The Portrait (A Soukoku OneShot)

Chapter 0

! WARNING !
Some triggers ahead, those with vivid imagination are advised to proceed with caution. (Yes, I'm talking to you over there, don't say I didn't warn you :))
For the rest, buckle up cause this is gonna be a roller coaster lol.

Chuuya remembered that fateful cold November night as though it was yesterday.

He could vividly recall how tightly his dark blue coat clung on to his frame from how cold it was. It had been a last minute call so he hadn't had any time to prepare for anything other than his weapons and a small first-aid kit in case the mission went downhill. "Ah, I knew I should've gotten a thicker coat after all," he grumbled under his breath as he clutched it impossibly tight around his shivering body. It did little to keep him warm. Chuuya sighed, breath fogging the view of the dark sky above which he was gazing upon. It was a starless night with purplish clouds covering the sky and partly the moon, shrouding the forest in dark shadows.

Speaking of which; the woods were exceptionally quiet, the only things that made a sound being the chilly wind rustling the greenery and trees as well as the occasional crunching of fallen twigs when he stepped on them. Chuuya had been plenty of times in forests (either with his father as a boy or now on missions), and one thing he had learned from his visits was that it was never a good thing when there was silence. Of course he could argue that it wasn't uncommon in enchanted forests -such as this one- to be eerily silent at random times, yet the quiet that stretched through its entire vastness was alarming to say the least.

Leaves rustled from the wind, their shadows moving along in a mystic dance that only he seemed to be privy to, yet he couldn't enjoy the play.

"At least the mission went well," he told himself to ease his rapidly growing uneasiness. It had gone better than he had anticipated in fact; the fight hardly lasted a few minutes and it made him wonder why his superior, Mori, had exaggerated on its difficulty. Whatever, it doesn't matter now, he thought, repositioning the small bag containing the beast's head. He was still going to get his payment once he delivered it to Mori and go home to rest so everything else was insignificant.

Rumble. A sudden flash lit up the sky.

"Damnit," he cursed, picking up his pace until it matched his heart beat. "This is just what I needed right now." It wasn't that he was afraid of lightning per se, if anything, he rather relished watching them from his window whenever it rained with a hot cup of lemon tea in hand and his cat, Arahabaki, on his lap. What concerned him was that it was a lot more dangerous to be there since forests tended to attract more lightning, and the last thing he wanted was to be near if it were to strike a tree as he walked by. Another rumble shook the ground below his feet and he paused in his tracks to turn his head in the direction he thought he'd heard it come from. One... two..., he counted mentally, trying to measure how close the brewing storm was from his current location. It was a technique that he had learned from his father who was a huge lover of the outdoors and a great hunter, and it surprised him that it was pretty accurate so he had quickly adopted it himself.

Another flash of lightning came down; this time striking an unsuspecting tree a little ways off the track. Chuuya was sure he looked like a deer caught in headlights when a distinguishing yellowish orange glow lit up around the area as the tree burst into flames.

"Fan-fucking-tastic." As if things couldn't get any worse, rain started pouring from the thick clouds overhead, adding to his already foul mood. Chuuya picked up his pace once more, practically jogging to where he believed he had come from. He squinted against the thick rain, raising the hand that wasn't holding onto the bag to remove the wet strands off his face so he could see better. He came to yet another stop when he reached a crossroads that he was positive it hadn't been there earlier. The hell? He looked between the two dirt paths in confusion, unsure which was the right one to follow.