Rumia was definitely being raped.

The night was calm – a moon like a plump, toothsome dango aloft in the blackness. Scents of spring grew thick in the forest, a night breeze making the trees wave their branches, excited to waken again. And if you thought trees couldn’t wave, you hadn’t flown around the things on a windy night. On that forest’s floor, on the soft, mossy ground where small game made its home and bigger game licked its chops, a human lay relaxed, straddled by the petite youkai of darkness.

A rod of terrible girth was gripped in a fist, readied for a strike should Rumia but make a fist herself. And even with its top thrown wide open and the trousers skinned down to the man’s ankles, Rumia recognised the star-adorned robes of religious power. The man, possessed of some years and such grit as she could tell, was just that, too. An onmyouji: a fixer of all things strange, youkai chief among them. A man of either prodigious skill or long, long expertise.

Rumia didn’t need her current position or the tingly fullness inside her belly to tell; the solid trouncing she had received in the previous half-hour spoke loudly enough. Last night must have been bad. Not that she knew how or why.

Humans acted truly perplexing in the best of times and seemed to spend their entire lives that way. A gaggle of hollering men and crying women had looked such easy prey. Turned out they hadn’t been, all scattering at the mere hint of the skulking darkness. Moreover, they turned out to not be of a mind to let sleeping fears lie.

Not a sundown later, the exorcist’s long silhouette stretched into view; to snare the little youkai’s home turf must have been mere minutes. Out she had crept to prowl the night’s purple shadows and he was already on her.

The duel must have been vicious. Rumia couldn’t vouch it had been, on account she had been blinded throughout every bit but the final one. And once she had lain, beaten, staring down the rod’s pointed end, now recognising it as a purifying tree limb, Rumia had found at last where she had erred. The mistake had been simple in hindsight.

Simple as space, time, and some composition thereof. A poorly chosen one, at that.

“The boy,” the exorcist had growled. A low, raspy growl. A loosed hound snarling into the dark. “From the village. You ate him?”

Not a trace, not a twitch of muscle anywhere when Rumia shook her head. It’d be three more before the exorcist would acknowledge her ignorance. Then, he questioned her. On the boy’s vanishment. On other youkai in the area. The nearby benighted shrine. Weird happenings of late – of which Rumia had not the first clue.

Exasperated at the uselessness of his catch, the occult-seeker relented in the end. He raised the deadly tool and allowed Rumia find her feet.

But not to flee.

“Hold fast, youkai!” he barked, sooner than Rumia could spin about. “We’ve talk to make yet.”

“Rumia.”

The correction came more as a reflex than any desire for familiarity. Naming herself seemed to thaw human iciness. If it worked in this case, though, this human was imperceptibly warmed.

“What?” she asked, seeing him thwap an open palm with his instrument.

“I avow your blamelessness,” he had said, “and shall not accost a creature I have not been prayed to accost. However, I shall not yet suffer you to leave.”

Rumia had titled her head, not cottoning on to what dissatisfied him. “Is that so?”

“No fewer than a dozen traps I laid for you.” Had it not been so or had Rumia heard bitter shame behind his gruff tones? “I will not return to the capital tribute-less one way or another. So, this little diversion means nothing in the end.”

He waved a hand at the surrounding trees. Energy reverberated through the air and vanished in the same instant, leaving the forest stiller. “These devices are another matter. My sweat and time, each in profusion, went into them. I will be reimbursed for that.”

There it was: something was now lacking so he demanded accounts settled. Humans were permanently occupied with such things, it seemed. “I don’t have money,” the youkai of darkness stated simply.

The human’s knuckles whitened against the blunt instrument of youkai destruction, the only show of emotion for the moment. Rumia stood in silence, not daring move. Her belly felt too empty and her body too bruised to warrant an attempted flight, anyway. Returning her stare, he moved closer. Her cheeks reddened under the force of his look.

“You certainly resemble a woman, at the very least,” he’d decided at length. His hand swept across her hot cheek, appraising its softness. “Yes, this will serve nicely. I’ll have you pay with your ying.”

Rumia had blinked. “My what?”

“What else could I ask of you? Your body, of course”

Once again, Rumia blinked. Humans and their riddles could be so bothersome. Whereas other animals would merely strike and kill, they would ask questions, playing silly games, wasting precious feeding time. They did so many pointless things.

A shiver interrupted her pondering. His hand had moved from her cheek to her thigh. Her cheek flushed deeper, a meaning suddenly dawning on her.

“Sex?” Rumia had guessed, perplexed. “Is that it? You mean sex?”

A smile slithered across the exorcist’s face. “You do know it, then. That saves me some trouble.”

Rumia had choked back the first answer to bulge her throat. Yes, she had known sex. No one lived long around humans innocent of that all-important act; nor had Rumia. Some of the human males she preyed on, for reasons beyond her, grew intensely fascinated by her shape preceding their ends. Those few occasions she’d been enough bored to let them near, precluding violence, had yielded like results.

She’d been called cute, gifted flowers, even pined for. Things had been said. Then done. And the sex thing, confounding at first, had been soon grudgingly tacked on to the list of things humans were good for besides a meal. It was fun and, done right, could leave her belly feeling warm and full in an altogether different way.

A mortal nemesis of all youkai propositioning you for it, though – now, that could see an aeon pass without happening twice. Against her bruises, both physical and on her pride, Rumia’s tummy had squeezed in insidious interest.

And so, she’d consented. She unclasped her skirt and let it drop from her slight hips. “I can do sex.”

No other quartet of words could have moved a man more decisively. The hunter had allied her in preparations; he’d undone his belt and unfolded his robes. He’d been, as Rumia’s intuition went, quite handsome. Undeniably, he’d looked yummy as little else: muscle like cord, tan skin shorn of all pesky hair. His manhood flopped, pendulous, between his powerful thighs once he’d doffed the trousers. That’d knocked her self-esteem a bit. Men were wont to stand to full, rearing attention by the time sex with Rumia was on the table. Not this one, ostensibly. Hooey.

He’d settled down anyhow, reclining on the springy, forest ground, and motioned Rumia to come hither. Sceptical, she’d complied – and knelt astride the man’s nude waist. Out of some pocket of his robe, he’d produced a small, earthenware jar. A concoction of corn-starch and water, Rumia’s nose had told once the hunter had screwed out the plug and bade Rumia extend a hand. She pushed it back.

“Nature’s way?” the scrumptious man had asked, amused.

Rumia hadn’t answered, instead reaching between her legs to tuck the front of her panties to the side. Cool, nightly air had kissed her exposed, hairless treasure.

The exorcist’s breath had hitched at the sight. “… Very well,” he’d resigned.

Then, with him studying every rub, stretch and prod, Rumia had begun to make ready. A fistful of fond memories, squirreled away for just such an occasion, married to the exorcist’s tasty physique had done her the office of an aid; soon, and Rumia had been flushed, gasping her climbing excitement, arousal sticking her fingers to her puffy privates. Somewhen in her dawdling run-up, the youkai hunter had overtaken his quarry; fully erect, persuaded by Rumia’s lewd display, he’d steadied his rearing manhood by the base and pushed its head up at the little youkai’s entrance. Rumia had given him a dark look… but moved her attentions to the stiff nub on the front of her crotch, while the exorcist had stroked his tip back and forth between her slick, hungry petals.

Nothing short of extermination would’ve forestalled what had come next. Masturbation, what Rumia’d had explained to her, could be wonderful by itself; when, though, a man’s thing had already been poking her from below… well, the only direction to go was down. Rumia had unhanded her tender, leaky privates and thrust the freed hands behind to prop herself on the exorcist’s folded knees. No need to aim or spread herself; the man’s engorged glans had already made an intimate friend of her opening.

And so, the falsely accused, little youkai of darkness had nipped her bottom lip… and guided her tight, slippery womanhood down his large, stiff, adult penis.

The journey had been hard and bumpy, and may have brought Rumia closer a helpless orgasm that would’ve befitted a scary youkai such as she, but… it was now done. This was where she was. The exorcist’s erection was sheathed to the sturdy hilt inside her hot, tense belly: her bottom firmly in his lap, her nether lips strapping the shaven base of his shaft, the bared head of his penis wedged up against the place inside her Rumia had been told was her “baby-room.” Gratefully, hers had so far lacked for occupants, else they would have felt mighty cramped. That penis was topping her up something amazing…

… Amazing or no, though, it was very much still a rape. The branch in the hunter’s fist had never left it; even if he had exhaled rather sharply once Rumia’s crotch had rested on his – which was subtler still than her own, throaty moan – the man’s jaw remained coloured, but set. It was obvious who was having sex with whom and where; which was to say, Rumia was having sex with him nearby a lethal implement. That made this a rape; and rape, to hear the humans tell it, was a sin of sins among their kind. Deadly, even.

Rumia couldn’t guess at why. It was great. It squeezed her down around the exorcist’s girth and thrilled her to the roots of her hairs.

“… All the way inside in one,” grunted the hunter, not dis-affected. “You are a beast.”

Rumia forwent replying, moving on to tug her necktie out of her shirt’s collar then to unbutton the shirt itself. The man eyed her appreciatively as she wiggled clean of it but left the tie dangling from her neck – where she’d been informed it looked “cute.” Yet another of those odd, human things. Clothes were cute, no lie, but she’d always found men more appetising without them than with. Still, she kept on the tie.

The rest of what the shirt had been hiding was anyhow more arresting. From the band of her pulled-aside panties up to her dainty bellybutton, Rumia’s tummy was swollen from containing the exorcist’s long, hard penis. The sensation of being full, of her other insides shifting slightly just to make space for the sex, coupled with seeing the protuberance, caused her head to swoon. Rumia brushed a hand up the distended region, up and up, then over one of her small, perky nipples, which proved so stiff and sensitive the touch alone made her body shudder. Turned on, giddy, not thinking of propriety, the little youkai of darkness leaned against the backrest of the man’s bent legs and whimpered at the starry, midnight sky.

All too. That’s how easy it was to forget how much she enjoyed sex.

The hunter’s jeer snagged her focus, “Comfortable, youkai?”

All the same, Rumia faced the stern man again – and nodded. There wasn’t a point in deception; the man could likely feel her horniness all along his erection. Rumia braced herself by his toned abdomen and rose a bit on her knees. The easing of pressure was instant, and she needn’t peek to know her vagina was leaving his shaft coated in warm juices. Inch after inch, the little youkai winched her waist and hauled her lower mouth up the man’s rigid length. His free hand sought and wrapped possessively around one of her butt-cheeks but daren’t interrupt what she was doing. Rumia clenched her teeth and kept going, going and going… until her narrow entrance began to stretch around his fat glans.

Then, slowly, Rumia righted up, wetted her lips… and lowered herself back to the man’s lap.

Twice as smooth – on account of the juices – the second insertion turned out even more fun. Trusting that the penis would enter her again without a hitch, Rumia thrust out her hips so that its tip rode along her vagina’s front wall. The secret, vulnerable spot, which Rumia had been shown by a nice, scrumptious young man in the past, responded to the prod, jolting her tummy with a shock of feminine pleasure. The hunter’s long manhood bottomed out a heartbeat later, Rumia’s slip plunging her slick vagina all the way down to its base. That time, they gasped their surprise together.

“… Some youkai, you are,” groaned the exorcist, fingers vising around her buttock. He lifted it, all but by himself, for the next stroke. “This feistiness must be punished.”

Claiming which, he pushed her back down his upright erection. He’d taken the hint. His tip jostled her precious place – then went on to cosy up with her baby room, scrubbed and kneaded by her squirming, writhing walls. Rumia locked gazes with the man, his eyes – dully human, hers – youkai-red, and did her best to ignore for now the eager tingling of her overstuffed privates.

“… I am youkai,” she promised the rapist exorcist.

The man scoffed at her – drew up her butt – then crammed his penis back inside her hardworking tummy. Rumia hissed as it stumbled all over her best, her rightest spots. The thing just knew how make her vagina feel good…

“I have lain with women less feisty than you, youkai,” said the very, very skilled hunter – as if she wasn’t herself a woman. “Such youth, also…” He swept his stare across Rumia’s naked frontage: the swollen belly, the red necktie drooping between her petite breasts and the hard, pink pearls of her nipples. “… What are you?” the exorcist then asked, dramatizing. “Youkai ought not to look like this; youkai ought not to do this. You are slacking, for that matter; shake your hips.”

Rumia bit back an indignant reply and, peeking at the nearby branch, resumed sticking herself onto his stubborn penis. Coaxed by the rugged fingers fondling her butt, she settled into a rhythm: sliding her soaked vagina almost up to his glans then swooping back down his length for her engorged petals to kiss his crotch – and for him to kiss her baby-room. And then over again. There was nothing for an undiscerned while but the sounds of copulation echoing in the woods: the slapping of skin, the squelching of scooped-out juices, the strained breaths of a youkai and her hunter hunting each other’s pleasure. The thrusts came easier and easier, Rumia’s insides now accustomed to the exorcist’s shape and girth. Her vagina squirmed and shivered around him with abandon. It was un-youkai-like, maybe… but it was making Rumia moan her excitement out loud. That balanced out the shame.

Humping the man at speed, the little youkai of darkness now of a sudden found he was attractive. The monasterial baldness, she could have done without – even if it would’ve lessened the labour of eating him – but the bravely schooled face compounded by the stifled groans of exertion tickled her on a very base, very youkai level. In all contexts and all positions – atop a man or wheezing down his neck – she loved that sound. Sex and predation may have been as far removed from each other as was conceivable, but some things… well, some things remained an exciting constant.

Rumia sat straight, swapping the up-and-down of penetration for the back-and-forth of grinding her weak spots on the exorcist’s obliging stiffness. He made no move to stop her. Only throbbed vigorously under her baby-room.

“Issit, hnn, as nice for you,” she asked him, another acquired line, “as it’s, fuhhh, for me?”

The hunter took measure of the small, virtually nude youkai mounted atop him – before sneering in a what-does-the-world-care-anyway way.

“… Never been harder on my life,” he confided.

To attest just such, he dragged Rumia’s unresisting hips forward, extracting from her half his impressive length – then sheathed himself up to her baby-room again. He really was hard. Rumia resumed twisting and twirling her waist.

“You can, hnn, let your see-men out inside me,” she proposed. More learned words. “Yunno? I am youkai. I won’t, fffh, get preggers… probably.”

At which, the exorcist sputtered laughter. “That is not how this works, youkai!” he chuckled. “Your ying is what you owe me; I shall not yield to you what stores I yet hold. I should relish naught more than to fill that barren, little womb of yours, but… no. You come, youkai – and spill your ying to me.”

Rumia’s mind hadn’t to race particularly fast. “What if you,” she suggested, “what if you gave me, eek, your yeeng – and then I gave back? Mine together with? Could do me, like, from behind, too.”

That gave the staunch man pause. After a moment, narrowing his eyes, he inclined his shaved head – and demanded, “… No deception?”

“I like it from behind,” argued Rumia. “My good spots get poked every time like that.”

Once more, there was a sneer – this one of a what-cometh-the-world-to variety. The noose tightened. “… Very well then,” he growled—

—and clapped both his wide, masculine hands down on Rumia’s hips.

The branch rolled to the mossy ground. Some detached itself from the man in its wake – something at once innate and external – but Rumia hadn’t the chance to place it before her butt was once again lugged forward on the exorcist’s lap. The little youkai of darkness clutched the exorcist’s brawny forearms, belly seizing taut as his penis first slipped out of her vagina… then slammed inside with vicious disregard for her soft, sensitive walls. Not a squeal had made it out of her throat when he repeated the motion. Then again. And again. Thrice and four times and eight and as many as Rumia’s fingers and toes. These weren’t the same conversational strokes of before. These were the apish thrusts of a brute who had scented his chance to breed. Rumia’s eyes rolled back in their sockets as the exorcist’s peaking manhood scoured her ecstatic vagina from lips to womb. Her hands curled into paws on the man’s chest. This was almost the best part.

The one in close following was the best. Overcome by her snug, cosy insides, the hunted man smashed her hips into his and there restrained them… while the palpitating head of his penis spewed his seed straight into Rumia’s baby-room. Rumia kicked a foot at the discarded branch before the shivers could set in: those wonderful pangs of joy at her belly being pumped full of hot, vital stuff. The exorcist groaned underneath her, teeth clenched, back arching; not about to perpetuate the “miracle” some of Rumia’s prey had lovingly explained to her, the exorcist was all the same keen on playing out his part of it. Trapped around his rapacious manhood, it was all Rumia could do to let him.

It wasn’t what she’d been waiting for anyway.

The last, debilitated throb. The deep, relieved breath. The slow relocking of focus. The dawning of awareness as the orgasm petered out and reality came crashing back. Of mistakes having been made. The missing length of purifying wood. The drained reserves of field-levelling ying. The widening of those ill-fated, human eyes.

Those weren’t what Rumia was poised for, either.

This was. The end of elation. The minute puncture in a man’s soul. The hair-rising point between when the fight-or-flight instinct flickers out and darkness sets upon the mind. The tipping point of terror.

Rumia drew of it.

Then she became the night.

On the morrow, a cooling corpse would be found in the woods by the village children. Half-eaten, but touched moreover: skin as chalk-white as if it’d languished a century at the bottom of a lightless cave. Like the boy before it. Like those before the boy. It would be days – and victims – before the next exorcist would conquer the remote trails of the Yatsugatake mountain range. Shinto this time, rather than whatever esoteric creed drove an onmyouji. A channeler dressed in robes the colour of light and blood. The same colours that would adorn her hair in perpetuity following the meeting.

It would mark the first time Rumia heard the name “Hakurei”.