With the trauma of their entry behind them, Rei and Zero continued their trek into the abandoned town, albeit more alert and on guard than they had been before. The clues from the information in Kaien's records eventually led them to search in a small church in the corner of the town. It was strange to Rei that as they'd walked through the town, there wasn't much left of anything -most of the buildings had crumbled or were demolished or destroyed beyond repair- however, as she walked she still felt an odd sense of familiarity. She scanned the rubble closely, trying to identify anything that might be giving off this sense. She wondered if it could have something to do with Hisachi, but she found nothing identifiable.

Once they'd reached the church, Zero noted that the smell of blood seemed to be the strongest here. While she couldn't smell the blood, Rei could sense something dark. It was similar to what she'd felt when they'd entered the town. Whatever had set that trap at the entrance had probably also had a hand in whatever carnage had taken place in here.

Zero and Rei looked around the remains of the church. It was one of the few buildings that still had all four walls and a floor, but outside of that it was mostly just a broken husk.

"How are we supposed to find anything here?" Rei wondered out loud. Any papers here were probably dust by now. But still, Kaien's records indicated that this was the birthplace of the cursed witches, so there must be something useful here for them.

"I guess we'll just have to turn it inside out until we find what we need." Zero answered, speaking the words that had been bouncing around inside of Rei's own mind. She turned and smiled at him.

"Yeah, my thoughts exactly."

Methodically, they went through the remains of the dusty church, searching through tattered papers, fallen portraits, broken furniture, and even under loose floorboards.

Exhausted, Rei wiped her brow. She was far from giving up here. There was something they were overlooking she just knew it. As she once again re-traced her steps around the perimeter of the church's small room, she suddenly felt something. A small pull. It was faint, but it was there. She paused, closing her eyes and trying to hone in on the feeling. Zero stopped his movements and turned to watch her – sensing her energy.

Rei took a small step forward and the feeling evaporated. Stepping back to her original place, a small pulse passed through her body. She turned to Zero.

"It's this area, it's something here, I feel it."

Zero crossed the room in just a few steps and they both canvassed the small section of room where they stood. Running her hands along the cracked wall, Rei wondered at the sensation and why it seemingly affected only her. As her fingers touched a soft almost imperceptible bump in the wall, she stopped. Determined not to overlook even the smallest detail, Rei stepped closer. Using her other hand, she began to rub the outer layer of dirt and grime off of the area of wall that her finger had touched. As she cleared the section, she finally gained an inkling of insight as to why she was the one pulled to this area. Under the grime, etched into the wall was the insignia of the Souma clan.

Zero looked at the expression on Rei's face and knew immediately that the symbol she'd just uncovered meant something important.

"What is this Rei?"

Rei stared mesmerized at the etching. She'd only seen it twice in her life. It had been engraved on one of the family heirlooms her father had left with her mom. The family seal was a secret one, not known to the public, and recognized only by the Souma clan. Her father's item had been an extremely dangerous thing for her mother to have in her possession. Her mother had showed it to Rei only once, and had then immediately hid it away again. Unfortunately, the secret of where she'd hidden it had died along with her mom.

The second time Rei had seen the emblem had been on a ring on Rido's finger the day he died. She remembered seeing it briefly on his hand in the midst of battle and somehow knowing it was related to the Souma family, but not recalling at the time, just how she knew. The memory of her father's lost heirloom and the seal had been almost all but forgotten by Rei, until now. As she looked at this insignia etched into the wall, Rei was stunned by her oversight. Traces of this insignia had been all over this town since they'd arrived. Not the full crest, but the pieces of the symbol that made up the full seal had been all around them. She'd noticed them and had a sense of familiarity when she did, but hadn't put it together until now. This town… It couldn't be the birthplace of the Kiryu witch twins. This town was the home of Souma Clan.

After she'd explained it all to Zero, he mulled it over in puzzlement.

"So explain again what information you got from Kaien about this town?"

Rei bit her lip, trying to recall the writings in the records that they'd read.

"There were records and a prophecy or something of sorts. It said something along the lines of this town being the birthplace of the original cursed twins. It's where they were born and where they will die…"

"Were those the exact words?"

Rei paused. "I think the exact wording was that the town was the birthplace and their beginning and their end." As she said this, Rei had still been fingering the insignia on the wall. As the sun had moved behind them, she'd noticed a small glimmer from behind the wall's paneling.

"Uh, Zero… I think there's actually something behind this wall."

Zero, stepped over and pressed and prodded at the wall, but nothing opened or came loose. Finally he looked at Rei, who was able to read his intent and nodded her approval. He stepped back and using his strength he shouldered into the wall, crumbling it's outer layer and revealing another opening behind it.

"A door?"

However this door had no handle. It was a flat slab of solid metal. The only thing on the slab was a small oval shaped hole centered approximately 4 feet up from the bottom of the door.

Rei didn't like this. Now even she herself could smell the blood from this entry way, but as they stepped into the opening, it was worse. It wasn't just the smell of blood. The opening was littered with skeletons. The corpses of a number of people who had presumably tried to get through this door and couldn't. She could only guess that for some reason they hadn't been able to retreat back either. On closer inspection she noticed fangs protruding from the mouths of many of the skeletons. 'Vampires, huh?'

Rei looked up at Zero to gauge his interpretation of this. Zero remained stoic. He had already taken in the scene and Rei could see that his attention had now turned to determining what they would need to do to figure out how to open this mysterious door.

Rei moved further into the opening and closer to the door, carefully stepping over the bones in her way. As she looked down to check her footing she noticed another Souma insignia positioned right at the base of the door. She thought she understood now what needed to be done and why this litany of bodies had been unable to open the door. It was designed to only allow certain people through. They were once again dealing with some type of magic.

It worried her. It meant that the Souma clan had been using black magic and she now wondered if the dark force that she and Zero had encountered as they'd entered the town had actually been the work of a third party as she'd initially thought or if it had actually been something set up by the Souma clan themselves. A defensive action put in place to protect the town? Either way, the Souma seemed to have some deep secrets and she had an unsettling feeling that she would be able to uncover them on the other side of this door.

"Zero."

Rei kept her voice calm and steady, but inside her nerves felt electrified. She knew parts of the Souma were bad news just from the stories her mom had relayed, courtesy of her father. But what she was imagining right now, was a thousand times worst than anything she had been told.

"Come stand next to me, quick. Better yet, hold on to me, just in case."

Zero was confused, but he could hear the severity in Rei's voice and he moved instead of thinking about it. Unsure of where to go or why he needed to hold her, he reached out and grabbed her hand. He could feel the tremors of her body resonating through her. Maybe it was this space. The vibe was the same as the one that had overtaken him earlier and it worried him. Everything about this situation and this place worried him. Holding her hand, he drew a deep breath. He felt out of his depth here, and he thought maybe Rei did too, but at least she seemed like she had a plan of sorts…

Rei looked up at him, "I'm not completely sure how this works, but I have an idea. I just think it's safest if we stay connected. I don't know much about all of this, so it's better to play it as safe as possible."

Standing in front of the door, Rei examined the oval opening up-close. It was small indent in the metal slab, and Rei's first thought had been that it reminded her of a fingerprint. It was her best guess at the moment, and she saw nothing else in the room to give her any other hints. Taking a deep breath and steeling herself for the worst, Rei squeezed Zero's hand tightly. She raised her other hand and with the palm facing the door, she pressed her index finger firmly against the oval indentation. At first it seemed like nothing happened and she felt silly, then without warning there was a sharp pain through her finger, prompting her to snatch her hand back, her finger now dripping blood. Shocked by the amount of blood it had elicited, but not surprised by the blood requirement, Rei studied her bloody finger. She'd considered maybe a needle poke at the worst- She knew the technology couldn't have been there for anything as elaborate as a scanner – but that hadn't been a poke. It looked like whatever happened had taken the entire top layer of the skin off. Every part that had been touching that oval. She guessed it was a small price to pay if it led to some answers, but damn had that hurt… She popped the finger in her mouth in an attempt to slow the bleeding and then turned to the door.

It hadn't opened as she expected. In fact it almost seemed to have done nothing at all. Almost. The door looked different now, it had somewhat of a shimmer to it. Squinting her eyes, Rei could see that the door felt like more of a mirage than a solid item. A fleeting thought crossed her mind that it somehow reminded her of the strange shimmer of Maiden's Revenge when she'd so recently held it in her hand.

Holding Zero's hand firmly, she reached out and watched as her hand went effortlessly though the now semi-existent door before them. Making certain that Zero too was able to pass through, the two of them stepped though into an entirely different room. This room was completely different than the church, and unlike anything else that they had seen in the town, it was perfectly preserved. In the middle of the floor was a stand with a large tome laying on it. The book was closed and the Souma crest was affixed to the leather cover in a delicate gold design that Rei would bet her bloody finger was made from solid gold.

Around the room were shelves lined with various other items and books. The walls were adorned with a number of weapons. Some Rei and Zero were familiar with as Vampire Hunter weapons, others were of the likes that neither had ever seen before. Zero stared in awe at the variety of weapons, intrigued he took a step closer, pulled in by curiosity and a mounting need to see them up close. For the first time since they'd entered the town, he began to feel something drawing him in. As if being called to it, he stepped toward a wooden box nestled in the corner. Almost in a trance he reached out to touch it before he even realized what he was doing.

"What's that?" Rei asked, lightly placing her hand on his arm and peering from the box to his face. "Are you alright?"

Zero shook his head lightly, coming back to his senses.

"I don't know… I felt like it was calling to me…"

Rei bit her lip, but removed her hand, watching carefully as Zero resumed opening the box.

Slowly he lifted the top from the box, revealing a bundle of dirty rags.

"Whatever it is, is wrapped in here…" he mumbled to himself, hastily pulling the rags away. He could sense Rei reaching out to warn him and stopping herself. It was fine, he'd be careful, but curiosity had the better of him. Nothing in this god forsaken town but evil had reached out to him so far. He wanted to know what this was.

Finally he reached the hilt of something. Taking hold of it he pulled the remaining wrapping off. It was a dagger. The hilt was carved from a dark stone, polished smoothly then grooved for an easy grip. It's blade was dangerously shaped, one side sharply curved and the other cut like the wide teeth of a saw. It's color was a dark brown. Zero turned it over in his hand, examining and marveling at it.

"Kiryu"

"Blood"

He and Rei both spoke at once.

Zero looked up at her. "Huh?"

"Blood." Rei repeated. "If you were wondering about the color, it looks that way because it's stained with blood. Whoever's it was, there was a lot of it and they obviously didn't bother to clean it." The look on her face said she was displeased at the thought of it and she probably wished he'd wrap it back up.

She sighed and turned her eyes from the blood covered dagger, up to Zero. "What was it you were saying? 'Kiryu'??"

Zero flipped the dagger over, pointing the bottom of the hilt towards Rei. Imprinted on the bottom was a small design with a 'K' in the middle.

"The Kiryu's seal." He stated matter of factly.

"Ah." Rei nodded. Unlike the Souma's there was nothing hidden or secretive about the Kiryu family seal. Like many of the other Hunter family's theirs was well known. The only strange thing was what a Kiryu dagger was doing inside of this room.

"I'm going to keep it." Zero said simply, as he carefully wrapped the blade and placed the dagger into his pack. Rei shrugged and turned back to the wall of remaining weapons. It was his anyways. Not to mention, if it really was calling out to him there was probably a reason for it. If they'd learned nothing else on their journey, they'd at least learned the importance of trusting their instincts.

They continued their trek around the outer perimeter of the room, taking inventory of the items around them. Moving quickly but trying to make sure that they didn't overlook anything important.

Upon one wall hung large plaques to which ribbons of long hair were attached. Some tied in braids, others bundled at one end and left flowing loosely, but all long in length and most jet black. The writing above them was in strange characters that Zero had never seen before, but as Rei stared up in fascination, she explained to him that these were the locks of Souma warriors who had used their powers and died in battles. They were heroes to the clan and praised for their sacrifices.

"Their names and their manner of death are listed on each plaque." She explained.

Zero gaped at her. "You mean you can read that?"

"What do you mean? Why wouldn't I?" Rei looked at him in confusion.

"Rei, what characters do you see when you look at that?"

Rei stared again at the markings above the plaques, prepared to spell out the alphabetical letters that appeared. She crinkled her brow then looked at Zero in bewilderment as she realized that she couldn't make out actual letters. She couldn't really describe what she was seeing, just that her brain was automatically converting whatever it was into words for her.

Noting that she was at a loss for words, Zero interjected. "I can tell you what I see – Strange symbols. They're not letters at all, like nothing I've seen before in any language."

He patted her gently on the back, "I'm sure it's confusing, but so much of this is. At least we know that you can read it. That's sure to work in our favor. There's bound to be some helpful information in that book," He jerked his head towards the ominous book in the center of the room. "And I really doubt they made that one easy to read."

After a thorough review of the outskirts of the room, Rei and Zero finally made their way to the book in the center. They probably could have started there, but Rei wanted to make sure that they had checked all of the other areas first, as she felt sure this book would be their last stop in this room.

Sure enough, as they approached it, they saw that the cover of the book was also in the strange language.

"Looks like you'll have to translate it all for me."

Rei nodded, "It's a history book, The Souma clan history."

She flipped the book open. "Looks like it goes all the way back, starting with the founding of the clan…"

As Rei finished the last page and solemnly closed the book, she and Zero sat on the floor, collapsing into one another, both of their minds working to process all of the information they'd just discovered.

Zero looked at Rei. She had it the worst. While some of the information had impacted him, she'd learned more about her family legacy than she'd ever known before and almost none of it good.

Rei's face was tinted a pale shade of green, so Zero reached over and gently rubbed her back. She looked over at him blankly. Her eyes were on him, but they were looking through him. Zero hugged her close.

"It's okay Rei, take some time and process it all, we can talk about it in a bit, but for now just relax."

Rei nodded mutely and dropped her head on his shoulder. Zero looked down at her and reflected back on the hidden truths the book had uncovered.

Reading the Souma history they had learned that the Souma and Kiryu families had a connection that was much deeper and went back much further than anyone other than the Souma clan themselves seemed to know.

The very first entry told the story of an old Vampire hunter who had come to this town long ago with his two children, a boy and a girl. His wife had died not long before- the victim of a vampire's attack, leaving a bitter and angry husband to care for their small family of hunters.

The husband Katzyo had moved himself and the children to this town, citing it as a "fresh start". The truth would later be revealed that the move was truly intended as a way to hide and conceal the black magic that he had turned to and that had overtaken his life in the wake of his wife's death. Consumed by his grief and desire for both more power and to ensure that his family would never experience such tragedy again, Katzyo had turned completely to the dark arts, committing unspeakable horrors and sacrifices in his search for power and protection for his family.

After being discovered, they were forced to leave their old home and escaped to this new town, discarding their true surname and continuing their work as Vampire Hunters under the new family name of 'Souma'. The history book seemed to have deliberately left out the original family name they had once held.

In their new town, Katzyo Souma continued to practice the dark arts, but much more discreetly, teaching it to his children, but keeping a tight rein on his family and allowing very little to almost no interaction with outsiders. The children shared a very close bond as siblings, they were the best of friends and relied heavily upon each other and their father. The tight hold that their father held on them however, apparently began to change as the children began to age.

A few other hunter families shared nearby lands and occasionally the families would have to work together to face larger threats. Eventually the girl laid eyes on a young man from a neighboring family. This family was incredibly strong, their prowess as hunters was well known and there were no other hunters known that could match their strength and power. Her love for him was immediate, though she knew enough to keep it to herself and away from her possessively dangerous father. She admired and pined for him from afar until she built up the courage to express herself, and then she met him in secret, their rendezvous' few and far between, sometimes spanning months before an opportunity could occur.

Finally, her love and rebellion had grown too large to quell, and she'd made her bold declaration to her brother and father. She was leaving. Marrying him and moving to live with him and his family. It went as expected. Anger. An attempted show of force. She may have been physically prevented from going if her brother hadn't intervened on her behalf and stepped in to hold off their father. She left immediately- a swift kiss and shed tears for her brother, and then she was off to start her new life.

She was gone little over a year before they saw her again. Her father and brother had been out chasing a rogue vampire and returned days later to a torn apart, ramshackle home, and her dead body lying on the floor. It was nearly a day before they could move far enough past their grief to even inspect the body. She had been executed. Her hands tied and throat slit by a jagged blade. Looking beyond that, they found her to be pregnant. Two tiny but stillborn fetus still inside her cold body.

It was surprising. Her father retreated- his anger engulfed by sadness, he pulled into himself, a quiet ball of fury. But her previously gentle brother was white-hot with rage. He was consumed with vengeance and hatred, that roared with loud, fiery intensity; and what was born inside him that day became the foundation of the curse that would haunt two families for generations to come.

The retribution was swift. No questions were asked until the very end. The husband's family was too strong to face head-on so they were slaughtered as they slept. All save for one. The daughter's husband. Saved for last, he was bound in the night and brought back to the Souma family's home. Dropped to the dusty floor and made to face the corpse of his dead wife as he was forced to explain the circumstances of her demise.

His explanation was simple enough, though relayed to them in a manner devoid of any emotion or regret. His family had found out that she dabbled in dark magic. That was it. Though rumors had quickly swirled that she'd used this magic to trap him and force him to fall in love with her, nothing had been proven, and she'd done nothing nefarious that they'd been able to otherwise prove. When confronted, she'd admitted to the magic but vehemently denied the use of it against him. It hadn't mattered -her admission had been more than enough. He'd dragged her back to the family home with the intent to kill the rest of her family as well- all of them to be executed as witches, and traitors to the Hunters. Not finding the father and brother there but finding a multitude of other evidence of black magic, he had simply killed her there by his own hand, leaving her body for them to find, and planning to come back later to finish the job.

The husband spat out his confession, apparently prepared to die as he gave these final words. Instead he found that her brother had prepared a different fate for him.

The book had been silent on the specifics, but a spell was performed and the Soumas selected a token- a pendant that had been crafted and gifted to the daughter. They used this as the binding for their spell. This item was enchanted with her blood and then used as a catalyst as the brother cursed the husband, siphoning much of his power and poisoning his bloodline- sealing and anchoring the curse to the husband with the same weapon that had been used to kill his sister.

Citing his dead sister and her children, the brother cursed him to forever have his family's power drained and limited, their true power to only ever be fully seen again when twins were conceived, and even then, the curse would allow only one of those twins to ever actually be born into the world. The other doomed to have its power absorbed and be consumed by the other in the womb. Over the span of generations, his family's lost power would continue to be obtained and absorbed by the Souma family and transferred through its own bloodlines, growing and strengthening each generation of the Souma family in direct correlation. Thus, the Souma's increasing strength would rely on the continuation of the husband's bloodline. In this way the families would forever remain tied together.

The cost of performing such a complex curse had required significant sacrifice. The sacrifice of life. Katzyo Souma had given his unwaveringly, and in penance his son was determined that he would in turn expand the Souma bloodline here in their new home. He vowed that this time he would make sure that their secrets were kept, and similar to his father before him, he would make absolutely certain that no one from the family ever strayed away again.

The full details of the curse they had placed upon him, were never told to the husband. He only knew that they had done something to him and that it had left him weaker. Afterwards he was set free. Advised to leave the area and start anew somewhere else and out of sight, he no longer had the family support or means to stand against his wife's brother, so he heeded the warning and left the area. Over time, the curse of the twins became realized as he created and expanded his legacy, but the Souma family's part in it became long forgotten, and any trace of a connection between the Kiryu and Souma seemed to now lay solely here in this singular, wicked, history book of the Souma clan.

Zero sat in stunned silence. It still floored him that the Souma were behind it all. It had been told for so long that the Kiryu's twin curse was the doing of a vampire's magic, but now to find out that was a complete lie. The Kiryus had been cursed by another family of Vampire Hunters. And not just that, but it had been done solely for revenge and power? He couldn't help but think of Ichiru and the pain and suffering that he and his twin brother had gone through as a result of this curse. The Soumas history of black magic was surprising enough, but to find out about the ways that they'd used it was frightening.

The rest of the history in the book hadn't been much better either. The dark arts passed down through generations and the gaining of power at other's expense seemed to be a Souma clan guiding principle. He thought hard about all of the information that they had learned here today and the purpose of their visit.

"I think I understand the prophecy now Rei." Zero stared ahead, his mind occupying two separate spaces: One here in the moment, thinking through the next steps they would have to take, and the other space in the past, trying to sort through the rubble of decisions made by their predecessors that would have left them in this situation.

"The twins weren't literally born here, but the curse that turned them into what they are, that essentially "gave birth" to the creatures that they became- that curse was born here. I think the reference to their death means that what we need to kill them will also be found here, and I think I have an idea what it is." Zero turned to stare gravely at Rei. "We need to find the item that they used to siphon and transfer the power from the original curse. I think that's the item that we're looking for – the one that will bring about their death. It's here somewhere, I know it. That pendant."

He looked hard at her, Rei was out of it. It was a lot to process and he understood that, but it wouldn't do to lose her now. He slid over to her and gently but firmly took hold of her shoulders. Fixing his eyes on hers he gave her a quick shake. Not hard enough to rattle her teeth, but enough to center her and remind her where she was. He watched as the focus came back to her eyes. She blinked up at him.

Zero raised his eyebrows, his mouth set in a grim line.

"You good?"

Rei tilted her head up. Then down.

"Good." Zero exhaled. "We've got work to do, and we need to move fast. I really want to be out of this crypt before nightfall." He looked around, there were no windows in the room and no electricity as far as he could tell, so he couldn't really pinpoint what exactly was lighting the room. He also didn't care to look into it too much. He had no idea how much time had passed since they'd entered but he guessed it was still mid-day and his gut told him that as eerie as this room was during the day, it would only get worse once the night came.

He stood and pointed to one side of the room. "We've already searched everything so we have a good idea of what's here, we just need to look again with a pendant of some type in mind. The book didn't say much except that it's hand made. You take that side of the room and I'll take the other. Hopefully it won't be too hard to locate."

Rei moved as if pulled by invisible strings to the area of the room that Zero pointed to, and he wondered for a moment if she was going to be up to the task or not, but as he watched, she began rifling back through the shelves intently scouring through the nooks and crannies and assorted items, and he decided to leave her to it.

After what felt like hours they were both once again exhausted. Rei walked back to the book at the center of the room, hopeful that there may have been another reference to the item somewhere in the book that she had missed. She flipped back through its pages, re-reading the historical stories left by her ancestors over the years and looking for any details about the pendant. Unfortunately the story about the original enactment of the curse was the only one that ever referenced the item. Frustrated she slammed the book closed, finding satisfaction in the puff it made as its pages clamped together from the force.

Angrily Rei stared at the cover. Why had they bothered to even make this? Wasn't some history better left unsaid? Who would want a record of all the awful deeds that they had done in the name of power? Disgusted, Rei ran her fingers over the binding of the book, tracing the cover with her hands. In her imagination she could see herself taking it and tearing it in two, throwing the halves into the flames of hell where it belonged. She let out a long exhale. Except that without this book they'd have had no chance at all of finding what they needed to kill this kidnapping witch. With blurry eyes she focused on the Souma insignia engraved on the book. The gold still glistening even after sitting for nearly a hundred years in this secret room. Gingerly she ran her fingers over the shiny gold inlay of the crest. As she felt a surge beneath her skin and a feeling of nausea rise up in her stomach, she also felt a slight shift in the insignia she'd touched. Pulling quickly away, she caught her breath and tried to stave off the desire to throw up.

"Zero, come quick."

Zero looked up from the shelf he'd been rifling through for what had to be the tenth time. Quickly he approached Rei and the book.

"What's going on?" He asked, giving a worried look as he saw Rei's green-tinted face.

"Touch that." She pointed to the crest on the book

Zero looked skeptical.

"The crest on your family book?"

"Yeah, please. I want to see what happens…"

Zero frowned at her, but slowly reached out his hand to touch the crest. He felt a slight pulsing under his fingertips, but other than that, not much. He turned to look at Rei.

"It buzzes a little. What were you expecting?"

"Uhhh. Well, did it at least move? Shift or anything?"

Zero touched the crest again, this time giving it a little nudge. It was slight, but he did feel some movement. Understanding the situation, he pushed it a little harder, back and forth, it moved a bit more. Excitedly, Zero pulled out the dagger that he'd collected earlier. Carefully placing the tip just under the corner of the emblem he applied some pressure and popped the insignia off of the book cover.

He and Rei stared in fixed concentration at the item in his hand. It was larger than what they had expected, but yes it definitely could fit the description of a pendant. A hand-crafted solid gold pendant, designed in the shape of the Souma family crest.

Satisfied that they'd found all that they'd needed to, Zero and Rei stepped out of the Souma church with the dagger and the crest amulet in their possession. Zero thought they'd made it just in time as the sun was just touching down on the horizon in front of them. The town was taking on a strange aura and he grabbed Rei's hand and began to tug her towards the town line.

"I think we need to hurry and get out of here. It might just be me worrying for nothing, but I don't want to be inside this town once that sun goes down."

Rei didn't bother responding, she just picked up her pace and began following quickly behind him.

They were almost out, just a few yards away from where they had entered when Zero felt Rei jerk to a stop, her hand suddenly falling out of his. He stopped and looked back at her in concern.

"Rei? What's wrong? We're almost there…"

Rei had dropped her bags and was looking out across the town lines, her hands reaching for a weapon. Fear and worry stamped across her face.

"Wait Zero. There's someone there. Someone's coming."