Thunk.

A dull thud resounded from the creature's head.

I opened my eyes. The creature, though, was no longer looking at me. Instead, it focused its attention on the entrance of the court, a black liquid oozing out of the right side of its head. I followed the creature's gaze, eventually resting my eyes upon the hazy silhouette of a girl.

It was too dark to tell in detail what she looked like or what she was wearing, but she seemed to have her hair tied up in a ponytail. In her left hand was a jagged, indistinct object and in her right was the distinct, sleek form of a shinai.

“Just in time, it seems…” the figure spoke as she cocked her left arm back before throwing whatever was in it at the demon.

The object once again hit the demon on the right side of its head, this time forcing it off of me.

I looked towards the object she threw. It seemed to be a broken-off piece of a brick, with most of its surface area covered in a talisman.

The demon got back to its feet and stared the girl dead in the eyes. A deep growl seeped out of its gaping maw as it lunged at her. If I had the strength, I would’ve told her to look out, though that proved unnecessary, as she deftly stepped to the side and dodged the demon’s attack entirely.

The demon crashed into the cage, giving the girl enough time to dash towards me, her eyes not leaving her opponent for even a second.

“Are you okay?” her deep voice was just loud enough to hear.

I wanted to say no, but I couldn’t speak.

“Mitsuki!” Yuki-san cried out, her voice like sandpaper.

…

I strained my eyes as hard as I could.

It really was Mitsuki.

She looked more or less how she did in my uncle’s photos, at least her silhouette did.

“Yuki-onna, what happened to you?” she looked towards Yuki-san, breaking eye contact with the demon.

“It does not matter. Do not worry about me… Please, I beg you… Save young Kumagawa-sama!”

Mitsuki’s gaze shifted to me for a second before snapping to the demon once again.

“Got it. In the meantime…” she gripped the collar of her shirt with her left hand.

In one fluid motion, she effortlessly tore the shirt off her body and threw it between me and Yuki-san.

“Stabilize his wound, fast, or he won’t make it.” She said in a cold tone as she gripped her shinai with both hands. It too was covered in numerous talismans.

Yuki-san gathered all her remaining strength and crawled over to Mitsuki’s shirt. She rested my leg atop the piece of brick Mitsuki threw before applying pressure to my wound, covering it with the shirt.

A sharp pain radiated from the hole in my thigh throughout my entire body. I bit down hard, my teeth feeling like they would shatter. In a matter of seconds, the light blue pajama shirt was soaked through and through with blood.

“Good. I’ll make this quick.” Mitsuki said.

She took a few steps away from me before taking a stance, her shinai facing forward at waist level and her eyes glaring at the demon’s movements.

The demon had gotten back to its feet and instead of lunging, it simply darted towards Mitsuki on all fours. However, as it drew closer, it got back on two legs as it needed to use its arms as a weapon. With its arms brought far back, the creature prepared its attack.

Unfazed, Mitsuki firmly stood her ground.

The moment the creature came within striking distance of Mitsuki’s shinai, she swung it hard into the left side of the creature’s body, a sharp snap coming from the point of impact. The demon stumbled about, its scrawny legs desperately trying to keep its body balanced. A loud sizzling sound came from where the bamboo blade struck the demon.

Mitsuki swung once again before the demon could recover. She struck its left shoulder at a 45-degree angle. The creature was knocked flat onto its side, groaning in pain as it tried in vain to get back up.

Without missing a beat, Mitsuki cocked her shinai far back before swinging it downwards to deliver a devastating blow. The hard bamboo blade struck the demon square on the top of the head, jerking it up and down, its skin slowly melting away.

The demon crawled away from Mitsuki, like a wounded rabbit scurrying in retreat from a huntress.

With every inch the demon crawled away, Mitsuki took another step towards it. She readied her blade for another strike. The demon desperately protected its head with its emaciated arms.

Its arms did provide protection, as scrawny as they were. They absorbed most of the impact of Mitsuki’s strike. However, it was clear that the demon was fighting an uphill battle.

Mitsuki continued to strike. The creature's arms grew weaker and weaker with every blow and the skin on them melted away. They then finally fell to the creature's side after a loud crack emanated from them. Mitsuki seized the opportunity and brought her blade back with a bigger windup than any of her previous attacks.

This was to be the finishing blow.

She struck down with the wrath of God in her blade.

The creature fell to the ground, its head dented where the blade had struck it. The demon laid motionless and sprawled out. Dark liquid spewed out of the creature’s mouth and nose. Its left eye had fallen entirely out of its socket.

Everything up until now transpired in what couldn’t have been more than a minute.

The girl gazed down at the corpse as sweat dripped down her neck. Her shinai had suffered quite a beating and its tip was darkened by the creature’s discharge.

She turned around towards me, breathing a sigh of relief seeing that I was still clinging to my life. Her eyes moved over to Yuki-san who laid motionless on top of me, though she was very much conscious and wore a weak smile.

“Mitsuki… thank you… very much…” She spoke.

The girl simply nodded in response before stepping towards the demon’s corpse. She laid her hand on top of the demon’s body, a bluish glow flowing from it into her fingertips. However, the glow stopped there without going further. The demon’s body faded into nothingness after Mitsuki was done with it, leaving no trace of its existence.

She got down on one knee before me and reached her hand out.

I stared unresponsive at the hazy light in front of me.

“Here. Take it in.” She took my hand and brought it under hers, my palm facing upwards.

The glow flowed from her hand into mine.

I glanced over to Yuki-san. Slowly, her body returned to normal, her eyes shining brightly once again.

“Young Kumagawa-sama… I will heal you, alright? Please stay with me…” she said as she removed Mitsuki’s shirt from on top of my wound.

A familiar breeze flowed from her fingertips. The bleeding ceased and the hole began to fill itself up. The blood from Mitsuki’s torn shirt, the sharp rock, and the basketball court flowed back into the wound. Before long, a layer of skin began covering the area where the wound once was.

My hearing and sight returned to me. The numbness disappeared from my body and I could speak again. The first words I spoke were

“Ouch!”

My shoulder was still in intense pain.

“I am terribly sorry… I will heal your shoulder at once.” Yuki-san said as she placed her hands over my shoulder.

“Not necessary.” Mitsuki approached me.

With my senses back, I could now see her with a bit more clarity. To put it bluntly, I was taken aback by her beauty.

She looked just like in the photos with her long black hair, sleek and sharp face, and the mole on the side of her lips. She wore a white camisole, though I was sure she didn't intend for me to see it. Curiously, there was a heat patch placed on her right shoulder. To complete her look was a pair of ill-fitting pajama pants that matched her torn-up shirt.

She stood behind me, rested her knee on my back. She then rabbed my right arm and pulled it back as hard as she could.

I screamed out in agony, but eventually, with a resounding pop, my shoulder was back to normal. I wiggled it around and the pain had all but subsided.

“All better?” Mitsuki asked.

“Yeah… thank you, Mitsuki.” I turned around to meet her.

“Don’t look.” She said.

Right.

An impenetrable awkwardness filled the air between us.

“So uhh… Long time no see, Mitsuki.”

“Yeah.” She said, still behind me.

“Umm… S-sorry about your shirt.” I scratched my cheek.

“Don’t worry about it. It was an emergency. I’m glad you two are safe.”

Yuki-san stepped towards Mitsuki.

“Thank you very much… It would have been the end of both of us if it were not for you.” She bowed.

“Yeah, thanks a lot Mitsuki. I owe you my life, I mean it...”

As I said that, the gravity of what just happened had finally dawned on me. A surge of blood rushed into my head. The sheer euphoria of cheating death clashed together with the realization of just what I had to endure, creating a jumbled mess of mixed signals in my head.

Every part of my brain responsible for every conceivable emotion fired up, all at once.

Even though I was healed of my injuries, my knees still felt weak. I swayed back and forth, before falling forwards.

“What’s wrong? Are you still injured?” Mitsuki said as she pulled me back up

She turned me towards herself to see if there was anything else wrong with me.

Steamy tears cascaded out of my eyelids. My face felt like it was burning up. Every tear that I didn’t manage to cry out tonight just came rushing through.

I didn’t care that I was crying in front of an old friend. I didn’t care what kind of impression this would make on her. I was simply overwhelmed. 

“Mitsuki…” I moaned out between my infantile cries.

Thinking back on it, so much happened since I moved here just two days ago. And in just a single night, I’ve gotten so close to death. I lived my entire life never thinking that something could happen and I could just drop dead. Neither have I imagined that in such a situation, my life would be saved.

To think that if she weren’t there, everything would just stop.

My bed would never be replaced, the locks on my windows would never be fixed, and the old man at the bookstore would still feel disappointed in me after I bought the porn mag from him.

Nobody would ever see a living me again. The next morning, the local news would be all about how they found a teen’s dead body in the middle of a basketball court with a trail of blood leading all the way to his house, only for it all to be forgotten in at most a couple of months.

Uncle would’ve woken up in a cold sweat to see that I wasn’t home, only to be called up and brought to the station for questioning. He would’ve had to explain through his tears to auntie and Anzu-chan. In the very least, I would’ve died before I saw him cry. Would Anzu-chan have cried? Would they name one of their twins after me? I wouldn’t be able to taste uncle’s cooking for one last time.

However, the fact was, the fact is, I’m alive. It's thanks to Mitsuki that none of that had to happen. It would’ve been too sad. At this very moment, there's no other human being on earth who I think of more dearly than her.

For saving me from that terrible fate, I owe her everything.

“Is something wrong?”

I wrapped my arms around her, unable to control myself. My tears cascaded onto her chest. I did it almost instinctively, as if my body decided that it was the only thing I could do in the face of such a rush of powerful emotions.

Though I’ve said all that, this was undoubtedly more of a shameless, selfish expression of my happiness and affection than a form of thanks to her.

“My my…” Yuki-san said in a tone befitting her age.

Mitsuki let out a sigh.

“You have ten seconds. Any more than that, you’re just taking advantage.” She counted down.

My muffled bawling made it difficult to tell what number she was on. I just brought her in tighter and showered her with as many words of gratitude as my shallow breaths would allow. Yuki-san’s faint giggling and old-womanly mannerisms did nothing to bring back my self-consciousness.

“You’re alright, you’re alright… Just let it all out and uhh… you’ll be alright… just alright.”

As cheesy as this sounds, I didn’t know another human being could be this warm. It was comforting and I just embraced the feeling. To be honest, I wanted to stay like this forever. She was so tender, so soft. Even though my embarrassment at what I was doing tried to gnaw at me, I just couldn’t bring myself to let go yet.

“One. Alright, time’s up.” Mitsuki pried my arms away from her.

I rubbed my teary, blurry eyes and looked right into Mitsuki’s.

Who knew what kinda face I was making.

“You look like crap…”

She knew.

“Had enough yet? This wasn’t cheap, you know… and it’s already all crumpled up and soaked…” she said.

A large splotch of tears stained her camisole, right in the middle of her chest area.

“Don’t look.”

I looked away.

“Sorry for… losing control like that. I didn’t know what I was doing… but I think I’ve calmed down now just a bit.” I said in between my sniffles.

“Don’t worry about it that much. You went through a lot… But that’s a one-time thing. Never again.” she frowned.

“Y-yes, ma’am.”

Silence fell between us once again as Mitsuki picked up her shirt.

“I-If there’s anything I can do to repay you…”

 “Enough with the cheesy lines. Just perish the thought. I’m heading home.” She hung her torn shirt from her right shoulder as if it were a coat.

“L-let’s go home together. It’s dangerous for you to be walking around like that.” I blurted out.

“Yeah, let’s. Though I’m more worried about you than myself.”

Right. Considering that she brought down a demon with a weapon that was designed for safety, I’d assume that she’d be perfectly safe going home on her own.

Yuki-san returned into my ring and the three of us headed home.