I am the nameless tempter,
he who spake unto
Onigumo
in that fateful night.
Crouching on
the wretched face
of a wretched man,
I hissed sweet temptations
of the sway of her hips,
the sheen of her eyes,
her breasts bulging
like silky spinerettes,
and he was tempted.
I am the spider,
the webspinner,
the firestarter,
he unto whom all is owed.
I am Kanna,
she who is nothing,
she who awaited the final fate
of he,
Onigumo,
in the furthest shadow
of the dank cave of yesteryear.
Thence I surrendered
all my power,
all my freedom,
and became one fragment
of a broken mirror.
For what is sacrifice
if not made for power?
I am old One-Eye,
once the mightiest of my kin,
and with mine eye I watched
as Onigumo fell and rose,
a spider phoenix,
burning us all to ashes.
In my mane, I carried with me
my children, my mind,
and the fate of my kindred.
I was once a dragon,
but too long in a spiderweb
leeches the mind,
and my memories are lost to me,
like a cloud through the claws
of a kit.
I was drawn to he,
to Onigumo,
when he laid bare
his soul, his body,
for the use of lesser demons,
and I thought, am I not greater?
Am I not entitled?
And my pride went before the fall.
I am Kagura,
the sweet music of windchimes
as unto the gods themselves,
but lost within Onigumo,
and what fools we windwitches be
to give up freedom
for power.
What is the wind
if not free?
I am Wide-Mouth,
named for my mark and pride,
or what it used to be,
for in the deepest,
darkest pits
of Hell Incarnate,
there is no mouth of which
to be proud.
No mark with which
to stand out,
from he who was
Onigumo.
And I am only
one of many.
I am Goshinki,
mind-reader and born
a beloved third.
I read the mind
of Onigumo
in the untrustworthy light
of a long-gone cave,
and to the spider I whispered
of her hips
and her eyes
and her breasts,
as fair as spinerettes,
and with my words
the spider weaved,
and opened to all of us
the path to damnation.
I am Horn,
or so I think,
for there are few names here.
He names us
when he releases us,
and if we forget aught,
he sees to it that it be our names.
I seem to recall my body was large,
and my eyes round,
round and red,
like the equinox moon,
and a great, splendid horn
rose from my mane,
before I, the fool,
was drawn to Onigumo,
thence to search for power,
and there to lose it.
I am Kageromaru,
the shadow boy-child,
riding the gut
of my beastly brother.
I fly the ice like a gull,
and my kinsman aids and abets,
listening only to me
and the blood-drenched whispers
I murmur still.
I must calm him,
dull, half-witted Juromaru,
for he is not used to dwelling
in another's bowels.
And we will be free,
and we will kill,
and we will taste blood again.
We were one,
and then we were two,
and fiercer beasts than us
you rarely saw.
He will choose wisely
to release us from Hell,
for we are ice and blood,
beast and shadow,
and was there ever
such a threat as we
within Onigumo?
I am...
I am...
I am Muso.
I am Onigumo.
The ghost spider of yesteryear
who sold his soul
for a slice of heaven.
And then look,
they went and killed her.
This is my body they took,
my flesh and my blood,
and stealing my soul on top of it.
For fifty years I languished
in the depths of Hell,
and this one taste of freedom,
of salvation
held in her face,
younger, yes,
but no less fair,
this one taste does little
to end my hunger.
And we love her,
and we hate her.
Is there no sanity
to be found within me?
I am Naraku,
whose faceted soul confines
all the depths of Hell.
There are some,
shining and laughing,
who will never be free,
but most are wretched creatures,
power-hungry and weak,
each carrying their own torment,
and they shall be released.
The cursed shall walk the earth
and gather to me,
in symbolic perfection,
the uniter.
She carried it,
and how we hated her,
and how we loved her,
and now it is spread
and we must find it all
that we may become me.
One glorious hell
born from the ashes
of Onigumo.
Out of many, one.
Out of legions--
Naraku.
