The church of the lord of blood and flesh opens for the first time. It's one of the most beautiful days in recent months. The snow has started melting under the ever-warmer rays of sunlight. People flood the church; some have to stand outside and listen to the preaching.
But they all make a path when an impossibly elegant and beautiful woman walks through the door. The people on the seats move away to give her as much space as she needs. She has long brunette hair going down to her lower back. She, of course, has blue eyes and perfect eyelashes and eyebrows. Her dress is of the finest quality.
Her face is perfectly composed and calm. Her eyes only stare forward, as if everyone around her doesn't exist. As the preacher walks out everything goes silent, not even a whisper. They all stand up except her, but no one seems to care or even notice. Then they start praying.
She closes her eyes and images flash in her mind. A man getting eaten by what seems to be an impossibly large crocodile. A woman watching her children getting eaten alive by a person wearing a cloak. Another of a corpse half buried in red soil that looked like flesh with veins running everywhere.
A couple more images flash of unholy creatures and people in unbearable physical and mental pain. She opens her eyes and sees that everyone is still standing up, smiling with their hands together, eyes closed and praying in silence.
She stands up and starts walking away, not a single emotion is found on that perfect face of hers. "How amusing you are." That is the only thing she says before leaving. No one stops or notices her and she seems to vanish into thin air.
Reiji and Taiken walk through the mansion to where they had the meeting last night. They're probably late. When they arrive, they see Yoruha sitting calmly in-between Fujioka and purple. The general is also there. Renji Kurotaka was sitting on one of the chairs with his feet on the table. There was also someone else. A new face.
They had darker skin with a pretty nasty scar running from the corner of their mouth to the ear, covering a large portion of the left side of his face. He had long black hair tied back into a bun, something similar to what Kurotaka currently has. He had kind eyes unlike most of the people in the room. He wore a winter jacket and winter pants. It wasn't even that cold anymore. What remained of the thick snow were a couple of melting piles.
Kurotaka immediately jumped onto the table and kicked an empty plate at Reiji. The plate broke into pieces on impact with Reiji's thick skull, not harming him at all.
"I missed you too." Reiji said.
"You're late." Fujioka commented with a sigh.
"How late? I'd love to make a new record for being late." Reiji didn't seem to care.
Reiji's face was once again hit by a plate that Kurotaka kicked at him.
"You're late and if you waste my time I'll kill you in your sleep."
Kurotaka then walked towards Reiji and jumped off of the table. He got right in his face.
"Want to fight?" Reiji asked. Kurotaka just smiled and stepped to the side. The general delivered a lightning-fast slap, snapping Reiji's head to the side.
"That's for last night's amazing sleep."
Taiken laughed for a moment before he too got slapped, making him shut up instantly. He looked at the general in a confused manner as she walked past the two of them.
That caught me off guard. Reiji thought to himself.
"Can we stop hitting, threatening and throwing plates at each other?" Fujioka said in a tired manner.
"That'd be great. Because I'm dying to know what special thing, you're hiding that will make us a match for those things." Reiji said.
"Come with me." Fujioka responded and got up, starting to walk towards their destination. Everyone followed him through the hallways. Reiji sped up a bit and walked right next to Fujioka.
"And as we walk, what are these two doing here?" Reiji asked him, keeping up with his fast pace.
"They have been selected to undergo the same process as you and your brother will." Fujioka answers, not bothering to even look at Reiji as they keep walking through the mansion.
"Taiken? How can you trust him?" Reiji asked.
"He is your brother and I can tell he is just as special." Fujioka said.
"Nice choice of words. Special instead of weird." Reiji comments one final time before everyone goes quiet and follows Fujioka. They go through doors, hallways, stairs and eventually arrive in front of large doors.
"Don't touch anything. This was expensive." Fujioka says before knocking twice and the doors slowly open. They walk through and the doors start closing. The hallway continues before opening up to a very large room.
It was brimming with workers and scientists. The room was so big you could fit way more than just a whale in it. In the centre there were multiple rings of stairs that led to a platform with what seemed to be a bathtub made of stone. From the bathtub there were engravings running all the way down to the first ring of stairs.
Taiken looked around in awe. Reiji couldn't hide his surprise either along with the new guy.
"Ugh, stop showing off. I'm tired and want to sleep." Kurotaka spoke in an uninterested tone.
Fujioka walks forward and around the wall of the circular room. There were valves, pipes and machines that were operated and maintained by the workers who were standing next to them.
These were divided into sections that were separated by an empty space. "Activate S1!" Fujioka shouted every time he walked by a section. The workers turned some valves, pressed some buttons in order and with correct timing, keeping an eye on the measuring machines.
After a moment a worker came up to Reiji, Taiken, Kurotaka and the new guy. He was holding four towels.
"You're going to have to take off your clothes." He then gave them the towels.
"What?" Reiji asked and looked back at Yoruha and purple. Yoruha was inspecting her sleeve while purple was just standing with closed eyes. They probably didn't hear the worker.
"Really? Scared of showing your little friend down there?" Taiken comments and starts stripping. The other two do the same. Reiji stands there for a moment. He then sighs and takes off all of his clothes and wraps himself in a towel.
"Look at you, all grown up with muscles and all. Yet you are still smaller than me." Taiken comments.
"Stronger and smarter are the words I would get described with if we were ever compared." Reiji responds.
"If you say so, princess." Taiken's reponse is quickly answered by an elbow to the ribs which makes him let out an ow and cover his side.
"Idiot." Reiji says before the quiet returns.
Soon enough, from the bathtub came spilling a red liquid like from a vulcano. There was probably a hole or something which it came through. Then when the tub was filled, the blood ran down the tub's engravings and then the engravings in the stairs until it reached the bottom where a moat caught the liquid and probably pumped it back up.
Fujioka had walked the entire room back to them. "You'll be submerged in that blood, your lungs have to fill with blood and when we pull you out, you're going to be practically dead. Hopefully you'll pull through."
"Hopefully…" The new guy says something for the first time. He seemed scared but strangely at peace.
"I'll go first." Reiji stepped forward. Fujioka took him up the stairs where Reiji took off his towel and jumped in, submerging his lower half.
"At least it's warm." Reiji commented, clearly nervous and his voice was strained.
"Might be better than getting ripped in half by some supernatural being." Fujioka commented, leaning on the side of the tub.
"This doesn't happen to be warm red water, does it?" Reiji asked and Fujioka shook his head no.
"It's blood." He said before going down to where the others stood by.
A worker came over to the tub and asked where and when he was born, his name, favorite food and sleeping habits.
"So, what's this about exactly?" Taiken asked. Fujioka gave him a look. He explained it just a moment ago. "You'll need to be held under the blood until it fills your lungs and until you practically die." Fujioka repeated the process.
"And how do you know when to pull us out?" Kurotaka followed up. "We'll know. Whether you'll survive is an entirely different story."
Reiji was bound by the straps on the bottom of the tub. After a tense moment he closed his eyes and let out all of his air. The surface of the blood was disrupted by bubbles for a moment before it went still.
"I'll tell you when to start the time. One to two minutes before the reflex to breathe kicks in and another two minutes to let his lungs fill up and body to saturate."
Reiji starts to fight against the restraints when he feels like he is drowning, but they hold. His eyes fly open and fists close as muscles strain to get free. He sees the face of a worker looking down at him through the blood. When his vision starts to fade and his body relaxes, he sees a dark cloud form above the tub. His eyes fly open once again as the hands that emerged from the cloud reach into the blood and grab the sides of his head.
The contact burns his skin.