"Right! Left! Left! Right! Left!"

Walang tigil na dikta ni Shou sa kung saan manggagaling ang kanyang atake. Maaring sipa at suntok. While Yuki keep backing away just to avoid all those attacks. Damn. Her body is getting weaker. She can feel any moment that her movements will get slow. And dropping even a bit of her speed will surely have no good consequence. They are at the backyard again and it's already been an hour.

"I will teach you how to defend yourself without your weapon. Just in case it happens."

He said that but is this what he means by teaching?

Fuck!

She immediately placed her forearm on the side of her head when she realized that she cannot avoid it anymore! This is bad news. She readied herself from the impact. The foot of Shou hit her defense and she tried to let her feet scrape on the ground, to at least maintin her standing position. However, the moment she received that attack, her body was thrown in the air--- not too far from him, her limbs spread on the ground and she pants heavily. Her head also got hit, though the impact was reduced because of her forearm. Her forearm is aching. She could feel her heartbeat along the pain. But gladly, it slowly lessens.

Thank god she avoided all those attacks from the start instead of confronting it.

Shou walked towards her, observing Yuki whose tiredness is obvious. He sits beside her but Yuki didn't even react a bit."I was waiting for you to receive my attack."

And that caught her attention. Only her head moves, indicating that she wants to hear his words. "Since your sense of protecting yourself is to dodge." If she keep receiving the attacks, she might die in a sense, her body will get numb. As if experiencing how to be a punching bag. Not to be exaggerating but his attacks are strong and feeling that strength will inflict big amount of aching pain to her body.

She can feel that her heartbeat goes back to normal and decided to speak. "So eto yung ibig sabihin mo sa teaching me." He can sense the sarcasm but it's not obvious to her facial expression. He chuckled. She just sighed since she understands his point. She herself knows that she is afraid of getting hit from the enemy despite of experiencing multiple battles since then. Shou stands up and offered his hand to her. She looked at it before accepting his help.

"That was really difficult as hell. It was a miracle na kayanang kong umiwas na halos isang oras." She said as soon as she managed to stand up.

"I will make it at least half of my strength next time." She can't understand his tone. Is he trying to raise her spirits up? Or breaking her confidence? Because heaven knows if she can really survived that!

"When you are going to confront an attack, be sure to put more strength in defending so that next time..." He let go of her hand. "...your head will not receive any damage." He smirked, then walked away.

She is speechless! So he is aware, at the first place despite of not bothering of hinting him that her head hurts! "Gusto mo talaga ako pahirapan eh no!" The moment he heard that he is already in the doorway. He waved his hand first and closed the door.

It's almost been one week since that weird reaction of Shou. However, Yuki still doesn't know the reason behind it. Also, she keeps trying to forget the snake before and stops relating it to every thing happened on her surrounding. She didn't bother to say it to Shou. Something vague always stops her from telling him. That's the way she is.

Everything is going smoothly. School stuffs, training and extermination. Shou is adapting fast. He already knows the system of the school and is catching up with the lessons very well. However, he is not that active. He is the type of person that will only talk if you talk to him-- a type of person that will respond if you do the initiation. Surprisingly, Shou can already handle his fangirls like how he talked with the salesman before when the both of them went shopping.

It is already weekends, that's why they were training. While weekdays is for extermination since their targets are the students in their school. Yuki just then realized that there are alot of creatures both inside and outside of the school. How she is not possessed or manipulated by these demons is what she doesn't know. But seeing these creatures everyday keeps her get use to it until she can already ignore them and act like she can't see them. Her too, is adapting.

It's raining. And they cannot do training since the backyard is affected by the rain. However, Yuki is not in her room. Nor downstairs. Even the bathrooms. Shou already looked around the whole house but she's not here! This is bad. Really bad! It is not safe once she's outside the house.

Where the hell is she?!

It is raining and she went outside. She just stays still on the road and let her skin feel the rain. She looked above and watch how every single water drops. Yuki closed her eyes and for awhile, she feels at peace.

She went to the park. It is already night so people rarely comes here. The park is a children playground while there's a single big tree at the center and it is surrounded by benches. Yuki went to the swing. She sits down and slightly move it. She leans her head to the metal chain supporting the swing and closed her eyes.

The isolation makes her think of the past. That's why she loves rain. It let her feel cold, numb and empty. Yet, it makes her feel comfortable. Rainy days makes her feel comfortable.

She noticed the adaptation she achieved since the moment Shou entered into her life. They are always together at school. And only at home, they have their space. Kung tutuusin, pwede niyang itaboy o iwasan si Shou the moment she discovered that all of the strange things happening to her is caused by him. She can manage even without him. She just need to act like she can't see them to avoid life and death situations. However, she didn't do it. She accepted the contract. Again, the feeling of something vague piercing into her soul makes her accept these abnormal phenomena.

Just what is she feeling?

Her eyes are half open as she thinks all of these things. And she saw a figure. A large dog. And a sudden feeling sparks inside her.

She called it. And its ear twitched. She wants to play with the dog. Yuki actually loves animals. She adores them no matter how dirty they are. If it bites her, she can just get an injection for the rabies, can't her?

The dog slowly approached Yuki with its ear both bent. It is drenched and shows how skinny the dog is. The dog seems like an abandoned one. Thinking of petting it makes her feel excited!

It sits on the ground in front of her. It has the height of Yuki's waist when sitting down. Also, its fur is covered with mud, making its original color to brown. It has morning star spread on its face.

Finally, Yuki slowly let her hand approached the dog's head and pet it. The dog permits her by bowing its head and ears down. She just then realized that it also has some grease on its body. She can feel how oily her hand becomes. But its fine for her. She can just wash her hands anyway.

The dog gets comfortable until it licks the back of her hand. It doesn't have a grease on it so the dog would be fine. She can feel how her hand becomes sticky because of its saliva but the rain minimizes that outcome. She just watched the dog's action until she feels something strange. Why the dog's mouth getting wider if it's only licking her? The speed of its tongue licking her hand is strangely getting abnormal too. It is as if, the dog finds her hand delicious.

Then, that's when something strucks her mind. Its eyes turned red! This is no normal dog!

She quickly pulled her hand away just as when the dog's mouth harshly closed. The sound of its encountering teeth can be heard. If she failed even a second to pull her hand away, her hand will be bitten off!

Yuki immediately get off of the swing and intentionally let it sway. After putting the swing in between them, she realized now how its teeth are razor sharp and how its wrinkles are forming on its upper muzzle, indicating that the dog is angry.

What should she do? She doesn't know how to make her scythe appear without informing Shou first!

Yuki panicked as the dog slowly takes each step while hearing it growls. She takes a step back again however it gave her a mini heart attack when her feet almost slipped. She cursed her clumsiness and immediately looked in front of her, putting her guard up on the dog movements. Fortunately, the dog didn't take the opportunity to attack her.

If she keeps backing away, she would be near the roundabout and from her right side is the large tree located at the center of the park. Where she should be heading?

She can't possibly fight it and the place makes her at disadvantage. She can't see that clearly if she keeps getting too far from the lampost at the end four corners of the whole park. Also, she can't hear clearly because the sound of falling raindrops blocks the possible sounds around her.

The dog passes by the swing and suddenly jumps at Yuki with wide open mouth! Despite of her fixed focus on the demon, she still reacted late and did her best to move her body to the side! She tripped and felt huge force from the weight of her body. Her arm landed first and scraped on the cement pavement. Gladly, she managed to put a quite distance from the enemy!

Yuki immediately stands up without letting the enemy out of her sight. Its mouth bite off the air. It looked disappointed until its expression grow angrier. And then, it suddenly turned its head to Yuki's direction and attempts to pounce on her again!

She's nearer at the tree after tripping down earlier and the light can still visibly reached the center so she turned her back and run away behind the tree! Knowing that, dogs are agile and fast, Yuki feel anxious of her decision and doubtful of turning her back against the enemy.

The weight of her body is dragging her speed down unlike when she's holding her scythe. So with all her might, she is careful of not slipping down and the same time, run as fast as she can. However, she can hear the bark of the possessed dog getting louder amd louder. And its bad news.

Yuki can already assume it jumped on her again straight on with its mouth wide open. So she have to make a turn! Make a turn faster!

So she throw her body to the benches, prepared for the incoming pain from the impact. As she faced her back on the benches, she saw the expected straight motion of the enemy and suddenly heard the familiar sound of a gun. The motion of the enemy stopped midway and fell down.

The dog howled and it slowly closed its eyes. It's not bleeding but it lost its consciousness. In spite of the darkness and droplets, she can faintly see the ashes flown away.

Yuki just noticed her abnormal pace of breathing. She dare not speak and open her mouth so she breath through her nose, making the source of oxygen smaller than what she temporarily needs.

Earlier, her back hit the backrest of the bench and her arm again receive the impact from sliding down on the seat. That is why at the moment, it looks like she is lying down on the bench sideward with her feet lying uncomfortably. The bullet comes from the entrance of the park where she came from and to confirm who did it, she moved her eyesight to that place. And she's right. It is Shou who is panting heavily and drenched in rain. She witnessed how he holds his gun but then it suddenly disappeared.

She slowly stands up and felt a bit of pain from her arms. But she's fine. The pain can be tolerated. She approached Shou who is standing at the road. He is wearing his undershirt and drawstring shorts. Did he really go outside like that?

The road is just beside the park however, the park has a large area. The distance between him and the target earlier is actually far. And yet, he still shot the target accurately. Yuki can't help but feel amazed to this guy. Unknowingly, she smiled. Though, her hair covers her face, it cannot escape away from the sharp eyesight of Shou. So he run towards her when she is already walking towards him. They stand in front of each other and the height between them is obvious. She just then realized the raindrops on her skin. She also just then realize how his hair looks so low in volume when its wet since his hair always look fluffy and stylish. Just the thought makes her giggles--- accidentally.

"What the hell are you laughing about?!" She keeps giggling even though she gets a bit nervous when she realized Shou is going to scold her. But the nervousness she feel is nothing compared to how nervous she was awhile ago. "What?! Don't just keep laughing at me! Didn't you even think it is dangerous outside, stupid!"

Here it is again... he is quiet and only talks when he needs to but when he is going to shout like this--- Shou gets really noisy and loud more than expectedly what his voicebox holds.

"And it's raining-- at night! It's not even a mild rain and yet you dare to go outside?! Are you crazy?!!!!"

They are just in front of each other but he still keeps shouting this loud. It hurts her eardrums whenever he is like this. No-- more like it is louder than usual. Or is it just her imagination?

So as he scolds her, she just looks at the ground or at the side of the road. She dare not look at him and instead look at his feet. He actually go barefoot. That realization made her a bit surprised.

She shouldn't expect anything from anyone, even from Shou but she feels very indebted to him. She took a glance at him. He is still scolding her and the surrounding is dark but she unknowingly have this desire to just watch his face right now. But she dare not to.

"Aish! Let's go now to your house!" And that's the signal that she can walk now. Her hair is laid down and she wears light clothes. And now, it is dirty and her hair is messy and sticky. Usually that will make her uncomfortable but the warmth she feel inside overlapped it.

No one dare to speak and the sound of footsteps they make can be heard. But she feel that, she has to explain to him. She temporarily closed her eyes to feel the rain at the very last moment and said, "You know, I love rain."

Shou looked at her and didn't say anything back immediately. But he snickered and said,
"So that is why you decided to go outside without telling me, huh?"

She decided not to say anything since that explained why she left the house. And she stopped. She opened her eyes and as if predicted, she's already in front of her house.

She entered first without waiting for him however she didn't forget to take a glance at him again.

Thank you, Shou.

With that thought, she smiled.

~'Sneaky' ends~

***
Please vote and comment!