The sword had held an evil spell for centuries, only able to be wielded by the strongest and most worthy of men. The problem was that it corrupted the minds of those unfit to claim its power, and when the owner refused to relinquish it, engaging in mindless slaughter, the blade and its master were cursed by a wrathful witch. He would be placed in everlasting slumber until someone who could tame his heart came along, someone who could awaken him and convince him to either wield the sword rightfully or abandon it. Until then, he would remain asleep.
It had been five hundred years since that day, and the ownerless sword had claimed many more victims, its curse spreading through the ground like poison and drawing arrogant power-hungry hearts to it. All perished. Even the sight of the blade, its very presence could have an effect on anyone susceptible to its lust for violence. The blade preyed upon weakness and howled for its sleeping wielder. Those who searched for the sword were doomed the moment they saw it. Even those who hadn't even laid eyes on it, who had never been burdened with the image of the sword and its terrible secret, they too still felt an incredible need bubbling within them like lava.
Having set foot on the cursed ground a hundred years prior, the sole survivor of a band of rogues who had been dead set on claiming the sword undergoes a terrifying transformation and is left to roam the countryside for decades, spreading fire in his wake. If only he could take that sword's secret to the grave, but alas, he hadn't aged a day in a hundred years.
The patron legend of their valley had long since been Yumichika's favorite, probably ever since the first time he'd heard it. The idea of a cursed sword longing for its slumbering master was quite romantic, waiting for him for hundreds of years and spreading an evil mire throughout their land when it was denied. He'd made his mother tell it over and over again until he could correct her if she got a single word wrong. He'd even taken to telling it to the kids who hung around his shack once in a while, but that didn't mean he didn't think it was a pile of shit.
The legend was just that, a legend, and Yumichika's lip curled slightly as he heard a crappy rendition of the tale from a nearby street-vendor who was trying to lure children and their money in to buy apples. What an ugly voice, and he was getting a ton of things wrong, embellishing on purpose. Oh, it irked Yumichika, but he couldn't help but stick around to hear just how badly he messed up the tale so he could shake his head and glare in disapproval. He grit his teeth in ire, but stopped begrudgingly to listen, hanging back behind the grubby kids and staring skeptically at the storyteller, daring him to make eye contact.
Telling the story rather like beauty and the beast, the vendor explained that the sword's master had been the strongest and therefore the most worthy man in all the land, which made him the only one who'd been able to wield the sword, the sword that was imbued with a dark terrible magic that gave its owner absolute power. Most men who would be considered worthy by it were pure of heart, incorruptible, but this one was different; his sheer strength and skill alone had allowed him take up the sword as his own, and the dark magic had twisted his heart.
Yumichika sneered. No one was worthy but that warrior. That was the whole point of the sword spreading its rage across the mountain. It wasn't a matter of those who tried to take it being pure of heart or not. The sword wanted its old master back, not a new one. That warrior just had to come back and prove he was worthy again, and all would be over. Besides, that idiot wouldn't be worthy anymore, not now that a witch had deemed that he was so violent and out of control that he needed to be put to sleep for the rest of his life until somebody in the far future came along to help.
Not that any of it was real. Especially not when this guy was telling the story so unbelievably wrong. It made Yumichika feel like gagging. Way to take a great tale and completely ruin it. He should just walk off right now! Oh, but not yet…
The part where 'Beauty' came in was what Yumichika was waiting for.
"The wielder was a reckless violent person, and when he finally found the most powerful weapon in all the land, he used it for heinous selfish purposes. He cared not for the responsibility that ultimate power provided, and chose instead to duel constantly, seeking opponents and increasing the sword's bloodlust with each one he cut down. He used it for evil."
"Ahhhhn!" a child chirped.
"Woah!"
Yumichika snorted. Just because the man hadn't used the sword to protect the meek like he'd been meant to didn't mean that he'd been evil. Yumichika imagined that others who had challenged him had probably been pillagers and other types who would use their swords for wrongdoing. He'd always imagined the sword-wielder as a sort of chaotic neutral, but never a villain. He was seen as a hero to a lot of people, although he had no idea why, if they believed in the mountain being cursed because of him.
"One day," the vendor said in a hushed voice that caused the children to huddle even closer, "he crossed a sorceress, who put a curse on him and his weapon-"
A double-curse, oi vey. Yumichika scoffed and walked away, not bothering to wait for the spell-breaker to come in to the tale. He knew the story well enough. At least the storyteller had known that the witch had just added another curse instead of being the original castor. The sword had a long history of violence, being passed by its master being defeated by someone more worthy; it was a true bloodline.
Yes, the foolish wielder had done something nondescript to royally piss off a famously beautiful sorceress, and had ended up placed in an eternal sleep. That something that the man had done was something to make her believe that he wasn't worthy of the sword until he changed his ways. Moreover, she believed he couldn't change his ways without help, and put him out until someone was born with a certain something that could persuade him to go soft and forsake his weapon. Not very likely. Anyway, the whole thing was supposed to have happened half a millennium ago.
What rot. To think that a man had been sleeping for five hundred years somewhere up on that mountain with that cursed sword, it made Yumichika want to laugh. What a pile of garbage, but certainly an inventive tale. He thought it was good for kids to hear the correct version. A fairytale without a resolution or a happy ending, a hero with a mean streak, a weapon that could teach them that ultimate power didn't always make you a good guy. It was closer to real life than white knights and golden princesses. Better than 'Jack and the Beanstalk', at least.
The part that Yumichika had always liked was the talk of spell-breaking and of the enchantment itself. The townspeople had long since stopped trying to forge the mountain, and were even beginning to avoid the woods. No one went out there, not even foolish kids wanting to prove they were tough. The legend decreed that an ancient dragon guarded the sword now, like the golden apples supposedly guarded by Ladon.
The town had been absolutely crazy over that part of the story lately, because in the last century, this 'dragon' seemed to have popped up in real life. Yumichika had seen the scorched tree trunks and the burnt crops himself. Someone had gone up the mountain and provoked the beast, probably, whatever it was, not that it existed. Something had definitely happened though, because that amount of fire power doesn't just come from nowhere. He had no desire to know himself, just taking precautions to keep Rangiku and himself safe if it were some kind of gang violence. He'd been sleeping with a hammer under his pillow, but for what?
Yumichika didn't like to fight anymore. He'd been discharged from the knight academy a month after joining and had buried his sword in the woods near his mother's grave. He wondered if she would have been ashamed.
He'd heard some hysterical girls earlier that day saying that they'd seen the beast and that it had snapped at them, but he figured that they had seen something else and had been so frightened that they didn't know what they were saying anymore. He probably would've done the same if he'd been scared that badly. Everyone's collective suspicion and paranoia was just starting to get to people and make them crack, that was all. It didn't mean anything was really going on, but there would be if everyone just went nuts. Probably a full moon approaching.
The town was rallying, talking about an attack and harassing a local boy with some sort of ghost-seeing eyes, but Yumichika chose to stay out of it. The last time something like this had happened, with the town nearly being burnt down, a lot of people had died. It had been before he'd been born, but he saw how new all the houses were compared to the church. There had been a massive attack of arson, or maybe from the dragon-thing. Yumichika didn't really believe it was an actual dragon. It was probably just some youths having 'fun' by destroying others' property. This is what the community got for sparing the rod.
'Nasty mean little children,' he thought, snarling bitterly, storming through the drafty wooden door to the little shanty he and Rangiku lived in together. Immediately, the smell smacked him in the face, but he said nothing, seeing Rangiku darning a sock, sitting on her bed. There was a red puddle in the dust, and Yumichika tried not to look, knowing that it was her monthly cycle once again. He didn't know how these girls put up with it, every month, not to mention supposedly going 'loony' with the moon.
Not that he'd ever seen a woman actually go loony, but it was what everyone seemed to talk about nonstop whenever a woman cried or so much as got frustrated. He didn't know, he'd just grown up with girls when he was young and realized that little boys and little girls weren't so different, and weren't any more different when they grew up. When Rangiku was upset, it was for a legitimate reason, and Yumichika always addressed that.
Still, god, the smell was overpowering. When it was faint and old, it was almost a comfort, because it was sort of a 'home' thing that he always came back to, but fresh like this, it was too much!
He was used to it by now, of course. The women around here just let it run down their legs and stain their clothes, because they'd all be dirt poor if they wasted cloth or water constantly cleaning off, and Yumichika understood that. He tried to ignore it whenever he saw it, making sure he never walked around barefoot.
It really got to him when he'd see really young girls holding their stomachs and sitting at the foot of trees on the side of the road. It made him suspect that this happened to them because a man had touched them for the first time. If he asked, they'd say they were okay, but they couldn't be more than twelve. They didn't even have breasts yet, it was crazy! Sometimes Yumichika couldn't stop thinking about it. Why would a child have to go through that? Was it because a man had hurt them? Some of them were so innocent-looking that he thought that couldn't possibly be, but he still wondered and tried not to get to close to young girls, because he was older now and just wanted to make sure.
Rangiku professed that it hurt, but was bearable, and Yumichika felt that they took it well considering that something had been cut and was bleeding up there. At least, that's what he suspected. How else would they bleed? It was no wonder everyone thought it was some kind of wide-spread disease.
Either way, Yumichika decided to get some sage to try to mask the smell. Besides, sometimes Rangiku got cranky when she was like this, and he didn't wish to have an argument just now. "I'll be back later," he said, needing to go get some firewood too. All of their wood had been burnt to a crisp by the arsonist, along with half their corn-field. Oh, if he saw who had done it, if they tried to pull this crap again, he would bash their head in. Because of them, he and Rangiku were probably going to starve this winter if they didn't resort to begging, again.
This was no way to live, now was it. Yumichika sighed when Rangiku gave him a parting wave.
Their little shack was on the outskirts of the town with the rest of the poor, of which there were many. Everything man-made out here was grey, dark brown, and so bland, so humble compared to the gorgeous green grass of springtime and the lovely trees. Oh, he loved spring. It had just begun to settle into the warm season, the trees on the tail end of blossoming, and everything was so fragrant.
The breeze felt nice, calling Yumichika up the unscathed hill and into the forest. He had a favorite spot to chop wood. He already had downed a few trees up there and just needed to yank his ax out of the chopping block and go de-limb the large oak. Maybe he could ask Shuuhei to lend his two-man crosscut saw and help him with the trunk later. He probably wouldn't agree. That man had been acting strange ever since he'd beaten him at cards. It wasn't as if he'd cheated, or anything. Yumichika smirked, holding a hand up to his eyes to scan the sparse stretch of trees for where he'd gone earlier in the week to cut logs.
He didn't want to freeze this winter, which was ironic, considering that they'd be going cold because of all the fires going on, wasting their wood. Winter was a long ways away, but it would still be a stupid way to die.
Wandering over a few hills, stomping through dead leaves and back out into some clearings where the grass wasn't choked out by tree-trunks, Yumichika saw his ax in the distance, sticking out of a rotting stump. He thought back to that cursed blade, wondering if he would be worthy of it. That'd be a way to get some respect around here. He bet that if he'd had that thing when he'd been in the academy, those men never would've said those things.
Yumichika sighed, pulling his ax out of the dead wood and stalked away. Rangiku wouldn't mind if he took a while. She didn't mind much of anything since that skinny guy had left.
He wondered where that legend had come from in the first place. Maybe it had been built on truth. He believed that the sword had existed once, long ago, but by now it was probably buried in the foundation of a castle, in a cave, maybe covered by boulders in a mountain rock-slide. It could be at the bottom of the ocean. Either way, the owner was long dead, his bones having eroded to dust ages before Yumichika had ever taken his first breath. Yumichika didn't believe in eternal sleep, and if he did, he didn't believe in youth holding out during an eternal sleep. The warrior was dead, long dead, and the sword with him. The rest was just being rehashed by everyone's imagination.
What a fantastic story it was, though.
Coming to the top of the hill, Yumichika squinted into the sun, putting a hand up to shield his eyes as he tried to get a view of the mountain. Even if the curse was a bunch of superstition now, Yumichika couldn't deny that strange things happened up there, and no stranger would it be if he got closer to get a better look. No one would know.
They said that the ground surrounding the mountain wasn't safe anymore, that the curse was spreading and killing the plants, that bands of men who had gone to search for the sword hundreds of years ago had all come to untimely ends, mutating into horrible creatures of shadow and ash.
Yumichika kicked his leather boots off, holding them above his head as he forded a small stream, shaking his wet legs off as he made it to the other side. He just wanted a good look at the mountainside. It was so hard to see through the thick forest from nearer to the town, that and the clouds that were usually strategically covering it.
If the dragon was real, or whatever the beast was, it was probably just hungry by now. If it were true that all the plants and animals near the mountain had died, of course it would have to come down sometimes. At least no one here had ever been eaten. Yumichika shuddered, imagining a wicked dragon swooping down with its leathery wings and picking up a full-grown sheep with its claws like an owl effortlessly captures a mouse.
Maybe the curse of the sword had driven the poor creature mad and it was tired of waiting for opponents to challenge its guardianship. No one had tried to find the weapon in years as far as he knew. Yumichika knew that people believed it existed; maybe none of them were fool enough to risk becoming cursed themselves. He himself didn't think stepping a foot on hallowed ground such as that would be wise, curse or not.
But that didn't mean he couldn't get a little closer, now did it?
Having been walking for almost fifteen minutes now, Yumichika crawled over a gorge on a log bridge, worming through the dirty roots and onto solid ground again. He'd always suspected that the crumbling remains of a castle resided on the mountain's far side, but he pinned that down to his wild imagination as a young boy.
The surroundings were changing. There were more hills and exposed rock, and the trees had to twist to adapt to the steep surfaces, which were severe and sudden.
What had always intrigued Yumichika the most about the story was the man. Not the sword or its power, but the man who had wielded it. He must've been a fearsome one to have been so strong that he'd been able to even lift the handle of a sword such as that. Yumichika had such admiration for that alone, but what disdained him was that the man had allowed the power to corrupt his mind, that with all his strength, he hadn't been able to resist its call to violence. The violence wasn't the problem, actually. It was that with all his determination, he hadn't the willpower to keep in control of his own mind, and had become violent because of it.
Then again, he assumed a man who had purposefully sought out a sword like that had been violent from the very beginning.
Still, it made Yumichika wonder... What had the guy been like before all of that had happened? Maybe... maybe he'd even had dimples when he'd smiled.
"AH!" Yumichika shouted, heart pounding as the rocks beneath him gave way and sent him skidding down a cliffside. Luckily, able to keep his balance, he let his hands drag behind him and slow his fall as he and the sliding stones and gravel plummeted towards a cave entrance, half-filling it when they finally came to a stop. Letting out a slow breath and pulling himself to his feet, he stumbled out of the pile of rubble, coughing in the cloud of dust.
As the sun moved out from behind the clouds, he saw something glinting from behind the rock pile, inside the cave. Not eager to go inside, he climbed to the top of the rock bits to have a look, seeing that there was… there was light in the distance in there. It was a tunnel.
Cautiously entering, Yumichika swore to go back if he came to even one fork in the road. He was claustrophobic and refused to get lost in here.
He wondered what had happened to the sword wielder. Yumichika knew it was most likely that he'd been defeated by another challenger and that he was lying dead beneath five layers of sediment, but he always came back to the fact that the story said that he'd been placed in an eternal sleep. At least that explained his absence and abrupt disappearance.
Until someone came along that could look upon his beastly face and love him, he would forever sleep. Yumichika could think of three princess stories that went along those lines already... He'd sleep forever until someone who could tame his heart came along and found a way to wake him.
The man must've been too stubborn to change his ways, and the witch who'd supposedly cursed him must've known that, relying on someone else in the far future to come and fix him for the good of the world, rather than destroying the sword herself. It was a weapon of incredible power… It just had to be in the right hands.
Yumichika came out of the dark, hearing an intense quiet spread around him as he swept aside some long hanging grass and entered into a sunny clearing, surrounded by sheer rock faces on all sides. Moss grew thick along the walls, and flowers were everywhere, along with a gigantic hanging tree that was shading some cracked stone steps. Yumichika hadn't known trees could become so big. It probably looked like it was growing on top of this hill, but it was just that colossal that it could pass for such and still originate down here.
Yumichika approached, almost afraid to disturb the surely sacred ground, seeing moths flurry away from him with every careful step through the moss. It was so beautiful here… He felt like taking a nap in the sun.
He thought he heard a soft snore, but it turned out to be his own labored breathing. His heart was still slowing from that rockslide.
As he approached the vine-riddled stone steps, he moved around the massive trunk of the tree to find someone sleeping on a flat bed of rock, almost like a coffin. There was no glass covering to shield a nubile maiden in her slumber, but there lay a lean man in a short-tunic, hands folded over his stomach, ropy scarred legs stretched out unnaturally straight.
With one look at his face, Yumichika's heart stopped.
Something in the back of his mind whispered, 'It's him,' and it was all Yumichika could do to keep from screaming and falling on his ass. After taking a few moments to adjust to what he was seeing, he realized that no one could sleep in that position. It was too perfect, like someone had lain him there and adjusted him so he was laying exactly straight. No one lay down to rest like that on their own. Was he okay? Was he breathing?
Heart jolting, Yumichika leaned forward in alarm, hovering over the man from a few different angles, trying to gauge whether he was just a traveler who had decided to take a rest here. Maybe he really was alert and just had his eyes closed, because he didn't seem to be sleeping at all; actually, he'd seem nearly dead were it not for the color in his cheeks and the gentle motion of his stomach with each breath.
Even laying like a corpse at a wake, he looked… he looked to be at absolute peace, and it awed Yumichika for quite some time.
"Hello," Yumichika whispered, hoping for a reaction, but there was no flinch, no hitch in his breathing, not even a batting of an eyelash. Yumichika held his breath tightly and stuck out a hand, touching the man's bare leg, prodding him gently a few times, then more roughly. He received no response whatsoever.
"Hey!" he shouted, surprising himself with the volume and the silence that followed, but still, nothing happened. Yumichika sat there for probably a full three minutes, heart pounding in his ears as he stared at the sleeping body.
This had to be him, didn't it. Who else could it be? Yumichika had never thought that the story was real. Besides, if it was, he'd expected the man to have been put to sleep on top of the cursed mountain somewhere, not in a hidden glen in the woods! If the story had been wrong, did this mean that Yumichika was on enchanted ground right now? If the warrior had turned out to be real, would it be a stretch to say that the curse was too? What would happen to him?
Yumichika held his breath, leaping onto a stone, not daring to touch the mossy ground once more as he stared silently at the sleeping man, who was absolutely motionless, breathing pattern never changing. No one slept like that. It was unnatural. This man had the face of someone who would snore and drool and spread out like a starfish, yet here he was with his hands neatly folded and his legs straight like a corpse in a coffin.
It had to be a spell.
Yumichika believed in spells, and although he'd never seen a real one, he thought that he'd know well enough to be able to confirm that this was a work of magic. Okay, it was settled. He'd found the man of legend, his idol, a man who hadn't moved an inch in five hundred years. Immediately, questions began tearing at him. How could it be that a leaf had never fallen on his face, that dust had never settled? That the clearing hadn't become absolutely overgrown? That insects hadn't eaten away his clothes? This whole place must be caught in an eternal standstill.
Yumichika's breath left him in awe as he stared around, and it left the question, if this was the legendary sword-wielder, where was the sword now? Suddenly, it clicked. The man had been cursed to sleep forever, but the sword had been what had caused the dark magic to spread throughout the mountain. It must still be there on the peak somewhere, awaiting its master's return. That would give this warrior a little time to think things over before immediately taking up his weapon again.
Yumichika wondered if he'd laid here undisturbed for the entirety of five hundred years. Had others come to try? Was this the 'sword-in-the-stone' type deal? Had others come here and struggled to wake him up, only to fail and leave, not telling anyone else because they couldn't bear the thought of another trying and succeeding in their stead? It excited him to think that he might just be the first to find him.
Yumichika swallowed. He couldn't just not try, could he? But did he have what it took? How to wake him though, how to wake him? Yumichika couldn't remember.
It had been something like, that person with the spirit that could tame the fire within the sword-wielder would be able to wake him and keep him from going back to his old ways, but that must mean that Yumichika had already failed. He didn't have what it took, which would be why the man hadn't awoken the moment he'd called him. If he were the one, he should just automatically know what to do. No, it wasn't him that was meant to wake him.
Oh, what a face, though. Yumichika found himself magnetized, feet sinking back into the ground as he drew himself over onto a stone step, knees resting a couple feet lower than the platform on which the sleeping man rested, putting him only a short distance away. He looked down, enamored by the sleeping swordsman's face.
His brow was uncreased, though his face was one that Yumichika was sure would be constantly drawn in a severe expression in waking life, which was why the vulnerable countenance was so captivating. He felt honored to see such a visage of utter peace. Yumichika felt called to sit here for ages and memorize those features. His eyebrows were thin and dark, the muscle beneath them incredibly chiseled, as if he spent a lot of time frowning. His lips were chapped, but not scaly, nearly the same color as his skin, maybe a light pink mixed in there somewhere. Those closed eyes were slanted sharply, with dark short lashes, red markings spread at the corners. He had no hair on his head, but not from age. No, he didn't look like he'd been a day past twenty eight in five hundred years.
Tearing his eyes away from that face for a few moments, they came to rest upon the swordsman's broad callused hands, tossed somewhat carelessly over his stomach, one on top of the other, low down enough that they weren't disturbed by the motions of his breath. His legs were lean and the muscles were defined, pale taught areas spread all over where scars had yet to heal. He was barefoot, and his clothes consisted of a very-short simple robe with sleeves, tied in the front with a dark grey belt with a notch for a missing sword.
It would be so easy, so easy to strangle him and end it all, to put an end to the magic sword's howling and violent grief. The dragon would leave, all of it might fade, the curse might settle down, and Yumichika would have been a part of his favorite story. He could be the conclusion, the happy bittersweet end that the legend needed.
But, oh, what a face. He'd never seen a face like this, that one should look upon it… until the end of time.
Yumichika felt as though he were in love. No, he didn't want to kill; he wanted to care. He had to wake this man, to save him from the horrible mess he'd got himself into. He could save him, he could change him, he could be the one to tame his wild beastly heart, if only he knew how to wake him up.
He tried to remember if the legend had mentioned a name. 'Edorad' came to mind, but that had been one of the sword's previous owners, who'd come upon an untimely death when he'd dueled the current wielder, i.e., this sleeping guy. Yumichika wondered just how crazed the sword had made him. If he were to wake him, would the man lash out? Would he try to kill him? Or would he be grateful?
Yumichika desperately wished that he knew the words to speak to break the spell, but he didn't know what to do, what to say. He timidly held out a hand and placed it atop the knuckles of the swordsman's hands, rubbing slightly with his thumb.
What a lovely face, so soft and relaxed, but still so fierce and powerful. Yumichika couldn't stand it. He'd tried to deny it for this long, but he knew one other method that may wake him. Besides calling him by name, having the power to tame his heart, and being able to defeat him in battle himself, Yumichika kept being haunted persistently by that little voice in his head.
'True love's kiss.'
He shook his head violently, cheeks turning pink as he looked away, unable to gaze at the sleeping man's face while thinking such thoughts. This is what had gotten him thrown out of the academy: rumors of his dispositions towards men. He'd had to defend his own honor and had gutted a young man from nose to groin for daring to jeer at him and spread word of his 'filthy affliction' around. Knowing that he could be thrown out as a pariah, maybe even stoned to death, Yumichika had kept his feelings to himself, but that didn't change what he knew deep in his heart.
He'd never even had one kiss with a man, because he'd never found anyone like him before. He still hadn't, but if this guy was sleeping, then… No one would know. It wasn't like it would wake him up. Yumichika had already been proven unworthy.
Still, the idea of it… True love's kiss, what a nice idea. It was cliché, it was everywhere in all kinds of stories, but Yumichika had never seen one. However, true love wasn't uncommon out here. It wasn't beyond the scope of normality for two young people to fall in love at first sight and marry within a few days; surprisingly enough, the pairs never seemed to tire of each other or have problems, almost like the true love was real. Yumichika had thought it foolish, and he didn't know if it was genuine, but oh, did it seem wonderful.
All he had to do… yes… it would be simple. Just one time, one little peck. Yumichika leaned down, holding his breath. The idea of it was intoxicating, causing the overwhelming loneliness of the entirety of his twenties to well up within him. True love forever with no effort. It was amazingly easy. He just had to feel true love for this sleeping man, and that would make it a true love kiss - all would be well. In a perfect world, the spell would break, he'd keep his new paramour away from the cursed sword, and they'd be happy, happily ever after.
That was the contract of true love, right? Happiness and forever… Oh, it sounded so ridiculous. He didn't know what he was thinking, but the temptation was too strong. Just once…
Looking around with guilt as if someone would catch him, Yumichika brushed his hand lightly over the cheek of the sleeping man, halting a few inches before their lips could meet.
'Still warm…'
There had been other criteria for breaking the spell, he was sure of it. It wasn't true love's kiss that was the cure, and he knew that true love didn't really exist, but the temptation was too powerful to resist. Even if only to have a regular kiss, Yumichika wanted this… Oh, he did.
Finally, Yumichika leaned down and let their lips touch, kissing him softly, eyes slipping shut as everything faded away, even the silence. A soft breath escaped him; even without any response at all, it felt nice, so nice to do this. He wondered what it was like, being loved like a true love… He wanted to have that someday, if it was possible.
Absolute nothingness enfolded him, and he didn't know how long he stayed there like that, the sleeping swordsman's hands clasped in his, their lips gently pressed together. All he knew was that when he moved back an inch in disappointment at the lack of reaction, he nearly fell back on his ass in shock when he saw that the man's eyes had snapped open.
"It happened again!"
"We'll all starve!"
"No one's safe until the beast is driven out!"
"What am I, the resident shaman? Get back!" Ichigo shouted, fending off an overzealous neighbor with a forearm. "I don't know when everyone decided that I was some sort of official exorcist! This is ridiculous!"
He was sick of all this wizard talk. Ichigo knew that in places like that, magic folk were either burnt at the stake or relentlessly bothered for favors, but he didn't fit into either of those situations because he wasn't magic. He had grudgingly conceded that somewhere somehow magic might exist, that mysterious creatures could be real, but until the cold hard proof was in front of his face with no speculative evidence, he said that the whole lot of it was hokum. Especially that dumbass tale told endlessly about their mountain. It was nothing but a rock mound going through a drought. These people were too superstitious. He bet they saw a monster a day.
Okay, he admitted that the burnt crops that kept persisting and the town being torched a century ago had to have something to it, but he thought it was just some kids horsing off. All the witch burnings that had ever went on were just the result of people panicking and getting carried away, not because there was legitimate proof of witchery being afoot. Besides, so what if it was? What had a witch ever done to harm anyone? Overall, Ichigo was ticked off at this new development.
It was bullshit. He wasn't going out there! They couldn't make him! What could he do, anyway? He was a man already in his age and should have been married by now, but he still thought of himself as young, and had a responsibility to his family. He wasn't going to go off traipsing around looking for something that probably didn't even exist just to give these people some peace of mind. He might be grown, but he was a young guy still, and he didn't have time for this shit. It was probably some cult vendetta, and Ichigo had no desire to get involved. If he caught this loser lurking around his house and setting fire to shit, then he'd meddle and probably crack their skull with his boot, but until that day, he was staying out of it. Let that jerk have their fun.
And if the possibility were there that it was a chimaera, a dragon, or a fire spirit, what would Ichigo do about that? It wasn't as if he'd been blessed by the church or lived a particularly pious life. He wasn't the strongest or smartest of men, and he didn't have some sort of 'talisman' that could 'ward off' 'evil'. He was a young guy! Too young to die! He wasn't going to be their sacrifice! Guh, the whole thing was stupid.
"You see spirits! You said so yourself." That made Ichigo quiet down, because it was true. He didn't like to talk about it, not because he was afraid of the town burning him at the stake, but because it sounded ridiculous even to him. Who would believe that, anyway? He could see ghosts? Yeah, right. It was different than that.
Sometimes when others were having trouble sleeping, or had evil on the brain, he could just tell. He'd see some sort of shroud or red mist following them around. Sometimes he'd catch shades or shadowy figures wandering around in the night, but that didn't mean he knew anything about banishing them or even what they were.
"I don't see what that has to do with it," Ichigo replied flatly, glaring back into their faces challengingly. Chad lingered off to the side, having paused at his anvil in response to the commotion. Ichigo tossed his gloves off and wiped soot off his cheek.
"Ichigo, don't you believe something's out there?" Keigo called, scratching at his thick hair as he leaned against his rake. Ichigo grumbled. That guy should be too exhausted from farming to have any time to speculate over this.
"I've seen the burnt crops, okay? Someone did it, because that surely wasn't lightning. But does that mean it's a… a, a… What in the hells do you people think it is, anyway?"
"The sword-guardian," Uryu said sharply, drawing Ichigo's attention. They leveled each other with a cold stare, acknowledging each other as rivals. Orihime shifted lightly where she was holding her buckets and fidgeting with her ragged dress. Ichigo growled. He didn't want all of this upsetting her. That girl was very susceptible to superstition, because she was so trusting in what people told her.
"Oh yeah? So, what? It's a ghost, then?"
"A dragon, you fool. What else breathes fire?" Uryu snapped in Ichigo's face. Ichigo had to wonder how he was such a good marksman when he was nearly blind, but he couldn't deny the man's skills. "I say we storm the mountain and kill it, but the-"
"Yeah, yeah, the curse, okay, sure," Ichigo said, rolling his eyes. "But what do you all want me to do about it?"
"You may be able to communicate with whatever it may be. If you can see spirits, maybe you have magical blood, which gives you a better shot. Not to mention that you'd certainly be able to go nearer the mountain, considering that you don't believe in curses," Uryu begrudgingly admitted, "They… well, we seem to think you have the best chance."
"Kurosaki-kun, couldn't you try? How will we sleep at night?" Orihime said timidly and Ichigo winced, not looking towards her as he gave a belabored sigh, not liking being put on the spot like that. Her scared voice always put a serious chink in his resistance, and right now was no different. If only to make her feel safe, maybe he could consider it… Still, he thought the whole thing was ridiculous, and he wanted her to understand that. If he gave in and went, it just might convince her that there really was something out there.
"It's only a matter of time before someone gets hurt, Ichigo," Chad mentioned, and Ichigo took those words to heart, looking at his feet and leaning on the wooden fence, running a dirty hand through his hair, contemplating it. If Chad had actually spoken up, it was a valid point.
"It could be one of your sisters," Keigo mentioned with an expression of woe, and that was just it for Ichigo. The thought of one of them, defenseless, running and crying in fear just tore his heart apart.
"Fine! I'll see what I can do."
"It must be killed if any of us are to be safe," Uryu pressed.
Ichigo ran a hand through his hair in aggravation, shouting in his face, getting heated, "Fine, if it'll get you all off my back, I'll go kill it! We'll be safe! I swear to all of you on my eternal soul! Now get! All of you!" he shouted, glaring out at them. "I'll go now, since you're all such dull cowards that you must come to me for help. Who will my family stay with when I depart? Who will take care of them with me gone? Do you think I have unlimited time on my hands?"
They had the decency to look embarrassed.
"I'll do it, but let you all hear that I'm not some local-sorceror who does favors for anywho just because of a few beggars. This be the last time that any of you will disturb me, asking me to banish the demon in your children. Just beat it out of them yourselves, and leave me be! I have a dragon to slay!"
"Oh thank you, Kurosaki-kun!" Orihime said cheerily, giving a short bow a few times until he shooed the milkmaid away. Yes, he'd go and see what all the fuss was about, although he still didn't see what a young man such as he could do. He'd never been through proper sword-training and hadn't entered the knight's order, so that he could stay and help his family feed themselves. Maybe they thought he had some secret way of warding off spirits, or had the skills to reason with a dragon.
Although he scoffed at the idea of such tales being true, he'd heard plenty of yarns in his youth, and dragons were his favorite subject of all times. That being said, he knew he had no chance against the cleverness of a dragon. He wasn't good with riddles and the like.
He supposed that meant that he had to go investigate in the mire over the hill. Don't get him wrong, he was pissed too. He was livid that the crops he and his sisters had broke their backs working on had been wasted so easily. Ichigo wanted someone to blame. He wanted to bring back the creature's head in a bag. That's what they wanted anyway. They wanted him to kill it and bring back proof.
Chad sharpened up a thin blade for him and clapped him on the shoulder with his rough blacksmith's hand. Ichigo nodded his thanks, feeling that Chad was telling him silently that this was a good thing he was doing for the wellbeing of everyone. Ichigo waved to him as he departed, kissing his sister's cheeks one by one, pecking Orihime on the cheek as well in farewell.
As the town disappeared behind him, it began to set in just what he'd vowed to do. He would return with the dragon lying dead in the woods somewhere, setting the valley free, or his soul would be eternally damned. He would've sworn on his Mother's grave, but he wasn't about to do that. Swearing on his own soul hurt a little less, since he wasn't exactly sure if he believed in souls. He'd sworn to everyone on his eternal soul that he would procure their safety, and he'd be damned if he'd break a promise.
At any rate, he was glad his kinsmen hadn't actually banded together on a wild crazed hunt for the beast, because the mania that spread through illiterate people's heads was like a fog, and they would find any scapegoat they could, usually a young innocent who would end up perishing in a fire or a lake. If Ichigo could prevent that, then he would.
Still, he regretted his quest. His father needed looking after, and had increasingly as of late since the loneliness of his mother's death had driven him nearly mad. He'd lost a true love, and even though it had been years, it had been getting worse and worse. At the moment, the poor man could hardly get out of bed, and Ichigo needed to be around to keep things running, to see to it that there was enough money and food to feed his sisters. He wasn't about to marry them off, even if they were at an age to do so. Even if they were what was defined as a 'burden', Ichigo didn't see it that way, and refused to give their hand to any of the men who had tried to arrange to take one of them as a wife. He would sooner marry one of their suitors himself than sell his sisters like scraps of meat for his own gain.
Maybe that was why he was doing this. He wanted his girls to be safe at night, whether it be from the monster, bad men, or simply from starving to death. Even if it wasn't a real dragon, whatever or whomever was burning the crops would eventually cause them to die of hunger, and he wouldn't allow that. He was already living on one meal a day so that there was enough bread and water for his sick father and the twins.
Working with Chad tempering steel had been a welcome change. When Ichigo had been forced to sell their cow and needed some extra money, he'd entrusted his sisters with the farm work for a few nights so he could take on the task. A blacksmith's life wasn't what he'd had in mind at this point, but it was either survive or lay down and die at this point. His family needed to eat. He didn't know what might happen if he was gone for an extended period of time.
It was bad enough that the townsmen knew about his strange mind and the things he saw. If they found out that one of his younger sisters also could, he didn't know what they would do. There had been no talk of running Ichigo out of town or burning him for witchery, but that might've been because of the debt the town owed to Isshin from long ago. If it were to get out that Karin had a power like his, he didn't know if they would do the old witch test on her, where she would either float or drown, or worse, burn.
If something like that were to happen, he had to be there to protect her. Who knows what men might come and… God, he didn't want to even think about it. The point was, he needed to be around.
Trudging through tall grass and over some hidden rocks, Ichigo looked back from atop a hill at the town at the bottom of the valley. Such simple minds. The curse was all in their heads. Even if there were a dragon out there and a sword, there was no curse. That foolish warrior had been drunk off his own power. The evil had been from within, not from some witch's spell. People were only corruptible if they allowed themselves to be, and all this magic talk was a way to shift the blame when their will wasn't strong enough. Ichigo believed that with all his heart.
Imagining that this was some crazed rogue with a penchant for fire, Ichigo didn't bother drawing his sword as he crunched through some dry leaves, passing between the thick trees. The forest was quiet except for the occasional cawing of birds, and after a few minutes of walking, putting some real distance between him and the town, Ichigo came across the first ash flake, just hanging in the air and drifting slightly on the breeze. For a moment, he just assumed it had been blown from a campsite, but then it puffed to life, turning and displaying a still glowing orange bit.
After a moment, he looked around sharply. How on earth could an ash flake still be smoldering if the source wasn't closer than three feet away? Ash went out immediately in the open air.
The hair stood up on the back of his neck and he put his hand on the hilt of his sword, watching the ash go grey and cold, carried away on the wind as he blew it out of his face. Ominous…
A few moments of silence passed, and Ichigo let his guard drop, continuing on with slightly more caution. He'd probably been seeing things, like always.
Truth be told, his visions had really used to bother him, scare him, even. Mostly because they'd first appeared after his mother's death. Everything had been clearer then because he'd paid them closer attention. He'd see a man hanging from a tree by a rope near their home, his face blue and choked as drool rolled down his neck, his eyes bugging out. Other times he'd come across corpses in abandoned fields with a murmuring ghost wandering nearby, their faces visible all except for gaping black holes where their eyes and mouths should've been.
He didn't see anything around here, oddly enough, as if nothing living existed out here at all except for the animals at this point. There was no spirit activity, which disturbed him, because he wanted to explain that ash flake away as a wraith's illusion.
Letting his imagination run wild, he wondered what he would do if the curse turned out to be real. Man, would that bite him in the ass. To think after all the times he'd denied that and called people stupid for believing in it, and it might really turn out to be true… He'd feel like the biggest jerk. Maybe… Maybe this whole 'curse' thing was just a tortured soul wandering the countryside and throwing a tantrum to spread its grief.
Ichigo climbed over a sheer face of rock, coming to rest down on the mossy ground, the smell of sulfur hitting his nose. Immediately, he could not ignore the carnage before him. This entire area of forest had been burnt down. What bothered him were the huge claw marks in the charred stumps of the trees. Something big had done this, and it was no spirit.
Let's say it was a dragon…
Ichigo swallowed and continued on, thinking back on the legend. He didn't know if a dragon had originally been part of the patron legend of their valley. He knew the part with the sword wielder and the cursed blade by heart, but the dragon… where had that come into play? Why would some random dragon just take it upon itself to guard a sword for what could be forever?… Didn't this dragon thing have something to do with the wrathful spirit that had come out of the blade and taken over the warrior's soul and mind?
That sounded more like a metaphorical dragon to him than anything, but he was beginning to doubt that it was a myth at the sight of the bare grey ground. This was fresh. The trees were blackened and still smoking, some of them red and glowing where the embers were dying down. It wasn't a flattened landscape where only the bare roots and stumps were left. The leaves were gone, but the trunks still stood tall, just blackened beyond recognition. It was almost like… the fire had gone out before it could do irreparable damage… Was that a sign of restraint?... or destructive sport?
This was the work of something large, powerful, and rotten. This was no human… Ichigo stepped over the smoldering trunk that had been knocked to the ground, roots left exposed, dirt tangled and dry from the heat.
This had been done by the beast that had been supposedly ravaging their town. He'd seen the bare fields where rows of corn and beans had once stood, but by comparison, this was monumental. He understood where the stories came from now, how they swore that this murderous beast had been occasionally ravaging their village for almost the whole of the last century.
Perhaps this was to do with the cursed sword, perhaps not, but Ichigo knew that either way he'd be doing the world a favor by slaying this animal. It was a danger to everyone. He imagined some drooling growling beast with long blood-stained fangs and thick scales, a wicked tail swiping behind it as the ground cracked under its feet with each step.
Strangely enough, he could see a patch of ground a small ways away from him, and as he approached it, it became clear that this had been the hottest point of the fire. The grass there was withered around the area in a circle, burnt and blackened, like a pillar of flame had blasted up from the ground and then gone out. It seemed like the site of a bonfire, but where were the logs or evidence of the pile of burning wood that would've been needed to cause so much heat damage? He was unable to resist stepping into the center, and from where he stood, he could see up towards the mountain on a lower ledge, a small pink and white flurry that looked about the size of a pinhead because of his distance from it. Still, he recognized a blossoming magnolia tree.
Ichigo shrugged, stepping out of the circle warily as if it were a fairy ring. Wandering off, he had to wonder… because when he saw that all evidence of the creature's little campfire party disappeared almost immediately, it was almost as if the barbecue had been the result of a short violent tantrum and nothing more. The surrounding forest was unscathed, green and lush once again.
The sun still shone high in the sky, and Ichigo hummed merrily as he trudged on. Coming through a meadow and across a small river, he began to see ash hanging in the air again, grey dead ash blowing on the wind.
The sulfur smell was pungent in his nose, but he saw no evidence of a fire as he forged on over hill after hill. Becoming lost wasn't an issue, even though he'd never traversed the forest before even close to this far away from home, but on the way back, he'd just walk in the opposite direction of the mountain. It would be impossible to miss the valley.
Coming to the top of a sunny hill, green grass waving cheerily and begging him to lay down, Ichigo saw some weeds on a distant hill that were giving off smoke, and as he jogged over there to investigate, he saw that they were burning out. What he could not ignore were the brown sections in the long grass and the crumpled areas, as if a large animal had been dragging itself, wounded, on its belly. Maybe this beast had legs that extended out from its shoulders instead of below, like a crocodile.
On the top of this hill, the forest was plain before him, easy to survey, baring the side of the mountain and the blooming tree. Taking a long moment to shield his eyes, eat a piece of bread, and rest, Ichigo began his way down the rocky hill, descending into the thick woods. The smoke smell was growing thicker, although the only trail he could follow were the little ash flakes that he'd sometimes see and the occasional smoking patch of grass. Once in a while, he'd spot a little red flash where a spark hadn't quite gone out, a tiny ember refusing to die just yet.
He was still pretty far away from the supposed 'cursed' ground of the mountain, but the villagers had begun to think that after all this time, the land of the forest was becoming infected by the dark magic. But how could that be?
It was beautiful out here.
Ichigo had never seen such a beautiful place, never having been in the woods when he was younger. He'd had to occupy himself with farmwork and errands. Slaving in the fields, raking the soil always made the sun seem so harsh and unforgiving, because then it was beating down on his shoulders and neck, scorching him. Luckily, he didn't sunburn so easily anymore, like he had when he was little.
But here, oh, here, the wind whispered through the grass and carried him away every time he reached the top of a hill and stood in the warm sun. It was so fragrant, the flowers having a chance to live out here without immediately being chopped up for church decorations. The slight smoke smell was mixing in with the flowers and filling his nose almost like incense, and it was starting to make Ichigo quite sleepy.
He came to a break in the trees that opened onto a vast field of goldenrod, and he flattened out a patch for himself to lie down as he found a natural path through the sparser weeds. Lying back and watching the clouds and the ominous mountain, Ichigo gave a long contented sigh, letting the sun play over his face, the wind tickling through his hair.
If that curse was true, that whole sword and the stone deal, Ichigo would like to see if he was worthy. He'd like to pick up that sword, the key to ultimate power, and then kill that dragon guardian. He'd like to find the sword's previous owner, awaken him, slay him, and then have the sword for himself.
And once he did, he'd melt that wicked sword in the forges and put it to rest deep in the ground. It would never harm anyone again.
Yes, that's what he'd do. Ichigo nodded to himself, his eyes closing as the smell of the goldenrod put him in a heavy daze. The sun was so warm and inviting that he opened up his tunic and lay his head back, enjoying the gentle heat and breeze on his chest.
He'd banish the curse that had been over their valley for over half a millennium, and it all would fade away. Real or not, the fact that the sword was gone would convince people to let go of their fear.
He had to wonder what this dragon was doing, if it was a dragon that was doing this. What business did it have burning the mountainside and destroying the forest, even if it was good for the soil? This was a temperate zone; did it get chilly sometimes for a dragon? But then what was its reason for coming down so far that it reached their town and destroyed their crops? It could just be making a mess while it hunted, but that didn't seem to be so. It didn't make sense why none of their sheep had ever been eaten or slaughtered, because that was what dragons were supposed to do: pillage. Was it purposefully burning their homeland?
What was it doing here if it was supposed to be guarding that sword? What had happened a century ago to break its four hundred year-long streak of protecting the cursed blade? Why had this started happening again?
Up on that mountain for so long by itself… Maybe even evil serpents got lonely.
Ichigo gave a sleepy moan, body writhing a little in pleasure as the sun and wind refreshed his skin. He lay still for a long time, contemplating whether the beast would smell him and seek him out. He still wasn't entirely able to wrap his brain around the concept of a creature like that being real, but he'd play the fool and prepare for the worst, even if it still sounded ridiculous to him to really believe that there was such thing out there as a real dragon.
Would it think he'd come to take the sword just because he was wandering these woods? Had it wandered out here to draw challengers? Would it wait for his approach or would he find it feasting on a deer and marking its territory by burning the entire forest to ashes? Maybe it would know why he'd come and would lie in wait for him somewhere. Maybe if he could just find its den…
Feeling a warm pulsating of air on his neck, Ichigo lay still, letting the sun warm him and keep him in a nice doze.
Hopefully the dragon would be the size of a mountain lion and not that of a barn. He didn't know that the mountain would sustain something that big, and the creature's tracks from earlier supported the fact that it wasn't much bigger than him, maybe a little larger than a big cat. In that case, it was feasible that he should be able to wrestle it and stab its heart without losing his own life.
He twitched in his light doze when the warmth on his neck left sharply, leaving him almost cold by comparison. Ichigo's eyes opened blearily, face still lax from sleepiness.
When his sight came into focus, he immediately honed in on a flower not three feet from his face, burning bright like a candle.
They said their eyes are red as flame,
I heard it told, 'from Hell they came.
Their breath is fire, their tongues are forked,
Thus are the beasts
of Dragon's gate.'
