1 What's the Catch?
Crickets sound mating calls into the deep night.
Fireflies twinkle about like descended stars.
Past shoji 1walls, the air thickens with sticky humidity and pungent incense.
Reluctantly rousing from her slumber, Ren blindly goes to remove the damp clothing clinging uncomfortably to her skin, only to find her body uncooperative and strange. A tingling spreads as if all her limbs have merely fallen asleep yet her limbs continue to struggle as if she never learned to use them. After a prolonged minute of trying to move, it's then that she notices something else.
A heaviness weighing upon her.
Weighing down even her breath.
'Oh great... Is this one of those — What's it called? — sleep paralysis moments I've heard about?' Ren sluggishly thinks to herself, only now noticing how foggy her head feels.
With much difficulty, Ren opens her eyes and takes several moments to try and focus as her head spins. When the room slows down, Ren notices that her vision has a chromatic aberration effect to it. Am I dreaming?
"Oh?"
The voice pulls Ren's disoriented attention.
"You woke up," the person states as if it's merely a fact.
Immediately Ren goes on alert but the sudden adrenaline spike only causes her head to spin some more.
The voice sounds familiar yet her delirious state makes it difficult to place. Ren tries her best to calm down and refocus her vision on the person sitting atop her. She tries to remember who they could be but the person is obscured by dark clothing and the shadows of night.
"How? ...Who?" Ren voices her confusion with laboured breaths as her body continues to feel strange. The more she struggles to move, the more it feels as if all the molecules in her body are restless — vibrating with intense energy.
At first, Ren wonders if her family's business had finally come around to bite her in the arse. However, her scattered thoughts are abruptly brought to a halt when the mysterious intruder kisses her!
'A pervert?' Ren can't help but think with a furrowing brow as her assailant grasps her jaw with a strong hand and slips a nimble tongue into her mouth.
Desperately Ren wishes to bite off the pervert's tongue yet is unable to do so due to their firm grasp on her jaw. She tries to use her own tongue to fight off the intrusion yet that quickly proves to be ineffective, even counterproductive as her weakened attempts seem to fuel some kind of fire within her assailant. The worst part being that Ren can't help but hyperfocus on the slick tongue wantonly exploring inside her. Her body heats up and her hunger awakens, yet her natural instincts are stifled. Blocked by something that causes them to well up within her like a dam on the brink of catastrophic overflow.
'Have I been drugged?' She wonders as fire courses through her and further excites her molecules that seem to be on vibrate. No wonder I feel so strange.
After a minute, Ren feels a sharp pain in her chest as her fox bead is simultaneously stolen.
Released and unable to stop the tears that well in her eyes, she chokes out, "Why?"
The intruder just throws their head back to swallow her bead and Ren lets her eyes wander down to find an iron dagger embedded in her chest.
Ah, she thinks to herself as the iron makes her body feel as if it's turning to ice. The restlessness within her causes the process to be all the more excruciating. Like having her entire body burned by both fire and ice. 'So this is how I die,' Ren muses sardonically. 'I'm sure there's irony somewhere- Heh,' the masochistic titter causes a sweetly metallic taste to spread throughout her mouth as Ren chokes down a cough. 'Yup. Irony. What a way to go. I suppose if you laugh at the death of others, you might as well laugh at your own while you can, I suppose. Or whatever.'
The person straddling her chuckles madly once her bead is downed, drawing Ren's attention back to the perverted assailant as her consciousness starts to drift. Having her lingering morbid sneer caught and misunderstood, they enthusiastically ask, "Are you happy?"
While Ren can't make out their features, she can make out the look in the intruder's eyes. The mixture of delusional excitement and obsession within them makes her already freezing blood run colder.
"You are, aren't you? Now, we'll be one," they say laced with obsession while caressing her cheek. "Forever." The touch causes her skin to ignite with overwhelming sensations that are equally pleasurable and torturous.
'Of course not, you psycho pervert,' Ren retorts internally while doing her best to glare daggers, unable to voice her thoughts as she grows weaker by the second. 'Who'd want to be stuck with their murderer forever? And how will this make us one? Will my body be cannibalised, too?'
Her breathing grows increasingly laboured as the iron poisoning spreads throughout her blood. The tears that well in her eyes finally fall, only to promptly be licked up by the pervert. Ren can't help but shiver as their slimy tongue trails across her face to revel in her tragedy.
Her assailant continues to stare at her as if watching her at their mercy gives them some kind of satisfaction. A sick smile lingers on their lips.
'I don't want to die like this-'
The thought is barely put into existence when a jarring stillness abruptly befalls the world.
The air stagnates.
The insects outside fall into a dead silence.
And the person looming over Ren freezes as if merely a paused recording.
[Make a deal with me and I can grant you a wish,] offers an androgynous, impassive, and almost childlike voice that seems to originate from no particular direction.
'What?' Ren mindlessly thinks, confused by the turn of events that keeps getting weirder.
[If you agree to be my host, I'll grant you a wish,] the voice repeats.
Thinking that the timing seems suspicious and that this could all be some kind of elaborate trap, Ren inquires, 'What's the catch?' Ren had always been taught that a deal that seems too good to be true or comes at too opportune of a moment should always be questioned. For all she knows, this could be some high level illusion meant to get her to do something.
[This isn't an illusion. You are dying at the hands of a pervert.]
'...Has anyone ever told you that being too honest is rude?'
[No. You're the first person to whom I've spoken.]
'What?'
While the spinning of her head has lessened, her mind remains disoriented. It doesn't help that everything that's happened since she's woken has been like some kind of fever dream. It's all too much for her sluggish, pain riddled brain to process. First, she woke to think she was finally confronting her sleep paralysis demon only for it to turn out to be some yandere pervert who drugged her and stole her bead. Now, she's dying and being offered a deal like she's a character in one of those stories she occasionally reads.
[We're running out of time. If you wish to accept, you must do so before you die in this world. Otherwise, I cannot save and extract your data properly,] the disembodied entity explains. [I've distorted time so we can have this discussion yet time, as you know it, continues.]
'Then, what's the catch?' Ren inquires, again, with some frustration. The warring fires within her continue to rage and slowly eat at her despite the time distortion.
After a few moments of pause, as if reluctant to mention, the disembodied entity responds in a measured tone, [You'll have to traverse several other simulations in order for me to accumulate enough energy to be used to make your wish a reality. In the aforementioned simulations, you'll have to live a long life. The longer and greater the impact, the more energy will be accumulated. However, except between simulations, you won't be able to remember this exchange. Additionally, you won't remember much of this life, nor other simulations, so as not to distract from your current one. Also, the soul of your firstborn shall be mine.]
'Yeah, yeah, pretty standard st- Wait... What the fuck?' Ren does a mental double take. 'If I don't remember anything then how will I accomplish anything?'
[I'll remain with you. You'd be my host afterall,] it states as if that should bring some kind of solace.
'Wow. I feel better already. Like I may spring back to life at any moment,' Ren retorts sarcastically.
[You're not dead, yet,] the disembodied entity states. [However, you will be soon. Time is running out.]
While she represses such thoughts, since it seems this entity can read her mind, Ren doesn't like children and plans to never have them. So, the last condition is rather easy for her to accept despite it being the one most would likely oppose. Thus, she doesn't give much pause before intentionally thinking, 'Fuck it,' and then croaking out, "I accept."
The blood she'd previously kept down erupts from her throat and a painful coughing fit takes hold of her for several moments. She only vaguely registers the disembodied entity's response.
[Understood. Commencing data save.]
When Ren's coughing fit subsides, she notices that time has resumed and refocuses her attention back on the now blood speckled, shadow obscured face of her murderer who stares back hungrily.
A tongue snakes out to lick up some of the blood that dots the corner of their mouth. Their eyes like a hunter that's finally caught their prey. Unable to hold back anymore, the perverted hunter draws close and greedily inhales her scent. The assailant's fervent breathing tortures Ren with more intense sensations that assault her heightened senses.
Ren tries to push them away yet her arms are like wet noodles. Never has she felt so weak.
Her assailant once again seizes her bloody mouth to enjoy at their leisure.
Beyond caring at this point, Ren just wants it to end.
'Oi. God. System. Rumpelstiltskin. Scotty. Whoever the fuck you are. Beam me up.'2
Ren closes her eyes — trying to shut everything out — as the one sided invasion makes her unable to breathe. Meanwhile, her whole body continues to burn as fire and ice battle within.
Despite her efforts, it all becomes too much.
'Now!'
A few moments later, the disembodied voice finally sounds, [Backup saved. Commencing transfer.]
'Finally,' was her last, exasperated thought as she drifts off into oblivion.
