Morning light protruded through the dirt-covered theater window and descended upon the sleeping Shinobu, gently waking her up. She opened her yellow eye and regarded the dusty cobweb-filled room which had been her sanctuary over the past year. Such an unfitting den for someone as illustrious and powerful as herself, but each night when going to sleep she told herself that the unfortunate situation would soon change. Getting up, she lowered her head, clasped her hands tight and uttered her master's prayer with all of her heart's conviction:
"Flesh is of earth and soul is of air, one world around and another beyond, I bring thee my offering under thine stare, through this sacrifice I strengthen our bond. I hereby renounce the weakness of kindness, care's limitations, the illusions of love, and accept only thy blessing of madness, for only through thee we shall arise above. Bring power to the few who deserve, cloak this rotting world in eternal night, from hereon only thy darkness I serve, my only Lord Shishima, bringer of blight!"
Her body and mind felt like falling into a euphoric trance, almost as if Shishima's very presence descended from the afterlife right inside of her, his only spokesperson among mortals. Assured that he was by her side and she had the strength to face another day, she climbed out of her bed and went to the wooden wardrobe in one of the bedroom's corners to dress up. Besides the hooded black robes which were mandatory for all ceremonies, she had also kept the dark blue uniforms with matching skirts that she wore back in her college days. Those were the only clothes she still owned and in a way they did help build an aura of sophistication and authority among her fellow casually-dressed cultists.
Once fully-clothed, she walked out of her bedroom into a dim corridor, making her way to the theater's makeshift kitchen. The whole building had an enclosed humid air filled with dust and the slight smell of rotting corpses. It was to be expected since none of them ever bothered to clean up the area for strategic reasons. If the police were to ever raid their new hideout, all they had to do was pack up their stuff and leave, then the only thing the authorities would find would be a genuinely abandoned building. Disposing of the countless dead bodies they left in their wake was a harder task, as a few were either burned to ashes or, mostly in the cases of toddlers, thrown in garbage disposals. But the majority of their corpses were packed in bags and stuffed down a septic tank in the theater's basement. Perhaps it was indeed a most befitting end to those dregs who were supposedly well-behaved citizens.
"Is breakfast ready?" she asked authoritatively while walking in the kitchen.
"Good morning, Shinobu! Your miso soup and egg rolls will be ready in two minutes!" the cook replied and got back to work. While on the surface he was but an ordinary man in his twenties who had a regular job at one of Sagakin's famous beach hotels, in private not only was he a Spawn of Shishima, but he also dressed up as Mashi, the friendly lion in order to lure unsuspecting children to their doom.
Shinobu took a seat at the dining table and soon found herself enjoying a well-deserved breakfast. While eating, she pondered over the dream she had on the previous night. In it, she was sitting on a flaming throne, staring down at a pile of bloodied skulls while the city of Sagakin lay in ruins around her. Far in the horizon, the monstrous Shishima was devastating the land, the screams of tortured humans being nothing but a harmonious symphony for her ears. Surely that dream was a sign that her time was nigh. With the assurance that the master was returning to Earth, she decided that she could wait no longer. That night was the night when the Spawns would finally emerge from the shadows in which they had been forced to hide for five years and invoke Shishima to terrorize mankind once more.
"Good morning, fellas!" Keiichi greeted while walking in the kitchen, receiving nods from the other two. He came up to the dining table and placed a large grocery bag on it. "Shinobu, I bought the ointments for your wound. Trust me, you don't want to know how hard it was to get my hands on them and also all this food! I had to wait for a fellow Spawn to come from the drugstore and supermarket for almost an hour in that alleyway and I was bored beyond belief! Then there's also the cops, I've noticed that their street patrols have increased, so you can bet I was anxious to no end knowing that there's a strong chance they'd find and start questioning me. And who could forget-"
"Worry not, Keiichi," Shinobu interrupted him, deep inside having grown fed up with his constant complaining. "The days of hiding are finally coming to an end." She reached into the bag and pulled out the required antibiotics. "Go spread the word online to all our circles that they should begin preparations. Tonight will be the night we finally rise from the ashes of defeat and bring Shishima's wrath upon mankind!"
"Are you serious, Shinobu?" the incredulous cook asked.
"Yes, bring forth all of our kidnapped victims for tonight's ritual. The time has come for us to pay the ultimate tribute to Shishima and welcome him back into our world!" she declared, excitement filling both men. "I will see you later." Her breakfast done, she got up from the table and left the kitchen, heading to the bathroom.
With the door locked and left all alone, she waited for the bathtub to be filled with warm water. Shinobu stared at her face in the mirror and lifted up the black patch to expose the flesh hole where her eye used to be, applying the proper medicine to the socket. While doing so, she reminisced the day when she suffered the terrible accident which took away half of her sight.
Around a year ago, Shinobu's circle had been hiding in an abandoned warehouse at the port of Osaka. That position had proved far more strategic than Sagakin since it was Japan's main port and thus they could always smuggle goods brought from overseas or hijack a ship to foreign countries where they could spread the good word to other nations. Whenever they moved to a new city, they made sure the murder rate went down in order to not raise any suspicion. On the contrary, they instructed their fellow Spawns in different cities to increase the number of their murders so the authorities would look elsewhere. While operating from the underground was the best option, given the current situation, Shinobu knew that they needed friends in higher places as well in order to ensure the safety of the cult's future.
Due to the chaotic nature of their doctrine, rich people were more than reticent to join their cause. Still, there was the hope that Shishima's promises of power would at least tempt one or two depraved and influential individuals into becoming part of their ranks. She tried contacting important people online with her well-built emails that would cater to the inherently nihilistic thinking that any cultured person had deep down inside. If the Spawns were able to extend their influence into the upper class of society, then they would finally be on the path of slowly but surely subverting the police which had been hunting them for so long. That was when she had received a reply to one of her emails from someone claiming they were part of an organization known as WEB. The acronym stood for World Elite Bureaucracy and their symbol was a black spider stretching its legs wide across the globe. This indeed seemed very promising...
After a couple of hours of exchanging emails with whatever representative or lackey was behind the other screen, Shinobu came to the realization that they were both testing each other, trying to see just how far both parties would go with their ruthlessness. It seemed that WEB's higher ups had a great interest in seeing a potential geopolitical upheaval from which a new order would arise. As such, they viewed the Spawns and Shishima as the key to said ambition. Although she was unwilling to share her master's power with anyone else, Shinobu reluctantly agreed to begin a cooperation between the two organizations, for there was a certainty of a mutual benefit. Thus they had arranged a meeting deep into the night by the dockside.
She recalled the chilly and foggy autumn night when she and over a dozen men waited, all dressed in hooded black robes and with their weapons ready. She recalled the lights shining brightly in the sky and the three helicopters which descended, out of which emerged military men, all dressed in khaki uniforms, but with the same spider symbol sowed on their chests. She recalled the multitude of guns which were pointed at them, the closest she had ever felt to death herself, and its sensation made her feel so weak and pathetic. A single figure remained in one of the helicopters and spoke to them with a voice so aloof and cold, she doubted it was even human. It sounded like a man in his early forties, with a distinct Eastern European accent:
"Drop your weapons and surrender. You are all under WEB's custody. Failure to comply will result in immediate death."
There was no doubt, it had all been a trap from the beginning. WEB never intended to collaborate with them, they just wanted to seize their secrets about Shishima for themselves, and then most likely they would have either disposed of the cultists or assimilated them into their organization. What followed next was a gunfire in which a good number of useful Spawns had been killed. Shinobu herself might have been among them if Keiichi didn't manage to pull her back into the warehouse in time. Still, a single bullet managed to hit her, piercing her left eye. It all happened so sudden that it took her a few moments to realize she had lost half of her sight. As traumatic as the injury was, she persisted through the pain and did her best to ensure their escape from that chaos was swift. Thankfully, or rather due to her thinking a few steps ahead, they managed to disappear through an underground pathway which led to the sewers.
It was on that fateful night that they had moved back to Sagakin after four years of constant relocating. They had kept their base of operations in the abandoned theater ever since. The pain Shinobu had endured back then was not something she could ever forget, especially when she was forced to use a knife to cut out her bullet-wounded eye without the use of painkillers or anesthesia. It was in that moment that she swore she would bring down WEB and personally sacrifice that coward hiding in the helicopter who had orchestrated the ambush. Yes, she would shed his blood and bring his worthless flesh as a tribute, all for the glory of Shishima.
Shinobu sighed after finishing her treatment and pulled the patch over her wounded flesh hole once again. Seeing that the bath was ready, she fully undressed and descended in the warm water. Finally, she could relax her mind and put her thoughts at ease. She went over her plan just one more time to ensure that everything was in order: Victims of all ages had been kidnapped and drugged into unconsciousness. Word had been spread among the cult's circles all over the world that they had to do the same and procure as much 'sacrifice meat' as possible. Then, when the midnight hour would come in Japan, she would make an online broadcast across the deep web for all Spawns so they could partake in the same sacrificial rituals simultaneously. The combined magic from their devoted belief and intense torture of their victims would finally be enough to catch Shishima's attention and grant him the power to manifest back on Earth once again. Then, with the master by her side, she would finish the job he started five years ago and begin the long-awaited world conquest, starting with the little island nation.
The mere thought of it all was enough to arouse her. While fantasizing about the upcoming bloodshed and mentally praying to Shishima, Shinobu reached and picked up her dagger. She stared at her reflection in the blade and smiled, for she was looking at the strongest and smartest human who had ever existed. Not wasting any time, she sank the blade in the bathtub, between her private parts, and began rubbing its steel against her clitoris while her free hand went to one of her breasts which she massaged intensely. The excitement was enough to send her into a pleasure-filled frenzy on par with the blood-hungry raptures she experienced while meditating and trying to commune spiritually with her master. This perverse pleasure was more than enough proof that she had made the right choice in life after all. Yes, throwing away her bright future as a well-educated young woman climbing the corporate ladder of Japanese society was well worth it. At the end of it all she would have still been wearing a mask like she did for her entire life ever since her early days at the orphanage. Shishima allowed her to embrace her true self, Shishima gave her a strong purpose in life, and it was through Shishima's power that she would at last stand out of the crowd to make both their voices be heard across the world. Yes, with his power she would be able to build a brand new future for mankind - a future for the few and strong, the only humans worth sparing.
She gasped and bit her lip, her legs twitching as she climaxed. Her mind was lost in the pure euphoria of her depraved desires. There was no turning back, this was the only path left for Shinobu Matsuda.