From discord to destiny

Six months ago, I met the girl of my dreams. Sakuya. Emerald green eyes, jet-black hair. And a smile that could stop a man’s heart in an instant.

We met online. On a Discord server, to be exact. I had recently graduated high school, and for university, I got the opportunity to study in Japan. It was an opportunity of a lifetime. However, as a requirement, I needed to dedicate one year to familiarizing myself with the language. I needed to bring myself up to a basic conversational level before starting school, and in hopes of doing that, I accepted an invite to join a Discord language-learning group chat. The very same server where I would eventually meet her.

Sakuya.

She was one of the part-time Japanese tutors on the platform. I introduced myself in the main chat as a prospective foreign student wanting to learn easy, conversational Japanese, and she was the very first person to reach out to me.

“Hi there!” she typed. “I’m Sakuya! Welcome to the group!”

Her profile was an image of a silly-looking anime girl dressed in an oversized kimono while striking an exaggerated fighting stance. Her role was a Japanese-to-English tutor, and her "About Me" section simply read: My life is a shonen, but I’m still waiting on my theme song hahaha.

Right off the bat, I was both interested and curious about the kind of person she might be. A few other people eventually began responding to my initial message, offering to be my private Japanese teacher, but I just sent a thank-you notice to the group as Sakuya had already agreed to be my tutor.

“Are you sure?

Because I do have the money specifically for this.

It was included in the scholarship program by the university.”

While texting in DMs, Sakuya had absolutely refused to accept money for being my teacher.

“It is fine. Yes, I’m sure.

My English is also not very strong, so we can learn together.

No need for payment.

I will not accept.”

After making her steadfast decision not to be paid, I decided to move on with the conversation. We created a weekly timetable for the lessons, which were done via voice calls and video calls. Her voice was high-pitched, soft, and carried a gentle current of innocence underneath it. Her face, when I saw it for the first time during our live video chat, left me dumbfounded for a few seconds.

“Umm…” I had said, momentarily forgetting what we were even meant to be doing. I just kept gazing at her emerald green eyes and long black hair. She was pretty. She was also wearing a plain white kimono at the time. It was simple but looked good on her. Really good.

“So, ready to begin, Jumo-san?” she asked me in the video while performing a small bow in front of the camera. From the way it looked, she wasn’t at her house. She was in some kind of internet café. Also, the way she pronounced my name was amusing and made me smile. No matter how many times I tried teaching her to say my name during our voice chats, her native accent always got in the way. It was cute, and I liked it.

Fast forward two months, and our relationship was starting to slowly head in a different direction. We weren’t just tutor and student anymore. Somehow, we had grown a little closer. We texted each other even after our lessons were done for the afternoon, we told each other about our day, what we had for dinner, and what our plans were going to look like for that week. At some point, I may or may not have intentionally let my growing feelings about her slip during one of our midnight voice calls. But the response I got was encouraging, and soon enough, she may or may not have slipped up too.

Four additional months later, and I finally made a decision. I was going to visit Japan early, even before the new school year began. Sakuya was my main reason for doing this, as despite the fact that we were both aware of the unspoken feelings between us, we weren’t really sure what to do about it. I was going to be studying at a college in Tokyo, while she lived and worked at a temple in a small town. In terms of proximity, we weren’t going to be all that close. That’s why we both agreed to see each other first before jumping into any labels. We wanted to know if we were a good fit and if things between us could work. And deep down, I really hoped they did.

“Calling all passengers, now boarding flight to Tokyo, Japan, at gate B12.”

At the airport announcer’s voice over the intercom, I got up from my seat and began making my way to gate B12, my suitcase rolling along behind me with a tug. After all the times I fell asleep while on a call with her, and all the mornings of waking up with her messages being the first thing I read, I was finally going to meet her in person. I was finally going to meet the girl of my dreams.

***

"Sakuya, listen to me. Take your sisters and run," her father said, kneeling in front of her. "Find Kanna and run as far as you can."

All around the two of them, the world was in chaos. People were screaming. Houses were burning. The smoke made it difficult for the little girl to keep her eyes open, and she was starting to cough.

They were everywhere. Monsters. Spirits. Massive creatures that resembled spiders with scorpion tails, and they were killing people. The temple had fallen, and the villagers were dying.

"Sakuya, look at me," her father said, drawing her attention away from the carnage. There was something in her father's eyes. Fear. Worry. All of the above.

"Run! Go find Kanna, and I will go find your mother. Go now! Go—"

Thwack

Her father’s eyes grew wide, and he suddenly stopped speaking. Something had burst through his chest from the back.

"Papa?" she said. "Papa!"

Tears flowed down her face as Sakuya looked down and found the reason her father had suddenly gone silent. A massive stinger was sticking out where his heart should have been.

She screamed. The stinger retracted, and her father coughed up blood before falling to the ground. And behind him was the woman who had orchestrated the attack on the villagers, the temple, and killed her father.

Kuchisake-onna.

She was standing beside one of the spider creatures, petting it like a dog in a disgustingly well-done manner. Her hair was jet black, her kimono was pure white and stained with blood, and her face was just as the legends had described—a horrible, slit-mouthed woman with an evil grin.

Frozen with fear, the little girl could only stand there as the slit-mouthed woman ordered her pet to strike her down. But before the creature could take aim, someone quickly pulled her out of the way.

That was when she woke up.

That was always when she woke up.

With a jolt.

...

Sakuya jumped out of bed into a sitting position. Strands of her hair stuck to her forehead as she had been sweating in her sleep. The nightmare was a recurring aspect of her life, ever since she was little. And although she had learned to live with it, she could never get used to the feeling.

She plopped back down on her pillow out of exhaustion while letting out a sigh. It was daybreak, and she needed to head out for her early morning patrol. Before that, however, she thought as she reached for her nightstand and picked up her phone. She smiled when she saw it. Jumo had already left her a voice message for that morning on Discord.

Settling back into her covers, she still couldn't believe it. He was coming. He was coming to Japan. As her thumb hovered over the play button, she allowed her mind to wander a bit.

Once upon a time, she joined an online language-learning group chat in hopes of helping people interested in learning her language. Among all the craziness surrounding the temple and her village, it was the only normal part of her life where she could feel, well, normal. But along the way, she met him. Jumo. An awkward boy from Africa. He was almost never serious, joked a lot when he was nervous, and had a tendency to sometimes make her forget she was living a double life ripped straight out of an anime.

She had almost told him how she felt this one time. But it was okay. He had basically almost done the same. But now that he was coming, she would be lying if she said she wasn't worried.

Jumo was normal. Cute, funny, but ultimately normal. She, on the other hand, was the opposite of normal.

She wasn't sure how to tell him about this part of her life. She wasn't sure how he would take it, understand it, or even process it. One slip-up, and everything would come crashing down. That's why she had kept the secret from him. Sakuya knew she would eventually have to tell him someday, but it wasn't today, or tomorrow, or the day after that.

She pressed play on the voice message, but before she could hear anything, she was interrupted.

Bam!

Her bedroom door flew open, and there stood her little sister, Shiun.

"Hey! What did I tell you about barging into my room, huh?"

Sakuya was about to scold her little sister for what seemed like the millionth time, as the girl tended to lack the basic understanding of privacy and respect. But then she realized Shiun wanted to say something.

"What is it?" Sakuya demanded, eager to continue listening to the voice message Jumo had left her.

The purple-haired girl standing in the doorway took in a deep breath before responding.

"A bunch of Inugami spirits are attacking the village market!" she shouted. "Ash and Aunt Kanna are still out on patrol, so you need to get going before—"

Sakuya was already on the move before her little sister could finish talking. In that moment, she must have resembled a gust of wind as she shot past Shiun on her way to grab her things from the hallway.

A bunch of Inugami spirits attacking the marketplace was bad news. She needed to get there before anyone got hurt.