Evening had turned into night by the time the police had finished investigating the Shirayama mansion. Much to Hajime's chagrin, they found no trace of his grandmother anywhere. Useless cops, they couldn't even find a body if it were right under their noses. As a forensic was taking blood samples from the message on the wall, one of the high-ranking officers sat down with the disgruntled Hajime in the kitchen.

"Let's go over this quickly, son," the middle-aged man began. "Did your grandmother have any enemies?"

"Most of her enemies had been dealt with. There was one…" Hajime hiccuped to suppress a sob, "…one who she feared would return."

"And did she tell you something about this enemy?"

He nodded. "She said he's a psychopath with a sadistic streak. She feared that the recent murders which happened on the college campus might have been his doing. But we were still unsure and I've been hoping over these past few days that the police would've found whoever was behind this." He clenched his fists tight and took a moment to wipe the small tears from his reddened eyes. "But then that sick fuck somehow got a hold of my phone number and threatened to kill grandma if I dared contact you…"

"You did wrong there. You should've contacted us right after that, there's no way you should have left the madman have an upper hand on-"

"I fucking know that!" Hajime raised his voice, venting out some inner frustrations. "I'm sorry," he added, returning to his calm demeanor. "My grandma feared that the killer might actually not be human, and I think I'm starting to agree with her."

"Not to demean your grandmother, but at that old age anything out of the norm could seem supernatural."

"Then how do you explain that our expensive camera security system equipped with lasers was so easily deactivated and we have lost all video footage? Or the fact that this was all done without one attempt to type a password, meaning that most likely someone jumped over our sharp electrified fence?"

"There are plenty of rational explanations for what happened," the policeman argued and turned for a moment to see that the forensic was done gathering samples.

"This was all my fault!" Hajime exclaimed and punched the table. "If I had been a bit more daring, maybe it wouldn't have come to this!"

"Take it easy, son. I promise you we will find her. Until then, if there's anything you need…"

"Actually, there is. I can't stay in this mansion without some protection. If it's not much to ask, could you approve for one or two officers to be my bodyguards, at least until my parents return from their business trip in the United States?"

The uniformed man regarded him. Hajime may have been rich, but police forces were not trained to be someone's personal guardians. Still, after witnessing the poor emotional state in which he was in, the policeman began to reconsider. "For how long will you need them?"

"Until Monday morning."

He gave a sigh of resignation and nodded. "Fine, I'll tell two of my men to stay here with you in exchange for a little salary bonus this month."

"Thank you." Hajime forced a smile of gratefulness on his face.

"Try to stay out of trouble and if you manage to find out something, anything vital for this case, contact us immediately."

An unnerving and dreadful silence befell the city's center. It was the only impoverished area around, having a handful of old abandoned buildings which reeked of piss and trash, a good hideout for hobos and other rejects of society. Jack gulped and wandered around, using Google Maps on his phone to find the exact location of the group meeting. If someone were to attack him in that place, he could have screamed all he wanted, nobody would have heard him. Even in the early hours of the night, that place was forgotten by the rest of the world. If someone wanted to host secret meetings, it seemed like the best spot.

After crossing two streets, he finally came upon a small building with neon lights spelling the word 'HELLHOLE' above its entrance. With its outer walls having their white paint dried off by time and covered in dust, the former bar truly seemed to be living up to its name. Jack checked his phone for a second time and confirmed that it was the right address. He gulped, went in front of the rusty door and knocked four times. The following moments of waiting in silence only increased the tension he felt. He then heard footsteps from the other side approach the door.

"Worship?" asked a young man's voice from the other side.

That was strange, he expected to be asked for a password as the email instructed him. Not knowing what else to say, he replied, "For power."

The old door soon opened with a creek which made him slightly cringe. A figure in black robes and with a hood covering most their face stepped aside and gestured for him to come in. Not showing any signs of hesitation, the cowboy entered.

The inside was rather small, being comprised of two large tables occupying most of its space. To the left of its entrance was a small bar, a bathroom was located even farther to the left with two slot machines placed near its entrance, and a large TV screen hung above the bar. Other than the occasionally flickering neon lights, nothing else seemed to work around there. A strange weak stench was in the air. Much to Jack's surprise, the gathering comprised of familiar faces he was seeing daily at college – the usual nerds and outcasts along with some frat boys. At one table a group was drinking beer and talking rather loudly about sports, while at the other they were reading comic books and discussing tabletop games. If it were not for the black robes that they all wore, he would have thought of it all as nothing more than a new kind of fraternity group.

"Your first time here?" asked the one who greeted him.

"Huh?" Jack turned around to see the other take off his hood. "Keiichi? Keiichi Satoshi? What are you doing here?"

The dark-haired peer smiled and shook hands with the confused newcomer. "It's always a pleasure to see familiar faces join our little group. I am one of its founders, so it warms my heart to see more of our colleagues come here."

"What is this place? Why gather here when you can just hang out in the dorms?"

"This place was once a very frequented bar, mostly drunkards and other lowlifes of our flawed society were welcomed here to drown their sorrows. Now it's only befitting that this place be a haven for us outcasts."

"What exactly are you guys doing here?"

"Oh, you will soon find out," Keiichi promised and then he disappeared into the bathroom.

Normally Jack would have just shrugged it all off and maybe attempted to integrate in one of the two groups. Most likely he would have chosen the few preppy frat boys, had a beer with them and talked about the latest game or whatever hot chicks they saw that day on the corridor. But he soon grew wary of his surroundings as he caught with the corner of his eye some dark red stains on the walls. A whistle signaled for everyone to cease their normal activities, so the students all got up from their tables and moved them aside to reveal that there was a large circle drawn in chalk on the wooden floor. As two of the nerdy losers began lighting candles around the circle, Jack looked around better and froze when he saw what seemed to be two mutilated bodies pushed in the corner of the room. So that's where the stench was coming from.

"Ah, Jack Thornton, what a delightful surprise!" another familiar voice called from the bathroom.

It came from a girl with long black hair and piercing yellow eyes not unlike those of a wild cat, who wore the same black robes as the others gathered there. But Jack was quick to recognize her. She was Shinobu Matsuda, the head of the student council and arguably the most popular girl on campus. She had the highest grades of her year, was working to maintain the drama and cinema clubs, and everyone knew her as the role model student. The only strange oddity was that she sometimes surrounded herself not with fellow preps, but the awkward nerdy outcasts who seemed to gravitate around her because she always promised them whatever favors. She always had a strange kind of social power over both the popular and the weird students. With each new detail that he learned; the mystery only grew deeper. Was the entire group her idea? How could she have profited over it when she already had all the advantages she wanted in college?

"Shinobu, I never knew you liked these dark places," Jack tried a joke but did not receive any reciprocated laughs.

"Trust me, the shadows are our greatest ally," she replied and offered him a can of beer. "Want a drink?"

"I'll pass."

"Your choice. Besides, we are all honored to have you here. Fitting members are always welcome among us!"

"Are they?"

"Why yes, after all, something in our message must've been appealing for you, right?" she asked and Jack struggled to keep his cool. "Seeing your answers, I dare say 'yes'. So, what was it? Do you also hate being swallowed by the endless crowd of students? Maybe you're tired of having others stand in your way and you want to get rid of them forever? Or perhaps you've come to the realization that this educational system is all a hoax and we'll all end up as working drones for a thankless society?"

Never before did Jack see Shinobu talk in such a manner or act that creepy. Maybe it was due to the positive image she had cultivated in college, or perhaps due to her titles and responsibilities. Such anarchistic views were more suited to the freaks she surrounded herself with.

"I don't know," he finally mustered up an answer. "Maybe, I think, it's… because it all feels so meaningless," he added, hoping that the lie was good enough.

"Worry not." Shinobu smiled and put a hand on his shoulder. "We also understand the meaninglessness of this pathetic existence we've been damned to endure. Perhaps after your initiation tonight you will see things clearer."

"Initiation…?" Jack looked at those around and saw that they were all unnaturally quiet, eyeing the two of them, eager smiles on their faces.

Shinobu motioned for two of the more muscular students to go fetch something from the bathroom. The others put on their hoods and gathered around the circle, humming an ominous tune. Shinobu looked Jack in the eye and continued her speech, "You should know by now that the recent campus killings aren't a mere coincidence."

"How so? You happen to know who's behind them?" Jack asked, and in the back of his head he hoped for an answer that would not leave him in danger.

"The crime rate in our city is growing lower and lower. The surveillance of our fascistic police is getting greater and greater. We're sure that these grisly murders could not have been done by a mere human. No, there's something out there, Jack. Something supernatural, and this being has left us a clear message – it's here to promote death."

Normally he would have expected such a line of reasoning to come from someone obsessed like Hajime. But instead it came from someone who before he thought of as one of the smartest and most talented of students at Sagakin University. Something terribly wrong was going on there and a part of his mind kept telling him to run out of there. But there were too many of them and for some reason he suspected that the front door had been locked. If he wanted to get out of there unharmed, he had to humor them.

"A supernatural being, ey?" Jack spoke up, masking his nervousness with fake interest.

"Yes, in this worthless existence to which we have been condemned, I'm sure this being has come to liberate us. Not by taking the lives of everyone, but merely by taking the lives of the ever-growing majority, those who created this system which now keeps us shackled. Their deaths will be our liberation!" Shinobu declared, a strong confidence in her voice which showed why the others seemed to gravitate around her.

The two students returned with a beaten-up stranger in his sixties, all tied up and with his mouth gagged. They tossed him in the circle and joined the others in their humming. Shinobu led Jack to the bound stranger and offered him a dagger.

"For you to officially enter our ranks, you must prove to us that you hate all life. In order to do that, you have to torture someone right in front of us."

"What the hell's going on here? What's up with that old guy?" Jack asked, no longer able to hide his panic.

"Since Tuesday night we've been kidnapping and sacrificing a weak victim to gain the killer's attention. On this third night we've prepared a victim just for you, our most recent member. Don't feel any pity for this old drunkard, his worthless life has brought no contribution to our society, at most he's been a leech. Take my dagger and do what must be done!"

The others kept humming and stared at them. Never would Jack have suspected that his ordinary colleagues acted in such a disturbing manner or listened to such nihilistic speeches. More so, if someone would have told him that Shinobu was committing murders and believed the crazy things he had heard on that night, he would have laughed in their face. It was almost as if the normal people he knew had transformed into monsters right before him. And now their gazes only added more to the pressure on him. With a gulp, he grabbed the dagger and Shinobu joined those outside the circle, waiting.

Jack stared down at the poor old man. He could easily read the fear out of those eyes which begged him not to do it. But what could he have done? Even if he tried to attack Shinobu and her band of freaks with the dagger, there were too many of them. And what guarantee did he have that they were not armed either? His mind went to the moment back in the library when Hajime convinced him to go undercover and investigate the group. His gut had told him that it was a bad idea and he regretted not listening to it. Then he flashed back to when he was seven years old at grandma Rita's ranch and he had to shoot cows in the head, after which he had to watch his family butcher them. Back then he was too scared to harm the animals, but his father's yelled insistence put enough pressure on him to push the trigger. Thus, he had spent the following years killing cows, sometimes having nightmares of their shot heads. Because of that, he had always been scared of becoming a murderer. And now there he was, with a dagger in his shaking hand and a helpless man in front of him. In the end he was forced to face reality: if he hesitated and did not do it, there might have been two deaths on that night. So, he closed his eyes and…

Stab! The victim's screams were stopped by the paper gagging his mouth. If he had heard them more clearly, he would have dropped the dagger then and there. Stab! This time he opened his eyes and saw the knife coming out of the old man's belly, having dug a second hole into it. He felt like cutting up a turkey on Thanksgiving. The way the blood fell off of the sharp blade seemed strangely entrancing. But he wanted it all to be over with, so he stabbed a third time, then a fourth, and he kept on doing it until the victim's shirt was a bloody mess.

"Gut him! Gut him! Gut him!" some of the boys did a chant similar to the ones they did at parties with drinking contests.

"Who knew that a nice guy like Jack had it in him?" Keiichi spoke to Shinobu, a surprised look on his face. "I suppose you're pleased with him."

"Very," she replied and walked back into the circle, grabbing Jack's wrist. "Enough, I don't want him dead yet."

Jack took heavy breaths as he stared in disbelief at what he had just done. Shinobu took the dagger from his hand and patted him on the back, saying, "You passed the test, I bid you welcome!"

One of the more awkward nerds took Jack into the sidelines and offered him a hooded black robe. Did it mean that others had to do what he had done to get in? No way, they had formed only three days ago. Or did Shinobu accept them because she already knew they were as fucked up as her? Her voice soon woke him out of his thoughts, "Go get dressed. You will witness your very first ceremony."

Jack went into the bathroom as Shinobu kneeled in front of the bleeding victim, those around the circle now chanting 'aah' in lower notes. Clasping both hands around the weapon's handle, she loudly uttered a prayer:

"Oh, great killer, we have gathered here to praise your sacrifice of worthless life. We wish to bring you an offering so that you may favor us. Lead us into a new era of glory!"

She raised the dagger and the chants stopped, dead-like silence filling the air. And then she opened the old man's throat, fresh blood staining the floor and her robes. Everyone stared expectantly, hoping that something would happen on that night. Their two previous attempts had been fruitless, but Shinobu insisted that they had to keep trying. Nothing happened in the following moments, leading them all to believe that they had failed again.

All of a sudden, the candles flickered and the floor began to shake lightly, alarming them. The neon lights went off and a glowing purple figure appeared above them all, shining red pupils fixated on the youths. Breaths cut, jaws dropped, bodies stunned, all were in awe. Just what did they manage to invoke?

"Are you the one responsible for the murders on the campus?" Shinobu broke the silence.

A chillingly-hissed voice responded, "Yes, I'm the one who killed Ken Sakaki, the lowly mugger, the drunken couple and the young professor. Who are you and why did you call me?"

"My name is Shinobu Matsuda and I have gathered everyone here because we wish to follow you."

"Keh, is that so?" A grin revealed a couple of fangs on that sharp face with leonine features. "I've sensed the negative energy your sacrifices brought me these past nights. You wish to worship me? Very well, keep doing your nightly murders until further notice. For now, our main goal will be to take over the college."

"What is your name, my Lord?"

"I am the demon Shishima. And henceforth, you shall be known as the Spawns of Shishima!"

Cheers of joy came from the students around her. Shinobu could do nothing but bow down in reverence. All her life she had aspired to ascend in higher positions of power, but then and there, after meeting that supernatural being, she finally knew of a power greater than anything she could ever achieve. And as they all shouted their praises for the monster in front of them, Jack could do nothing but stare from the bathroom door, at a loss for words.