were all worn out during the long walk for a whole day. When they finally woke up in the night, they saw that the Sanzo party had left the five of them alone in the room and had gone down to fight.
"Come on, I want to go down and see!" Machi said as she pulled on her boots.
"Yohina, aren't you going to come?" Vessica asked when she saw that even though Yohina dressed up like everybody else, she didn't seem to want to go down. "No, you guys can go. I don't really want to go down right now." Yohina's answer was in a distant tone as if she was spacing out.
Vessica didn't say anything more but just nodded. She then followed the other three out and left Yohina alone. In the dark room, Yohina wandered why hadn't she gone with her friends. Ever since she the first time here, she'd felt something strange inside of her. It wanted to come out, but something was holding it back.
Even though Yohina didn't go down with her friends, there was really nothing to see after all. When Vessica and the others got down to the fighting ground, the fight was already over. At the end, Machi was sent back to get Yohina down so they could leave.
The monks were surprised that five of them were actually girls. When they saw them, they just pointed at them with shock and they became speechless.
"We are sorry that we have lied to you, but we knew that you wouldn't let us stay if you knew that we are girls." Yohina apologized before anyone could say anything more.
To her surprise, the abbot smiled at her. "You guessed right, young lady. Well, you should get on with your journey now. We will pray that the merciful goddess protects you and bless you on your journey." The abbot said with a kind smile and then they were off.
* * * *
Far away in the west from where the Sanzo party was, in the Houtou Castle where Gyumaoh was slain 500 years ago, Kougaiji watched the progress of the Sanzo party along with his friends Lirin, Yaone, and Dokugakuji. "The Sanzo party is only 7 kilometer from where we are now." Yaone commented as they watched the scenes from a mirror that they have.
Yaone is a pretty demon with purple hair like Yohina's. They are the exactly same color. Her hair was tied high back into one ponytail. Yet, the ponytail split up into two so it looks as if she had two ponytails. She has a pair of orange eyes that showed coldness toward the enemies but caring to those that she cared about.
"They have a dragon that turned into a jeep for easy transportation, which is totally annoying if you ask me." Dokugakuji said.
"What are mother's orders?" Kougaiji asked. He was the leader among the four of them. Yaone and Dokugakuji had sworn their allegiance to him years ago when he saved them and took them into his service. Also, Lirin is actually his younger sister so he really cared about her.
"To send in more assassins of course." Dokugakuji answered carelessly. "It's useless if you ask me."
"Of course it's useless! I'm tired of losing my brothers. She throws soldiers at them as if they were nothing!" Kougaiji said as he punched the wall with anger.
"Maybe we should just go and take care of them ourselves. Or are you nervous about this bitch and her little demonic revival?" Dokugakuji asked.
"Of course I'm not. I know what needs to happen here." Kougaiji said as he regained his coolness. Then, Yaone walked up to them. "My lord, why not you...let me go and take care of them?" She asked carefully.
* * * *
"Man, I'm tired." Yohina complained as she sat down under a tree. They had been traveling for two days in the same forest already and there was still no end to it. Since the trees are too thick for a jeep to pass through, they have to walk all the way.
"Why do we have to endure such torture?" Sakura said as she sat down also.
"Come on, you don't have to and don't be such a drag! I think we'll make it soon." Vessica urged on her friends.
"Whatever you say, Ves. I'm tired of this. It's been two days since we got here. What would happen at home if our parents found us disappearing for two whole days? They would go berserk! I really want to go back!" Yohina said heavily with depression as she stood up again.
"I don't think anything would happen at home. I think the time here is suppose to be faster than our world's. I don't think the person or thing that brought us here want to cause chaos in our world." Vessica answered reasonably.
"I guess you are right." Yohina said with a sigh as she followed her friend.
"Come on! You guys are being such sissies!" Gojyo shouted at them from the front.
However, just as Yohina was about to shout back something mean back to him, three dark shadows jumped out of the bushes and landed between Yohina, Vessica, Sakura, and the others who were way in the front of them.
From one look, all of them could tell that they were demons. As those in front turned back to help the other three girls, the demons attacked. One headed for Vessica, another one headed for Sakura, and another one headed for Yohina.
Vessica had no problem handling the demon. Her samurai blame came out of nowhere and first cut out the demon's arm. However, at that time, Yohina was trapped. The demon was right in front of her while her back was against a tree. "You are mine dinner!" The demon muttered as it raised its claw and snatched for Yohina.
Yohina heard herself screaming as the demon's hand grabbed her throat. Her own hands clutched on the demon's arm as she felt a sudden burn on the palm of her hand. Seconds later, she heard the demon's scream accompanying her own as fire consumed the demon like it did once before. The demon was turned into ashes before anyone could help Yohina. Yohina was shocked. She sat there without knowing what was happening.
At the same time, Sakura was pushed onto the ground by the demon that was attacking her. At the scream from the demon that was trying to kill Yohina, the demon that was attacking Sakura was killed by Gojyo's crescent blade with the chain.
"Are you OK?" Vessica asked as she bent down by where Yohina was sitting.
Yohina looked up to her with an empty expression that Vessica didn't recognize at all. Yet, it disappeared in an instant and Yohina's face was filled with shock. "It hurt. The hotness on my palm hurt. I couldn't control it and it just went out of control!" Yohina muttered when she looked at Vessica. Vessica didn't know what Yohina was talking about at all, but she sounded as if she did.
"Yohina, I know. Don't worry about it." Vessica said with a smile.
For the rest of the day, Yohina seemed to be out of it. She was spacing out a lot of times and when someone tried to talk to her, she always had her barrier up for some reason.
That night, they were again attacked by demons. That time, it wasn't as easy as during the day since the demons seemed to be much used to the darkness than any of them were. It was especially a hard job since the Sanzo party also had to protect the girls, who were defenseless except for Vessica.
When Vessica suddenly fell down because of a demon had slashed on her leg, Yohina pushed her out of the way when the demon attacked again. She felt the burning pain on her back as the claws slashed through her skin. At the same time, the same burning pain came from her palm as if something were waiting to get out.
"Get away, you demon!" Yohina shrieked and then two blasts of fire suddenly shot out of her palm as she shrieked and burned at least 3 demons into ashes and injured another 4. Everyone turned to look at her with shock. Yohina just stood there with the same shock as others. No, she was in more shock. She couldn't believe what she had just done.
"What was that?" She thought with amazement. The palm of her hand still glowed under the darkness as she looked at it. It also felt hot. At that moment, she forgot about the wound that was still bleeding and just looked at her hands. "What's happening to me?" She thought suddenly with fear as she remembered seeing those two fire blasts suddenly coming out of her hands.
No one talked to her as Yohina sat alone by herself during the night after Vessica bandaged her back. They didn't know where the bandages came from since Hakkai just took them out of somewhere. Everyone seemed to be having their own thoughts. Once, Vessica sat down beside Yohina during the night. She wanted to talk since they were best friends in this group and she wanted to let Yohina know that what happened earlier that night was strange but it might just been a hallucination.
"That's impossible. Everybody saw it. I don't get it. Why is this happening to me? None of you guys are having some strange powers. I was thankful because it saved me three times already, but I really want to know why and how to use it. Right now, I feel just like I did before as if I don't have any powers at all. It feels really weird." Yohina answered with depression.
Vessica couldn't argue with her friend. The truth was that she had no idea what was going on either. She just wished that she could come up with an answer.
"Ves, I want to go back." Yohina suddenly said the sentence out of nowhere as she hugged her legs closer to herself. Vessica looked at Yohina weirdly because Yohina seemed so depressed lately. Sure, Yohina is not the kind of cheery person like Machi or Nuriko, but she's not this pessimistic either.
"I miss home. It's been three days already. What if the time here is the same as back in our world? Do you know how worried our parents would be? I don't want to stay here anymore. I don't want to have that weird fire power." Yohina muttered as tears dropped out.
"Yohina, what's wrong with you? You are acting really weird. I thought you don't like to cry." Vessica said, trying to sound optimistic. Yohina just shook her head with pain and anger as she pulled down the necklace.
"I hate this thing! Why does this have to happen to me?!" Yohina cried as she threw the necklace away toward the other wall. With her shouting, the silence of the night was broken as everybody turned to look at her and then at the necklace on the floor. As soon as everybody's eyes were on it, it shone with bright light purple light, which blinded them for a second.
The next thing Yohina knew, she was back in her own world on her bed as if she had just been waking up from a deep dream. She looked at her window and saw the little sunlight coming through the blinds. She wondered if everything that had just happened was a dream. Quickly, she jumped out of the bed, noticing that she was going to be late for school, and rushed to the bathroom to get dressed. As she came out to the kitchen, her parents were still nowhere in sight. She wondered where could they be this early on a Monday morning.
With that thought, she prepared her own breakfast quickly and turned on the TV. As she was heading back to her room to get her backpack, something in the TV caught her eyes, or rather, her ears. She walked backward until she stood in front of the TV. Surely, she wasn't wrong. Her parents, along with Machi, Nuriko, Sakura, and Vessica's were all there, in the morning news. Their mothers were crying as the news people talked in the background.
"Five families are very desperate right now that all of their daughters have suddenly disappeared since this Saturday. The five girls are very best friends. According to one of the parents, four of the girls were together before they disappeared. It has been three days and there is still no sight of the girls. Authorities wonder if the girls ran away from home together. If you have seen one of the five girls, please call 911 to notice the authorities." The announcer in the television said and then the screen showed their pictures.
Without noticing, Yohina had covered her mouth with shock. "So it's true. One day in the Saiyuki world is almost one day in ours."