The fire spread throughout the village and the surrounding forest. The screams were deafening, and the sound of battle even more so.
Tsukiko had just been returning home after being tasked with gathering herbs from the nearby valley for her mother's shop, when the smell of burnt trees caught her nose—then came the deafening screams.
As she grew closer to her village, her heartbeat quickened and her stomach churned. She used her magic to conceal herself and continued forward. As the smoke parted and she got ever closer, she caught a glimpse of what was happening. One by one, all the people she knew and cared about were being mercilessly slaughtered by devils.
First, it was her neighbor—the one who used to give her flowers for free every time she passed by his shop. Then it was his wife. After her came their children, who—while not even old enough to sprout their tails—had just witnessed their parents' deaths.
The boy was the first of the two killed. A devil put his hands on the boy's face, his thumbs resting just above the eyes. He pressed them into the boy's eye sockets, turning them into mush. The boy screamed louder than anyone. The devil's gaze sharpened at the sound. He applied more pressure, then ripped the boy's head off and threw it away.
Tsukiko's eyes narrowed into slits, and her tail bristled as she watched the brutality with which the devil killed her kind.
Then came the girl's turn. The devil used his magic, and the girl's limbs twisted in ways no limbs should. Still alive, she was gagged and bound before being taken away by some of the weaker devils. Her fate was shared with most of the girls in the village.
As Tsukiko stood there, watching her people get murdered, every instinct in her screamed to run—but her feet remained rooted to the ground.
Then she saw her own parents—warriors of her village—fighting side by side, and a small sense of hope filled her.
Maybe we'll survive.
But the devils tricked her father, and as he lunged at them, a trap went off and he was caught in an explosion.
The sound of the explosion was deafening, and Tsukiko's knees almost buckled underneath her. When she looked at where her father once stood she saw nothing but a smoking crater.
Then it was her mother's turn. Having just witnessed her husband's death, she stood frozen, consumed by grief. The devils, using that to their advantage, quickly rained fire upon her.
In her mother's final moments, they locked eyes together, her face drenched in tears and blood. As her death grew closer she mouthed to her daughter. Run.
The flames engulfed her mother's flesh, devouring her within seconds. When the flames on her body dissipated all that remained was a scorched corpse. Flesh and cloth fused into one.
She wanted to scream, she wanted to rip their spines out of their bodies with her bare hands. But she knew she was too weak to even get close to them, let alone hurt them.
The smell of the burnt flesh almost caused her to vomit. She had seen enough to know that staying any longer would mean the end of her.
So she ran—as fast as her legs could carry her and then some. She ran with everything she had. Her breaths soon became ragged, but her pace never slowed. Not until she collapsed.