The Crimson Rose

I was on my way back to the same bathroom I’d used to cross over into the spirit realm, my head in the clouds and spacing out. Today was a good day, I got to make out with Kaneko, Honda and Ishibumi started warming up to her, I learned more about my club-mates, I got to see Shino’s boobs, and I figured out how my Grim Core worked. Things were really going well for me, and I really hoped I hadn’t jinxed myself just by acknowledging it.

As if to punctuate this thought, I heard a noise from somewhere behind me. I turned around swiftly but didn’t see anything. I knew I heard it, and since the Spirit realm was eerily quiet, there was nothing I could have mistaken it for. And yet, there was nothing behind me besides a few slow-motion students going about their business.

I decided to keep walking but kept my wits about me. It wasn’t very far to the bathrooms; I’d be safe once I got there. I could leave the spirit realm and go study with my adorable, wonderful girlfriend. Kaneko drove my feet ever forward, despite the fear threatening to root me in place.

Then I heard the sound again, but closer. It sounded like something slithering along the ground. This was bad. I should have had Yamazaki-sensei order someone to accompany me, I couldn’t use basically anything to fight by myself. Once again, looking behind me yielded no results, but I did notice a few droplets of water on the ground.

I was able to map the power that sent me to the spirit realm and back to a “button” on my mental gamepad. Perhaps I could assign my Crimson Rose spell to one of those buttons, even though I didn’t really know how to use it. It was better than having absolutely nothing. I tried it, and it worked, and just in time for me to hear the slithering again, louder this time.

I spun around one last time, and I was face to face with a monster.

It was upside-down, hanging from the ceiling. It looked like a woman, at least, partially. She had porcelain pale skin and a curvaceous figure, with huge breasts and puffy, pouting lips. Her hair was extremely long, partially tangled around her body, and soaking wet—which explained the water puddles. She was missing arms, only having shoulders that eventually just blended back into the rest of her body, and she also didn’t have a normal lower body. From about her waist down she was a massive, lengthy snake.

Her eyes gleamed a deadly golden color, and she opened her mouth surprisingly wide to show off a set of wicked fangs. The sound she made was what set my fear over the edge. A sultry giggle.

I turned and bolted as fast as I could. I would have shifted to the mortal realm right then and there, but the halls were still filled with students, they’d see me pop into existence out of nowhere if I did it here.

I heard a heavy thumping noise, like several wet bags of vegetables were dropped onto the floor, and then that sopping slithering sound.

Shit, shit, this was really bad. Was I going to die before I even had a chance to fight? This thing was a phantom, right? It looked like some kind of youkai from Japanese folklore. I think I’d seen something like that in a game or in a book.

It was slithering closer, and it made another one of those maddening giggles. It sounded like it was right behind me.

“Sato-san, get down!” I heard a voice call from behind me.

I didn’t think, I just acted, dropping to the floor. I was too panicked to recognize the voice, but it was one I trusted. The air above me suddenly got more heated, and I saw an amber glow light up the linoleum floor around me accompanied by a whoosh. It sort of sounded like fire.

The creature chasing me let out an otherworldly yet distinctly human scream. I took this opportunity to stumble forward and spin around to see who my mystery savior was. I recognized the fiery orange hair, frosty blue eyes, and stylish glasses of my class representative, Ando. She was holding a pair of folding fans, but they looked different from the one she frequently used to punish Honda and Ishibumi’s misdeeds. While that one was made of wood and paper, the pair she had now appeared to be made of gold and cloth, both had a motif of cherry blossoms, but one was vivid orange and the other was sky blue.

She dashed forward, circling around the snake woman while waving the orange fan in her right hand, this sent a brilliant arc of fire hurtling toward the creature. It was a direct hit, and the air hissed as plumes of steam drifted off from the snake’s body. It screamed again.

I stumbled back onto my feet, “Rep-san!” I could barely contain my elation at having gotten backup.

“Tch, resistant to fire, eh?” She said as she somersaulted forward to avoid a wicked fast swipe of the creature’s tail and bounced back up next to me. “Are you okay Sato-san?”

“Thanks to you, Rep-san, thank you. What are you doing here, though?”

“Sensei had me watch you until you passed back over, just in case. The school is a breeding ground for phantoms, lots of intense emotions around here. Hostile ones are rare, but not impossible.” I was glad to know that Yamazaki-sensei hadn’t needed me to request an escort after all.

“That’s a phantom?”

As if summoned by my question, the creature emerged from the mist and lunged at Ando with an open mouth, its sharp fangs looking especially vicious, but she nimbly jumped backward into the air to avoid it.

I remembered a useful defensive roll that Miura knew and used that to get out of the way as well. It was a little clumsy, but it did the trick.

“Let’s try cooling you off this time!” Ando said and swiped with her sky-blue fan next. A flurry of snow and ice suddenly burst into the air in front of her and struck the serpent woman. It screamed, and this time it seemed to have more a visible effect. The creature writhed around on the ground in evident pain. It’s whole body was covered in a thin layer of frost, and it was already shivering.

Ando had a triumphant look on her face when we both felt the floor vibrate suddenly. We shared a look, then we felt it again and even heard a distant thump. It was like a footstep, a big one. We were standing at a T-intersection and coming from a hall perpendicular to ours was something enormous.

“Shut up!” Something called from the hallway in despair, “I wish you’d all die!” Its voice was loud and booming, fitting for the appearance of this thing.

It was a morbidly obese thing, over ten feet tall, with pitch black skin and what looked like a massive cleaver clenched in its meaty hand. In lieu of a head, it just had the skull of a bull with a dimly glowing red light inside. Each step it took caused every inch of it to wobble. It was at this point I noticed it had cloven feet like a bull, and its movements were awkward thanks to that and the fact that it was almost too big to even fit in the hallways.

Now there were two phantoms to deal with, this was bad.

“Rep-san, deal with that one if you can, I’ll try to handle snake-chan over here.” I said, mustering up my courage.

“Are you sure?” she called back before swiping her blue fan again, covering the snake in a fresh layer of chilling frost.

“I can’t outrun her, and I don’t want to leave you behind.”

She blushed briefly before nodding, “Shout if you’re in trouble, be careful if you get wrapped up in her tail! It will crush you!” Then she dashed toward the larger creature and unleashed a blast of flame into it.

Now that I went and said something so brave, what in the hell was I actually supposed to do? My Thorn Heart could summon thorny vines but how could I actually do that? Was it just setting the heart to one of my buttons? Thinking fast, I did just that and then tried to press the button. To my shock and disappointment, the necklace merely vanished in pale light. Shit, that wasn’t right, it must have been more involved.

The snake creature then whipped its massive tail in my direction. It absolutely would have hit me if not for its freezing cold body moving a bit more sluggishly. As it was, I had just enough time to hop over the tail, but only just barely. If she did that again, she would probably be warmed up enough to hit me with it, and then I was done for.

Well, it was now or never, I didn’t have any choice but to try the Crimson Rose spell. At the very least, my hope was that if it was ineffective, it would still buy me enough time for Ando to come back and help. I mentally pressed the button I mapped the spell to earlier and aimed it at the snake phantom. To my surprise, the spell wanted me to select a secondary target. Actually, now that I considered the phrasing of the spell’s description, that made sense. On a whim, I targeted myself.

Crimson Rose

After my own voice involuntarily boomed this phrase in my head, I saw a beam of red light shoot from the chest of the creature to my chest. Then its entire demeanor seemed to change. It just began staring at me, wide-eyed. It actually looked a bit confused. It followed my every movement closely and with rapt attention.

Oh shit, what if I just made it even angrier? Maybe that was like, a taunt spell or something and now it was only going to exclusively target me? It slithered toward me, but surprisingly slowly. I stumbled backward but my back hit the wall. I had nowhere to go, and it was too late.

The snake immediately wrapped its tail around me and began to squeeze. I was about to call for Ando’s help when the creature pressed its lips into mine suddenly and without warning. I still tried to scream but it was muffled by the kiss. It gripped my body in its tail tightly, it hurt a little, but surprisingly not as much as I thought. Perhaps it had a numbing agent in its saliva? Speaking of which, its tongue was very strange, rather than a normal human tongue it was like a long tendril. It was still very smooth, but I was trying not to think about that, instead trying to figure out a way out of this.

That’s when I noticed something was off. She wasn’t actually constricting me all that tightly, in fact she was loosening and tightening her grip on me at regular intervals. Almost like… a hug? Then she started whimpering into the kiss in a strangely human-like gesture, like she was **** for the kiss.

No way, was this… was Crimson Rose a charm spell? She parted lips and giggled at me softly, smiling, before using her tail to pull my head into her bosom. Her breasts were extremely soft, but oddly didn’t have any nipples, making them smooth and firm all over. They did feel kinda nice actually.

“Are, are you going to hurt me?” I asked her, hoping she would understand me.

She shook her head and giggled again, wiggling her torso back and forth so I would motorboat her.

“Gah!” I heard Ando cry and looked just in time to see her smashed into a nearby wall. It looked like she had been punched by one of the giant guy’s meaty hands.

“Shut up!” It repeated itself, “I wish you’d all die!” it wailed.

Oh no, this was bad news.

“Uh, hey,” I said, getting the snake creature’s attention, “my friend is in trouble, help her, please!” I didn’t know if that would work, but it was worth a shot.

To my relief, the snake creature nodded and immediately slithered away from me, releasing me from her hold. She rapidly moved toward the giant creature hissing at it. Just in time too, as the thing was raising up its cleaver to bring down on Ando. This sudden act of aggression from one of its own kind confused it, visibly, and it turned to look at her curiously.

Suddenly, a pair of flashlight-like golden beams erupted from the snake woman’s eyes which seemed to instantly paralyze the giant. Then she pounced like a bullet, latched her sharp fangs onto its neck, and then wrapped her tail around it. She began strangling the monstrous thing without hesitation.

Visibly confused, Ando used this opportunity to make a quick escape. She dashed to me and grabbed me by the arm, pulling me away. “Hurry! Let’s get out of here before one of them wins!”

I nodded and ran with her. Eventually we arrived in front of the restrooms outside the library, she was barely winded, but I was panting and sweaty.

“I don’t know what just happened,” she said, “I’ve never seen more than one hostile phantom in the school, before. I’ve also never seen two phantoms fight each other.”

“I think it was me,” I admitted.

“What?”

“I couldn’t figure out how to get my Thorn Heart to work, so I just used my spell as a last resort. I think it made the snake friendly to me, so I commanded her to help you.”

“Wow, really? Nure-Onna are serious business, pretty nasty Phantoms, a great creature to turn on an enemy.”

“Nure-Onna?”

“The snake-lady. They’re excellent at ambushes and apparently really resistant to fire. The term comes from ancient Japanese folklore, we just call it that because that’s what it resembles. We actually aren’t sure if tales of creatures like that were because of phantoms escaping into the mortal realm, or if it just takes that form because it’s a popular idea in our culture. Anyway, that spell of yours was a big help. You’re just chock full of useful stuff, aren’t you?”

“I guess, I don’t seem to have anything that can really hurt them, unless my Thorn Heart can.”

“If you can make two phantoms square off in a battle to the ****, you don’t need to!” Ando exclaimed. “It honestly saved my life. I’m useless against big bulky phantoms or highly resistant ones. Touma-san would have turned the big guy into mincemeat in no time flat, and Taki-chan would have turned that snake into charred meat with her electricity.”

I shrugged, “That fire and ice thing you’ve got going on is really cool,” I said, figuring she could use a pick-me-up.

She giggled, and after making sure we weren’t being followed by either of those things, since my Crimson Rose spell only lasted for one minute according to its description, Ando suddenly hugged me.

“Ah!” I gasped at the sudden affection and her big boobs pressing against me.

“Thanks for saving me back there, Sato-san. I owe you one.”

“Don’t mention it,” I waved a hand dismissively, “but you know, you really should keep the PDA to a minimum.”

She laughed cutely, “All right, go and hang out with your girlfriend.”

“You sure you’ll be okay on your own?” I asked.

“I’ll just call up one of the others to come meet up with me. I’m not taking any chances tonight. If something comes, I’ll phase in the bathroom.”

I nodded, stepped into the bathroom, entered a stall, and shifted back into the mortal realm. My first encounter with phantoms. That was terrifying, they were honest-to-god monsters. I was even more committed than ever before to figuring out how Thorn Heart worked. I didn’t want to be hopeless in combat, especially now that I knew how dangerous they could be. The snake lady had really nice breasts, though, and she was a good kisser. Weird, but good. I was a little disappointed I’d probably never get to experience that again.