Thy Father's Sins

Chapter 1. Boy in Kamakura

Tsuzuki Asato barely had time to put the allowance in his pocket before he found himself landing headfirst in the middle of a park found in Kamakura City—street, unknown. None of the people raised their heads to watch him, since none of them can see him. However, a few dogs and cats did raise their heads and bared their fangs at him; birds from nearby trees also began to squawk loudly. Animals, he surmised as he plucked some dry grass from his black coat, always had a strong sense for the paranormal.

Wrinkling his nose, he looked around and tried to place himself. "Kurosaki estate, Kurosaki," he muttered, frowning as he made himself visible to the people. He checked his pocket again to see if anything was missing, then his bag which contained a laptop—just in case. Tatsumi Seiichiro, the tightfisted cheapskate secretary (at least, Tsuzuki labeled him thus for now) had warned him that he would only get 50 thousand yen for this journey. Tsuzuki had protested; Watari Yutaka, Tsuzuki's best friend, had joined, but Tatsumi was adamant.

"50 thousand yen and that's it," he had snapped. They had shut up.

Konoe-kachou had cleared his throat. "Well, then. Let us then proceed to the briefing." He had raised an eyebrow at Watari, who had received a case earlier and left them grumbling.

Tsuzuki had a very bad feeling about this case. There had been signs.

For one thing, he had awoken from a "very bad dream". "Dreams" were okay, so were "bad dreams". But this was actually a "very bad dream", something that he did not get every night and also something he thought he had finally overcome. He thought wrong. Unfortunately, he was unable to recall what it was, except that it involved flames and loneliness.

Dreams about loneliness never really led to something good.

The other sign was that when he went to his usual café for breakfast, they told him they had run out of apple pie. He had begged. He had pleaded. They told him to come back for lunch. He asked: "Who on earth would buy apple pie for breakfast?" They told him: "You." He asked: "Who else?" They answered: "The other people who bought it before you." He left in a huff, promising himself that he will never go back there again. He knew he would break his promise. He would return for lunch.

The final sign was Terazuma Hajime, one of his co-workers. Seeing Terazuma was always a bad omen.

Sighing, Tsuzuki resolved to solve this case as quickly as possible.

"Excuse me," he asked an old man passing by him, "do you know how I can get to this village?" He pointed to the map in his hand.

The man squinted down at his map, adjusting his eyeglasses. "Yeah."

Tsuzuki waited before finally venturing, "Can you tell me?"

"Why would you want to go there?" the old man asked, not looking up.

Tsuzuki tried not to sigh. "I'm visiting a relative."

"Have relatives down there, too," the old man confided.

Tsuzuki gave him a weak smile. "What a coincidence." He felt very tired. "Should I take a local ride?"

"Here, give me your pen." Tsuzuki obliged and handed over the map, which the old man studied before marking some points over specific places. After scribbling on the paper, he handed it back to Tsuzuki. "Follow where I indicated, you'll be there in no time."

Tsuzuki frowned at the hardly legible writing. "Thank you—" He looked up and blinked; the person had disappeared into the crowd. "—sir."

He tried to look for the old man but he was gone, so he stuffed the map into his pocket and made his way to the nearest station.

===

Tsuzuki knew he should not have complained about not getting a bonus.

The area was not even his. He was assigned to Kyushu, a place that hardly required special investigations; another pair of shinigamis were supposed to handle the Kantou area, which many say is rumored to be one of the most active areas filled with unnatural mystical events. No one even blinked when they got a faxed request to investigate an abnormal spiritual possession as well as search for a missing soul.

Except the shinigamis assigned for Kantou were handling a different case elsewhere.

Tsuzuki, who had just entered the office area (and barely restricted himself from having a fight with Terazuma), was immediately called by Tatsumi to Chief Konoe's office.

"This is your chance to earn your winter bonus, Tsuzuki-san," Chief announced.

Tsuzuki was immediately bouncing towards him. "Really?" he crowed. "Can I pay my debts through this bonus?"

"It can pay one-eighth," Chief told him, to which Tsuzuki wilted but a quick calculation told him that it was better than nothing, so he forced himself to give them an undeterred smile.

"Here." Tatsumi Seiichiro, Chief Konoe's secretary, gave him a case folder.

Tsuzuki opened it and his ecstatic expression was immediately wiped out to be replaced by that of concentration. "This is…unusual."

"Yes." Konoe coughed.

Tsuzuki looked up, his eyes narrow. "It's not in my area."

"The two assigned there have not yet returned from their recent case," Konoe said patiently.

"What's the catch?"

"Your bonus," Chief Konoe said with his smile widening.

Tsuzuki hurriedly returned to reading the file.

There were two: first was a request for an investigation on unnatural spiritual buildup of a particular woman named Kurosaki Rui. Hakushaku-sama had reported that the candle of the woman still was still lit, but the flame was cold and faint, as if the will to live had already disappeared. With that, Tsuzuki was ordered to investigate the reason for her sudden unnatural spiritual power before retrieving her soul and escorting her to Meifu for judgment.

The second was that there was also a pile-up of stray souls in that area, something that the heads of EnmaCho have missed because the souls did not come from Kamakura themselves, but were from other parts of Japan. As Tsuzuki read on, he became more and more disturbed. The pile-up apparently began at least three years ago, although with the record backlog it was very possible that the event had begun earlier. Some souls have already been escorted to Meifu but they wanted to be sure that some were not still stuck in the area. Tsuzuki would be retrieving those souls as well.

There was nothing that remotely connected these two cases, but it wouldn't be too much of a coincidence if both the soul pile-up and the unusual spiritual possession were actually linked. At the same time, he would be investigating both cases in that area personally.

"Hold on, wait a sec!" he burst out after reading the second page. "For one thing, retrieval of one soul is one thing, the retrieval of stray souls is another, and investigation of spiritual buildups is a whole other thing!" He counted. "So that's not two things for me to do, that's three!"

"We appreciate your ability to point out the bureau's inability to count, Tsuzuki-san," Tatsumi told him wryly.

"Do you honestly expect me to handle this by myself?" He clutched the file in his arms and looked pleadingly at the two heads of his department.

Chief Konoe coughed slightly. "Well, not really." He hesitated. "We are, however, a little understaffed. Your partner will be along but you will have to go ahead and do a preliminary investigation. God knows you'll be able to handle at least that." The last sentence was said under his breath, but Tsuzuki managed to hear it anyway.

"I don't want to go to the middle of nowhere with no one to talk to," Tsuzuki wailed, giving them his teary-eyed look that never seemed to fail. "It's not even my area and the case is just too haaaard. And there are three, not two!"

However, Konoe and Tatsumi seemed grimly serious that time and were not affected. "Do you want your bonus or not?" Konoe growled.

Tsuzuki sniffed. "Do I at least get a million yen for expenditure?"

"Tsuzuki-san!" Tatsumi exclaimed in exasperation.

===

And that was how Tsuzuki found himself trudging along this dusty path leading to the province somewhere at the very outskirts of Kamakura. He had tried to beg once more for more than 50 thousand but it had only resulted to shouting and unnecessary chaos.

Still, Konoe had given Tsuzuki an extra thousand yen for some souvenirs. Tsuzuki patted his pocket to make sure that they were still there, then gave himself a self-satisfied grin when he found that it was still safe.

He entered the village soon after getting off the bus. It left him by the roadside, conjuring dust that covered the darkening sky and made Tsuzuki temporarily blind. When he was finally able to blink, he saw that the bus was already a small speck on the road, and that the only trail from the station was a path that seemed unused. Here, he sighed and began his journey.

He had been walking steadily for around half an hour when he found himself before an entrance to a village whose name was announced by a washed-out sign hanging by a post, a half-attempt to get inform people about the town they would be entering. Looking around, he was surprised at what he saw. The houses were traditionally built, many of them still made of wood and paper. Some were also built by bricks but they looked corroded and abandoned. People glanced at him briefly before letting their attentions wander into something more important. Most of them still wore kimonos and Tsuzuki blinked to find an old woman sitting by the entrance of her house, fanning herself.

It felt like stepping into a time warp.

"Creepy," he murmured to himself. Suddenly, every step felt like he was being watched and judged. Something heavy tugged at his insides, only to be released again. He felt awkward walking through this people while wearing his very modern coat and tie, but as much as he wished to become invisible, he had a feeling that these people would continue to see him.

The weight, he thought to himself grimly, was the realization that there was the big possibility that everyone in the village had high supernatural powers.

He stuffed his gloved hands in his pockets and forced himself to calm down. Keeping his eye on the old woman, he went towards her and asked, "May I know the direction to the Kurosaki estate?"

The woman looked up at him slowly, as if she was trying hard to see his face. "All paths in this village," she announced in a matter-of-fact voice, "lead to the Kurosaki estate."

"Er." Tsuzuki wished he was back at home practicing his cooking. "Thank you." Is it just me or is everyone being weird? he thought, a little spooked. No one was giving him a direct answer to his simple questions. With that, he gave a barely audible thanks to the woman and continued on his way.

Because he was occupied with his thoughts, Tsuzuki did not realize that he had somehow led himself to the direction of a large cemented wall. He finally came to his senses when his he looked up just in time for the immovable object to collide with his nose. "OWCH!" he yelled. His hands flew to his face to check if there was blood. "Dam—oh." Blinking, he looked up and gasped.

Stretched before him was a wooden gate carved with an ornamental design of dragons, something that he remembered only rich aristocratic and traditional families had. At the side was a plate embossed with two characters that read: "Kurosaki."

He mentally gave himself a cheer and a small scolding. Surely it won't be that bad, he thought to himself. If he got one job done, he'll probably be able to solve the other. That Kurosaki Rui woman was the key, he just knew it. And besides, it wasn't like he was going to do this alone. Konoe and Tatsumi have promised him a partner. None of his old partners had stayed long with him, but he was willing to bet that they'll at least find someone he'll be able to get along with 24/7, especially with a top-priority case such as this.

He just needed a cover.

"Damn!" he muttered to himself. He had forgotten that should be conjuring a scenario that will give him an excuse for staying in this little town that obviously did not receive as much visitors as the main city got. Attempting to investigate while in spiritual form was out of the question, especially with what he figured out earlier. Even if he was wrong, he could not risk that chance.

With a sigh, Tsuzuki sank into the soft grass and let his back rest into the door. "After all that trouble," he sighed, closing his eyes, "should I go back to Meifu after all?"

Suddenly, an image of sakura and moonlight strayed in his mind and he frowned. "The cherry blossoms might be unparalleled back there right now," he said aloud, and wondered where this sudden wistfulness came from.

"Will it?"

Tsuzuki opened his eyes and saw a boy dressed in simple kimono standing near him, his shadow falling over the sitting man. He gave the boy a smile. "Where I come from," he told him, "the sakura trees are always beautiful."

The boy frowned at this statement. "I wonder if it will still beautiful while at nighttime?" he murmured to himself.

Tsuzuki grinned. It seemed like a question that was not expecting an answer but he was tired and a little irritated so he would answer it anyway. "Sakura trees blooming at night is said to be one of the most wondrous images."

"I have yet to encounter a sakura tree bathed in moonlight that is beautiful enough to move me," the boy retorted.

The older man could not help but laugh. "Then come with me and I'll show it to you," he said softly.

There was a tense silence between them where Tsuzuki finally realized exactly what he had said and froze while the boy looked positively murderous. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Tsuzuki apologized, quickly standing and dusting the seat of his trousers. "I didn't mean to be overly familiar."

The anger disappeared from the boy's face and was replaced with indifference. "It is alright," he responded smoothly, but Tsuzuki did not hear this since he finally realized what color the boy's eyes were.

They were green, a rich hue of green that reminded him not of clean fresh grass, but of the steady yet enigmatic ocean that holds too much murkiness and mystery at the same time. The hair that fell over his neck and forehead, piled in a disorganized array over his head, seemed yellowish under the sun, but Tsuzuki knew it was brown or something really lighter than black. The boy's skin was pale, too pale, and Tsuzuki found himself almost reaching out to make sure that it was real before he blinked and realized that the boy was still staring at him.

"I'm Tsuzuki Asato," he announced politely. "I'm here visiting."

"Visiting," the boy repeated, another frown settling on his face. "I can hardly believe that."

The edge of Tsuzuki's mouth twitched. What is with this guy?! He growled to himself, then felt a little embarrassed so he shrugged and said, still politely, "It's an interesting place."

"Indeed," the boy replied, raising en eyebrow.

Tsuzuki clenched his hands and was finally about to make a scathing remark when someone called out from somewhere behind him: "Sensei!"

"Sensei?" Tsuzuki repeated, turning around and missing the boy's appalled expression.

A woman rushed over to Tsuzuki, carrying a basket full of vegetables. She was also dressed in a kimono, with her shoulder-length hair tied over her head. Tsuzuki gave her a second to stop and catch her breath before he took a good look at her. Freckles dotted both sides of her cheeks and she was almost as pale as the boy beside him. "Sensei," she panted, "I did not know…forgive me, I was not able to inform the master."

"Sensei…I see," the boy murmured. "Then you are the doctor whom we have been waiting for?"

"Ah, yes, I suppose I am…?" Tsuzuki laughed and scratched his head, trying hard not sweatdrop. But I don't know a thing about first aid! he thought to himself a little frantically. Watari, help me!

The girl gripped his arm and bowed to the boy. "Forgive me, I was supposed to await his arrival today, but I was tasked to buy—"

"It is understandable," the boy interrupted.

Tsuzuki watched the exchange curiously. "Huh?"

"Ah!" The girl turned to Tsuzuki, seemingly confused. "I had assumed that you have already met our master—"

Master? Tsuzuki turned to the boy.

"—the head of this esteemed house—"

Head? Tsuzuki's mind was in a whirl as the boy gave him a cordial nod.

"That is enough, Miya-san," he interrupted the flustered girl before turning to Tsuzuki. "Welcome to our house, Tsuzuki-sensei. I am the head of this house, the heir of this estate. Kurosaki Hisoka."

===

A pair of eyes was always staring at her from the shadows. They had been there for a long time, always waiting, always judging, but no one believed her. No one believed her much, even if she told the truth about seeing people from the past—or that the person who always came in the room was a monster.

The truth deserved no forgiveness, and her truth was her sins. She had always known that the descendants of darkness would always seek the light but would never find it. She had always known, from the very beginning, that she was doomed.

Still, she was afraid of shadows, so she huddled near the lamp wherein a single candle flickered.

"No forgiveness for my sins," she murmured, voicing her thoughts. "No pity for love."

In the darkness, the unblinking eyes continued to watch.

-end chapter 1-

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Notes:
- ¥ 1,000,000 = $ 9,000 roughly
- ¥ 50,000 = $ 450 roughly which, I think, is not enough for one whole week
- I figured that Kantou might also be a busy area because it's includes Tokyo (which has its own set of shinigami) so there might be cases that stray to there. Weird figuring.

Bonus if you guess who Tsuzuki's partner is going to be. Hint: he's in the manga, he's a shinigami, and he only appeared in one chapter! ' Please C&C, since I need to know how it turned out.

Coming up next!

Preview:
"It isn't your father's child, isn't it?" Tsuzuki asked gently.