Led by an oni's arm.

	Anon’s vacation had turned into a nightmare. He had planned out all the usual tourist traps but after a discussion with a pair of cute university students added some off the beaten path locations. What should have been a brief detour into some of the rural areas of Japan became a quagmire of undergrowth and neglected buildings. Many items were out of place, old telephone poles, rusted out car frames from the 1910s, track for a steam train, and other anachronisms. Then night came and problems really started. Attacks by creatures ripped straight out of an antique scroll, kept trying to bite a chunk out of Anon. He took refuge within an ramshackle old building built at the base of a mountain. The youkai seemed more reluctant to attack through one controllable point of entry and risk a counterattack, but they had gotten closer each night, slowly testing when he would be most vulnerable. Trapped and passing the time, Anon began examining the woodwork of the building to distract himself during the less dangerous daytime hours. One of the cracks in the wood caught his attention. The scenery through it was more appropriate to the springtime, not the fall season he entered in. Checking it repeatedly throughout the day, the scenery moved a bit each time, closer and closer to a large Chinese building that was deeper within the area beyond the crack. “Hey pal, you gonna stay out there and die?” A voice from beyond the crack addressed Anon. “Who said that!?” He retreated back off, preparing for an attack. “I’m the one who’s gonna save your sorry ass, unless you’d prefer to be dinner for those weakling youkai about to rip your soft tender flesh off your bones?” The voice answered. Turning to the falling dusk, Anon looked back to the wall and responded “I can’t get through here, is there an alternate entrance?” “Just place your hand against the crack and walk forward, like you’re pushing a curtain out of the way.” Doubtful but, running out of time, he did as he was bid. Pushing on the crack and taking a step forward, he found himself in front of the large house and a board with a similar crack in it planted into the ground behind him. “I’m deeper in the house, come on before the landlord returns,” the rough female voice conveyed from beyond. Pulling back the sliding doors Anon observed what looked like a training hall. Sparsely decorated and in a Chinese style. “Up two floors, the room at the end of the hall,” the voice directed him. Having found the room anon entered it to find nothing. Only some sparse furniture and a wooden box lying on a shelf .“On the windowsill dummy.” “First I’m chased by monsters, now boxes are talking, I must have gone insane from stress.” “I’m surprised you can still joke given the circumstances, maybe I should just eat you and be done with it?” Anon quickly changed the subject, “well I suppose I should thank you for saving me from an eventual ambush in that hut.” “Don’t thank me just yet, the landlord will eventually be back, and if that happens your odds of surviving change drastically.” The image of what an entity capable of making it’s own dimension would do to intruders caused Anon to break into a cold sweat. “So you brought me here to get killed your owner, that’s hardly any better than where I was!” “Nope, I brought you here to make a deal.  Partner with me, and I’ll help protect you from the locals and show you the exit.” Anon’s doubts resurfaced. “If you're so powerful, why not just get up and leave yourself?” A pair of shadow jaws bit onto his neck, lifting him up and drawing a trickle of blood. I would kill you right now, but I can’t go out of my own will! That’s why you’ve gotten more second chances from me than any other human in history.” The phantom jaws released Anon’s neck, blinking out of existence and dropping Anon to his knees. Rising up and running a hand over his neck Anon replied, “alright, I’ll partner with you, just get me out of here alive.” “Good, now pull me out of the box and we can make this official.” Anon opened the box and grabbed the item within. A mummified arm with a wrist iron and long nails. “See, was that so difficult?” The voice vibrated along the arm, not emanating from any one spot. “At least you don’t have any physical mouths attached to you,” Anon had imagined much worse. “So now that I have you out of the box, do I shake hands with you to make it official?” “Nah, just hold me backwards for a moment.” Anon flipped the dried arm so it pointed towards himself. “That'll do,” the voice purred.

The arm twisted, jamming its nails into his shoulder. Sliding through the connective tissue and muscle the mummified fingers got behind the socket and pushed out Anon’s arm, letting the live limb fall with a meaty smack to the floorboards! Pausing in shock for an instant, as the damage started to register, Anon screamed in pain and stumbled back onto the floor. The mummified arm skittered to him, gripping his side and jamming its severed end into the newly opened socket. Anon let out a choked scream as the mummified flesh dug into him, his blood vessels and muscles being forced to connect to the arm’s. Mercifully a consciousness intruded into his mind, pushing him out of his waking mind. Anon’s tearing eyes closed in relief. Less than a minute later the lids parted again, with new slit pink pupils. Getting back on his feet, Right wiped his eyes, then stopped to gaze at the right arm. The flesh was still arranging itself, but had mostly connected. The withered skin of the arm was noticeably improved, healing in sync with each pulse of  blood from the body. Though unbearable for a wimp like Anon, Right felt not but a light itching from his closing wound. “I can’t remember the last time I had to work with someone so weak, you’re gonna need to improve a lot to make this work, partner,” Right taunted his new host. Right picked up Anon’s old arm up with a hungry smile, “well tonight at least we can celebrate our deal with a meal and..?” Rummaging through the shelves, Right pulled out four bottles, each clasped between his fingers. “Not quite what I was looking for, but it’ll do. Least I can do since you provided tonight's meal,” Shadow said with a hungry grin. Opening a fanged mouth he stripped the flesh from Anon’s poor arm. Upon leaving the Senkai, all that was left of Anon’s bargain was a bit of dried blood and some bones left on the floor.

Blue eyes reflected the dim ceiling of the shack. Grabbing the wrist of his right arm to ensure it was still attached, Anon let out a light breath of relief. Judging by the empty bottles scattered through the room Anon concluded he must have binge drunk the night away to cope with his stress, though uncertain of where he had gotten it. Looking about his borrowed shack, Anon felt a burning sense of being wronged. Being trapped in this broken down hovel by a bunch of youkai grunts who didn't deserve the air they were breathing! If he saw them next night he was going to show them who was on top of the food chain! Brushing off the thought, Anon took a steady gait south. There was a human settlement a while off and he needed to shake someone down for breakfast and more booze. Some of his would-be hunters took a try at him on the way, but found a right arm punching, crushing, or otherwise beating them, and eventually they decided against testing the newly empowered outsider.
“Glug, glug glug, ahhh!! That’s better, I can actually feel this stuff burn.” Wiping his mouth with a sleeve anon leaned back onto the wall. His raid had gone well, there was plenty of alcohol and food to steal. Though out of place, Anon had been quite stealthy. When he was caught pilfering through the storage room of a manor, a quick grabbin of the witness's head and a light bang against a wall was enough to knock him out. “Enjoying ourselves?” The woman’s voice came from no particular direction. Placing down the bottle, Anon rose and surveyed his surroundings. Nothing had tried to eat him since the morning, but it was still possible one would try, or someone had come trying to avenge his earlier theft. Wait a minute “I stole from someone, in broad daylight no less!” “Of course you did, what were you supposed to do, starve and die? Humans exist to provide us with sustenance, they should be grateful to give it up to someone as splendid as myself, even if you’re attached to me.” Anon’s right arm moved up and cupped his jaw. “Did you forget our deal, partner? I’ll keep you safe and you’ll take me where I need to go. We both agreed, so you don’t get to back out now.” “You knew that place was there the whole time didn’t you!? What other thoughts did you plant in my mind!” Anon accused his new limb. Popping some grilled meat in his mouth and silencing him, the right arm then gripped the left hand firmly and the voice spoke  again. “Don’t be so ungrateful!  Who do you think took care of you on our first night in your hovel, why else would I leave you with the knowledge of that village if not to feed yourself?” Anon couldn’t argue with the voice, the pleasant drunkenness, and having a full stomach were slowing his ability to argue back. The right arm upturned the palm of the left and started massaging it at the joints of the fingers. “I put you to sleep after you couldn’t take the pain of our first meeting. I moved you from being desperately hunted to being top of the food chain. That podunk village out of time won’t even be a concern once we’re done here.” Anon’s increasingly addled mind was gently reassured, and the right arm moved on from the now feminine and clawed left arm and moved onto massaging an ear. “Just yesterday you were a weakling struggling to survive, and happy, fed and secure, because of what I’ve lent you” Anon was no longer capable of stringing together words, as the sweet drunkenness, the right arm’s tender massage and sweet words had put him into a blissful trance. As the arm moved over him, his body came to resemble the original host’s, body hairs loosened and released out of their shafts, vertebrae and tissue condensing and shrinking down several inches. His previously blonde hair grew out to his shoulders, turning pink as it went. His jaw adopted a gentle slope and plush lips, concealing a larger set of canines behind them. The hips pushed out from the inside becoming wider, the legs got plumper at the thighs and the buttocks became rounded and full. Anon’s rising body heat compelled him to unzip his jacket, and kick off his loose pants for ventilation. Reaching down with his left hand, he seized what was left of his manhood and began to pull. The right arm moved to Anon's chest, kneading his pecs and eventually pinching his nipples. Working in concert Anon’s chest began to swell, obscuring his vision of his waist, as his nipples thickened and areolas expanded. Finally at climax Anon’s sight was obscured by his new breasts, seeing only a thin string shoot out from below him. The last of his hereditary information expelled, the shrunken organs retracted into the new hollow cavity inside her belly, becoming a new pair of ovaries. Lastly a pair of white nubs pushed out through Anon’s skull, the first growths of a newmade oni, drooling from both her lips.
Do you remember where you were originally staying? “Ahh, yes.” Anon murmured after swallowing the food Right had given her.  “Good.” Right took over with a smirk and Anon’s legs got up and started walking away with her. “ I’ll take us outside, then you can lead us from that point onward, I promised to take you out of here after all.” “And what will.. you do once we’re both out?” Anon inquired with what little lucidity she had left. “I’m gonna show you how to party properly. Now lie back, I’ll bring you out when I need you again” the arm cooed to Anon, pushing her mind out of awareness and into the dark.

	Anon was drooling in the afterglow. That night had gotten them more flesh and pleasant company than she had tasted in her entire previous life. Tongues were taken in lust, then taken out in hunger, suffering made long by cutting motor nerves short. Trudging back drunkenly, Anon’s mouth was leaking from her previous meals. The hotel had been a great hunting ground, lightly populated, she had been able to go room to room and take her time with each of the guests. The building had been built with thick walls that ensured no one had any notion of what was going on until it was their turn. Right was also quite pleased with her partner, not only had she been very compliant, this partner applied a new method to her hunting. Not as loud or prideful as the oni of old, Anon took a much slower method with her kills. More serial killer than monster, it was still a rapid improvement from the frightened outsider she first bargained with. The whole thing had taken multiple whole days to finish. By the time the concierge found the stripped skeletons, Anon and Right had slipped out and returned to the mountain shack with a bounty of stolen liquor and viscera stains on her clothes. Anon had become an almost complete vessel, taking the plunge on human flesh had added to the previous changes. Small nubs had pushed farther out of the skull and gained a hard brown coating, becoming a pair of almost 15 centimeter horns. The slightly effeminate nails were grown out and thicker, now being proper claws. The effeminate oni had become a fully fledged terror, and Right allowed herself to feel a sense of pride at her work. She didn’t have the same dignity as her original host, but she was well on her way. There was more than enough strength in this body to confront her previous partner. She’d need full control to do it, but Anon could easily be made to switch over for a bit. What bothered her was what would happen after that. She still wanted to rejoin with her inferior half and become Ibaraki-Douji again, but would it be possible? Even the time her partner betrayed her, she had joined consensually, but would it be possible now? Right could always just hold her down and force a connection, a complicated maneuver, but doable. Maybe she should just stick Anon, but she might start to fight back once she was sober again. Anon may not even have the potential to reach the same heights as Ibaraki-Douji did. This venture proved that she could just pick another host if she felt this one was holding her back, but would a replacement be needed? A scraping sound and the smell of wet dirt interrupted her thoughts, her current partner had arrived at the shack and had started using her new claws to rip open the soil. “Partner, what the hell are you doing?”  “Digging out a bathtub,” Anon replied. “Stop that, an oni’s claws shouldn’t be use for such low class labor!” “Then what am I supposed to do? I haven't bathed in forever.” Anon whined. “Here let me show you a trick for that.'' The right arm pierced into the dirt, pulling out a wet skeleton. Called by the first motion, nine others pulled themselves out of the ground. “Finish this hole, my partner wants to wash up.” Shadow commanded. The skeletons moved about to their task, some kneeling down and further excavating the hole, others picked up tools and materials to line it with. “Wow, what else can we do? “Anon gazed at her arm with wonder. “A great many things, and as you and I grow we’ll be capable of a lot more. Oni are capable of producing a great variety of wondrous items and techniques. What you’re looking at is nothing, I used to have a lot more subordinates back in my heyday,” the arm bragged. “Still I have one last thing to handle, so why don’t you hit the hay while I handle it, then you can bathe by the time my servants are done.” “Why can’t I do this,” Anon whined. Right arm popped a bottle of stolen maotai into her mouth. “You’ve been partying for two days straight, let your partner handle things while you get some rest,” the arm assured Anon. Sucking down the liquor Anon let her blue eyes close, and slumped down, reassured by her partner. Right’s pink eyes opened up and she moved to the crack she left in the Senkai. She hadn’t made a firm decision as of yet, but it was time to make a move before either of her partners had figured out what was going on. Kasen would eventually find the extra entrance, and Anon needed to be alone and pliable to be convinced to not start fighting back when finally returned to her senses. Slipping through the crack in the back of the shack, Right entered the warm air of the Senkai, a wild oni hunting a horned hermit.

	Right made a brisk place to the manor, pink eyes hunting for her prey in the dark. The animals scampered out of the way sensing the ill will of their owner’s evil twin. Sliding open the screen, right checked the dojo composing the first floor. “Nothing.” Moving up the stairs to the second floor, Right moved through the hall with measured, discrete steps, cracking open the doors and checking inside. “Nothing.” That meant her target was on the third floor. Moving up to the last floor, Right approached the room where they both had slept, using a pair of extended claws to slide open the screen. There she was, her old partner, the one who willingly split them again, legs crossed in a meditative trance. Tensing up Right crouched back, moving her left arm to the door and extending the claws on her right. One shot wouldn’t kill her, but it would definitely give her the edge needed to either eat her or reconnect. Footsteps echoed from behind. The Hakurei miko slid out of a shimmering barrier running up the side of the wall. A piece of metal was wrapped in the bandages at the tip of her gohei. Right turned and braced for a hit, the miko flying down the hallway and flipping the gohei up in one motion, slinging it under Right’s armpit. The resilient arms of the oni took the physical hit like a champ, hardly even a lovetap! The embedded spiritual attack was much more devastating. Right felt an itching then a tearing sensation at her shoulder. Vessels and connective tissue began pulling apart, the individual cells connecting them exploding! Anon’s consciousness awoke in distress, and for a moment both let out an agonized scream, as the right arm was cut from its host. Kasen’s still facade disappeared, she leapt out from her bedroom, grabbing the mummified arm and slamming it into a new sealed box! Anon fell to the floor, having woken up to her arm sliced off yet again. Reimu didn’t pause, throwing needles into Anon’s remaining limbs to hold her still. The miko walked over and gave a withering gaze to Anon, angry at all the effort she’d been forced to expend over the past few days. Planting her knees into Anon’s ribs, the miko grabbed one of Anon’s horns pulling her up to make eye contact. “Do you have any idea how long it took me to hunt you down? First an outsider robs the village, then the arm goes missing, only to disappear for two days. Then you show up as an oni and I have to wait for you to make this attack. I’ve had entire incidents that took less time and effort for me to resolve than this petty theft! Anyone else would be dead after pulling what you did, but technically the only thing you did was an assault and burglary, and I’d say you’ve been punished plenty enough for that.” Reimu’s left fingers slid up to the open shoulder and pressed on Anon's injury. Anon winced in distress, unable to remove the offending fingers from her immobilized body. The top half of her horn broke off, Reimu grabbed a handful of Anon’s hair and forced eye contact again. “If I catch you trying for that arm, robbing a house, or laying a finger on one of the villagers again, I’ll kill you dead and you can get started on your sentence in hell early, understand?” Anon nodded, not wanting to aggravate, this sociopath that lept on her ribs and jammed her fingers inside her wounded shoulder. Reimu rose from Anon’s ribs and pulled the needles out her remaining three limbs. Assuming a cold smile, she then shouted, “now, GET OUT!” Cracking the gohei like a whip, and giving a light burn to Anon’s legs. Pulling herself up, she ran down the stairs stumbling just shy of the bottom floor, fear pushing her back up and moving forward. Trailing a thinning line of blood on the ground Anon fled back to her sanctuary in the land of fantasy, her abandoned shack.

	Soaking in the completed pool, Anon had something she hadn’t had in a while. A clear and unclouded mind, no brain parasites, booze, or homicidal love-making to stop her thinking about what had happened. The faces of her unwilling lovers, as she finished playing with their bodies and eating them instead. Severing a tourist’s spinal cord and forcing her to watch as boyfriend was eaten, only to move on and eat her alive. Using their still wet bones to do her manual labor. Anon massaged her remaining horn only for most of it to break off in her hand. “Figures,” Anon threw the fragment out into the woods beyond, leaving the short white nubs she started with. Her pulse started to quicken, thinking about her short and intense atrocities committed. “There’s no coming back from this! My face is either on a wanted poster or the side of a milk carton. Maybe both!” She wasn’t some kind of monster, it was the arm’s fault!  “Those crimes occurred for no other reason than I got unlucky and ended up having some bad encounters,” Anon attempted to persuade herself.  “No, it wasn’t all the arm’s fault.” She sunk lower into her bath. “The arm gave me the means, and pushed me, but I never once fought it. I never stopped to think about what I was doing. It was fulfilling my desires at least as much as its own,” Anon admitted to herself. Her eyes wandered to her new body. Plump breasts obscured her lower body through the water. She couldn’t even enjoy her new body. The memories of her actions kept creeping in from the dark parts of her mind, intruding on her conscious thoughts and interfering with what was supposed to be a recovery. Anon had given up on sleep. Her attempts lasted barely an hour before being ended by images of her previous actions, arrest by the police, or being killed by the shrine maiden, waking her up in a fit. There was only one other person who could possibly know what Anon was going through, one that had already moved past it. Lifting herself out of the pool, Anon struggled to put on the now odd fitting clothes and prepared for a long search. The entrance to the Senkai had been sealed, but the arm had still left something for Anon to get back in with. In Anon’s mind was an accounting of the animals kept within. And amongst them was one Anon could easily spot and follow. A distinctive silhouette that had been lurking in a distant tree, watching her. A massive, but slow eagle.


	“And here I thought this issue was put to rest,” Kasen Ibaraki thought. The previous day's events had confirmed it, the arm had become capable of bonding with new hosts. “I’m surprised it had condescended to fuse to a human. And it was capable of reaching out and altering the Senkai.” The new partner was completed in a remarkable time. Over three days what had been an outside young man, had become an almost fully complete female oni. Thankfully the arm and her new partner lacked subtlety and it allowed Reimu time to set up an ambush. “Of course she’d still want to settle things with me,” Kasen reflected on why she knew where her arm was going to go. It was eerie how close the host had looked to her and more unsettling to how quickly the predatory gaze had switched to fear. She hadn’t even tried to retrieve the arm or fight back, fleeing immediately. How long had the human inside been awake for? Were they complicit from the very beginning, influenced like some form of possession, or just body jacked and woke up missing an arm, assaulted by Reimu, and residing in a female oni body? The victim hadn’t done much interesting since being kicked out, returning to the abandoned building, having a fitful night of rest, then giving up and taking a bath. And there was still the question of what to do with her. Having a clone of herself bumbling around with an indeterminate amount of knowledge that she would rather be kept secret, wasn’t the most reassuring thought. She’d need to be more properly confronted, preferably before one the sages or oni got around to her first. The spying eagle looked concerned at his master’s prolonged silence. “I’m just thinking about something, don’t worry.” Kasen reassured the oversized bird, petting. “Scrunch, scrunch, scrunch, crack!” Ending her stride by breaking a branch, her new twin announced her presence. Looking like a vagrant parody of herself, the twin had deep bags under her eyes and dried gore smeared on ill fitting clothing. Apparently she needed to move the Senkai’s entrance again. Rising to her feet Kasen inquired “how did you get back in here?” The twin replied “ I followed the eagle back in.” Ah that explained it, those two would know what came in and out, and she tracked her way in from there. “So, why did you come back here?” Going to try to steal the arm again?” Kasen gave an accusatory look.  Puffing up and drawing back her shoulders, the twin’s expression intensified. “Is she about to fight, cry, explode!” Kasen's mind raced through the possibilities, trying to decipher what such an intense change in body motion heralded. Throwing herself to the ground in a lopsided dogeza. “Please tell me how to live with myself after what I’ve done!” The outsider begged. “Huh?” Kasen uttered, expecting violence not a petition for help. Anon continued “I know you were the partner of that thing before I was, and I get the impression you two were together a while before you abandoned her. I don’t have anyone else who knows what I’m going through, and best as I can tell you’ve managed to move on, even after being with it for a lot longer than I was! Please I can’t live with guilt anymore, it’s chewing me up from the inside out!” Kasen walked over to her twin, kneeled down and tilted her face up, looking directly at her eyes. “Are you here to steal the arm again?” Kasen asked again. “N-no!” Anon squeaked out. “How many people did you kill on your rampage?” Kasen asked. “Nu- nu- seh, ten!” The twin coughed out after choking on her initial lies. “Well she can’t lie anymore,” Kasen mentally noted. “Tell me the full list of the crimes you two committed and don’t leave any out.” Kasen commanded. Anon turned her head to the side, reluctant to give such an in-depth accounting of events. “Do it or you can go back, face your demons on your own and see how you fair!” Kasen threatened her twin. Flinching then turning back Anon started. “ We robbed the local village, beat the ones that got in our way, broke into other peoples rooms, assaulted, ate and killed them and tortured them for our entertainment. “You’re leaving out something.” Kasen stated. “I also crippled and violated them for my own enjoyment!” Her twin responded, tearing up. “And what’s the first thing you’re leaving out?” Kasen demanded from her lookalike. “I broke into your home and stole your arm for my own use!” Anon cried out. Grabbing Anon’s tongue with her fingers, she probed further, “was it this mouth that ate so many innocent people?!” “Yesh ish was this one.” Anon gagged out. “Grabbing Anon’s remaining hand and pulling it, Kasen asked," Was it this hand that was laid on innocents and used to harm them?!” “Yesh it was this one!” Anon slurred out her tongue not yet released” Removing both hands from their prior position and grabbing Anon’s face, bringing it close Kasen more quietly asked “does this person deserve peace?” “N-no.” Anon sobbed out. Kasen grabbed Anon right below the shoulders, taking care to avoid the injured one and brought her into a hug. “The path to redemption starts with admitting one’s mistakes. Alright, I’ll teach you how to move on, you’ll walk the path of the hermit and I will teach you. It will take a lot of time to burn off your sins, but if you’re willing I’ll show you how.” Anon’s face lightened up briefly, elated at finding someone who was willing to help her after all she'd done, everything she’s lost, everything she’d been bottling up. A choking sob turned into a prolonged one, crying out her feelings in Kasen’s embrace. Gently stroking her twin’s head Kasen comforted Anon “go on let it all out, you’ve been through a lot the last few days.” Anon did exactly that.

Anon had fallen soundly asleep in a futon on the second floor. After discharging all her pent up emotional energy and the physical drain of hunting down this place while wounded, her body had finally given out, now permitted to do so by her lightened mind. Kasen was upstairs arranging the contents of a dark wooden box. Resting inside and on top of a swatch of synthetic fabric were the bones of Anon’s old right arm. Kasen considered giving it to Anon as a present when she’d been rehabilitated. Still Anon’s sins were a comparatively short, but severe list. To do away the stains on her soul would require not only self discipline, but some virtuous acts and a lot of time doing them. Perhaps she could help with incident resolution once her strength had grown. Of course she would have to repay Kasen, helping her with sage duties, chores, and any other favors she asked, almost like having her own shikigami to do her bidding. Placing the dark box of human bones, next to the one containing her arm, Kasen locked them both in a secret compartment, hidden from any more wanderers. The oni’s arm had been more thoroughly sealed to prevent it from whispering to potential new hosts and poking holes in the Senkai. Closing the compartment, Kasen sighed and thought about the future. “First she’s going to have to bury those skeletons, then I have to develop a training regimen, hide the entrance again so she can’t just break out, then I have to educate her about all the ins and outs of Gensokyo. I’m gonna need to get her some new clothes not covered in blood as well, and that don’t make her look like an unhoused vagrant.” Leaving the trouble for tomorrow Kasen took a que from her new disciple and left the problems for the morning.