WE HAVE CONTINUED TO OWN NOTHING

A Second Chance:

Chapter Five: Reflections

Sitting back in his chair, the Headmaster considered his options. After all, it wasn't every day that a literal embodiment of hellfire decided to attend university, as opposed to a figurative embodiment of hellfire like any other teenager.

Tenmei Mikogami had lived a long life and seen many terrible things, and had done a few terrible things himself. It hadn't been the first time he met a Ghost Rider, though it had admittedly been a while. To a one, they were all tormented souls, tricked into deals and cursed with terrifying power that was barely controllable.

Of course, he hadn't met one so young before, but if Carter Slade's story was true, he was actually quite a but older than he looked. If he was to be believed, he had been born not long after Mikogami and his comrades had united against a great evil. 'What a time that was.' He mused to himself, allowing himself to remember the old days. The prime of his life, drunk on his own power and ready to pull off the greatest victory imaginable.

'We thought we were invincible, then. So convinced in our own superiority that we almost lost it all at the last step. If Akasha hadn't sacrificed herself, we would have ended right there, and who knows how the world would have turned out. And even 170 years later, it was almost for nothing.'

Shaking off his melancholy and nostalgic thoughts, Mikogami returned to the matter at hand. Slade's story, if it was true, was something else. Breaking the unbreakable chains that had bound him, mentoring another Rider down the road of salvation, succumbing to death and then being reborn as a child to be the protector of a boy? It sounded almost too fantastical for anyone to believe.

If he was anyone else, Mikogami himself might not have believed it. However, he was one of the Three Dark Lords for a reason, and he knew more than most about how the worlds of magic and man worked.

Whoever had returned Carter Slade to life was powerful, more powerful than any being he knew off the top of his head. Returning him to life was one thing, he knew a number of beings that could do it when pressed. Restoring his youth? A bit rarer, but still possible.

But giving him the Rider's spirit back as well? That was difficult. Only a higher demon could manipulate hellfire with such skill and strength as to facilitate a resurrection. And among the higher demons, Mikogami could only think of a few that could restore Slade's youth at the same time. As far as he knew, only one of the Perdition Lords could do such a thing.

Then there was the directive. If Slade's resurrection was all there was, Mikogami would think that was the end of it, but it wasn't. He had been reborn and charged to protect Tsukune Aono.

He couldn't think of any reason one of the Perdition Lords would want a human boy protected. The idea of protection, to keep one safe from any harm, was so against the ideals of the Hell Planes it wasn't even funny. Therefore, Mikogami sincerely doubted that it was a demon behind Slade's rebirth.

But, having ruled out infernal manipulations, he was somewhat at a loss as to who was then responsible. He couldn't think of any monster who was powerful enough to perform such a miracle.

Could it be divine intervention? He doubted it. Over his centuries of life, he had seen very little evidence in favor of the existence of gods. Mikogami had long since reached the conclusion that the 'gods' of ancient myth were most likely just rather powerful wizards or monsters, using their gifts to carve out domains for themselves. If there were ever any real gods, they had surely either abandoned the world or died off.

'Could be an angel. Maybe a Sefirot or a high-ranking Keeper decided to take pity on the old man and give him a second chance.' He considered this train of thought for all of two seconds before laughing to himself. If a Hayyoth of old had indeed descended to Earth in order to perform a miracle of that caliber, everyone would know of it. The lack of Aether energy surges told him all he needed.

At the same time, the lack of Dark Aether energy surges reassured him of the absence of the Hayyoth's greatest enemies. That, and the general lack of undead rampaging around.

Thus, Tenmei Mikogami found himself in a bit of bewilderment. No reason for demonic involvement, no sign of angelic manipulation or Apothicon incursion, no one living who could pull off a miracle, and no sign of any god capable of such a feat. And yet, despite the lack of any evidence that pointed to a culprit, an old man was reborn as a young boy with the full power of a Spirit of Vengeance behind him.

It wasn't very often that he asked a question and got no answers. All he knew was this: whoever had resurrected the Ghost Rider known as Carter Slade was immensely powerful and apparently benevolent to at least one human.

Beneath his hood, the Headmaster frowned as he considered his options. After all, it wasn't every day that a powerful player came along to flip the carefully-balanced chessboard over.

'I wonder if I should tell old Smiley about this? Nah, he could use a good surprise every now and then. It'll keep him on his toes. Besides, he's been busy ever since the Yamatai Incident.'

A few years back, news had reached him of a rather astounding discovery out in the ocean. The legendary island of the long-dead Sun Queen Himiko had been discovered, with the eternal storm shrouding it having finally dissipated. A few polite inquiries had gotten him answers that he probably wasn't supposed to have, and he had learned that the Queen had been on the verge of being revived before being beaten by a normal human of all things. That must have stung.

Despite the quarantine zone the Japanese government had installed, he had taken a trip to the island over summer break that year. The residual energies surrounding the island had been fascinating, though Fuhai had always been the best at energy manipulation among the three of them. Personally, he had been much more interested in the Stormguard soldiers that had still guarded the ruins of Himiko's palace, and had drawn curious similarities between the Stormguard Transformation and the Ghoul Conversion process.

After he returned from his summer vacation, Mikogami had been contacted by an old friend he hadn't seen in a while. Back when he was still working for the International Defense Council, George Smiley had visited Japan several times to inspect Yokai Academy (from a safe distance) and to make sure the local magical population had been keeping things under control.

That itself was a rather tricky situation, since their little corner of the world was arranged rather differently than America, Britain, or the rest of Europe. Although the wand-wavers and other practitioners were in charge, they ruled only as much as the monster population, which was much higher in number than anywhere else in the world, let them. It was a delicate balance, keeping the monsters happy and keeping the wizards nervous enough to let matters continue, but not panic completely and do something drastic.

Not long after he had returned from his 'vacation,' Smiley had contacted him with some questions about what he had discovered. The old spy had already deduced that Mikogami would investigate the moment he heard about Yamatai's discovery, so he decided to not bother investigating himself and instead wait for one of the few people he trusted to bring him answers.

The wily old man asked about the possible after-shocks of the eternal storm's dissolution, ranging from possible weather effects to magical backlash on the surrounding ocean. Innocuous questions, ones that Mikogami had answered to the best of his knowledge. Left unspoken was the real question: how was this incident going to affect the world as a whole? An island shrouded by an eternal storm isn't something easily forgotten. The past couple of years had been relatively kind in terms of problems, but Mikogami knew that peace wasn't going to last.

In a world like theirs, peace only lasted as long as it suited the powerful and committed. The people like him, the ones who worked to maintain peace, had been preparing themselves and others for something big over the past couple of years. No one was quite sure what was coming, but everyone could tell that something was coming. The boundaries between mundane and magical could only last for so long in this new, digital era of technology. 'Every time a wizard wipes the memories of a non-magical, the truth gets one step closer to the general populace.' Mikogami thought to himself.

The great revelation of the fantastical world was inevitable at this point. All that could be done was maintaining the current status quo and figuring out how to soften the impact of a world turning upside-down overnight.

To that end, Tsukune Aono had been chosen by Mikogami as an agent of this goal. It was almost a pity that the boy had no idea how important he was in the grand scheme of things. If a completely normal human boy could walk into a school full of monsters and come back out better than he walked in, it would serve as a prime example of cooperation and peace.

And now an unknown force, one capable of true resurrection and manipulating hellfire, had appointed a Ghost Rider to guard his chosen from harm. Was this new factor an ally, or were they simply using Tsukune for their own purpose?

Only time would tell.

Tenmei Mikogami, Dark Lord of Japan and Headmaster of Yokai Academy, felt every one of his years as he poured himself a glass of saké. Before taking a sip, he examined the glass for a moment, then held it out in a toast to the empty air.

"To a new world of gods and monsters." he said, before downing it.

It was already night out when Carter Slade returned to the graveyard. For most people, skulking through a graveyard at night looking for monsters was not the wisest thing in the world.

Most people were not Carter Slade.

His footsteps were silent as he walked through the silent graves. He idly wondered how much use the graveyard actually saw. Considering the school in question, Slade reasoned that the answer was probably rather depressing.

His young yet experienced eyes took in the scene of the crime. From what he could tell, no one had disturbed the site since his last visit. It was all there still, the burned remains of the ropes, the ash piles and bloodstains, the scorched hoof-prints. Slade began to look around the area, trying to spot anything he had missed during the battle.

An examination of the area around the grave revealed nothing of interest. Any footprints had been destroyed by the ravenous jikininki as they had surrounded Cailin. The ropes were mostly burned, so there was no evidence there. Having found nothing close by, he decided to spread his examination out a little, choosing to look around the other graves.

The first trail of footprints he found belonged to him, as evidenced by the scorch marks that appeared as they approached the grave. A second, smaller set of prints most likely belonged to Cailin, since they emerged from the torn up dirt in front of the grave and headed towards the girls dormitory.

Though the information was useful, it didn't tell Slade anything that he didn't already know. He needed to keep searching.

Slade hit pay-dirt fifteen minutes later. Behind a nearby gravestone was another set of footprints. They didn't have the gait of an undead or the scorch marks from his transformation, nor were they the same size of Cailin's prints. This was someone else.

Kneeling down, Slade estimated that the prints weren't much larger than his own. Probably not much older than him, most likely a male from the way they stood. He couldn't tell how long they had been standing there. They could have been standing there the entire time, but he doubted it.

'If he'd been here the whole time, the Rider would'a sensed him. Since he didn't help Cailin, he's probably the instigator.' Slade thought to himself.

'Makes sense to me.'

"WHAT THE-" Slade jerked around, his hand going for the whip in his bag. Twisting around, he saw nothing. Nobody was there.

The adrenaline fading, he sighed and tried to calm his beating heart. "Must be hearing things." He muttered to himself.

Turning back to the footprints, he saw them trail away from the main campus. Curiously, Slade began to follow them.

Grasping hands, pain in the side of the head, the snarls of the undead, the burning pain of the ropes, a surge of heat and a terrifying roar-

Gasping for breath, Cailin Ailbe shot out of her bed, the growls of the jikininki echoing in her ears. Climbing out from under the sheets, she grabbed a glass of water and downed it quickly. A look at her alarm revealed the time as 2:30 in the morning.

Sighing to herself, she decided to take a quick shower to calm her nerves. Entering the bathroom, she quickly disrobed and climbed into the stall. Her tense muscles relaxing under the hot water, Cailin allowed her thoughts to drift to her mysterious savior.

She had been jumped from behind in the hallways on the way back to her dorm. When she had awoken, she had been tied to the gravestone, unable to focus due to her panic as the undead closed in. Cailin had never been so scared in her life.

Then he had come.

The image of him was burned into her mind, the skeleton wreathed in flame, wielding a mighty whip with incredible skill. It's destruction of the jikininki was brutal and quick, with no wasted movement. After the undead had been slain, it had freed her from the grave and summoned a spectral horse that it had departed on.

Cailin had never heard of a monster like it, and a brief search of the library hadn't resulted in anything. She planned to spend the next weekend researching, but wasn't optimistic. Maybe she'd ask that Slade boy for help. He seemed nice.

Turning off the shower, she turned to the mirror. For a moment, she simply stood there motionless. Suddenly, she began to vibrate in place, her image blurring for a moment. When the blur vanished, her hair was dry. Satisfied, she put her sleepwear back on and returned to bed, hopeful that the nightmares would not return.

Her last thought was of a grinning skull, wreathed in flame.

When he looked into the mirror, he saw a weak person, a boy who couldn't stand up for himself and had to rely on others for protection.

Ketsu Kokoro sighed in despair as he examined himself. Today was supposed to have been the day, the day he stood up against his bullies and said no more! A real man could stand against them! Gan Ceann wouldn't run from a fight! He'd have hurtled his head at his enemies and cut them down before they realized what was coming!

Ketsu had envisioned it, his triumphant victory over the bullies. He would stand tall over their fallen forms, and they would never bother him again.

Instead, the moment he opened his mouth to speak, he had lost his nerve. His voice had cracked, they had laughed, and in the moment he was reeling from embarrassment, they had taken his head again.

He had resigned himself then, knowing he was going to be late to all his classes for the day. When his head was up the tree, he had despaired at his fate. But then, as if by a miracle, help had come. His body came charging out of the school, another boy right behind it.

Throwing aside his leather jacket, he had scaled the tree without a fuss, retrieving his head and uniting it with his body.

As he gazed upon Carter Slade's face, he wondered if this is how Gan Ceann had felt when he had been saved by Zamiel the Huntsman. Awe? Certainly, for he was in the presence of something incredible. Fear? Absolutely, for Ketsu feared that the boy who helped him would cast him aside like the rest, abandoning him to seek the favor of the masses.

Friendship? Was it possible for a Border Being like himself to make such a friend, the kind of friend you only read about in the old stories?

Ketsu didn't know, and his reflection didn't tell him anything. Sighing, he picked up his head and turned the lights off in the bathroom. He returned to his bed, setting his head on the special cushion for that all dullahan had.

His last thought was a question, simple yet not easily answered.

'Will I ever have a friend?'

The footprints had led him to a smaller building separate from the main campus. Slade realized where he was quickly, though he had never been there before.

"The Public Safety Commission Building?" he asked out-loud. Why would the school's peace-keepers tie a girl to a gravestone and leave her to be devoured by undead? It didn't make sense.

Yawning, Slade looked at his watch and saw that it was almost three in the morning. Deciding to leave for now, he began to work his way back to the dormitory.

Upon arriving, Slade changed into his sleepwear and entered the bathroom. After brushing his teeth, he stood in front of the mirror for a minute, examining his youthful face. For a moment he remembered his old face, weathered and aged.

"This is proper strange." he muttered to himself.

'You're telling me, pal.'

Despite what others may say, Slade did not jump out of his skin. After frantically looking around, he turned back to the mirror and jumped back in shock.

His reflection was gone. In it's place was a grinning skull, bleached white and wreathed in bright red flames. 'What's the matter, old sport? You look like you've seen a ghost.' the skull said.

Slade rubbed his eyes and looked. No change. He splashed some water onto his face and looked again. Nope. Still there. Still grinning.

'I'm pretty sure that isn't how you drink water. But hey, what do I know? I don't think I've ever drank anything before.' the skull commented.

For a moment, Slade said nothing, choosing instead to simply observe the grinning skull. Finally, he spoke.

"Are you wha' I think you are?" he asked hesitantly.

'Depends. What do you think I am?' the skull asked in return.

Slade swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. "Well, if I had ta' reckon, I'd say tha' you're the Rider. Am I wrong?"

'No, you're right. I'm what you call the Rider, though I think I'm different now.' the skull mused to itself.

"Different? How?" he asked, finding it rather surreal that his inner demon had apparently decided to start talking.

'Dunno. I feel different, feel like new. I can still hear the Call for Vengeance, but it's different, more quiet.' the Rider said calmly, it's skeletal face somehow frowning in thought. 'There's another Call now, a call to Protect. I don't quite understand it.'

"Could it be because of our unique circumstances? I mean, I was reborn, so maybe you were too?" Slade asked, his mind racing at the possibilities.

'Probably, but I'm still trying to figure out what it means. Eh, I'll figure it out later. You got class tomorrow, so go to bed.' With that, the Rider's skull vanished from the mirror, leaving behind only Slade's reflection.

"Did the Spirit of Vengeance jus' tell me to go to bed 'cause it's a school night?" Slade weakly asked to himself.

'Yes I did, so do it! I want to learn more about everything! Go to sleep!' The Rider's face appeared in the mirror again briefly before vanishing.

Sighing, Slade left the bathroom and climbed into bed. Maybe everything would make sense in the morning.

He doubted it, but it was always nice to hope.

As he closed his eyes, his last thought was of his mission, and a single question that had been burned into his mind since the day he had made a deal that cost him everything.

'Why me?'

In the depths of the Public Safety Commission, Kuyō pondered his next move. A large part of him was seething in anger at the loss of the pack of jikininki that he had spent the better part of three months cultivating. He had planned to move them into one of the dungeons under the Commission building in order to dispose of miscreants, but that plan was now truly shot to hell.

Or rather, he mused, burned to hell, if Sato's report was accurate. Burned by a monster that he didn't recognize, a skeleton wreathed in flame wielding a flaming whip.

As one does when confronted with the unknown, Kuyō had delved into the school's library for any information.

What he found hadn't thrilled him, as evidenced by the smoldering pile of ash that had once been a book in his trash can.

GHOST RIDER: (Nocens ass)

Officially considered to be a myth by the monster world, the Ghost Rider is supposedly a human that had gained the powers of Hell. In legend, they exist to hunt down anyone who escapes from Hell and to punish the guilty. Of course, they do not actually exist. If they did, the entire monster community would be dead by now from all the evil deeds done. Such as the time the Vampires convinced Hitler to start killing Jewish people, or when an Orc named Saddam Hussein bombed the United States of America. In conclusion, they are nothing more than a myth created by humans to scare us.

That was it. There was no other information. However, that wasn't the book's only problem.

Kuyō had read through the entire book and had been less than impressed by the knowledge within. In addition to the minimal information about the mythical Ghost Rider, the information about other monsters like Vampires or even Kitsune was either woefully lacking or horribly ignorant.

On top of everything else, the book was poorly written. Kuyō hated poorly written books. Whoever the idiot that had written Marauding with Monsters was had better hope that Kuyō never found him.

What kind of idiotic name was Lockhart, anyway?

'Just another symptom of Yokai Academy's downward spiral. They can't even properly vet the books in the library without us!' Kuyō thought to himself.

Returning his thoughts to the topic at hand, the mighty yokai considered his options. Whoever this new monster was would have to be dealt with in a swift and decisive manner.

Tomorrow, he would order Keito to begin discretely investigating the student populace for their culprit. When they had a name, they would strike. Order would be maintained.

This was the oath of Kuyō, nephew and true successor of Yasaka Rīgaru, leader of the Kitsune Yokai of Japan.

AN: Been a While, huh? Fear not, We are, Despite efforts To the contrary, Still alive. Great Plans are Afoot. There is much In store. One who has the Eyes of an Eagle may see the Clues.

For now, Though, stay Safe, stay Healthy. Conquering the world Requires people to be Conquered, after All.

Thank You and Happy Easter

-Z