Akisame, Era

       FULL NAME:
      → Akisame Era 秋鮫・鰓
      → Code name: Elastor
      → Yuki-onna


       AGE:
       → 25

      SEX:
       → Male
       → Female

       BIRTH PLACE:
       → Hakodate Hokkaido, Japan
       → Hakodate Hokkaido, Japan

       RACE:
       → Japanese

       TYPE OF AYAKASHI:
       → Human type - Yuki-onna

       ENTITY:
       → Same Being

       DATE OF BIRTH:
       → 4 July 1990



       HEIGHT:
       → 5"11"

       WEIGHT:
       → 166 lbs.

       PICTURE:
       →

Spoiler:

       PERSONALITY:
       → Era is obsessively private. Meaning, he never shares anything about himself nor cares to. People are just nuisances to him, getting in the way of his constant need to function efficiently. He never stops, never rests, and will avoid talking to someone if at all possible. He hates encountering new people and being probed for information in general. However, despite his intense antisocial attitude, Era actually works well with people. Well, that is once they can look past his bitchy remarks, anal perfectionism, and solitary elitism…

Era's favorite thing is one-word answers or a look that says it all (and by look, it's usually a leave-me-alone-or-I-will-kill-your-entire-family glare). If he can find a way not to reply, he will. Usually it involves handing them a stack of papers filled with the needed information, a nod, a shake of the head, or motioning towards something and walking away. Sometimes this can irritate a person and evoke a negative reaction, but he doesn't give a shit. They can get all pissy as long as it's not on his time.

He is known for his icy glare of no return. Once said glare is initiated, normally all those under its wrath instantly submit, succumb...or run away. This glare usually means that they should shut up and leave him the hell alone or die. On other occasions though, this glare could also simply mean: "die". People have said that he has the eyes of a killer, and Era doesn't bother hiding it. People fidget, twitch, cower, and piss their pants under his normal gaze, so when this specific glare comes out, it's time to act...or stop mouthing off for that matter.  

Because he grew up as a sickly child, Era still has fragments of who he used to be ingrained into him. He has an unusual fear of anything dirty or unkempt and will shun contact with it, making up any kind of bullshit excuse to escape. If he has no choice or happenstances upon it, he will freak out. Under these circumstances, his guard will drop completely, and he will fall prey to the common nature that is typically lacking in the human ice cube referred to as Akisame Era.  Among other things, he is deathly afraid of rats (disease-carrying vermin!). He also avoids going outside. Like a feudal version of a Hikikomori, Era tries to escape the need to leave his room at all save for business purposes (and those around him who are unaccustomed to his health tend to prevent him from it anyway). He’s just used to it. That’s how he spent his life, forbidden to leave the premises unless accompanied by someone, and in small doses. Anything too dire or too extreme would exhaust him and bed-rid him for days. He hated being that way—suffered constantly with the foreboding idea that he may not live much longer. The only male heir, the spoiled rotten child, the heroic stories of warriors carving paths through the mountains, the bitter taste of medicine all wore him down, shaped him like a thousand-year-old river stone. And soon, he thought, he would be nothing.    

That is why small things mean a lot to Era. Riding a train, walking down a street, eating udon in a shop: are all meaningful. What many take for granted, he doesn’t. Silently, he approaches what he could only dream about as a child, carefully observing everything—taking everything in. Even when he was a child, he would get stir crazy, lying around all the time. So, to this day, if he does spend too much time indoors, he’ll wander out on his own.

Era is a perfectionist in definition. His quarters are so perfectly organized and sparse that one could barely tell that it is lived in at all. Usually it can be passed off as merely a spare room. He likes it that way. So if he died, disappeared, or was captured, he wouldn't leave anything behind for people to find. And because of this, he has no worldly possessions besides his sword. His perfectionism does not make him Obsessive Compulsive exactly; it only makes him extremely anal about certain things. He'll bitch and complain if people don't pick up after themselves or if they do things that compromise a mission or their safety, but he will say nothing if they purposely leave things for him to do. Era will just take it, do it, and get it over with. And because of this, he can easily work himself into the ground without realizing it. That is why he also needs to be watched out for, evaluated, and forced to take days off.

He is obsessed with money, saving money, and picking small coins up off the sidewalk. The reason for this is deeply ingrained into his psyche due to the fact that he lost his entire family and all of their fortune to a clever assassination. He knows that to maintain the frugal lifestyle of which he is accustomed, he must accumulate a fair amount of money. Era’s mentality isn’t just to survive, but to survive in the only way that he knows. Luckily, with the addition of Yuki-onna, he is capable of much more than he ever was. Era completes tasks flawlessly, without complaining and without a single error. But humanity always has their mistakes...just Era hasn't encountered one yet.

Despite all his misgivings, Era is quite capable of what one would call ‘cheerful’. He’ll let it out on occasion when he thinks no one of importance is looking. He knows how to smile, show his teeth, and laugh carelessly. When the scars fade, he is able to forget and let go of the bloodshed—of the ideals planted into him from the violent coughs and writhing pain once tearing his life away. The childhood he never had comes out. There is a lot he doesn’t know, never experienced, and often is confused over. When exposed to it, it’s hard to hide his excitement, and yet he somehow manages to, upholding his duty to be ever reserved.

Era was raised as a girl, befitting tradition. Why? Well, usually male heirs are kidnapped, assassinated, or otherwise calamity befalls them (not that Era was exempt from that). I think it’s pointless to say he was sheltered. His family even went so far as to give him the ‘temporary’ name Era, calling him that even when they were alone (don’t know who could be watching). He was never given a male name, seeing as his family was murdered before he came of age.  Thus, that was his name. He was dressed in the clothing a little girl of high status would wear, his long hair done up, his fair skin and appealing features feminine enough to fool anyone. Mention it anywhere around Era, and you’re asking for your funeral. Yet, despite his complete outward rejection of it, he actually is quite okay with it, finding comfort in kimono like one would in an old friend.

He is the epitome of macho resilience, denying things that he knows are true. And he does this especially when he is in a foul mood. Era is worse than a girl on PMS with his violent mood swings and odd behavior. If someone accuses him of something he doesn't like, he will avidly refuse to acknowledge their existence for a week and deny it ever happening. (He does this if someone pisses him off too, which is relatively easy). If someone provokes him, prods him constantly, or claims something he has chosen to be ignorant of, they are seeking hell. Era is good at making people's lives a living hell, but he never does so in a childish manner; he is slick and sneaky with his revenge. So watch out.


       AYAKASHI’S PERSONALITY TRAITS:
       → In many stories, Yuki-onna appears to travelers trapped in snowstorms, and uses her icy breath to leave them as frost-coated corpses. Other legends say she leads them astray so they simply die of exposure. Other times, she manifests holding a child. When a well-intentioned soul takes the 'child' from her, they are frozen in place. Parents searching for lost children are particularly susceptible to this tactic. Other legends make Yuki-onna much more aggressive. In these stories, she often invades homes, blowing in the door with a gust of wind to kill residents in their sleep (some legends require her to be invited inside first). What Yuki-onna is after varies from tale to tale. Sometimes she is simply satisfied to see a victim die. Other times, she is more vampiric, draining her victims' blood or 'life force.' She occasionally takes on a succubus-like manner, preying on weak-willed men to drain or freeze them through sex or a kiss. Like the snow and winter weather she represents, Yuki-onna has a softer side. She sometimes lets would-be victims go for various reasons.

However, while that is all rainbows and butterflies, Era knows Yuki-onna in a much different way. Worshiped at their shrine, she was the Ayakashi of missing children. Oftentimes when a child went missing, family members would come to pray for the child's return or simply for their safety. When all hope was gone, they would linger at the shrine and regain some optimism. Sometimes, their wish would be granted. Other times, it just couldn't be.

Yuki-onna would tell lots of stories to the bed-ridden Era. He would listen intently to the cold figure perched alongside his pillows and even try and repeat them to his sister or to his mother. He wasn't always believed, but he knew he wasn't just delusional.

Yuki-onna saved Era's life. After his parents were murdered and he created a distraction for his sister to flee, he was on the brink of death. While he shrine was destroyed and he life force dwindling, Yuki-onna chose to enter into Era's body as a Same Entity Possession. That day he became a Tsukimono. While her intentions are usually pure, they are also self-fulfilling. Thus she is neither something evil nor anything so pure. The snow is much more white.

       LOVE:
       → Being private, Death glaring, Success, Being effective, Being precise, Being ignored, Silence, Night, Sleeping, Reading, Keeping things clean & tidy, Upkeep, Organization, Tea, Broccoli, Roses, Family, Soft music, Eating healthy, Klondike bars,


       HATE:
       → Failing, Being looked down on, Being pried, Being asked too many questions, Being cornered, Being talked to randomly, Being someone's babysitter, Jokes, any kind, Wasting time, Elevators, Garlic, Rain, Crowds, Traffic, Smoke & Smokers, Anything foul or dirty, Disarray, Disorganization, Getting handed things he has to hand back, Touching people, The word 'Divine', Ayakashi because they're annoying,


       DEEPEST SECRET:
       → He was raised as a girl.

      IDOL:
       → No one



       HISTORY:
       →
1997 – Age 7

Memories drift quietly—tenderly, as if playing behind it are the sounds of many instruments humming, when instead, they are feet pounding—door jams being torn apart by gunfire, screams. Faces he did not recall were grasping him with their eyes since their hands could not. Run, Run! He didn't get it. Standing there in their family bathroom, all his seven-year-old mind could think to do was to grab the shower curtain and drape himself in it like a super hero. Hopping down from the tub, he stood on his tip toes to grab a tooth brush. Swinging it around in his little fingers, he held it up to a dark man’s knee, and whacked him with it. His sister would be mad he selected her My Little Pony deluxe pink edition, but he was sure mother would buy her another if she blamed it on him. It was okay. Until the man let out a grunt and grabbed him by his long hair. The super cape with dinosaurs on it fell to the ground like crinkled newspaper under foreign subway cars. The man trampled over it like it was nothing, reeking of something the boy had never smelled before.

“What’s your name, girl?” Mistaken again. As always. It was nothing new, just a little embarrassing when he was here trying to save the day and all.

“Era,” he managed to whimper out, struggling to pry the greasily hands from his scalp. Don’t talk to strangers. To no avail, he was dragged down the hallway, scrapping fingernails against the wallpaper and leaving ribboned streaks alongside old crayon scribbles. Musky yellow: that was the color. Little houses printed with ‘Home Sweet Home’ written in cursive beneath them, accompanied by his toddler art all up and down. The black crayon was his favorite. His sister’s was always pink. He remembered.

The dust parted. Or the smoke. He wasn’t sure which. But their bodies moved through the dying sunlight into shapes and struggling. On the floor of the veranda at his feet was an expression no human face could make alive. Garish, twisted, gaggling lips still pressed into begging words of rage and alarm—eyes gasping fervently for reprieve from pain. And here, pressed into skin—into form, littered with torn clothes stained in red were the remains of his family. He could almost hear the whinny of his mother curled into the abandoned pistol, resounding over and over again as silence. He never heard it, but he felt it leaking out of her parted lips, lipstick—blood smeared over the side of her face where more fell out all over the tatami like Capri Sun tropical fruit punch. She’d be upset about that. Empty shells lie dead all around them—a picturesque metaphor. And now it could end. And now. And now. And now. But it didn’t. The longer he gaped, the more he realized that his sister was across from him with a bag over her head; the more he realized that the tooth brush was already flumped beside the limp grip of his father’s broken sword; the more he realized that it wasn’t enough.

He dropped to the ground, all his tiny weight slamming into the squish of soaked bamboo, knees caked further in velvet. Something whispered to him then—a familiar chill of breath forming words no one else seemed to hear. “Shoot them.” It was frigid, murky—the voice that made his parents bow—the voice that held up the walls and that people prayed to hear. For some reason, he was always the one who heard it. Yuki-onna. “Shoot them all.” And he knew how.

He scrambled the distance to the pistol. Raising it, his tiny fingers pressed blindly against the trigger without looking. He shot backwards, his back slamming into something calming, but not warm enough. His mother’s head lolled to the side, his hands shaking as he grabbed again for slippery metal. Someone had fallen. Others were huddling around them, but it was as if he couldn’t see anything else but death. Nothing else but death. Arid, putrid darkness loomed around the very edges of his soul, licking at the fabric of his being, and consuming every inch of everything he had ever thought to have known. Super heroes fell beneath shiny shoes. Tooth brushes were for brushing teeth. No matter who fired, bullets took. He shot again and again into the nothingness, hardly knowing his own voice was hoarse from screaming. He couldn’t hear her anymore.  

The empty gun cascaded from his clutch like a mirror reflecting everything. He saw in it why people fought—why movies always had happy endings—why people refused even on the other side to give up. He could see it in their eyes as if they still blinked: the will to keep going—the desire to keep living—the fear to have that taken away. As a child, he wasn’t only watching; he was part of it. He was part of this. He was in it. Those were his parents. This was the ending of his story.

---

2007 – Age 17

“I have a sister…?” He breathed. The room was silent. His head was trilling. Images of horror dug their slimy yellowed finger nails into his brain and cackled like branches scrapping against window glass. Cracked and wilted, these people—these lying people!! He was moving backward, technicians with beady eyes looking him up and down in case he were to fall. No, he had already fallen—fallen so far. “And where is she now?”

Scorn. It was all he felt. Anger. Simmering somewhere deep inside him, bubbling up like mud to taint the water. These people—they were the ones that took everything from him! “My sister,” he growled, “where is she now?”

Tentative, the technicians approached him with white gloves, touching him, coaxing him into a fog. A bleary, lengthy being approached him, stature and plaid. He looked like a rat. Nose squished into his face, eyes small and calculating; his teeth were discolored from smoke—his breath equally rancid with nicotine. Elastor suddenly felt nauseous—suddenly felt like Era. He looked up as if for the first time, seeing not a man called Arthur Talbot, but a monster—a monster with money staining him. And he realized he could no longer move by will, pinned to something hard and cold like the body of his mother except this was a chair. When had he sat down? Swimming, his head was, catching up to a— Rain. It had been raining.

---



1997 – Age 7

Black hair matted to his face, it all dripped away. Cleansed without wanting to be—lifted from it without being grounded. If he could catch the water, he’d hold the rosy hue to himself and wish it stay. It was all he had left. Like rubber ducks in the bathtub, he’d float away on it—be nurtured by it—be told no when he wanted ice cream for breakfast. Rumiko, his sister, was being carried, limp. He didn’t have the mind to wonder if she was even still alive. But why else would they be carrying her? They left their parents in there, scattered like broken toys. There was no box to return them to. No goodbyes. No more words. Just rain—rain and fire. It poured, hissing over his hunched shoulders, and lathering his tiny frame, leaving nothing dry except the flames. They were burning it—their house, their shrine, everything. Purified, he had nothing of them left to remember.

He didn’t know. He didn’t really know what was going on. He heard a sound—a low groan coming from beneath the bag over his sister’s head. He didn’t think. His wrists were being held firmly behind him, but the water allowed him to squeeze away. He ran full force at the man carrying his sister, his tiny hands pushing fervently at the gunshot wound the man had been nursing. The force caused him to yell out and drop his sister with a string of curses. Almost immediately, she was crawling through the puddles, but there wasn’t time before she was already being retrieved and he restrained.

“RUN,” Era managed to scream, kicking Rumiko into a tumbling sprint. She slipped and sputtered into the nearby brush of their shrine she knew so well, but he did not. Most of his life was spent indoors, away from danger. He navigated the house; she navigated the wilderness—he pretended to be a girl, and she hiked up her kimono. That was how their days went. He had to be a girl to resist the assassination attempts and be confined indoors not just to escape suspecting eyes, but also to avoid pushing his illness too far or put too much pressure on his already weak composition. She was strong for him. But now—now he could be strong for her…even if it was the last thing he did in this short flash of existence.

The man he shoved didn’t go after his sister. Instead, he turned to Era, flames flickering garishly in his pupils. The man’s fist slammed into the side of the boy’s head, causing his body to crumble.

”Hey, you’re not supposed to kill him!” Someone yelled.

Instantly, Era began coughing, vision turning to darkness, body quaking painfully into another fit he was so familiar with. The man didn’t seem to notice that this wasn’t because of his violence; it was something else entirely. Blood veined down from his lips, but the suited gunshot victim came on the boy with a kick, slamming his foot into his small body again and again. Rage was all that mattered; he didn’t care if the kid died; he’d still get paid. And all the while, all Era could think was RUN, the sound of his sister’s footsteps getting farther.

---

2007 – Age 17

When next he woke, there was a fish bowl beside his bed. Tiny eyes were gendering at him, beating their fins through water enough to make him feel as though he had been drenched. Funny. They were seeing him from their tiny world. It made him stir enough to be confused. He didn’t recognize anything. When did he put these clothes on? Where was he?

Memories had been taken from him. All the important ones. He became their property—their drone with which to do what they pleased. Unbecoming to his knowledge, his sister had escaped, but he was still here. All he knew was where he was now. And being so young, he was easily assimilated into believing that this was all there ever was. The girly name, Era, was discarded and forgotten for his new name: Elastor. He was kept in a pen, gated and barred in a back room. He took his meals there, spent his time there, and only left when accompanied. Often, he was chained to the wall with a couple text books thrown his way. He read them enough times to recite paragraph by paragraph. His wrists grew shadowed from where the cuffs bit into his skin despite never having resisted. This was normal. He grew excited when he was allowed outdoors. And when he turned ten, they began teaching him how to hit targets with sticks. Rocks. Throwing knives. Arrows. Bullets. His entire life revolved around learning how to puncture a tiny red circle. Wherever his eyes met, a certain bull’s-eye entailed. He was fitted with multiple swords, taught by a different person each week how to handle them. And it was always different. He grew accustomed to nothing. Constantly being shifted around and changed, he ebbed the flow like a tree growing in the middle of a raging river. He was the flood, and he was the one drowning.

Eventually, the chains were taken away and he was left with the buzzing silence of solitude. He was gathered occasionally for services elsewhere—was able to travel in cars and trains to places with people. He held conversations and stood guard beside doors with a teenage finger always pressed against a trigger should anything go wrong for his American master, Arthur Talbot. His eyes always followed the man when he crossed a room, always guarded every single movement of every human in the room. Often, checks were written and traded for keys, a large truck parked outside. They were bidding. He never saw on what.

Humans. Live humans handed over like slaves to people with golden fingernails and barbed wire smiles. They were trafficking human children all this time! Do with them what you please. Demons with human skin. Eyes you’d dream of seeing in your worst nightmares. They paid for them, took them, and that was it. Whether they lived or died was of no consequence. Donated for the greater good of consorting with the devil, chanted about over dinner and red wine. They probably giggled about the little girls as they pulled on their curls and tossed them into a pit of fire. Cursed and inbred over hundreds of years, these monsters were born and born again from corruption. Bound together only by chains, false promises, and misguided minds, they collected bones.

Only rotten minds could do this. And most of his life was lived a lie. He had shot people for getting too close to Mr. Talbot, strangled the life out of strangers for looking at him sideways. He had covered up the trails of blood and the questions, never wondering himself. He was trained to feel nothing—taught to know always how to solve the problem when the problem was with him all along. He felt dirty. He felt like those very men. He was the shadow behind the demon—the darkness that made the light that much brighter.

He squinted up at the illuminated LED’s, counting how many heart beats he had in a minute. His pulse was too high. He sat up, and noticed immediately he was alone. No answers. They must have given him his memories back if only to corrupt him further—poison him with himself—let him turn himself into what he hated most. He might as well have put the bullets in those kid’s families himself. He let those keys slip through the cracks, run gallantly through his hands like sand escaping the tide.

---
1997 – Age 7

In the middle of summer, it was snowing. The flames snuffed in an avalanche of icicles. Prostrated, the dark-clad men that remained didn’t seemed fazed at all. Couldn’t they see this? Some were whispering amongst themselves, while two others ran off towards some parked cars. It was slow—as if time was nearly stopped. Did they see it? Somehow, he was seeing everything—feeling everything. It was as if he were the air itself—or a snowflake drifting quietly into the cold. Strangely, he felt okay with this—felt he could let go and let it happen.

Just as he was falling away, he noticed it. The sheets of ice were all welded around a single, ethereal form. Black eyes. White kimono. She basked in the wonderland—her oasis in summer. The Ayakashi, Yuki-onna. Often he had seen her, though no one else could. He would tell his mother stories about her, what she liked, and the tales she told him. Half the time he was sure she thought he was delirious from his sickness, but once in a blue moon, the things he knew and said weren’t the words of a seven-year-old. It was those times, he was sure she believed him. Even now, when Yuki-onna was right there, he was sure people wouldn’t believe it even if they could see it. For all around the snow, the rest of the world was normal. All you had to do was run away.

Her hand was outstretched towards him. But he didn’t know where he was, and he knew he didn’t have a hand to take it. Beside himself, he wondered if he was dying finally. Yuki-onna shook what looked like crystals from her eyes, extending her hand further. There was a pleading look in the darkness of her eyes—begging. Ah, he thought, she was dying too.

The men had reached the car, helping an important-looking man from it. He was wearing plaid. He was also grinning as if everything was going according to plan. He must not have been able to see the snow then unless he was planning on going sledding.

No, Era wasn’t about to let Yuki-onna die; It was his duty as the Shrine’s first born son to protect its Ayakashi just as she protected all the children who had gotten lost. Like his sister had once. He would do the same, even if it involved giving up the last bit of life he had left.

With twitching fingers, his blood-coated nostrils flared to breathe in the freezing air, pulling together what little strength his tiny body had left. Reaching, reaching as hard as he could, he clasped her hands in his and she was gone.

---

2007 – Age 17

He left the bed he found himself on, white sheets falling from his legs. Bare feet padded against the cold linoleum and to the door where he lingered. Beyond it, he heard nothing. There were no cameras. He was simply left to his own devices, trapped, in a way, in his own trap. Carefully planned, these memories were supposed to torment him further into submission, drown him under each wave, and end any form of rejection. He was to become one of them—to give himself over completely. And to do that, he had to be himself.

But that wasn’t him.

Almost mindlessly, he opened the door, hardly surprised it was unlocked. He floated down the hall, scantily dressed until he reached another door. This door he knew very well. It wasn’t his door, but another that led into a series of computers hooked together and always on. The heat from the room leaked out from under the door and tickled the tops of his feet. He reveled in the strange sensation, and grasped then how drugged he must be. They probably expected him to lay there a little longer in self-pity and woe. But this was the seven-year-old that killed a man for taking his parents from him. And this was the teenager that stole important files.

Logging into the computer with Mr. Talbot’s passcode, he combed it. Having had been properly debriefed on anything related, he was very adverse with knowing how to utilize a computer to its fullest capacity. He slipped in a drive, tapping furiously on the keys until files began to pop up all over the place. Names, dates of birth, faces, and locations came into view. So many—countless: old, new, yesterday’s. He felt like throwing up again, his center of gravity moving sideways like his equilibrium quit its job. Innocence wasted. Families destroyed. Lives ruined. Very much like his own. And yet? He was still alive. He was the chosen one. He was meant to carry on the carnage.

He found his sister’s name, taking those precious seconds to read words that would tell him if she was alive or dead—words that may elude the outcome of the only family he had left. Digging hopefully into the guile of his own worthless humanity, Elastor’s eyes scanned over the words. Nothing—there was nothing, but MIA. Lucky. That was the first thing he thought when he stood up, throwing in the wheel chair to crash into the desk. The drive was in his mouth.

He left the room, sweat beading his forehead. The air was filled with invisible waves, he felt like he was swimming—choking on air and trying to float. He had to escape. Now was the time. He had to now. This very moment. He had to leave, but the images kept searing into focus—out of focus—into focus. Faces. Young boys much like himself fed as breakfast to the thick-pocketed plenty. Demons in disguise—the night dwellers—the flames of hell consume. He tripped on his thoughts, veering into the wall with what seemed like an audible thud to him. It almost echoed. He changed directions, heading for a different wing of the house.

They lived in a large mansion just outside of Edo. The house itself was refitted to include all the necessities of running a large trafficking outfit. As he learned, there were many employees all carefully selected and trained to do a multiple number of jobs. But he was one of the murderers.

Mr. Talbot was minding his own business, sipping his cup of coffee loaded with cream and sugar, and was about to ask for more when the door burst open. A sword was planted at his neck, gloved hands on the other end. Icy blue eyes bared into him, squirming around like butterflies with broken wings. It turned him on. He stood up, coffee dropping from his lap to spill all over the floor. He didn’t care. The blade dug into his neck, causing a warm streak of blood to slither down his neck. He laughed, and reached up to stroke the sword he had given him.

“Come to terms with yourself yet? You were always a killer. Since you were seven.”

Silence.

“What do you suppose the difference is between you and I, hm? I’m sure you’ve killed more people with your own hands than I ever have. But what about Ayakashi?”

Nothing.

“Come, let me show you the joy of trashing a Shrine.” He was perfect! He was so effortlessly perfect! Just the look he was giving him was enough to make the hairs on his arms stand on end! His creation was nothing short of his own hard work paid off. Ah, the release it gave him to finally see it come to fruition. Now he would get over his angsty tantrum and go with him to the vault where he could witness a possession. This was it! The birth of a new era!! Literally.

He made one cut just below the Adam’s apple so he could still speak. Blood oozed out. He watched it as if for the first time. And at first, Mr. Talbot did not exactly seem fazed. He didn’t realize what was happening just yet. With quick motions practically undetectable, his blade shot through his ex master’s right arm, extorting a loud shriek.

“Did that hurt?” Elastor cooed. The man swallowed hard, quivering slightly. The look in his eyes was still clinging to his intentions, latched evermore on the idea that his little pet would fall like a chess piece into the right place. A dark place. A place that he could never allow himself to go, brainwashed or not—raised by demons or not. He dragged the tip of his sword down from forearm to elbow, crunching against bone until the master collapsed like a heap at his feet.

“Did you stop when my parents begged for their lives?” He stabbed his sword into Mr. Talbot’s other arm, eliciting another scream. “Did you stop when all those children pleaded with you before you took away their memories?!” He yanked it out and plunged it into the man’s leg. By now, his consciousness must have been fading into the pain. Elastor kicked him in the face, knowing that usually woke someone up. “Did you spare their lives?"

“N-no I was doing what was asked of me in order to—"

“I don’t care about your excuses.” He walked around the man now wallowing under him, eyes fierce with rage. “And my sister? You were going to sell her. You were going to sell my sister and keep me, why?”

“You had potential—you… What seven-year-old p-picks up a gun and starts shooting, kills someone? Usually they piss themselves or cry. Or pass out. It’s easier if they pass o—“ The blade was now lodged in his foot. His eyes filled with tears, streaking his cheeks in an unfamiliar way. He found himself laughing, giggling, choking on a weird metallic taste, and basking in the wavering between life and death. Ela saw this, and without blinking, severed Mr. Arthur Talbot’s spine with one stroke. The limp body flopped onto the ground with a gross shudder, life stripped effortlessly. Elastor felt no lighter—no better than he had before, just dirtier. He flung the blood off his blade into a corner, wiped it on the couch, and left. Job done.

The man was dead. The man that had taken the last ten years of his life and turned it into a brainwashing training program designed to make murderers out of young boys and create Anti-Ayakashi insanity was now lying on the floor of his study in a pool of blood. Hm. He wiped his shoes off with the curtains that obscured the bars in his room, took all the necessary things he had (if any—really it wasn’t anything important, don’t know why he bothered to check), and proceeded to find the nearest exit. Let’s see, they usually went down the stairs, down that other hallway that was past the kitchen, and out from a side door that led onto the patio. He did just that, sounded some annoying alarm in the process while not really caring, stole the keys to one of the trucks, and that was it: he was free.

Now freedom didn’t feel exactly how he would have expected it. He was suddenly on his own, not even 18, and already on the open road. He didn’t even know where he was going. He drove for hours and saw the sun sink and rise twice. The truck ran out of gas. He pulled over at a motel where he would unknowingly spend the next six months just surviving, and then escape without paying.

He got a job working as a waiter at one of the famous fancy restaurants on the side of the highway. They gave him a suit and told him he was suave enough as he was even with a fake license. He didn’t care. He got a paycheck and bought lighters and gasoline with it, and then went back and burned down the mansion a couple months later, catching quite a deal of staff inside. They were operating with a new head. Ela was sure to take his in the confusion of the flames.

His next paycheck went to guns and ammunition, wherein he hunted down by memory everyone else that had bailed after Mr. Talbot’s death. They hadn’t gotten far: family homes, vacation homes. Not anything he didn’t already know. They had made mistakes filling his head with their own information, being blasé and bragging about it. Now they got what they deserved. Well, at least they’d have friends in hell.

Ela saved for a computer, bought a top-of-the-line one, and plugged in the drive he had stolen. Each night, he read through the information, memorizing it. As soon as he was sure he knew every detail of each file, he destroyed the drive, and erased all evidence from his laptop.

He spent years living in a crappy apartment in Shibuya, hiding away out of sight, doing research, talking to people. Word of mouth brought him to a warehouse where weird noises and grunts wafted out from the flickering lights cast through the cracks and onto the pavement beside his feet. That was no doubt an event caused by an Ayakashi. Unless, of course, they were having an illegal dog fight down there. Without thinking, he burst in during what seemed like the middle of some kind of possession. Heads turned, lips silenced. A child began screaming violently, their guts gurgling in their throat. That was new. Ela looked on, already too numb to be effected. He pulled the sword from his back and stabbed it straight through the heart of the man nearest to him. He continued crossing the distance, cutting down bodies already dead inside. He stopped at who he decided was the head honcho and slammed his blade to the base of his neck, holding it softly there, eyes ablaze with icy fire.

“How many,” he growled, “how many innocent people have you killed?” The man didn’t seem willing to speak. Ela yanked a crumpled picture out of his pocket and shoved it between his eyes. “Do you know this girl? She escaped from your buyer eight years ago. Her name—“ He was stopped by laughter.

“Do you honestly think I remember all the faces of the children I’ve bought? And you ask me about one someone else has who’s escaped even?” The child, by this time was convulsing, contorting, twisting—eyes wide with an ethereal glow. Its head tweaked, or rather turned, bones grinding together to tilt and to see. A sound exited its throat: garbled, word-like, many languages in one. The black-haired swordsman was still as if bound by the words. His heart slowed, air in his lungs frozen in the negatives despite it being the middle of summer. The man or monster, Donahue Burathe, stepped away from Elastor’s sword, walking around it to what he had created. “Do you see now? Do you see what this power can do!?” Human experimentation. Ayakashi. The pieces were suddenly clicking.

“No,” Elastor barked, shaking it off. He put the picture away, and straightened himself, trying to breathe. The shape began to choke, laughing like it was under water. Ela grew dizzy, and stumbled into a crate.

“He’s resisting it?” Donahue asked the possessed child who responded with more jumbled sounds, whiskers sprouting from its face.

“It’s surprising...for a human.” There was a click. Both of them turned to see the barrel of a gun.

“Shit!” was all Donahue managed to spew before a gunshot tore through his shoulder. His heavy body jammed into the concrete floor, echoing. All in the same moment, the possessed child launched itself from its perch and tore across the room straight into the mouth of the gun where Ela fired two more times, eliciting screams of pain and wails of merriment. It moved backwards away from point blank. Elastor was struggling to hold the gun steady, eyes squinting in and out of focus. His pupils dilated and shrunk to pin pricks, struggling relentlessly to see—to aim just enough to get another shot off.

The child lurched off the ground, swaying and dripping blood all over the floor. How it moved—how it was still alive was not of this world. It approached him slowly, a nightmare in the form of a little girl with ringlets and a foxy smile. Her head listed to the side, pale lips squeezed into hilarity. She blurred and unblurred, climbing over abandoned tools and right into the swordsman’s face. She smelled like the last day on Earth. He fired off another shot into her, which only seemed to slow her down. Her cold hands coiled around his neck, pressing tenderly into certain places. The light turned away, his hand quivered up, pointing the gun into the side of its head. It raised a clawed hand to grab the gun away—to steal what he had left. He struggled to hold on, finger slipping off the trigger, teeth clenched tight. He was too stubborn for this.

All at once, he let the gun drop, but with his other hand, grabbed for the hilt of his sword. He plunged the blade into its back, hardly hearing the wail that rattled his eardrums or the shadow of a Kitsune that darted away out of the broken body to the open window. His other hand flung the gun up from the floor and into place. A single shot ended it. The little girl’s head was in pieces, her body torn to shreds. Covered head to toe in sticky liquid, he felt his own consciousness succumbing to the lack of oxygen. Clawing his way to the surface as if trying to breathe under water, he just barely saw Donahue pick himself up off the floor, clasping his shoulder. He was cursing and yelling something at him, but it was muffled and distant. Someone else was in the room. Someone else was restraining him. Someone else was stooped over Elastor, commending him for killing a child.

The man’s name was Arnwald Bernardisson. When Ela came to in the car, he caught the tail end of a conversation.

“He killed the host of their main Ayakashi.”

“But we don’t know him.”

“We’re taking him.”

“But he could be involved!”

“We’re taking him.”

“Where?” Ela forced his body to sit up straight. “Where are you taking me?”

For the next two years, Elastor let himself slowly go back to being Akisame Era again and studied under Arnward Bernardisson and his Alchemist guild, learning what it meant to be a Demon Hunter. The old man personally trained him, took him under his wing, and opened up an entirely new facet of the world. People were fighting them. The darkness was being pushed aside. No longer would humans have to submit to the inevitable. No longer did they have to fall to the face of Ayakashi’s demonic power. There were various guilds—there was many different kinds of Alchemy. The men, Arthur Talbot and Donahue Burathe, were part of an organization called ___ that assisted Ayakashi with human possession. Apparently, it was easier for them to take over children. Anti-Demon Hunter, this organization aimed to wipe out the existence of Tera-chips all over the world by using Ayakashi to assist them. While Era didn’t exactly find himself on a side, it was definitely wrong to kidnap and exploit children for this purpose. Definitely.

Donahue was milked for all he knew, but turned up nothing of value. In fact, he had even lost contact with Mr. Talbot, and was getting his sick supply from elsewhere. He gave that up too, which resulted in a raid Ela only heard about. Too busy training and being taught the ropes, he had no part in it anymore. In a way, it was nice being far from the bloodshed: he was told he could relax now. But in another sense, he couldn’t stop pacing. His sister was out there, dead or alive, she was out there. He could feel it. He had to find her.




     TRIVIA:
     → Good traits - Loyal, no exceptions, Obeys orders flawlessly, Good with rules, Determined, Goal-oriented, Provides mercy-killings, Can cook, Can turn anything into a weapon, Protective, Once a friend, always a friend, Feels taller than he actually is
     → Bad traits - Obsessive compulsive, Doesn't know when to quit, Reckless, Sucks at small talk, Antisocial, Stubborn, Gloomy, Complains a lot, Tightly wound, Resentful, Unforgiving, Can be viewed as heartless, Apathetic, Childish, Can't take vacations, Tries to hold the whole world on his shoulders
    → Does not know he is a Tsukimono
    → Favorite food is broccoli
    → Will do anything for a Klondike bar
    → Favorite pastime is reading
    → Favorite color is royal blue
    → Has never gotten drunk because he is afraid that it will kill him
    → Is afraid of cameras because he believes they will suck out your soul
    → In the Dictionary of Era ‘nice’ means ‘leave me alone’
    → Frequently used vocabulary includes: “hn” and “…”
    → Speaks in Hama-kotoba 浜言葉 (seashore dialect)
     → Japanese (Tohoku dialect) and English
 



       ALIAS:
       → Aki

       OTHER CHARACTERS:
       → None yet.

      CREATOR'S COMMENTS:
       → Elastor Ito > Elastor Essa > Elastor Hargreave > Akisame Era

       FACE CLAIM:

Code:

[b]KARNEVAL[/b] - [i]Gareki[/i] - Akisame Era

     CUSTOM RANK:
       → HUMAN ICE CUBE

Done! D<