vivid

iii. reality

"Where am I?" I mumbled, my eyes slowly opened and adjusted to the light. My hands were suffocated by a rope behind my back. I sat on a firm wooden chair. I looked before me only to see the white haired man again. He sat lazily on the chair... backwards? Leaning on his wrists. There were no windows, only dim orange light.

"Oh... You're awake. It's about time." He sighed.

"Where am I? Who are you?"

"Ah! I hate introductions. Whatever, I'm Satoru Gojo, a teacher at this school."

"School?" I asked.

"Yup, we had to take you here after what you'd seen the other night. Couldn't let you back into society just yet."

"What I'd seen?" The memories came flooding back to me, my breath hitched in fear.

"I still don't understand what happened... I-... I'm afraid."

"Understandable. Well, I guess we've got some explaining to do. Oh! I never got your name kid?"

"I'm... y/n."

"Nickname?"

"Don't have one."

"Well, I'll start with who that man was then..."

~ ~ ~

We sat in that room together for about an hour. I had no idea all of this stuff was real. I mean, I had learned about the occult before but I always thought that stuff was just metaphors. Not to be taken literally... I guess... It was all real.

He told me that they would have to keep special watch over me because a certain mark on my neck left by that man who attacked me. It's called being "branded" by a demon. Research on it is slim according to Gojo because of how rare this happens.

He said, a demon will usually brand someone that they want to "use" later on. Marking their life as somehow spiritually linked. Not that it made much sense to me but apparently the demon can feel your pain, your emotions, and even sometimes your thoughts. It's strange.

By "use", it's apparently meant to mark a human as a potential vessel, to know if their body is good or not. It's kind of like surveillance, or quote "buying a new house". But demons usually go for a human with the same gender. Gojo said he might be using me for something else. And because of that, I'll be under strict watch by one of his star pupils...

He also explained to me why I felt ill that night all of a sudden. Apparently there was something called "a veil" above. It's used to block sorcery battles from the public. When a non curse user aka (a regular person) is caught in a veil, their body can't handle the force field and they fall sick. Their instinct is to exit the veil.

No wonder I felt so sick all of a sudden in the alley. Everything was starting to make some semblance of sense.

But, I was not alright with all this, not even in the least. My dad was ill and I didn't have time for a freaking supernatural ordeal. I mean what the hell was this!? I still thought I could be dreaming. Maybe I was. Did someone drug me for fucks sake?

Demons and curses aren't real right? This had to have been a prank...

☾