1 Crimson

It was the darkest night, but the moonlight shone, lighting the way. A tall and slim teenage girl dragged her feet on the ground while groaning in pain. The wind stirred her dark brown straight hair and her white shirt and black pleated skirt were covered with sweat and mud, but she did not mind how messy she had become. She could not stop groaning as she could feel the aching of her feet as if telling her to stop. Her almond-round amber eyes looked around, wary of her surrounding.

"I want to go home," she muttered while sniffing, preventing tears from falling. The 15-year-old girl named Eirin could not stop regretting the decisions she made.

The empty city on a night made the teenage girl terrified. She ran nonstop, making her breathless, and her legs were ready to go numb. Her black loafers were covered with dirt and mud, and she doesn't remember where she left her school bag. Despite that, Eirin could not stop moving or it would cause her life. As she ran and ran, she reached a dark alleyway that the moonlight could not reach. The damp smell lingered everywhere, mixing with it was a stinky scent she could not fathom. Eirin's eyesight adjusted to the darkness, and she noticed piles of garbage surrounding the alleyway.

'Maybe this place is the dumpster,' she thought.

Eirin could not take a deep breath due to the foul smell covering the place. "Isn't this place abandoned?" she talked to herself while wondering what could be creating such an awful smell as if like dead rotten animals. She held onto her nose, grazing the mole on top of her nose bridge. Despite how horrendous the smell was, the fear that she might see those people again made her endure the stench as she shivered in fear.

'It's just dead rats,' she assured herself.

Only the sound of the wind and the squeaking of the rats filled her ears. They must have been famished and are now searching for food, just like Eirin, who has not had her dinner yet. Who could have expected her to lose her way in the city she grew up in? Everything happened so fast that even Eirin could not comprehend how she ended up in a completely different place.

The cold air touched Eirin's fair white skin, making her realize how alone she was. She rubbed her palms and breathe into them, keeping herself warm. 'I need to leave as soon as possible, but where do I go?' She has been finding her way out of the abandoned city, but it was futile. 'If those people catch me… they might do something insane,' Eirin thought and sighed.

Eirin could not take any steps further due to her aching feet. She looked around to see if any people were wearing those black cloaks, and after seeing no one, she decided to rest in that alleyway. The teenage girl sat down near the trash bags, hoping to cover her scent from those monstrous beings, and hoping that she could survive the night.

"I just want to go home." Eirin sniffed with tears almost falling out of her eyes as she hugged her knees. The ground was damp and hard. It made her bottom hurt, but she did not have a choice. This made her miss the comfort of her house and the warmth of her soft bed.

The exhaustion's starting to catch up to her, making her eyelids feel heavy. Her phone's out of battery, and she does not know where she was. 'Maybe… I could sleep here even for a little,' she thought, but the howling wind made her unable to calm down and she kept trying to keep her eyes wide open.

As Eirin struggled to control her desire to sleep, she heard a loud thud coming from one of the garbage bins near her. It was black and looked bigger than every bin beside it. Eirin adjusted her blurry eyesight to see what was the source of that sound. Her heart thumped as she stayed completely still, waiting for it to move again.

She heard another thud from the black bin. Out of curiosity, Eirin stood up with shaking legs and sauntered towards it. Her black stockings are torn into pieces, causing the vile wind to seep through them. The second Eirin touched the lid, a rat leaped out, sending her tumbling to the ground with the black trash bin, revealing what was inside.

"Ouch."

Eirin groaned as her gaze landed on the trash bin. Her amber eyes flickered and went wide open as she screamed internally. Holding it in, afraid of being found out if ever she made a loud noise. She heard her heart pounding, and it was deafening. The teenage girl was also out of breath and she almost gagged.

"What is this?"

Her head went blank as she could not fathom why there was a human hand with blood still dripping from it on the ground. Negative thoughts filled Eirin's head.

'What if this is it for me?'

She started regretting her decision of following her friend and losing him amid the chaos that went on soon after. But the thought of her friend made her freeze. 'W-Was he caught by those people too?' A lousy thought crossed her head, causing her whole body to tremble.

'W-What if that severed arm belonged to him?'

Just that thought made Eirin's tears fall, and she could not stand as her gaze went to the rat that came out of the black bin. It was eating something that she could not see clearly.

Eirin swallowed her fear. She stopped caring about the awful smell and took a deep breath. She tiptoed her way toward the rat, preventing it from running away. Carefully and quietly. Despite all the watchfulness she exerted, when her right foot landed in a shallow puddle, the rat noticed her advances and scurried off, leaving the thing it brought out. As if something was controlling her, Eirin's curiosity got the best of her, and her hand moved on its own, picking up the thing the rat was gnawing at. No thoughts, just pure instinct. The teenage girl did not even think of how disgusting it was to pick up something that was being eaten by a rat.

The rat deformed the thing with bites as if it was savoring every part of it.

Eirin gulped as she rotated the object. Eyes turning wide and stomach churning, Eirin realized what it was. She tossed it and screamed at the top of her lungs, forgetting the danger it could bring. The disgusting thing made her shake both of her hands, trying to remove even the smell of it.

It was a human eyeball.

"There you are."

Eirin's body stiffened after hearing the sinister voice of a man behind her. "Nick, stop this already. Are you still out of it?" She soon heard a woman's voice. Those voices were all too familiar for Eirin not to react.

"What's the fun in that? Those people made me like this. Why do I have to stop? I have already become a monster, just like how they wanted."

Eirin did not bother turning around. She dashed away as fast as she could. She knew that if she stayed there even for a minute, she would soon be lying beside the severed hand on the ground.

"See? She's running away. That girl's thinking that I'm a monster." The man said. "I should be chasing after her, should I not?" Eirin heard a terrifying cackle from that man named 'Nick,' making her scream.

"Help! Someone! Anyone!"

Tears were falling out of her eyes as she ran with a blurry vision. She did not expect to be so helpless in such a situation. No, she did not expect to be in such a life-or-death situation like that. The houses she passed by were all empty and the darkness made her stumble a lot, but she could not afford to fall. Eirin did not wish to die there.

"Where do you think you're going?"

Eirin stumbled into the man, who magically appeared in front of her. His bloodshot crimson-red eyes stared right at her. "The fun's just starting." The man licked his lips and his eyes went down to Eirin's white, bare legs. "Why don't you play with me a little? I'll make sure you'll drown in pleasure," he said. The blood thirst that he could not hide made Eirin shudder.

'How did he?' Eirin thought as she backed away. "P-Please, let me go."

The man laughed. It was such a wicked snicker. "I can't do that. You're my meal," he said as he started panting. "You look stunning." His sinister smile grew wider as he reached out to Eirin's arm, but a wall of ice appeared in between them, severing the man's arm and separating the two.

"AH!!!" the man screamed in pain. Eirin could not understand how such a thing could appear in front of them.

"RUN!"

Eirin heard someone shouting above Nick's agony. Despite the confusion, she saw this as a chance to escape, and so she ran back to where she came from. Her feet were already numb, but she did not stop. Even when she could not see anything as the clouds covered the moon. When Eirin reached an open space that looked like a plaza, she stumbled and fell face-first to the ground. It was as if her body was giving up on its own.

"Are you going to run no more?" The man's voice brought chills to Eirin's ears as she started crawling. Darkness soon swallowed the whole place once again.

"Stop this already, Nick!" The woman wearing the same black cloak tried to stop her companion as she pulled him away from Eirin. "This isn't right! They are influencing you." No matter how much the woman tried, Nick did not listen to her.

"You chose a great place to die," Nick said.

The moment Eirin raised her head, the clouds covering the moon dispersed, letting her see a glint of bright red light at the branch of a tree in front of her. When the moonlight disappeared again, Eirin saw nothing but darkness. She soon heard a scream and the crackling sound of flames that brightened the whole place. Her breathing grew heavier as she saw a pair of black shoes in front of her.

The heat coming from the flames made Eirin gasp as she struggled to see a silhouette of a man standing in front of her.

'Who?'