Chapter 3

Setting: 4/9 After School, Gekkoukan High

It was the second day of school at Gekkoukan High. Nagito was surprised how quiet his day at school was. He was bombarded with questions about him and Yukari being a couple and had to prevent Junpei from embarassing himself in class by giving him the right answer. But he wasn't bullied all day, which was fine by him. For the next few hours, he wandered around the town. He visited the Iwatodai strip mall and found it changed a lot of the last ten years. The Wild Duck Burger, the Octopia takoyaki stand, and the Bookworms book store was still there, there were a bunch of brand new buildings. They were higher up and could be accessed by a set of spiral stairs. There were two floors. The new places consisted of a sweets shop, a manga cafe, and a ramen restaurant.

There was an awesome ramen stand back in Adachi. I wonder if this place has any good ramen, I'll have to check it out later... Nagito thought to himself.

Setting: 4/9 Evening, Dorm

Nagito arrived to see Mitsuru on the couch reading a book. "Ah, welcome back, Ishikawa." She greeted, briefly taking her eyes of the book.

"H-Hello, Mitsuru-senpai..." He said while blushing.

"Since you're back, there's something I need to tell you." She said.

"W-What is it?" He asked nervously.

"A bunch of strange incidents have been happening as of late. I'm asking you not to go outside at night, it's too dangerous." She said in authorative voice.

"Y-Yes, I understand, Senpai." He responded.

"Your face is burning up. Are not feeling well?" She asked, this time with a concerned tone.

"I-I-I-I'm a-alright.. I-I'm still t-tired, so I-I'm going to bed. G-Good night!" He then bolted up the stairs to his room.

Yukari saw him bolting up the stairs with his flushed expression. He has a crush on Senpai. That's cute. She thought to herself.

Setting: 4/9 Dark Hour, Dorm command room

Mitsuru, Yukari, and Ikutsuki were in the command room watching Nagito sleep on the monitor.

"Hm, he's still asleep. Even those who have the potential tend to be unstable at first. Memory loss, disorientation, but Nagito here is rather unique, he hasn't had any of the common symptoms." Ikutsuki said.

"Should we monitor him some more?" Mitsuru asked.

"I don't like this, I feel like we're spying on him..." Yukari said.

"I understand your concern, but it's imperative that we find new recruits. I heard he's your classmate. Wouldn't you feel more comfortable working with someone from the same grade?" The bespectaled mab said.

The monitor started beeping all of a sudden. Mitsuru pressed a button on the control panel and spoke, "Command room. Is that you, Akihiko?"

"You won't believe it, this thing is huge! Unfortunately, I don't have time to talk, it's chasing me! I wanted to let you guys know I'm almost there!" A voice on the other end yelled.

"Does that mean he's bringing that thing here?!" Yukari asked in a panicked state. As soon as she that, the building started rumbling. "You gotta be kidding!" She yelled.

"Prepare for battle!" Mitsuru ordered.

The three ran down the arrived downstairs to see a guy sitting against the front door, clutching his abdomen. He had silver hair and grey eyes. He wore a red vest over a white long sleeved shirt, black trousers and black loafers.

"Akihiko!" Mitsuru yelled.

"I-I'm alright. Get ready to be surprised, it'll be here any second!" The boy name Akihiko said while smirking.

"This is no time to joke around!" The readhead said annoyed.

"It's one of THEM, Akihiko?" Ikutsuki asked.

"Yes, but not an ordinary one." Akihiko said.

The building started rumbling again.

"Mr. Chairman, return to the command room!"

"Right, be careful!" He obeyed and ran back up the stairs.

"Takeba, go wake Ishikawa up, then escape out the back!"

"W-What about you?" Yukari asked.

"We have no choice but to fight! Sorry, Akihiko, you brought it to us, so I'm afraid you have to fight." Mitsuru said.

"Like I had a choice! What are waiting for, Yukari?! Go!" Akihiko ordered.

"R-Right!" She complied then ran up the stairs

The rumbling startled Nagito so bad, it knocked him out of his bed.

"W-W-What the hell's going on?!" He asked panicked. He was startled again by someone banging on his door.

"It's me! I'm sorry, I'm coming in!" A voice said on the other side of the door. The door was then forced open to reveal Yukari in a panicked state. "There's no time to explain, you need to come with me right now!" She ordered.

"W-What's-" He was interrupted when Yukari grabbed his arm and started running downstairs while dragging him along.

Just as they arrived at the back door downstairs, Yukari's headset started beeping. "This is Yukari!" She answered.

"Takeba, be careful! There's more than one! The one we're fighting isn't the one Akihiko saw!" Mitsuru's voice on the other end said.

"W-What?!" Suddenly, something started to violently bang on the back door.

"L-Let's pull back!" She said. She grabbed Nagito's arm again and dragged him up the stairs to the roof.

"We should be safe up here." She said, wiping sweat from her forehead. Their relief was short lived when the building rumbled again. They turned around to see a bunch of black hands gripping the fence behind them. One of the hands was holding a blue mask with the number "I" on it. The creature climbed down and appeared before them. The creature was strange looking. It was just a mass of hands. A bunch of knives appeared in its hands. The creature then charged after the two.

"What is that thing?!" Nagito asked.

"Those creatures... we call them Shadows. I-I have to fight..." Yukari removed the gun from the holster on her leg. She didn't aim it at the Shadow, she put it to her head!

Nagito's eyes went wide. "W-What are you doing?!" Was she going to kill herself? She slowly and nervously pulling the trigger. Nagito was too frightened to stop her. Just as she was about to pull it, the Shadow launched a fire ball at her, sending her flying, skidding on the ground near the door.

"Yukari!" He yelled.

Nagito had to do something, but what could he do? He didn't have any weapons- "The gun!" Nagito noticed Yukari's gun lying under his feet. He picked it up and was about to aim it at the Shadow, but for some reason he found himself putting it to his head.

What am I doing? He thought. He wondered why he was putting it to his head, but something was telling him to put it to his head and pull the trigger. I can't back out now. He thought.

"Per...so...na!" He then pulled the trigger and was overcome with a warm energy. Something then appeared above him. It looked like a man with a mechanical body. It had a harp on its back and a speaker in its stomach. It had long white hair and red eyes.

"Thou art I."

"And I am Thou."

"From the sea of thy soul I cometh."

"I am Orpheus, master strings." The creature by the name of Orpheus said.

He could defeat the Shadow with this new power of his. Just he was about to order Orpheus to attack it, he started clutching his head in pain. Orpheus suddenly exploded to reveal a different creature. It wore a blue cloak and had a bunch of coffins chained together floating behind its back. It wore skull helmet and was carrying a katana shaped weapon. The creature jumped into the air and swung its sword at the Shadow, cutting some its hands off, it then grabbed it by another one of its hand and sliced it off, it then delivered a diagnal slash to its mask, slicing it in half. It then used some sort of hand sign. When ir was done casting, a dark purple circle appeared around its remains. The circle lit up instantly disentigrating the rest of the Shadow.

The cloaked creature disappeared into a blue light and Orpheus returned, fully intact.

"I-Is it over?" Yukari, who watched the whole thing, asked. Just as she asked that, two smaller Shadows wearing the same mask as the first one appeared, charging at the defenseless Yukari.

"G-Get away!" She screamed in terror.

I gotta save her! He then ran over to the Shadows and ordered Orpheus to attack. His Persona crushed one of the Shadows with his harp, killing it instantly. He then played a song on his harp and burned the last one with fire, taking it out.

"Are you okay, Yukari?" Nagito asked her, dismissing Orpheus.

"Y-Yeah..." She answered.

"Awesome..." He said with a smile. His vision turned black, he collapsed.

"Hey! Are you okay?!" Yukari asked while panicking.

"Answer me!"

Chapter 3 end

A/N: If you can guess which spell Thanatos used, you'll get twenty cyber cookies.