Age of Darkness

by Brandon Chen

  “Yeah,” Tobimaru said with a sigh. “Members of the Hayashi clan. Our families were both killed, and it somewhat disgusted me to see you thinking of these imposters as your parents.” He kicked Keimaro’s father over onto his stomach, raising his sword into the air. “It disgusts me to think that you ever had a connection to these people. These murderers who deprived our loved ones of their lives and us of our happiness!”

  “Shut the hell up,” Keimaro growled suddenly.

  “What was that?” Tobimaru raised an eyebrow, lowering his sword and giving Keimaro an irritated look.

  “I told you to shut the hell up!” Keimaro yelled, his eyes glowing bright red. His body was swaying lightly, feeling weak after such pain. Happiness? “Look, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Whatever my parents did in the past, I don’t care!” he snarled, turning around to face Tobimaru. In the end, these are the people that raised me. And I won’t forgive you for this. “I don’t care about any of your crap—or what you think is best for me! That was my mother! And you took her from me!”

  “She isn’t your—”

  “She is to me!” Keimaro screamed, rage sparking inside him. His chest felt extremely hot, as if he were literally on fire, but he ignored it. His mother was dead now—the woman he had grown up with. The one who had always been there to listen to his problems when he was down. She was gone! Forever! And the ones who took her from him were right before him. Was he going to be helpless and weak like he always was in the face of danger? Hell no. This is my chance to finally do something. I’m done being powerless!

  A burst of flame suddenly sparked from his chest, and he closed his eyes as he gasped, a growling fire surrounding his body to accentuate his rage and determination. His eyes widened with shock at the astounding amount of flames that had conjured from nothing and beckoned at his very call. They surrounded his body in a massive vortex of bright gleaming fire, howling into the night as the fire stretched toward the sky in a brilliant display.

  Junko’s eyes grew wide with the excitement of a little child as he clapped his hands with an outburst of laughter. “Oh my, oh my! Tobimaru, it seems that this young lad has gotten his hands on the meteor! You never told me that he beat you to it! And to have such an outburst of magic at once! This could only be the power of the Hayashi clan’s rage!”

  Keimaro locked his eyes onto Tobimaru now, confident with his new power. His wish had come true. Now he would be able to fight and destroy this bastard who took his mother from him. He didn’t care if the two of them weren’t related. His mother and father were his family and would stay that way, forever. All of the fear in his soul had been completely eradicated, and his mind was set on killing this man before him. He cared for nothing else.

  “You’re angry,” Tobimaru said, pulling back his hood to reveal that he had a similar hairstyle as Keimaro as well as the same colored eyes. They looked extremely similar except for the fact that Tobimaru looked significantly older and more mature than Keimaro. He stepped away from Keimaro’s father and began to circle the young boy calmly with his blade dragging across the ground, creating a small path behind him. “I remember when I used to look like you—filled with defiance and anger, wanting to destroy everything in my path. I had not a care for anything else in the world. I’m telling you now, you will fail. And if you don’t accept our offer to join the Bounts, then there truly will be no one to pick you up when you fall.”

  Keimaro leapt up into the air, the flames swirling around his body and soaring downward into the earth, creating a massive explosion that erupted outward. The fire buffered his strength, creating a large crater in the ground while swirling dust and smoke surrounded his body, drifting out of the destroyed area. The young boy slowly exhaled, trying to let out some of his anger. He rose back to a full standing position at a leisurely speed, trying to peer through the dust before him.

  “Not bad,” Tobimaru said, and Keimaro found that the man had appeared inches from his face in a mere millisecond. There was hardly any time to react, and Keimaro hadn’t even sensed the speed of this Bount despite his enhanced reactions. A fist was driven straight into his face, and a crack of pain burst through him as he was rocketed backward, flying off of his feet as he flipped through the air clumsily. He slammed into the ground and rolled a couple dozen meters before he finally stopped, his body feeling practically broken. The energy had been sapped from his body and the breath from his lungs. He closed his eyes as a cloud of dust breezed over his body.

  After a few seconds, his eyes cracked open as he fought to stay awake. Had he been so easily defeated already? A single punch had rendered him defenseless. As he watched Tobimaru standing before him, he heard a small cry and saw his younger sister, Mai, standing before him.

  He wanted to reach out, grasp her tiny hand, and tell her that it would be okay. He wanted to comfort his younger sister, who was sobbing at the sight of her family lying motionless on the ground. But instead of Keimaro holding her hand, it was Junko. The Bount stood there with a bright smile on his face as he nodded at Keimaro before turning and beginning to walk off. Keimaro stretched out his hand in the direction of his younger sister, trying to speak but unable to muster the strength.

  No … I can’t lose Mai, too. I can’t lose everything! Please … give her back!

  His eyes began to tear up once more as he tried to stretch outward for her. There was nothing he could do. He was powerless in the end. Always powerless.

  The Promise

  An endless darkness enclosed around Keimaro, trapping and grasping his very soul. Its tightening grip choked the life out of him, and soon he could hardly hear his own breath, only a choking sound that was made as his heart pounded in response to pure panic. Oh, how he dreaded the thought of death. His eyes were looking forward into the dark abyss that surrounded him, and he wondered what was grasping his throat. Then a pale, ghostly face came into view inches from his, and his eyes widened when he saw that it was his mother’s, coated in impure blood. Her eyes lacked pupils, and all that he could see was a blank stare, one that brought him dread and miserable pain.

  The young boy’s eyes snapped open, and he found himself lying with his back on the ground staring up at the dark night. The stars themselves gleamed as if there were hope, their lights flashing in the blackness that coated the sky. His breath was heavy, and he no longer felt as if he were choking. He winced at the pain that was inflicted upon his body; his ribs might have been cracked, and his cheek was bruised. He turned to see his father standing there before a burning fire.

  Keimaro could see that the fire was made from his mother’s deformed corpse, which was being broken down into ashes and drifting off into the wind, scattering amongst the earth. He could see tears brimming in his father’s eyes, gleaming salty tears that he had never witnessed before.

  But the boy had no more tears to spare. All he could do was whimper at the sight of the woman who had been there all of his life as she was cast off into the world, something that he had ironically wished he could do. His eyes lowered, and he pushed himself to his feet, ignoring the aching pain that dragged out in his body. By now, Tobimaru and Junko had probably escaped. Had that been Mai walking with them, or was that merely a figment of his imagination? No, it had been her. He recognized her cries. Aika had probably been taken away as well. Yata was probably dead. His mother was dead. The rest of the village had been burned to the ground and was probably being devoured by the forest’s creatures. Soon he would be next.

  He wiped his eyes with a tired swipe of his sleeve. He trudged over and stood by his father. In the end, everything he had known was gone in the blink of an eye. Now he had nothing except for his father. His resentment for his father had diminished and had only redirected itself at the Bounts. The sound of the fire popping and crackling was the only thing to break the dead silence before his father finally spoke.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” his father said, his eyes mesmerized by the soft flame before him as tears began to
dry on his cheeks. “You think that I wish you and your mother would switch spots. That she was the one to survive and that you were the one to die. Is that what you’re thinking?”

  Keimaro was silent. It was exactly what he had been thinking—and he didn’t mind the thought either. He now understood what Yata had felt when his mother was hanged. His mother hadn’t done anything wrong. In fact, she had been the most pure woman that he had ever known. Why had she been the one to be slaughtered? What gods that watched over them would allow such an atrocity to occur? He turned to the fire and allowed the blazing flame to reflect into his dark eyes.

  “I don’t. I don’t wish the two of you had switched. In fact, I’m glad that you’re still alive, son,” his father said, bowing his head with a shake as he chuckled weakly. “Everything I’ve done up to this point has been for your own good, to make you strong. In the end, the Bounts ended up coming and killing everyone. And now Faar will eventually be back to take complete control over this area. I’m glad it is you that survived because you will be the one to restore our honor.”

  “Honor?”

  “You will avenge your mother and save your sister.”

  Keimaro looked at his father with shaking eyes, and his heart pounded. Revenge? Was that what he wanted? He felt an empty hole in his heart, as if a blade had skewered him straight through his chest and burst out of his back. Would complete destruction of his enemies fill that void? His hands were tightened into fists at his side and his head lowered, a dark shadow coming over his face. This new power had activated out of pure hatred, and he remembered roaring flame howling around him. His younger sister had been taken. His mother had been slain. The people he had grown up with were massacred and now lay dead on the land that he had once wandered endlessly, searching for freedom. He closed his eyes, locking his mind in absolute darkness. It was ironic that the moment he would gain his own freedom, he was also bound to the past of this village. What has been seen cannot be unseen. He had suffered, and now he wanted to destroy Faar. He abhorred all of those in the empire and its king for what they’d done. He hated the Bounts even more so.

  “You don’t have the strength to do so now,” his father breathed and shook his head slowly, “but I’ll teach you. One day, you will end the lives of the men who took your mother’s. Do you understand?”

  Keimaro watched his father for a moment as droplets of rain began to fall from the sky, starting off as one or two and then coming down in showers, making the light of his mother’s fire flicker. He watched it die down for a moment and saw nothing but ash where she had lain only moments earlier. He felt just as he had when he’d first seen the body of his mother—incapable of stopping anything. Powerless. Not even able to keep her flames alive for a few minutes while she was being cremated. Training underneath his father, he knew, would improve his chances of growing stronger. He would be able to defend himself and would never feel powerless again. Rather, he would obtain the strength to avenge his mother and all of those who perished on this day. He lowered his eyes and saw his father beginning to rise from his knees to his feet. The man turned to his son and looked him straight in the eyes.

  “How many men would you kill to save your little sister?”

  The young boy was speechless as he looked into his father’s eyes and saw the seriousness of the matter. Today had been the first day he had slain a man and stolen a life. It felt horrible. He knew that, from this very day, he would be haunted by the screams of anguish that came from the men he killed. But he had done so in self-defense. Was that not the right thing to do? What his father was asking was if he was willing to taint his soul in order to save his younger sister. Mai was the one who gave him a reprieve from the horror of abuse that he constantly suffered. She returned innocence to his life, and he felt an unexplainable connection to her. He wouldn’t let those men take her.

  His eyes began to glow a demonic red as rising hatred for the men who had kidnapped Mai grasped his heart. “I would kill them all.”

  His father nodded casually and pointed to a young boy who was lying in the dirt a few meters away. “Tend to your friend. He tried to recover Mai while you were unconscious, yet he was defeated as well. I will train both of you, and you will both become my legacy when I pass,” he said softly and turned away as if he had just seen a ghost. He glided silently away with no particular destination.

  Keimaro rushed over to the unconscious boy, knowing immediately that it was Yata. He touched the boy’s neck, feeling for his pulse, and sighed with relief when he felt it. He watched as Yata’s eyes began to crack open, his body filled with agonizing pain. He winced as he awoke from his slumber.

  “Stay still. You’re injured,” Keimaro whispered

  “Where’s the little girl?” Yata gasped, leaning his head back into the mud around him.

  “She’s been taken.”

  “As has Aika.”

  “We’ll get them both back,” Keimaro said with a weak smile. He had hoped that at least she would’ve been safe, hidden away in Yata’s isolated home. “Just you wait.”

  Yata didn’t feel like complaining or arguing against such a bold statement. The men they had fought were unlike anything that he had read or studied in all of the books and lore of man in this world. They used unnatural human abilities, like the new powers the two of them had obtained. Were they monsters? No, monsters were common—but humans who could control unique powers were not. This new phenomenal gift that had been bestowed upon them was something else. It would help them find their friend one day, though Yata knew that the day he would see the beauty of the princess would not be so soon.

  As Keimaro’s eyes wandered upward and locked onto the cloudy skies that blanketed the land in its shadow, raining down forceful droplets as the gods wept for the lost souls, Keimaro didn’t feel pain. Despite losing everything, for some odd reason, he felt numb, as if nothing had happened.

  Reborn

  Four Years Later…

  The eighteen-year-old boy stood upon the hill that he had once lain upon as a child, having looked up at the twinkling stars. The apple tree no longer grew there. It had been burned down when Bakaara was invaded four years earlier. A gravestone stood in its place. The young man stood at the gravestone, his throat tightening. He looked at the stone with dark eyes, a shadow looming over his darkened expression. A gentle gust came, blowing his hair ever so slightly. His hands were relaxed at his side. Rain was pouring from the sky just as it had when his mother had passed, and when his sister had been kidnapped. He remembered that day so vividly. It was more than just a dream and clearer than just a memory. He remembered every detail, every ounce of hatred that he had felt on that day. He hadn’t seen his sister since then, and he had just buried his father beside his mother. Together. That’s what his father would’ve wanted. Keimaro remembered burying his mother’s bones, a painful experience that was imbedded into his mind.

  His hair had grown a bit longer, and he had grown to be just below six feet tall. His muscles were toned and shaped to perfection after years of his father’s vigorous training. His bangs spiked down close to his dark eyes, which were calm and barely opened, as if he wanted to close them forever. He looked much older than eighteen; his body had matured dramatically over the years. He wore a black cloak that was tightly wrapped around him, a cape draping behind him. His cloak was buttoned up to conceal his white tunic underneath and draped all the way down to his large black boots. A leather belt was curled around the waist of the cloak and tightened to keep it from flapping whenever he moved or when the wind blew. It had been his father’s until recently when it had passed on to him.

  He heard a sound behind him and raised his head lightly as Yata walked up. The boy was older with strong, broad shoulders and had grown a significant amount over the years. His dark-brown hair was longer and wavier, nearly coming down to cover his eyes. He wore a black shirt with torn sleeves, exposing his rippling muscles. His signature weapon was a simple metal bat, which he carried in his hand every
where he went. He had left the bat at the bottom of the hill today and walked to the tombstones of Keimaro’s parents unarmed. He had felt as strong of a bond to Keimaro’s father as Keimaro had, and was also quite traumatized when he had passed from a heart attack. But now, at least he would rest in peace with his wife in the afterlife.

  “It has been a couple of days now,” Yata said, knowing that Keimaro wanted to stay in the area. But Yata also knew that staying here when they had been training for four years would be pointless. “It’s time to go to Bassada,” he urged, naming the capital of the Faar Empire. “There’ll be an escort caravan moving from Bakaara through the forest to the city. We can follow close by and make use of their escorts and protection.”

  It was a good plan. A lot had changed over the years. The Faar weaponry was much more advanced, and Yata was sure the escorts would be able to hold the monsters of the forest at bay while they stayed close behind.

  Still, the sound of the rain falling was the only response.

  “Kei—”

  “Did you know that there was an elite escort team that came by last week?” Keimaro said suddenly, looking over his shoulder at Yata. “That stopped by in Bakaara. What would an elite escort team want in Bakaara?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe there’s something—”

  “A chest that was kept in my room all of these years was supposedly destroyed in the fire. I never checked or scavenged the remains of my own house after that day. And when the new settlers came in, I never decided to go down there and check for what had become of my old home and whether or not the chest was still there. I did some research and interrogated some people,” Keimaro muttered, slowly standing and leaving lilies at the grave. He turned to face his friend. “The king has found keen interest in the chest from the looks of it and has it in his custody. Some say it’s the reason that he destroyed Bakaara. The chest was apparently indestructible and survived the fire when my house burned down. No human has seen anything like it. A master locksmith couldn’t even open the chest to see what was inside. They’ve been trying to open the thing for years.”