Wildflowers, Part I
"Ngh…" Slowly, Kazami Yuuka came to, clutching her head as she pushed herself off of the ground. "What just—?" It took a few seconds for her mind to put the pieces together and recall what had just transpired. "Oh, right."
She managed to get up into a kneeling position and temporarily stabilize herself. "That woman! Always doing whatever she wants!" She let out a pained grunt as she struggled to keep her balance. Determined not to fall, she pressed one hand sharply into the ground. Her hand landed on a moss-covered rock, slipped off and threw her off balance. She careened into the ground, her shoulder taking the brunt of the landing. She winced at the pain and resigned herself to laying sprawled out on the dirt.
As she laid there, she took in the scenery around her. Where around her was once a sprawling field now was a dense and dark forest. Above, the sky was obscured by a thick canopy, with occasional gaps allowing enough light for her to see. The forest floor was covered with dirt, twigs, and moss, all wet to indicate recent rainfall. The air was filled with the sounds of wildlife; birds chirping and deer foraging all around her. Out of everything she could see, however, there was not a trace of human involvement. Even the most isolated reserves in her hometown would have been covered in trails, markings, and invasive species. The only thing that looked this natural would have been her father's land of fantasies.
'But this doesn't feel like that at all... does that even exist now?' She thought back to what she had heard as she fell through the gap. "Before it began, huh? Maybe she should have told me what 'it' is!" She lashed out at nothing before letting her hand fall back to the ground. "Damn it… why do I feel… so…"
Overcome with exhaustion after having only been awake a minute at best, she fell limp once more and passed to the realm of dreams as she lay on the floor of an unknown forest in an unknown world.
For the first time in as long as she can remember, she dreamt. Despite everything she had gone through in the real world, her nerves were unusually calm as she found herself in yet another unfamiliar place. Her entire vision was obscured by a thick haze, and only through the feeling in her soles could she tell the ground was made of hard, cold rock.
Ahead, she could barely make out the silhouette of a person in the distance. She tried to call out to it, to demand their name, but she found herself unable to. No matter how much she tried, something in her mind intervened at the last second, and yet she never got frustrated. It was as if some part of her mind was telling her: 'You don't need to do that. You don't want to do that. You're happy just as you are. You belong here.'
She knew something was amiss, but even when she tried to take a step, whether towards or away from the figure, the same voice came in to stop her.
While all of this had been going on, the figure failed to notice her presence. It continued to stare off into the distance at something far away and unseen. As if she wasn't even there.
'You don't need anything else. You are happy.' She could feel the energy leaving her as the voice bore into her head.
"NO! YOU WILL NOTICE ME!" She managed to shout, in defiance of fear.
Suddenly, the figure's head snapped towards her, and although she could not see its face, it was clear they were completely surprised to see someone else standing there. "Who… are you?"
"papawe, soti pa tare?" As she slowly drifted into consciousness, the first thing she noticed was that she was no longer laying alone on the forest floor. Light streamed onto her face through the cracks in a shoddily-built thatch roof. She strained her neck to look to the side, where she saw the roof continued at an angle until it met a low wall that seemed to be made of little more than packed mud.
"siii~, soti pa kikuru!" She heard a woman's voice in a harsh whisper. It seemed as if the woman was admonishing the young boy who spoke before. "A! okuari!" The woman spoke again, and quick footsteps could be heard drawing nearer. With great pain, she tried her best to roll her head in the other direction in order to get a glimpse of this woman. "me ga samasika?" The woman asked as she approached, speaking a strange language that sounded equal parts familiar and foreign.
"Where… am I?" Yuuka managed to ask through pained breaths. "Who… are you?"
"Doko? Patasi? Wakarienu." The boy interjected, expressing his further confusion with the girl on the ground.
"Koko pa iduku to touyou to womöpu" The woman responding as if she understood something, but Yuuka had almost no clue as to what she could be understanding or how well. "Aga da pe yokukoso. Aga na pa Kumömi." It seemed like at this point, the woman noticed Yuuka's bewildered expression and clarified by pointing a finger towards her chest and repeating the last word. "Kumömi." Then she pointed a finger towards the boy. "Tutimi. Soga na pa Tutimi." Then finally, she pointed towards Yuuka. "Naga na pa?"
Her eyes glazed over for a second before she realized they were waiting for her to say something. 'What the hell do they want me to say? I don't understand a word they're saying! Naga na pa? What does that even mean? Na… na… My name? Is that what they're asking for?' She cleared her throat, but in her current state it sounded more like a sickly cough than a distinguished attempt at speaking. "Kazami. My name is Kazami Y—"
"Kazami? A to Tutimi to onazi dearu! Tomö ni kumö to tuti to kaza wo miyo!" The woman jumped excitedly.
'I almost understood that… almost.' Yuuka sighed and turned her eyes away from the two, towards the ceiling. While she stared down the bundles of thatch that separated her from the sky, she tuned out everything else the boy and woman were trying to say to her. 'Why should I even try to listen to them? I don't know what they're saying and I probably wouldn't care if I did. All I need to do is get my strength back and figure out what the hell is going on. By myself.'
"Sukosi matite kudasaru, mesi wo motite kuru." Suddenly the woman excused herself and ran off to another corner of the hut. While she was away, the young boy tried to make conversation, to little avail. At this point, Yuuka had already stopped paying attention the two and occupied herself staring at a mud wall.
'But still, what kind of people would live in such a place? Nothing but mud and dirt as far as I can see. What kind of backwards hole have I ended up in? Is this what that woman meant when she said 'before it all'? She could have at least had the decency to tell me what 'it all' is!' As she silently fumed towards the wall, the boy realized she wasn't listening and started poking her to get her attention. At first she ignored it, but it quickly became too much of an annoyance to handle. "What do you want, kid?" She growled as she rolled over to face him.
Surprised at her hostility, the kid's face deflated and he took a step back in shock. Timidly, and without making eye contact, he raised up his hands to show her what he held. "P—pana. Ageru."
Suddenly her expression changed. She saw what the boy held: A small wild rose of the species multiflora. To the untrained eye it may not look like a rose, but for her it was more than enough to bring a smile to her face. "A flower? You're giving this to me?" Seeing Yuuka's demeanor improve, the boy lifted his head and his face too lit up as he grinned in affirmation. She then reached over to take the flower out of his hands and cradle it gently in her own. The small white flower had a gentle fragrance that calmed her nerves. While she had seen many of this species in the past, somehow this one flower felt infinitely more beautiful and pure than any other. She could tell that she was no longer nearly as able to connect with the flower as she had been in the past, but even she could tell this was a plant that knew nothing of the contamination of the modern world, and before the boy found it, it was likely all of humanity had no influence on it.
"Ah! She cry! Why she cry?" At this point, Yuuka had finally started to pay attention to the boy's words. As it turned out, while much of his speech was foreign to her, a good portion of it was similar enough to the Japanese she knew to be parsed. Still, she did not respond immediately, overcome with emotion as she was.
After a while, with the boy looking on in increasing worry, she pulled the flower close to her chest and wiped the tears from her face. She slowly looked up at him and whispered weakly: "Thank you."
"Arigatou? Sikasu iduku nimo ari, arigatawanu!" The boy complained, seemingly misunderstanding the word she used. And again, she found it hard to make heads or tails of what he was saying. Even then, she was satisfied. Even if the meaning was not conveyed, it was enough to know that, for the first time in a long time, she had meant it.
As they shared this emotional moment, The woman returned with a pair of crudely-shapen clay bowls in her hands, letting off a gentle wisp of steam. This immediately caught the boy's attention as he turned and greedily reached for one of the bowls with both hands. As soon as he got a grip on it, he gave out a surprised yelp and retracted his hands just as quickly. The woman just laughed as he did, calmly bending over to place the bowls on the ground. "Mesi agari." She said as she took a step back.
As the boy made another dive towards one of the bowls, Yuuka leaned over to get a better look at them. While she had expected a simple bowl of rice, she was instead confronted with a vibrant array of colors. Nuts and berries of all descriptions were mixed in with a few pieces of what seemed to be some sort of fish. 'What a strange combination. Why would she put fish in with such a – what am I even thinking? I'm not here to criticize some woman's cooking! She suddenly turned away from the two and pushed her arm against the ground to lift herself up. Both of the residents noticed this and watched curiously as she pulled herself off of the ground in a way that was both painfully slow and yet still far too fast for her body to keep up. Still, head spinning, she continued, on to her feet where she struggled just to maintain balance.
"Iduku he iku?" The boy asked as she ambled away from the makeshift bed she was in, just before shoving a handful of nuts into his face.
'I wonder what he's trying to—no! It doesn't matter! I don't need to know! I don't need him! I need answers!' She thought, forcing herself to pull away from the cozy atmosphere she found herself in. 'This is not where I need to be! I can't afford to waste time here! I have to—!' Her train of thought suddenly stopped when she reached what seemed to be the entrance to this hut: a small opening, behind which the light of the day shone brightly. At first she squinted her eyes at the sunlight, but as her vision cleared…
She saw the hut was situated on a hill at the edge of the forest, and out the door was a clear view of the valley below. A grand valley that seemed to stretch endlessly in both directions sat at the foot of the hill, and between the patches of forest lay a large meadow filled with blooming wildflowers of all kinds. All this, and not a trace of human influence in sight. She fell again to her knees as she took it all in. She opened her mouth to react, but no words could explain the sheer emotion she felt at the sight.
The woman then came up to her side and knelt next to her with a concerned expression. She cautiously reached an arm around Yuuka's shoulders to comfort her, and against her better judgement, Yuuka let it happen, and leaned into the embrace.
A few days passed without incident as she slowly became acclimated to her new environment. It was clear to her by now that the strange language they spoke was actually closely related to the Japanese she knew, and if her assumption was correct, could very much be an ancient version of Japanese itself. Knowing that, she could manage to piece together some things the two were saying to her, but that didn't necessarily change the fact that it was, for all intents and purposes, still a completely different language.
She had awoken to a small commotion in the hut and sat up from her makeshift bed to investigate. After a short glance around, she saw the boy standing next to her, rummaging through some of their supplies before pulling out a relatively sizable clay bowl. "What do today?" She asked him, trying to piece together a sentence from a mix of her own knowledge and what she had picked up.
"We find fish!" The boy, Tsuchimi, said, jumping up and down with excitement. Yuuka knows that his name is pronounced more along the lines of 'Tutimi,' but she found comfort in using a pronunciation that reminded her of a more modern form of Japanese.
"I see." She replied curtly, this time not even bothering to translate her speech for him to understand. "You have fun then." Tsuchimi just gave her a strange look of confusion. He hadn't understood a word of it, but he quickly decided to pay it no heed as he turned and jumped off towards the 'door.' Yuuka then let out a sigh and laid right back down. It was futile to go back to sleep at this point, so she picked up the flower from the other day and held it above her face and stared at it. She would say she was 'studying' it, but after at least two days of staring at the thing non-stop, there was hardly anything left to study. Still, she continued to stare, looking for that one hint of power, the faint connection that she knows should be anything but faint.
"Kazami!" As she continued to stare at the flower, she heard the voice of the woman, Kumomi, beside her. She didn't react in the slightest, acting as if she couldn't hear the woman. "Get up, Kazami!" Yuuka couldn't help but make a barely audible 'tch' with her teeth. Half due to the woman's arrogance to think she was able to tell her what to do… and the other half being her odd tendency to refer to Yuuka only by her last name. Whether it was because she didn't understand the concept of last names or because she just likes how it fits with their names, it was nonetheless annoying. "Why you no get up?" Kumomi crouched down to her level and waved a hand in front of her face. "Kazami?" After a few seconds, she sighed and stood back up.
"Mom? When we going?" Tsuchimi asked from next to the door.
Kumomi sighed and walked over to the wall and picked up a stick that was leaning against it. If one were to look closer, they would see that the stick was sharpened on one end to serve as a crude spear. "We go now…"
The boy, already more excited than he had any right to be, jumped with joy. "Yay! She come too?"
"…No." His mother said. She sounded disappointed, but strangely enough Yuuka had a distinct feeling that the disappointment was not aimed at her—Kumomi seemed to almost fault herself for the fact that Yuuka didn't want to come on their little fishing trip. "She no want to come." When Yuuka was to reflect on this day much later, the ensuing silence from the boy would be one thing her mind would always come back to. She would never admit it, but the sound of the young boy's heart breaking over such a simple thing would be one of the most painful silences she'd ever endure.
Nevertheless, she remained silent. The two left the hut on their expedition without another word, and Yuuka was left all on her own. Once she was sure she was alone, she tried once more to connect with the flower, but it did little more than twitch under her influence. "Aargh!" She cried out in frustration as she slammed her hand down to the ground. "Why isn't my power working! Why am I stuck here, of all places? Where even am I!?" She shouted at the ceiling. A few seconds pass in utter silence before she shouts again. "I know you're listening! Answer me!"
Again, only silence follows.
"Tch, the one time I need someone to be listening." With contempt in her voice, she starts to get up and dust off her clothing. "I'm sure that old hag will be back for me. She always is." Now fully awake and dressed in the modern-day clothes she had when she came, she began to pace around the hut. "All I need to do is wait for her to show up again and I'll have all the answers I need!" She paused for a second, raising her hand and smiling optimistically—
—Before immediately souring her expression and doubling over in a strange mix of laughter and anger. "Bah—! As if!" She picked up a stick that happened to be lying about and jammed it into the ground and angrily wriggling it to dig it in even deeper. "No way that selfish old hag would do anything useful! I bet she just sent me here because she wanted to get rid of me!" The stick quickly broke under the force, leaving her with only the top half. "Hah! Even our very own, high-and-mighty 'ancient youkai' couldn't stand my presence!" She tossed the stick away, straightened her stature, and turned to face the exit to the hut. "I'll show her! I don't need her help! I don't need the help of these humans either!"
And with a newfound confidence, she began to march out of the door for the first time since she arrived. "After all, I am the strongest, most fearsome demon in existence! I can get my own answers!"
Yuuka left the hut, picked a random direction, and walked. Not bothering to remember her path, she was determined to go wherever her fate wanted her, stopping only to admire the wildflowers along the way. She heard the sound of leaves crumbling with every step she took, and soon she found herself in a rhythm that left her mind free to wander.
Around her the forest was thick, light only touching the surface in the form of small beams that penetrated the canopy. The forest floor was covered in an assortment of ferns, shrubs, and of course, the occasional wildflower, all amongst a blanket of decomposing leaves from years past. In the air, the sound of cicadas piercing the atmosphere gave the distinct feeling of midsummer. She followed along the game trails through these woods, in the tracks of numerous deer and other wildlife that have come before her.
"What a lovely day it is." She voiced her thoughts as she walked. "It would be a shame if someone were to interrupt this peace…" She paused for a second, looking around. After a moment, she shook her head. "…No, that would be too convenient." She fixed her head forwards and kept walking, this time stepping away from the game trails onto completely untreaded terrain.
She walked and walked without goal, and lost herself in the rhythm of her footsteps.
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
Last year's leaves, foliage, and some unfortunate bugs flattened in her wake, leaving a trail not much unlike those game trails left by the beasts of the forest. Deeper and deeper she went, in search of a sign, an answer… something. Without a clue to guide her, she continued onwards as the sun set and the thin rays of light faded to nothing.
"Wow! We caught so many fish!" Sitting on the banks of the local river, Tsuchimi gaped as he held the clay dish, now filled with a small pile of freshly-caught fish. Yuuka might have heard it differently, but to him and his mother, there was nothing archaic or strange about their language.
"Yes we did! Good job, Tutimi!" Kumomi gave him a pat on the head as she stepped out of the river.
"But mom, I didn't catch any!" The boy complained. "The fishes were way too fast! I didn't do a good job at all!"
"No, Tutimi, you did a great job. Without you, we wouldn't have been able to catch any of these fish." Kumomi said as she bent over wash off her hands in the running water. "After all…" She stood back up and flashed a wide smile towards her son. "What point is there in catching fish if you have no one to carry it back?" She laughed as Tsuchimi pouted, then patted his head again. "It's okay, I'm sure next time we can convince Kazami to come help us."
Tsuchimi's eyes lit up. "That means I won't have to carry the fish?" He asked, with a distinct sense of hope in his voice.
"Nope!" She shook her head, still smiling from cheek to cheek. "It means we can catch even more fish!"
"But this dish isn't even full…" Despite it being a very fruitful day of fishing, the pile of fish in the center of the dish still left a considerable amount of open space unfilled.
"Oh? So you want to carry more?"
"No! No! No!" Tsuchimi vigorously shook his head.
Kumomi just laughed even more before giving her son yet another pat on the head. "Alright, I give in, you only have to carry that much." She said, giving him the illusion of having negotiated easier work. "Anyway, it's getting dark; we should probably start heading back."
"Okay!" Tsuchimi nodded his head and jumped to his feet, carrying the dish with the fish. "I can't wait to eat this!"
"I'm glad you like it!" His mom said as she picked up the fishing spear and started walking ahead of him. "I'm sure she'll be excited to see just how much we caught as well!" Tsuchimi hurried up to walk alongside her, and together they set off on the path towards their home.
After about thirty minutes of walking, extended by the occasional break when the load became too much for the young boy, the party of two finally returned to the small clearing where their hut stood. Much relieved after a long day of walking and fishing, Tsuchimi excitedly ran up to the entrance and dashed in, his mother following shortly behind. "We're back!" He shouted as he entered.
Kumomi, having heard no response by the time she stepped in the entrance, made what to her was a reasonable assumption: "Kazami, get up! We brought fish!"
However, when she looked at the makeshift bedding where she assumed their guest was, there was no one to be found. All that was left was the strange object that she had found laying next to the green-haired girl when she found her: a stick made of some mysterious material and draped in an exquisite cloth. Wherever she was going, Kumomi could not understand why she would have left such a fantastic tool, even if she didn't know what it was for.
"Kazami…?"
Night fell, and one woman walked alone in the depths of the forest. She knew not how long, nor how far she has walked, only that she must. Her legs grew tired with each passing step, and her stomach emptier with each passing second. Nevertheless, she pushed onwards into the dark.
'I'm a fearsome beast. I'm strong.' She tried to convince herself to continue. 'A youkai like me can't be stopped by something lame like hunger. No—' She furrowed her brow. 'A youkai like me can't be stopped—by anything!' To prove her point to a non-existent audience, she reached a hand out and furiously swept away a branch that stood in her way. 'Humans need food. Humans need rest. Humans are weak. I am no human. That much is certain.'
She marched onwards, never closer to her goal, ever father from the family that offered to help her. 'As if I need their help! What do I need from those humans? They've offered nothing but worthless food and their pathetic pity.' She laughed—a single sharp, insincere bark of a laugh. 'I certainly don't need their pity.' And yet, despite her assertions to the counter, the sharp twang of hunger continued to make its presence known. 'They did try to feed me…' She shook her head to clear it of such thoughts. 'No, I don't need any food from a human!'
Suddenly, she stopped for the first time in hours. Ahead, something seemed to interrupt the monotony of the forest: a small clearing, where the trees had been cleared and a structure erected in their place. She could only think of one thing that could build such a structure.
'Unless…' She licked her lips as a wicked smile spread across her face. 'I am a monster, after all. It wouldn't be strange if I were to try something a little… befitting of a demon like me.' She dropped into a crouch and crept through the bushes towards the side of the structure. Closer up, she could tell that this structure was made of rock shaped into a mound, with moss and dirt covering it. As a dwelling, it did not seem entirely well planned or constructed. 'How barbaric.' She thought, drawing closer to the gaping entrance.
She rounded the corner, and caught her breath. Just in front of the entrance lay a form, silhouetted by the faint moonlight that reached the clearing. Her heart raced as she drew ever closer, and soon she was close enough to hear the poor thing breathing heavily as if in pain. It appeared he had already been wounded earlier; his left leg had a significant gash in it, dried blood sticking to the hair around the wound. 'The fool didn't even make it all the way inside.' Quietly, she bent down to pick up a loose rock off of the ground. 'Too bad you forgot rule number one: never sleep in the open.'
Her stomach grumbled again, alerting him to her presence. When she saw his eyes open in shock, she knew there was no more time to hesitate. She pounced, reaching out with one hand to grab his snout while raising the other to prepare a strike. 'You're mine!' She let out a deranged scream as she brought her hand down onto his head, making a chilling crack when the blow landed.
Her prey, still alive, shrieked in pain. It sounded more like an animalistic screech than a dignified scream, made even more grating as she attempted to hold his mouth shut. She cringed at the sound and moved to strike again. While she shifted her weight back to prepare the next strike, her prey kicked out with his injured leg, landing it straight into her gut.
"Ngh..!" She was forced to take a step back, losing her grip on him. While she did, the prey tried to get up and run away. 'Foolish.' She lunged back at him, confident that whatever damage he did to her would have been multiplied on his own injured leg. She soon had him again, and after a short contest of strength, had him once again pinned. She struck again, and again, over and over with unrivaled savagery. The blood splattered all over the one outfit she had from the modern world, and the sound of each impact was painful to hear, and yet she continued. "Just! Die!" She shouted as her swings became more erratic and uncoordinated.
After a few minutes, her attacks slowed and became weaker until her arm tired. "Haa…" She panted as she collapsed onto her knees and dropped the bloodied rock onto the ground. "I… did it…" She looked at her handiwork: the head was hardly recognizable, long since turned into a pulverized mess of flesh, bone, and fur. She winced slightly at the sight. It was far from the first time she had done something like this, but it was by far the hardest and most unsettling for her. When she killed, it was supposed to be something deliberate, using her power to incite fear in the most traumatic way possible. Certainly, her previous kills were by no means pretty, but she found a sort of elegance in those, whereas here…
Reduced to no power but a heavy rock, and no motive but survival, all sense of elegance had disappeared.
Once again, her stomach complained. "Yes… dinner." She bent over to pick up the rock again. "You… are my dinner." Then she took the rock to the corpse once more, ravenously tearing through the flesh to separate the meat from the bones. Without the time, energy, or skills to cook the meat, she instead resorted to grabbing fistfuls and shoving them into her mouth. She devoured chunk after chunk, each one tasted different, with some bits being inedible fat and bones and other being tender muscle, but all had the distinct flavor of venison in every bite. In its entirety, she did not enjoy it one bit, but she persisted to sate her hunger and prove to herself that she was capable of surviving and thriving in this unfamiliar world.
"I am a demon!" She shouted towards the sky, a chunk of meat still in her hands. "I am above all else! I will survive, no matter what I must do!"
And in her shout, she expended the last of her energy, and collapsed to the forest floor.
She awoke slowly, spending several minutes in that groggy state between asleep and awake. It was only when she heard the sound of approaching footsteps that she was startled awake. She jumped up as fast as she could and shouted in the direction of the footsteps: "Who goes there!?"
"Ahh!" Clearly her senses are not as honed as she thinks they are; not five meters in front of her stood a middle-aged woman holding a basket of sorts. "W- Wh- Who are you!?" She spoke in the same dialect as Kumomi and her son did earlier. Somehow, Yuuka seemed to be able to understand it even better now. She pointed a wavering finger at the mutilated carcass on the ground. "W- What you do to that deer?"
"… Deer?" She looked down at the grotesque mess she had created and things started to come together. She recalled once again the events of the past night:
She pounced, reaching out with one hand to grab his snout
the head was… a pulverized mess of flesh, bone, and fur.
the distinct flavor of venison in every bite.
Thinking on it further, the racks of horns on its head should have made it painfully obvious. The muddled mass of flesh and bone at her feet was indeed the remains of a common deer. A deer that, last night, had successfully evaded the one predator that wounded its leg only to fall at the hands of another. 'I… I killed it… and it wasn't even…'
"Hah…" Not knowing how else to react, she grabbed her head in her hand and sighed. "Hah… Ha…" Before long, however, the one sigh became two, and two into even more as it began to sound less like sighing and more like cackling. "Hahaha… Hahaha! HAHAHAHAHA!" Her lips curled into a vicious smile as she stood there laughing, a dead deer still at her feet, its blood splattered all over her clothing.
'Ha! The poor beast! Your greatest sin was the arrogance to think you, a simple creature of the woods, could stand before me!' Her thoughts went off into a line of thinking that was demonstrably untrue. Her laughter rang out all the while, filling this forsaken corner of the forest with a most unsettling sound. The woman with the basket, not so foolish as to take her chances, quickly turned and broke into a sprint while this demon was occupied. 'YES! RUN! For you are but a mere human! I am a youkai! I am the top of the food chain, and none, not human nor beast is fit to stand before me!' She continued to stand there laughing until long after the woman had disappeared from sight. 'There she goes, tail between her legs, the little sheep gone to tell the flock of the wolf that roams the land.'
She straightened her back and traced her eyes in the direction she saw the woman running. Surely that direction must lead to her home and possibly a village. 'What would she think, I wonder, if suddenly her place of safety… wasn't so safe anymore?'
She followed in the direction that she saw the woman run off to. Yuuka was far from an experienced pathfinder, but after hours of walking and some trial and error, she was able to identify the trail of deep footsteps and broken branches that indicated a running human. Despite the tedium, she was more than excited. 'Like a hunter following game in the forest! No, not 'like,' I am a hunter, a predator in these woods, and they are my prey!' She laughed as she walked, slowly proceeding down the trail of footsteps. Where she had previously assaulted a deer as if it were a man, she found it far more satisfying to be hunting man as if it were deer.
In time, the forest thinned and the ground became much more well-worn. Through the trees ahead, she saw a large clearing ahead. After spending over a day continuously under the forest's canopy, the light of the sun shining unimpeded into the clearing was nothing short of blinding to her, so she raised a hand up to her brow to shield her eyes. As her eyes adjusted to the light, the view before her became ever clearer: In the clearing stood not one, but five individual structures. Each one was a mud hut not unlike the one she had stayed in with those two further out in the woods, although these seemed to be much better maintained. Four of the huts were arranged in a circle, their entrances facing the fifth, much larger one at the center.
Beyond the clearing was not more forest, but instead a lake that stretched out towards the horizon. It wasn't so big that she couldn't see the other side, but it was large enough that it filled her field of vision, stretching out to the base of mountains on each side. The water was so still and pristine that the reflection of the mountains on the other side was almost indistinguishable from the real ones. Such natural beauty—soiled by the stain that is human settlement. With heavy footfalls, she approached the village, fully intending to do something about that.
As she neared, she saw a few people outside doing various menial tasks. Some were weaving baskets, others seemed to be gathering wood for a fire, but all of them immediately dropped whatever they were doing when she approached. Among them, she recognized the woman from this morning, who seemed to have the most extreme reaction, turning and running towards one of the huts. The others, seeing this and the bloodstained, green-haired woman that approached, began to panic in kind. All the while, Yuuka decided that her first objective should be the large hut at the center and so ignored the villagers and walked unimpeded towards it.
She headed straight for the entrance of the large hut, and when she was not ten feet away, a diminutive figure stepped out and faced her. Before the fearsome youkai stood a young girl, no older than ten from the looks of it. The girl wore a tunic far nicer than anything anyone else in the village wore, even being dyed a bright purple. What stood out even more, however, was the girl's hair: rather than the typical shades of black, hers was a brilliant blonde. On her shoulder sat, of all things, a frog. The girl stepped out of the hut and looked up at Yuuka. Her expression was not one of fear, nor did it show a hint of anger. She seemed… bored. "…Who are you?"
Yuuka laughed sharply. "Hah! You have a lot of guts to be asking that, missy!" She made herself look as imposing as possible. "I am a great and fearsome demon! The powerful youkai, Kaza—"
The girl interrupted her by yawning loudly. "I no really care. Go."
"What?" Yuuka replied indignantly. Even with the unfamiliar dialect, she didn't need to understand the girl's words to know what she meant.
"You heard me. Leave." The girl said, not a shred of the fear Yuuka had hoped to instill. "I no like weird things in my village." Suddenly she turned to face the frog on her shoulder. "Right?" The frog seemed to nod enthusiastically in response.
"Oh?" Yuuka smiled confidently. "And what are you gonna do about it?"
"Hmm~?" The girl smiled and looked back at Yuuka. "You sound strong. If you want stay, then we play~!" Seemingly out of nowhere, she produced a pair of large iron rings, each one bigger than her head around and over an inch thick. With those dimensions, there should be no way that a girl that age should be able to hold two of them without suffering serious strain on her muscles.
Confident, Yuuka stepped towards the girl. "I'm not sure what those are supposed to do, but if you want to play…" She licked her lips and smirked. "I'll play." Then she exploded into action, lunging towards the girl and delivering a punch straight to her gut. Yuuka put all the strength she could muster into the punch, and when it connected, she heard a distinct crack.
… What cracked was nothing other than her own fist.
"Ngh… you…!" She retracted her broken hand before launching her other hand to avenge it. Both of her hands were blocked easily as the girl casually lifted the large metal rings to block them. "Don't think you're so hot because you've got some stupid rings!" She reached out again with both bloodied hands and tried to yank the rings from the girl's grip.
Yet the girl stood strong, and was able to match her strength with little effort. "How sad." The girl said as she pushed forwards with her strength, throwing Yuuka off balance and making her stumble away. "I thought you were strong. Weak ones should not play with a god…"
"A god…?" She repeated angrily; internally, she tried to dismiss it as a child's boast, but the reality of the situation made it very difficult for her to convince herself.
"But you so weak. You just a human." She dropped the rings and walked towards Yuuka. "Go away!" She delivered a punch straight to her face, sending Yuuka flying into the wall of a nearby hut. She was still standing, but seriously dazed by this point.
"A human? No, you're sorely—"
"I know what you are." The girl/god interrupted her. "And I am a god. People say gods give gifts, so I give you a gift." The girl walked up towards her and touched a single finger to her forehead. From the tiny contact, she felt a strange sensation suddenly come over her. Even that was enough to make Yuuka's legs give out, sending her crumpling to the ground.
"A gift? Ha! You can't—" Yuuka tried her hardest to be defiant, slowly managing to get to her feet and talk back as a trickle of blood streamed from her mouth.
"Tonight... you die." The girl smiled mockingly.
"Die?" she let out a feeble laugh. "It… It takes a lot more than that to kill a demon like—"
"Demon? You not more than regular human!" the girl pointed a finger accusingly at her. "A human that should not be in my village. So leave!" and with a solid and unexpected kick, she sent Yuuka flying once more, this time far enough that she flew away from the village center and back into the forest she had entered from.
She tried to get back up and return to the village, but when she did, she felt an immense power pushing her away. "Tch… I'll come back for you, little 'god.' Just you wait."
She stumbled back through the forest, weakened, bloodied, and demoralized. Unable to turn back thanks to the small god's efforts, she once again marched aimlessly into the woods. After the time she spent walking to and in that village, the day was starting to draw to a close, and the woods beneath the forest canopy were once again plunged into darkness.
She walked completely without a purpose, and while she did, the pains accumulated from the previous days made their presence known. Deep in the wilderness, far away from even the most remote traces of humanity, she finds herself overcome with agony. Her legs, tired from days of constant strain; her arms, bloodied and fractured from her recent encounter; and her mind, overwhelmed by a spiral of humiliation and powerlessness; all succumbed at once.
'No…! No…! It can't… It can't… It… It can't end here!' She screamed internally, but she could do little to resist the toll being taken on her body. 'I… I… must… go… on!' She put all her strength into her legs, pushing and pushing. Slowly, her body lifted off the ground bit by bit…
Before collapsing once more.
'No! No! No! I… I can still—!' It was both agonizingly slow and unbelievably sudden. Her thoughts, the sheer defiance by which she lived, fell silent. With no fanfare or recognition, the youkai who had so terrorized the modern world and done the impossible by travelling much farther in time than she ever had in space, lay splayed out on the forest floor.
In the thickest of woods, hidden in the mountains of one of the most remote regions of Japan, the form of a single girl lay in the undergrowth. Were it not for her unnatural hair and wildly anachronistic dress, she was no different from any human. No one would ever know of the strength she commanded nor the grand ambitions she held. To the rest of the world, she would be remembered as but a girl, one who foolishly tried to fight the world and met her end, without progeny and before reaching even twenty years of age.
…and yet, she persisted.
What is death?
'Weakness.'
Does that mean you are weak? For you are dead.
'I am neither.'
Then what are you?
'I am Kazami Yuuka. I am strong.'
And what if you aren't?
'Then I will make it so.'
And if you fail?
'I will not.'
Even if the whole world rejects you?
'I will turn that into my strength.'
You are not destined to exist, and yet you persist.
'All the better.'
… "Then," suddenly, instead of a vague nothingness of thought, she could hear the voice of a woman, loud and clear. "I cannot take you…"
And then the voice changed. In the voice of a man she knew well, it spoke once more.
"…my beautiful flower that will never wilt."
Somewhere, deep within the woods where the light of the sun does not reach, a flower bloomed. Tall, strong, and radiating confidence, a sunflower grew in the dark. It should not be there. A flower that should never bloom. And yet, it bloomed. Where the sun cannot reach, it became its own sun, shining brightly over the forest floor, and the girl who lay before it.
Just as if awakening from a dream, she opened her eyes calmly and slowly. Without an ache on her body, she laid peacefully, allowing her rest to last those few precious extra minutes on a lazy morning. The world around her continued on as any morning. Birds called high above the canopy, while insects floated around in the air. In the ground around her, a large number of flowers of all types bloomed on all sides. Those flowers grew denser as they got closer to her, almost covering her completely. For once, she felt entirely one with the world around her.
And yet, in this environment of tranquility and comfort, something told her she mustn't stay. She had somewhere to go, a mission to accomplish. Where and what, she didn't know, but she knew she must go.
She rose from the ground, displacing an unusually large amount of soil that had settled around her. She dusted what seemed to be years of sediment buildup from her clothes to reveal that her clothes themselves had not fared very well. Although her body beneath seemed to show no evidence of the harm she had previously felt, her clothes were severely degraded. Torn all over and weakened so much she was surprised they even stayed on.
Regardless, her appearance was low on her list of concerns at the moment. Before that, she had to tend to her more basic needs. However much she thought it below her, it was clear she would actually have to go looking for food. Properly this time.
So she set out, once again into the wilderness. With hardly even the clothes on her back, she set out to do some hunting. It was a difficult endeavor to start tracking prey when she found it hard to even locate the path she had walked to get here, so she, as usual, picked a direction and walked.
Just as before, each step came with a satisfying crunch as she treaded on the fallen leaves and undergrowth on the forest floor. As she walked, she noticed a slight change in altitude as she seemed to be walking down the slopes of a mountain of some sort. On the slopes of the mountain she was able to find a few berries along the way. She was relatively confident that the ones she picked weren't poisonous, and if they were she didn't think it would make a difference, but they were hardly enough to fill her stomach. She needed to find something more—something more… meaty.
However, growing up in the modern world, she had no experience in tracking that would help her find suitable prey. On the rare occasions she did spot a deer or something similar as she walked, it had already heard her from a mile away and was running off with a speed she couldn't hope to match. The only meat she had found thus far in the entire time she had been in the 'past' was that deer earlier that was already half dead by the time she got to it.
She continued to walk, following only her instinct as her stomach grew ever emptier. In time, dusk came, and in the twilight, she spotted her first glimpse of hope. On a hillside deep in the forest, in an area that showed almost no signs of human involvement, she suddenly came across a small clearing. The clearing, which provided a pristine view of the valley below, was only large enough for a small hut to stand hidden between the trees.
'I hope my mind isn't just playing tricks on me again. Who knows how long its been since I've had a… proper meal.'
She approached the hut with much trepidation, fearing a repeat of her last attempt at something similar. She decided to creep along the side to get the jump on whatever awaited her inside, and as she reached the entrance to the hut, she stopped and listened. For a few seconds, she could hear muffled sounds, but nothing that she could make out as the sound of a human or anything else.
"YOU WHAT!?"
-There it was! A voice! A human! A woman, from the sound of it, and unless she somehow had a phone line in this day and age, she had a pretty strong feeling someone else was with her.
"I told you, I say no!" A man responded. Younger, it sounded, but grown nonetheless. Of course, she could be off on her predictions, so she assumed the worst—a man in his prime would be harder to take down…
'But that doesn't really matter, does it? I'm a youkai! I don't need to worry about any man!' She boasted internally. 'That said… I might want to listen in a little more… just in case. Not that I'm doubting my strength or anything!' She defended her pride to a nonexistent audience. In reality, she was starting to notice her strength was not quite as reliable as she had once thought. It had fluctuated so much in so little time that she had no idea where she actually stood in terms of power, so she decided to be cautious... just this once.
While she went on in her head, the woman was talking about something inside. " – is very nice girl, you can not find better!"
Now that she was paying full attention, she took notice of the antiquated speech the woman was using. It was, as she should have expected, the very same style and language as anyone else she had met around here. In fact, the woman's manner of speech seemed almost suspiciously familiar…
"I do not want be with her!"
'So she's trying to get the poor lad with a girl.' Yuuka smiled in a way that only she could. 'Too bad he'll soon be—'
"LISTEN TO ME, TUTIMI!"
"WHAT?" Her characteristic smirk was gone as soon as it arrived. Replaced with abject shock and confusion. 'That doesn't make any sense! The guy sounded—! he sounded like he was—! Maybe it's a common name! Yes, yes, that must be it! It doesn't make sense any other—!"
"Who said that!?"
'Oh no.' All of her plans collapsed around her. She fully intended to turn and get away from her now compromised situation and yet… she stood there. Too confused and shocked, at both those in the hut and her own loss of composure, to do anything.
It would have been too late, regardless. In an instant, there was a man standing in the doorway, looking directly at her. He looked to be of age, somewhere around twenty, if she were to guess. The man's face already looked visibly affected by the stress of the previous argument, and when he saw her, his eyes widened even more. It was truly a wonder this man hadn't fainted by this point. He opened his mouth to speak, and the result was far more nervous stammering than coherent speech. "Y- Y- Y- You—!"
It took all of her energy to try and conceal her own afflictions and present a calm, charismatic face. "Good evening, sir. I hope my appearance is not too much of a disturbance." She put on a deliberately fake smile and made eye contact. 'Sure, there might be a little bit of a resemblance, but surely there's no way…'
It was clear that, with the modern and complicated turns of phrase she used, the man did not understand a word, but it was also clear that hearing her say that made him understand something. "It… It is you! Kazami!"
'If he recognizes me, then that means… but then how…?' Her confusion only deepened, but on the outside she still tried to maintain composure. "Then you are the little Tsuchimi I remember. Though I must say you aren't quite as little as I remember." While he probably couldn't pick up on everything she said, she had no doubt he would be able to pick out his name in her speech.
"It has been long! More than ten years! I knew you were alive! I am happy you remember me!" Tsuchimi – it was strange for her to think of the grown man by that name— eased his expression, and his look of shock and stress became one of inexplicable joy. "Come inside! You and I must talk!"
"I—" She tried to protest, but stopped herself. Plan A may have to be shelved, but if this was truly the same family that took her in before, she knew she could certainly take advantage of their kindness and fill her stomach in a much more… civilized manner than she had planned. "I would appreciate that." She stepped forwards and followed the grown Tsuchimi into the hut. Very quickly, she spotted an aging woman sitting on the dirt floor. "I apologize for the intrusion." She said, maintaining an air of poise.
"This is surprising. It has been long since I saw you, Kazami, but after many years, you are same." The woman smiled at her as she entered, although with a certain amount of hesitation that wasn't apparent on Tsuchimi.
"A—Ah, I suppose I am…" Yuuka replied, the uncertainty she was trying to keep contained showing in her voice. 'Since when had so much time passed? What kind of trick is this?' Panicking internally more than ever, she still tried to keep her cool façade. "It seems you both have fared well over the past... ten years." She said the last two words cautiously, as if testing how they felt in her mouth. She quickly decided she didn't like the taste.
"Sit down! Sit down!" The woman, who she assumed was the mother, Kumomi, gestured towards the 'floor' of the hut. "We must talk!"
"Ah, yes…" She hesitantly obliged and moved to sit down. "Then, if you'll excuse me…" She picked a spot near the back of the hut, where she once slept what for them must have been long ago.
Tsuchimi also sat down where he was standing, and the three of them talked for a few hours. All the while, Yuuka replied largely in pleasantries and vague half-truths, especially when the subject came to where she had been before or after her last visit.
While Kumomi was regaling her with a random story that she could hardly understand, she became aware of something against her chest. Tentatively, she reached into her vest and pulled out a small flower—a white rose. 'Why do I have a—' She looked up and noticed Tsuchimi was giving her a particularly strange glance. 'What could he—oh, that's it. This is the flower he gave me.' She laughed a little under her breath, causing Kumomi to stop talking and look at her too. 'I honestly forgot I kept it. I guess it's no surprise it's still in perfect shape.'
"Hm? What is in your hand, Kazami?" The old woman asked, seemingly having decided herself that this was more interesting than whatever story she was telling.
"It's a wild rose." She replied turning it over in her hand. "This child has been through a lot. I'm glad he's still looking healthy as ever."
"Child?" Tsuchimi took notice of that one word.
"Yes, all of my flowers are my beloved children." She lifted a finger on her left hand and stroked one of the petals. "I shudder to think that I have forgotten that fact these past few days." As she talked, she turned to face Tsuchimi in the eyes. "Boy, did I ever tell you what the wild rose means?"
"Means?" ironically, he did not understand what 'means' meant, for the word she used was borrowed from Chinese long in the future.
"A wild rose such as this one…" She ignored his confusion and kept talking, twirling the flower in her hands all the while. "It represents love, but not in the passionate, lustful way that the red rose does. Rather, it represents a more homely, wholesome sort of love, one that echoes a happy family living in simpler times." She smiled cryptically. "Such a thing is foreign to me."
"What words are you saying?"
"That is why I was so emotional when you gave this flower to me." She leaned over and placed the rose into Tsuchimi's hair. "Here, I am returning this to you. Take care of it, and know that it is the flower that saved your life."
"…life? I do not know what you say."
"Had you not come to show me the one thing I desired most, I most certainly would have killed you both the first time I laid eyes on you."
The two of them jumped visibly when they heard her say that. "K- Killed?" Tsuchimi repeated.
'Good,' she thought, 'at least they got the important part.' She continued to hold her cryptic expression. "Ah, but of course I won't now. You've passed the test, and you have something very important you can offer me."
Author's Notes:
It's been a while, but I present to you the first half of Chapter 3 of Scattered Flowers! I figured the previous 20K-word chapters were really helping no one in terms of readability, but I still feel the story is best told as a series of novella-length episodes, so I have decided to split Chapter 3 into two parts. I have held off on publishing the first half until I was far enough into the second half to not need to change anything, so I hope that explains why this didn't come out sooner.
The theme of this chapter is "The Wild," be it the physical wilderness or the "wild" that is present within our minds. I aimed to explore and develop Yuuka's character through the lens of wild beasts, proto-societal humans, and ancient forms of the supernatural in order to answer the meaning of her identity as a youkai that is at once all three. As she is sent to this unfamiliar world with no warning and quickly finds herself losing everything that had kept her (relatively) sane, she snaps and her emotions go haywire.
The backdrop for this chapter is a period of history which is known to modern historians as the "Late Jomon Period," but to older religious historians as the final days of the "Age of Gods." Because this is a tale that relies heavily on the supernatural, I do give precedence to religious accounts such as the Kojiki, and I'm using that as an excuse for any historical inaccuracies that may appear. Namely, the language. The oldest records we have of the Japanese language are works such as the Kojiki which was written sometime in the 7th~8th centuries CE. This chapter happens over a thousand years before that. Some historians believe that Jomon language more resembled Ainu than modern Japanese, but I generally tended to lean towards the language used in the Kojiki as a reference because that's what I had.
Also, the plot would never move on if I just had them speaking ancient Japanese all day, so I quickly made the switch to a sort of broken English. I'm sorry if it's hard to read or annoying, but I thought a lot about this and I'm still not sure what to do. It's all based on what our protagonist is experiencing, and Yuuka hears strange people speaking an unfamiliar, unsophisticated language, so it's really a wonder everything doesn't just come out as "ooga booga." Of course, she grows more accustomed to it over time, so things become more readable as the chapter goes on.
I would go through the rest of the references and such like before, but these author's notes are already very long and I'm not sure if people actually pay attention, so I'll forgo that this time. Also, I'm kinda interested to see how much you guys pick up.
Re: Acerman
I'm glad you're getting in to it, and while my updates may not be the most regular, I hope you enjoy each chapter as it comes regardless. Also, I can't really comment on the mysteries you mentioned yet, but I can say that you're asking the right questions.
Re: Hazard 567
I'm glad you enjoy it, and yes, I have taken your concern into account and cut this chapter into parts, so hopefully it's a little more palatable. I may or may not go back and do the same to the old ones, but that depends on the response I get.
Also, regarding your other concerns, I do have to admit that this fic plays fast and loose with the characters' powers sometimes. I like to think that Yuuka would react to the bullet like that to intentionally make the biggest impact, and I would say that while Yukari may have been able to stop one or two missiles with the last of her power, it wouldn't be enough to stop anything. I hope to build more on Yukari if I can get to chapter 4 or 5, so look forwards to that.
Re: Guest II
Don't worry, I was able to escape. I think.
Anyways, thanks for reading and don't forget to send me a review and tell me what you think! See you next time in Wildflowers Part II!