I stifled a groan and put my head down. The others noticed, and gave me confused looks.

"Ellie? What's wrong?" Pearl asked quietly. I just glanced at the new kid, Hato. He was smiling, looking out at the class, but his eyes were on me.

"Do you know him?" Ashton questioned, and I nodded. The teacher told Hato to tell us about himself.

"Yo! My name's Hato, Hato Air!" He had messy black hair, and black eyes, but extremely pale skin, and looked about maybe 4 '10 in height. His mouth was pale, and his nose was slightly longer than the average person's. He sounded way too excited to be here, "I just moved here, great to meet you all!"

Our teacher nodded, "Alright Hato, why don't you go sit next to Ellie?" I flinched. His grin got bigger if that was possible.

"Ellie! Girl, I haven't seen you in forever!" He exclaimed, rushing over, and plopping down next to me. I forced a smile.

"Hey Hato, long time no see..."

"Yeah! Geez, you're shorter than I remember," he frowned, and I glared at him.

"Still taller than you are, pigeon," I grumbled. He smirked.

Class started, and I tried to ignore him for the day.

"Excuse us," I muttered to my friends at lunch, grabbing Hato's arm and dragging him away.

"What the hell are you doing here?!" I demanded, glaring at him as I pushed him against the wall outside the classroom. He laughed.

"And here I was, thinking you were happy to see me again! But if you must know, I'm the help you were promised." He smirked. I groaned.

Pearl came out, and crossed her arms, glaring at me, "Ellie, what the hell is going on?"

"Hey, you're Pearl right! Nice to meet ya!" Hato exclaimed grinning. Pearl ignored him.

"I can't believe she would send him of all people," I grumbled. Pearl sighed.

"Okay, spill. Who is he, and how does he know you?" She demanded, glaring at both of us.

"I-"

"He's the help that Kaze promised us," I sighed, "a bird spirit from New York. I met him once while visiting there on a mission for Kaze."

"A bird spirit?" She asked. He nodded.

"Yep! That's me! Hey, we should talk more about this after school, so no eavesdroppers get suspicious!" Hato grinned, and I sighed, before nodding.

After school, we all went to our house, and into the basement, bringing Hato with us. I explained the situation to them.

"So he's the help Kaze promised us? He doesn't seem like much," Ashton grunted.

"Not to you, but I happen to be pretty powerful for my species!" Hato argued. I snorted.

"Your species is naturally weak," I replied. He glared at me.

"Whatever the case, if Kaze sent him, I'm sure he'll be of use." Isabelle stated. I frowned.

"Are you kidding me?!" I exclaimed.

"Ellie, he was sent by Kaze herself. He has to be of some use." Pearl said.

"The only thing he's of use for is stealing crumbs and food!" I argued.

"Don't be ridiculous, he can't be that weak." Hunter said.

"He's a pigeon!" I argued.

"You're a pigeon?" Ashton asked, crossing his arms.

"Yep! And don't listen to miss grumpy pants here, she's just sour over our last encounter." Hato put his arm around me. I pushed it off.

"I am not! If anything, I'm surprised you aren't sour over it!" I retorted, crossing my arms.

"What happened last time?" Pearl asked, frowning. I flinched at the question.

"Little blondy here is a little sour over the fact that I was so affectionate towards her," he smirked, and I stood up, punching him, knocking him over.

"You're the one who wouldn't shut up about how much you 'loved' me! Even after I slammed you into a building!" I retorted.

"Excuse me?" Ashton asked.

"And don't call me little," I added angrily, "you're shorter than I am!"

"Oh, don't be like that!" Hato laughed. He was infuriating me to no end, and I knew it was on purpose. I was getting pissed.

"Ellie, go sit over there," Isabelle stated suddenly, pointing me across the room where Pearl was. I stood up and walked over, plopping next to my sister, who grabbed my hand.

"Hato and Ellie, keep a distance of at least 5 feet away from each other," Isabelle ordered, "and don't speak to each other unless absolutely necessary."

We both nodded, and she sighed.

"Now, with that incident over, let's begin the meeting. What's our next move?" She asked, sitting down at the head of the table.

"We didn't find anything at the school," Ashton sighed.

"Neither did we," Hunter nodded, "I'm not sure what to do now..."

I was silent, trying to think. Pearl had her notebook out, and Isabelle seemed deep in thought. I let out a soft hum while thinking.

"Hey, isn't the cultural festival coming up?" Hunter asked suddenly. I blinked, looking up at him.

"Yeah, it is, why?" I asked.

"It's just... of all the times for Seishin to go missing, it happened right before the cultural festival. That can't be a coincidence." He said.

"You might be onto something Hunter," Ashton muttered, "the cultural festival takes place on the first day of spring, because that's when all 4 of the elements begin to thrive until summer. But Seishin's element is life and death... he's technically a manifestation of all the elements."

"Which means the time Seishin is most powerful is March 21st," Pearl nodded, "where are you going with this?"

"I think I get it," Isabelle said, "Seishin holds a lot of kept up rage. Whenever someone dies, he absorbs whatever emotions they felt at that time. Most of the time, that feeling is rage. The more rage he absorbs, the more power he exerts to control himself. If someone was to kidnap him, and limit his power so he had barely any left, like now, he would spend it all trying to control himself."

"Oh... and if Seishin were to lose control, at the time of the cultural festival when he's most powerful..." Pearl trailed off.

"The fighting tournament is meant to be a tribute to the deities," I said, "each school is supposed to send a boy and a girl to fight the other schools as entertainment for them. It's kind of sick, but they take special care to make sure nobody gets hurt."

"The final match is supposed to be a tribute to Seishin, right?" Hato asked. I scowled, but Isabelle nodded.

"If I was a bad guy, and I kidnapped Seishin so I could unleash his rage," Hato muttered, "I would do it early enough so I could wear him down and unleash him at just the right time."

"And in this case, the right time would be the Cultural Festival." Pearl nodded, "But the festival lasts for a few days, when exactly is the enemy aiming for?"

"If I had to guess, I would say the final YFC match. It's dedicated to Seishin, and is almost like a mock fight to the death," Hunter said, "Because to win the final, you have to knock out your opponent entirely. It doesn't stop until you do."

"I forgot about that," Ashton sighed, "the idea of not stopping until the other is 'dead'," he made quotation marks as he said that, "is supposed to encourage Seishin to bless us with the dead's safe passage to the underworld or something... I'm not actually sure."

"You're close," Isabelle stated, "it's a tribute I believe. There's... a lot of things in the cultural festival that are messed up, I won't give you the details..."

That left me confused, but nobody pushed the matter. Pearl finished writing things down.

"So, we seem to have a general idea of what's going on..." she stated, "but we still don't know who the enemy is. If they know who we are though, it puts us at a serious disadvantage."

Everyone frowned, and then Isabelle stood up, and said, "We should go through the religion history books, and see if we can find any stories about the deities having enemies."

"If that's the case, let's wrap up this meeting." Pearl nodded, and everyone stood up, "we all have a free period at the same time tomorrow, right? Let's meet up at the school library and go through the history books."

"Alright!" Ashton nodded, and smiled. Everyone agreed, then Isabelle, Ashton, and Hato left. Hunter, Pearl, and I went up to the main floor. Pearl immediately went up to our room, probably going to either do her homework or start researching. Hunter plopped onto the couch, and started playing a game with Uncle Fred. Aunty was watching them, amused.

I decided what I was doing quickly, and called to Aunty, "I'm going out! Be back soon!"

"Alright! Stay safe honey!" Aunty called back, smiling at me. I grabbed my hoodie, and pulled it on to protect me from the cold wind, slipping on my shoes, and went outside.

I started walking to the local hospital.

It is Wednesday after all.