By his college years, Izumi began to work two jobs as a server at two different cafes in the city in order to pay off his tuition. His mother continued to pour money into what she believed to be his well being, causing them to struggle to pay bills on occasion, hence he worked not just for his education, but to help keep a roof over their heads too. Arguments between the two would ensue upon him telling his mother that he’s fine and he doesn’t need therapy, even lying a few times and saying the medication worked, but Kanae knew her son all too well to know when he’s lying, so she kept him in therapy regardless.

One of the server jobs was at a normal cafe, which paid about fourteen dollars an hour. On the other hand, his second job which paid a more handsome eighteen dollars per hour was more...eventful. He worked at a cat maid cafe and became fairly popular as unfortunately, feminine men were highly sought after at the time, and Izumi was very dainty for a male. His skin was as perfect as porcelain and his slim figure and soft voice made him a hit in the cafe, earning him bonuses and tips constantly. He was quite disappointed in himself for accepting the job, especially due to the occasional creeps he would get, but the pay was good, and if he didn’t have so much to pay for, he would only work the one job. In comparison, college felt slow and overwhelming to him. If he wasn’t working on papers he was working in a cafe or helping his mother at home. He never had time for a relationship, a social life, or anything outside of work, school, and his family, which included Eiji, who became the one person he really maintained contact with on the daily. Even worse, after Izumi graduated with his bachelor’s in journalism, he didn’t feel as happy as he thought he would. His mother, Eiji, and Lala were happy for him, sure, but he didn’t feel it. Izumi came to see that he couldn’t even enjoy college with the workload he had, and he couldn’t even enjoy the degree after the fact because he couldn’t find a job in the industry. So, he continued to work his server jobs, while on the side he searched for a job as a photographic journalist. He hoped to be able to write about whatever he wanted, but he knew that such a dream couldn’t be achieved for years to come. It would probably be yellow journalism for a few years, if he could even get into journalism period.

Exhausted, he walked alone on a cold spring night one day with no real route in mind. He had already been walking for a few hours, but he just wanted to clear his head, figure out what to do. At this point he was already twenty seven and five years had passed since he graduated from university, his debt still haunting him. He wondered if it was worth it, just to see his mother smile the way she did that day- No. It was. In time, fate would take its turn and carry his steps, leading him to the wheat field from all those years ago. He’s never seen the field at night before as he came to notice that the field was especially hard to see through at night as it was nearly completely pitch black. At least this is still here...come to think of it, I haven’t even tried to find that guy, I completely gave up after college started. As the cold air sifted through his hair, Izumi hugged his jacket, pulling it in closer. I should probably head back, maybe I can still catch a bus. He took his phone out of his pocket to check the time, about 8 p.m., and it would take him at least thirty minutes to reach the next bus stop. I think the last one is at 9, I should be able to make it but maybe I should walk faster to be safe. The sound of a car coming down the empty street caught his attention, as he looked back in hopes that maybe it was one of the locals so he could ask for a ride to the bus stop, but as the car approached, he became uneasy. It was moving at high speeds, and as the car swiftly loomed in, the heavy tint of the windows became more and more apparent. He picked up the pace in the opposite direction, wondering if it would be a wise idea to run into the wheat field and hide, but before he could implement his plan, the car came to a sharp halt in front of him. Several men, many wearing normal street clothes with lackluster covering over their faces, came out of the car and grabbed him. Before Izumi could yell for help a man covered his mouth with a cloth and his consciousness faded.

Rope dug into his wrists and ankles and the violent shake of another finally woke him up. Around him were several men, the area seemed to be an old warehouse, judging by its smaller size. Izumi still struggled to see clearly as his vision was still hazy, but surprisingly, his mouth wasn’t gagged. This at least showed him that screaming won’t help, so negotiation was his best option, but whatever they wanted, it wasn’t money. If they just wanted to rob him they wouldn’t have gone through all this effort. Did they want to kill him? That would make more sense, but it didn’t look like they had any weapons...still, it wasn’t completely ruled off. Plenty of murders have been committed without the use of a weapon.

“What do you want from me?” Asking couldn’t hurt, he thought to himself.

“You’re that server right? From the maid cafe?” Oh no.

“Why are you asking me? Go through all that effort and now you’re concerned if you got the wrong guy?” Izumi wanted to try taunting him. If he got him angry, there was a chance that he would make a mistake. At the least, it would buy him some time to figure out what to do. Some of the men started laughing amongst themselves at his comment, infuriating the man who spoke, who yelled at them to shut up.

“There’s no way you aren’t. You wanna know why we kidnapped you? Because everyone wants a piece of the pie, we were just the first ones to take the initiative.” The man motioned to the others, who began to undo Izumi’s ropes. He tried to shake off their arms, but he couldn’t even shake off one man, let alone six. Small towns are strange in the fact that either events like these rarely occur, or they commonly occur, and he wondered if it has always been the latter and he never realized it. They pinned him against the ground and he shut his eyelids tightly, hoping that it would will it to stop. That he would be at home with his mother and Lala. His mom would be downstairs on her laptop, photoshopping a photo for work while watching TV on the recliner, and Lala would be sitting on the couch beside Izumi. He never liked any of the late night shows, most were usually graphic, and ever since that day, he became ill at the slightest hint of gore. Yet still, he refused to believe that was the only side of that man who he never came to even know the name of. Izumi always referred to him as…

A crunch and a splatter. Izumi opened his eyes in confusion, feeling the weight of the men who pinned him down disappear. There was no one around him. His eyes frantically tracked the sound: screams, more splatters, more crunches. The sound moved too fast for him to keep track of, but the end result was clear as day. They were dead. All of them. More or less the same way; they were thrown against the ground or walls, pressed down upon by their skulls, slashed to pieces, but that was the worst of it, nothing as bad as that time. A curdling choke caught his ear; he drifted his eyes to the direction of the noise, and there he stood. The man in the hooded red robe lined with black fur. His hood was down, as it usually was, his eyes glowing, and his robe masquerading the stains of blood on the rest of his clothing. What was a new sight to Izumi was his right arm, which was a staticy black and his fingers were long and sharp, nothing like normal human hands. They were more like the talons of a carnivorous bird than anything else. The right sleeve of his robe seemed like it was burnt off, yet simultaneously merging with his skin to transform his arm, but as far as he could see, his left arm was normal. Blood dripped down his right talon-like hand and he squeezed the throat of the last barely alive man.

“Apologize, won’t you?” The tall man threw down the kidnapper before Izumi’s feet, who unconsciously retracted from the man as he held in his disgust. The kidnapper struggled to speak as blood poured out of his mouth and through the holes in his neck. He reached outwards towards Izumi, and for a brief moment, Izumi felt pity. He felt the overwhelming fear in his eyes and knew that he once experienced something similar, caused by the same man. Shortly, the kidnapper’s hand dropped down along with his head, lifeless. The red robed man sighed, “Maybe I should’ve been a bit more careful, but people like him piss me off. They flock together to take down someone they could’ve overpowered by themselves, and for what? Do they feel more dominant after? A power high is it?” The man clicks his tongue and kicks the body aside, wiping the blood off his talons using his clothes. “They’re not even worth eating, pieces of shit.” He holds his right arm outwards and the staticy black retracts and reforms into the sleeve of the robe as he regains his human right arm. Using his left hand, he reaches for Izumi, who backs up immediately. The red robed man sighs once more. “I get it you’re scared but do you really think that I would hurt you after showing the others no mercy?” Izumi glared at him, still a bit distrustful, he gets himself up. “Well?”

“Thank you...for saving me.” Izumi mumbled, his eyes looking downward. He had no idea what his intentions were. Maybe he just wanted to finish the job. The crimson robed man was too unpredictable for Izumi to let his guard down.

“At least look at me when you say it. It’s not everyday I help someone, especially a human, for no reason.”

Izumi looked up. “Thank-” He made eye contact with the strange man. He never realized how enchanting his eyes were until he was a few feet in front of him. When Izumi was younger, he did notice that his eyes were different colors, but he never saw his face up close. The tall man’s face was well formed, as though made by an artist who envisioned the definition of striking as a person. His right royal blue eye complimented his left amber orange eye incredibly well. What added to his eyes was the glow that they had. Typically, one would find such unsettling, but the glow was soft; it was more something that made the eyes a bit sharper and brighter than something unnaturally glowing. The main unnatural thing about his eyes though were the white lining his pupils had, yet they only seemed to compliment his eye color more than distract from it. His shoulders were broader than he remembered, but Izumi couldn’t distinctly tell his body shape due to his clothes. At the very least, he seemed to have an athletic build, if not a bit more on the muscular side, but since his muscles weren’t bulging through his clothes, he figured he wasn’t heavily built. A wave of a hand in front of his face snapped him out of his trance.

“Kid? You alright?”

Izumi became flustered and his ears red hot. “Y-yes! Thank you!” He bent in a 90 degree bow as quickly as possible and lifted his head once more.

“What’s your name kid?”

“I-Izumi!”

“Izumi. I actually want to talk to you for a sec. You mind? Or you got some plans?”

“Ah- actually…” Izumi thought about his mother, who is probably worried sick at this point. “I need to get home, my mom-”

“Yea, right, I get it. I’m more of a night person though so after you sob to your mom you got time to talk?”

“Tonight?”

“No seven years from now. Yes tonight. The sooner I see if you’re worth my time the better.”

Izumi wasn’t sure what he was getting at, but he wasn’t about to let his opportunity slip by. He’s been waiting for this since he was a child. “I-I can do tonight. I just need to talk to my mom first.”

“Sure. I’ll drop you off and you can go in and talk to her and I’ll meet you in your room, sounds good? Oh, and don’t tell her about me, or you know, this.” He gestured to the room around them, which Izumi forgot was now filled with corpses.

“What are-”

“I’ll take care of it, no worries. I’m not gonna pin you for something you didn’t do. No point in it anyways.”

“And how do you plan on taking me home? Do you have a car?” Izumi started to realize the stupidity of his question as it came out, but it was too late, the well formed man was already laughing at him.

“Pfft car yea sure I have a car, it’s right here.” Before he knew it, Izumi was swept off his feet and held like a bride by the red robed man. “Hold on tight yea?” In the blink of an eye they were outside and the man was effortlessly hopping over buildings. With each jump he would launch several meters into the air, the wind pressure was enough for Izumi to have to shout to hear himself.

“How do you know where to go?!”

“I can trace your scent back. I have a keen nose you see.” He shouted in response and smirked at Izumi, which caused him to avert his gaze. In no time, they arrived at Izumi’s home. “Go do your talking then kid, I’ll be in your room.”

“How are you gonna get in?”

“Don’t worry about me just do your thing.” He flicked Izumi playfully between his eyebrows, but it still stung.

Izumi rubbed his forehead, his brows now furrowed. “You never even told me what your name is.”

“Wraith.” He smiled slyly, his teeth showing. They were sharp, like that of a lion or bear. With every passing moment with him, he learned something new, more than he knew before today, and Izumi liked that.

After talking to his mom and reassuring her nothing was wrong, he went upstairs to find Wraith playing with Lala, his clothes magically cleared from the blood stains. He ruffled her fur over and over again and the smile on his face was the widest Izumi’s seen so far, unexpectedly touching his heart. He was sitting on the edge of the bed. For once, his robe was off. It was draped over the bedpost by the backboard of Izumi’s bed. His current clothing consisted of what he remembered when he was a child, a teal dress shirt and black slacks with a dark cyan ebony-patterned belt looped on each hip. The only thing he didn’t know was that he wore his dress shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows, likely because he was always wearing that red cloak which covered his arms entirely. His hair was still wavy and voluminous, reaching to the nape of his neck. Nothing changed about him, but that didn’t surprise Izumi. If he really was a ghost, or even the one from the legends, it would make sense.

“So, what did you want to talk to me about?”

“Well, maybe send your dog to bed? I don’t want to scare her.”

Izumi got a little off put from his comment, but he listened, motioning for Lala to leave the room and she immediately did what she was told. Closing the door behind her, Izumi pulled out the desk chair and sat facing Wraith.

“Yea..?”

“Hmm...where do I start...how about, why I saved you? I was sitting in the oak tree and really I was thinking about taking a nap when I saw you walking on the road by the field. I recognized you immediately, because you see I never forget a face. It’s been some years for sure, I’m not sure how many exactly I don’t really count the years as they pass, you were only this high then.” Wraith holds out his hand to demonstrate. “Saw me in the tree in that field.”

Izumi shoots up from the office chair in excitement. “You remember me!”

“Course I do, I’m more surprised you remember me considering you were so young.”

“I do because you weren’t in the pictures I took! I still have them wait-” He runs over to the pictures which are mounted above his dresser. Removing them from the wall, he hands them to Wraith, who studies the empty images. “I never understood why I didn’t see you in the pictures and everyone thought I was crazy, but you really are real!”

“Yea well, if I’m honest you're the first human I’ve met that can see me, even when I’m invisible to others.” Wraith hands the pictures back to Izumi and looks curiously at him. “And I honestly have no idea why. I didn’t think much of it at the time, thought maybe I was getting old and I just thought that was concealed, but then some years later I heard rumors about some kid asking around about me, matched your description perfectly. You’ve got balls honestly, if you asked the wrong person you probably would’ve ended up dead.” Izumi was well aware of how risky his behavior was but he still shuddered at the thought. “I never really felt like trying to find you, as interested as I was, so I just left it to fate. Lo and behold, I see you again several years older walking past the same field. I was debating approaching you but those guys threw you into their car and then I had some moral conflict. I never really help people, just not my thing, not unless it’s for a price of equal value to what they want.” Like the legends, Izumi thinks to himself. “Decided not to charge you though since it had mutual benefit. I get to learn why you can see ghosts, including myself, and you get to live to see tomorrow.”

“So you really are a ghost then?” Izumi tries to hide his excitement. He’s long since awaited the chance to ask his overflowing amount of questions to him.

“Of sorts. There’s three different kinds of ghosts: shades, spirits, and specters. What you’ve been accustomed to seeing are shades, normal dead people. I’m assuming you never saw anything outside of that, or I’m sure something would come to mind, right?”

Izumi racks his brain, but Wraith’s assumption is mostly correct. He never really saw a ghost that seemed abnormal, except…. “There was one, some years ago, but it was dead.”

“What’d it look like?”

The grotesque image of the torn apart body from the conference room replays in his mind. He shakes his head, deciding to find a way around describing what he saw. “Do you kill other ghosts?” Izumi asks, trying to keep his composure.

Wraith doesn’t seem like he wants to answer the question, but he does anyways. “For reasons.”

“Did you kill one in an abandoned office once?”

Wraith thinks to himself for a moment before visually having an ‘aha!’. “Actually I did, some random spirit picked a fight with me, was that the one you saw?”

A nod in response.

“What a small world we live in. I’m surprised I didn’t notice you were there. But yea, he was a spirit. Spirits are born ghosts, so they’re not humans that died, hence why that one didn’t really look like a human. They have all sorts of weird forms, in some cases, can do a little bit of magic, that kind of stuff.”

“What about specters? Are they born too?”

“Yea but not from the same source. They’re usually born from some form of strong negative emotion, like rage or sorrow, and they feed off of it.

As far as the food chain goes, specters are at the top.”

“Well, if you have a human appearance, does that make you a shade then?”

Wraith smiles widely. “If only. I never said that specters can’t have human appearances. I’m a specter, specifically, the specter of despair.” He places both his hands on the bed and tilts his head to the side. “Do I not look like I fit the part?” Wraith, grinning playfully, clearly wanting to see how Izumi will react, who in turn becomes flustered.

“N-no you do you! I-I just thought-”

“I’m just messing with you. Most of us do look mostly human because of our job. We’re the only ghosts that can materialize and become invisible at will, while shades and spirits are always invisible. We can change our form too, but the range really depends on how powerful the specter is.”

Izumi can’t contain himself any longer. “So like the legends then?”

“The legends?”

“You know, you grant people’s wishes for a price and then one day you devour them?” He’s sitting on the edge of his seat begging for a response.

“Yea, that. Do people really have legends about us? Actually I’m not surprised now that I think about it.”

Bursting with excitement, his mint eyes brim with joy. “That’s so cool!!! How do you do it? Like how do you grant wishes? Is it just magic? Do you really need to ask for a price? Why-”

Wraith retracts, gesturing to Izumi to calm down, placing his right calf over his left leg with his left hand resting in between the gap. “Geez kid one thing at a time. I’m sure you have plenty of questions and I unfortunately need to answer all of them if I’m gonna need your help figuring out your situation. So first, yes it’s just magic, plain and simple. Specters can do a lot of things, there’s not too much of a limit, but I can’t do stuff like make other people a specter or make someone immortal or create a person or whatever, stuff that’s obviously way out of our limits, which usually has to do with changing someone too much. Like if someone wanted to be prettier I could do that, but only I really know how to do that. That’s because a specter’s range of what they can and can’t do also depends on how strong and experienced the specter is, but that’s a bit too deep. All you need to know is shades can’t do any magic, spirits in some cases can do basic things but not all of them, and specters can do the most magic but they still have limits.”

“If specters are so strong, there can’t be that many, right?”

“You’d be correct, there’s only thirteen of us, myself included obviously.”

“And where would you rank? In terms of strength and experience I mean.”

Wraith smiles once more and teases Izumi, now knowing that he gets flustered easily. “Where do you think I rank?”

In order to avoid the seemingly inevitable situation, Izumi decides to think before he speaks. He’s done plenty of research on ghosts matching Wraith’s description, and he was the only one in the records who was described, the others were only generally matching the ‘wish granter and devourer’ description. If so, then he must’ve been the most memorable, and therefore…

“I’m guessing you’re the strongest?” Izumi answers, hoping he’s correct or else he’s in for another mocking session.

“Correct.” Wraith responds, a little disappointed. “I’ve been alive the longest, don’t ask me how long that is because I’m way past knowing.”

“So you guys do die?”

“Not the way humans do, as in old age. We basically just live until we’re killed, that’s about it. Only thing that can kill any ghost is another ghost.”

“But why would they do that?”

“Food chain, remember? You said it yourself, we devour humans. Other ghosts too, but humans are usually better. Spirits and specters eat more specifically, shades don’t need to eat. The more they eat, the stronger they are. Sure things like just practicing how to fight and use magic and all that helps but that’s still a core factor.” Izumi assumes that means that he’s both the most experienced fighter...and in turn the most seasoned murderer. Thinking back to the previous scenes, both the warehouse kidnappers and the spirit in the conference room, it makes sense, both clearly one way fights.

“But you also said that specters feed off of whatever emotion they were born from.”

“Yea, that too. How do I explain it…” Wraith seems to always be smiling widely and he speaks very casually, making Izumi wonder what kind of person he really is once more. That’s the one question he hasn’t really seemed to have answered yet. “I’m sure you’re familiar with wagyu right?” Izumi nods his head. “Super expensive beef well cared for from start to finish. Compare that to ground beef or sausages, just stuff mushed and thrown together, usually pretty cheap. Normal humans are like ground beef to specters, while humans that experience said emotions are like wagyu. What specters do is make the person drown in whatever emotion they’re born from, I suppose I’ll use myself as an example. Since I’m the specter of despair, I do whatever I can to make the person become overwhelmed by despair. Sometimes it takes a few months, sometimes a few years, but the end result is worth it to any specter.”

“So why do you grant wishes then?” Izumi tries to wrap his head around it all.

“To lead to that. You remember that politician that died recently? Some years ago he had money laundering and bribery allegations, was on the road to ruining his entire livelihood. Then, I appeared. I promised to make the world forget about the scandal if he would give me his only child, his daughter. Of course, he was hesitant, but he ultimately agreed. I knew that without his daughter, he’d feel constant regret, sorrow, all of which would lead to despair.”

“And then when he couldn’t handle it anymore you ate him?”

“You’re getting better at this.” Wraith’s smile was more unsettling this time around as Izumi began to stomach the fact that he eats people. Not just people like Izumi, but his own people. Was there really a world like that and no one ever knew?

Izumi regained his composure, trying to ignore the nausea he felt. “So only specters eat…people with overwhelmed emotions?”

“Yep.” Wraith seems to want to wrap things up as he’s clearly losing interest from the extensive questioning.

“But if ghosts just eat so much, then wouldn’t more humans be dead? Or more ghosts?”

“Well, most usually have blood and the like as a substitute, works just fine for a while. Plus, if spirits aren’t affiliated with a specter, they basically can’t eat humans period. Each specter has a territory and their own following of spirits. The specters regulate how much the spirits eat from the human world to avoid humans basically going extinct. But…” Wraith gets up and comes closer to Izumi, placing a hand on each of the arm rests, he entraps him. Izumi is looking up to Wraith, his eyes fixated on his sharp teeth. A carnivore. Heart beating out of his chest, Izumi grips his clothes tightly, hoping he doesn’t become Wraith’s next meal. “Calm down kid I’m not gonna eat you… Or am I?” Wraith holds Izumi’s right wrist in his hand, feels the pulse, and laughs. “I don’t blame you for being scared, but I’m a man of my word. I won’t eat you, I genuinely am curious why you can see ghosts, so how about this, I’ll sweeten the deal for you. I’ll do anything you want, in fact, I’ll be your personal bodyguard. Someone like you is bound to end up in a tight spot with how much you go parading the fact that you can see ghosts. There’s a catch though, I’ll only protect you without a price, but anything and everything else you want you have to pay for, just like everyone else.”

“But I don’t even have a daughter to give you-”

Wraith starts laughing again. “Man you’re good kid. Unless you plan on asking for something as tall as that politician, you don’t have to worry about that. Most things you can just pay for by letting me have some of your blood, other things I’ll play it by ear. But just so you don’t get all worried, I won’t ask you for anything that’ll harm you, your family, or your friends. Deal?”

It’s incredibly tempting. Izumi still has many questions for Wraith, but Wraith was dangerous. Although he promised not to hurt anyone he cared about, there was still a chance he could attack others unwarranted.

“You can’t hurt other humans.” Izumi tries his hardest to be firm with his demands.

“And if they’re trying to kill you or anyone you care about?”

“That’s…” Izumi thinks for a second. “You can’t kill them unless I give you the ok.”

“Sure, but that only applies for when I’m with you, got it?”

“That’s fine.”

Wraith holds out his hand. “Then, I look forward to working with you, little Izumi.” He smiles cockily. Izumi hesitates for a moment before shaking his hand. “Ah, I almost forgot. If you ever need me, you just need to say my name, either orally or in your head both works. I’ll know don’t worry. I’ll see you first thing tomorrow kid.” Before Izumi could respond, Wraith vanishes into the air, leaving Izumi in his room alone to process the events of today.