Tsukune did not believe in monsters. The very idea! They were folk tales, superstitious nonsense spouted by those without crucial understanding of the way the world actually worked! Nothing more than that. Right? Well, oftentimes what we believe to be true is not, and we must revise our beliefs accordingly. Case in point: Tsukune was currently standing on the grounds of a school for monsters.
His parents had been increasingly concerned that his grades might not be good enough to attend any other school (for keep in mind that in Japan, attending high school meant one had to maintain an expected level of grades) and so were tremendously relieved to find one with almost no requirements at all. How did they discover this school? Did they scour the Internet? Did a friend tell them about it, or perhaps some other contact they have through their careers?
None of the above. The truth of the matter is that a brochure was found after being dropped by a creepy man that they happened to pass on the street.
A moment of sarcastic applause for the brilliant care and consideration by Tsukune’s parents, ladies and gentlemen. They’ve earned it after sending their only son to a school into which neither of them appeared to have conducted the minutest research, based purely on the grounds that they were extremely open to taking just about anyone regardless of grades. No warning flags there! No, sir! Especially not considering that the only way they even knew of its existence involved picking up a brochure from the ground after it had been dropped by the winner of last year’s “likeliest to give you nightmares with a passing glance” award.
But let’s be fair to them. They really did believe they were doing him a favour. Just like Tsukune believed that monsters did not exist. Belief is often like that. Belief can lead people astray very easily. Belief can be as solid as a rock, yet as wrong as most people’s use of the word “irony”.
Most know the fallacy of blind belief, yet are unwilling to examine their own with any real, meaningful scrutiny. This particular fact was going to benefit Tsukune quite a great deal in the difficult years ahead.
And you can believe that.
<hr>
It should have been taken as a bit of foreshadowing for events yet to come. It really should have. Not a minute on school grounds and here he was, lying down with a cute girl on top of him. But right about then he was a little too disoriented and distracted to think in such terms, after all: Cute girl on top of him. That tends to have quite the impact upon a young man’s mental state, and rather shifts his priorities away from pattern recognition.
“Cutest girl I’ve ever seen,” he thought. Not quite the best way to meet other students, being the victim of a bike crash. Even so! No matter how creepy the school may be, she more than made up for it.
“You’re bleeding,” the girl said, leaning in closer and closer. Tsukune was paralysed in the face of such cuteness. No way! Was she going to kiss him? “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to… I mean… I… lose control when I smell blood. Please forgive me.” She cupped his chin and lifted his head, her lips seemingly inches away while Tsukune couldn’t look away from her big, bright eyes. “It’s just ’cause I’m a vampire.”
Chomp.
It was an odd thing, really. Being bitten didn’t hurt nearly as much as it probably should have. In point of fact, it felt rather pleasant. Almost sort of intoxicating, like being pleasantly drunk. Which was exactly what was happening to him, come to think of it.
The girl suddenly backed away leaving Tsukune sitting on the ground in a stupor. “I’m so sorry!” the girl said. “I’m Moka Akashiya. Although I look like this, I’m a vampire.”
“… Buh,” Tsukune burbled.
“Oh, right. Sorry about that, the euphoria should wear off in a minute.”
“… You… For… A?”
“In-built vampiric ability,” Moka said, fidgeting uncomfortably. “By inducing a state of pleasure in our bite, we get all sorts of advantages. I mean, for example, sometimes a victim willingly lets us feed from them again and again because the bite feels so good. That sort of thing.”
Tsukune very slowly nodded in understanding.
“I shouldn’t have bitten you without permission. Oh, you’ll be in no state for the entrance ceremony! It’s such a shame since your blood was so yummy, too! Is there any way I can make it up to you?”
What a peculiar question to ask from such a cute vampire girl. Tsukune grinned in spite of himself. Yeah, he kind of knew what he wanted from her. Not that he’d ever ask, of course. That would be a cruel thing to do to someone so cute, and he wasn’t the type to take advantage like that. Besides which, no way would she agree to do something like -
“Kiss me…” he whispered, and even through the still lingering euphoria he regretted saying it immediately. Ah, but that was the problem with a mind-altering state like this. It often resulted in a person’s inner monologue failing them in a rather spectacular manner. Hopefully she hadn’t heard him. Hopefully she didn’t -
“I… should kiss you,” Moka said, leaning in once again. “I should kiss you. It’s only right after sucking your blood. I should kiss you whenever I suck your blood. It’s a fair trade.”
And then she did just that. Soft and tender lips pressing against his own. One form of euphoria was replaced with a much more natural one as Tsukune realised his very first kiss had been taken by the cutest girl he’d ever laid eyes on.
Far, far too soon she broke away, smoothed down her skirt and righted her bicycle. “I was feeling lonely since coming here because I don’t know anyone,” Moko said. “If it’s alright with you, please be my friend.”
“Sure…” Tsukune said, unable to take his eyes away from those lips. “I’m Tsukune Aono.” Those smiling, enchanting lips. “Pleased to meet you.”
“After the entrance ceremony, let’s talk some more,” Moko said, riding off towards the creepy building with a friendly wave. “Pleased to meet you, Tsukune! I’ll see you around!”
“Bye…” Tsukune mumbled, giving his own wave to the sole beacon of light in this otherwise dark and miserable place. His fingers brushed against his lips in recollection. She kissed him. She kissed him out of nowhere! Does that mean she liked him? Or maybe it really was just because she felt guilty about biting him.
Wait. Biting him.
“Vampire? Did she say she was a vampire? As in, bloodsucking monsters that hate crosses and garlic?
“No way! Someone that cute couldn’t possibly be a monster like that! It just can’t happen!”
<hr>
It is a rather unfortunate truth that much of human interaction is based largely upon first impressions. Too infrequently are we willing to make allowances for a person’s appearance even when there might be reasonable mitigating circumstances beyond their control. Being in the wrong place at the wrong time when a car drove rather a little too quickly through a puddle might leave a person looking ragged and filthy enough that this person might erroneously be believed to be like this all the time. On the other hand, the opposite is quite often true: After all, the most successful criminals tend to have an honest face.
So far as Tsukune was concerned, the building and location may appear to have been used as a former horror movie set but the interior seemed much more normal. Well, maybe not entirely normal. But, you know, cutesy dragons or cat decorations on door numbers somewhat paled in comparison to an exterior so gothic Edgar Allan Poe might well have asked them to turn it down a little. If anything it could be read as an adorable affectation by his homeroom teacher, an in-joke about the spooky atmosphere portrayed by the exterior. After all, the other students all seemed normal enough. They ran the gamut of your typical random high school classroom. There was the sickly-looking kid trying desperately not to be noticed, the gossipy girls in the corner, a student or two flicking through books while ignoring the rest of the class, and then there was the big guy over there that looked like he was spoiling for a fight and should - at all costs - be avoided whenever possible.
Yep, no doubt about it! That whole experience outside with a girl saying she was a vampire was just some weird fantasy he’d had because the outside spooked him so much. No way was that real. No way did vampires exist. No way would some girl so cute as that just up and kiss him.
There was no further time to consider this matter, because at that very moment the teacher burst into the room. She seemed a rather cheery energetic sort, particularly given that endless smile. She had sort of spiky hair that went down to her shoulders, with the tip much darker than the rest, a pair of glasses nestled neatly at the end of her nose and… Huh, that’s kind of odd. On either side of the back of her head, big tufts of hair sort of stuck out in a way that was almost like cat ears.
“Hello, everyone and welcome to Youkai Academy! I am your homeroom teacher, Shizuka Nekonome!
“I think you all already know this, but this is a school for the sake of monsters to attend.”
What? What did she just say? <i>What?!</i> No way! Was this a practical joke of some sort? Monsters?! A school for monsters? Where were all the monsters hiding, then?
The teacher continued, but to Tsukune’s disappointment only served to pour fuel onto his flames of fear. “Our problem is simple: Earth has come under human control. If monsters are to survive, then we must learn to peacefully co-exist with humans. That is one of the subjects you will be learning about while you are here. As a school rule, you will live your lives at this academy in human form without revealing your true nature to your fellow classmates. Is that understood?”
No! Not remotely! What madness was this? Monsters? What was this teacher talking about?! Was this all part of the strange in-joke?
“Hey, teacher!” a big student just a little in front of Tsukune said. “Wouldn’t it be better if we just ate all the humans? ’Cept the cute girls. I can think of a few better uses for them.”
It wasn’t part of the in-joke! Was there a hidden camera somewhere around here? This couldn’t possibly be real!
“Oh, and before I forget. All of the staff and students are monsters. There are no humans here. If any humans did find out about this place, they would have to be, I don’t know, killed or something.”
Killed? Argh! Now Tsukune was really panicking! He’d be killed if they found out who and what he really was! This was terrible! He had to get out of here as quickly as possible, before anyone found out the truth! The alternative was too much to bear, the risk too tremendous -
“Sorry I’m late, everyone!” a familiar voice came from the doorway. “I got a little lost in the school!”
- But on the other hand he might as well stick around to take in the sights. Like a certain super-hot vampire girl strolling into the classroom.
“Who is that?” one of the boys asked, perhaps a trifle more enthusiastically than he’d intended.
“I don’t know, but she’s hot! Too hot!” another declared.
“I’m so happy to be in the same class as her!” another tearfully wailed.
Well, he could take this much comfort at the very least. Monster or human, boys his age were boys his age wherever he went. Wait. Maybe that wasn’t something to take comfort in, particularly given what some of the boys he knew might do if they had monstrous superpowers. Still, it did indicate that as long as he was careful not to draw attention to himself the other boys wouldn’t think his behaviour was particularly odd. Just had to keep a low profile, and -
“Huh?” Moka said as she passed Tsukune’s desk. “Tsukune?” she asked, and her face lit up like a firework festival. With a shocking speed and a grace she hadn’t quite shown earlier on her bike Moka dove forward and gave Tsukune a rather thorough introduction to the delights and horrors of the expertly delivered glomp. “It’s Tsukune!” she squealed. “We’re in the same class?”
The reaction around him was just about what one might have expected in this situation. All the boys were jealous, and all the girls were rolling their eyes at the stupid boys. The main exception being that any one of these boys could theoretically rend him limb from limb if they found an opportunity where they were inevitably not observed. Or he could be killed by the staff if they discovered the truth. Or any of another hundred possible ways this could turn to shit in an instant.
But one look at Moka’s face and the recollection of what it felt like for her lips to be pressed against his was much more than was necessary to give his libido complete and undisputed control over his risk assessment abilities. Therefore: The monsters were no big deal if he could be as happy as this!
Big surprising revelation. The libido is quite possibly the worst aspect of human nature to let have the remotest say in risk assessment.
<hr>
Tsukune was not the only one filled with an odd sense of contentment in their new relationship. Not at all. Moka felt like she was walking on air when in truth she was almost skipping down the school hallways with her arm tightly wrapped around that of her new boyfriend. Er. Friend that happened to be a boy. A cute, nice boy whom she liked to kiss. With an intoxicating aroma about him that made her feel dizzy and a voice so trustworthy she could believe anything he said.
When had she last had a friend like this? It was so long ago… Why, surely not back then! Oh, what a wonderful month that had been! The very best of her life! Was it any wonder she was remembering it now? Why, just look at them! Walking together arm in arm through a corridor in the school. So much to explore! So much to see! The students were particularly helpful in letting them pass as well, particularly the boys who would stop to look at them as they went past. So nice of them to clear the way!
“Hm, I wonder what they all find so interesting about us?” Moka wondered aloud.
“Th- They’re jealous,” Tsukune whispered, shaking in a sort of adorably frightened way. Sort of like a cornered rodent that just saw the herd of cats.
“Oh!” Moka said. Jealous. Yes. Of course they were jealous. Now that she looked back, the envy in their eyes was rather obvious. They were clearly jealous, yes, no question of it now! Except… “Of what?” she asked, feeling a small headache rising from the paradoxical certainty of their jealousy versus the lack of understanding what it was they were even jealous of to begin with.
“Our f-friendship!” Tsukune responded, glancing back over his shoulder with a face white as a sheet. “All they’re seeing is the pretty face, and they would probably kill to get that chance!”
They would kill him for the chance at her friendship. They would kill him. Moka was a rather easy-going person, and to some might have seemed quite naive and unassuming. Had anyone else made a claim like that, she might have believed it to be hyperbolic. Not so here. The bloodlust was so palpable and recognisable now that she knew what it was that she could probably have fed from the very atmosphere. They <i>would</i> kill him just for a chance to be her friend.
And for the first time in a long time, Moka felt herself getting angry. It was a peculiar thing that was only perceptible for the briefest of moments, and in point of fact those that did happen to notice something believed it to be little more than a trick of the light. After all, Moka’s pinkish hair did seem to turn a little more on the silvery side for a split second there, and anyone that looked at her from the front might have noticed her eyes taking on a rather intense gaze straight ahead while her fangs became rather a great deal more prominent… But then the rosary around her neck would glow, just a tiny bit, and the effect would vanish, leaving Moka clutching at the self-imposed seal with ragged breath.
“Moka? Are you alright?” Tsukune asked, keeping her steady on her feet by allowing her to rest her weight against his.
“Yes, thank you. I just need a little air. That’s all.”
“Hmph! Such a pretty face!” a deep voice said from just in front of them. Moka turned around and saw a rather tall-looking boy with trouble written all over his face. “I am your classmate, Saizou Komiya! Salutations, Moka Akashiya!”
He wants to kill Tsukune. He wants to kill her friend. Moka tugged at his arm to try and pull him away from the brute because he seemed far more willing and able to do something than any of the other students, and indeed he was. In a second he had grabbed Tsukune by the tie and hoisted him into the air by a single hand.
<i>A human and a vampire can’t be friends,</i> said the treelike demon of years gone by. <i>Let me show you, little boy, what true horrors we monsters really are!</i>
“By the way, what is a beautiful lady like yourself doing associating with a guy like this?” Saizou inquired, unceremoniously dumping Tsukune on the floor like yesterday’s garbage. “Wouldn’t someone like me be far superior to that sort of scummy guy?”
Without a second thought Moka grabbed Tsukune’s hand and used her considerable strength to pull him to his feet. “Tsukune might not be as strong as you, but he’s ten times the monster you’ll ever be! Come on, Tsukune! Let’s go somewhere else and have some fun!”
She dragged him away down the corridor with an uncharacteristic scowl. Tsukune was her friend. They were on bloodsucking terms and everything! No way would she let some creep hurt him. No way would she let that jerk or any of those others hurt a hair on his head! But rather than pay any attention to how right it felt to be holding his hand right then, Moka found herself distracted by another memory of a time long ago.
<i>“Moka… Someday I’ll make it up to you! I promise we’ll meet again and have fun! I promise!”</i>
A promise that made her heart feel like it was about to burst. A promise she hadn’t thought about in years.
<hr>
The two of them caught their breath in a nearby stairwell, and Tsukune felt the most tremendous relief that those eyes filled with envious bloodlust were no longer focused on him like a series of laser sights. He felt like he’d been walking through a sniping team’s killzone. Then that big thug just shows up out of nowhere and starts tossing him around like a ragdoll!
“Th-thanks for getting me out of there,” Tsukune said. “I really appreci-mph!”
Well, he’d learned at least one thing in his first day of school. It is extremely hard to:
1: Talk.
2: Remember how to breathe.
3: Remember how to think.
When an insanely cute girl’s tongue is in your mouth, and her arms are ensnared rather comfortably around your back. Incidentally causing her chest to press against yours, revealing to you just how soft and pleasant it is, you lucky, lucky bastard you.
“He didn’t hurt you, did he?” Moka asked when she drew away. Tsukune slowly shook his head. “Good. I got a little scared for a moment there.”
“Moka…” he whispered. No. Come on, Tsukune. Clear your throat, that’s a good boy. Now ask her so that she can understand it. “Why did you - I mean… Why do you like someone like me?”
“Hm, I guess it’s because… You remind me of someone. The only human that ever treated me nicely. We played together for about a month before - Well, it’s nothing, really!”
How adorable could this girl get? Look at her! The way she was blushing. The way her bright eyes refused to look directly at him. The way she touched her cheek and smiled in remembrance of a friend. She was simply too cute!
“Besides, we’re on bloodsucking terms!”
And she was a vampire! Right. Kept forgetting that part. Kind of a big deal that the first girl to express interest in him was only interested in his bodily fluids to begin with.
“Be proud of yourself!” Moka said. “You have top quality blood, Tsukune! It’s way better than any of the blood I’ve drank from the transfusion packs! Full bodied, sweetness and mineral balance… Five stars! I’d recommend your veins to my friends!”
“I am not a restaurant!” Tsukune insisted. He would later be tremendously grateful that he had not phrased this as a rhetorical question.
“Well, to be honest, it was my first time feeding from a person,” Moka said. “I could tell immediately that you were a kind-hearted person, and… That feeling… I’ll never forget it.”
Alright. Enough dancing around the issue. He needed to confront this, and he needed to do it now! “Are you really a vampire? I mean… I look at you and I can’t see anything except a cute girl.”
“Of course,” Moka said, resting a hand on her chest. “I look human now, but if I take this rosary off my chest, I become a scary vampire. You see, rosaries seal a vampire’s power. In my original form I wasn’t well liked, so I decided to put this rosary on to keep my powers sealed.”
Incredible! Is she serious? Even though she’s kind and gentle, is Moka capable of… Are the two of them really that different? Is she really not human at all?
“Oh, but even if our power is sealed we still crave blood,” Moka said, tugging playfully upon Tsukune’s collar and pulling him closer… closer. “Did you know that some vampire families call the gesture of feeding from a person a ‘kiss’?”
“N-No, I didn’t know that!”
“I think it’s rather appropriate to trade a kiss for a kiss, don’t you?”
Tsukune swallowed nervously and found he couldn’t look away from those big, bright, kind (hungry) eyes. In this situation he defied anyone even to conceive of thinking of the word “no”.
<hr>
He was running through a forest, hand in hand with his best friend. She was skipping next to him, full of joy and wonder at the sights and sounds all around them. So different from the first day they’d met when she’d been sullen and quiet. He couldn’t dream of leaving someone alone when they were that unhappy, and knowing that he had squashed that icky scowl made him feel every bit as happy as she looked.
They raced up a tree. As always she won quite handily without even seeming to lose track of her breath. In stark contrast to him, who had to find something to lean against to try and make sure he still looked cool instead of the half-dead exhaustion he really felt. The only thing he could find was the very trunk of the tree they were sitting on or the girl herself, and the weird thing was that he had the strangest impression she would be less likely to move under his weight than the tree.
“Tsuky, look!” she gasped. He followed her gaze across the trees, and much like her his eyes went wide open. Autumn had fallen and the leaves were all turning that lovely brown colour. “So pretty!” she gasped, turning back to laugh at him. And in the process of doing so showing him a sight even more beautiful and even more precious. Her smiling face stole his breath even more effectively than the race.
The tree started to shake. “Fu fu fu!” a deep, rumbling voice began. “A human playing games with a monster so freely! Little girl, do you not care for your heritage? Do you not see how much better than humans you are!”
A branchlike hand reached out and plucked him into the air by the collar. He screamed and kicked and bawled and cried, but the deep voice only laughed and laughed and laughed in response. “Silly little boy!” it cackled. “You will learn your place!”
Tsukune sat up in bed, hugging his sides. No. No. He was safe. That nightmare again! The same one he’d been having since as long as he could remember, the same one he’d always had! The tree demon didn’t exist. The tree monster that tried to kill him nightly was not real!
He looked around the room at the gothic apparel. Weblike curtains, old-fashioned European furniture, a darkened room with all the atmosphere of a black and white horror movie…
Yeah, that’s right. Monsters really didn’t exist at all, did they? All he could do now was lie back in his bed and try not to have that same nightmare he had every single night for years upon years.
Except that unknown to him, this was the very first time he’d had that frightful dream.
<hr>
The air in the school grounds was rather crisp and comfortable that morning. A gentle breeze that almost appeared to be beckoning him down the path towards the school. Tsukune had yet to see Moka today, but that was fine by him for the time being. That girl did something to his head just by being around him and at this particular moment in time he really wanted to be able to think clearly.
Choice 1: Stay the course. Stay in this school for monsters and try to pretend to be one yourself. Revealing one’s own monstrous form was against the rules, so he should probably be okay. But if he was uncovered he would probably die, probably horribly.
Choice 2: Leave the school. Get away from all of these monsters, and try to pretend this whole thing never happened. It would be rough finding a new school to attend and explain why he left this one, and he would have to leave Moka behind too…
Either choice was hellish in an entirely different way and he couldn’t imagine doing either. Yet those were the only roads that lay before him. Which path should he take? Safety? Or Moka? Safety? Moka? Safety? Moka? Whichever it was, he’d already written up a withdrawal notice. That way if he decided to leave, he could be gone in an instant.
“Hey, loverboy!” a voice behind him called. Tsukune turned around just in time to see a hand snake forward and seize his collar, and then he was thrown up against a wall where he was forced to look down into the cold, murderous eyes of that boy from yesterday, Saizou. “You looked like you had plenty of fun with Moka yesterday,” the bully said. “But nothing in life is free, so it’s time you paid for that today.
“And you’re gonna start by telling me your true form! What is it?!”
His true form? Saizou, you fool, you’re looking right at it! But Tsukune knew that the moment he said that sort of thing he was a dead man. Still, Saizou did not seem to be the sort that took no for an answer, and he was pressing pretty hard with just that grip on his tie. Who knew how hard he could punch if he was pissed off enough? Who knew how angry refusing to tell him might make him? There was only one way out of this situation, and that was to lie, which meant Tsukune had to try to remember every kind of monster he’d heard about in this school to try and figure out which one he could pass himself off as.
Well, there was the vampire. Then there was.
…
Uh…
Just that, I guess. Well, fine! If that was all he could be, then he’d have to say “A… vampire!”
The effect this information had upon Saizou was immediate and obvious. His eyes sparked with interest, then narrowed in concentration. “A vampire?” the monster repeated. “An immortal, atrocious Western monster that it’s said are the best of all at using their supernatural powers?” The wall was punched right above Tsukune’s head and crumbled away instantly. “A weakling like you? No… You’re not as weak and helpless as you seem, are you? Does Moka know what you are?”
“N-No, she doesn’t have a clue,” and neither did he, apparently. Unless he was trying to catch Tsukune out in a lie of some sort!
“Fufufu, I see! So, you’re playing to her sympathies to make her lower her guard? We’re more alike than I first thought! But in my case, I shall illustrate to her that no guard is strong enough to keep me out.”
Saizou turned on his heel and stalked off. “Vampire or not, if you talk to Moka again I will come at you with all of my strength. Then we will see what is truly the best of all monsters!”
Tsukune was left sitting in a pile of rubble. Alone. Silent. Alone. Terrified. Alone. He knew what he had to do now. He knew that there really was no choice left for him. This school was far too dangerous for him even to dream of staying one moment longer.
<hr>
Call it an unconscious quirk, but one of the reasons humans are so afraid of monsters is that in spite of the fact they are thought of as supernatural they are a single step closer towards nature than ourselves, but are better found within the gap than across it. Consider the werewolf! An ordinary human, with all the intelligence of an ordinary human, that transforms in an instant into a slobbering, hairy, claw- and teeth-filled beast that could rend a person to shreds in the blink of an eye. A wolf by itself is scary. A wolf with the capacity for human intelligence is outright terrifying.
It was reflected quite well in Saizou’s earlier comment: “Would it not be better to simply eat those puny humans?” Such an animalistic response! Show them who is the true alpha of the pack and who is strong enough to truly rule the world! That is the psychology at play here. Instinctive yet intelligent. Animalistic yet human. It rests upon that simple border. One side views the world as territory to be marked, food to be consumed, rivals to be dominated or mates to be screwed. The other is more complicated and nuanced (or at least pretends to be). It invents and imagines, dreams and laughs and loves and thinks. Between those two is where monsters dwell and that, for all it says about human psychology, is why we fear them.
Or to put it another way: They can tear out our vital organs with their bare hands while making remarks like “Oh, that Jane! She was all heart!”, “Never did have the stomach for this”, or in particularly cruel cases “Liver let die.”
So it’s not unreasonable to be a little concerned with the way that Moka’s shoulders were hunched over as if trying to keep her head low. It’s not entirely out of place to be worried that her movements were slow, deliberate, focused, and that her gaze was unflinchingly settled in a single direction. Almost like, for example, a predator on the hunt. Which, in a manner of speaking, she was.
And her prey was (for some inexplicable reason) pacing around and around in circles carrying luggage. Moka didn’t think about that for now. She was more interested in giving him a surprise glomp and maybe exchanging another kiss for a kiss before they went to class.
“Tsukune,” she cooed, moments before the pounce. Haha! The look on his face! He never saw her coming! “Hurry up! Or we’ll be late for…” Tears. He was crying. Not because she’d hurt him or anything, she’d barely even touched him. Those tears were fear, and “What’s with all the luggage? Did those boys threaten to kill you? You can’t run away just because of that!”
“I’m sorry Moka, I can’t help it!” he sniffed, forcing Moka to realise how completely traumatised those bullies must have left him. “I want to go to a human school! For me, this place is far too scary!”
He wanted to go to a human school because this place terrified him. Yes, she believed that completely. But no matter what he might want now, Moka remembered her own time at a human school. For the good of her friend, she would have to try and change his mind. For the good of her friend, she would have to convince him not to attend one of those places.
That is why, even believing with all of her heart that he really wanted to leave, Moka yelled “Tsukune, you can’t!” at the very top of her lungs. “I used to go to a human school myself! I spent so much of my time isolated because none of them believed in monsters and thought I was weird! It was so rough! You’re the first friend I’ve had in years, and if you give in to those bullies all you’ll do is make us both miserable! Please, Tsukune! Please stay! I don’t want to lose you as well!”
He fell silent and stared at the ground between the two of them. His tears had stopped if nothing else. After what felt like forever, he finally spoke up. “Do you really think all humans are that bad?”
“No,” Moka said. “Of course not! There was this one boy I used to be friends with, but all of the others were really mean! I doubt I’ll ever meet another human as nice as him.”
“And what if I told you I was a human? What would you say then?”
It was her turn to fall silence. What sort of question was that? There was no way someone like Tsukune could be -
“I’m human.”
Anything but human. She took a reflexive step back. It may seem strange that such a powerful being as a vampire might be scared of a single human, but there are things to keep in mind. Legends and myths of a terrible being that sneaks around your home while you sleep, approaches your bed while you remain helpless, and uses that opportunity to utterly destroy you were you lay. They were not physically strong, but they did not need to be for that is not how they fought. They fight with mobs. They fight with cunning. They fight with stealth and knowledge. To cross one and let it be known publicly is to welcome hell upon yourself, for they shall descend like locusts and strip you bare.
These are not tales told by human mothers to human children; they are tales <b>of</b> human beings whispered among monsterkind. For lo, we are unto them as they are unto us.
H-How could a human be here? How was it possible? No, Moka did not wish to believe it. But she couldn’t help herself. Right before her was a human. It explained the smell, the taste, that terror in his eyes that she somehow willingly ignored yesterday. Her only friend here was a human boy, and - And he really didn’t care that she was a vampire. He had liked her anyway, and allowed her to feed on and kiss him even knowing and accepting her true nature… And most importantly of all, she had broken his heart by telling him that she hated him.
“Tsukune, come back!” she yelled at the forming dust cloud. Too late. Moka’s energy suddenly fled her, and she dropped to her knees. “Tsukune…
”Even though I finally made a friend, after all this time. Someone that reminded me of him. And I threw it all away because… Because I -”
“Hey, what’s a pretty thing like you doing out here all alone?” Saizou asked in a tone that indicated the question was beyond merely rhetorical and more into the realm of arrogant presumption. “You shouldn’t be alone, Moka Akashiya, when you can be with a man like me!”
<hr>
There it was at last. The bus! All he had to do now was go back home, and he’d be back to a normal life. A normal life. Without Moka. Without the cute face, soft lips, perfect figure, friendly laugh, enchanting personality…
Without monsters threatening to kill him over their friendship.
“So you’re running away after all,” the (spoooooky) bus driver said. “I had a feeling you would! Don’t feel too bad about it, boy. In your position, I would probably run too.”
“My position?” Tsukune asked, still trembling slightly. “You mean… You know?”
“Know what, exactly?” the driver chuckled from deep in his throat. “I know a great many things! For example! I know that you’re not quite as certain you wish to leave as you think.”
“What makes you say that?”
“I don’t believe in coincidences,” the driver said with a smile that was probably intended as reassuring.
“Wh-what do you believe in?”
“Promises made. Promises kept.”
Promises? What a strange thing to say. What did that have to do with him at all? He followed the driver’s line of sight towards a tree in the background. It looked dead. Almost. It wasn’t dead at all. It could come alive at any moment, its long and bare branches almost seemed to be reaching for something just out of reach. Just like fingers. Just like -
<i>“Tsuky, it’s so pretty!”</i>
The luggage slipped from Tsukune’s hands and he stood stock still, stunned stupid. It couldn’t be.
<i>“I’ll find you again! I promise!”</i>
It <b>couldn’t</b> be!
He didn’t even notice when the bus doors closed behind him, and the rather noisy vehicle trundled off the road. The driver’s smile could curdle milk as he drank it, but that made it no less genuine. Sometimes this job had amazing perks, and watching young love bloom was among the best of them.
<hr>
She tried to flee, but the act was futile. The brute simply seized her wrist and tossed her against a nearby gravestone hard enough to leave a nasty series of bruises on a human. On her? Not so much.
“I can’t help myself,” Saizou said. He tossed his jacket to the side, and his skin began to ripple and rupture. No way! Was he… Was he transforming, right here on school grounds? “When I feel like this, my body starts to ache! I just can’t stay in human form no more!”
“No, you can’t! It’s against the rules!” Moka cried.
“Such a shame! Guess I’d better enjoy myself in the process!”
The change itself was incredibly drastic. His entire uniform simply burst at the seams as muscles poured out from seemingly everywhere all at once. Where once had stood a perverted school bully there was now a hulking brute with a tongue hanging from his mouth. Judging from the way it was moving it was probably prehensile, but right now she was worried about those hands that looked like they could each crush her head within them in a casual gesture.
“Come here, my pretty!” Saizou slurped. “Let me show you what a real man is like!”
“Noooo, stay back!” Moka shrieked, suddenly noticing the way the tongue was looping around her body as if trying to lick her. Gross!
“Moka! Where are you! Moka, I need to talk to you, and - Uh… What the hell is that?”
“Well, would you listen to that,” Saizou growled. “The scum says he wants to talk! Well! Didn’t I warn him not to come near you again? Vampire or not, let’s see just how strong you really are!”
Oh no… No! If he really was a human, just like he said.…Saizou would kill him! He really would kill Tsukune, just for the chance to try and be close to her! That sick… Sick… Ugh, her vision faded for a moment there, and why was her rosary so hot all of a sudden?
“No way?” Tsukune yelled. “Are all monsters like this?!”
He didn’t get an answer, as Saizou casually tossed him over his shoulder like a ragdoll. No! Moka ran past him without hesitation or even caring where Saizou was standing right now, only peripherally being aware of his maniacal laughter. She soon found him resting against a crumbling gravestone, barely conscious, barely even breathing!
“I’m so sorry,” Moka sobbed. “All I wanted was a friend. Just like the boy I knew once, even if he was a human, I wouldn’t care.” She sniffed, and cradled his head. “But look at us now! I guess monsters and humans are too different after all!”
To her surprise, she felt Tsukune’s hand cup her cheek and through the tears she saw that he was smiling at her. “Moka… I… Promise… I…”
“Scum should stay silent!” Saizou screamed, suddenly striking Tsukune’s skull. Tsukune slowly stumbled, sickly stiffly sinking.
But as he fell Tsukune’s hand reached forward and Moka felt the lightest of tugs, accompanied with the lightest of weights vanishing from her chest. Looking down at his crumpled body, Moka noticed something that should not have been there. But there it was. Lying in his grip on the ground.
“My rosario!” she gasped. “It came off!”
Everything turned white, and she remembered nothing else until afterwards, waking up in Tsukune’s arms….
<hr>
The release of monstrous energy was as intense as a firework going off at ground level. Tsukune felt blinded by it, even though there was no light at all given off. No heat, no light, no sparks, no anything at all that could be sensed by any of the traditional five human senses. But, as some scientifically inclined nitpickers might well decide to explain in great detail, there are many other senses available to most humans beyond those five. A sense of time, a sense of self, a sense of when one is being watched, and many others besides. Among them is a tremendous survival instinct regarding the greatest predators humans have ever faced. Those that feast upon their blood and their flesh. Creatures that stalk in the darkest of shadows and prowl the coldest of nights. They walk upon moonlight, dance in nightmares, torment the deserving and undeserving alike.
There may not be any obviously measurable stimulus for him to react to, but the hairs on the back of Tsukune’s neck were reacting nonetheless. Goosebumps formed upon his skin, his legs kicked reflexively at the dirt as if attempting to run much faster than his body would currently let him were he even standing at all.
<i>”When I take this rosary off I become a scaaaaary vampire!”</i>
And so she was. The sight took his breath away. The adorable, nice, friendly, charming Moka was transforming before his very eyes. The changes ranged from the subtle - fingernails growing out and hardening into tiny claws - to the much more obvious like her hair turning completely silver or the fangs prominently protruding from her mouth.
This new Moka was every bit a knockout as the former, but in a completely different way. Confident. Powerful. Fully aware of how hot she was, and completely uncaring to the fact. Where one was an immature kind of attractive, the other was about as mature as could be believed.
Moka was standing between Tsukune and Saizou, both of them completely stunned by the transformation. Tsukune lay perfectly still where he’d been kicked towards while drawing in ragged breaths. Though Saizou seemed larger in physical terms, Tsukune didn’t fancy his chances of walking away from this encounter intact.
<i>Moka was standing between Tsukune and the tree in heroic defiance.
“What’s this?” the tree asked. “This must be -”</i>
“A super vampire!” Saizou snarled. “Red eyes, intense supernatural energy… Incredible!”
“What’s the matter?” Moka asked. Her voice sounded completely devoid of the emotion he was familiar with. So cold. Unfeeling. Almost mocking. “I thought you wanted to -”
<i>“Teach my friend his place in the world? Why don’t you try it now? Why don’t you try to get past me and take him -”</i>
“Take me by force?”
Saizou charged forward in a reckless move that was possibly motivated more by pride, possibly motivated by sheer terror, possibly even both. Tsukune couldn’t tell, and hoped never to learn which.
<i>The tree reached back one of its limbs as if to backhand Moka out of the way, but before the blow could land -</i>
Moka chuckled and said “Attacking me with just this degree of power?”
<i>“It seems to me that you were that one that ought to -”</i>
“Learn -”
<i>“Your -”</i>
“- Place.”
<I>The kick hit like a cannonball. The tree stopped in its tracks and a large series of cracks spread out from the impact area all along its bark. With a dreadful gasp, the monster crumbled and collapsed backwards.</i>
Saizou dropped to his knees, clutching at his stomach. From the gasping motions he was making, all the wind had been kicked right out of him. Moka stalked around him with her hands behind her back, and chuckled.
“I could have made this easy for you and rendered you unconscious. But, since you seem to have made my outer self so very angry I think you should suffer a little first.”
She leaned over his shoulder with the wicked grin on her face. Not “a” wicked grin, mark you. “the” wicked grin. The definitive article. The one by which all others measure up against and cower away from when they can’t even begin to manage it.
“I might even start with a little snack,” she licked her lips. “Except I’ll deactivate the euphoric aspect of it, just to let you feel the full horror of having your neck nibbled upon. I understand it’s quite hellish.”
And it was then that Tsukune showed the very finest aspect of humanity. For all that we are selfish, for all that we are short sighted, for all that we are arrogant and violent there are some bright gems within that rough that shine so very brightly. “Moka, no! You shouldn’t do that!” yelled one of those bright, bright jewels. He had somehow managed to catch his breath from the sheer awe induced by the presence of this super vampire, and somehow felt that he could not allow her to torment their tormentor, because he was not in the mood for eyes for eyes, not now or ever. Who else could say that, particularly when bleeding from the forehead because of this very person he was now trying to protect?
That isn’t even the most amazing part. In the face of everything else, the sheer power and grace of this super being that even monsters feared turned towards Tsukune and said “Yes, I suppose you are correct.”
Tsukune let out a breath he did not even know he’d been holding in relief, then noticed that there were a pair of legs standing right in front of him. He looked up again to find two blood red eyes boring down upon him, and all of a sudden he felt like the mouse staring into the eyes of the cat.
She seized his lower jaw in a grip much like a vice. Powerful and precise, yet he felt that she could snap it off should she feel the need. “Are you as you say, I wonder…?” Moka said. “Tongue. Out with it. So I can see.”
He was hardly going to refuse that generous offer, though he had to admit to a little surprise to see her peer at it as if expecting to find tiny text scrawled upon it. Moka even sniffed it for good measure! “Yes, it would indeed appear you are as you say,” she said. “Before we discuss this further, repeat aloud exactly as I tell you. Do not ask why. It is your position to obey.”
“Y-You should have finished me while you had the chance!” Saizou said. “An attack like that won’t work a second time! I’ll kill you both, and then feed on your bones! I’ll tear you into tiny scraps and fry your hearts on - “
“You don’t want to,” Tsukune repeated. Saizou stopped where he was and started to blink very rapidly. “Instead, you want to go home, because you just realised that taking a hammer to your genitals is more fun than harassing cute girls.”
The giant brute grinned madly. “Of course! It’s so obvious! Fufufufu! Why didn’t I think of it before! Later, losers! I have to dig through my toolbox!”
And off he went, transforming back into his human form as he departed. Just like that.
… <b>What?!</b>
“Just as I thought,” Moka said. “How very interesting. A human with a power like that!”
“Power? What do you mean? I don’t have a -”
“Do not finish that sentence,” Moka warned. “In future, consider carefully whatever you might wish to say. Your tongue has a potent charm upon it, and you would do well to have it investigated by a witch. While I am physically powerful, even I appear vulnerable to its influence.
“For you see,” Moka said while plucking the rosary from Tsukune’s grip. “It would appear you have the power to manipulate the beliefs of others. An interesting coincidence that you of all humans would have that power, come to this school and encounter us as soon as you arrive, don’t you think? My outer self’s promised boy!”
“You mean… Moka really is…”
The silver-haired Moka simply smiled and fastened the rosary. In a split instant the transformation reversed, and before he even knew it Tsukune was holding the cuter Moka in his arms. Sleeping like an angel.
“Moka,” he said to himself. “How could I forget you? My promised girl!”
They were already very late for class, so… Screw it. He’d sit here and wait for her to wake up. It felt kind of nice holding onto her like this, and besides which it gave him the chance to think about a few things.
Chief among them, that special power “Inner Moka” mentioned. Manipulate beliefs? No way! He couldn’t have that sort of ability!
Could he?
- I want to understand my ability.
- I want to remember the past better.
- I want to be able to date this cute girl in peace.
- I don’t want to be in danger right now.
- I want to be stronger.
- Something else
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