by Fuyumi Ono
Perhaps because of that, his accession didn't create much of a stir. As time passed, his fame increased. By now, the Kingdom of Ryuu was renown as a kingdom of law and order. And yet it was hitting the skids. To Rikou, this was an entirely unexpected turn of events.
When he said as much, Fuukan tilted his head doubtfully. "Unlike you, I'm surprised the dynasty lasted this long. When Rohou acceded to the throne, he didn't strike anybody as king material. He'd been a county supervisor and then a governor in the provinces. The locals thought well of him, but not so much that word of his accomplishments ever made it to the capital. Nothing much to set him apart from the next guy."
Fuukan knew Rohou's given name as well, evidence that he moved in the same circles as Rikou.
"Well, you'd expect a man from En to know about such things. You're next door neighbors, after all?"
"I guess so. I swung by shortly after the coronation. A middling choice, was my impression. Like a ship that looked nice sailing out of port but would sink during the first real gale."
"The first real gale," Rikou echoed.
The reign of a king had no time limit. As long as he followed the Way and ruled according to the Will of Heaven, his dynasty would continue. But keeping the Imperial Court in working order was no easy task.
What made the whole thing surprising to Rikou was that Heaven started out by bestowing its Mandate on such a person—an enlightened monarch—with the capabilities and qualifications to govern a kingdom. The kirin listened to the Word of Heaven and chose its Lord and the new King.
And yet the dynasties were so short-lived. Sou at six centuries and En at five were the exceptions. After them was the Western Kingdom of Han, closing in on three centuries. And then Kyou at a mere ninety years.
Curiously enough, having witnessed the six hundred years of an Imperial Court, Rikou had concluded that there were certain turning points over the rise and fall of a dynasty. The first came at the ten-year mark. Successfully crossing it usually meant another thirty to fifty years of comfortable rule.
Then came the second, and this one was a big one. It coincided with the king's natural lifespan.
Upon his coronation, a king was entered upon the Registry of the Gods, after which he did not age or die. A king who had acceded to the throne in his thirties would, after another thirty or so years, had he not been listed on the Registry of the Gods, be closing in on his three-score-and-ten.
This rekindled sense of his own "mortality" could prove dangerous. Even though the word "lifespan" meant nothing to them, the king and the ministers who served him couldn't help but keep track of their "real" age: the ages at which it was not strange for them to be still alive, and the ages at which, by rights, they would have otherwise lived a "full life."
And at the same time, in the world below, all the people they used to know were disappearing one by one.
In fact, this wasn't something they witnessed personally. Being listed in the Registry of Wizards or the Registry of the Gods inevitably broke their relationships with people in the world below. Climbing above the Sea of Clouds, their birthplace became just another one of the kingdom cities. "News from home" rarely reached them, and nobody came to visit.
And yet it was impossible not to imagine their passing and imagine that he wouldn't be long for the world either. He couldn't escape the thought that he alone had been left behind to live a life whose ending he could not fathom.
A life's worth of time had been exhausted, and what did he have to show for it? Some looked backward and were overcome by the meaningless of it all. Others looked forward and were overcome by a terror of the unknown.
The ministers listed upon the Registry of Wizards faced these same turning points, and sudden resignations were hardly unexpected. But a king couldn't just walk away from it all and end his life in the face of some vague sense of futility and fear. And so Heaven's hand would be forced instead, and the chaos unleashed.
Such a king created the very inevitability he resigned himself to. Rikou and others identified it as a "passive resignation."
In any case, once he had made it past that point in time when he should have no time left, he would catch his second wind. Having crossing over that mountain, a dynasty could expect a long life ahead of it, and wouldn't face its next gauntlet until the three century mark.
Rikou didn't know why this milepost was so perilous, but when a kingdom collapsed it always seemed particularly ugly. Respected and enlightened monarchs until then seem to transform into tyrants overnight. The people were slaughtered and the land laid waste.
"They got over the mountain and made it to the one hundred and twenty mark. Split the difference, more or less."
"Split the difference." Fuukan smiled. "I see. Many kings who cross that mountain make it to three hundred. But just as many don't."
"True enough."
Except that Rikou had been in Ryuu at the time of that first high hurdle. He'd wandered around and seen for himself how well that hurdle could be surmounted. The feeling he got at the time was quite positive. Things were looking up.
There were definitely a good many kingdoms that made it through that gauntlet and yet collapsed before making it to the three-hundred mark. More made it than didn't, but made it through the storm with sails torn and taking on water, on the verge of abandoning ship.
Rikou hadn't seen any signs of that in Ryuu. A sound hull, clear skies and calm seas.
When he explained this, Fuukan raised an eyebrow and scowled a bit. "Yeah, I thought the same thing. I recall thinking that Ryuu was something of an enigma."
"An enigma?"
"It had taken on a form that wasn't obvious at first glance. I talked about that first real gale, but the real typhoon comes at a dynasty's inauguration. The first ten years of so after the coronation of a new king determined the structure of the new Imperial Court. It seemed to me that Rohou messed that up."
"If they can't get it right out of the blocks, even with a bit of improvising here and there, the dynasty won't last long." Rikou glanced at Fuukan and grinned. "As far as that goes, once in a while you see an incoherent monster that doesn't know its head from its tail and lasts only a generation or two."
Fuukan laughed. Rikou added with a thin smile, "Normally, a kingdom that begins in failure won't last a hundred twenty years."
"You wouldn't think so. But Rohou held it together. More than that, when the first big test arrived, Ryuu did a complete about-face. Most striking was the legal system. It was so constructed so soundly that I could imagine the king turning his throne into a bed and the kingdom would carry on regardless."
"True, true. I had to believe this was one capable man. Anybody who lays down that firm a foundation at that stage should make it to three hundred."
"That big of a change always struck me as odd. A kingdom used to traveling in a rut is likely to topple over when the king jerks the reins in a different direction. That was the first time I'd seen the opposite."
"Reminds me of En," said Rikou. "I didn't think En was going to last during its first decade. But it turned things around with that first big hurdle." He folded his arms. "If Rohou was following suit, then Ryuu wouldn't be in such dire straits. I haven't seen anything like this before."
En and Sou alone had passed the three-hundred mark. That's how fragile the other kingdoms were. Three-quarters didn't make it through the first gauntlet. A dynasty survived several decades and then died. So Rikou had seen many a dynasty rise and fall.
"I never get used to the way they fail," Fuukan muttered.
Rikou cocked his head to the side. "Never get used to it?"
"I don't understand why Ryuu has begun to fail now either. Or rather, I don't understand what's happened, except that, to put it bluntly, Rohou seems to have reversed course yet again."
"Now?"
"Now. Not only has Rohou become oblivious to the fact that the laws he promulgated are being ignored and trampled upon, but he is acting in a manner that undermines the very edif
ice he constructed."
"He's undermining it?"
Fuukan nodded. "The law requires three components to work together. Simply forbidding something by statute is not enough."
"An organization is needed to ensure that that prohibitions are applied where intended and faithfully carried out. Else the law is simply an ornament. And the third?"
"The law must affirm as well. Laws designed to outlaw tyranny and the corrupt must respect the incorrupt and make the most of their contributions. The one will not work without the other."
"I see."
"Ryuu did this remarkably well. But Rohou has set to wrecking it. He changes one and leaves another alone. Nothing is done in a consistent manner. That is how discord is born."
"And that is very strange." Rikou pondered this and exclaimed, "Perhaps Rohou is no longer sitting on the throne."
"No longer occupying the throne?"
Rikou nodded. "Maybe he just got tired of the whole thing. Gave up the reins of power."
"I could believe it," said Fuukan. He got to his feet and went to the window. The rays of the early summer sun were beginning to slant across the city. The cacophony from streets below was growing louder.
Voices of drunken merriment like a pack of baying hounds unleashed. Flirtatious, cooing voices like musical instruments played wildly out of key. As if the entire city had turned into one giant block party.
"Rohou set up a very sound system. So even if he threw away his authority, it should have lasted this long. The real chaos will start to set in after this. But Rohou would have abandoned the fight a long time ago. So much so that Heaven withdrew its favor."
Rikou drew his brows together. "What do you mean by that?"
"Youma have appeared along the Kyokai coast."
Rikou hadn't expected this development. It could only mean that the end of the dynasty was on the horizon. And yet the chaos remained at a low enough level that it was only apparent to an outsider like Rikou.
"Snow piling up in areas where snow is ordinarily scarce, and the like. Heaven is not happy. The chaos is buffeting the countryside before striking at the seat of power. It's usually the other way around."
"It's progressed that far without revealing itself?"
"So it seems. En has begun posting troops along the border," said Fuukan, as if discussing a situations removed far from them.
Rikou glanced at him and nodded. "In any case, Ryuu hasn't got long to go." The Imperial Court was in a very brittle state.
The commotion drifting in through the window grated painfully in his ears. Invisible fissures were opening in the earth beneath their feet. The gates of hell were opening. Nobody could stop them now.
When a king strayed from the Way, the kirin who chose him grew ill. When that happened, it became clear to all what was going on, no matter who the king was. All a monarch had to do for the kirin to recover and the kingdom to catch a second wind was return to the Way. And yet Rikou had rarely seen that actually happen. There were kings aware of how far they had fallen. But examples of a king repenting and reforming the kingdom were few and far between.
Once that downward slide had begun, a kingdom's fate quickly became inevitable, and the king's tragic efforts a drop in the ocean.
"What's that?" said Fuukan from the window, waking his from his reverie. "You that down about Ryuu falling short of your expectations?"
"The meeting of my expectations is neither here nor there." Rikou sighed. "But it is a disappointment. The dynasty had such a promise of greatness."
Ryuu had that spark of greatness in her. And yet in a mere—at least what to Rikou was a "mere"—one hundred and twenty years, Ryuu had failed.
"When you stop to think about it, dynasties like that never lack the ability to disintegrate overnight."
"Now you're just stating the obvious. The good man from Sou has no doubt seen them come and go by the gross."
Rikou laughed. "And so this man of Sou has. I guess a young colt like yourself wouldn't understand." When Fuukan quizzically hiked up an eyebrow, he added, "Sou being the longest-lived of all the Twelve Kingdoms."
"Oh, is that it?" Fuukan answered with a wry smile. He turned and looked out the window.
"That's what it comes down to. A man of En couldn't grasp this sense of oppressiveness. Even only a hundred years, you have least have one example standing before you."
But Sou had none to follow. And after eighty more years, even the legends would be left behind. No other dynasty had lasted that long.
"I think about it every time a dynasty comes to an end. I stand beside the deathbed and can't keep the thoughts from my mind: no dynasty lasts forever."
And Sou and En were unlikely to prove the exception to that rule.
"When I think about it in those terms, it makes me catch my breath. No dynasty lasts forever. An immortal dynasty is impossible. And if all dynasties must surely die, then Sou must surely die."
"Nothing lasts forever," said Fuukan, still looking out the window.
"Nope," Rikou chuckled. "No matter how I look at it, that's what it comes down to. And still I can't imagine the end of Sou."
"Naturally. Nobody can imagine his own death."
"You sure? I think I could picture it. Getting drawn into some meaningless quarrel and losing my head in the process, or getting turned into youma food during one of my wanderings."
Fuukan laughed and turned around. "Imagining the variously possibilities and imaging the moment itself are not the same thing."
"You could have a point." For a moment he let his thoughts spin. "You're right. It's a non-starter. Nothing comes to mind."
It was difficult for Rikou to imagine the conditions that would cause the Royal Sou to stray from the way. But insurrections could arise no matter who the king was. Thinking along those lines, he imagined the faces of the retainers in his mind's eye. Among all the princes of the kingdom, he couldn't connect any of them with the word "treason."
"But when it comes to En," he muttered, "I can well imagine it."
"Oh?" said Fuukan curiously.
Rikou smiled. "I have no problem imagining that. Taking the Royal En's temperament into consideration, I don't think it'd ever end with him straying from the Way. There is some question as to what understanding he has of the road ahead. But the law has been laid down, and he's not going to accidentally drive the cart into the ditch. No matter what two-bit criminals try to take him on, he's not the type to go quietly. En will only fail when the Royal En decides to let it."
"I see."
"And you can count on him doing it just for the hell of it. No big reason. One day, out of the blue, with no malice aforethought. Considering how persistent the man can be, though, once having resolved himself, I doubt that he would immediately spring into action. Yes, he'd make a wager."
"A wager?" Fuukan inquired with a dubious look.
"Exactly what the word means. A bet with Heaven. For example, that you'll run into a certain person you rarely see a hundred times. Every time fate smiles upon you and you meet, you win. Every time you don't, you chalk one up for Heaven."
"Oh, that kind of bet." Fuukan laughed.
"Whatever he settled on, he'd do it whole hog. En would be wiped off the map. The ministers, the people, the Taiho. The capital and the cities. En would be turned into a pretty but empty field."
"Killing the Taiho would be as good as slitting his own throat."
"But not right away. He'd kill the Taiho and declare war on Heaven. Whether Heaven would take him out before he'd razed the land and salted the earth—that's the kind of wager he'd love to make."
"And who do you think would win that one?"
"Push come to shove, I think he could pull it off. But it'd prove so unbearable that in the end he'd leave behind a few scattered hamlets and then die, all the while laughing at himself. How's that?"
"Not bad." Fuukan smiled. "And when it comes to Sou, it's not beyond my imagination."
"Eh?"
"The vagabond
prince gets tired of clinging to the world as it is, and assassinates the Royal Sou."
Rikou blinked, and then burst out laughing. "Low blow. And I have a feeling it just might be possible."
Fuukan laughed loudly, and then turned his gaze out the window. "Flights of fancy rarely touch down on solid ground."
Would it were so, Rikou thought, watching as well as the twilight settled over the city.
"Such things tend to resolve themselves without ever playing out."
"Probably." Rikou didn't respond further.
The dusk crept into the room along with the noise of the street below. What they mused about in these flights of fancy had already occurred to most dynasties. If such things could wreak such destruction, then living an extraordinary long life was not in the cards. With the run-of-the-mill dangers surmounted, the future only became less and less certain.
Why did dynasties fail, Rikou wondered to himself. Why did a king who had received the Mandate of Heaven fall from the Way? Was it because it never occurred to himself that he really had? And if he hadn't noticed, had he ever understood was the "Way" was? Could such a person receive the Mandate of Heaven in the first place?
If not, then he surely should have known at some point. And yet he strayed. At some point, he must have realized he was heading in the wrong direction.
Based on past precedents, he could grasp at what point the mistake was made. But just as he could not imagine the moment of his own death, he couldn't imagine being consciously aware of setting down the wrong path. What was the cause that came before the effect? And how to stop it ahead of time?
Fuukan's cheerful voice suddenly broke into his thoughts. "You staying in Shisou long?"
"That was the intent, but I'm not so sure." It wasn't mere rumor anymore. If things really were getting chancy in Ryuu, then Rikou had to sound the alarm. "Maybe two or three more days. I want to check things out with my own two eyes. And you?"
"I'll be taking off tomorrow. I took the long way around from the En border to here."