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"i won't let you do this to me!"
tanaka hotaru opened her eyes and was immediately flooded by a sea of pain.
what happened? she wondered.
looking around her, she could immediately tell that the bed she was lying in was not her bed. the sheets were far too expensive to belong to her, and there was no window by the bed for her to look out of.
confused as to how she'd fallen asleep in her bed and awakened in another bed, she stepped out of the bed onto the tatami-covered floor to try and explore, but she was immediately hit with another wave of pain, and collapsed to the ground, whimpering like a hurt dog.
the door to the room she was in slid open, and she could see a pair of well polished black dress shoes approaching her. she struggled to try and get up, but the pain wouldn't abate, so she fell back to the floor and sighed in defeat.
"the lovely tanaka hotaru, moonlight hashira..."
a voice that was simultaneously sweet as honey and dark as the darkest night called out to hotaru. she recognized this voice and the accompanying scent as belonging to none other than kibutsuji muzan himself.
"you..." hotaru hisses angrily. "how dare you abduct me! i'll make you regret this!"
muzan laughed, but it wasn't a happy and bright laugh. it was a dangerous one. he knelt down next to hotaru and tilted her head up with his fingers so that she was looking directly into his bright blood red eyes.
"would you really hurt your father, little one?" he asked.
there's no way! he can't have-
"i can't have done what? finish the sentence!" muzan said teasingly.
hotaru gasped in shock and looked down at her shaking hands to see that her neatly groomed fingernails had been replaced with long, sharp claws that were curved like a scythe.
"no! i won't let you do this to me! this can't happen to me!" she cried out, slashing blindly at muzan with her new claws.
"you don't have a choice in the matter, little firefly. the blood transfusion i gave you will only cause pain for a little while longer, and then you'll be a demon, just like me. do introduce yourself to the rest of the ranks sometime soon; i'm sure they'd be happy to meet you!"
with a mocking, contemptible laugh, muzan stood back up and left the room, sliding the door shut behind him. hotaru heard his footsteps going down the wooden hallway outside of the room, and then there was nothing but silence.
hotaru usually liked silence, but now, it never felt more melancholy. she missed the sounds of the hashira chatting- and sometimes fighting. she missed the sounds of oyakata gently lecturing them. she even missed the loud sounds of sword training, the clanging of swords hitting one another and the satisfying sound of pieces of bamboo being cut through.
everything was quiet. too quiet.
as muzan had said, the pain only lasted a little while longer, and then it left. now that hotaru wasn't in pain anymore, she was able to stand up and examine the room around her more closely.
the bed was against the wall that was farthest to the back, and the sliding door to the room was directly across from the bed. diagonally to the left of the door, against the leftmost wall, was a large chest of drawers with a mirror and a small box of makeup and other beauty products on top of it. hotaru opened up the top drawer and found folded kimonos in it.
at least they're providing me with clothes, she thought sarcastically.
the second drawer held undergarments, and the third drawer was, to hotaru's delight, full of cute barrettes and headbands for her to wear on her hair.
maybe it wasn't so bad being a demon after all, hotaru thought.
no! that was what muzan wanted her to think! she couldn't be seduced by all these beautiful garments and accessories! it would take more than that to turn her heart to the dark side!
the rightmost wall didn't have much of anything against it but one painting of a beautiful starry sky. the lights of a city were present in the distance, and in the painting was a young girl resting against a tree on a hill, looking out at the city lights.
hotaru was drawn to the painting, and, without an explanation as to why, she went over to it and touched it.
suddenly, she was no longer in the room she had been in, but was seemingly in the painting! behind her was a tall tree, and her back was pressed against it. in the tree, there was a small knothole, and in that knothole, she could see an image of the room she was just in.
hotaru looked out into the distance and saw little dots of light burning in the silhouettes of building windows. in the sky, uncountable amounts of stars shined, rivaling the hesitating, unsure light of the lanterns in the windows of the city buildings.
despite never being in this location at all, hotaru felt as if it was familiar, as if she had somehow been there before. the beauty of the stars and the city lights made her heart feel warm, and her lips curled into a smile.
this place is beautiful! she thought. if i could be here everyday, maybe i could live with being a demon.
