8. First day in Hel---School

Kaede stared at herself in the mirror, her horns slightly longer and more pointy than before what she came to call the 'awakening', for several reasons. One of them being the wake-up call of her current reality. 

They always had grown as she aged, that wasn't new, she even had made monthly reports to see their growth and change. She also did with her size, and she didn't particularly like being small.

Anyway, her horns did grow really slowly, so in less than a week gaining nearly 2 centimeters was surprising. She wasn't exactly sure why this was happening tho… 

Her lack of knowledge and understanding of her physiology and biology was a problem. 

A weakness. That's why even though it was a shitty week she focused on that aspect, so far she has noticed distinct differences between humans and ghouls beyond the obvious of her peculiar appearance and vectors. 

Her vectors let her feel their surroundings with incredible precision at the moment her limit was bordering on the cellular and with enough training and experience she supposed she could go beyond. 

With this, the ability to phase through matters and she has one of the best tools to explore and study others, her environment, and even herself. It was perturbing at first but she mapped her entire body, particularly her brain.

It was there she found the biggest internal difference, the first thing she noticed was her pineal gland. The size of a pea, this part of the brain found in its middle played an important and major role in biological cycles such as the sleeping cycle.

For her it was the size of an egg, ridiculously more complex, it fundamentally changed how her brain functioned and looked from the other two hominid species. 

Even someone with no knowledge could tell the difference. Not forgetting in the first place that her brain was different, her status as a reincarnator and her various activities changed it far beyond what you would normally find in the head of a prepubescent girl.

Then there was the connection from her horn to her brain, metaphorical tons of highly compacted nerve, blood vessels, a liquid that reminded her of cephalon rachidian fluid, and more tissue. 

She also reckoned they were like 'antennas' to her, antennae in the sense that they sent signals and let her control her vectors via means still unknown to her. They also were very sensitive, the exact opposite from before was they felt completely inert.

"Today is my first day of military school… Yay.", Kaede muttered in false excitement, while she put her pink hair into two buns around her horns, hiding them and avoiding future annoying questions. 

One hour later.

At the front gate of the 1st Academy, both behind were an Academy Junior School, a more or less normal high school, and then the Ghoul Investigator Training Academy where ghoul investigators are trained… 

To join the second will usually need to do the first but Kaede was a very special case.

Special cases need special sets of rules, liberties, and conditions, and they had many such special cases. No sane or normal people will choose this career after all, if chosen at all. 

Though even then Kaede was a case never seen before, extremely young, not human, and very gifted on the academic spectrum. It has never happened before.

A mother and her daughter could be seen while dozens upon dozens of students from teenagers to young adults walked in the wide open front gate.

"Don't worry Mom. I will be fine.", Kaede reassured as she hugged her Mother, she could feel her Mother cry and she hated it but it is what it is. 

Moving away from the death grips of a hug the pink-haired girl smiled and waved before walking to the huge gate. She got a lot of curious looks due to her apparent age but none stopped her until she entered.

"Hey little girl are you lost?", a voice from behind her, an adult male from the pitch asked her with some confusion and worry.

Turning around she saw a somewhat tall middle-aged bulky man with short black hair and a beard. 

He was dressed in a few three-piece suits and likely was a ghoul investigator that will be an instructor and he looked familiar. Tilting her head to the side Kaede fumbled through her bag and took the card she was given two days ago.

"Here… Mister hm?", Kaede said while showing him her honor student card, she was quite surprised to see hints of fury in his eyes and face, then sadness as it disappeared.

"Sorry if I scared you, Kaede. I'm Yukinori Shinohara, a ghoul investigator and temporary instructor here. Do you need help?", he said gently with a polite smile. 

Still furious as to why a kid that was barely a teen was here and was going to be trained to hunt those man-eating monsters. 

She was no older than his eldest son for god sake! She shouldn't be here, but the most horrifying part was if she was here, and an honorary student he couldn't begin to fathom the reasons behind it.

Before Kaede responded a familiar voice she didn't hear for the last two weeks entered her ears, said voice caused Yukinori's demeanor to shift entirely.

"Follow me.", Arima said neutrally to the pink-haired girl, while she did what he asked, she was informed beforehand, this man was going to be her instructor for the better or for the worse. 

Honesty she preferred to not be here at all but what you want isn't always what is necessary for your future. That she perfectly understood.

She didn't forget to say goodbye to Yukinori who was even more confused about it all, and he was sure he wouldn't get an answer or explanation.

The two moved through the compound,  moving by various buildings, a library rivaling the biggest public library in Tokyo, it was almost rivaling a small town in terms of sheer size. Most of it was for various sports activities but still. It was impressive. 

During this Kaede was clutching her hands to try and ignore all of the humans they passed by, their curious glance and their simple presence were… 

Infuriating, the same one would act with a fly or a mosquito, a pest to be rid of, and what a peculiar feeling it was, it felt both oh so right and oh so wrong. 

Yet it was different with Arima, there was still the instinctual need to murder him, rip him apart but it was lesser, muted, and ignorable like a whisper.

On another note, she remarked the difference in the whitening of the half-human's hair.

'How long does he have left?', she wondered, his hair in a mix of white and blue wasn't a dye or anything. It was caused by the various health problems hybrids have the fact humans and ghouls could procreate was quite incredible in itself. 

"We're here.", she was interrupted id-thought and narrowly avoided bumping into the half-human who suddenly stopped moving. She was sure he did it on purpose.

In front of them was an immense blocky building, with plants growing all over its gray wall, bushes, and tall grass everywhere from the cracked cement. 

It looked old and was clearly abandoned for at least a few years but it was in somewhat good condition. The door was closed by chains and a lock, those looked new.

Arima arrived at the door and snapped the metal lock with his bare hands before beckoning the somewhat shocked Kaede to follow him inside. It was clean, suspiciously so, it was empty.

She was confused as to why they were but that was answered right after.

With a flick of his right hand a black sword with red pulsating veins within appeared out of his sleeve, a sword made of quinque metal, the next instant with precision and power he slashed right at Kaede's neck.

Her body acted on instinct before she could think anything elaborate about her shock that the sword, aimed at her neck was cleanly cut into five irregularly sized parts as four of them flew in the direction he moved his arm, all embedding deeply wooden floor.

But the very tip of the blade managed to draw a droplet of crimson red blood from her neck as it was stopped.

The CCG's Reaper observed the broken tip of the blade being flung back at him with half the speed of sound, sidestepping almost in a lazily-like manner he dodged it.

"What the actual fuck!?", she jumped back, yelling shock, anger, and a sense of betrayal in her being. Her vectors spread out ready to snap and kill anything. A hand on her neck, the small wound healing almost immediately.

"Too slow, too predictable. I could have killed you right at this instant. As expected. Your training will begin today we will test what your current limits are.", Arima said calmly, his face unreadable outside of the stone mask he wore. 

While a great part of his mind focussed on replaying the moment the blade was cut apart, it was both fascinating and terrifying, asking how she was doing was pointless.

She was smart, she wouldn't tell anyone the how of her seemingly supernatural power.

But he could still deduce from the little knowledge he had, the range was limited to around 2 meters (~6ft6).

It could cut through something as durable as quinque as if was nothing, however, it wasn't instantaneous even if faster than what a normal human could ever hope to react to, she had faster regeneration and it was only the tip of the iceberg.

The future promised to be interesting and full of change.

"So that's how it's going to be…",

Kaede mumbled as she rationalized what happened, she was still pissed off. She could and would have died, decapitated might she have, if she didn't react fast enough, that much was evident. He wasn't playing around.

It set his character, as a monster, what he told was but plain factual truth, one that was cold and uncaring for her being and one she recognized as necessary. The future will be far from pleasant.