Threads Tangled Together

Bankotsu: Omnisexual describes a sexual or romantic attraction to people of all genders or sexualities. These individuals can still have distinct preferences for certain personality or physical traits, or favor dating specific genders, even though their capacity for attraction includes everyone. This is the closest I to him as he’s attracted to strength which is not just physical, but also mental as well. For examples typically he’s attracted to men more than women due to their strength and personality. He can be attracted to women as well though.

𝐃𝐈𝐀𝐋𝐎𝐆𝐔𝐄 :

➔ you're gonna be okay , just keep your eyes on me. ➔ don't move - you're going to make it worse. ➔ it's not that bad. ➔ you saved me once before , now it's my turn. ➔ you fucking idiot , you weren't supposed to take the hit for me. ➔ i told you not to do that! now look! ➔ you're lucky that i know basic first aid , or you'd be dead! ➔ stay with me, okay? stay awake. ➔ i'll be as gentle as i can be , i promise. ➔ you're bleeding - oh my god , you're bleeding. ➔ you told me it was a scratch , this is not a fucking scratch! ➔ there's so much blood. ➔ next time you want to play here , just don't. ➔ stop fighting me and let me help! ➔ you're banned from doing anything remotely dangerous. ➔ you could have died , what were you thinking? ➔ if you die on me , i'm going to be pissed off. ➔ you didn't have to be so reckless just to prove a fucking point. ➔ the wound will heal but you'll have a scar.

𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐒 :

“All this worry, for what?”

Kikyo followed him out of the tavern as each step was measured, deliberate, though nothing about the act of walking felt natural anymore. Her hooves struck the warped floorboards behind him with hollow clicks that echoed too loudly in her ears, each sound a reminder of what her body had become. The tavern door groaned open, and the moment she crossed the threshold, the air changed. Kikyo’s gaze remained fixed on his back, on the coarse brown fur spreading across his neck, on the way his spine arched unnaturally beneath his clothing.

As she chuckled, humans were delightful! Their little hearts fluttered so prettily when threatened, their faces twisting into such entertaining masks of fear, but this one? Oh, this one was different. Bankotsu’s pulse hadn’t spiked once, not even when she’d kissed him with teeth sharp enough to split his tongue. His breath hadn’t hitched when the ice wall sealed them in. Even now, his grin stayed lazy, unbothered, like they were discussing the weather instead of his potential murder. How fun.

“Refusing to help me, when I have been nothing other than nice, like not eating you?”

Truly she expected such refusal, humans never failed to disappoint.

But this?

The moment her fingers snapped around his wrist, Bankotsu knew exactly where this was going, and there wasn’t even time to click his tongue about it. One second,d he was standing there, half-amused, half-bored, and the next, her body shifted. Legs melted away, bone and flesh rearranging with that wet, splintering sound that echoed louder than it should have. The sudden weight change yanked him forward hard enough to throw off his balance, boots skidding against frost-slick concrete, and then the world broke. The impact into the water punched the air out of his lungs in a violent rush, a shock so sharp his chest seized before he could even try to hold his breath properly. Saltwater forced its way into his mouth, burning his throat as instinct kicked in too late. The impact blurred everything, sound, sight, direction, as they plunged beneath in a churn of bubbles and fractured light.

Halsin's gaze settled on her when she offered her name, and in the midst of rot and shadow, it struck him as something strangely unbroken. He inclined his head once, solemnly, the gesture carrying more gratitude than words could easily hold.

Kikyo. His tongue never shifted in such a manner, nor did his lips as he pronounced it. He let the name settle on his tongue with quiet care, committing its shape to memory.

“I will guide you to the edge of this land.”

"You have already done more than most would dare." He spoke with a low voice, roughened by pain but steadying with each breath he drew. His broad hand pressed briefly to the blackened bark of the woven dome, feeling the curse eat at the living strands one patient bite at a time. The corruption moved slowly. Sluggish. Still, it moved all the same, and that alone was warning enough.

"Let us not waste the mercy you have given me."

The archdruid straightened to his full height despite the weakness that still clung to his limbs. Driven with determination, he turned his face toward the darkness beyond the failing barrier and closed his eyes for the briefest moment, reaching outward to listen not with his ears -- but with his deep connection towards beasts, roots and soil.

Beneath the screaming corruption and the smothering blight, the land still remembered itself, however faintly.

"There is an old trail." Halsin said quietly, opening his eyes. "Half-swallowed by stone and deadfall. It bends northeast toward the mountain pass. Before this curse, deer once crossed there in spring, and shepherds drove their flocks through the higher ridge."

With a soft snap of his fingers, a flickering mote of golden light shot forth, darting along the floor to outline a rudimentary trail of golden threads.

"If any path remains to us, it is that one."

As if in answer, a sudden noise struck the outer wall.

The vines shuddered. Black seeped through the lattice with long, grasping tendrils. Another impact followed, then a scraping chorus, hungry and persistent from every side at once. Halsin wasted no more breath on caution, stepping beside Kikyo as his shoulder nearly brushed hers.

"When it breaks, do not turn for any cry you hear behind us. The curse has many voices, and none of them speak the truth." The warning came from hard experience, though he suspected she needed to no lesson in danger.

The dome gave way a heartbeat later, bursting apart in a storm of leaves, thorns and fragments that once were.

Kikyo’s gaze did not waver as the dome shattered. She felt the vibration of the collapse under her feet, the hiss of corruption licking at the edges of the remaining lattice, and yet she remained composed, a slender figure of stillness amid the sudden tumult. The ravenette’s grip on her bow tightened, not out of fear, but in anticipation of what was to come. The shadows surged forward, writhing like smoke, black tendrils clawing at the air where the barrier had been, but the torchlight cast from the druid’s hand kept them at bay for now, flickering reflections of their rage dancing across her calm features. The human moved without hesitation, matching his stride as the air was heavy with the stench of rot and death, but Kikyo inhaled lightly, drawing strength from the faint pulse of light within her. Each step into the darkness felt deliberate and measured, yet the forest seemed to twist beneath their feet, roots writhing as though to snare them in a final act of spite. She ignored it, letting her own spiritual energy form an invisible corridor of safety around them, a subtle but constant warmth that pushed back the ever-pressing malice.

Her brown eyes flicked to the golden threads that danced along the ground, illuminating the path Halsin had uncovered. The woman could sense the faint echo of the land’s memory, the whispers of life that had once moved freely through this valley. It was weak, faint, but it guided her as surely as the stars once did across an open sky. She followed without a word, letting Halsin’s magic outline the remnants of the trail, noting every curve and jagged obstruction, committing it to memory should the threads falter. The shadows scream, beg, and threaten, and would twist into the voices of those she might have once known, but Kikyo had learned long ago the difference between truth and illusion. Her lips pressed together lightly, and she inclined her head once, acknowledging him, a silent promise that she would heed his counsel.

The first wave of corrupted matter recoiled at the torchlight, hissing and twisting in irritation. The priestess stepped forward, letting the flow of her energy pulse faintly in tandem with the torch’s glow. The trees themselves seemed to part subtly in their wake, guided by the faintest influence of her divine presence. Her hand brushed lightly against the shaft of her bow, fingers tracing the carved runes etched into its surface. Every instinct told her that danger was all around, not just from the shadows that now lunged hungrily toward them, but from the deeper corruption that waited silently, coiled beneath the earth, patient and inevitable.

“Why have you come to these lands, Halsin?” she murmured softly, her voice low, deliberate as her eyes scanned the surrounding gloom, the dense black of the Shadow-Cursed Lands pressing in from all sides. Yet, she stepped forward with confidence, letting the pulse of her spiritual light radiate outward, protecting, guiding, and affirming. The path ahead was narrow, treacherous, and far from guaranteed, but Kikyo did not falter. The priestess carved through the rancid dark beside him, a silent sentinel of light and precision, unwavering as the shadows shrieked and lunged. With a final glance at Halsin’s resolute form beside her, she allowed the first arrow to rest lightly against the string of her bow, ready for whatever shape the darkness dared take. “Let’s move,” she said again, softer this time, almost to herself, and stepped into the trail of gold, letting the rhythm of her footsteps fall in time with his own. The shadows would not take them as long as she drew breath, but they needed to keep moving as fast as possible before the curse would consume either of them.

𝘖𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘛𝘩𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘥 𝘖𝘧 𝘍𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘐𝘴 𝘛𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘭𝘦𝘥, 𝘐𝘵 𝘊𝘢𝘯𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘉𝘦 𝘜𝘯𝘥𝘰𝘯𝘦.

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Bankotsu's mocking voice hardly reached his eardrums, even with the tip of his fluffy ears poking out. He was too focused on the challenge, the surrounding, muffled sounds slowly turning into a buzzing sound.

Could his lungs really implode? Or would he pass out first, his face still plunged into the water, until his brains entirely ran out of air? Could this cause irrepairable damage to his nerves? How long had it been now?

Inosuke waited, and waited... until he felt his body start to seize up. He had touched the limit, but he wasn't quite ready to go past it. He emerged from the surface with a loud gasp, flailing and gasping for air with great splashes.

"H... hah?! I wasn't... cheating!" Inosuke gasped, flinching at the water Bankotsu flicked at him. He retaliated by slamming his hand on the water's surface, which splashed him as much as it splashed the young leader.

"It's not like... I can breathe... with my ears... you dumbass! I'll go again... and I'll hold my breath... even longer! So you better be... counting!"

Inosuke wasn't sure that he could count that long himself.

Bankotsu barked another laugh as the splash hit him square in the chest. Water ran down the hard line of his jaw, dripping from his chin, and he wiped it away with the back of his hand. “There you go. Now you look more like a proper beast,” he drawled. The undead corpse settled back against the stone again as the demon disappeared beneath the surface for a second time. This time, there were no twitching ears left behind, no obvious sign of him beneath the clouded water save the faint shadow of a wiry body crouched stubbornly at the bottom of the spring.

Bankotsu began to count slowly, his voice rolled lazily through the steam. “One…Two… three… four…” Truthfully, the boy had already lasted longer than he expected. Most children would have given up the moment their chest began to ache. Most adults, too, for that matter, but the halfbreed was all teeth and pride and sheer, the kind of creature that would run headfirst into a cliff just to prove he could break it. The ravenette’s grin tugged a little wider, though something sharper flickered behind it. He remembered when he met his other brothers with that same look in their eyes. The ones who threw themselves into fights too hard, too fast, because nobody had ever taught them there was a difference between being strong and destroying yourself. The human leaned his head back against the rock, pretending not to notice. “Twenty. Maybe you’ve got some demon blood in you after all.”

Blue eyes slid sideways through the steam before, in one smooth motion, he pushed off from the rock and crossed the spring in two strides, sending ripples through the steaming water. He caught Inosuke by the back of the neck and hauled him upward like a drenched, hissing cat. “There,” Bankotsu snapped, though there was more irritation than anger in it. “You win. Congratulations. Strongest mountain idiot I’ve ever seen.” He kept a firm hand on the back of the boy’s neck until the coughing eased, until he was certain the brat was breathing properly instead of trying to drown once again, as he wasn’t sure if the teenager had passed out or not. The ravenette reached over and flicked Inosuke hard in the forehead. “Use your head, can’t become king of anything if you drown in a puddle,” he muttered.

The padlock mocked him. Its steel gleamed under the flickering dock lights, utterly indifferent to his desperation. His claws, once sharp enough to shred flesh, scrabbled uselessly against the mechanism, leaving nothing but faint scratches. He snarled, a sound that might have been terrifying underwater but here dissolved into the storm like a dying fish’s gasp. Behind him, somewhere in the labyrinth of loading docks and storage crates, the distant hum of the aquarium’s nighttime generators thrummed like a heartbeat. His own pulse hammered louder. This was as far as he got, this was as far as he made it, but by the gods, he was not turning back.

Then saw her and looked up at her, rainwater sluicing down his face like the tank’s filtration runoff. His pupils were knife-thin slits in the downpour, the gold streaks in his irises dulled by exhaustion. For a heartbeat, they just stared, him crouched like a wounded animal, her standing with her hand outstretched, before his gills flared wide, sucking in air that tasted of diesel and wet concrete. "You!" He rasped, voice raw from disuse above water. The word wasn’t gratitude. Wasn’t accusation. Just a statement of fact, as if her presence was another inevitable torment.

“Help me?”

He lay in the spreading puddle beneath him, the rainwater pooling around his tail like a shallow, mocking imitation of the ocean. Each drop that hit his scales was a fleeting reprieve, just enough to keep his gills from drying out completely, just enough to prolong the slow suffocation of air. The storm had saved him, but only barely. His chest rose and fell in ragged bursts, every inhalation scraping his gills raw against the unfamiliar burn of oxygen. As he didn’t want her help, she left him there, didn’t trust him, thought he was weak or dangerous, but the choices, he had so little.

“…”

So slowly he nodded at her. Just once. A sharp, jerky motion that sent rainwater sluicing down the jagged ridge of his dorsal fin. There was no gratitude in the gesture, only necessity. His claws flexed against the asphalt, scoring shallow grooves into the blacktop. Trust was a luxury he couldn’t afford, but survival was non-negotiable. “Then help me.” As he held his hand out for her to take.

The moment his hand touched hers, Kikyo understood exactly how little time they had because his skin was wrong. The mermaid’s skin was too cold where it should have held life, too dry in places despite the relentless rain. Beneath her fingers, the texture of his scales had begun to change as the edges lifted, flaking where the air had already begun to claim him. She tightened her grip, not out of urgency alone, but to steady the subtle tremor running through him. It was not fear. The woman’s gaze moved over him quickly, clinically, though something quieter pressed beneath that practiced detachment. The rain struck harder, pooling beneath him, gathering along the length of his tail in shallow ripples. Kikyo could see it in the rhythm of his gills, how they still moved, strained but functioning. “You pushed too far without water,” she said quietly.

Her hand shifted slightly, bracing his wrist more securely as she adjusted her stance. His weight was unfamiliar like this, unbalanced, dragged down by gravity instead of supported by currents. Every movement he made worked against him, not with him. Her other hand came to his shoulder. “Do not fight the movement,” she instructed, her voice low, steady, something meant to cut through the haze of his pain. “You are not in water. If you force it, you will exhaust yourself before we reach anything that can sustain you.” She did not wait for agreement; instead, Kikyo shifted closer, guiding his arm over her shoulder with deliberate care. The contact was brief, controlled, but enough to redistribute his weight so he would not collapse back into the puddle that had become his only lifeline.

The distant hum of the facility still pulsed behind them, steady, mechanical. Down below, in the dark water, the sedative would still be working its way through massive bodies. Slower in one than the other. She had accounted for that, but not indefinitely. Her attention returned to Kaigaku as his breathing was still uneven, each inhale catching slightly, his gills struggling to process what little relief the rain offered. His pride had not left him, as she could feel it in the tension that remained in his arm, the way he still held himself just short of leaning fully into her support.

“We are not going through the gate,” Kikyo said, her tone shifting firmer now, more decisive. “You will not make it that far like this.” Her eyes moved past it, scanning the perimeter. A drainage channel ran along the side of the loading dock, half-hidden beneath the runoff pouring from the storm. “It will be enough,” she murmured, more to herself than to him. “Move with me,” she said, turning just enough to guide him. “Slowly. Do not waste strength.” Kikyo began to move, careful and deliberate, guiding him away from the useless gate and toward the narrow channel where water rushed steadily into darkness. The rain concealed their progress, softened their sounds, turned their escape into something the world might overlook if they were careful enough.