The Stevie Wonder Memorial Library looked exactly like I remembered it—too quiet for a school this haunted, too big for anyone to use properly, and too weird to exist anywhere but here. The whole place smelled like moldy pages, old glue, and secret regrets.

I stepped inside, Yuki floating beside me like the world's most adorable anxiety attack as we passed through rows of dingy books lining cobwebbed shelves.

"Yuki, any clue on where I'd find something on orcs?" I asked her, looking at the endless rows of crooked shelves. "I'm not sure where this place would keep information on what I assumed were fantasy creatures."

Yuki blinked at me, her silver hair drifting behind her like fog in a shrine. "I'm not really sure. Maybe ask the librarian?"

"Yeah," I said. "You know, that's not a bad idea. Like, they have to have something… reference books. Lore. Field guides. Hell, I'd settle for my old Dungeons & Dragons manuals."

Yuki tilted her head. "I wish I understood what you're referring to sometimes. Is that something Tolkien wrote about?"

Kinda. "I think he had something to do with it."

We walked deeper into the stacks.

The air got cooler, the lights more uneven. There were flickering track bulbs that didn't light anything up and wall sconces that didn't belong in a modern building.

The rows seemed to shift when I wasn't looking and stretched on forever when I was.

Frank Lloyd Wright in a double-blind competition with M. C. Escher.

That's when Yuki froze.

"Oh no, Ryu," she hissed. "It's Murasaki. She must've seen you when you walked past Fushineko-sensei's classroom. She's looking for you!"

My spine straightened like a puppet getting yanked.

"What? Now?"

I peeked from behind one of the rows and saw her by the entrance.

She was carefully looking from bookcase to bookcase.

I doubted she was searching for Fifty Shades Darker.

Yuki nodded, her eyes darting between the shelves. "She's coming up the main aisle. You need to hide. Now."

I ducked between the rows, weaving through dusty encyclopedias and some cursed-looking cookbooks that smelled like burnt chestnuts. Every shelf creaked like it was sighing in protest.

That's when I heard it—Rōshi-sensei's voice booming through the library like thunder stuffed into a kimono.

"Skipping class, are we? Think the rules don't apply to you, do you, young man?"

I nearly jumped out of my socks until I realized he wasn't yelling at me.

I peeked around a shelf and saw him: Shiryū Rōshi, the ancient Zashiki-jiisan yokai librarian, leaning on his gnarled staff as he loomed over some poor kid trying to sneak out the back.

"You know what happens to students who play hooky in my library?" he said, eyebrows twitching like they were alive. "You get to feed the shoggoth, boy!"

A chill ran down my spine so sharp it could've filed my bones flat.

Nope. Not dealing with eldritch cafeteria duty today.

I slipped into a dark alcove and found a tiny, dust-covered door labeled "Audio Archives (Beta Format Only – Do Not Digitize)."

What's wrong with these people?

I pushed it open and slipped inside.

There was a single listening booth: ancient, padded, and small enough to make a coffin jealous.

A dusty chair sat in the corner, surrounded by reels of cassette tape and forgotten headphones coiled like dead snakes.

I slid inside, pulled the door almost shut, and waited.

I sniffed, detecting the faint hint of marijuana and Axe body spray.

Then Yuki popped her head through the door. "Oh, there you are. You picked a good spot, Ryu."

Then she looked around, confused. "But where're the 45s? What's this nonsense?"

Yuki inspected the cassette tape as I stood by the door hoping no one saw me.

And then Murasaki walked by the door and I caught a whiff of her lemon/ginger perfume.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

She passed by the booth like a specter in a perfume ad, her steps slow and deliberate, eyes scanning the rows. She was humming something low, slow, sweet, and every note made me feel like I was being stalked by a lullaby.

I held my breath.

Just when I thought I was in the clear, Rōshi-sensei's voice cracked out again, closer this time.

"Hmm, are there other students trying to hide in my library?"

I saw him a few rows behind Murasaki.

He was about to spot her. She was walking right into his line of sight.

My fingers clenched the edge of the chair, conflict bending my brain.

She's a succubus. She was hunting me earlier this morning in a hot spring while wearing something technically classified as floss.

But… I remembered the way her voice had cracked when she asked about Inego.

"…He's been avoiding me… like everyone else does."

Before I could talk myself out of it, I shot out of the booth, grabbed her shoulder, and yanked her inside with me.

She gasped, deep and breathy. Her body crashed into mine, soft, warm, unreasonably perfect. The door shut behind her with a quiet click.

And we were in the audio booth. Together.

Barely inches between us.

Yuki spun around. "Oh, Ryu, what have you done now?"

Murasaki's violet eyes glowed in the shadows like twin amethysts dipped in mischief. Her smile stretched wide and slow, sharp enough to split atoms.

"Well hello there, Ryu-kun," she whispered, her voice like silk dipped in venom. "If you wanted to be alone with me, all you had to do was ask."

Her thigh pressed against mine. Her breath was warm on my neck.

I couldn't move.

And worst of all?

I wasn't sure I wanted to.

I could feel Yuki's judgement the exact same way I could feel Murasaki's impossibly soft and warm body pressed against mine.

"Oh, Ryu, why'd you have to save her? What am I saying? You saved the shoggoth. It would've choked to death on her fake eyelashes," said Yuki.

Murasaki couldn't hear, but I could.

The amethyst-eyed girl smiled at me and leaned forward. Then she smelled my school jacket. And her eyes flashed with jealous anger.

"Tsk, tsk, you positively smell like pot smoke and a litter box, darling. That's not good you know. What was wrong with my lemon and ginger, hmm?" she poked my chest.

She tried to appear playful, but beneath it I could sense boiling jealousy.

I put my finger against my mouth, shushing her.

Just then, Rōshi-sensei walked by the audio booth. We watched as he stopped by a row of books, grabbing the corner with his talon-like fingers and peering around the corner with his bald head and sharp, glassy eyes.

He waited a moment. He turned his long, bent nose to the air and we watched as he sniffed, turning his head left and right slowly.

Then he let go of the corner. "Bah! I must be hearing things again. Whatever happened to that Tsurara-onna? Never called me back once March came…"

We watched him wander away.

Murasaki turned back around to face me, the jealousy gone and replaced with something infinitely worse: adoration.

I felt her shift back and forth, playfully rubbing against me as she spoke. "Ryu-kun saved me! Ryu-kun, you really did it, and you weren't even charmed or anything!"

She gasped, her eyes growing wide and flashing like purple party lights. "Oh, that's so much better because—"

Her voice shrank to a whisper, as though she were almost afraid to let herself believe it. "That means what you felt was real."

I winced as though she'd slapped my face.

Then I heard Yuki. "What have you just done to her? Oh my gracious… you could break her if you're not careful."

I swallowed hard as I felt Murasaki's arms wrap around my waist, hugging me.

"Thank you," I heard her speak. Her voice was muffled against my chest.

I tried to ignore the creeping warmness I felt spreading from her body into mine. She stood on her tiptoes, practically putting her brunette hair, with blue highlights I noticed, under my nose, begging me to smell her hair.

I looked over and saw Yuki's ice blue eyes looking straight at me, silently screaming.

Tension kept my back as straight as a telephone pole, and I felt like I could snap at any second because I wanted to hug her back and fall into her arms. I wanted to let her hold me, cry, and say Murasaki, I'm falling apart, and right now you're the only thing holding me together by default.

The only thing stopping me was the image of Inego shaking his head no: bad move.

I felt Murasaki stirring. "You're so close to me right now," she whispered, more to herself than to me.

But her fingers slowly inched their way down my back, like an insect exploring new territory. "Darling, you knew what I was when you saved me, didn't you?"

Her voice slid across the room like silk over a dagger—low, playful, and polished, each word a brushstroke of honeyed threat.

She called me 'darling' like she already knew how the story ended, and I was just catching up.

My breath caught in my throat.

She grinned like a cat who'd just caught a mouse with its paw.

I said the only thing I could think of. "I heard what you said at Shin'yume-sou."

She looked a little confused. "When I invited you into the onsen? You barely spoke to me at all."

I shook my head. "No. Come on, you know what I mean. When you said you were lonely, okay?"

Her smile faltered for just a moment. Then she tried again. "Oh? That? Well—"

I didn't want to hear it, so I interrupted her. "That's what saved you, Murasaki, okay? The fact that I overheard you muttering about how lonely you were. Not your looks. Not your pouty lips, or your perfume, or the way you press yourself against me like it's an accident, because that's fake."

Her lips pursed and she narrowed her eyes at me. "Why, the very nerve—"

You messed with my thoughts, my emotions!

I took a breath, but she saw the anger flash in my eyes, and she stopped.

"Normally I wouldn't talk like that," I said. "But I'm tired as hell, and I don't even know what you want, or why you're messing with me in the first place."

I paused, feeling conflicted. "But, I didn't want you to 'feed the shoggoth' or whatever the hell Rōshi-sensei has."

Having gotten all of that out, my shoulders relaxed. I leaned against the back of the audio booth and watched Murasaki process everything I said.

Then I felt Yuki's cold presence at my side. "You're doing fine, Ryu. Just, please, be careful with her. She's going to use whatever you say against you."

Murasaki looked at me with her violet eyes. I watched as she studied me for a moment, then they lit up with more than a hint of mischief.

"Oh, Ryu-kun," she whispered, leaning closer to me.

I caught the faintest hint of lemon and ginger.

"As if I could stay angry at you, darling. After all, you did save me from that awful Shoggoth. Do you know what I think? I think you've more than earned a reward."

I inhaled sharply.

"What's she have planned now?" Yuki gasped.

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