Friend (11)

The tanuki didn't hesitate to pull me forward still as it said, "Come, everyone's waiting for us!"

When we arrived in this world, I was surprised to see that this tanuki's form had completely changed.

It had gone from that strange looking raccoon dog form to what seemed to be a cute little child.

Though it was hard not to stare at him since he was basically naked…

Not to mention…there were some really big round things hanging in between his legs.

The tanuki pulled me along the streets of the city that was just like the city that I lived in.

But the further that we came, the more the surroundings changed.

It went from the streets of the city to what seemed to be an empty space.

This was the true appearance of this supernatural space, not one that just mimicked the real world that was parallel to it.

As the scenery around us changed, I was able to see something appear in front of us.

It seemed like there was a group that was gathered there in front of us and as we came closer, I saw what they were.

It was a bunch of yokai who were gathered around what seemed to be a single shrine.

As we came closer, the yokais also turned around to look at us who were approaching.

I could see all of the different yokai that were there, it was an all star lineup of Japanese monsters.

The Snow Woman, the Red Cape, the Ox Demon Spider, and all kinds of different yokais.

Finally, the tanuki stopped pulling me along when we came closer to them.

The different yokais gathered around us and narrowed their eyes, or rather what seemed to be their eyes to look at me. Then the Snow Woman asked the tanuki, "Pon, who did you bring with you?"

The tanuki called Pon looked up at them with an excited look and said, "Look, look, I found a friend from the west to help us!"

"Friend from the west?" The yokais said in confused voices before looking carefully at me.

There were some of them that even came forward to sniff me.

I just forced myself to stay calm, to not be bothered by any of this even though I was panicking on the inside.

After all, the moment that they found out that I wasn't a vampire and was just a normal human…there was no telling what they would do to me.

It was all my fault for letting my guard down and letting this tanuki drag me into this world.

Even if I wanted to leave now, I couldn't since I couldn't go from this world to the real world.

In the end, it was the Ox Demon Spider that said, "There's the smell of blood coming from him, but there's also the smell of the humans coming from him as well. Are you sure that he's a vampire?"

Pon revealed a shocked look when he heard this before quickly turning to me to ask, "Are you really not a vampire? Are you really a human?"

As he said this, there were some yokais that started moving towards me in a threatening manner.

It seemed like I was about to be exposed much sooner than I expected…that is unless I did something to prove that I wasn't.

In a loud voice, I said, "Are you eastern monsters looking down on me for being a half vampire? I was born from a human and a vampire, so I'm only a dhampir."

All of them couldn't help being taken aback when they heard this.

They all looked at each other with confused and uncertain looks, as if they didn't know if this was true.

But then again, the concept of vampires was foreign to them as eastern demons in the first place…so this could very well be true and they would have no way of proving it.

There were many uncertain looks that appeared on the faces of the yokai as they didn't know what to do.

In the end, it was Pon who came forward and said, "I believe him! I was the one that brought him here, so I'll take responsibility for him!"

I couldn't help feeling a bit touched when I saw him standing in front of everyone like this. Especially with how he looked like a little kid who was doing his best to protect someone.

In the end, some of the yokais gave up on this matter and backed down.

There were still some others that wanted to pursue this, but…

"Enough, she's coming!"

There was a voice that suddenly rang out through the air that made all of the yokais turn in a certain direction.

I followed the direction the voice came from as well and saw that there was an oni standing in front of the shrine in the center.

The dark energy coming from the oni was quite visible as it clashed with the bright energy of the shrine.

It was almost as if the oni was trying to destroy the shrine with this dark energy.

But the moment that the oni said this, all of the yokai immediately prepared themselves for a fight.

Even Pon, who seemed harmless, raised his fists as if he was going to fight too, but it looked more cute than threatening.

The shrine in the center suddenly lit up with a bright light before a figure came out of it.

When I saw this figure, I immediately recognized it.

It wasn't because of the figure itself, it was because of how short the figure was.

There was only one person that I knew who was this short.

Once that person came out of the shrine, her appearance was revealed and it was who I thought it was.

It was Kyoko who came out of the shrine.

She looked at the oni who was standing in front of the shrine and said, "You dare attack this portal our family has been guarding for centuries? Over my dead body!"