Chapter Text
"Oh, it's you."
The voice was unmistakable. He hadn't sensed an approach in the preceding seconds, but in an instant the early morning chattering of the birds had silenced.
Naoya's gaze lifted from the gravel path and stared back at Toji Fushiguro, blinking against the starkness of him in broad daylight. His cousin's eyes were strangely, unnaturally black, along with the fuzzy white sweater, splattered with congealed blackened blood. He looked incongruous with the carefully manicured Zen'in gardens, not aged a day since the last time Naoya had seen him.
"What the hell are you wearin-" Was all Naoya could get out before in the space of a single breath, Toji had closed the distance between them.
As Toji's arm lifted over his head, and Naoya wondered how the hell he hadn't noticed the bloody stick he was holding.
—
Ow Ow Ow Ow Ow.
Naoya's forehead felt as though a knife had been gouged into his forehead and twisted. He tried to lift a hand to check if one was, but his arms were bound so tightly in front of him that they’d gone painfully numb.
Fucking stupid Toji
What the hell had happened? He'd been walking back to his room through the gardens- and coming face-to-face with his dead cousin- He surely should have been able to beat Toji now in an even match at his level.
...If this even was Toji. It had certainly felt like him, that same completely suffocating pressure he always had. Which was probably why Naoya had let his guard down and allowed him to get so close in the first place.
It didn't matter, he wouldn't happen again. He would find a way out of his binds, and he would destroy Toji, or whatever curse was wearing his face.
Naoya squirmed against his bonds. He could feel the tackiness of blood dried on his face. He could smell it too- the cloying, coppery tang so thick it was almost overwhelming, a blanket of rot that threatened to choke him. Just how much blood had he lost? It was no wonder he couldn’t even will himself to move.
He forced his eyes open, each pulse of light a fresh dagger plunging into his skull. As his vision finally swam into focus, a startled gasp tore from his throat. Staring back at him from mere inches away the room were the glassy dead eyes of his eldest brother.
A wave of prickling unease hit him- the overpowrring blood smell made more sense now. As Naoya managed to roll over onto his stomach, he was met with the slaughterhouse. Every inch of the walls and floor was saturated with blood, gleaming wetly in the summer sun. Bodies were tossed about with the careless disdain of a child discarding broken toys, a gruesome tangle of severed limbs and familiar faces.
He struggled in his binds, a fresh surge of panic lending him the strength to move. But his head was pounding with such intensity that he could barely focus. His body weakly begged for him to close his eyes, to slip back into the peaceful oblivion of unconsciousness.
But he was the future head of Zen'in clan. He would not panic and kneel like a dog. If he could just find a weapon, something sharp from one of the corpses—
Naoya tensed as the deliberate sound of footsteps shook the boards on the veranda.
Naoya held no illusions that help was arriving. He knew that heavy stride.
Toji rounded the corner, with an unhurried stride. He was no longer in that strange get-up. In familiar lose kimono, his eyes were his own again. They peered down at Naoya with a strange indifference.
"Damn. What a shame, the old man's already dead," Toji said, his voice casual, as if commenting on the weather. Naoya couldn't tell if he was speaking to him or just thinking aloud.
He strode over and fell into a squat besides Naoya. A massive hand fisted in Naoya's hair, yanking him up to eye level. Pain lancing through his forehead, it felt like he was being scalped.
"Let go- ow—ngh!" Naoya struggled. Toji jerked his head violently, forcing him to look to his left, five bodies piled onto each other in a mess of limbs- oh, the rest of his brothers, and Mai's father. They were so bloody and brutalized, Naoya would have a hard time identifying them without their clothes.
"Do you want to join them?"
Naoya's blood ran cold. He went still, holding his mouth shut as each second in the air felt like an inch of skin torn off his scalp.
Toji let out a little huff of a luahg and released his hair. Naoya dropped forward, his tender forehead smacking hard against the floor. He groaned, his vision whiting out as he writhed on the filthy floor in pure agony.
Get free, kill Toji. He was definitely the head of the Zen'in clan now by process of elimination at least. All he had to do was kill this one man. He strained against his binds, trying to activate his technique, stand up, do SOMETHING. But even pulling with all his might, something was sapping his cursed energy, a foggy weight in his head that left him powerless.
He couldn't move. He couldn't stop the tremors wracking his body from the pain. The smell of blood was making him woozy, or maybe it was just a concussion and blood loss. That shouldn't have been stopping him though- Toji, he must have done something else to him. He was always playing with curses, could he have used one to sap Naoya's strength?
"Hm… Weren't there two girls born around your age?" Toji asked like he hadn't just practically scalped Naoya. The question was clearly directed at Naoya, but with his skull feeling like it was about to split open, all he could manage was pained gasps for air.
But wait, shit, did that mean Toji hadn’t gotten to those two in his massacre? That stung almost as much as any pain he was in. He wanted to watch Toji take out that smug little bitch Maki- maybe Mai watching, or the otherway around-
"Ogi's- kids, Mai… and… Maki-" Naoya choked out with a renewed sense of energy- twisting his head up to try and mitigate the agony of his forehead. "I don't know where but—"
"Ah, well. Doesn't make a difference. Finding them would be a hassle." Toji cut him off, scratching his cheek idly. "You're already here, so I suppose you'll have to do."
Naoya blinked up at him. He'd have to 'do' for what? The bastard had just massacred the entire Zen'in clan but spared him. Did that mean he recognized Naoya's strength? Honestly, the rest of the family was always extra fat to be cut off. As long as he had his power and his money, who gave a shit? He'd always hated all these weak, pathetic slugs.
"You were a cute kid," Toji muttered, flipping Naoya onto his back with a rough tug on his kimono. The back of his head thudded against the floor again. Toji peered down at him with an odd look in his eyes- they weren't back to that strange black color but it was still unsettling him. "Your face still looks like a girl's. How old are you now?"
A cold pit of dread formed in Naoya's stomach. Toji's tone had shifted, taking on a strange, speculative quality that made his skin crawl. He bit his tongue, but the overwhelming stench of copper and death seemed to loosen it for him.
"Twenty-eight."
Toji let out a low whistle.
"If you were a woman, they'd have you knocked up by now. Especially with that face." He prodded Naoya's stomach with a single finger, and an involuntary shiver wracked Naoya's body. This was wrong. This was all wrong.
"Let's see how the rest of you measures up."
"What are you talking about?" Naoya asked, his voice thin. Naoya knew, he wasn’t stupid- but there was still a chance Toji was messing with him, a test perhaps, to test Naoya-
The whisper of steel sliding from a scabbard answered him. The blade of Toji’s sword, its polished surface still smeared with the black, tacky blood of their family, sliced through the ties of his hakama with a soft rip- The fabric went slack. A casual, almost lazy tug was all it took for the pants to be dragged down his legs, pooling around his ankles. The back of the cold metal blade then snagged the collar of his kimono, pulling it open. With that, he was completely exposed to Toji's eyes.
"Toji-kun," Naoya said, his voice a hoarse, broken thing. Screaming, fighting, threatening—seemed suicidally unwise while he was lying there bound, with the knife that had just orphaned him resting with menacing familiarity in Toji's hand.
"Hm?" Toji didn't sound like he was listening. His gaze raked over Naoya's body, past his chest and stopped on his lower half. For the first time since this nightmare began, an actual emotion surfaced on that cold brutal face. An eyebrow arched. A ghost of a smirk played on his lips.
“Doesn't look like much has changed down there.” Toji chuckled, a low, gravelly sound that vibrated with mocking.
Naoya’s face prickled with a sudden, unbearable heat. What the hell right did he have—
His indignant retort died in his throat a Toji’s free hand moved, his fingers closing around Naoya’s cock. His burning hot grip was neither gentle nor overtly cruel, Naoya more felt like he was cattle being inspected.
Toji pulled on his dick, stretching him out to full length. Naoya could see the blood-stained blade shift in Toji’s other palm, tilting, catching the light—
The realization of what Toji intended to do hit him.
"Please. Please, please," Naoya begged, the words tumbling out of him, devoid of any calculation. His body shuddered uncontrollably, a violent, rattling tremor. He couldn't move. Whatever cursed technique—or lack thereof—Toji had used on him, it had sealed his own energy off completely. All that was left was him frozen as Toji's burning hot hand yanked on his dick, and a bloody knife poised to emasculate him.
A startled, strangled gasp escaped his lips as he felt his bladder let loose. Piss streamed out, splashing onto the back of Toji's hand, spattering on the floorboards already slick with blood. Toji released him with a low grunt. Naoya immediately, tried to stop the flow, but it was too late.
He could only lie there as the shameful warmth seeped up his back. The fine silk of his ruined kimono top soaking it up like a sponge. The sharp, acrid stench of his own fear filled the air, cutting through the coppery smell of death, and making his stomach churn
The warmth quickly began to turn clammy and cold against his back as he stared up with wide, eyes at Toji's unreadable expression. His cousin held his soiled hand up, inspecting the glistening liquid with a flicker of distaste.
Toji glanced from his dick, to Naoya's face, and then back to his hand.
“I guess doesn’t make much of a difference whether it’s on or off,” Toji said flatly, wiping his hand off on the front of Naoya's kimono.
With that, he moved the knife, not to Naoya’s groin, but to his wrists. A single, clean slice parted the ropes and released his arms, and discarded the sword in front of him. Toji stood, his shadow falling completely over Naoya for a moment before he started walking away.
"Clean up this mess. You have plenty of time before dinner."
Toji didn't even look back. He turned with a languid, feline grace, his shoulder blades shifting beneath the thin fabric of his shirt as he stretched casually. Like he wasn't in the same room where the muggy summer air trapped the stench of opened bowels and viscera. Flies were already beginning to find the feast, their frantic buzzing the only sound in the wake of the slaughter.
Naoya’s fingers twitched, his hand hovering inches from the hilt of the blade Toji had tossed at his feet. The grip was still warm from Toji's hands.
Naoya tried to pull on his cursed energy, reaching for that familiar, jagged spark of Projection Sorcery. He needed that precision. But as he reached, there was nothing but a sickening, hollow void. It flickered and dissipated like smoke each time he tried to grasp it.
His gaze dropped to his wrists. The angry purple welts were swollen and hot. They looked like shackles burned into his very flesh. Every time he tried to channel even a spark of power, the nerves in his arms screamed, a white-hot agony that forced his hands to tremble uncontrollably.
He was glued to the spot. He could see the could see the relaxed set of the his cousins shoulders. The fucking Killer wasn't even on guard. He didn't have to be. He had hollowed Naoya out, stripped him of the only thing that made him a Zen'in.
The seconds ticked by, loud as his heartbeat pounding in his ears. The opportunity was right there and yet Naoya remained paralyzed. Each second slowly ticking away his chance to strike.
Damn it, damn it—what had Toji done?
As Toji began to whistle a low, tuneless scrap of a song, Naoya realized with a sickening jolt that he wasn't going to strike. He had no chance in this state.
He was going to have to clean this up.
"Oh yeah,"
Naoya startled as Toji spoke again. He looked up, where Toji had turned back to him- his eyes were that sickly, inhuman black again.
"If you step one foot off the property, I'll find and kill you."