Prologue
"Don't leave the path so much darling!" A woman in her early thirties called out to a small, red-haired boy before he vanished into the under woods. Her worries were not unfounded. The forest around Mt. Fuji contained many caves one could wander into and not find out again. And a more tragic thing this forest was known for was as one of the most used spots for suicide.
No mother would want to have her child stumble over a half-decomposed body dangling from a tree.
The boy on the other hand barely listened to the warning before he advanced deeper into the veritable ocean of trees. The plantlife here was not cared for by human hands and almost seemed to be geared to impede a persons movement. The ground was covered by a dozen centimeters of dead leaves and decomposed wood, terrible footing for any kind of bigger animal. Above that were small mostly bramble-like bushes and the big trees shutting out most of the sunlight.
A normal forest mostly untouched by humans.
But such small obstacles were nothing compared to the boundless curiosity and energy inside a small child's body. Thus the redhead proceeded further into the thickets surrounding the highest mountain of Japan, squeezing beneath fallen trees and through thorns in search of adventure.
When the sun had passed its zenith, the small boy was still wandering through the ancient forest, not remembering the path back, unsure as to where he should go, the redhead still kept moving, certain that his steps will lead him back to his parent's side.
The undergrowth had turned into an almost impenetrable mixture of rotting wood and verdant vines that exhausted him with every step he took. No human hands had cleared out fallen trees here for at least decades.
Toiling through this harsh, for a child, environment made the boy lose his feeling of time and direction, stretching hours into years, making him question whether he would ever return home by afternoon.
A ray of hope shone down on him when he reached a cliff. Something he could use to find his way back. After all if you touched the wall of a labyrinth with one hand you couldn't get lost, or something like that, he remembered hearing on some TV show.
Following the cliff in one direction, the boy was soon rewarded with something that was not green or brown, but red. A color that didn't belong to nature in this season, meaning it had to be something man-made. Hastening his steps the, by now hungry and thirsty, boy reached a torii, a red shrine gate, standing in front of a cave going into the rock.
But the salvation he had looked for did not exist here.
The red had already faded greatly, the wood bleached under rain, wind and sun. Weathered tags of paper with unintelligible squiggles on them were torn or halfway pealed off from the pillars. No trace was left behind of a path leading to the torii and the cave from the forest. Nothing indicated that anyone regularly visited this place or any clue he could use to return home.
Exhausted, the redhead leaned against the cliff before sliding down into a sitting position.
With the sun slowly moving towards but not sinking yet, he could feel how it got colder and slightly darker. Especially from his left side where the cave was. It felt like the gaping hole in the rock face was sucking in the light and warmth of the surrounding area.
Having been told by his parents and the television that carelessly entering caves is dangerous he was hesitant, but something seemed to pull him into the void, latching onto him, one delicate ephemeral touch at a time.
As he entered the cave, the light seemed to vanish more with every step, enveloping him in a thick darkness. The black was so overwhelming and all-consuming that he was convinced he could literally smell it, feel it crawling down his throat.
Where before the time he had stumbled through the forest had seemed endless, it now was but a short glimpse for him. One by one, his senses left him. His sight went away first, enveloping his world in darkness, followed by the loss of his hearing, the silence crushing him like a giant boulder. When his sense of touch and balance began to sputter away, he completely lost orientation, unsure whether he was walking upright, crawling on the ground, or even moving at all. Heat and cold took turns, freezing him to the bone at one moment before burning his skin away the next, before this sense too stopped working.
The only thing that was left working in the end was his nose. He still believed he could smell the darkness forcing its way down his throat. But where before the blackness had been a thing of monolithic uniformity, the boy could now smell something different. The heavy scent of wet earth mixed with the freshness of an ocean breeze.
Directing numb limbs he wasn't even sure existed anymore towards that smell, the darkness seemed to lose its overwhelming oppressiveness. The boy felt his body return to his control step by step as he got closer to the source of the scent.
*Clink*
A metallic noise suddenly cut through the silent darkness.
"I-Is someone here?" the boy asked hesitantly.
*Clink* *Clink*
A pair of glowing golden orbs opened to look at the young boy. The two spots of light in the darkness focused on him, tense seconds passing with the boy holding his breath, before his question was answered.
"Made to hold one, yet suddenly contains two.
Miracle or necessity?
Speak, child of man, what is your name."
The voice made him feel like a myriad of insects were squirming inside his body, he needed to vomit all of his organs out, and rip his own ears off. Yet, at the same time he felt safe and content as if he was cradled in his mothers arms, pure bliss transmitted via his eardrums.
"M-My name is XXXXX."
The golden eyes fixed him with burning intensity for another heartbeat.
"A child of man finding its way where man has denied passage,
treading a path where none is supposed to exist exist."
Darkness returned with the closing of both gleaming orbs.
"###### is who I am.
With names freely exchanged the pact is bound.
Your miracle shall be rewarded in kind when the time is right.
Until that day, fare well, my child of man."
With their reopening, the eyes turned the darkness into a world of gold. Before the boy's eyes could get used to the sudden illumination, he was blown away by something akin to a gust of wind, losing his sense of orientation completely once again.
A small boy who had run off to deep into the forest and got lost as a result was found, disoriented and confused, by a search group the day after he went missing.
He was brought to the hospital where his frantic parents were waiting for him. While the boy was being checked for injuries on the way to the hospital, it was noted that his eye-color didn't match the description. What should have been a plain brown was now an eerily light brown color bordering on gold.
Even after a series of extensive medical checks, no reason for the discoloration could be found and the boy was released from hospital after his mental state had returned to normal.
The family then returned to their home in the tranquil city of Fuyuki.
CLANGcling
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With each time the chains were strained, they lost some of their strength, their anchor point coming loose an infinitesimal bit at a time.
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The path had been created.
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With that miracle accomplished, the chains were but a small nuisance.
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Nothing that couldn't be fixed with some strength and a dash of time.
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And patience was about the only thing this imprisonment could teach.
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CLANGcrack
"-Ahh."
