4

"Ah-! Kutsuki Sora. My pleasure to meet you, senior." He took a slight bow, straddling on the edge of informal and formal. He wasn't quite sure if the other was older, but acted as if he was. It was all part of putting on his schoolboy persona. He held Naomi close, stroking her fur. The man seemed amused by this, and held out a hand. Sora confusedly held the cat out, thinking the other was asking to pet Naomi. When the man- Akujin laughed, and a jolt of realization hit Sora. Embarrassment soon filled him, and he awkwardly took the other's hand, letting the man pull him to his feet.

"I can help you, but only under one condition. You must give me your heart." Akujin whispered in his low tone, pointing at the other's chest.

Desperate, and lonely- Sora grabbed what was once thought to be a pencil from his bag, carving into his chest. What was now revealed to be a blade glimmered with crimson sin. Tears flooded down Sora's cheeks, he didn't know why he was doing this, he didn't know why he felt so hopeless at that moment. It was almost as if his arm was being controlled, jerked and led like a puppet by a trained puppeteer.

Sora smiled weakly, his hand now covered by streams of trickling blood.

"Am I good enough, now?"

Akujin looked at him silently, making his way towards Sora's bag, he pulled out dismembered fingers and various chopped up body parts, throwing them onto the ground roughly in pure disgust.

"How can someone as selfish as you be good enough? What about the lives you took? The families you shattered? Or do you still only think of yourself, even in these moments?" Akujin let out a short chuckle, a bitter symphony. He grabbed a forearm and a finger, dangling it in the face of Sora. Sora was barely conscious at this point, he had cut out his entire heart. He was dancing with death, and the final sway was about to occur.

Sirens filled the air, drowning out into weak echoes as everything went still.

•••

Akujin looked out at the sirens, turning his form invisible to the eyes of humans once again. It wasn't him who had called the emergency line, it was one of the students. He looked down at Sora's lifeless corpse with a sigh, kneeling to get a closer look at the cat beside him. As the sirens closed in, responders had started to flood in. Akujin took a closer look at the taxidermy cat, no wonder it hadn't moved or made a noise the entire time that Sora had been holding it.

"It was dead all along," Akujin chuckled sinisterly.

***