"Mister," she said sweetly. "Can you please come play with me?" she giggled. "I'm bored, and all my friends ran off somewhere. I can't find them, so I need someone new to play with," she piped happily.

"What would you like to play?" I asked rather casually. But in the back of my mind, there was that small voice telling me that something was wrong with this situation. That there was something deadly about it.

"Tag, tag, let's play tag!" The girl smiled and spun around in a circle with her arms outstretched. "Yooouu're it!"

It was only a moment after this did I realize that she, instead of running back towards the forest from which I came, ran straight through the Gates. "No wait!" I called after her, immediately giving chase. All I could think of how dangerous it would be to go running through the Abyss. How dangerous it would be for such a small child like her. When I passed through the Gates myself, it felt as though something as taken the breath straight from my lungs and wouldn't allow me to take another. Looking through the Gates from the other side, the land beyond looked like nothing more than forest. The same as the forest through which I had just traveled to arrive at this very place. But no...beyond the Gates was something that I hadn't expected. The land was ravaged and black, with the after glows of ashes from a fire being the only light aside from the red moon. When I had entered it had been mid afternoon, with the sun high in the sky. The forest was charred and trees bare. The smell of burned flesh lingered in the air, but there were no corpses of creature nor human in sight. This land was a horror to behold.

Though...what was worse than any sight that the Abyss could provide, was a sudden, crushing feeling of dread. Of fear and dispair, though the Gates were right at my back. I suddenly felt as if they could disappear at any moment. Disappear and leave me to face this horrific world without an exit.

A flash of white appeared in my sight. It was the girl as she waved to me from afar. "Mister, come on, you gotta catch me!" she giggled before running off into the ash darkened forest. Suddenly reminded of why I had entered to begin with, I once more gave chase. No matter how far I ran though, the only thing that seemed to change was how far away the Gates got. I tried to keep my sense of direction as I searched for the girl, but there were no landmarks. Nothing to keep a bearing with. Taking my dagger from the inside of my cloak, I pulled my arm back to make a slash on a tree, only to be stopped by the sound of the silver bell behind me. "I wouldn't do that if I were you," she said. I spun around to face her, my cloak whirling in my wake. I'd lost sight of her only moments ago, and now she was standing behind me..? I swallowed. I hadn't noticed it until then, but the further in I'd gone, the more that feeling of dread had seemed to take over. Telling me, warning me to go back, that I would regret not heeding it's pleas.

"W-we shouldn't be in here," I panted. "Come on, we should get out. We can't play tag in such a place," I told her. Whereas before her giggle had put me at ease, now it sent a shiver down my spine. Something had changed about her. But what was it? She looked up at me and I realized what it was. Her eyes had changed. They were no longer blue, but the blaze of a black fire. It was the most horrible color I'd ever seen. Almost as if it was completely void of all color.

"Why not? It's so much fun playing here though!" She turned, her white gown spinning behind her. "Now come on, catch me!" I grabbed for her, and as my hand clutched the back of her dress...it slipped right through. Just as my hand would have slipping through smoke. And indeed, the white of the dress swirled as if it were just a gas and nothing more. My eyes widened as that gripping fear finally overtook me and as the girl spun to face me with a large smile. "Haha, you caught me!" she squeaked. But as she did, there were suddenly other sounds stirring throughout the land. Branches crackling, the sound of wind blowing through invisible leaves, yet I felt no gust on my skin. I stepped back from her, my body suddenly shivering. "Go on then, run! I'll even give you a head start! You get ten seconds, and then I start running," she giggled, turning around. "I won't even look which direction you go in."

I didn't have to be told twice. Immediately I turned tail and started back towards where I thought I had come from. I should have known, I thought in a panic. The Phantom of the Abyss...it takes the form of whatever will make it's victim most vunerable... I tripped over branches as I went, but only stumbled for a few seconds. I'd heard of the Phantom before, but I'd never thought it existed. The horror stories that were told about that creature were enough to make me fear for my life the very moment I realized who it was. No, what it was.

As I ran, I heard her counting loudly enough for me to hear, even as I sped forward. It didn't seem like I was getting anywhere. Everything looked the same. "Mister, what did you come here to look for?" I slid to a stop and fell backwards as I suddenly found the girl in front of me. As I did, a scream of pure terror escaped me. For a moment, she simply looked confused. "Why'd you do that?" And then she pouted. "I'm not scary, I just wanna know." And then she paused, and then she giggled. "Oh, it's cuz I'm gonna tag you isn't it?" I didn't answer her before I got up and pulled out my dagger again, marking the tree next to me before turning around and running back towards where I'd first discovered her true nature. I didn't see her face, but rather, I heard her frown when she spoke next. "I told you not to do that." In that next instant, all those sounds that had suddenly started earlier, stopped altogether.

The further I ran, the deeper the silence got, until it was overbearing. I had to stop. I had to look around. There were no noises anywhere. The Phantom was nowhere in sight. Just to break that crushing silence, I stepped on a twig, which broke noiselessly under my weight. I took my foot off of it and looked at it with a swallow. It had broken, but there had been no sound. This silence truly was unbreakable. I looked around again, sweating and panting from the panic this place had instilled in me. And then I saw it. Something...out of the ordinary about this place. A shine. It looked like it might have been the shine of a light off water. And so I ran. I ran towards it as fast as my legs could possibly carry me. Not even my footsteps pounding on the blackened earth made any noises. I ran, and ran, and ran, until a small river came into my view. Just when I thought I had been getting close to it, I ran into something. Or rather, I ran into nothing at all. The air in front of me wavered visibly, shivering as if an icy wind had chilled it to the bone. But, air didn't have bones. So...what had I run into?

As soon as the thought had crossed my mind, I'd just as soon wished it hadn't. For the shivering air had begun to make waves, and in place of the silence came the sound of high pitched pulsing. So high pitched that, my ears were barely even picking up the fact that there was a sound at all. I dropped to my knees, covering my ears. But it didn't help. The sound came in short, strong bursts, waves of searing pain after another until my head was spinning and my ears bleeding. Finally the sound stopped, and I realized that it had stopped because the air had stopped shivering. I didn't dare stand up just yet, for my head was still in disarray. I could barely even see straight. When I did finally push myself up, I had to use a tree for support. But just as soon as I had, the bark of the tree began engulfing my hand, forcing another scream from me as I wrenched my hand away. When I looked at the tree again, it was as if nothing about it had changed. It looked...normal. Well, as normal as anything could get in a place like this. I turned to look at the bit of air I'd run into and slowly reached my trembling hand forward. This time when I felt it, the...whatever it was, barely even moved. It was as if I had touched solid water. It still trembled when I touched it, but it would not allow me through. So instead, I quickly put my other hand on it and felt along it, searching for an opening, pushing every now and then to see if it would open. I couldn't get the Phantom out of my mind. It was silent again, as I felt for an opening. No matter how far I went, there was nothing. Until...finally I had given up for a few moments, in need of a rest. So I leaned back on the invisible shivering wall. But when I did, I fell straight back through it, and tumbled down a hill towards the river, a hill which I had though only moments ago to be completely flat land. Rolling curled up down the hill, I landed in the river, though I didn't stop moving. Instead of rolling, I now felt as if I was falling...falling......falling.............

My scream echoed off the white and gold walls as I fell into a fountain in the middle of a large room, set with two staircases and a set of large wooden doors on the side opposite the stairs. The fountain was deeper than I'd expected it to be, for when I fell in, I sunk down quite a way, without feeling a bottom before I hurriedly swam to the surface. Gasping for air, I threw my arms over the side of the fountain, clinging on as if the water would drag me back under. I looked up from where I fell, only to see a fountain very similar to the one I was sitting in, placed on the ceiling, the water rippling from my emergance.

I then turned my gaze to the rest of the room. The walls were white with gold lining, and the two sets of stairs came about to the middle of the balcony of the second floor from the left and right. Lining the walls were suits of armor, one on either side of the double doors, one each by the base of the staircases, and two to each the left and right walls. And between the staircases stood the little girl that had lured me into the Abyss. Only. Her eyes were no longer a black fire. They were the pure blue that they'd been when I'd first seen her. She smiled brightly.

"Welcome home big brother!"

"Okaeri, Oniisan!"