A/N: ...let's just say that I didn't have the best day today, so that's why this chapter may feel more edgier than usual. I hope you had a better day than I had. But enjoy the story, as always.
(Just know that the fairy bible passages was ripped straight from the book called Artemis Fowl.)
The Ice Queen they called her. Frozen in the heart and frozen in the body. A priceless yet cool statue. Kaguya knew it all, every single rotten rumor and nickname they hid behind her back. And today was no different, even if she got no sleep.
Before she entered the school gates, Kaguya heard chatter and laughter. They were quieter than usual, but there was a hum; a hum that was the collective of Shuchi'in Private Academy. Filled with the wealthiest and brightest minds across Japan, and perhaps the world. Heirs to companies that were too big to die, secret billionaires, accountants, and more. The puppeteers of the world, they are the hearts that pump the world forward.
As soon as Kaguya stepped inside, the hearts stopped their beating. And the world went silent as she quietly strolled through the halls. The guards watched her warily, arms crossed. But it wasn't just the guards, it was also the secret spies. The ones implanted by their heirs company, to make sure nothing bad happens. They all saw her, and they knew.
She was no longer just the fourth child. She was the heir to the Shinomiya Conglomerate in less than a day.
Kaguya spotted Hayasaka hanging around her group of 'friends', watching Kaguya. You better give me the answers, Hayasaka seemed to be saying. But remaining in her incognito disguise, she didn't call out.
Nobody had the will to say anything indeed, not when rumors spread like wildfire, and the incident was already released to the public. Not when Kaguya could order their deaths at any second.
"Shinomiya."
Kaguya released a breath she didn't realize she was holding.
"Shirogane," Kaguya responded. "I didn't see you."
"President is here," the whispers said. "He's here…"
"Maybe he can cast her away…"
"He always knows what to do."
Shirogane glared at them, his sharp glare shutting them up quickly. "The headmaster said that Kaguya will still be welcomed to this school. While I honestly rather not let her here, she will be still among us all. Treat her like a normal student would, just stay safe."
He somehow sounded sincere. Perhaps even more than when he acted like her servant. Feeling a slight stab of jealousy, Kaguya didn't let the emotion show. The crowd seemed to get back into a small conversation after his talk, but they were still deathly quiet.
"Thank you," Kaguya said.
Shirogane looked away, "let's go."
Kaguya felt like her heart was just stabbed but she didn't know why. Miyuki Shirogane of the Student Council was just a lie, right? He was her servant after all. He was a liar, just like her. Disguising his true self away, pretending to be a great man. His disgust of her was just an act, right?
Right?
Back then there used to be people admiring them. A large crowd of students gushing as they arrived at their posts. Cheering as they passed by, they would surround in mass. But never too close, as if touching them would break the illusion and make them disappear.
Today the hallway to the Student Council room was dead quiet. The doors nearby were locked, and the lights turned off. A security camera followed her, whirling as it silently observed. There was no trust here, it seems.
Their steps echoed against the smooth granite floor, and Kaguya could hear the whirling of the A/C. Shirogane still refused to talk, eyes looking far off into the distance. She had no idea what he was thinking, but it still somewhat worried her.
More than it should, in fact.
You are a Shinomiya, you cannot love.
Right, she can't afford to feel anything for anyone. Even if it's for a useful pawn, like Shirogane.
"You shouldn't have come out by yourself, master."
Kaguya startled before eyeing Shirogane, realising that they already entered the office. She got distracted. Only fools get distracted, for even a couple of seconds could mean billions or nothing.
"What do you mean?" Kaguya asked. She sat her computer on a nearby desk, turning it on.
"You could've been shot," Shirogane said. "And I or even Hayasaka couldn't have done anything about it."
Kaguya waved her hand. "Nothing bad would've happened. We have work to do, right?"
Shirogane nodded his head. "Yes. We do."
He had office work to do while she had more important business.
Kaguya brought up a text file. She had the fairy scripture book scanned into a file where she could work on it. The student council room had no security cameras, so she didn't fear getting caught. She also had no network on, what she had on her computer wasn't connected to any internet source. She won't let a single person that she didn't trust to look at the precious data.
She had thousands of pages of notes from research she did on fairy kind, noting down every single information she could find. From government spotting, to supposed alien attacks, memory disappearance, existence of hidden beings, sightings of disturbances in space, religions that documented fairy like beings.
If she released this info online, it would definitely prove fairy or alien existence. But that wasn't what she was looking for. She wanted their gold, and to do that… she pulled out The Book from her pocket, making sure that everything matched.
Shirogane looked up from his paperwork, noting the golden artifact. "May I ask what's that?"
"It's not your business yet," Kaguya said sharply. "But if you wish to know some of it, then think of it as a religious text. Like a Bible."
Shirogane's looked inquisitive for a second. "Are you learning religion? To pray for your siblings?"
Especially since you were the ones who killed them?
"Would I care about a couple of dead rats?" Kaguya asked, activating her translation device. "Especially if I was the one who set up the poison?"
"If you're the trapper than who am I then?" Shirogane asked. He got out another bulb of Stormlight, rolling it between his fingers. The white orb puffed with energy, a miniature storm rolling between its foggy body.
"The poison, of course. What else would you be?"
Her tone obeyed him to be quiet, and he said no more. Kaguya returned to her text, toying around with it. She analyzed the alien-like text that filled the screen. The text wrapped around the pages weirdly and were all in hieroglyphs. Pictures of birds, crabs, eyes, dots, circles, tear drops, swirls. She had only seen this text once. And that was her firsts and only encounter with the fairy.
Her first encounter…
Kaguya activated the program, running the text through the algorithm. A bar popped up, displaying how close she was to finishing.
1%... 2%... It will take a long time, but she knew the program could handle it. First, it would go through all the known languages in the world and compare it to them. If that doesn't work, it would try and create a new language based on the text. But it would take a long time, a very long time.
Time for her thoughts to wander, and she suddenly felt super tired. She should've slept during night but she didn't. Because she was weak, weaker than the rest of her family. Weak enough that the memories she tried to push away began to haunt her back. Back when she first met that fairy.
Winkly green skin, nose long and hooked. Two golden eyes, so old and wise that Kaguya felt like nothing under that stare. Pointy ears, but the rest of her body was melted like putty. Alcohol addiction, her father had said. Alcohol ruins a fairy faster than it does a human. The thing sat in the corner of the glass boxed room, curled up like a baby. It looked so pathetic that Kaguya almost felt sorry for it.
"We call it Minerva," Gan'an said. "It's useless to her race now. It forsake it's magic long ago, turning it into this sad object. We found her in Ho Chi Minh City, working as a healing maiden in the alleyways."
He opened the door to the cell, walking in with firm steps. Kaguya stuck to his shadow, still so small that she barely reached his torso. Now that the door fully opened, she was hit with the smell of sweat and disease.
And blood.
Cringing, she wanted to leave. Turning, she was about to walk away. But her father hanged on tight and she was forced to follow him.
"You," the thing seemed to say as they approached. "You're the last thing I wanted to see. And I see you brought a pet along with you. I already told you everything I know, what else do you want?"
"To show my daughter the truth," father said. "And you said you wanted this."
He took off some kind of necklace and threw it towards the fairy. Kaguya realized it was the golden ring that her mother gave him during their marriage. Not that she had many memories of her mother to begin with. The fairy glanced at the piece, blinking its eyes in disbelief at first. Glancing at her father, the fairy was still reluctant. But the ancient eyes, filled with wisdom, was slowly eclipsed by a hunger. A hunger so obvious that even father scowled.
It rushed towards the piece of gold, grasping it between her fingers.
"Mine, mine, mine…" it said, before its voice became pure gibberish.
Father waved at the fairy. "You see? These things are addicted to gold, they love it as much as we humans love drugs. That's in the story's, right? The Leprechaun with his crack of gold, and the Aztecs with their gods. It's all connected. But… it's all in the past."
For the first time in her life, Kaguya noticed that he looked in pain. For a moment. When she turned her eyes away for a second, he returned back to his indifferent stance.
"I wanted you to know this, so you can avoid my mistakes. And understand the true past of the Shinomiya. You're turning seven soon, right?"
Kaguya nodded her head, not knowing if it was a trick question.
"You will soon face the hardest trials in your life, but you must know one thing."
She was still staring at the fairy, as it hugged around the piece of gold like it was it's lifeline.
"We Shinomiya's never love."
He gestured at a servant, and soon a group of guards with batons came in. Surrounding the fairy, they began their beating.
Yet there was not a single scream.
Gan'an spat on the floor next to the fairy.
"Disgusting rat," he muttered, before dragging Kaguya away yet again. As he always does. Always there to haunt her like a ghost. A reminder of who she is. A-
"Shinomiya?"
Kaguya looked up, suddenly noticing that she was shaking a lot. And why was her eyes so blurry? Whipping her face, she noticed that tears were dripping down her face. Shirogane leaned next to her, looking slightly apprehensive.
"Are you okay Shinomiya?"
"...I'm fine."
Shirogane shook his head. "No, you're not. Don't pull that crap on me. You like to isolate yourself when you're not happy, I know that for a fact, But right now, you should take a break. And sleep." He glanced at her screen, eyes scanning down the screen. "I have no idea what you're doing, and it must be important. But you're not going to be okay if you act like this all the time."
Kaguya peered at him before sighing.
"Perhaps you're right."
Closing her eyes, she yawned. She did feel a little bit tired, indeed. She should've gotten more sleep but…
The corpse was covered in so many bullet holes. It was bleeding a lot more than she thought possible.
Kaguya shuddered. She felt Shirogane sitting beside her.
"Just go to sleep," he grumbled. "You'll miss school, but you probably don't care. I can get Hayasaka to look over you, if you wish. But for now, you need your rest."
"How noble of you," Kaguya snapped back, but she let him relax next to her.
"Wow," Shirogane remarked, "you're nice."
"I thought this to be a beauty sleep. I don't want your complaining."
Shirogane raised an eye brow.
"Don't talk back to me, boy."
"Who talks like that?" Shirogane asked, sounding quite humored. "You sound like an old lady. A mean old lady to be precise."
"Be quiet, you," Kaguya said, yet she still somehow chuckled along with him. She did feel very tired, and somehow talking to Shirogane made her nicer. A person to relax with for the rest of the day. Someone who she trusts, for real.
A person her father thought impossible.
They bickered for a little while, going back and forth. Shirogane let himself go into a comfortable rhythm of joking and making fun of one another. It was hard to believe that she was the one who ordered the deaths of dozens of people, but life seemed to land him in the weirdest spots. He was joking around with a sociopath and was actually having fun. He was pissed at her too.
"I think I'm crazy," he claimed.
"That's because you are," Kaguya said. "A big lunatic who can use BS magical powers."
"That's the first time I heard you swear," Shirogane remarked. "You must be drunk right now or something."
And her voice did sound slightly slurred.
"I'm always active," Kaguya complained.
"No you're not," Shirogane responded. "In fact, do you even go anywhere that's not in school or at the household?"
"Yes I do, for business deals," she said. "I probably explored the world more than you ever did. You probably never stepped a foot outside Japan, while I headed to America multiple times to learn the art of business."
"And I did not know that," he replied.
"Cause' you're an idiot. An idiot..."
"Thank you."
She didn't say anything back.
Shirogane sighed. "Anyways, the bell's going to ring. If you want to go to class then you should go now. Otherwise…" he realised that Kaguya's breathing was slowing down. And when he looked down, she was snoring.
Shirogane rolled his eyes. "Now of all times…"
Her hair was spread over his entire body, her head resting against his legs. It would be a pain to move away without waking Kaguya up. At least she doesn't look as upset anymore. he could still remember her whispers as she froze for what seemed like forever.
"Fairy… Minerva… Leprechaun… addicted to gold… never love."
He was also very much aware of the fact that she might be going insane. Looking to the heavens, he heard the school bell ring.
"I'm an idiot."
A big fat idiot who's willing to miss class over a person he hardly knew. Her past was practically invisible to him, hiding deep within Shinomiya. But that was fine, she deserved her own secrets. But someone, who shouldn't be hiding was right beside them...
"Come out from your corner," Shirogane said. "I know you're listening."
Hayasaka strolled from the side, hands behind her back. "You two look cute together."
"I can see that yet I can't," Shirogane responded. His voice somehow changed, becoming quieter, and less enthusiastic. More robotic, only a hint of his human self showing. "Master had a hard day."
Hayasaka approached them, grabbing the computer. "So did I."
"Can you call the office and say that we're sick," Shirogane said. "I can't exactly move right now."
Hayasaka nodded her head, placing the computer aside. Getting out her phone, she began to call the office. Shirogane curiously glanced at Kaguya's computer, wondering what was written on it now.
DATA 10% ENCRYPTED: PROCESS WILL SPEED UP DRAMATICALLY SOON. LANGUAGE SIMILAR TO: EGYPTIAN.
"Do you have an idea what she's doing?" Hayasaka asked, finishing her call. "I know it has to with fairies."
Shirogane shrugged. "You read my report," he said. "You should know everything that Gan'an said.
"The only thing he didn't include was one of his first lines.
Kaguya will never love you back.
It… just felt so personal that he didn't want to include it. And he didn't know how the master would react to that.
Gan'an Shinomiya may be a monster but sometimes he spoke the truth. The honest, brutal truth. And it hurts, it hurt like a punch to the gut.
No. He can't say anything.
"But do you also know what's going through Kaguya's head?" Hayasaka asked.
"How am I supposed to know?"
Hayasaka rose. "You're so oblivious."
Shirogane clicked his tongue. "Perhaps so, but… just let me have peace with Kaguya. I don't feel the best right now, so just for this one second, please let me be alone. I want to sleep too." He was basically begging now. A disgrace, but one he had to go through. For now. Hayasaka looked like she understood his disgrace and backed away. But not before giving him a suspicious glance.
Yeah, I can deal with you later, Shirogane thought. I have another problem to deal with. Leaning his head against the sofa, he closed his eyes. And after some time, he fell asleep, his snores mixing with Kaguya's.
Shirogane woke up with Kaguya still around his lap. But it wasn't her snoring that woke him so, it was the ringing of the computer. Looking at the screen, he squinted his eyes at the scrolling text that went down the screen. Years of training made him very active, even if startled awake.
DATA 100% COMPLETED. DISPLAYING TRANSLATED TEXT:
The booke of the people.
Being instructions to our magicks,
And life rules.
Carry we always, carry me well.
I am thy teacher of herb and spell.
I am thy link to power arcane.
Forget me and thy magick shall wane.
Tell times ten commandments there be.
They will answer every mystery.
Curses, cures, and alchemy;
These secrets shall be thine, through me.
But, Fairy, remember this above all.
I am not for those in mud that crawl.
And forever doomed shall be the one,
Who betrays my secrets one by one.
Blinking his eyes, Shirogane processed the words in his head. What the heck? Why did Shinomiya have that kind of text? And as if to answer his question, he noticed that his master was beginning to stir.
Getting up, she rubbed her eyes, before glancing at the screen. Looking back at Shirogane, she pinched her nose. Shirogane tried not to show any emotion, but she always seemed to understand what he's thinking.
"I guess I have to explain things to you too," she sighed. "Another problem I have to deal with. Tell me. What is the time?"
Shirogane glanced at his watch. "School is over in about twenty minutes."
Shinomiya huffed, before waving him up. Her calm piercing red eyes were steady now and they glared at him easily enough. For better or worse, his master seemed to be in full condition again.
"Very well," she said, "once we get back to the household, I will explain my plan to you and Hayasaka. Bring your sister along with you, we need her too. But don't tell anyone else. Not yet, anyways."
With those words, she straightened her clothes, making sure her hair was fine, and grabbed her computer.
You seem so different than the person who fell asleep against me.
That Kaguya was honest and brash.
This Kaguya was cold and intricate.
"Today will be just as tricky as yesterday. Get used to it, for the next few months will be the hardest you'll ever face."
Shirogane nodded his head in agreement, not knowing what to say. But he knew one thing for sure:
Kaguya, no matter what mood she currently has, is a pain in the ass to deal with.
Meanwhile, deep underground...
Makoto Niijima leaned on the porch, watching the view from the Lep Headquarters. Watching the large artificial lights that shone upon the city in large patches. Haven City was a land of colors, flashing reds, greens, and yellows. Advertisements of recent movies shone from giant ships in the sky, but of course, it wasn't really a sky. Instead it was a massive steel ceiling, filled with hundreds of holes that lead to other parts of the underground. Or perhaps… the surface. Where the mud men lived. The humans.
Her visor suddenly buzzed and her vision was swarmed with information. Advertisements, chat rooms, text messages, news, politics, charities, and more began to pop up all over the place. A signal began to pop up for the nearest fast food restaurants, and the Fountain of Youth. Akira just texted to the group chat about how he got the best equipment from his squad. But what matters more was the speaker icon that was displayed near the edge of her vision. The active chat rooms.
"Ms. Niijima," a secretary said softly, "boss wants you up."
Glancing backwards, Makoto sighed.
Sister…
"Very well, I'll be there soon."
The speaker cut off, and she turned on full vision mode again. She wished she could just take the visor off, but nobody uses phones anymore. She only lived for about a hundred years, and she already felt so old.
Anyways, there was business to be done. Complaining gets you nowhere, but the dumps next to the goblin dens; and that was a fate worse than death.
Preparing to meet her older sister, she began to pump herself up.
You can do this! You won't get yelled at, that badly! It's not like you messed up so badly that you almost exposed your entire race to the humans, and start a war that could destroy the entire earth!
Oh, what was she joking? Why was she even lying to herself, the truth was super obvious.
She was sooooo screwed!