The Last Higanbana

Chapter 2: Peaceful Days

A small child slept peacefully in his blanket, hugging his favourite pillow. His black hair swayed in the gentle breezes, and his child-like angelic face seemed to glimmer under the light.

"Rihito! Breakfast's ready!"
A woman's voice echoed through the room, and a tempting smell of freshly cooked food wafted through the air. The woman walked into the room to see her child still in bed, with a ray of sunshine casting over his face. The atmosphere was so peaceful and serene.

The mother gave a helpless smile, and with her loving gaze, she stared at her still unmoving child. This moment held a harmonious mood of motherly affection.
She sighed, but in the next second, she roared -
"GET UP! HOW LONG ARE YOU GOING TO SLEEP!"
Her voice was so loud that the chirping birds outside panicked and flew away from the tree branches they were resting on.

The poor little boy was startled awake, and met the eyes of his mother. She was smiling, but her quiet anger could be seen through her expression. He hurriedly jumped out of bed, changed clothes and brushed his teeth. When he went to the dining room, he was delighted. His favourite dish was spread out on the table.

"Good morning, mommy!" Rihito greeted whilst happily sitting on his wooden chair.
"Good morning, Rihito, did you have a good dream last night?" Riri, his mother, had asked as she poured some soup and rice into their bowls and gave it to her child.

Their conversation continued as they enjoyed their breakfast, and it was time for Riri to leave the house to work. Their financial status was not very high, but the two of them still spent their days in happiness. Whilst his mother was gone, Rihito would look after the vegetables outside and clean the house, busying himself with chores. However, since his mother would not return home until it was dinner time, Rihito always felt lonely being in the house alone.

For all these years, the two of them were able to blend into human society only because of Riri's illusion spells covering the colour of their eyes. Both Rihito and Riri were the direct descendants of the lord, which is why they had red pupils and were different to those vampires that had black eyes. Normal vampires would only inevitably show their scarlet eyes whenever they started to crave for blood, and so they had the advantage of hiding themselves amongst humans, who also had the same coloured eyes.

Vampire children didn't need to consume blood until they reached the age of seven, and Riri had strictly decreased the amount of animal blood she consumed, allowing the both of them to live like humans. The truth was, as soon as Rihito was born, Riri held conflicting feelings towards her child. Unlike her, his eyes were golden red, showing how he was a pure-blooded vampire and would most likely become stronger than the normal red eyed vampires.

Riri was excited to see that her child had a future of having a chance to become the lord of the underworld, in case she wasn't able to protect Rihito when he grew up. But at the same time, she felt a bit dejected, because according to the legends, golden red eyed vampires had some restrictions towards the blood they could intake apart from family members. If they drank the blood of someone who wasn't compatible with them, they would feel a strong repulsion in their body.

Rihito woke up again the next morning, being surrounded by the dusty smell of rain. It was cloudy and the skies were grey, with a dark atmosphere. It felt as if the heavens were giving an ominous sign. Rihito prayed for his mother's safety, and continued his daily care inside the house. At dinner time, Riri realised that she forgot to buy salt, the main ingredient for her delicious cooking.

"Rihito, can you buy mommy some salt please?" She asked
"Okay!" Rihito answered, as he went to shop for his mother using his secretly stored allowance that he had been collecting.

Lightning struck, and the clouds rumbled, the rain pouring heavily again. Even so, Rihito happily sprinted in the rain, hurrying to complete his mission. He couldn't wait to get back - to be greeted with mother's warm smile and the scent of freshly made soup, the homely environment wrapping his entire self.

But what greeted him was not what he expected. The lights had gone out, their vegetable gardens trampled on and the furnitures inside their house smashed and everything was out of place. Even so, all those didn't matter. Lying on the ground, his mother had blood pouring out of her wounds, and she seemed to be so still, so lifeless.

"M-mother!" Rihito screamed. Riri would sometimes scold him for not calling her 'mother' instead of 'mommy', but nevertheless she still accepted the use of 'mommy', so Rihito would always use the more childish tone. But that didn't matter anymore. He shook her shoulders lightly, with his tiny, feeble hands, but she didn't respond.

"R-Rihito will be a good boy, he'll do whatever mother tells me, so, please-" Tears slid down his face as he faced the body of his heavily injured mother.

"Rihito?" A weak voice responded to his cries.
"Mother! Wait, ill get the village's doctor, so-" Rihito quickly stood up and was about to leave the house.
"Wait" His mother coughed. "It's no use, so listen to me." She explained briefly about how they had destroyed her blood core, the very essence of vampires and how she couldn't regenerate anymore. Afterwards, she made Rihito grab a necklace from one of her drawers. It had six red pearls and a small metal plate in the middle.

"This metal plate has the imperial crest of mother's origins, and the pearls are the condensed form of my blood." She said weakly, as she strictly told Rihito to eat one pearl at a time whenever he felt a strong urge to drink blood, and to use his inherited powers to hide the necklace and the colour of his eyes.

Rihito continuously shook his head, as he shouted about how he didn't want to leave, and how he wasn't ready for her to leave him. Streams of tears ran down his face, with sorrow being the only emotion covering his face. But he still promised to do as she said, and to always keep his promises.

Riri looked at the pathetic state of her child's face covered in tears, and she smiled. "Mommy is only worried....... that you will make the same mistake as me....... make sure to choose someone who will give you happiness, okay?" Rihito nodded, without understanding the meaning of those words but engraving it into his heart anyway.

"Rihito is a lot like mommy, so mommy is very worried........." She slowly closed her eyes, as her voice faded and her breathing steadily weakened.

Holding onto his mother's body that was becoming colder as time passed by, Rihito felt as if reality was coming back to him. As a recently seven year old child, he couldn't bear the heavy truth that his mother died in his arms.

The heavy rains fell, loudly drenching the floor, drowning the long cries of a young boy mourning over the death of his mother.