Curse of the Arachnid

By: Pathfinder

Chapter One: The Village Outcast

"Eleven years have past and the son of Rajura Kuroda is already beginning to look like his father!" A short middle aged man slammed his fist on the floor. "We should banish him before our village here in Kanto feels his father's curs- "

"Masubei that is enough!" The older man in the room silenced the complaining voice. He wore a dark blue kimono and had many scars on his face. He spoke in a very calm voice, and there was sureness in it that didn't waver. "Young Jirougo has committed no crimes, and despite being almost complete ostracized, he lives an adventurous, yet peaceful life, including helping others of our clan who feel pain."

"But Master, he is a cursed bastard! If we turned our backs on him that demon's curse would surely-" Masubei was silenced this time but only a hand motion.

"You may leave now." The elder said at length.

"Yes Master Fujiyama." Masubei bowed, stood and left the large home without another word.

The sun was lowering down and was barely touching the earth as a young white haired boy climbed up a tree on the bank of a river. The summer air was still warm against his soft skin around him as he reached his usual spot in the tree. His eyes stared at the sun beating down on the clear stream. One eye was a gorgeous shade of blue, the other a very pale bluish-white. He sighed and sat down staring at the golden light dancing on the water's glassy surface.

This can't be all there is to life. Jirougo thought to himself. On the outside, with the exception of his left eye he appeared to be a normal eleven year old boy. One of the only things unusual about him was his past. Every person in town never let him forget that he was the son of thieving murderer, and though Master Fujiyama had told him that his father had never killed anyone, the taunting from the villagers was almost unbearable to deal with over the years. At least now that he was older he actually developed an ability to help people, and the taunting was dying out. The most abnormal thing about him was that he had powers; strange powers. For one thing, he could see into other people's minds. He could ease the mental pains of a person, or put them into a severe confusion. A lot of the natives in his town were afraid of him because his powers could be used for a serious amount of destruction if he chose to. But whenever some one was having emotional problems or going crazy they always called out Jirougo's name and he basically had no choice but to come running. If he didn't come to help his life would just get worse.

In addition to his strange qualities Jirougo spent most of his time acting. His appearance of happiness for one was completely counterfeit. Despite how good he was a pretending to be something he wasn't; Jirougo had the distinct feeling that Master Fujiyama could just barely see the pain inside his heart. After all he was the only man in the whole community who didn't provide him with a filthy look whenever he walked down the dirt roads in their village.

The girls in the village on the other hand liked to talk to him, but their fathers prevented them from exchanging any words with him. Jirougo didn't have any idea on why they girls were into him, perhaps some of them were curious about the powers he had. There were rumors circling around the girls in town that he was a demon. He only knew this because one of the other boys in town came up to him and demanded to know on behalf of his sister. Jirougo was enticed by this thought and was glad to tell the boy that he was only aware that he was a curse upon the village and didn't know that he was a demon too. That boy or any member of his family hadn't gone near him since.

Jirougo closed his eyes and sighed miserably regretting what he had done. Growing up for him had been very lonely, he lived with his grandmother, but she couldn't provide the sort of companionship as a kid his own age could. It was the first time a boy in town had actually asked Jirougo about himself. He should have told him that he was a normal boy like everyone else, maybe then he could have found a friend…

At that moment Jirougo heard a splash in the river below him. He opened his eyes and looked down to see a girl flailing in the water.

"Help me!" the girl began choking on the water. "Some- PLEASE-" Coughing and gasping for breath the dark haired girl sank under the surface of the water.

Without thinking about it Jirougo stood up on the branch and jumped, plunging himself into the deep waters of the river below him. When after he grabbed her around the waist from the bottom of the river it occurred to him that he didn't know how to swim. He had no choice; learn how to swim or be swallowed by the river with this unconscious girl in his arms. He felt his feet touch the rocky bottom; he pushed hard against it and tried kicking his feet. It was working, slowly, but they started rising up to the surface of the water. Jirougo's lungs were beginning to ache when his head rose out of the water and took a tremendously needed breath of air. Holding the girl with one hand he stretched his other hand and reached for the shore. He grabbed the muddy bank and pulled himself and the girl up. He stared at her weakly, don't die… he thought, before he passed out.

When Jirougo woke up the girl was gone and the moon was reflecting on the river near by. The wind blew and he shivered as it cut through his damp clothing. He stood up shakily and began his walk back towards town.

He entered a small house on the fringes of the town and closed the door. He walked over to the hearth and after steadying his shaky hands managed to light a fire. Slowly he pealed off his wet cloths and hung them up around the fire.

"Jirougo, is that you?" An older woman walked into the room with a cane.

"Yes Grandma." He replied sitting himself near the fire trying to warm up.

"Where have you been? I've been worried sick!" She said, "I made your dinner hours ago, and you never came home. I've been waiting up for you all night! What happened? Why are your close all wet?"

"I… well…" Jirougo looked over at his wet cloths drying by the fire place. "I had a bit of an accident." He began to enlighten his grandmother on the escapades of that evening. After the story he shut his eyes waiting to see if he was in trouble or not.

"You… are more like your father than your mother could have ever guessed you would be." She said, "You should be careful who you help in this town. Noble as your intentions were, it could still be taken the wrong way… Who was it?"

"I don't know, but she was really pretty, and had long black hair." Jirougo said. "Her eyes were shut…so I didn't see her eye color. She was wearing a red priestess robe..."

Jirougo's grandmother frowned, "training at the temple, the only one with long black hair training there is… damn. She's Masubei's daughter, this isn't going to be pretty."

Jirougo looked up at his grandmother with a scared look on his face, "but what should I do?" he asked panicked.

She smiled warmly placing a shaking hand on his shoulder, "don't you worry about it; I'll talk to him." Her eyes drifted over to his clothing, "I'll wash those before I got to bed, let me just fetch your supper for you."

Jirougo's grandmother left the room and brought him back some of the tofu and vegetables that she had cooked up for his dinner, but when she came back he was fast asleep. She smiled at the boy sleeping on the floor. "Did you know," she whispered as she got a blanket and covered him up. "That your mother met your father when he saved her from that same river."

The young boy shifted in his sleep getting comfortable on the floor. He pulled the blanket subconsciously up to his face. Gathering hid dirty cloths from where they were hanging his grandmother closed her eyes and walked slowly towards the hallway that led to her room. She might have moved him had she not had such bad leg problems. She stopped turning to look at her grandson again, "Good night Jirougo."

The next morning when Jirougo woke up his grandmother wasn't home. He looked outside and the sun was already high in the sky, he figured he must have slept the morning away as usual. If there was one thing that Jirougo wasn't it was a morning person. For an eleven year old boy, he slept more like a teenager, always past noon if his grandma didn't wake him up to do his chores. He crawled stood up and groggily began to dress himself.

Jirougo went over to the table nearby and kneeled down to eat the breakfast his grandmother left on the table. He picked up his chopsticks and began eating the rice on the table. "Mmmm… good…." He muttered.

After several more bites of food Jirougo rose from the table, cleaned his dishes and set forth to do his other daily chores. After sweeping all the dust back outside he grabbed two buckets and began his walk to the center of town to the well. It wasn't a very long walk and Jirougo's tolerance for the stares and whispers had grown substantially over the years. He didn't mind it at all now. But as he walked around he looked at the people he pasted, they weren't looking at him like he had the plague. That made young Jirougo very nervous; he quickened his pace and hurried towards the well.

When he got there he hurried back home with the water as fast as he could. Once he was inside he slid the door shut behind him and went into the back yard to fill up their smaller personal well which had run almost dry. That was scary… what happened with them? He looked down into the well, it still wasn't full enough; he'd have to go back. Could he wait on it? His grandmother wouldn't understand if his chores weren't done when she got home; and especially when he had a kendo lesson that evening at the village Dojo. She'd probably say something like, 'the people in town always give you looks, you should be used to it by now…' or 'you need to face your destiny, even if it's a hard road, you can't run from it. Now go back out there and get the water…' Jirougo shuddered to think about it. He had the town's disapproval; he didn't want the only person in town who cared about him to disapprove of him too.

Begrudgingly he gathered up the buckets and walked back to the well again. It was just his luck that he lived in one of the houses that lacked a channel system from the river. Once he and his grandmother saved a little more money she promised they would hire some one to help Jirougo build one. The people who were whispering stopped and stared at him again when he approached the well. He tried to not pay attention to them as he filled up the buckets but a smaller child came up to him while he was doing so.

"Is it true?" The small boy asked wide eyed.

Jirougo looked at the five year old. "Is what true? Do you want to know if I'm a demon?" He asked impatiently.

"No sir!" The child squeaked, "I, I just wanted to know if it was true that you, you saved Miss. Ritsuko!"

Jirougo stared at the boy, was that why the people in town weren't giving him the look of death as he walked by? "Um… yeah." He said at length.

"WOW! You are so COOL!" The child squealed with delight before bouncing off to another group of kids near by telling them that it was true.

"Uh… thanks?" Jirougo said quietly. He shook his head and finished filling up the buckets. Lifting them up on to his shoulders with a stick he started his walk back home. On his way back he was very uneasy, this is going to be very bad… He thought. The little kids might think he's cool, but the older kids and the adults in town aren't going to be very please with the idea of Rajura Kuroda's son being called a hero.

Author's note: In the original YST character description (Dais) Rajura's human name is Jirougorou Kuroda. In my story I shortened Jirougorou to Jirougo so that I would be able to actually say the name, and since it's written in English I thought it would also make it easier for you the readers to be able to say it and memorize it as well. I hope that you enjoyed the first chapter of Curse of the Arachnid!