The man smiled and said, “Sure, anything we can do for you is our honor.”
Akio smiled. “I would like you to build me a private temple.”
“We would be honored to build a temple for you. Here on the grounds?”
“No,” he said, “I have a specific place in the forest that I love to visit where I would like it built. The day after the celebration, I would like you to come here and meet with me. I will help you draw up the plans and will show you where the site will be.”
The other man nodded. “I will be here directly after breakfast, ready to create a grand temple for you, sir.”
Akio smiled and clasped his hands together, walking toward the back of the compound, leaving the men to their work. As he walked through the beautiful gardens, he realized that his irritation was leaving him. The idea of a temple over the ship where he was training washed away all of the rage he had at his mother. He would have a private place to call his own. Somewhere no one else would be allowed.
Making his way through the gardens, he stopped to smell a few of the flowers that were in bloom. Beautiful reds and pinks were everywhere, dotted with yellows and whites. The golden fish in the pond came up to say hello to him as he passed by.
He made his way through by skirting the roads and such in the woods. Finally, he arrived at the spot where the ship was waiting. As he approached, the hatch opened without a sound and the soft, white light enveloped him. He stepped inside and the hatch closed behind him. He felt safe here, welcomed, happy. When he headed into the chamber, Aichu welcomed him. “Hello Akio,” she said. “We have been waiting for you to return. We have news.”
He frowned slightly, as the tone of her voice was not excited. However, he really wasn't sure what the tone of her voice was when it was excited. He just felt, inside, that something was amiss. He made his way to the chair and sat down. “What news?”
The screen in front of him once again showed him Aichu's home planet, before it had been destroyed. The swirling atmosphere was mesmerizing and beautiful. “Those who destroyed us are here.”
Akio was quiet for a moment. “Here?” he asked. “As in, here, on Earth?”
“Yes.”
“What do they want?” he asked, bolting to his feet. “Are they going to destroy this planet? Why would they be here? Why would they want to hurt us? We are no threat to them.” He rambled, pacing back and forth in front of the screen.
“They do not want to destroy Earth,” Aichu said. “They want to destroy me.”
Akio stopped short and looked up. “You? Why do they want to destroy you?”
“Because I hold the key to rebuilding our race,” Aichu responded.
He stood for a moment. “What can I do to protect you?”
Aichu showed on the screen his sword, the Hi No Tamashi. “You carry our essence with you in the fire soul,” she said, showing the symbols on the sword and hilt, each glowing as it came clearer into view. “In the sword lies the combination that can unlock what is needed for my race to be reborn, to regrow into a population and to finally come back from the destruction that has been dealt to us.”
Then another sword appeared on the screen. “The Kurou No Tatsu, the dark dragon, has been awakened,” Aichu continued. “The dark dragon holds Tux'els, one of the leaders of the Nax'oix, those who destroyed our world. Tux'els is an ancient being; his hatred has been fueled by millennia of war and isolation. He believes that the Eza, my race, encased him in this weapon as punishment, but it was his own people who did so. The Nax'oix imprisoned him because he could no longer be controlled, he no longer followed the rules, and he used his power only to destroy.”
“So, then, how did he get here?” Akio asked as he studied the sword on the screen. It was eerie, a deep grey with hauntingly beautiful lines of onyx running throughout it. As it turned on the screen, he saw that it also held symbols along the blade and the hilt. “I see the symbols on this weapon as well. Are they like the ones that are on the Hi No Tamashi? Will they be given to someone to use?”
“Yes,” Aichu responded, “and it has already begun.”
“What?” Akio froze, his eyes wide. “Someone has already found the sword and has started learning the symbols?” He never had paused to realize that there could be anyone else like him out there that might have abilities and powers to match his.
“We knew the sword had been sent to find us,” Aichu said. “However, we thought it lost in space. We thought that we had escaped it here, on Earth.” She paused for a moment. “We were wrong.”
Akio went to the chair and sat down. “What do we do? How do we stop it?”
On the screen, the other sword disappeared and a symbol came into view instead. “We start with today's lesson.” He felt the familiar sting on his arm and knew another symbol was being fashioned into his flesh. “This symbol is for Intelligence,” Aichu continued. “It will continually boost how well your brain learns, how it thinks, and build your knowledge of everything. As you come here, you will also be ingrained with our knowledge, which will help you rule, will help you in battle, and will help you in life.” Aichu paused as the symbol's power flooded into Akio. “Now repeat the words.”
Akio repeated the chant he had come to expect with each new symbol, “The symbol is me and I am the symbol.” He felt so much knowledge flood into his brain that he almost couldn't stand it. It was overpowering the things that he suddenly was made aware of; from the exotic flora and fauna that used to inhabit Utroth, to the subatomic properties of metals, or even the best way to strike a man to kill him. He was amazed and frightened at the same time, but felt an addicting rush as the new power flowed throughout his body and mind.
Aichu brought him back to the present. “Akio, now that you have this symbol as a part of you, you will find that each day, new pieces of knowledge will be in your mind. These things will come to you from the sword itself; you will learn things your grandfather knew, things I know, things my race knew, and more. Do not be surprised, or scared, by them.”
He nodded and looked down at the symbols on his inner forearm. They were an elegant flow of characters, wonderfully laid out on his skin. He imagined what their language must look like written out.
Reading his mind, Aichu popped up several lines of their language on the screen in front of him. It was mesmerizing to Akio. “This is our language,” Aichu said. “You should understand it now.”
He was shocked to realize that he did understand it. On the screen in front of him was a short proverb that he had heard a thousand times growing up, but he suddenly understood it on a deeper level: “If your mind is strong, all difficult things will become easy. If your mind is weak, all easy things will become difficult.” Aichu was giving him the gift of amazing knowledge so that his mind could become as strong as his body to ensure that he would not fail when the time came to meet the other sword.
He suddenly understood so much about the world around him, about Aichu's race, the Eza, and how eventually the battle with the other weapon, the dark dragon, would come. Akio also felt a deep loss inside and frowned hard.
“You are starting to see that you will face great loss now that the other sword is here and awake,” Aichu said. “This is something that cannot be prevented, Akio.”
He sat there for a moment, soaking everything in. He wanted to cry, but refused to do so. The loss that he felt was so real, so powerful, that it was almost overwhelming. “But what loss?” He asked, looking up at the screen again. “How can I be feeling something that hasn't happened yet?”
“Unknown,” Aichu said. “But with knowledge comes the realization that pain and suffering are inevitable in life and in any battle. Your mind prepares you for it now to protect you from it when it happens.”
Akio sat quietly for a moment. Then asked, “When will I come up against this sword?”
Aichu didn't respond right away. The screen was cleared of the symbol and the dark dragon appeared again. “You will come acro
ss it several times without ever knowing,” Aichu finally said. “Then, you will meet it in battle twice. The first battle will cost you something you truly love with all your heart.” Aichu paused, and Akio could hear a break in her voice. “The second battle will almost cost you everything.”
“But will I win?” he asked, standing up and walking to the screen.
Aichu did not respond.
“Will I win?!” he asked again, more forceful this time. “Aichu! I need to know! Will I win against the dark dragon?”
Aichu still did not respond. He headed to the door. “Let me out. I'm done. I don't want to stand here if you're not going to answer me.” The door did not open. “Aichu!” he demanded, “Let me out right now.”
“Akio,” she finally responded, “I cannot tell you the outcome of the second meeting. It is not written yet.”
He paused. “Not written? Yet you say you know exactly what will happen to me.”
Aichu showed several lines on the screen. “There are multiple lines that time flows on, Akio,” she said, and he watched as the lines moved along the wall, some jetted off in different directions while others continued to go straight. “Each time a decision is made, the line that you are on changes with that decision.” The screen focused in on one line toward the middle of the screen. “If you decide not to marry Saru…” The line on the screen jolted downward from the straight line. “Then things will change for that time line.” The line straightened out again. “If you decide not to come to me any longer…” Another change in the line. “Then things will also change for that time.” The line straightened once more. “However, if you continue to come to me to train, time will recognize that as well.” The line jolted upward this time for a bit, then straightened out. “Any decision that you make affects your time,” Aichu finished.
He bobbed his head, contemplating everything she had said and shown him. “So, every single thing that I do can alter what is to come,” he said, understanding what she was trying to tell him.
“Yes.”
“So, then, if I know what might come, I may make decisions that will pull me from that outcome.”
“Yes.”
“And if I make decisions to change that outcome, I may alter the entire course of that time and lose what I am trying to gain.”
“Yes.”
He stood still, rubbing his chin with his left hand, the other hand on his sword, fingers feeling the hilt. He walked around the room a bit, thinking, pondering, and considering. Finally, he sat back down in the chair. “Okay,” he said, “teach me what I need to know and I will not ask again about the future of this fight.”
In the air, he could sense the relief that Aichu felt at his statement. She pulled up another symbol on the screen and he felt the burn on his arm. “The symbol for Protection will bring you aid when you need it most,” she told him. “Now repeat the words.”
He did as he was told. They continued through two more symbols, one for Luck and another point for advancing his Strength, which added a dot to the side of the Strength symbol that was already on his arm. When everything was finished, he got up and walked to the hatch.
“I'll be back soon,” he told Aichu as he stood with his back to the white room.
“I know,” came her voice behind him.
He stepped out of the hatch and it closed. Heading off into the forest around him, he was amazed at the beauty and quiet that instantly surrounded him and prayed that it could just be this peaceful forever.
***
Arima Saru sat in a hard chair, somehow sitting through the pain that was her mother fixing her hair. The tighter that the other woman pulled, the more the anger welled up inside of Saru.
“I don't understand, mother,” she said, “why do I have to marry Akio? I do not care that he is daimyo. I could not care if he were emperor...” She paused. “Well, maybe if he were emperor.”
Her mother smiled and continued with her hair. “Daughter, you need to marry. You are getting old. Eighteen is not an age to find oneself without a husband,” her mother said curtly. “Plus, he will only be daimyo for a short while; I foresee him being shogun and more as he grows. He will become a powerful man, Saru. He will make you a good husband and give you everything you want.”
She sat still, crossing her arms. “I don't like him.”
“You don't know him.”
“I know his type, mother.” She spat. “He will be spoiled. He will demand things...” She shuddered, “things I do not want him to do.”
Her mother paused and jerked her hair hard so that the girl looked up at her. “Listen to me Saru,” she said with a very cold tone to her voice, her eyes squinted into slits, “you will do what he wants, when he wants. You will give him an heir, several heirs. You will cement our family's place into the court and into royalty. Period. There is no discussion and there is no refusal. Your father has made the arrangements to provide you everything you could ever need in life and provide our family honor throughout the lands. You will do nothing to damage this.” She pushed the girl's head back down. “Now look what you've done.” She growled. “I must start over!”
Saru fought back tears both from the humiliation of marrying someone she did not want and the pain that her mother was causing from yanking her head around. She made up her mind right then and there that she would never love Akio; she would do anything she could to damage him, his court, or anything he loved, just to spite her father and their family.
***
Ratnakar was fuming. He had spent at least two months trying to convince Atagi to train him, to no avail. However, he refused to give up. He had gone to the tavern to look for the man again today, but Atagi was not there. Heading back to the house, he was just completely beside himself. He was tired of chasing this man down, tired of being rejected, just tired of trying to get the attention of a man that he wasn't sure he needed anymore.
On his way, two of Atagi's men passed him, laughing and pointing. He was now being ridiculed and it truly angered him to the core. He wanted to slice their throats open, right here, in the street, and leave their corpses where Atagi would find them. But, there were other people here watching and he did not dare do something so bold in plain sight that could have him arrested and executed.
Throughout the time he had been trying to convince Atagi to train him in the art of the sword, he had been organizing and training his boys into a well-oiled machine of destruction. They had been easily hitting travelers throughout the woods around them, raking in the money, gems, and weapons. They wanted for nothing and were growing so fast that Ratnakar couldn't believe it.
Their home had become better fortified and their members had excellent weapons to train with. Daily, there were new boys wanting to join up with his group. Some coming from several towns over as word of his accomplishments, and his power began to spread through smaller gangs. He was happy in this, but still wanted more.
Each day, he spent at least an hour practicing alone in the woods with his sword. Strangely, no one in town had put out the word that it was missing. He heard no rumors about the heist that he had pulled and now felt safe in using the weapon outside of his room. The sword continued to speak to him, to train him, and to imbue him with powers that he could not even begin to fathom. He only knew that he was stronger, faster, smarter, and luckier than anyone he had ever met – and he had the dark dragon to thank for it.
Once, it crossed his mind that this sword might not be all good. He considered for a moment that the sword might be using him, that there might be a terrible cost at the end – but as quickly as the thoughts came, the sword knocked them from his mind.
As he finished his training for the night, he headed into the house by the backdoor and toward his room when he was stopped in the hallway by his second in command, Kujo. “Sir,” Kujo said, leaning in toward Ratnakar, “there is someone waiting to see you in the living room.”
“What?” Ratnakar asked, turning around, frowni
ng. “Who the hell would be here to see me in the evening like this?”
“I don't know,” the other replied. “But she is... beautiful.” This peaked Ratnakar's interest and he turned and made for the living room. His eyes adjusted to the dim light that the candles provided. As he neared the living room, he saw that there was indeed a breathtakingly beautiful woman seated on the couch while several of the boys in his group stood on the other side of the room, watching her oddly. The scene was so surreal that he paused in the doorway for a moment, wondering if he should even enter the room.
She never looked away from the group of boys but addressed him before he ever came fully into the light. “Ah, Ratnakar!” Her voice was low and smooth, dangerously enticing. “Just the man I came to see.” She stood and he saw that her form-fitting clothing hid nothing and he felt a stirring deep inside.
Raising one eyebrow at her, he said, “And why is that?”
She sauntered toward him, finally turning her brilliant green eyes to him. “I came to help you.”
He tilted his head slightly in disbelief. “In what way could you possibly help me?” he asked her, trying not to stare into her eyes too long. Behind him, Fate and Karma had come out of their room to see what was going on. They took one look at the woman and were enamored with her. Whispering to one another, the girls watched this new woman's every move.
“I believe this is a conversation better had in private,” she whispered, leaning in toward him. She smelled like flowers, soft, sweet flowers. He took in a deep breath of her smell and nodded slightly.
“Follow me then,” he said. As they neared his room, he motioned for Kujo to stand watch by the door. As fascinated as he was with this woman, he did not trust her. His gut was screaming that he needed to get out of there, to tell her to leave – but he just couldn't say the words. In his room, he carefully shut the door and then stood by it, folding his arms across his chest. “So, what is it that you can do to help me?” he asked. “And, who are you anyway?”
Samurai 2.0 - Destiny: A Harem Fantasy Adventure Page 8