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#hmm i should maybe make a pt 2 for this about the Ha clan? perhaps. bc i think people who haven't watch noragami would enjoy the angst of i
camels-pen · 9 months
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you are a person that is looked up to. respected. sought out for certain types of help, on occasion. a very important figure.
you make many friends in order to help you with your responsibilities and it never takes long for you to consider them family. they bicker and fight on occasion, but they are your precious family. you love them and they love you just as much. they care for you and look out for you, to a point sometimes you would consider yourself spoiled, but they insist it's the least they could do for you, because you are an important person, but also because you are loved. you are so so loved.
you become ill one day. nothing much, just a small cold, but your family frets and frets, trying to make you feel better. the cold doesn't go away, always this small annoyance to you, but you grin and bear it, because you don't want them to fret any longer.
you start getting pains on the back of your neck. little ones, at first, but more and more started to come, started to hurt in different places around your neck. your closest friend and guide, practically a doting grandmother to you, takes to rubbing your shoulders and your nape when she can, and when she can't, she'll get one of the younger ones to do it instead. you try to grin and bear it as best you can and, eventually, they stop fretting as much. your guide scolds everyone else, certain that someone must be stressing you out enough to get hurt. your bonds with your family are special after all, and negative thoughts and actions can really hurt you. the others gasp and shake their heads, saddened that one of them hurt you, but they mostly take it in stride.
the neck pains never go away.
you gain a new member of the family. a handsome young man with little to offer in terms of aiding you in your duties, but he does his best. regardless, you are happy to have him. and it's always amusing for a new helper to get so nervous around you. the following days are fun and content, watching him get used to the family and the various mishmash of tasks that must be done. you take him on a few of your outings and he is greatly overwhelmed, but he is observant. he aids you in keeping mind of the details, the little things that might slip through or be lost in the big picture. he is clumsy and he is new, but he too, might make a fine guide one day, should the need arise.
you become ill again.
it is not a simple cold, this time.
you hardly know what is happening around you anymore. your guide came to visit in the morning and you could hardly muster a greeting before she pulled back the blanket to expose your bare back.
you have a feeling you know what she saw. you don't want to think about it.
your guide excuses herself and through the door to your room you can hear her faint reprimands—much sterner and less forgiving than the last time—and mentions of holding rituals to purify each and every member of the family. the pain is horrible, you writhe on your bed to try to escape it, and you wish, more than anything, to be able to stand and tell them you're alright. to lie to them that everything's fine. that you will surely survive.
you hear as the last ritual is completed. your pain has worsened by the end of it. it's unbearable now. you can hardly speak anymore, but you are still capable of sound. still capable of making grunts and gasps and wheezes.
your family are arguing outside and you can hardly hear them now, but things don't sound good. you feel the illness spread further. it's covering your neck completely, most of one arm, and much of your face.
you don't know what to do.
you know exactly what you need to do.
you won't do it.
someone does it for you.
someone like you. an important figure, but not one that is looked up to. one that is feared.
you are present, when it happens. you are in the middle of this family you can barely recognize anymore, this family whose bonds are in tatters, as they are taken away.
as they are killed.
you are stuck, physically stuck. the pain steals your movement, but there is someone—something else holding you down. you cannot move. you cannot stop this. you are forced to hear their dying screams as they call out for help. as they call out, for you, to help.
you beg—with your hoarse and pain ridden voice, you beg and beg and beg for this person who is like you to stop this slaughter.
you tell this person who is like you that your family is good, is gentle, and to please please stop—to not kill any others.
you don't know if this person who is like you couldn't hear your strained whispers or if your words fell on deaf ears, but this person who is like you does not listen.
your family calls out for help again. they reach out to you, for protection. you reach out to them, a small fickle hope that you could at least save—
light. sunlight was filtering in through the window.
you hear someone come in.
it's the new member, the clumsy one.
now, the only member.
he says he is incapable of protecting you. he says you should find new helpers, friends, family. he says this, after having cared for you tirelessly on his own for so long, while you have barely had the will to move.
he starts to say something else, but you can't take it.
you tell him, in a quivering voice, "I never want to go through that again."
you cling to his lap and say, "I don't need any others!"
you cry and bury your face in his thighs and exclaim, "All I need is you!"
it takes time, but you pick yourself up, and—despite your words—you find new helpers, new friends, new family. but unlike before, you let any and all you find into your home, regardless of how suitable they are to helping you. unlike before, the risks of getting ill are higher, but you don't care. you need to make up for letting your family die. you need to always take in those who need it, to make up for those you failed.
and unlike before, you will not allow your family to die.
your name is Bishamonten and the next time you see the Yato God, you will kill him.
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