CHAPTER TWO: ONISM

"The awareness of how little of the world you'll experience."

A MAN PASSING by heard the sound of a little girl crying from inside a shrine. A pink-haired little girl sat at the bottom of a well, her little hands plastered on her face. There was nothing but dark wooden walls surrounding all around her. Beneath her body was the cold, thick soil that dirtied her kimono and her skin. She felt lonely... Very lonely. Not a single person was anywhere near or with her. She was all alone in this creepy, old well. Right where she had awoken. "I...I wanna go home." she wept, her hands plastered over her face. "W-Why am I here? I wanna go home..."

"Are you lost, little girl?" asked an older male voice, snapping her out of her trance. She looked up to see a man, around in his late twenties. "Now, what on earth is a child doing all alone in the well? Did you accidentally fall in?" he asked, looking down at her, with concern. "Are you hurt?" The little girl did not answer, too startled and scared to do so. "Where are your mother and father?"'

"I...don't know." she sniffled, wiping her eyes. "I...don't have any…."

The man frowned, not liking what she told him. That can't be good. A child should always have a parent or a guardian to love and protect them. Why was this girl left alone in a scary place like this?

The man let out a sigh and used the latter to climb down in the well. He held his arms out to the little girl. "Come here." The little girl looked at his hands, hesitation in her eyes. "It's okay, I won't hurt you." he gently said, his arms still stretched out to her.

The girl went into his arms and before she knew it, she felt them tightly wrap themselves around her waist. He lifted her off the ground and into his lap. He brought the little girl to his chest, hugging her. The girl was too shocked to do anything. It took a little more time before the little girl wrapped her arms around his neck and cried into his shoulder. "It's okay, sweetie. You can cry." comforted the man, stroking the girl's hair. "You don't have to worry about being alone anymore. I'll take care of you from now on." The man faintly smiled while the girl cried in his arms.

Moka quietly released a moan from her throat, stirring and turning slightly. Her eyes fluttered open to find herself staring at a well-painted wall. Alarmed, she immediately sat up and took a look around her. Judging by her surroundings, Moka knew she wasn't in the same place she was when she fell unconscious. Instead, she found herself in a nice Japanese-style room, the wooden lanterns softly lighting the walls.

She became well aware that she was wearing a comfortable lavender yukata instead of her school uniform and denim jacket.

"W-Where...where am I? What happened?"

Moka only stared forward as she tried to recollect the recent memories of the last place she was before blacking out. Then unexpectedly, the vision of being hunted by those men in the forest and nearly falling prey to the spider demon flashed in her head. The only thing that didn't go unnoticed was her savior, who significantly possessed long flowing hair.

"That man..." she murmured, placing her hands in her lap. "He saved me."

Now, it was all making sense to her why she woke up in this strange place. Did the man save her from being devoured? Of course. Not only was she alive, but also, somehow, he went out of his way to remove the venom from her body before it consumed her entirely. Since Moka was in a different place with people wearing nothing more than kimonos, she wondered how he made it possible to withdraw all the poison with no medical supplies. There was no way he could've removed it using his mouth, could it? She could only hope he didn't endanger his own life trying to save hers if he did.

Pulling the covers back, she pushed herself to her feet from the floor and decided to have a walk around the huge place. The wooden floor made a creaking sound with each step she took, making a silent echo within the room.

Moka came upon two paper sliding doors and pulled one of them to the side, revealing a room that looked like a hallway. A rather long hallway that was enough to give anyone a good and relaxing exercise. "H-Hello?" she called, her voice echoing back at her. All there was present was silence. Pure silence. Whatever place she was in, she was pretty sure its exterior was big enough on the outside as it was on the inside. While it was initially her plan to stay behind and wait for her savior to meet her, Moka felt the overwhelming desire to explore the building.

Becoming eager and curious, Moka begins her journey through the spacious halls of the enormous place. While detouring the place, she didn't spot a single piece of furniture and her ears didn't pick up on the sound of a generator running outside. She glanced around her like a mere child to examine the ancient interior. It wasn't anything that she would see back in where she had spent her entire life.

'Ridiculous.' she mused dryly. She had witnessed men wearing kimonos and raising their weapons to her. The spider monster nearly devoured her, so where did she get the random idea of a generator being in this world? Earlier, when she climbed out of the creepy well, she spotted nothing she would usually see back in her world. The absence of buildings, vehicles, and lined concrete roads made it clear to her that she was no longer in the overpopulated town of Tokyo. She was thrust into an entirely different world, where only grass and trees existed.

Although Moka was rather intelligent in her studies, history was the least subject she was interested in. However, she took time to see that it looked as if it came straight from a textbook. The pitter-patter sound of her feet echoed in her ears as she continued to stroll down the hall, looking back and forth to inspect every inch of the place. Instead of seeing painted-colored walls and a regular door that would be part of a house, she was met with dark wooden walls and paper sliding doors. Looking to her left, she spotted a huge koi pond in what appeared to be a courtyard.

While examining the pure water, Moka found it strange to see a few monstrous-looking fishes swimming amongst themselves in the place of koi fishes. Considering what she had to deal with every day from humans of society, these monster-like creatures wouldn't be given their own exhibit in aquariums for humans to see. It would be an utterly disastrous mess that would take a long time to clean up. She could just imagine the worst outcome. The image of people running away in terror at the sight of the monstrous-looking fishes played itself in her head. It was funny just thinking about it, but also horrible.

Unfortunately for Moka, people don't run away at the sight of her. They get confrontational.

A part of her wished they only ran away when they saw her, but no, She could remember the relentless beatings and taunts she received during her childhood up to her adolescence just because humans could not look past the fact that she was a vampire. Every single day she was alive, it wouldn't stop. It'll continue to get worse than she intended it to be.

~Flashback~

There were fits of laughter being heard all around her as she was helpless on the grass, receiving kicks, punches, and hair-pulling.

"Vampire freak!"

"Bloodsucker!"

"Parasite!

"Leech!"

They all taunted.

She watched as the human children surrounded her, laughing and pointing fingers at her while she lay there in humiliation. She could only lie there and let them make her suffer for what she was. There was nowhere to escape, nowhere for her to flee from her torture cage. All of them stood firmly around her, closing so many gaps so that she wouldn't be able to escape her nightmare. She wanted to run home and forget about this whole mess that had started, but she knew that those who had hatred towards her wouldn't let her go so quickly without a fight.

"Eww! Look at her hair. It's so pink!" shouted a little girl, roughly yanking on her hair.

"No! S-Stop it!" she pleadingly screamed, trying to escape the relentless beatings. It was all too much to bear. Moka wanted it to stop.

"Hey, I've got a better idea. Hurry! Grab her!" commanded a girl.

The rest of the children did as they were ordered and roughly grabbed Moka by her arms, sitting her on her knees. "Hold her still." called the leader of the devious children. Moka watched as the evil little girl pulled out a pair of scissors from her bookbag.

"Hey, bloodsucker!" sounded the human girl as she grabbed Moka's chin to force her to look at her. "Since you're having a bad hair day, I'm gonna help you fix it a little." the bully mocked, opening and closing them to intimidate the vampire. "But if you cry and beg for me, I might change my mind about cutting it off."

~End Flashback~

"Ah, so you've finally awoken, vampire." sounded a male voice, shattering her illusion of memories. Moka's head snapped towards the direction of the voice and found a young man who looked around her age standing a distance from her. Moka took a minute to examine him. She could see that he was very handsome with feminine features, his long dark hair tied back into a braid and enchanting eyes that one could get easily lost in. Also, he had unique eyebrows in the shape of lightning bolts or thunderbolts. His body was clad in the robes of a traditional Chinese male. Any girl that went to her school would intensely yearn for this gentleman due to his handsome features.

'Hold on...judging by his clothes, could he possibly be Chinese?' she inwardly questioned in confusion. Moka didn't understand. She was wearing a Japanese kimono and inside a huge ancient Japanese building with a man of Chinese descent. There was no way the Chinese somehow traveled overseas to ancient Japan.

"W-Who are you?" Moka asked, her voice a little shakier than she attended. "Where am I?"

"Follow me. Great grandfather has been waiting for you." smiled the young man as he continued to walk ahead. Without an answer to her question, the woman only walked past her.

'Great grandfather?' pondered Moka in wonder as she allowed the woman to lead her around the enormous place. 'Who's great grandfather? Could he possibly be the one who saved me from being eaten alive by that spider monster?' The picture of the man's handsome face appeared in her mind. Something about the smile he wore that brought her comfort and, in a way, silently assured her she was safe. That was all she could remember about him besides his hair since it was becoming harder and harder to remember what she saw through her blurry vision. His kind smile.

Moka silently grimaced in frustration at her faulty memory. She wanted to know what else had occurred before she fell into a state of unconsciousness. It was easy for her to recall her clothes being ripped to shreds, the monster impaling and poisoning her, and a warm feeling of liquid touching her bare body. Of course, she couldn't leave out the agonizing scream she could luckily hear, letting her know he had slain the monster on the spot.

"We're here." announced the boy, bringing the pink-haired out of her train of thoughts. The pair had made a stop in front of two sizeable Japanese-style double doors, allowing Moka to think about what kind of person her savior was. Was he someone of the higher status of this place or a well-respected king? That was one of the few things she could come up with since the woman referred to him as "Great Grandfather" before leading her to him. Moka was now growing confused. How can someone look so young and handsome be a great-grandparent? "Great Grandfather, I've arrived with the girl as you requested."

There was a moment of silence before the two heard, "Ah, excellent job, my dear boy! Bring her in." exclaimed an elderly male voice. As told, the young man slid open the doors to reveal a well-kempt, beautifully furnished room with ancient Chinese items and equipment. Moka had never seen so many historical things up this close before. It was like she fainted and woke up in a different time period further from the present. But there was one question in her mind she wanted to ask. How did ancient Chinese items end up here?

'Where is he?' In search of the man's voice, she started to look around for him in the vast room.

As if fate could read her mind, the man spoke up. "Down here." Moka adverted her eyes downward and nearly fell over in shock at the physical appearance of the mysterious person. Before her was a short, older man wearing a white, bell-sleeved robe with a more decorated black robe beneath and possessing long gray hair, his hands hid in his sleeves as black round sunglasses covered his eyes and a Chinese pipe stuck between his lips. The unusual feature about the older adult was his oddly pointy ears. Still in a state of shock, Moka continued to stare down at him. "What? What's with the face? You got a problem with me?"

"Uh..." was the only thing that fell on her lips. 'N-No way. This little guy is the one who saved me?' His extremely long hair was the only thing she could identify with the man she saw before she fainted. 'Something's off with him. Judging by his ears, he's not a human.' Moka couldn't sense anything human about this man.

Moka watched the older man remove a hand from one of his long sleeves to wave at her. "Greetings. I'm Touhou Fuhai." he greeted with a friendly smile. "And who might you be, pretty little lady?"

"Um...I...uh..." Moka stuttered for a bit. "I'm Moka."

The man, named Touhou, chuckled in response. "Well, Moka, we have much to talk about...but first-let's eat! I'm starved!" he declared, turning away from her. Out of nowhere, Moka felt a gust of wind pick up, slightly blowing the locks of her pink hair back. She looked around her and saw that the old man that was once in front of her was no longer there. He was gone in a flash. "H-He's fast..." she stammered with awe and shock, fixing her hair. "Is he always like this?" she asked, turning her attention towards the younger man beside her.

The boy nodded with a small. "Yeah, but you'll get use to it eventually. He may seem impulsive, but he means well once you get to know him," he said, walking ahead in the direction where the old man vanished. Of course, Moka followed him to where he was headed. Since she was in an unknown location and knew very little of the place, she didn't want to risk getting lost that easily.

"I see," she responded, trailing behind him.

TO BE CONTINUED