Preparations

Ram and Rem were walking towards the river, with their mother. While walking they were talking and having fun.

"Sister, do you think Kaji will come to play with us today?" Rem asked her sister with visible excitement.

"I don't know, he trains most of the time now, but I hope he does!" Ram said while scooping up some water with a wooden bucket.

"Why does he train so much, isn't he the strongest in the village already?" Rem asked.

"Maybe he wants to do something, but he does come by to play and spend his time with us. I wonder how does he do that with all the things he does?" Ram said while looking at her sister.

"You know, you two are very close to him, do you girls like him?" Temae asked her daughters.

"Yep"

"Yes"

Temae couldn't help but smile. She started thinking that maybe Kaji would become her son-in-law in the future. After the girls filled the buckets with water, and started going back towards the village they saw Kaji with his dad. Kaji was carrying a dead stag, while its legs were brushing against the ground. Kurai was carrying five birds on his belt, and a boar on his shoulder, but as he walked he turned his head to see Temae.

"Hey there!" He shouted while waving his hand.

After a greeting, the group were walking back to the village together. Kurai started praising his son, telling Temae how he hunted the stag he was carrying all on his own. While they walked they didn't notice the black horns sticking out of Kaji's head, after all, the stag was far bigger than the five-year-old boy. Soon they all reached the village, Kurai and Kaji placed the hunted animals at a specific point, from where the butchers would take over.

But when Kaji placed the stag down, Temae saw his black horns and opened her eyes wide, she looked at Kurai. Kurai, seeing the woman looking at him, explained that even the chief didn't know why this was happening, but for now, it was all good. While Temae was talking with Kurai, The twin girls looked at Kaji with sparkling eyes, they thought that the horns looked really cool for some reason. They have seen the horns of an oni manifest before but, the horns on Kaji were so natural, they didn't glow or anything but they just seemed to fit.

"Kaji, can I touch your horns?" Rem aked while running up to him.

"Sure, go ahead." Kaji didn't really mind as he tilted his head forwards.

While Rem was touching his horns, Ram joined in and the two girls started asking him questions about how did he get them, and many more. Kaji just answered them patiently, while thinking, what to do in this situation. Kurai and Temae were looking at this with smiles on their faces. They were both planning something, but what could they plan?

********

Time continued to flow and so did the seasons, Kaji became closer with the girls then ever before. Four years have passed by and Kaji had a bad feeling, it was like something bad was going to happen soon. He could predict what was going to happen but he didn't know when or how, all he knew was that the witch's cult would attack the village sometime soon.

So he began his preparations. He prepared his katana that he got for his birthday when he was seven, the sword was not ordinary; it had a bright red blade while the body of the sword was blue. He would make sure that all of the things he will use would be prepared. But there was one more thing he needed to do, he needed to inform the chief of something bad happening soon.

There were still so many things he needed to do, but he would try and do everything he could. After informing the chief, to the surprise of Kaji, the old man took the nine-year-olds words to heart. He informed the men of the village to be on guard in the upcoming days and to be prepared to fight if needed.

But there was one thing Kaji noticed about the villagers, most of them were very proud of their strength and considered their race the strongest. Especially after the birth of Kaji and Rem, they thought that their god had finally returned or blessed them. But oh how wrong they were when they didn't take the word of the chief too seriously.

Kaji set up some traps that the oni knew how to recognize, he hoped that these traps could hinder the crazy cultists at least a tiny bit. Kaji trained for almost his whole life while preparing himself for this, after all, to survive in this messed up world one must be strong. Stronger than all of his opponents.