Ghost Stories:Shiryo Village *Editing*

Chapter 9

NINA'S P.O.V-

I could tell that I was being held by someone, I just didn't know who. All that I knew was that I had just murdered Nana. Her lifeless eyes gazed deeply into my remorseful, self-loathing ones. This is all my fault. All my fault. I killed her. I killed her. I killed the one person who I need in this world. I killed her.

My mind had gone blank and my eyes began to become filled with the salty tears that threatened to fall.

She’s dead because of you.

You killed your own sister.

Murderer.

Murderer.

You’re at fault.

You murdered your own sister without hesitation.

All I remembered was Lara whispering in my ear and seeing Nana's pleading look. I listened to the sorrowful stories of ghosts who have been stuck in Shiryo Village for the past hundred years. I bore witness to their pleas for the ceremony to be completed so that they would finally be able to escape this prison which they have been forced to live within. Then, all I had thought was doing whatever I could to help them and due to my actions, Nana was taken away from me.

"N...Nana? ", I called out in a quiet, hoarse whisper. My stomach dropped and I knew that she wouldn’t answer my call. Trying would only be futile. Yet, I still tried, thinking that maybe this was just a sick, twisted joke.

I did not receive a response. Nana's body was just lying on the pedestal, lifeless, unmoving. Her arms were hanging loosely off of the pedestal. Her legs were unmoving, just lying lifelessly there. There was already a bruise beginning to form around Nana's neck, the same place where I had choked her. Her mask of the sun was falling off of her face, revealing half of her face. Her mouth was slightly a gap like she tried gaining some air before it was taken forcefully from her and by my own hands it was taken.

“Nana! ", I screamed at the top of my lungs, trying to get out of the hold of whoever was holding onto me. Despair took me over and I desperately tried to reach out to my passed on sister. I lost her. I lost her.

Her body was slowly lifted into the air and floated over the hole. My eyes widen in fear and I started to claw at whoever hand their hands around me. I remained ignorant to everything that was occurring around me. I ignored the chanting, I ignored the cries of my captor to stop, I ignored the echoing laughter coming from Lara’s tainted, foul mouth. I ignored it all. I just want Nana back. I just want her back.

The chanting grew louder and louder as Nana's body was floating over the hole. There was ear piercing screams coming from within it, dying for the sacrifice to come down so that they would be able to devour her very being. Lara's menacing laughter echoed the room once more, a victorious laughter, a devious laughter, a tyrant laughter. Then the force that had dispersed and Nana's body fell into the hole, disappearing from my sights.

I felt like it was all in slow motion, watching Nana’s corpse slowly descend down into the pitch black cave. Her arms reached out above her, her mask long lost, gravity forcing her down to the depths of Hell. They didn’t even let me say goodbye.  They didn’t let me apologize. They didn’t let me. They didn’t let me.

"Nina, stop! ", I heard Seiku's voice, "She's gone! She’s gone, Nina! ".

I let out another scream and managed to get out of Seiku's hold before running towards the hole. My vision became blurred by my tears and everything else around me went on mute. I wanted to jump in with her. I didn’t want to be alone. I thought that she needed me this whole time when I really need her. She can’t leave me. She can’t leave me.