My name is Satori, but that's also the name of my species. We're distinguished from other youkai by our third eye, which lets us read minds. Even among species that aren't liked, we're...particularly reviled, for our ability.
...I never hesitated to use it, so that made me especially disliked. I accepted that I would be hated, and lived my life in the way I wanted despite that. I've made many, many enemies, embarrassed people, cut them off in conversations to respond to their thoughts. I've rifled through their memories to find their most painful ones to see how they react. A goddess felt the need to go behind my back because I'm notoriously impossible to agree with. I'm a satori, but I'm also not a very good person. So I can understand why I'd be chosen for some sick killing game, sort of.
Koishi is different, though. She was never able to handle the thought that an ability she didn't even ask for would cause such hatred. Asking a satori not to read minds is like asking a human being to stop being able to taste food. It's how we interact with the world, and the surface dwellers and even most of the other underground youkai - even though they're undesirables too...they all hated her, because she was a satori. Even though she never did anything wrong.
She couldn't even pretend not to know about it, because even when they never said anything, she knew what they were thinking.
[That bitter tone is back in full force.]
They're garbage just like the rest of us, but they still thought to treat my sister like she was lower than them, even though she was the only good person in the entire underground...
[That's probably not actually true, but that's how Satori sees it.]
She doesn't deserve this. She doesn't deserve to be dragged into this just because I was. That's...
[Uncomfortably close to what's already happened once.]
no subject
...I never hesitated to use it, so that made me especially disliked. I accepted that I would be hated, and lived my life in the way I wanted despite that. I've made many, many enemies, embarrassed people, cut them off in conversations to respond to their thoughts. I've rifled through their memories to find their most painful ones to see how they react. A goddess felt the need to go behind my back because I'm notoriously impossible to agree with. I'm a satori, but I'm also not a very good person. So I can understand why I'd be chosen for some sick killing game, sort of.
Koishi is different, though. She was never able to handle the thought that an ability she didn't even ask for would cause such hatred. Asking a satori not to read minds is like asking a human being to stop being able to taste food. It's how we interact with the world, and the surface dwellers and even most of the other underground youkai - even though they're undesirables too...they all hated her, because she was a satori. Even though she never did anything wrong.
She couldn't even pretend not to know about it, because even when they never said anything, she knew what they were thinking.
[That bitter tone is back in full force.]
They're garbage just like the rest of us, but they still thought to treat my sister like she was lower than them, even though she was the only good person in the entire underground...
[That's probably not actually true, but that's how Satori sees it.]
She doesn't deserve this. She doesn't deserve to be dragged into this just because I was. That's...
[Uncomfortably close to what's already happened once.]