Well, the time is coming up, I went to go prep my tutoring materials. I wonder if I should buy something for myself and Kaoru at the coffee joint. I think they have other drinks besides coffee, I’ll stop by.
When I got to the joint, I reviewed their menu. Mainly specialty coffee, and there were some non-coffee drinks. This is the first time I noticed fruity drinks and milkshakes. I think Kaoru likes some fruit, and I remember sawing a cherry atop her notebook. I’ll grab her a cherry milkshake, and I’ll grab a peach one for myself. Peach is one of my favorite flavors for milkshakes, but I usually grab a different flavor every time I stop by my usual milkshake joint.
~~
Knock, knock.
Apartment 436, I’m kinda nervous. It’s not my first time tutoring someone in their home. In fact, I usually tutored Saki. Probably just because it’s the first time I tutored Kaoru.
Kaoru had answered the door, “Is that you Ryotaro-kun?”
“Indeed it is, I bought you a cherry milkshake.”
“Cherry’s my favorite, thanks-thanks.” She sounded delighted, but her voice went back to timid I guess, and she stuttered a little.
I walked into her apartment, and I was mildly surprised. I liked the purple hints in the furniture, and it’s surprisingly clean for all the stuff she had.
“Kaoru, do you live alone?”
“Yes, I moved out when I went to college.”
“Ah, that’s neat. So, ready for tutoring?”
“Uh sure, let me grab my notebook.”
She went to her room, I saw a little bit of it. Admittingly, it was kind of bland. Well, the only comparison I had was Saki’s room and it was pink and pretty.
Kaoru had stepped back into the living room, and she had her characteristic cherry notebook.
I already had my prep materials on the table, and was sipping on my peach milkshake.
She later sat down, she had the same look of dismay I noticed earlier in the day.
“So, Kaoru, I prepped the stuff that you missed from Shiba-sensei. I apologize in advance for some formatting errors, there was some info that was odd to write out.”
Kaoru silently nodded, and I went over to help teach her.
~~
Slowly, something felt off in Kaoru’s apartment. I was feeling sleepy, and It got harder to grip my pen. I think an hour had passed by.
Brzzt.
Nifuji, Fuutarou told me about you going out for drinks later, can I come too?
I lumped my phone up, it’s Saki. I fidgeted my fingers to type something, but I dropped my phone on the table.
I wasn’t sure it was my imagination, but it looked like Kaoru had a death stare. I blinked, and she disappeared for a second, then I blinked again, and she sat back at the table. She had flashed a gentle smile. I reached out to pick up my phone, and it said the text came 40 minutes ago, but it just came in. A sense of fear came to me, and I looked to my left. What used to be a beautiful evening sunset, now was a void-like black.
“Wh-.”
I cut myself off, Kaoru obviously did something. I watched a bunch of movies with Fuutarou to understand exactly what was going on.
My phone had read a few new messages.
Where are you?
Nifuji this isn’t funny.
You know what I and Fuutarou are coming to check on you.
Looking at my phone it was 0:15, this is so strange.
Before I noticed it, I had fallen off my chair and onto the carpet. I tried to move somewhere, but my arms felt like noodles, and couldn’t do much. I tried moving my head to where Kaoru was. My neck was stiff, did I nap at the table earlier? I heard some odd giggling in the room, my senses were going off and on in 500 different directions. I felt the room expanding and shrinking. Pounding, I wasn’t sure it was actually pounding or my headache. The giggling was circling around me, I heard it in the left corner, then the right, then above me, then below me. It points out that it didn't sound like Kaoru, but some ghost lady from some horror film.
~~
When my arms were more akin to sticks rather than noodles, I attempted to lean myself on the couch. My hands slipped on something, it was warm. It was some sort of liquid, and it wasn’t sticky. I went for a smell.
Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.
The whiff of iron, its blood. Is it mine? I’m not hurting anywhere, but that’s unreliable. My senses are thrown off, and even my thoughts are trailing.
I wiped my hand off on the nearby carpet and was able to successfully lean myself on the couch. It seems the room is empty, there’s a knife on the table. I looked everywhere top to bottom. It was only when I looked down, I realized the problem. I’m not the sharpest guy, but I can safely say there’s a knife in my leg. I think the fear kicks in within a few seconds.
Now it kicks in, my heart is beating very fast, and I’m breathing loudly.
I can’t really remove it, but I think whatever is happening to me is allowing me to skip out on the pain at least.
~~
The door of I think uh Kaoru’s bedroom opens up. The figure standing there doesn’t look like Kaoru. Her eyes were now simple holes with black liquid leaking out. The figure is pale and has a knife in its long claw-like hands. Why need a knife when you have those claws?
The front door had begun pounding, it wasn’t my headache.
“Nifuji, Nifuji! Are you in there! It’s Saki!”
The figure had quickly walked to the door. It looked very animal-like in it’s walk, and on closer inspection had skin like the rocks on the moon.
I tried to yell out to Saki, but all that came out was a weak groan.
I yelled out again, another weak attempt at a yell.
My knife leg can’t move, but my other leg can. If I can push one of the chairs down, it could get her attention.
When I went to move my leg, these strange purple spiky tendrils had reached out to move it. I felt it constrict my leg like a snake or constrictor or whatever they’re damn called!
This can’t be real, this is some sort of drug, there’s no way these things can exist. I forced my leg to move. It had only minorly jerked, but that was enough to knock the chair down.
“Nifuji is that you?! What’s going on inside?!”
~~
I’m so worried, Nifuji is never out like this without a word. I know he’s tutoring but there’s no way he’s tutoring someone that late in the night. There’s no way that Kaoru or whatever can possibly be up to any good.
I asked Fuutarou if we could check on Nifuji, he said he’ll drive us to the place he’s tutoring. I hope this is just some extended tutoring, but he hasn’t responded to any of my messages.
When we got to the door, I could hear some odd groaning inside, and then something fell inside. I saw Fuutarou listening in, and he had begun kicking the door in.
~~
The door had slammed into that thing’s body, and I saw two figures walk in. I saw Saki and Fuutarou rush inside. Fuutarou had decked the figure who turned into Kaoru in the face. It seems whatever was happening was wearing off, and I felt a stinging in my leg. This pain must’ve been saved up from the beginning, it was like a thousand ants burrowing into my leg, and biting the insides of the meat that resided in my leg. I could only groan in pain, but I realized something was muffling it.
Saki rushed to my side and saw my sorry state.
“NIFUJI, what happened to you?!”
She saw me, hair rustled, eyes bloodshot, blood on my hands, knife in leg, and tape on my mouth.
She had stepped back in shock and slipped onto the blood pooling around me.
“Listen, Saki how’s Nifuji?!”
“It’s Awful, there’s blood everywhere and a knife in his leg!”
“Damn it, I’m going to call the ambulance, you keep him awake!”
Fuutarou had kicked Kaoru in and went for his phone.
Saki had sat down and put my head on her lap, she reached with her delicate hands to tear off the tape.
"Nifuji, you'll be fine just hold on a little longer."
Her face was above my head, it was pleasant and comforting.
My eyes had blinked out for a second, can’t do that.
Something had lightly slapped my face, it had slightly jolted me.
"Nifuji, Nifuji wake up, you can't sleep now!"
I felt a soft pressure in my hands.
Then I felt water droplets fall on my face, and what felt like hair droop onto me.
“Huh, your food was nice."
Ryotaro Nifuji was declared dead when emergency services arrived. Autopsy results revealed that he was drugged before being stabbed in the left leg by a classmate named Manakata Kaoru. He was bleeding for a few hours before friends came to check on him. A friend named Mori Fuutarou and Sugahara Saki had checked on him and had apprehended the killer classmate. However, it was too late as Ryotaro had lost a fatal amount of blood, and then shortly expired in front of Sugahara Saki.