Disclaimer-I do not own Shaman King.
Shaman King-Raining At Midnight by Charlottlette.
Prologue Whenever I feel depressed, it always seems to rain at midnight. I was not used to the drudgery of such tormented inner dialogues, used to the false promise I had carried all my years of the efforts I had made to appease my family. I had to carry on the proud family name, to prove myself the worthy heir of becoming Shaman King, the most powerful of all Shamans.
I had spent almost every waking moment of my short life preparing my body and soul for this task, hardening my heart and tightening my disregard for others to achieve it. My sister Jun, a shaman in her own right, was not held to such high standards as I was, being female and caretaker to Li Peilong, a spirit who who still had a physical body if not the soul within it.
I had chosen a powerful Chinese warlord as my guardian spirit and had looked upon him as a tool to my living existence. He was dead, you see, and therefore he had no credence the way a living person would. His only worth to me was as a warrior and to help me cultivate my own strength towards my own earthly ambitions.
As far as I was concerned, the only living being whose feelings counted were my own.
That was until I met him.
The object of my scorn, my hatred. He was my enemy and my rival, the one that wished to twist my path into a road less traveled. I could not allow it.
He was a slacker, worthless, barely anything more than a child really. His outlook on life was completely foreign to me, as if it didn't even matter who the next Shaman King was, as long as he had the best intentions.
Ren snorted with disgust. Only a fool would harbor such ignorant thoughts. Intentions, good, bad or otherwise, had no bearing on the conditions of whether someone was suitable to be Shaman King. It all came down to strength.
But there was more to it than just that. Ren had found out the hard way.
He did not want to consider them as friends. Doing that went against everything he had been taught and had taught himself over the years. That the only objective that was worthy of contemplation was becoming Shaman King, that emotions were a waste of time, to put this ideal ahead of anything else that might try to corrupt him.
The thing was that that his enemy, the teenaged Yoh Asakura, was not corrupted. He was training to become Shaman King because of his own desires, to experience new things and to see the world as the vast universe it was. His only intentions were pure of heart and undiluted in their strength.
And he had conviction!
He had that from within himself and in the friendships he had made. Through the bookworm Manta, the best friend who stood much taller in his faith in Yoh than in his own stature, in Ryu, the biker gang leader who had found his own strength outside of inflicting harm on others. He found this within Horo Horo and Pirika, the brother and sister who were fellow rivals in the competition but who he claimed he was fighting for as well. Lastly, Yoh was fighting for Anna, his fiancée, the blonde female who had driven him nearly insane with her grueling training schedules.
Like himself, Yoh had his own guardian spirit, an ancient Japanese samurai named Amidamaru. Fierce and headstrong, the silver haired warrior had forgered a strong friendship with his master out of mutual respect, and that by itself, was enough to make him a rival worth battling.
He wanted so badly to rue the day that he had come to Japan to defeat the shamans that laid in his path, for the opportunity it had lent him to meet Yoh and his friends. From that one single moment, his whole life had changed...Ren held out his hand carelessly, taking notice of the cold wetness that fell from the sky. His ever present companion, Bason, looked upon him in wonder as his master sighed.
"What are you thinking about, Master Ren?" Bason asked.
"Nothing of any importance." Ren told him.
Shaman King-Raining At Midnight by Charlottlette.
Prologue Whenever I feel depressed, it always seems to rain at midnight. I was not used to the drudgery of such tormented inner dialogues, used to the false promise I had carried all my years of the efforts I had made to appease my family. I had to carry on the proud family name, to prove myself the worthy heir of becoming Shaman King, the most powerful of all Shamans.
I had spent almost every waking moment of my short life preparing my body and soul for this task, hardening my heart and tightening my disregard for others to achieve it. My sister Jun, a shaman in her own right, was not held to such high standards as I was, being female and caretaker to Li Peilong, a spirit who who still had a physical body if not the soul within it.
I had chosen a powerful Chinese warlord as my guardian spirit and had looked upon him as a tool to my living existence. He was dead, you see, and therefore he had no credence the way a living person would. His only worth to me was as a warrior and to help me cultivate my own strength towards my own earthly ambitions.
As far as I was concerned, the only living being whose feelings counted were my own.
That was until I met him.
The object of my scorn, my hatred. He was my enemy and my rival, the one that wished to twist my path into a road less traveled. I could not allow it.
He was a slacker, worthless, barely anything more than a child really. His outlook on life was completely foreign to me, as if it didn't even matter who the next Shaman King was, as long as he had the best intentions.
Ren snorted with disgust. Only a fool would harbor such ignorant thoughts. Intentions, good, bad or otherwise, had no bearing on the conditions of whether someone was suitable to be Shaman King. It all came down to strength.
But there was more to it than just that. Ren had found out the hard way.
He did not want to consider them as friends. Doing that went against everything he had been taught and had taught himself over the years. That the only objective that was worthy of contemplation was becoming Shaman King, that emotions were a waste of time, to put this ideal ahead of anything else that might try to corrupt him.
The thing was that that his enemy, the teenaged Yoh Asakura, was not corrupted. He was training to become Shaman King because of his own desires, to experience new things and to see the world as the vast universe it was. His only intentions were pure of heart and undiluted in their strength.
And he had conviction!
He had that from within himself and in the friendships he had made. Through the bookworm Manta, the best friend who stood much taller in his faith in Yoh than in his own stature, in Ryu, the biker gang leader who had found his own strength outside of inflicting harm on others. He found this within Horo Horo and Pirika, the brother and sister who were fellow rivals in the competition but who he claimed he was fighting for as well. Lastly, Yoh was fighting for Anna, his fiancée, the blonde female who had driven him nearly insane with her grueling training schedules.
Like himself, Yoh had his own guardian spirit, an ancient Japanese samurai named Amidamaru. Fierce and headstrong, the silver haired warrior had forgered a strong friendship with his master out of mutual respect, and that by itself, was enough to make him a rival worth battling.
He wanted so badly to rue the day that he had come to Japan to defeat the shamans that laid in his path, for the opportunity it had lent him to meet Yoh and his friends. From that one single moment, his whole life had changed...Ren held out his hand carelessly, taking notice of the cold wetness that fell from the sky. His ever present companion, Bason, looked upon him in wonder as his master sighed.
"What are you thinking about, Master Ren?" Bason asked.
"Nothing of any importance." Ren told him.