AN: Hello again. This is going to sound a bit dumb but I had forgotten I was posting my story here after I returned from my hiatus early this year and was reminded this morning by one of my readers on AO3. I'm posting this same authors note on each of the new chapters so just check to make sure you are starting with Chapter 32 if you are coming back to the story. New Chapter 3/9.
After I announce the feast, Akio clears his throat and addresses the crowd, "Alright everyone, you know the drill! Hunters go scrounge up some food!"
There are some cheers that ring out and a group starts heading out into the forest. Akio looks at me, only now realizing he's taken over out of habit, I shrug and gesture for him to continue. Deligation is something I need to get more used to anyway.
"Right, Emi-san, grab the others and start fixing sides!" An older woman nods, whistling sharply as another group breaks off.
"Hayate-san, break out the new bottles that have been brewing!" A younger Oni nods vigorously, a wide smile appearing as he rubs his palms together in anticipation.
"Oh, I can't wait for the Chief to try the new brew! I think this one will turn out to be the best yet!" He bows to Akio then again but more deeply toward me.
I glance at Akio with a grin, "I see someone in the village has been focused on what's important."
He snorts in amusement, mirth in his eyes. "We wanted to commemorate your reign somehow. Hayate-san decided that since you showed an interest in saké from a young age he should develop a speciality brew for you."
"If it's good I might need to officially designate him as the village brewmaster for his diligence." I muse aloud.
"He'll be over the moon, as well as insufferable to the rest of us." I pat Akio on the shoulder. Not my problem, buddy.
I make a note to memorize the names of everyone when they come up. It would be awkward to be caught out on the fact I don't know hardly any of their names.
I survey the crater that I made with Akio's body in the centre of the village. "Oi, Kiyoshi."
The man in question jogs to my side. "Yes, Ibaraki-sama?"
"Help me out for a second, okay?" He nods and I start to use Senjutsu to return the environment to the way it was before. Kiyoshi picks up on my intentions right away and immediately goes to work to support my efforts. The crater disappears but soon grass and flowers start to grow all over the place. Not helpful at all nature.
Actually…
Refocusing, I change the goal I'm aiming for and the grass flattens out, becoming softer and thicker. The flowers creak as their shapes warp, explosive growth rippling out through them. Instead of flowers, trees start to grow and I try to bend their shapes to produce benches and tables. It's a novel idea but neither I nor Kiyoshi is able to pull it off yet.
He looks upset at the fact he couldn't manage it so I grin at him and pat him on back, "It's something worth practising now that you know what you can't do. Looks like we have to do it the old fashioned way after all."
"Akeno, Takehiko, you guys help chop these down and make some furniture too. Takehiko, you cut them down, Akeno you shape them into planks with magic." Akio and Kiyoshi form a pair and start to do the same, while I work by myself.
A chop at the base separates the trunk from the roots, the stump forming a seat. I catch the tree and set it down to actually prepare into a workable material. Placing my palm on the trunk I coat it in a ring of Ki and create a sharp edge. From there I force the ring to flow along the trunk, shearing off the branches.
What next?
Keeping the ring of Ki wrapped around the trunk, I tighten it and start to spin it. This creates a sanding effect, stripping the bark off the trunk. Once I'm left with a decently smooth cylinder I form Touki around my hand, manipulating it into sharp Ki blades on my fingers. A quick swipe along the cylinder makes five similar planks. I'm not happy with the fact they aren't the exact same though.
I place a hand on one of the planks and smile. Even though the wood is 'dead' its Ki hasn't faded completely. It's fading at a rapid rate but I can still manipulate it. As long as that's true I can form the wood into any shape I want through forced growth and removing the excess. After a couple of minutes of playing around, I have a pile of perfect planks.
Looking around at how the others doing gives me a surge of pride. Takehiko has been busy chopping down the trees and dividing them into manageable pieces. He's even practising his forms at the same time. From there, Akeno shapes them into planks. She's repurposed a wind blade magic circle to make a circular saw and is maintaining it while feeding the planks in by hand.
Akio is ripping the trees out of the ground and chopping them up with his claws. I can hear his chant of 'Ora Ora Ora!' from here. Kiyoshi is using Senjutsu in a similar fashion as I was to shape the planks after his companion mangles them. Akio is more precise with his strength than Yaeko but that isn't very high praise.
I take the pile of branches I made and build a fire pit in the centre. After that I notice three Oni staring at the piles of wood. "Yo, what are you guys up to?"
"Ah, apologies Ibaraki-sama, we were wondering if we should be building tables and benches with the wood you have provided?" A closer look shows they all have a set of woodworking chisels on them. Right, of course, we have craftsmen for this. If we didn't we wouldn't have buildings, stupid.
"Yep, make sure everything is ready before the others are done." They begin working in a flurry of movement and I'm left with nothing to do for prep work.
' Don't sulk, it's unbecoming of you.' A bored drawl rings out in my ear.
'Byakko! I missed you, buddy!' It's so much more boring to talk to yourself when there isn't another voice in your head to answer you.
' If that were true you would stop making so much work for me.' I roll my eyes, huffing at his comment.
'Going by the fact that I don't remember the end of the fight, you can't blame this one entirely on me.' Byakko growls, not playfully but actually showing his anger at my response.
' No, I can and I will. You picked a fight with someone you couldn't possibly harm yet, let alone defeat.' I bite my lip to hold back my retort. As much as I want to say that he doesn't know that, even I'll admit that I don't stand a chance against Susanoo as I am.
I sigh and reluctantly ask the question I've been dreading, 'What's the damage this time?'
' It… It's better to just show you.' There's a tug and Byakko drags me into my mindscape.
I frown not seeing a difference at first until I start to notice small changes. Parts of my mindscape have… solidified? Crystallized? They seem tangible compared to the rest but at the same time frozen. The pieces are a deep red and feel as if they are composed of nothing but anger.
Actually, frozen is a good descriptor. Where the older sections are like water in the sense you can't grasp them easily but still have, hmm, potential. The affected parts, however, are maybe not stronger but feel stable and as though I could pull on them without any effort. Those affected parts though are completely static and it doesn't feel like they will ever be anything but stagnant .
If I had to use a single word to describe them it would be permanence.
"So what actually happened here?" I turn to Byakko and see that one of his legs is affected like my mindscape. It looks like solid metal, coloured a deep blue, compared to the rest of his silvery fur. Almost like a prosthetic, except the prosthetic looks stronger than his other limbs.
"You attempted to Ascend." I frown not understanding why that would be a bad thing.
"I get that I wasn't in a good mindset but would that have mattered?" Byakko swats me over the head with his tail causing me to yelp.
"Of course it matters." I stare at him uncomprehending causing him to sigh.
"In any story of the Gods. Any Gods of any culture. Have you ever heard of a differing account of them? Have you ever heard of a differing personality displayed? A difference in their power?" I mentally review my mythological knowledge but it seems like Byakko doesn't care about me referencing the memory banks.
"The answer is no. Even now Zeus wields overwhelming power and sleeps with anything that has a pulse, except his wife. His power though is still the exact same as it was when he slew his Father." I frown, looking at the -apparently divine based on what Byakko is implying- sections of my mindscape. They don't look very impressive.
"Wait, what about deities that develop new aspects based on the views of their worshippers? Multiple Kami of the Shinto Pantheon were reimagined by Buddhism." I point at Byakko accusingly but he just smirks.
"Did they change though? Or did the beliefs of their worshippers change? By becoming a God you exchange your ability to change yourself for eternity. Never becoming weaker or stronger by your own efforts." I click my tongue in annoyance but concede the point.
"I wasn't aware that you could stop ascension and not die." Byakko doesn't even look smug like I thought he would, he actually grimaces instead.
"Normally you can't." Byakko visibly gathers himself before continuing. "I estimated a thirty percent chance that you would die if I stopped the ascension."
I grit my teeth and try not to explode. "Explain yourself. Quickly."
Byakko's ears flatten and his tail swishes angrily, "Watch it, brat. It was either a chance of you living from me stopping you or guaranteed death."
He rises to his full height, his sounders tense and his lips peeled backwards to show his teeth. "Do you think Susanoo would have kept you around as a mindless beast? Because that is what you would have ended up as if I hadn't stopped you."
"Not only that but do you think that I would've been free with your death? I'm bound to your soul, if you die so do I!" I slump as my anger drains away. If he was willing to risk his own death then it had to be the only option.
"I'm sorry, Byakko. Because of me, you've had to work hard again, huh." The tension in his posture begins to bleed away and he nods.
"It was a desperate, foolhardy manoeuvre. Your soul was becoming crystallized divinity so I had to shatter the formation to halt it. I can't exert enough power to do so myself so I had to let in something stronger." He shakes his head and his hair stands up on end.
"I forced you to stare into Susanoo's soul, something that is far beyond your comprehension at this point. I'm almost shocked you didn't simply fade out of existence; swallowed by that Storm ." The mindscape shakes around us as Byakko says storm and he curses.
" That is why I thought you might not survive. Not only are the concepts partially incompatible with your soul but they are many orders of magnitude more refined than the ones that currently form you . I had to wipe any impression of seeing Susanoo's essence from your soul or else it would start to destroy this place again." If mentioning the concept can destabilize my mindscape then the knowledge being actually present here would definitely do serious damage.
"Wait a second, so you erased it from my memory. The fact that you still remember how this happened means you still remember everything." Now Byakko grins smugly. His earlier anger has faded completely and now he is sitting like a housecat who dropped a birds corpse in front of me.
Entirely too proud of himself.
"Of course. I'm far superior to you, brat. It would do you well to remember that fact." I stare at his mutated leg in realisation. Not only does he remember the experience, but he has also managed to integrate gleanings from that experience into himself. He always gets the best things, doesn't he?
"What did you gain from my suffering this time, furball?" Byakko preens and shows off his new leg, not even rebuking me for the name-calling.
"I'm still working on the integration but I should be able to translate some concepts to fit me. His prowess with a Sword can help me improve my Metal nature, for example." Light flares across his fur and the individual hairs sharpen as the light covers them. After the light dims they turn back quickly though.
"As I said, it's a work of progress. The storm aspect can help with my autonomy. If I have gained as much as I think from that brief glimpse, independent manifestation might be within my grasp." I frown not exactly understanding the mechanics of what he's talking about.
I understand concepts and symbology fine but not at the level of Byakko. There are meanings to what he's saying that can't be put into words and explained because words are such a lesser form of communication than pure concepts.
A single word can mean dozens of things but a single concept can encompass thousands or millions of different meanings. Not only that but there is an intrinsic limit to how much these concepts can be conveyed to another without that person experiencing them directly. Describing a concept in its entirety to someone who has never experienced it would be like describing the aurora borealis to a blind person.
For example, the feeling of being a brother, a sister, a mother, a daughter, or a son isn't something that can be easily defined such that everyone will agree completely with that definition. Different people have different understandings of each role inside a family based on their own perspectives. Even within a singular culture, the roles of each family member will differ in each household, let alone in different cultures.
In the same way, try describing a storm in exacting detail without consulting another person and see how your answers differ. In the north, it could be a blizzard, in the south, a heatwave, the west and east, a hurricane, typhoon, thunderstorm, or even just a heavy rain. How much constitutes a storm? How little? Is it the phenomenon that appears or a level of damage that occurs?
A storm is also defined by turmoil. In that way, guilt is a storm in your heart; where your actions are at war with your morality. Lust, love, and affection are also tempestuous at times, having highs and lows, eroding rationality, coming without notice and tearing apart your preconceptions.
So when I say that Byakko can't describe what he learned, I mean he literally can't . Even if he slowly tried to work his way through what he learned, not only would it be immensely time-consuming, but I wouldn't come to the same conclusions as him by the end. It doesn't help that what he learned aren't concepts that I could easily slot into myself.
I return to the present where Byakko is waiting for his praise. "Thank you again, Byakko, and congratulations."
Byakko smiles and trots off into the forest, leaving me alone in the middle of my mindscape. I sigh and run my hand through my hair, what do I do with this place now? Wiping everything away and rebuilding from scratch is the only viable option. Thankfully, I did plan on rebuilding my mindscape eventually, so I guess I'll do that tonight.
Before I attempt that, I should partake in the feast with the rest of the village. I did call for it, so standing there spaced out wouldn't be good for my credibility. Plus, someone has to look after my cute little students.
Takehiko yawns as he trudges behind Shishou. Akeno is beside him, also struggling with the early wakeup, combined with the late night. Apparently, he and Akeno would start 'seriously' training now that they arrived in the village.
They would begin sparring with each other using their weapons in earnest in the coming days. With Shishou there to watch them and their similar skill levels, the chances of them seriously injuring each other was low. It is still somewhat nerve-wracking to imagine training with an actual opponent even if they would be using blunted training weapons.
At the end of each week, they would both spar with Shishou, individually then together, using live steel. This was less of a scary proposition because Takehiko knows they couldn't hurt Shishou unless she let them. The gap in their abilities was too great.
If anything he takes comfort in that fact. Otherwise, if he was almost as strong as his teacher then they wouldn't be able to teach him much.
In addition to the normal exercises they already did to hone their weapons skills, they would be undergoing tougher physical conditioning. Originally, Takehiko brought up concerns about heavy conditioning stunting his growth but Shishou shrugged and said Ki would fix that issue. Not much of an answer but Shishou clearly knows how to get strong.
Seeing little children, even if they are Oni, casually wielding the strength of adults assuaged some of his concern regarding the stunting of his growth. If a natural affinity for Ki allowed them to have that absurd constitution, Ki should fix any issues with overworking his body.
The early wakeup was justified by the fact that future enemies won't care if they get a good night sleep. As much as he understands the reasoning… he's so tired. The feast was fun, and interacting with Shishou's people gave him a good perspective on why she was so cautious of them. A lot of the Oni lacked any restraint.
Even something as simple as a meal was like a battle with them. Challenges of who could eat the most, or eat the fastest were battles that waged all around him yesterday. They would even violently sabotage each other to win! One hand was on your food and the other was fighting off your opponent.
Shishou engaged in a drinking competition with her second in command after a while. She defeated him handily, even going as far as to drink double the amount to rub it in his face. Her boasting was a bit… shameless but at least she put her all into that too!
Even after drinking though she was fiercely protective of both him and Akeno. If anything she got more protective. He covers his face, flushing in embarrassment as he remembers what else Shishou did. After her drinking competition, she pulled both Akeno and him on her lap and started growling whenever someone came close. At least she didn't try to get him to call her Onee-chan as she did with Akeno.
As if listening to his thoughts Akeno turns and narrows her eyes at him. If Shishou hadn't been distracted by the other Oni and kept up her begging for a little longer Akeno might have given in. Her face was getting pretty red and he thinks she was only a minute away from agreeing.
Though Takehiko can't say much since he doesn't know Akeno well enough but would having Shishou as a big sister be that bad? She clearly cares about the two of them. Though sometimes more aggressively than they would like.
He's still a bit shocked that she openly showed her care for him like that. She only just accepted him as an official student. Perhaps it is simply her nature to be this possessive with what she claims as hers?
"You alright, kiddo?" Shishou suddenly says, an inch from his face.
"Gah! Don't do that!" He jumps in surprise, the shock waking him up more.
"You were spacing out there, bud. We've also arrived so I needed you present and paying attention." Looking around, Takehiko isn't sure what they've arrived at. To him, it looks like a random section of the forest with nothing special going on.
Akeno grumbles beside him, "You still haven't said what we are doing."
"Ah well, let me remedy that for you, Akeno-chan!" Shishou stomps her foot lightly and some bushes shift out of the way.
Through the opening, he can see what looks like a running track extending off in the distance. Like a running track due to the number of obstacles covering it. Roots that poke out of the ground make tripping hazards, thorn bushes that pop up in the middle of the track, low hanging branches, and more make a natural obstacle course.
"We're going to be working on a lot of things at once. Speed, stamina, endurance, adaptability, asymmetrical movement, observational skills, blocking, dodging, teamwork, and most important of all these, instinct. You guys are going to be running this course daily trying to get further and take less time doing so." Fearing the worst, Takehiko looks behind him and sees that the course connects at the start meaning it goes around the entire village.
Akeno frowns and looks at the track they're going to follow. "Couldn't I just fly above the course?"
Takehiko shivers as Shishou's smile widens, "You could but there's no cover in the air."
"Why would we need cover? It's an obstacle course, right?" Takehiko says this and he hears Akeno gulp.
"She said blocking and dodging were part of it…" Shishou starts to laugh before she looks off into the distance.
"I'd start running if I were you, kids. The arrows have already started flying." The clone of Shishou disappears in a red haze and Takehiko starts to run as he hears a faint whistling in the air.
Dammit, Shishou!
He barely draws his sword in time to shatter the bolt of energy that would have hit him in the chest. His practice at home and the instincts he cultivated are the only things that ensured he was accurate and fast enough to block the projectile.
He glances and sees that Akeno wasn't so lucky. She tried to block with her wings but the arrow exploded into a blaze of fire. The wings are slightly singed, not enough to hinder her but they'll definitely itch.
"We need to run, Akeno!" She turns to him with wide eyes but nods and follows his lead.
Falling into the habits he cultivated through practice, his breathing levels out and the warmth in his gut starts to pulse through his body. His vision sharpens and his blood flows hot under his skin.
Leaping over a root cluster he has to duck as an arrow rips through where his head would have been. As he lands in a roll, he has to immediately draw his blade to cut down another arrow. His sword goes back in his sheathe even as he continues running.
Akeno has conjured a shield that's floating blocking the side the arrows are coming from. "Be careful, she'll just break it!"
Akeno grimaces and leaps backwards just in time for an arrow to break her shield and another to pass through the instant the barrier shatters. Scary.
Takehiko is about to draw his sword to block another arrow when his instincts scream at him so he dodges instead. The world slows down and he sees that instead of an arrow made of Ki, an angry red arrow made of flame passes by him, exploding in the forest.
Akeno runs ahead but not without calling out to him. "Dodge the fire, block the Ki!"
Akeno demonstrates this by firing lightning bolts to cut down a barrage of Ki arrows, all while weaving her body through the flame arrows. Takehiko grits his teeth as she starts to pull ahead of him, feeling the warmth in his gut surge more powerfully.
As they continue to run through the course, things start to become easier, the two of them getting a handle on things as they go along. A big problem is that the arrows are all varied in speed; the slower ones hitting far harder, while the faster ones are only enough to bruise or lightly burn. They've both taken multiple hits from the faster arrows by the time they are five minutes into the exercise.
More disheartening is the slow progress they've been making. With the amount of focus they have to put into the inbound projectiles, and not getting caught on the obstacles along the way, they're barely travelling faster than a jog if you take an average speed.
The rhythm is basically, sprint between cover while blocking or dodging projectiles, take a quick breath before your cover is destroyed, then rinse and repeat. It's a maddening pace for not making large gains of distance.
The pain of being hit by so many arrows both slows their reactions and the speed they move at, making more hits slip through their defence. They get almost thirty seconds reprieve -far more than normal- and while Takehiko enjoys the short break it feels wrong.
He kicks off the ground faster than before, and cuts through a barrage of his own, jumping and swinging off a branch above to dodge the fire arrows. His temporary higher viewpoint allows him to see an arrow curving off in the distance; one that Akeno isn't going to notice.
Damn it! Of course, Sensei can hit them from other directions.
His muscles burn in protest but he pulls out even more speed, catching up to Akeno and tackling her to the ground. Their clothes and hair ripple from the displaced air and there's a large explosion behind them.
"Thanks." Takehiko grins as he hears this and gives her a hand standing back up.
"No problem." He sees her eyes widen and turning his head he catches a glimpse of bright light before they're pelted by a hail of arrows.
I whistle as my bow fades away, taking in the damage my exercise did to the forest. Even dispelling the fire quickly after impact caused more damage than I thought it would.
I got a bit excited at the end there and sent a lot more arrows than the kids could reasonably handle. This isn't just a form of practice for them but also practice for me. I haven't had any moving targets at long enough range to hone my archery for a while.
I wasn't able to use full-powered shots or the fastest arrows I could make since those would invariably kill my students. Instead, I focused on quantity, diversity, and precision. This training will help me weave together barrages of Ki and magic arrows, with precision from a distance. Considering that I'm nearly 4 kilometres from the closest point on their obstacle course, I have to be able to predict where they will be a long time before they get there.
That was why the training ended so quickly, I hadn't expected them to be stopped there for that long. I released that barrage in order to get them to kick it up a gear after it exploded behind them. I hadn't expected Takehiko to tackle Akeno out of the way of an arrow she should have seen. I don't know why she thought I could only make the arrows come from one direction but hopefully, she'll learn for next time.
I might see if Akio wants to run the course occasionally. With him doing laps, I'll be able to use far stronger arrows and hone the power of my archery. If I'm going to be slaying dragons on the open ocean, ranged support will be a useful ability. I can already imagine having both my clones laying down supporting fire while I cut down sea serpents up close.
Speaking of clones, I break off a horn and use it to form one. Once it appears it heads off to heal the kids up and tell them how they can improve tomorrow. It will also get them fed, rested, and begin their weapons training.
While it's doing that, I reach out with my Ki and start to fix the environmental damage I caused. It's difficult at this range to do everything I want. Not having practised the nature manipulation aspects of Senjutsu from this distance is a hurdle I need to overcome; eventually, however, I should be able to fix the forest and make changes to the obstacle course on the fly.
Within the next couple of months, Akeno and Takehiko will learn; how to gauge the threat level of inbound attacks as well as the best counter to them by identifying my different arrows and responding to them; They will start to learn how to make most of their environment while travelling through it. I never said Akeno couldn't fly and the branches are sturdy enough for Takehiko to run across; As I speed up the projectiles their instincts will improve; when things become too easy I'll start to have the environment attack them to train their adaptability; Lastly, the sheer physical exertion will increase their stamina and speed.
This training accomplishes so many training goals and the nightmare-inducing difficulty will make them an effective team! Nothing bonds people like shared trauma, after all. The best part is, because I'm so far away, they'll develop a phobia of nature not a fear of me. It's a win-win-win scenario.
My end goal is that by the time we leave the village they'll be able to run the entire course -which is twenty-five kilometres in length- in twenty minutes. Basically, they will be over three times as fast as the half marathon world record for adults or lower supernatural physically. Their actual combat skills I'll improve outside of this exercise but this will help their basics across the board.
With the kids no longer running the course, I need to focus on rebuilding my mindscape. I had underestimated how much time it would take to wipe it clean and rebuild everything from scratch. Worse because the crystallized sections didn't want to move at all.
After staying up the entire night I managed to wipe everything clean and 'pile up' the divinity in the centre. Byakko was angry that I hadn't finished the remodelling because there was nowhere comfortable to sleep anymore.
Projecting myself into the blank space I survey the divinity that was accrued. Due to the state I was in when I attempted the ascension, the 'flavour' of the divinity is almost pure rage. It has aspects of my various skill blended in but the most prominent element of it by far is rage. I can see now why Byakko said I would have ended up as a mindless beast.
The question now is what to do with my mindscape. The form will influence my personality and future growth in the same way my personality and past growth will influence the design I craft. In order to get the most benefit out of this remodel, I need to build an inner world that best represents myself and my abilities, while leaving room for my future growth.
"You're thinking about this too hard. " Byakko lies down beside me, gesturing for me to sit.
"To be fair, it is kind of important." I scratch Byakko behind the ears as I sit down, eliciting a deep rumble of contentment from him.
"This place is an expression of your soul. Don't shape every inch of the space, just control the general intent. Your subconscious will do the rest." I exhale and unbidden I remember Byakko saying he wanted a shrine.
The crystals of divinity shoot toward the centre of my mindscape, slamming violently into each other. Intense heat and bursts of energy explode from the area as a figure gradually takes shape. More than anything though is the aura of malice that exudes outward from the figure. A cloying miasma of rage dripping off it.
The feeling gradually dies down but it remains embedded into the crystalline statue. Once it's finished Byakko start laughing and I grimace in distaste. Of course, I end up making a depiction of myself in battle with material created from rage.
The statue of myself is an unsavoury revelation of how much my bloodlust shapes my character considering it ends up forming the centrepiece of my shrine. The look of manic glee on 'my' face as I brandish my sword and bow, with blood dripping down my body is equally distressing. The sword in its hand burns with silver radiance and the bowstring is wreathed in flames.
The remaining crystals form a quartet of pillars around the statue to support the roof of the shrine. Underneath the statue, black flames begin to billow outward, eventually forming the base of the structure. I can see memories flickering in the flames, violent ones mostly but also precious ones involving my family. The flames start to eat away at the statue and pillars but as though a dog pulled to heel, they back down in the face of the raw anger. Focused anger was what brought the grudge flames to heel originally.
A Golden tiled roof made of pure life energy starts to assemble itself above the statue on top of the pillars. The Ki, because what else could it be, begins to seep down the pillars. It burrows inside them, engraving depictions of my growth and struggles inside. Stories of my life thus far.
The Ki drips down onto the statue in the centre, and much like how it burned tattoos into me so long ago, the same happens to the statue as it pulses with life. A third eye opens on the statue and a pulse of energy echoes throughout my mindscape. Blinding light shines from the forehead of the statue and shows no signs of stopping anytime soon.
I sigh, wondering how my inner world became so chuuni but deep down I know it's all my fault. It is an expression of myself, all things considered. Instead of lamenting what has happened for the rest of my days, I move on to the rest of my mindscape.
Around the shrine, nature blooms in full force. Grass shoots up from the darkness, coating the ground endlessly in all directions; Trees explode upwards, their bark creaking as they try to scrape the sky in their ascent; Flowers bloom, releasing a cloyingly sweet, almost intoxicating, scent; The raw wilds in all their glory suffocate my surroundings.
Nature even has the audacity to try to devour my temple, something the temple takes offence to. Vines start to wrap around the pillars so the crystal warps, blades forming and cutting down the vegetation. The black flames leap outward to devour the encroachment of nature and nature meets them in an infinite tide of green. The malicious miasma brings death to all plants that approach but nature adapts and grows in response. Sword intent and flaming arrows flash outward to destroy the environment, matched by torrents of greenery.
Both sides fight furiously until the sky falls upon them.
The darkness above shudders and cracks. Byakko and I both gasp as our breath is stolen from us when raw nothingness swallows the sky. It then slams into the ground relentlessly crushing both sides of the battle. The world halts and I can hear cracks ring out all across my mental world.
I grit my teeth and exert my will onto the most troublesome of aspects I've harnessed in this lifetime. I could shove it into the sky and it would likely comply but my mind recoils in disgust at the idea. That course of action feels too much like surrender to me.
I roar as I pull , dragging the nothingness down to the ground. It fights against my control and when that fails it tries to devour everything else. Again I force it to bend to my will, weaving it into the world so it permeates everything without destroying it. It gradually settles down, hanging low along the ground in a dense fog.
By the time I'm finished, my mental avatar is sweating. Something I didn't know was possible considering I can't physically exert myself. It's probably due to spiritual exertion though and that is just how my mind conceptualises the idea. Yet when I look around I know my efforts were worth it because everything feels right .
"When I said build a shrine, I meant you should build one for me, brat." I snort in amusement at Byakko's comment.
"Big talk for a freeloader here." I stick my tongue out at him and duck under his playful swat.
"Tch, we both know I'm carrying your dead weight not the other way around." We both glare at each other for a second then laugh.
Once we recover I find myself staring up at the empty sky. "It's unfinished… I'm going to have to work harder in the future, huh?"
Byakko hums noncommittally in response. "You're still young. You have time to grow."
I sigh and fall onto my back. "I wish I shared your confidence. Things are only going to get harder from here."
"Maybe. When has that stopped you before?" I close my eyes as I concede Byakko's point. As I drift off to sleep in here, I reawaken in reality.