“This inn is as nice as always,” Yoshiko commented as she sat down on the futon. She was a rather tall woman in her late forties, her hair prematurely graying and her eyes carrying a stern look to them. “How is Rie-chan doing?”
“She’s grown to be a fine girl,” Masako said as she poured some tea. “She still won’t come to her senses though; I told her numerous times that the Order of the Spider Princess is the only path for her, but she refuses to listen. She may even be planning to leave the village to pursue a career in the cities!”
“I see…” Yoshiko said as she accepted a cup from the mother. “I’m sure that she’ll come to see our path is the right one; my own daughter has recently been made a shrine maiden in the Order. It took a while for her to come to terms, but in the end she finally saw the light. I am very pleased with her. But enough small chatter for now. I bring some important news for you.”
“What sort of news?” Masako asked, her body suddenly tense.
“The Order has decided to take the female students,” Yoshiko said. “She will be sending people over here to take the girls away.”
“Alright; do I show them where the girls are sleeping?”
“Please do,” Yoshiko said as she finished her tea. “However, there is the problem with the male students. How many of them are there?”
“Not many, maybe about three of them,” Masako said. “How are we going to deal with them? If the teacher notices that only the female students are missing…”
“I’m sure that the Priestess will think of something,” Yoshiko said, a small smile on her face. “She’s always gotten us out of trouble before; she will handle it.” Yoshiko looked over at the clock and stood up. “Well, I’ll be off now; be sure to wait outside of the inn so that they will know where the girls are.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Masako reassured her.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------Rie sighed in frustration as she put on a simple kimono that she always wore to sleep. “Honestly,” she said in frustration. “Why cant’ she understand that I’m not interested in her crazy stories?”
Falling down onto the futon in her room, Rie stared up at the ceiling. ‘When did she begin to be so obsessed with the Spider Princess?’ she wondered. ‘She wasn’t like this when I was younger…was it the day after she came back from the checkup and received the news that she might lose her eyesight? She had gone to the old temple to pray that day. Then, she started to believe in those strange stories…’
As the clock in her room chimed midnight, she slowly got up and walked downstairs. ‘I really need to get a drink…’ However, before she reached the kitchen area, she heard voices coming from the hall, voices that didn’t seem to belong to any of the staff members of the inn.
“So where are the girls being kept?”
“Right this way,” she heard her mother say. “They’re all asleep, so be careful when you bring them into the truck; wouldn’t want any of them waking up, would you?”
“Don’t worry about that, Masako-san,” another voice said. “If they do rouse, all we need to do is put them back to sleep again before they can cry out. Come on, let’s get to work. We wouldn’t want the Priestess to get impatient…”
Rie stood frozen at her place at the top of the stairs, her eyes wide with horror. Were these women here to kidnap the guests? Was her mother helping them? ‘What’s going on?’ her mind screamed out. ‘This…this can’t be happening…’
She could hear the footsteps of several people walking down the hall once again. “Hey, one of the girls isn’t in her bed,” she thought she heard one whispering furiously. “What are we going to do if we can’t find her?”
“She’s probably in the bathroom or something like that…”
“There’s no one in the bathroom! Where could that missing girl be?”
“Keep your voice down! Do you want to wake up the guests?”
Rie hurried back to her room, leaping under the covers in case her mother came up to check. ‘Oh no, oh no…what should I do?’ she thought, her eyes wide in terror and her mouth biting down on her nails. ‘I…I need to help those girls…but how? I’m…I’m scared…I’m so scared…’
---------------------------------------------------------------------------‘I’m so scared…I have to get away…I have to run…get away from here, get away from this place…anywhere but here…’
Kanako ran from the inn, running as if all of hell had risen and given chase to her. She had been lucky enough to wake up during the middle of night. As she was about to lay back down, she had heard the sounds of people approaching and realized that they were coming to kidnap her and the others. Panicking, she had made a run for it, hiding in the backyard and slowly making her way to the front in order to avoid being spotted. Kanako was never an athletic person, but now she forced herself to run as fast as she could away from the inn.
‘I have to get away, I have to get away…’ she thought. Her breath was getting ragged and her legs were starting to feel heavier and heavier. She finally slowed down, panting and leaning against something smooth and firm. ‘Where…where am I?’
She had run into the edge of town near the forest areas. She was leaning on a red torii gate of sorts. The torii gate seemed out of place; there were neither stone paths leading to a temple nor a trail of any sort. It was as though someone had just placed it there for no reason. ‘What…what should I do…? I…I have to call the police…who am I kidding? I just left everything and ran, even my cell phone…’ Tears started to fall from her eyes. ‘Watanabe-san…Takano-senpai…I’m sorry I ran away…I’m sorry I couldn’t be a better friend to you two…’
As she sat down on the ground shivering, she noticed that the area she was in seemed to have an air of foreboding. There was no breeze in the air, no cries of cicadas, and no signs of life other than the plants in the area. It was almost as if the animals were avoiding this area on purpose…
A sudden feeling of dread shot through her spine. She had no idea how she could tell, but something was coming. Forcing herself onto her feet, she glanced around wildly to see if anyone or anything was headed in her direction. Nothing; the place was still as abandoned as the moment she had found it.
‘What…what was that feeling? I…!’
A sudden crashing sound brought a shriek from Kanako; the torii gate had suddenly broken, the main two stands cracking splintering while the upper part of the gate swayed around dangerously before starting to fall. Kanako threw herself out of the way as the top part of the gate crashed down on the ground, sending up a cloud of dust and debris. Kanako shakily picked herself up, starting fearfully at the broken gate.
“What…what just happened?” she whispered out loud. “Why…why did the gate just…just break like that? It felt so sturdy just a moment ago…”
“Well, well, what do we have here?” A flashlight beam struck Kanako in the face, forcing her to shield her eyes. As soon as the beams lowered, she found herself looking into the leering faces of three men.
-----------------------------------------------------Tsugumi stirred, only dimly aware that she was no longer lying down on a futon. Turning her head to the side a little, she was instantly alert the moment she saw Sachiho. The older girl was bound and gagged, lying on her side while still asleep. Tsugumi tried to move her arms only to realize that she too was bound. The ball gag stuffed into her mouth was causing a line of drool to appear, and she was gripped with fear. What had happened? How come she and the others were here?
The place she was in seemed like a temple of sorts; however, there were no windows and the only source of light they had were a few lamps in the room. Wall scrolls were all over the place, strange writings on them that seemed like some sort of ancient form of Japanese writing.
The other girls were in a similar predicament and some of them were starting to regain consciousness. Many of them started screaming through their gags, the fright immediately settling in. Sachiho herself was slowly waking up. “…Mgh?” she mumbled before realizing that something was in her mouth. When attempts to move her mouth failed, the older girl eye’s widened in horror. “Mgh! Mgh!” She started to thrash around a little, trying to free herself from the ropes binding her hands and legs to no avail.
“Ah, I see that you are all awake,” a soft voice rang out. The frightened students turned around to see a nineteen year old girl in ceremonial robes seated not too far from where they were. She was accompanied by several other shrine maidens, some who were busy drawing some sort of magic circle on the ground.
“I’m sure that you’re all curious about what’s going on. I’ll tell you this; you girls have been chosen to be a part of an amazing revolution. You girls will be the ones that help bring about a new age in this land, an age where the land will be taken back and made prosperous once again!” She motioned to the shrine maiden; two of them walked over to one of the girls and pulled her over to the circle. The girl tried to resist, but the shrine maidens’ strength was almost inhuman and the girl was soon on top of the circle.
The Priestess walked over to the girl and inspected her. “Hm…she seems healthy enough. Very well, this one will be the one we start with.” Saki grabbed the girl’s pajamas and tore them apart, causing the girl to let out a stifled shriek of shock. She also pulled down the girl’s bra as well, revealing her breasts. “You’ve been taking care of your body,” Saki remarked. “Good; you will make a fine addition.”
With that, Saki pulled out a needle and pricked her thumb with it, drawing out a bead of blood. Lowering her finger to the girl’s chest, she started to smear her blood on the girl’s skin, the trails slowly forming a pattern of sorts. The girl shivered as Saki finished tracing and stepped back.
“Alright girls, let’s get started,” she said with a smile. “The Metamorphosis shall soon commence!” With that, four of the shrine maidens stood in the magic circle’s smaller inner circles, each one placed in one of the four cardinal directions. Clasping their hands together, the four shrine maidens started to chant while Saki held a finger near the pattern drawn on the girl’s body. “Hatsudou…” she murmured, causing the pattern to glow a sinister red color.
The other girls could only watch in horror as the pattern started to grow and spread across the unfortunate victim’s body. As the girl collapsed onto the circle, her muffled screams rang through the room as the magic circle started to glow the same color as the mark on her chest. “Mmgh! Mmmmgh!”
“The process will take a few hours to complete,” Saki told the other shrine maidens. “The next ones to go should get some rest.” She turned towards the shrine maidens who were standing in the magic circle. “I’ll leave this to you all then; let me know when she’s finished and we’ll get started on the next one.”
---------------------------------------------------------------------------Kanako whimpered as a piece of cloth was stuffed into her mouth. “So this is the ‘missing student’ the Order was looking for,” one of the men, a young man with short black hair chuckled. “She’s cute.”
“Let’s hand her over to the Order,” a mustached man wearing dark glasses said. “Saki-sama will be surely reward us if we hand this girl over.”
“Aw, don’t be stupid!” the last man, one who had spiked his hair up and dyed it fiery red said. “Why do we have to? Let’s have some fun with her!”
“Yeah, don’t be stupid,” the first man said. “Why do we have to do anything she tells us to? The ‘world’ she wants to create is one that will be dominated by women! That’s ridiculous! There’s no way in hell I’m going along with something like that!”
“You’re right,” the red-haired man smirked. “To hell with the Order! After we’re done with this girl, let’s go to the temple and get the others! And if the women there try to stop us…we’ll just use this!” He pulled out a gun and loaded it, grinning maniacally. “Now little girl, if you don’t want to die, do as we say!”
‘No…” Kanako thought, tears streaming down her eyes. ‘I don’t want to…please, someone, anyone…help me!’
“Heh, she’s not struggling. Good girl…” the first man grinned. “I’ll go first.”
“Wait,” the mustached man said. “Do you hear something?”
“The hell you talking about now?” the first man said, looking up. “I swear, you…” His voice suddenly trailed off as he squinted at something in the air. “What the hell is this? Is this…thread? What the hell is it AAAUUUGGGHH?!"
That was when all hell broke loose.