by DB King
They cheered on, hearts elated and souls burning brightly. Jin hardly cared for them personally, but raising morale was important during sieges. It helped them stay focused and steady, despite the enemy’s might.
Regardless, Jin wasn’t quite in the mood to be talking to peasants. He retreated inward, pulling his very being into himself, hiding his essence and his aura behind a veil of silent magic. Jin became a ghost in all but form. He could still be seen, of course, but the lack of a presence made it so that he blended into anything and everything. No one would recognize him and no one would see him, unless Jin wanted them to. Now, where’d that woman go?
Well, she was a servant. She was dressed like one, at least, which meant she would probably be at the makeshift manor Ebisu had built for his father’s servants. It wasn’t much, but it was spacious enough to house several people at once without getting crowded. Though, Ebisu never really stayed there. The boy spent most of his time in the woods, training by himself.
Jin stalked across the crowds, through the roads, unseen and unheard. The new manor was on the other side of Hirata. It took him ten minutes to reach it. Though, it would’ve taken far less time if he’d been in a hurry, but he wasn’t. This matter was not immediately important. It was more of a curiosity that demanded his attention and nothing more. At least, that’s what Jin told himself as he walked into the manor’s grounds and unfolded his aura, becoming perceptible once more.
One of the servants approached him, a young girl, who was probably only a few years older than Jin was. “How may I help you, Lord Jin?’
“Do you know an older…” Jin paused. She was right there, standing next to a tree. “Excuse me.”
He walked past the servant girl, trying to get to the older woman, who might’ve been one of his father’s servants in Castle Murasaki. But then she moved and walked onward, disappearing out of Jin’s immediate field of view. Jin followed after her, rushing as quickly as he could, without alerting anyone to his presence. The more people were aware of his affairs the better. He circled around the new manor, if it could even be called that, and found that the old woman walked lazily around it as well. Jin caught her for only a moment before she disappeared behind a wall. Oh come on!
Jin’s feet dug deep furrows into the loose soil as he ran after her at full speed. But then, as he came around the wall she’d disappeared into, the old woman wasn’t there. Jin paused. Where’d she go?
Something about this felt… wrong, somehow. That old woman shouldn’t be as fast as she was. Unless…
Jin froze as he settled upon a dreadful realization.
She’s a mage.
He strode forward. With his magical senses stretched outward, Jin searched for any possible trail of magic. But he found none. There weren’t even any footsteps where there should be.
Well, she might not be a mage, but only a highly trained assassin—a master, at that—could possibly walk over such loose soil without leaving any footprints. Not even the grasses were disturbed. Her feet must’ve been moving almost ethereally, like Nobito No Yoritsumo. Was she a fellow practitioner of the Feather-Moon Blade?
Well… it wasn’t impossible, but what was she doing here?
Jin’s eyes darted left and right. His search for the elusive old woman was leading him toward his uncle’s abandoned manor.
He stopped. No, I mustn’t tempt fate, he decided. Ebisu said there was something powerful in there. It’s certainly powerful enough to mess with my head, that’s for sure.
What am I doing? Jin frowned. He’d wasted precious time chasing after some old servant woman. He could’ve been training. He could’ve been securing Hirata’s defenses. It never hurt to recheck a hundred times just to be sure everything was absolutely perfect. Instead, he’d—
There! His eyes caught the old woman’s form lingering within the manor. She knew he was following her!
She turned to look at him for a moment, winking, before disappearing into the dark hallways of his uncle’s family home. Gritting his teeth, Jin leapt in after her, jumping over the gates and into the mossy, grassy courtyard that’d seen better days.
“Who are you?!” Jin called out after her, but there was no answer. He walked forth and stopped right before he could take a step into the manor itself.
It was dangerous, wasn’t it? The whole town had been mind-controlled in some way by some entity that’d taken residence in his uncle’s old home. Should he really risk it?
A sudden commotion from upstairs caught his ears, the rumbling and breaking of wood and a sudden bang upon the floor, echoing all over the manor. What was that?
Jin sensed no magical energies anywhere close to him. Was it safe? Was it a trap? He’d fallen for a very similar ruse many days ago with that creature that Ebisu had bonded with.
Before Jin could decide on anything, something burst through the ceiling.
Jin froze as a familiar object landed in front of him.
His eyes widened. It was the heirloom. Cracks marred its once pristine form. Black smoke seemed to emanate from it. “What the—”
The box snapped open, and the world was engulfed in darkness.
Chapter 24
Jin’s eyes snapped open. His eyes met only a grim, endless darkness for a moment. Colors settled slowly, shapes filling the inky blackness of his vision, like sloths crawling through mud and sludge. He wasn’t sure if he could move. His arms were weightless and non-existent; Jin couldn’t even feel them there. What happened?
Something flashed in his mind’s eye, a memory that’d arisen in the darkness.
In the dream from which he had awakened, the ghost of a faceless child had led him by the hand into the mouth of a deep, dank, cave at the center of the world. They went inside. Bloody crystalline growths grew at the walls and the ceiling, filling the cavern with an eerie, crimson light as the crystals pulsated with the energies of life. Bells tolled in the distance, somewhere within and beyond his hearing, again and again, their loudness boomed in the emptiness of it all.
The faceless child led him into a wide, gloomy chamber, whose walls were alabaster and porcelain. They stood upon the bank of an underground lake, whose waters were clear and bluish, bathed with an inner light that left sparks within his chest as he looked. The child pointed. Sitting on the edge of the bank across them was a horned creature. Its body was all darkness and black smoke. Its eyes glowed a fiery red. Flaming tears streamed from its eyes, falling down its face and into the ground, hissing as it dripped over the rocks of the bank. Bestial fangs jutted out of its upper lips, pointing down and glimmering in the soft light of the crystals around them. It was muscular, and its arms ended in black talons and cackling lava-like patterns from its fingers as though it’d dipped both its hands in molten rock. Much of its lower body was covered by a long, black skirt that was torn and ragged, filled with holes and tears, but it was large and baggy enough that the damage it held hardly mattered.
At the center of its chest was a single, black hole.
The child disappeared.
And their eyes met.
For the longest time, the two of them held their stares. Neither of them backed down. The waters of the underground lake grew disturbed. Once it’d been smooth and stagnant, it’d become a baleful body of water, filled with crashing waves. And still they looked toward each other, each one silent and defiant to the very last.
Until the horned figure broke the silence, sighing before speaking. Its voice was like the cracking and grinding of rocks, metal, and glass—terrible to behold. “You’re not really Murasaki Jin, are you? I have waited for so long—to join with my destined vessel. And yet, you are not him—not really. You may have his name, you may have his face, you may even have his potential, but you are not him. No… you are something more, aren’t you?”
He said nothing, preferring to let the demonic thing continue.
It did. “Your soul is not of this world. It’s brighter and stronger, and your will is cemented into its being. I see, Murasak
i Jin is not you, because Murasaki Jin never had the chance to exist. You came into this world and took away what was not yours.”
It stood up. “But I can make this work. Go forth, interloper. I will be watching, for our souls have joined.”
The creature scowled and sighed. It snapped its fingers and a wave of dread passed across the entirety of the cavern, calming the waves and causing the light of the crimson crystals to flicker away. “This will have to do—for now. Let’s see what fate has in store for us, eh, Mage-Emperor?”
Jin froze.
And his dream shattered.
And here he was, blind and apparently paralyzed.
But that didn’t last as long as it once did. All of Jin’s senses returned in full force, like a great and terrible tidal wave washing over him and everything about him at once.
He blinked once and all the colors returned.
That was a strange and awful dream. It’d left him with plenty of questions about himself.
But, for now, he had other problems and no time for self-reflection.
Jin found himself lying flat on the ground. His head spun, but he could feel all his limbs now and there were no phantom pains on his chest. In fact, Jin felt… stronger somehow. He wasn’t physically stronger, per se, but he felt it, like he’d been energized. Well, Jin couldn’t even explain it to himself if he wanted to, but something in him had changed. It wasn’t exactly a radical change, but he knew there was something fundamentally different within him now. Again, he wasn’t sure what.
Jin pushed himself up and breathed in the crisp, cold air. He was still in the courtyard of his uncle’s manor, near the steps to the living room and its adjacent hallways. Jin’s eyes flashed. The Murasaki family heirloom was still there, but it seemed impotent now—as though the strange and otherworldly powers it once had within it had been ripped away from it or something. Jin shook his head and turned away.
What was he doing here?
He wracked his mind for answers and found none. Thankfully, it was still early in the day and it was likely that no one had noted his absence yet, assuming today was the same day he thought it was and not a few days after the fact.
Jin rushed out of the manor, leaping over the walls in a single bound and landing on the other side with a soft grunt. Hirata looked as he had remembered it: bustling with activity and preparation. Jin shook his head once more, wondering why his mind seemed strangely absent and lax. That’s right, we were preparing for a siege, Jin thought. There’s an invading army marching right for us.
A platoon of marching militiamen caught his eye.
No, what really caught his eye was the lone child at their front, barking out orders and constantly yelling at the men to keep up with him. Jin chuckled, raising a single eyebrow as Ebisu commanded a host of fifty men to turn to the right and raise their shields as though they were suddenly accosted by a rain of arrows and projectiles. The militiamen moved sloppily and Ebisu did not notice that fact, but Jin did not need them to be the perfect soldiers and he did not need Ebisu to be the perfect commander—not yet, at least.
Ebisu’s eyes momentarily widened when they locked gazes. Jin smiled at his protégé. The boy really gave it his all when the time came to do so. A lot of noble children had a tendency to be lazy and self-serving, but Ebisu was remarkably responsible and hardworking, especially in the arcane arts. Soon enough, Jin figured, the boy would no longer need his teachings – at least, when it came to magic. Ebisu had a lot to learn if he was going to lead his people properly.
And then it hit him.
For the last several years, Jin had found himself without any true purpose, without a goal in sight. He had deluded himself into thinking that his purpose was the gathering and the culminating of power, but that was a lie. In the darkest pits of his mind, Jin knew that goal to be a lie. Once, in another life, he had dreamed of the same thing—and his friends and lovers suffered for it. Yavira, whose name he’d been reminded of by some foreign seer, had died because he was too blind to see what he had become. And no longer could he follow that path, not anymore.
No, though he had the skills and the will for it, the man who had once been called Valden no longer wished to be the king, the emperor, or the leader. For a moment, he had glimpsed it: the promise and potential of a child who stood to inherit his father’s domain. While Jin had no real wish to be a king, there stood a child who had the gift to be one—Ebisu, and he only needed guidance. Valden’s mistakes, his thirst for power and domination, would be torn away and used as kindling to fuel the boy’s growth.
Valden had been a terrible, dreadful Mage-Emperor. Sure, he’d built monuments and cities and united an entire world under one banner, but everything he’d built was built over billions of corpses. Blood flowed in rivers because of his thirst for power. But Ebisu could be different. The boy’s eyes glimmered with dreams of conquest and the desire for power, but Jin could steer him into the right path. He could groom him to be a true leader of men, one who inspired his people to greatness and not bullied them into submission as Valden had done in his previous life.
Yes… Jin smiled as Ebisu continued on with his drills, barking out redundant orders that if nothing else served only to harden their warriors’ discipline and obedience. He will become Emperor and I will guide him to that path, Jin decided. I will be his teacher, his mentor, his friend, and his instructor. Ebisu will rule, but it shall be with a thundering hand of silk, not steel.
Smiling, Jin walked down to join his warriors in their drills, already having forgotten his dream and the dark entity that had spoken to him in it.
Two days passed in a blur. In that time, Jin had finished preparing his people for the coming army. They were about as ready as they could be. Then again, there wasn’t really a lot to do, since most of the population was more than willing to fight for their homes or contribute something, anything. Aside from the children—of those whose ages were five and below, at least—and the sick and the elderly, every single person in the town was given a role. Most of the non-combatants were placed in the hospices and the kitchens, to tend to the wounded and to make meals for the warriors atop the walls. Others were given sanitation duties, to clean up after everyone else and keep Hirata free of disease and sickness.
Jin sat quietly on his chair, elbows propped on the wooden surface of his desk, with Ebisu sitting across him. The boy’s eyes were closed. He was deep in meditation—mostly to calm his nerves. The two of them sat in silence, alone in the comfort of Jin’s fancy tent that had become something of a miniature manor in the last few days.
Ebisu breathed in and out, steadying his breath.
Not that Ebisu was afraid—quite the opposite, in fact. The boy was far too excited for his own good and Jin worried for his well-being—his mental wellbeing, especially. Not even Jin was thoroughly excited at the prospect of a large-scale battle—not even when Jin’s powers were brought into the equation.
Jin’s ears perked up as someone walked right through the tent flap. He had yet to install a makeshift door.
Jin winced and stood up, laying a hand on Ebisu’s shoulder so the boy wouldn’t stop his meditation. He eyed the warrior, who entered, carrying a scroll. Jin raised a single eyebrow. It must’ve been truly important for anyone to come barging into his tent. “What is it?”
The man heaved and gasped, but forced himself to speak through muddled breaths. “I bring a message from our supporting army, my lord!”
He lowered his head and extended the scroll. Jin nodded and took the item in hand before dismissing the warrior with a simple wave of his hand. When the man spoke of a ‘supporting army’, he was likely referring to Yojimbo’s band of ambushers. Jin had never really explained to his people the true nature of the other army they had, wandering the countryside. Still, intrigued, Jin opened the scroll with a curious eye.
Jin froze, eyes narrowing.
“Ebisu,” He spoke with a grim tone. His student quickly awakened from the stupor of his meditation and
stood up.
“What is it, master?”
“It is as I feared,” Jin began, crumpling the scroll in his left hand and burning it with a simple thought. “The invading army is not led by any lord and neither does it march under the hidden banner of any clan. It is led by a powerful mage.”
Ebisu nodded. “Will you be confronting the mage, just as you planned, master?”
Jin sighed, “Yes, I will eliminate this mage, before his or her army can reach Hirata. Otherwise…”
Jin’s eyes lingered on the walls for a moment. Whatever defenses he’d erected, no matter how durable and powerful they were, would not stand a chance against someone who could just chuck a fireball at it and cause the whole thing to explode in a single breath. No, the enemy mage had to die before his or her army could reach Hirata. Jin would not allow this siege to end in the same manner as Murasaki Castle had ended—excellent defensive structures undone by simple spells. He would not allow it.
The people who lived behind these walls were his people as well. And he had sworn to defend them.
And he would.
“There’s only one mage, according to our scout and I’m inclined to agree,” Jin said. “Mages rarely ever lead armies. This one must’ve been hired by a foreign lord to lead a host of soldiers to take a strategic point.”
Nobito was right. These people were very likely not here for Hirata, but for Muteba Castle. Still, Jin had to stop them. He continued, “The mage is there to ensure their success.”
Ebisu nodded. “Do we know where this invading army is at the moment?”
Jin smiled. “Yes, they’ve made camp at the edge of Serpent Pass. They’ll likely begin their march southward tomorrow. I’ll have to pay them a visit tonight.”
“But what if it’s a trap?” Ebisu asked, his eyebrows furrowing. “What if this mage is stronger than you, master? What if you can’t win?”
