So this is a story about A Teenage boy named Yuuku and his friends Akira, Rin, Kinzan, and Katarina. The setting is before technology became normal daily things. In this chapter you'll see Yuuku and his friends are in school, learning about their world. Magic, Monsters called Phantoms, ect.
When I opened my eyes, all I could see was black. For a second, I thought my eyes were still closed, I blinked several times, proving it wrong. I looked around in the dark, wondering where I was. "Where am I…” I muttered, taking a step forward. A quiet whisper echoed around me, and I could almost make out voices.
“Who’s there?” I called out, but only silence answered my question. I frowned, but a single voice started growing louder.
Yuuku- you.....are o-our....last......
Its broken voice trailed off, leaving an empty echo.
"Last what?" I yelled back, but I was interrupted by someone yelling my name.
"Yuuku wake up!"
I jolted upright, my friend’s loud voice startling me. I rubbed my eyes wearily, trying to see who the rest of the people standing around me were. I blinked several times, and as my vision cleared, I could make out my friend Akira standing right over me. His reddish-brown hair fell past his eyes, and his jeans were dirty from scuffling around outside. He was wearing his usual short sleeved black t-shirt with the golden colored strip on the shoulders.
“Dude, you passed out in class again.”
“Seriously?”
He nodded, an exasperated look on his face. “That’s the third time this week, and all of ‘em have been during Monster Studies.”
I grumbled and lifted my head up off the desk. My eyes were still blurry, and I tried to rub the sleep out of them. “What time is it?”
Akira shrugged but then my other friends Kinzan, Katarina, and Rin look at the clock.
"It's been about half an hour." Kinzan replies.
"Wow, um, so did I miss anything important?" I questioned, hoping they would say no.
"Yeah actually you did, the teacher talked about Phantoms and she said to take notes about it cause it'll be on a test." Katarina started to list random facts about Phantoms.
"Here... I took extra notes for you." Rin sighed and pulled out a notebook, handing it to me.
"Thanks a million! I owe you one again Rin!"
As I tried to take the notebook from her hand she quickly pulls it out of my reach. "I will give it to you only in one condition, you need to go out with me..."
I gave her a confused look. "Wait what?"
Rin's face became bright red. "I mean you have to fight me you dimwit!...it's not like...what you think it's...I mean.....gah just follow me!" She grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the classroom.
"Well that was an interesting statement from Rin, by the way for the record I ship those two." Akira snickers as Kinzan sighed and shook his head. "Here it goes again, it's another Akira's I ship Yuuku with a girl statement."
Katarina glared at Akira. "So it was you who spread that rumor about me and Yuuku!" Katarina fired a magic attack at Akira. A boom sounded as her attack hit its mark, and the room echoed at the sound of Katarina's spell. When the smoke cleared, the room was frosted by thin layer of ice.
"Let's go Kinzan we are done here." Katarina slammed the door and walked out of the class. Kinzan looks back to Akira, who was now an ice statue, and followed after Katarina.
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Rin and I exited the school’s back door, stepping out into the dirt arena just outside. The space was cleared out from the forest a few years back, because Mrs. Stroganel, our 2nd Field Training teacher, decided that it wasn’t safe to practice in the indoor gym after Akira burnt a hole through the wall. I swear, one of these days that child will burn down the whole entire school. Fortunately, it only destroyed the west wall, but that gave the teachers and headmaster an incentive to make an actual arena.
It wasn’t that well constructed however, and the pits where the tree stumps had been were never filled in all the way, and left annoying potholes in the ground. At least they had some benches so we were able to put our baggage on. The wind was starting to pick up, and I got a gust of dirt in my face as it suddenly changed direction. I spluttered and rubbed my eyes, blinking quickly. Rin laughed, and I growled, unable to shoot her my usual death glare because of the dirt.
“Don’t you think this is a bit much just to get a few test notes?”
Rin rolled her eyes and activated her Aura, making the wind around her slowly pick up speed. “Stop whining- you ready?”
“I guess, but-” I grunted as a blast of air hit me right in the gut, sending me skidding backwards. I coughed as the dirt kicked up by me sliding swirled around. “Rin! You have to give me at least a warning, geez!”
“Oh, sorry.” She snorted, obviously amused. “I thought you said you were ready.”
“I did but- oh, never mind. Lets just get on with it.” I hated fighting against her to be honest.
Her Aura was long range, and because it was wind based, you couldn’t see and could hardly hear her attacks coming. I huffed and unsheathed my katana. I just needed to get close up and I could beat her. I bent into a crouching position, holding myself completely still and trying to make the least amount of noise as possible. Rin narrowed her eyes, throwing her hand out in front of her suddenly. The faint whistle of her attack reached my left ear, and I jumped off to the right. I glanced back at the spot I had been just as her attack hit it. The dirt flew everywhere, and I shielded my eyes with an arm.
The second Rin was visible, I dashed forward, bounding across the area towards her. Another quiet whistle came from my right, and I dodged it again. She knew how to control her powers well, unlike me who didn’t have much control over my own. My dad and brother were born to use both magic and an Aura, but I didn’t have a lot of talent in the magic area. There was one time when our field teacher found out I was the son of Bakuya, and she got excited, thinking that I had the same strength as him. She put me on the spot and asked me to perform some magic to the class as some sort of example, and even though I protested, she insisted. My friends and I knew it was a bad idea, but in the end she got what she wanted.
As I started to focus my power together, the students started to come closer for a better look. I told them to back off, but unfortunately for them, they didn’t listen. Kinzan and Katarina were smart and ducked behind the nearby trees, but Rin and Akira didn’t move. Akira looked excited, and that crazed smile that usually appeared when something “awesome” was going to happen was on his face.
The electrical current ran through my hands, making sparks at the end of my fingertips. Nothing was going wrong, so I pushed a little more, thinking that I might be able to do it. When I got to the second stage though, it was too much for me to handle and I lost control of it. My spell went out with a literal bang, and the rogue lightning bolts scattered, everything hit was blackened by the energy. After that day, my teacher banned me from using any kind of magic in the school, but I honestly didn’t blame her. Plus, I don’t really like using it anyways, so it’s not too bad. I prefer solid weapons.
"Your attacks are as sharp as usual Rin, but I know all about your abilities..." In a blink of an eye I appeared right behind Rin with my katana pointed at her back. "and your weakness to. You have an exact 1.5 seconds cooldown for each attack. Checkmate.” I laughed and stepped back as she smiled and deactivated her Aura.
"Nice move Yuuku, they don't call you the fastest kid for nothing. Here you go Black Kitty." She handed over her notebook.
"Thanks....wait did you just call me Black Kitty? I thought we had an agreement to not call me by my old nickname." I sat down on one of those school benches, feeling down a bit.
I looked inside the notebook, it was neat and nicely organized. She even drew a picture of a Phantom, with labels and the functions of all the body parts. It was pretty impressive but the amount of the note pages were too much for me to finish it right here. I picked up my backpack to put it away for further studies at my dorm but my cat Chibi, who was in there the whole time jumped out of my backpack as soon as it opened. I yelped and jumped, making Rin laugh as I tried to recover from the shock.
“Wait, what the!? CHIBI!” I yelled as it ran toward the fields.
“Pfft- Yuuku you gotta keep that little guy in check.” She snapped her finger to summon her spirit dragon/pet Mini-Haku. Rin looked at me and gave me a mischievous smile, and picked up where we left from our conversation. "But come on, it fits you perfectly. You love animals and you’re caring for others and above all you are a Cat Chimera." She laughed and sat down next to me as she watched our pets play with each other in the distance.
"I know, we knew each other ever since we were three but…” I trailed off with a sigh. “Why can't the things go back the way it use to be, where Humans and Chimera's were in stable relationship towards each other and.....my dad. I wish he was still here with me, and Riku...."
As I started to break down again, Rin put her hands around me and hugged me. It's been hard for me to adjust to this "new" life style. Two years ago, my older brother Riku told me that our dad went missing from his last mission and that he was leaving to go find him. Riku left me here at the school and told me to stay for my own safety. Safe from what though? How did father go missing? Was he ok, and did he have to do with Neo Elements? There was so much confusion and unanswered questions, I felt like as if all of my emotions were going to explode.
I tried to hide how I felt, but sometimes it gets so overwhelming that I break down. Rin's the only one that knows about this, she found Chibi all by itself one day and followed it where I was crying my soul out behind the school building. After that incident she's been there for me whenever I needed someone to talk to and promised me that she won’t tell anyone about it.
"It's fine.... We are all here for you, me, your brother, Akira, Kinzan, Katarina. We will always be there for you, and if not I will. No matter what I will always be there for you if you need me...you're not alone." She hugged me tighter.
"Thank you Rin... you’re the best." I hugged her back, I could feel my body relaxing as I slowly pulled myself together. After a few minutes I started to get a grip on my emotions. "I think I'm fine now...thank you again Rin. I'm sorry." I let her go as I wiped my tears away.
"Hey no problem, I'm just repaying what you did to me when I lost my mom. I know the pain to lose someone you care for.”
“Yeah I guess...well thank you for the notes again Rin.” I gave her a weak smile and
Rin winked and smiled back.
“Hey no problem. Sorry about making you fight for it, but I wanted to test if I was getting any better.” A few minutes later I was able to pull myself back together and we recalled our pets to us. It was getting pretty late so we decided to head back to our dorms.
I looked at Rin and winked “Well at least we know when to stop, unlike Akira and Kata-” I stopped short as I heard a muffled explosion behind me. My ears twitched and I caught the scent of something burning. Rin looked at me confused, giving me a why-did-you-stop look.
“What? What’s wrong?” she asked.
It didn’t seem like she heard the explosion or smelled the burning stench. I don’t blame her, though. My Chimera powers enhance my five sense, making them super sharp, especially my hearing. My cat ears are so sensitive that I could pick up any slightest sound possible, but sometimes it’s more of a curse than a gift.
I told her what I heard and smelled then she quickly spun around and gasped. She tapped my shoulder to get my attention and I turned around and saw what was going on. A line of thick black smoke spewed from the school, and small flames could be seen from here and there. We both looked at each other and nodded in an agreement and took off running towards the school.
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