CHAPTER 2: XIN THE CITY TO THE EAST

Yu stared at everyone in the room, the aura they were emitting was suffocating, and he found himself having difficulty breathing. Calming his nerves down, he stood there and watched as Kuro walked around the table and sat at the chair with the number one on it.

Kuro looked at Yu and motioned for him to sit at the eighth spot, Yu nodded and walked over to the last chair. He sat down and observed everyone's reaction, aside from Karin who was still glaring daggers at him, everyone did not seem to mind. 

"I'm sure you are wondering who we are." Kuro began and saw Yu nod. 

He cleared his throat as the lights in the room flickered off and the table illuminated, each number illuminating a certain color in correspondence with their respective color affiliation. "We are known as the dawning star! The seven of us make up 10% of Toru's military force. My name is Kuro Shirogane." 

"I'm E.N.D." The mechanical ball introduced itself after Kuro

"Yuli," the multi-colored-eyed man said half enthusiastically. 

"Karin Iwatane." Karin scoffed and looked away from Yu. 

" Mimihoshi Kataraga." Yu stared at the woman, her sultry voice captivating his ears. 

"Call me Shi." The pink-haired girl said enthusiastically punching the air. 

"I'm Grandalf Osborne." The last one introduced himself. 

"I am Yu Yomi, son of Amaterasu," Yu announced his full name which drew the attention of everyone including Karin, Amaterasu had a child? That was their thought. 

Kuro broke the silence with a question. "Yu, you said Amaterasu sent you here, mind I ask why?" 

"Because of this…" Yu lifted his shirt making Shi blush from his chiseled body. On his torso was a cross, the cross had one side depicting darkness and the other side light. "She said if I get here, I might get help. Although I feel tired, because of this thing here on my chest, I tend to lose my humanity." 

Kuro studied the cross with a keen eye, it made sense to him why Amaterasu would send a child their way. He did not want to voice out his conclusion to the rest but he figured that Amaterasu had come to the same conclusion he had to. 

Yu was not human, he was not a divine being nor a cursed being. 

He was the duality of both, but the only dualities to record were those N.E.X.T tried to clone after the war a thousand years ago, a majority of them failed and the operation was canceled but over the years, the dualities that had managed to survive banded up and started to cause terror amongst the world. 

"What are you going to do now? I know for certainty that the creatures will hunt you until you perish. Want to join us?" 

"You can't!" Karin sprung up, slamming her hands on the table. She didn't want Yu in the group, he was going to act as a replacement for her deceased partner too. 

Kuro placed his hands on the table, he calmly looked up at Karin, his gaze sending shivers down her spine. "I feel for you but, the 7 luminaries and the hordes of monsters out there won't. We are a member short and we need him as much as he needs us. Amaterasu wouldn't have sent him here if she didn't believe in him."

Karin tried to rebut against Kuro's words but she knew they held truth to them. If the boy had encountered Susanoo prior to him reaching them, that changed almost everything. She was certain that it was Susanoo who killed her master, thinking about it her face distorted but nonetheless, she yielded and sat down. 

Kuro having dealt with the issue for the time being heaved out a sigh and he clapped his hands. The table radiated with Aenether and it levitated from the table forming a scroll with writing on them. "Now then, the kingdom has been under attack from monsters, cities of Shu and Xin have been swamped by monsters and residents can't leave. Our task will be to exterminate the issues before the other kingdoms use this chance to invade from the west." 

Kuro closed his eyes, and moments later he opened them. His mysticism-filled eyes glared at Yu and Karin. Even though it was Yu's unofficial inauguration into the dawning stars. They needed all the strong people they could get. "Yu and Karin, you two are to depart immediately and head for Xin. Exterminate the monsters there, failure is not an option." 

Yu nodded, although he was still wondering what was going on because the events had occurred so fast in such a short time span. One thing he was running from those creatures, next he was in jail with a crazy woman trying to kill him, and now he was here attending a gathering he had no business in attending. 

Karin glared at Yu, she had her complaints but when she shifted her eyes from Yu to Kuro, she understood what that glare meant. Finding no reason to complain, she nodded and got up from her seat. "Let's go, we will make it to Xin by daybreak if we leave now." she walked toward the corridor not waiting for Yu to catch up. 

Yu nodded and hurried to his feet, he quickly chased behind Karin only to stop when a pale white sword flew in his direction from Kuro. He caught it and smiled at Kuro, this sword was his lifeline, the only thing that remained aside from the pendant that connected him to his mother Amaterasu. 

Yu walked behind Karin in silence, it had been a couple of hours since they left the dawning star base and were now crossing the depths of the sandy terrain. The midnight wind made the normally hot climate extremely cold, and from what Yu could tell, they were a couple of hours away from Xin. 

Karin stopped, she unbuckled her belt and laid it on the ground. Without a word, she clapped her hands together, her Aenether conjured to his hands and feet making the sand move about, converting it from sand to wood. She snapped her fingers after and the wood caught fire. Once done, she sat on one of the logs she created and watched the embers with a furlough look. Distant from reality. 

"Amaterasu was more than a master to me, she saved me when I was close to dying, taught me all I know, and for you to possess the Sun blade! It grinds my gears." 

Yu sat down across the fire. His eyes looked at the woman sitting across from him, and he could not help but feel empathetic toward her. "She was my mother, although she told me she found me as an infant, she treated me like her son. I still regret not staying and fighting with her," 

"You are right, a part of me hates you for running but what kind of an adult would I be if I hate on a kid because of his inability to stand up for himself…" Karin let out a dry laugh. " Even so, did she teach you anything worthwhile? Being a part of the dawning star means that you have to be strong enough to take down demons, demi-holy beings, and even fellow humans. This war-torn world has nothing to offer but pain." 

"I know my fair share of pain, from the moment I could crawl I never had peace," Yu replied and looked at the sky.

The midnight color was starting to fade away and the tips of the rising sun started to clear away the night gray lights. 

Karin got up and kicked sand onto the fire turning it off. "Let's go we are close." She said and took her sword, she attached it to her waist and took off toward Xin. 

Yu was right on her trail. 

The city of Xin appeared in the distance, and they calmed down their speed to a walking pace. They walked side by side and made it to the walls of the city. 

"State your names!" The guards posted at the foot of the city gates yelled out to them, those on the walls loaded their weapons and prepared them for the worst-case scenario of these two being enemies. 

Karin took out her badge and showed it to the guards. "My name is Karin Iwatane, I'm from the Dawning Star Guild. This is my partner Yu Yomi. We were sent here because of a request from the king to come and help with the demon issue." 

The guard looked at her badge and nodded, he gave the signal and the doors hiding the city opened from the inside allowing Karin and Yu passage into the city. 

The first thing Yu noticed when walking inside, was the creeping shadows to their right, he dismissed them and continued to observe the city as he was not familiar with its layout. The buildings at the entrance were torn apart, and people residing there were on the streets, looking into their eyes, he could tell they had lost the will to continue on living but the question was why? Why would a city noted for its people have so many people with dead-looking eyes? It made no sense. 

"We are here Yu." Karin snapped him out of his train of thought. 

Before them were walls half the size of the ones they encountered at the gate. But they were big nonetheless and behind the walls, he could see the tips of the pointed roofs used all over the kingdom. The doors leading to the royal palace opened for them and they walked inside. 

Their intention to meet the king.