This is the last chapter of the prelog, just the mc's background to the main story.
I had been wandering endlessly for days now, following the footsteps of that blasted monk. I could see his prints in the ashes outside the castle. Despite Dashi leaving 2 months ago. Since it never rained, and the thick walls of bones and corpses blocked any wind. It was only too easy to follow his trail for a short while.
I could track him only so far unfortunately. As soon as I left the hollowed countryside, where my fathers grasp was at its peak. I came too a farming countryside. People, extremely poor, had surprisingly made some kind of modest life there. The hills had been dug into trenches to allow a flooded stream of water to pass through, in between farming fields.
The sweet colour of spring came to mind, when did this happen? The blistering sun my father had created loomed an extreme heat over the lands, burning away any sort of vegetation. I was flabbergasted at the sight. Lush green, sweet periwinkle of flowers starting to bloom. Trees had budded with tiny florets of encapsulated baby leafs.
"How?" I gasped breathlessly. I descended down the small lush hill, it was rather muddy from a fresh rain. I could smell the earth, rich and heavy as I settled down. At the sum, a grey gravelled path cut through the swells of watered patches. I squatted down to feel the small smooth rocks beneath. I smelt the air again, I didn't recognize the scent of Dashi. I was losing his trail it seemed.
But I didn't feel frustrated surprisingly. The smell of flowers filled my breaths, this feeling. It was peaceful? I shook my head, stop thinking like this. I have to find that monk. My father is waiting...
My father.
I had been using this chase as a way to distract myself. Trying desperately not to think about the future I was shown. I had been trying to convince myself that it was a made up reality that monk had used in a way to fool me. A way to try and force me to betray my father. I will find him and I will sever his head from his neck. It does not matter what my father wants from this witch. It is my job, no. It is my duty to serve him.
I'm all that's left anyways.
The stones kicked under my foot as I walked along the path. This country side would soon burn once I sent my report to my father, there is no way he would allow such, beauty? No, such life to be near him.
My thoughts turned in my belly, why was I thinking so much? I should just quiet down, and follow his orders. Find the monk. That's all that matters
I wandered for a short while, keeping my head forward, I bypassed people, they were noticeably quiet. They didn't speak to me, I could feel their heart rates booming through the earth. Surly uncertain of me. I had a tendency to leave the people I passed uneasy. Without my star, I saw no point to ask it weather I should kill people or not. Without it, it's now just easier to keep walking.
Maybe I should ask people, if they have seen this monk? No, that's pointless. How would I even ask? It's just easier to keep walking, I have tracked people for my father before. This is just the same.
I followed the path, and could see a small village beneath the summit of the rolling green hills. I had been here years ago. The once dried savage streets, seemed a bit brighter, roofs of homes had been repaired. Heavy stones placed on top to stop the roofs from blowing away. Windows no longer broken, but with bamboo blinds hanging in front. I could hear the subtle chatter of townsfolk, the laugh of a child, and the songs of white wagtails.
I closed my eyes, and breathed in through my nose. Like the smell of freshly baked bread, I locked my senses on a familiar scent. That monk. I wasn't one hundred percent certain. But a lead is a lead. Making haste down the path, I entered the small village. No one seemed to really notice me. It's true it had been a long time since I passed through here. People had just sat on the ground slouched over with famine back then. It was grey and weary, the air had a foul sour smell.
Now people are laughing? I can hear the sounds of a gentle fire, people are cooking. The aroma of lavender and other simple flowers. I let out a gentle sigh. Truth be told, i've never seen such a thing. No I had. But I didn't take it in then, this is the first time since I was standing under the blooming sakura tree, that I had noticed the flourishing life around me.
Its like life has returned to this village. Just as I watched in non understanding awe. The flapping wings caught my eye. Like watching in slow motion, its wings beat as it flew in front of me. The batting wings of a sparrow.
I launched forward chasing it. Im sure of it! This was Dashi's sparrow from that day. Its black eyes glistened with the afternoon sun. It gracefully wavered in between the alleyways of wooden homes.
With pace I followed it, one hand on the hilt of my katana, ready for anything.
Suddenly the bird swooped upwards in a graceful arch. With power in my legs I leaped up on top of the roof. I let out a slight pant, I turned to see the tiny sparrow perched on the side arch of the roof to the farthest edge.
It tweeted, and cleaned its feathers. Hopping back and forth in a simple kindred manner. I swallowed, taking a creaking step on the roof over to it. I expected it to fly away, but it didn't. It just chirped and chirped, carefree, just like that monk. I was right before it, its brown crest rather precious upon inspection.
I crouched down in front of it, it still not flying away. I looked into its tiny black button eyes, the sun reflecting sweetly in them.
My attention snapped, I turned around sharply hand gripping at my katana. The sleeves of my kimono whipping around startling the small sparrow. His sent allerted me first. For it to take the time to waft up to me, he must have been there longer than I had noticed.
Dashi.
He was standing there, his finger up and poised, as the small sparrow fell on it like a perch.
"Well, well, well. Look who's here." He enthused. He was standing tall, one arm behind his back. His chest up and poised in posture. He was wearing a white bathrobe, the squares of his broad chest poking out the folds of the robes. Bare foot, and unarmed.
I gripped the hilt tight, it wheezed from the friction. I grit my teeth and dragged my back foot against the roof. Ready in position to pounce and dig my fangs into his neck.
"Wow, easy tiger!" he laughed a bit. Taking a small playful step back, his eyes closed in a cheerful manner.
I exhaled, hot hair escaping my lungs creating an instant mirage like haze outside my lips.
"My father has demanded your head." I gritted out.
"Well I need my head you see, so I don't think you can have it." He laughed again, before slipping out of sight. He must have moved faster than my eyes could process. Where did he run too? The sent, to the left. I launched as fast as my feet could take me, the roof below me exploding in a splintering hurl where my feet once stood.
I bounced from roof to roof, following his trail with decisive haste. He was close, I poured the chi to my leg, launching myself forward with vigorous intensity, slamming the back of my katanas hilt into the center of his spine. He fell and landing roughly on the dirt path below. He rolled over and groaned. His once white robe now dirty and muddy.
I unsheathed my blade. Its dark red metal glistening in the sun's blaze. The air around began to wave with the heat it expelled. The blade was a channel, a way to focus my powers of the fire dragon into one centered point.
"This is the end, Dashi." I taunted darkly, the sun at its highest peak in the sky, beating down making my vision obscure in the intense light.
"I didn't expect you to come after me to be honest. I figured the next time we met it would go a little differently." He said getting onto all fours, head facing the earth. His skull pointing at me, begging me to behead him, my palm quacking a bit. With him gone, I can go back to the way I was.
He chuckled, before bouncing backwards, quickly I lep to action, launching ahead, blade drawn in both hands readying for an arched strike.
But, just as I lept, he leaned back, I watched him reach into his sleeve, and pull out a small orb.
Another Shen Gon Wu? I quickly halted my step to reposition. But it was too late.
"Spear of Yun!" He cried out.
I was instantly imprisoned in a small clear orb. Violently I smashed my fist on the glass. I screamed out in frustration. Slamming my katana on the orb, over and over, and over again.
It didn't budge, or crack. I began to pant. Was I tired? Already? How, what is this thing?
I fell to a knee, huffing out in disbelief. What in the world is this thing? I flung my body into the side of it. It didn't budge or roll.
"You can't get out of this, as long as you're stuck in here, you're powerless." Dashi almost mockingly told me.
"Let, me out!" I snarled like a wolf, again slamming myself into the wall of the sphere.
"Nope you and I are gonna talk, without violence." he laughed rolling me away.
Looking rather unpolished after running like a rat on a wheel. I huffed out fixing my kimonos waist line..
"so here we are its seems." Dashi said pouring himself some tea. He had relocated us to a small bamboo hut outside the skirt of the village. It was plain and modest, a wheat stack for a roof, a small trail of stepping stones outside.
Sitting in the grass, he took a sip of his hot drink. He sighed out in pleasure.
"Im happy you found me, I was worried the next time we would meet would be less fortunate. But you did it!" He chuckled softly, as birds began to gather. Surrounding him like he was some sort of fairy tail princess.
He let a moment of silence pass, I was fuming in a mildly defeated lull.
"So," He began making snapping my eyes at him. "Are you here to accept the offer I made?" He asked, with a bird perched on his shoulder.
"I am here to kill you." I said menacingly.
"Tsk Tsk." he hushed. "Than i'm never letting you out of that birdcage, and then how will we stop your father's rein?"
My eyes bugged out, i tilted my head to the side slightly. I have never heard such nonsense, did he not hear me? I am here to kill him.
"You think i'll fall prey to false prophecies? By some sort of magic trinket? Then you're sorely mistaken!" I hissed at him.
"Oh you mean the crystal glasses? That was no parlor trick. It shows the future. Your Future." He put it matter of factly. I tucked in defiance.
"Its true, I believe your father is trying to plunge this whole country into an eternal darkness. Ash's filling the sky so no sun peaks through. Sapping the life from the earth and its people."
I do not care. If that is my father's will then so be it.
"But I think he's getting weaker." Dashi stated, I tilted my face to look at him. I could feel my eyebrows sag down.
"His magic on this land is already weakening."
"So this wasn't you're doing?" I asked, my tone a light hush. Dashi's eyes seemed to narrow in on my slight distress.
"No, this isn't from me." He stated. Turning his back to me, his hands behind him. He tilted his bald head up to the sky.
"I know somewhere in that mind of yours, you are enjoying the spring. I can see it already." He turned a bit, looking towards the small village. My heart began to pound uncomfortably in my chest. So loud my ears started to throb.
"When I first met you, say what two months ago? You had this forlornness and desolated look in your eyes. Like light refused to reflect in them. Your skin was sickly pale, but now look at you." He poked at me with his words.
He then turned back around, a small twinkle in his eyes.
"Maybe it isn't the life of spring returning to this land, but life returning to you." His words strong, so strong my heart began to well up.
Me? How could I have done this? Nothings changed in me, i'm the same. Then to my almost horror he reached into his sleave of endless tricks, pulling out the Star Hanabi. I let out an audible gasp at the sight of it. Glowing like a morning star in the sunlight.
"Did you have to ask it to come here?"
"Foolish question, I am simply following my father's orders." I hissed out at him. My palms slick with sweat. The sight of the star alone made me remember every time I needed to flip it. Eat or do not eat. Kill or walk away. A shadow of who I was.
"I don't think that's true." He said. His brows lowered in focus. "You've already began to change, hesitating before a strike. Stopping to notice the flowers, admiring the pecking of a small bird."
I swallowed, I was gripping my fists so tightly the skin began to break and bleed. Had he been watching me this whole time?
"I'm gonna leave you in here for a day or two. Let you come to your senses a bit." He chuckled, my eyes popping forward as my upper lip snarled.
"Within the Sphere of Yun, you are powerless. Like a newborn baby, but don't worry. You can't die in here. It's like being in staysis. All the nasty haylin energy flowing through you will be sucked out. Then maybe you can hear me out a little better." He almost sung at me.
He took a firm step up to the glass, pressing his index finger, making his skinwirls present against it.
"I know there is good, in that little heart of yours." He grinned, a twink in those dark brown eyes.
I stood silent, almost horrified. My father, what would my father think if he saw this? He would certainly kill me. Wait, he's already going to-
No, I shook my head, turning away from Dashi, my eyes tried to prickle with morning due, but I forced any weakness back inside. This was horribly frustrating.
He's just trying to get in your head! There has to be a way out of this stupid ball, i'll find it, and kill him. And make my father happy.
Dashi had walked inside his hut, whistling an unknown tune to himself. And allowed me to sit, alone in the sphere. He was gone for a short while. Annoyed I inspected the sphere more, there must certainly be a weak point somewhere in here.
I unsheathed Enbo no Hono, with a long slick drag. The walls encasing it to the tip. I took a stance, as far as the dome would let me. Inhale, and exhale. I pierced my blade into the wall. I then reaped what I soed, as thousands of tiny like needles felt like pricks on my skin as the vibration pulsed through my entire body.
I couldn't use my fire element within here, nor pull from my strength. I had never felt so, so... aggravated. It's so unlike me to lose my cool like this. Why does it feel like the more I am around this blasted monk the weaker I become?
The sound of the door drape being swiped open shot me up to my legs. A small sweat dripped from my brow as he walked back over to me. He had gotten changed, into a full black button up top, with large white cuffed collars, along with sleek black running pants.
"Let me out!" I fumed with a grit of my teeth.
"Nope, i'll be back later, hang tight." And with that he walked into town. Angry I banged my fists on the glass to no avail.
Time passed slowly as I still tried to escape. But it was all pointless in the end. I still didn't give up. I figured i'd just humor this man, and once I gained his trust he would let me out. Then I would strike. Killing him swiftly, while there is still time to please my waiting father.
So I sat, and began to meditate. I would grab hold of myself, and come to clerity. My eyes fluttered closed, and I breathed in tandem with the world around me. I was quiet, only listening. The gentle sound of a river could be heard, mixed with the sound of birds singing. Peaceful, with an almost kindred heart I could only float into the gentle mewls of the new spring around me.
I drifted away. The green ideal of the calm world around me began to darken. The earth cracked and splintered as black smoke geysers burst through the tattered earth with vigor.
The sky became a black murkiness that blistered out any hope of stars.
It was that dream, I had drifted back to it. I turned, as if the word was moving in slow motion again.
There I was, walking towards myself. My hair long and floating in the wind with crowned glory. My eyes a crimson red, the fire within me blooming proudly. I was wearing a kimono I had never seen, the chest hung open flirtatiously, the sleeve were so long it fated to touch the ground below. Held together by an obi and ribbon. My breasts covered with a black hultered robe.
In my ear, tucking my long bangs, a single cherry blossom flower.
Was this me? My gut said it was, but inspecting myself for the first time, I felt foreign. Almost, I even had the small mole under my lip. It was unsettling to look at myself I this distorted mirror of a cursed fate.
Knowing what's coming next. And with that thought I felt his breath on the back off my neck. The earth started to fall into some sort of black hole sucking me down, I danced on top of an endless nebula. The vacuumed crater swelling deeply. I looked up at myself, i was staring at my father. Knowing what would happen next.
Reaching up to myself in a panic, as if trying to pull myself out.
"Run!" I cried out in a sad desperation. Knowing I couldn't hear myself.
I awoke, in a dull shock. I panted faintly, my stomach in deep knots. I exhaled with a ragged breath.
"You alright in there?" His calm voice shocking me, I looked up almost panicked to see who it could only be.
Dashi stood up in front of the glass, the sunset behind him.
"I?" I breathed, tears streaming out of my eyes at my own powerlessness. I hate that dream, somehow Dashi had poisoned my mind with his stupid fake visions.
"that's odd, I didn't think you could cry." He put it bluntly, I sniffled in humiliation. Taking my sleeve to wipe away the shameful tears.
"Why don't we talk? You seem a little more tender than before." He said with a smile. I turned away shamefully. "You just listen then." my eyes cut back at him.
"I came here to stop your father, i'm from far away if you cant tell. I sailed the great sea to come here. Even so far off your father's terror has become legend. I suspect he is working with the evil witch Wuya for some sort of plan."
"You don't know?" I cut him off.
"Know what?" Dashi engaged.
"That stupid dream you've plagued me with, did you not even watch it or are you playing dumb?" I scoffed a bit, my eyelashes annoyingly damp still.
"If you're referring to the crystal glasses, they don't show a future I picked out, they show your future." I got up to look at him.
"It's just about you, I have no idea what it showed you. I just assumed it was terrible, judging by the look on your face." He jeered. My face fell flat, was this a lie? I couldn't tell inside this stupid sphere.
"When, when you use them. What do you see?" I asked with a gentle tone. My eyebrows crossed in subtle confusion.
"The end of the goddamn world, A black dragon rising into the sky, sending a black cloud over all the lands, choking out the sun, and extinguishing all life in a deadly ash." He relayed matter of factually.
I looked down in disbelief.
"You don't see him.." I began, Dashi cokcing a brow at me curiously.
"Do you know what he's planning?" I looked up at him, my chest heavy. "What did your father meet with Wuya for?" His tone more direct.
"I." I bit my lip. "I could never, betray my father." I managed to choke out.
Dashi let out a disappointed tsk noise.
"Then simmer, i'll try again tomorrow." He started to walk away, I wanted to call out to him. A panicking feeling flooded me as that stupid damn in my heart started to pop, water rushing through the eroded cracks.
"He wants immortality." I blurted out.
Dashi stopped dead in his tracks, his back turned to me unsparingly. A moment passed, my throat felt dry, why did I tell him that?
"Do you know how he plans to do this?" Dashi said, not turning around to look at me.
I exhaled something that sounded like words. My mouth was so dry, it was suffocating.
"He, he as to." I choked a bit. Dashi turned around more, his eyes setting on me with palpable pitty.
"In the dream, that I relive every night." I begin to crumble. "I see myself. Not the me I am now, slightly older, almost prettier? Im wearing a bright red silky kimono, the sleeves are on fire. But the kimono does not burn. I'm standing on top of a crumbling world. My hair whips round violently in the haze. And then, before me is my father." I begin to sob. "He walks up to me, older as well, his entire being cracked with a deep age, almost sickly in a way. And then, he drives his fist into my ribcage, pulling my still beating heart out between my ribs. And he." I start to choke out never before talking about such a deep emotion. I didn't know how to handle them, justs speaking about it was tearing me from limb to limb. Slamming my eyes shot I scream.
"He eats me whole! Saying that the seal is complete! That he will live for Eternit-"
Im cut off, but a warm embrace. I'm in shell shock, unable to move. The sphere had fallen in a smooth shimmer of stars.
I was in a hug of gentle arms, tight but still with the space to breath. His strong arms confessed to me everything that I was. Despite the heaviness in my stomach, I melted like warm chocolate in his simple kind gesture.
I cried like I never had before. Never in my life. I learned from a young age that crying only got you beat into shards. Like a broke clock one day the dial just stopped ticking. I stopped crying, I stopped thinking. And now, just in less than half a year? I was whaling like a babe in a man's arms whom I barely know.
After that, Dashi took me inside his hut. I confessed the dream to him in greater detail. I had in such a pure childish way betrayed my father.
I told Dashi the flat truth. My father might not know that I am the key to his plan. That I assumed that Wuya will give him this information in exchange for Dashi's head.
Dashi became unsettled. I told him he should leave this country and never return. That I would deal with my father somehow.
But he refused. He said stopping my father was worth his life. It was frustrating. What is with this foolish monk? Was any of this truly worth dying for? Caught on my own words that mocked me back. Was any of this really worth living for.
I stared down at my lap, eyes heavy. Crying makes you tired, a different tired that I had ever felt.
Somehow, days passed, and him and I stayed together. He showed me things in my silent rather contempt defeat that I had never experience. The simple taste of hot local tea. The laugh of children playing with a tamari ball. Such oddities you think sometime in your life you had experienced, but I had never pinpointed in my own memories.
"Will you join me?" Dashi asked, the night was late and we sat by a small fire in the back of the hut. A sea of stars littered the sky in a sweet ebony rainbow. He was grilling two fish over a spitroast.
I had changed to local clothing, something more feminine that I cared for, my hair pulled back into a loose bun. The night was slightly chilly, even for myself.
"I don't know." I admitted.
"You're afraid of him aren't you. Your father?" He asked, weaving straw in a laced pattern, working on who knows what.
"Of course I am." I said flatly.
"Why?" he asked, the truth was simple.
"He's a monster."
When I was a child, too young to walk. My father's cruelty began. It started small, he would yell, get angry over things that were trivial to most. But after the war he came back a darkened man. The haylin side of his creeping in his soul like a parasyte. My mother's death the last blow on his morality and humanity. After that he just became a beast. My eldest brother was the first to die by his hands. My brother, cool and defiant. Stood against my fathers crushingly cruel ways. But he was no match the malice within his fangs. The power of the dragon soon ground my second brother to stone. The training was long and intense. We would would till out bones broke, then work on those shattered bones. Knuckles so destroyed we could barely feed ourselves. My brother drowned. During an especially cruel training session. We were thrown in the cold waters of the far northern mountains. The lake had frozen in a thin sheet of clean ice. There my father tied weights to out legs and dropped us from the sky.
I lived. My brother, not so lucky. I never mourned for them. If you asked I don't even remember their names. Things like that didn't matter back then, the only thing that matters was surviving. For god knows what reason.
"You're stronger than he is, you know that don't you?" Dashi stressed to me, I looked into the fire, its warm glow all over my body. "I'm not, i'm weak, I can't even outsmart a monk." I almost laughed bittersweetly.
"I'm a grandmaster, but, even though you're young. I know you're stronger than me. You just have to believe it. You can stop your father."
"I just wanna run away." My voice stangled as I spoke. My father would kill me on sight if I returned without Dashi, but i had already lost the will to continue this mission. It was for my own death was it not? How could I hold strong?
"But you are. I know it."
I couldn't agree then. After that I told Dashi I would never return home. Canceling this prophecy of my dreams. He curtly told me that was pointless. I don't know how I got to the future predictions to begin with. Running away may just be part of that path of fate, he put it bluntly.
I argued that wouldn't it go both ways, if I fought my father the same outcome could still happen.
But just Dashi laughed. Fiddling with what was now apparent to be a coned bamboo hat, that he had been working on.
"Would you rather die as a coward, or a hero?"
My mouth a-gape I didn't know how to answer, what he was asking me was beyond any thought i'd ever had. Not once have I even considered betraying my father. I never once thought of the future. To ask me of all people such a question. OF course I do not wish to die a coward, but i'm no hero.
"Rest on it, let's eat kid." he smiled warmly at me, handing a stick.
I never agreed to join Dashi, but for some reason I followed him. Together we joined the countryside, I stored my father away in my mind. Trying not to think about his anger fuming, that I had not returned with my trophy like kill.
Dashi and I trained together after that, he would laugh, saying I was like his apprentice. Our relationship grew closer too, he taught me forms of martial arts i'd never known. Together we traveled the countryside, undoing my fathers misdeeds. Dispelling his cursed magic from the lands. I had even killed my own brethren. Minions of my fathers. He had surely heard of my betrayal. My hands would clammer on my blade when i thought of the look in his windowless black eyes. But then just as I would tremble. A warm hand would touch my shoulder. Blooming a shocking life in me as i turned to look. It would always be Dashi, smiling down to me.
I don't understand why Dashi did this. I don't know if he forgave me sins, or judged me for having them. But because of him I was able to change.
I didn't want to admit it, but it felt like what I would have been like. If I had a real father.
Next chapter is in the future, we will start with the elements gang. Hang tight.