Chapter Text
To say that staying very far, far away from the bunch of trees that Morimura (森村) village calls “the forbidden forest” was the only unwritten, unspoken rule Ochako Uraraka would be breaking in the upcoming couple of weeks… would be blatantly lying, but for the sake of avoiding spoilers, we’ll just have to pretend that that’s where she’ll draw the line. After all, Ochako Uraraka had always been such a good kid.
She had never broken the rules, always did her best to help her parents in any way possible, as well as anyone else she might have come across. The Urarakas were well known throughout the kingdom as excellent masons and carpenters, even grabbing King Enji Todoroki’s attention, getting the chance to work on his own personal projects. Ochako made sure to always be there to help with anything they’d allow her to do, which was nothing. They didn’t want her to join the family business, always hoping that she’d make a better life for herself, found a spouse that would give her an easy, happy life, free of their harsh labour. So they never officially employed her.
Not that this stopped her. Again, they never officially employed her. They couldn’t exactly stop her from picking up an axe and going in the woods by herself, spending her days studying the woodsmen’s techniques and training herself until she could chop down trees all on her own.
They could stop her from entering the mines that they owned, but the woods didn’t belong to anyone.
Add some experience with hunting and foraging and voilà: you get the one and only Ochako Uraraka.
Her life used to be more than just working, working, and working; she had a life, friends she hung out with, hobbies she pursued— until recently. She offered her services to other people in the village too, whatever they might have needed, she provided. She liked to serve, to see the people around her happy and satisfied. It felt good to know their burdens were gone because of her. In the end, Ochako might have been amazingly skilled with her faithful axe and deadly crossbow, but she was a jack of all trades. She knew how to fish, how to work glass and clay, how to tend to animals, a little bit of farming— as long as she put her mind to it, she would learn how to do anything.
If there’s someone anyone would have wanted to be when the infection came —ask anybody in Morimura village— they would all have given the same exact answer: « Life would be so easy if I was the Urarakas’ kid ».
Of course, that was far from the actual truth. The correct answer should have been: « Life would be so easy if I lived anywhere, but here, » Anywhere far, far away from the infection, from magic.
Sadly, there wasn’t anywhere you could go where there wasn’t magic. Sure, travel between kingdoms were limited at first. Official believed a sort of quarantine would have been enough to end the spread of the curse, but no matter where people turned their heads, any land they heard back from gave the same answer: there are monsters among us.
It was an inexplicable phenomenon. Mythological beasts used to be unheard of, mere legends. People could go their whole lives without encountering one— people did. To come face to face with a siren, a real witch, a yokai, was a one in a thousand people occurrence. To come face to face with them twice in the same life was impossible, yet all of a sudden those creatures were showing up everywhere.
Only they weren’t really the legendary beasts people used to hear about from tales, but humans.
One day, people started mutating into horrific demons, others showed signs of witchcraft, and those who had come into contact with the afflicted would soon after become like them too.
The great hunts had begun. People from all over the Todoroki Kingdom joined in to help get rid of those ‘infected,’ as they had started to call the individuals cursed with magic. They were killed and disposed of in any way possible: thrown into the sea, buried deep, deep underground, fed to wild animals as bait to keep them away from the flocks and herds of shepherds.
Burned at stake, until nothing but their ashes remained.
Yet, the monsters kept showing up. People started avoiding each other, hoarding resources, and refusing to provide services to their fellow citizens. Living became almost impossible. It was an absolute nightmare.
Everyone had lost someone to the infection: whether they got killed by hunters, or lost themselves to the madness brought along by magic. Many ran off into the woods in their new found monster bodies, never to be seen again.
The Urarakas had lost so many. How could they not have? They knew everyone.
But see, Ochako Uraraka didn’t cry when she helplessly had to watch her best friend get hunted down and killed for sport. After all, it was supposed to be a joyful occasion: no one cried when monsters died. The people of Morimura were safe from meeting her horrible fate. It really was for the best.
So instead, she cried in the comfort of her home, where no-one could see or hear her weep. She let everything out, merely wash over her, said goodbye to the memory of her, what she represented, and went on with her life, as she was expected to.
The worst thing you could be —other than a witch or a monster— was a sympathiser.
Tsu’s whole family was gone in an instant. Only her younger brother, Samidare, had come out unscathed. He picked up what was left of the Asui family business and managed to survive, somehow.
Ochako didn’t know how he managed.
She and her parents of course offered to give him a home, but the boy insisted on continuing with his nomad lifestyle, traveling from city to city on his own, managing the merchant carriage of goods and continuing to provide everyone in Morimura with good resources from the nearby towns. He always saved the best he had for Ochako though.
Life went on, but that was the breaking point for her. It all felt so deeply unfair. She’d watched her esteemed mentors disappear, family friends die, her own best friend’s corpse burned at stake— but she was still there.
She wished it had taken her too— taken her instead.
But she also felt horrible knowing deep down she was glad she was still alive. She would have never forgiven herself if something happened to her and her parents had to take the fall for her. They needed her, as much as they tried to make it look like they were doing fine. They needed her there.
Business wasn’t going well, she knew as much. The constant fires they still suffered from caused the nearby forests to lose a lot of their trees. Wild animals were becoming harder and harder to find, especially with winter approaching. Resources were scarce, and instead of trading and working with each other, to limit communications and chances of infections, people preferred doing things themselves. They’d go get the wood they needed on their own; struggling, sure, but they’d still do it.
Yet, there was one forest that seemed to be doing just fine: the god-damned forbidden one.
Why forbidden? Because anyone that had stepped foot in it in the past five months didn’t come back. People took the hint after the twenty-seventh missing person report.
But here’s the thing: none of those people were Ochako Uraraka. If anyone had a shot at surviving that place, it was her. And she was tired of eating squirrels every single day.
Plus, she couldn’t die in there: her parents needed her alive. She’d go and make it out in one piece. She’d hunt a whole deer, find mushrooms, get wood— she’d do it all, because that’s just who she was.
So that’s what brought her here, to her first infraction of… honestly who’s keeping track at this point? You’ll see.
Her parents weren’t in town. They had been working directly for the king for a couple of months now, while she was left behind to ‘just take care of herself and stay safe’. That, of course, wouldn’t cut it. Ochako spent her whole summer breaking her back gathering as much as possible material for her parents’ activity, and she wasn’t going to stop until they came back… actually, not even that was going to stop her.
The world was ending anyway, the least she could do was make—the what? few years? months? weeks? whatever— the anything they had left be comfortable.
So she grabbed her trusty axe and crossbow along with a wicker basket she made herself, and headed out.
She would have gone yesterday if only she hadn’t run into Samidare himself, but she was actually glad she did. He warned her personally that the goats of the local shepherd’s herd had run off from him. They’d definitely been out in the open for a few days; most had managed to make it down the mountain all the way to town. Many seemed to have made it out of some nasty encounter with a wild beast of sorts, seeing as they were partially covered in blood.
The young Asui had already secured two for himself, which were going to be a great source of milk for a while, but he couldn’t not tell Ochako about it too.
The two managed to get a hold of one, and as they were dragging it back to her house they heard some commotion in the town square about the situation, about how the young farmer Shuichi refused to acknowledge the few people that came to inform him about his herd. He yelled at everyone to go away, that he didn’t care, and that the goats were all up for grab. So Ochako shrugged off whatever his issue was and took little Zakuro home, named after the poor state she was found in, as the bloodiest goat of the bunch, genuinely soaking wet, dripping and leaving a trail of red wherever she’d go. It wasn’t hard to track her down.
Ochako spent the rest of the day washing her off at the river after that. She’d have one more mouth to feed, but at least she’d have a source of milk, which meant a source of cheese. She’d take anything the world would give her at that point.
But that day, there were no more goats in sight to distract her: she was going to do it.
Standing at the edge of the forbidden forest, a rush of wind blew over her body, sending a chill down her spine. Summer had truly ended, anyone with half a brain in their skull could feel it. A few hours of walking through the woods and she’d make it to the nearby port village. Ochako closed her eyes and imagined the wind coming from the sea. If she concentrated hard enough, she could almost smell it in the air, alongside the various herbs and plants that tainted the breeze while passing through the woods.
She could hear the faint sounds of birds in the distance and instantly knew to steer away from them. Risking to see if they were a specie that was procrastinating its migration wasn’t safe when there were monsters roaming those very same woods. Plus, summer forest fires weren’t that common until those things showed up, and she’d heard enough people say there was a phoenix hiding somewhere in there. Ochako had never seen nor heard a phoenix’s cry, nor was she interested in finding out how it looked or sounded like in that particular moment.
She’d look for deer, mushrooms, and wood. That’s it. No birds.
It would be her unspoken unwritten rule: no hunting for birds in the forbidden forest. There. Look at her: she knew how to not break rules. She was truly a good, responsible kid.
A young woman, even; her twentieth birthday was fast approaching.
Ochako turned around one last time, smelled the faint scent of burnt bread in the distance, and walked into the mix of fragrances the woods had to offer instead.
Foraging was most likely the easiest part of her job. On the days that Tsu would stay in Morimura, she and Ochako would take long walks in the woods alone and Tsu would teach her all she knew about the plants in the forest. They’d been doing that ever since they were kids. Back then it was safe to do so.
Well, back then they’d go accompanied by trusted adults —most times— but still, it was still safer than it was now.
Tsuyu Asui had the keenest eye out of anyone Ochako knew in recognising trees, plants, herbs, berries— anything. She knew what was poisonous, what was okay to eat, what could be used as medicine, and what wouldn’t exactly kill you, but could drug you. She taught Ochako everything she knew. They even wrote a journal together on their explorations. Samidare had Tsu’s nowadays, but Ochako still had her version.
Sure, Tsu was an amazing teacher, but Ochako still had an issue or two when it came to some plants, so having the book to rely on was amazing for her. There was too much information to keep track of all at once. Truth be told, Tsu didn’t even need her journal, she just wrote it to match with Ochako. It was obvious from a mile away that she could recognise everything correctly without any issue.
And now that book was one of the few things she had left from her best friend.
Dead or alive, Tsu would always help Ochako stay alive.
But there wasn’t much she could do from beyond the grave to help her with what she was walking towards. Maybe she could resuscitate and come to her, but she wasn’t undead when they killed her, so that was not an option.
Ochako picked up the sound of a twig snapping. She was pretty light on her feet, aware of her surroundings, and most of all quiet. The trees’ foliage was so thick and overgrown that light barely shone through it, which made Ochako truly invisible. The few rays of sunlight passing coming through were granted by the holes left by the first fallen leaves.
Whoever made that noise wasn’t going to be making much more noise ever again pretty soon.
She readied her crossbow and charged it with an arrow. The twig didn’t sound too thick, but also not that tiny. Whatever had walked on it had to be at least somewhat big to break it. But nothing was visible over the bushes in the distance where the sound came from. Maybe a hare, a wild boar, or a badger— heck, she’d take a fox too.
Ochako wasn’t scared of what could be hiding in the woods. She was a hunter. People had to fear her. Still, she couldn’t help feeling an intense feeling of dread in that moment.
No. Not dread. She was creeped out by… something. Sure, the turf she was using as her hunting ground wasn’t exactly the same as the one of the other forests, but it was still just a forest. Forbidden, but a forest nonetheless.
Still, she could feel her skin slowly crawl as she got goosebumps all over her body.
She carefully stepped closer to the source of the noise, lifting her crossbow to aim at her prey. Her hands shook for the first time since she was thirteen, back when she first pointed the weapon at a rabbit as a beginner hunter.
She got them to stop their shivering through sheer will.
Ochako took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and just as she was about to shoot, she heard another twig. She couldn’t tell where the noise came from though, as in fact, she heard many twigs. Snapping all at once, from every direction.
She flinched, turning around and shooting her arrow in the middle of the forest trees, into the darkness. Yet, nothing seemed to run away from the bush where her prey presumably was.
In fact, it was all so quiet again. The wind had stopped blowing too.
There was something strange in the distance, to her right. In the thick darkness, a single light source seemed to be visible. A small orangish point of feeble light.
It looked almost translucent, and Ochako only saw it in the corner of her eye for a second before she turned towards it and it was gone again. She must have imagined it.
Ochako wasn’t one to get nauseous easily, but for a second she felt like throwing up all of a sudden.
There wasn’t any foul smell or anything really justifying the sudden urge, but it felt unbearable. Ochako resisted despite the burning acid in her throat.
The tweets of what seemed to be a sparrow snapped her out of whatever confusing sensations she was feeling. It started singing so loudly all of a sudden, crying almost… frantically? It seemed agitated.
A sparrow couldn’t be a decent meal. And again: no birds. She gave herself one rule, she might as well follow it.
She decided to get as far away possible from the current area she was in, maybe there was a gas source she couldn’t smell, but was there nonetheless. So she walked deeper into the woods.
The tweets didn’t stop though, actually, it sounded like the bird flew closer to where she was going. It was annoying, but hopefully it wouldn’t make her designated prey flee.
Eventually she managed to find a hare, and it was a hare, there was nothing mythical about the way it looked. It seemed lost in thought or whatever it is hares do when they stand still in the woods sniffing the air.
Ochako aimed again. The sparrow’s cries rang in her ears so loudly she was considering shooting at it just to make it be quiet. It was so bad she felt as if they were ringing: a high pitched whistle scratching at her eardrums.
In a few swift seconds, Ochako let the arrow go, but was shocked to see it curve and miss by an inch. The wind seemed to pick up again all of a sudden, the culprit of her mistake for sure. She always had impeccable aim, after all.
The hare ran off in the opposite direction of the breeze and as Ochako got up to go retrieve her arrow at least, she noticed a new sound amongst the screams of the sparrow: a vague whisper, overlaid on itself, constantly repeating like a broken record. It was impossible to make out what it said; it sounded too faint to be able to distinguish anything, but it definitely wasn’t an animal’s doing.
Screw the arrow. Ochako could take an hint. She’d try her luck again anywhere else in the other woods, the ones where the few animals that were there could actually be caught if you found yourself face to face with them.
Horror and dread came over her as she turned around and noticed the trees were different. She could bet on it, sure they might have looked like normal trees of the same kind that were there before, but they were not where they were supposed to be.
The foliage began to shake as the wind picked up again. The sparrow went quiet. Everything went quiet, really. The only thing she could hear was the whisper, getting louder and clearer with every repetition.
Leaves started flowing through the air as Ochako decided to save her questions for when she could clearly see the light of day again.
She ran. She ran back in the direction she came from, towards the edge of the woods, yet the path felt longer than it should have been.
And no matter how far away she ran, the whisper still became louder and louder with each step.
An arrow was quickly readied and as she turned around to aim it at whatever was making the noise, she heard it. She didn’t see it, but she heard it loud and clear.
All it was saying, whatever it was, was just “Thirteen”.
Over and over. Nothing more.
She shot the arrow without meaning to and watched it soar towards “it” faster than she’d ever seen an arrow fly. Now that she noticed, the wind had changed its course again.
The wind aimed for whatever it was that was behind her. Like a compass, the wind was its needle, and the creature was north.
Ochako kept running, the ringing worsened, the whispers became voices.
She couldn’t think, and she couldn’t even process if it was because of the panic, or because she couldn’t stop repeating that damn word in her head too.
Thirteen, thirteen, thirteen, thirteen—
If it was already dark before, it was pitch black now. The things around her existed without their shadows. They were just flat coloured shapes slowly abstracting all around her.
There was too much noise, there was too much to see, it was hell. Nothing made sense.
She was going to die. Of course she’d run towards death because she couldn’t stop overworking herself, of course.
In trying to help her parents, she was leaving them alone to fend for themselves. Why did she have to throw herself away for a bunch of wood? She already had wood at home— it wasn’t that much, but she had it. Why did she have to go in the stupid woods people never come back from to realise it?
Was she hoping she’d be taken too?
She didn’t have time to process what her answer to that question would have been. She realised she was muttering “Thirteen” too like a lunatic. She hadn’t picked up a bad mushroom and eaten it by mistake, had she? She had Tsu’s journal, she knew better than that, surely. And she hadn’t even eaten anything while hunting— or had she? Nothing made sense anymore. Her hands were starting to look funny.
The voices were clearer now. Overlaid with that cursed number was the sound of laughter. Children, women, men, many different voices, all laughing together. It was as if Ochako had walked in on a room full of people all laughing about an inside joke she didn’t know about. It was as if they were mocking her. It felt like an eternal pity laugh.
Then the laughter became screaming. The screaming became singing, until there no longer were people’s voices, but bird cries. Were they still singing as birds? Or was it back to screaming again? The two had always sounded so alike to her.
Ochako closed her eyes and stopped running, falling to the ground on her knees.
It was too loud to do anything. Her ears felt like they were bleeding.
Maybe it’d go away if she just stopped running.
And if it didn’t, well, they were all going to die one way or another soon enough.
It was always going to be either this or the hunters, because she sure as hell wasn’t going to kill herself to run away from it all.
She did everything she could in her almost twenty years alive. It sucked magic had to cut that time short though. Ochako knew she could have done great things in her life; the world had just decided to go to shit right when it was her time to do those things.
The noise was getting louder and louder, but all she could hear at that point was the ringing in her ears drowning it out, as if an explosion had gone off right beside her ears.
Something was dragging her, yet nothing had grabbed her, but she could still feel the sensation of her knees scraping against the ground through her clothes. She felt each stone, stick, and bump just like the wind caressing the rest of her body.
One last mistake: Ochako turned around. With nothing left to do but wait for the inevitable, she tried to get one last glimpse of her personal grim reaper.
And she was left mesmerised, like a moth staring at an open flame, as she looked at the abstracted creature before her.
Shapes didn’t make any sense to her anymore, all disconnected from each other and moving unnaturally, but the general idea was still there.
A faceless being acting as a cage for a sphere of pure darkness, a faint orange glow surrounding it.
Nothing else really mattered. What else was even there to begin with? How could she describe what she was watching?
Teeth. Ochako could recall teeth. Sharp fangs, precisely; but to say exactly where they were supposed to be was too much for her in the state she was in. Was it a mouth on its torso, containing the black orb? There were also a lot of wings surrounding the creature, but they were moving too fast for Ochako to really understand what they were. The rest was mostly just colours, intricate lines of red, white, black and yellow, tangling with each other.
No more numbers, no more laughter: the voices were calling her now, telling her to join them. Telling her it was time to join them.
So at last, when it seemed like it was finally over, Ochako managed to see through the sphere.
And on the other side, was just her. Different, but still her. She was…
Happy.
She smiled and closed her eyes as it claimed her, thinking “Yeah, it won’t be so bad,” right as something decided it was finally time to get a hold of her and tug her away sharply.
The noise suddenly stopped, and Ochako was no longer awake to hear the silence that followed.