Chapter 66 A Night In The Woods, Part One

A light flurry of pearly white snow. My insulated runner's tracksuit, green as the Spring's first grass. A massive gathering place filled to the brim with shining new youths, Hokkaido's best and brightest.

I found myself inside that familiar scene.

After seeing a faceless pair of panicking students, I remembered. There was a specific event fast approaching. It was an event that teachers and students alike loathed because of the stress it brought: tests.

I'd been agonizing and agonizing over them. Every day I was left utterly drained as I balanced all of my daily responsibilities. I was the Track and Field club captain, a top academic student, a social butterfly, and even an avid volunteer for community service.

Why was I overloading myself with so much, you ask? Expectations.

EVERYONE had an expectation of me. Everyone expected me to perform well in all facets of my life, from my parents to the teachers and even other students.

Because of that, life always felt so...suffocating. It was like I'd been tossed into a churning whirlpool, left at the mercy of multiple twisting tides created by the image others had for me and my future.

The expectations of others were why I always hated my life. Because of those expectations my life wasn't mine anymore; it was owned by the people around me.

I wanted to be free from all of them so badly, to disappear and start over.

"Hey, Saya!!! You've got this!"

After those words, I realized I'd been running. The rapid crunching of gravel beneath my dirtied white sneakers confirmed that.

Without straying from the painted white lines on the snow-stained track course, I averted my gaze toward the snowy banks on my right to see my best friend, Aiko, cheering back at me.

"Keep running, Saya! Breathe!" She'd been cupping her hands over her mouth to amplify her cheering.

Her voice was always soothing and playful; it drained any fatigue I'd felt and empowered me to try harder.

I smiled back at her, returned my sights to the course, and took a throat-burning breath of frigid air. After my exhale, I accelerated exponentially, gliding down the path ahead of me as quickly as possible.

At first, I hated running; it was something my parents forced me into when they thought I was "wasting my youth." But, as time flowed and the annoyance became routine, I realized my love for it.

While running, I was free from the machinations of others. It was just me, my two legs, and my drive to beat the few people that could keep up with me.

Running was...liberating.

I genuinely felt I could stay on this empty track with Aiko forever. It was a thought that gave me everlasting joy.

After I passed a lap, I looked back to where Aiko had been, ready to give a triumphant smile, but she was long gone. Likewise, everything around me began fading away from view.

The buildings decayed to dust, falling apart down to every molecule. The once gentle snowfall became darkened red and pelted me in a rain of blood.

"Ai?!" I shouted, frantically looking around for her, for anyone. My heart raced with fear as I realized the life I'd lamented had fallen away into a nightmare.

In my panic, I tried to stop myself from sprinting, but my legs refused me. Instead, they kept thrusting me forward relentlessly, dragging me with reckless abandon.

Laps became endless as the curves twisted and contorted before my eyes, forming an ever-expanding straight road.

My breathing became erratic, and a wet sensation streamed down my cheeks. Though I hadn't noticed it, I started bawling at some point.

I cried, but my whimpers were stifled when I heard a horde of howls, cackles, and growls from behind me.

I turned to see I was being pursued by what I could only describe as hell itself. A swarm of shadow-cloaked dogs, dozens of ground-smashing quillbeasts, and even a caste of filth-ridden dungeon guards.

They all shuffled in my direction, reaching for me however they could to pull me back into an abyss of despair.

So I faced forward, ducked my head, and ran.

I ran through a corpse-filled street stained red with blood and gore where hooked corpses lined every street light. I ran through a pit of screams where faceless people were carved apart by knives and devoured.

I ran and ran, unsure if I'd ever make it out alive.

Hell, at this point, I think I would've smiled at the thought of death. The idea of endlessly, frantically, desperately trying to escape it was too much for me to bear.

The chorus of the underworld grew closer, so I glanced back. Though I was the fastest in my class, the fastest in the prefecture even, my speed wasn't enough to deter my pursuers forever.

Over time, they gradually gained on me. A few moments later, they were close enough for the dogs to snap their teeth at my heels.

An image of Nakamura appeared in my mind; it formed when I felt the pressure of fangs clamping down on my foot. The dog tugged and dragged me off balance, forcing me to faceplant into a pool of blood below. My face, my tracksuit, everything was stained crimson.

Then, snarling, the dog dragged me backward to my fate.

Everything happened at once. My clothes were torn off by the guards, my skin was shredded by dozens of canine fangs, and my limbs were outstretched by the clamping jaws of massive, mutant bears.

It was so overwhelming that the pain hadn't even mattered anymore. With every cell of my body in agony, it started to feel normal.

Finally, a quillbeast hovered over me, its mouth unlatched, and snapped its teeth shut over my head.

It was then that I woke up.

My heart thrashed painfully against my chest as I clutched it with one hand. I felt soaked, so I ran my other hand over my body and underneath my soaked blouse. I was terrified by the thought that the blood from the nightmare had transferred to reality.

I brought my hand back to view to reveal a transparent moisture. "Thank god..." I let out a weary sigh of relief. "It's just sweat."

Though there was no blood... Though there were no dogs, quillbeasts, or dungeon guards, one thing had become a reality from the nightmare.

Out of the corners of my eyes, a steady stream of clear liquid poured forth down my face, blurring my already strained vision.

I brought both hands to clutch my eyes and wept quietly within the darkness of our hovel.

"I miss home..."