Tea splashed upon her kimono, staining the whites to green and the violets to gray, followed by glee and chuckle of the ladies around her. Those hateful eyes gazed so delightfully upon Hanaka’s trembling hands and gritting teeth, as she found herself both embarrassed and furious at her supposed allies during these troubling times.
“Oh, I’m sorry Fukuzawa-san. You had a stain in your dress, so I was intending to wash it with water, but to think that you chose sencha tea. How unfortunate.”
“What by whatever do you mean? If you mean the giant stain wearing that icky rag, then it can’t be helped. It has always been like that.”
“That rag is so two seasons ago, but it certainly suits someone … forgive me, I meant something like this one over here. I can’t believe that Akizuki-sama would lend an invitation to it.”
Hanaka bit her thumb, a childish habit which she retained whenever she ever felt stressed. The others might think of her as immature, but Hanaka didn’t care, this was the only way for her to gain self control over herself. At least until she could find another way to vent her frustrations.
For her to not lash out in gatherings was the one mistake she needed to correct. Especially under the eyes of Yuko Akizuki, the host of this party, who after successfully solving the food crisis two years ago due to famine, gained considerable reputation and a hefty sum of money which paid her noble’s debt in full. Not unlike her ex-husband, who still to this day had yet paid it off, nor herself for that matter.
The kind and gracious Yuko Akizuki of the Akizuki Clan would surely lend aid to those who needed it, and this was the first time they met. Had Hanaka had it her way, then she would’ve blasted those traitors with the same tactics they’ve employed. However, in order to get on her good side, Hanaka must first act the part.
The thumb thing aside, her eyes were swollen with tears, as Hanaka kept reminiscing her worst memories. The betrayal of her allies, the divorce of her husband, and most importantly, the fall of the Fukuzawa Clan, whose land had long since been turned into rows of apartments and Tengokunashi’s national park. What the hell was a park’s worth? Those sick uneducated fiends shall only stain Fukuzawa land with their dirty crusty soles, breeding more fiends in the process, and infecting those with heaven’s blood with the same illness, turning them into poor shells of who they originally were.
Keika should’ve stayed with me … Hanaka bit her thumb harder until Akizuki, after moving from another table, came to see hers.
“My oh my. What on Antryion happened?” she said, looking over the table on both sides of the sphere.
Those traitors acted as if nothing happened. Meanwhile Hanaka opened the floodgates while brushing away her tears. “No … it’s nothing. We’re … we’re having the time … of our lives!”
“That won’t do,” the kind Akizuki gently grabbed Hanaka’s hand and raised her up, taking her back from the garden to her house. “You must be suffering greatly.”
“No, I …,” and thus cue the tears. “Yes, I was suffering. How could they be so mean? They were my friends!”
“Hush now, Fukuzawa-san. Right this way.”
“Thank you, Akizu—Ugh!”
Her back pushed and Hanaka fell down the steps, ending up on the streets with a baffled expression toward the culprit.
“What the hell?!”
“Ah, so that’s your true self,” she spoke with cold eyes. “After all these years, you still haven’t changed. It’s honestly a relief. Otherwise, I wouldn’t feel guilty for doing this to you.”
Her words stung due to the pedestrians now watching Hanaka, their wretched eyes must be delighting on this sudden travesty. But why though? Hanaka couldn't understand why Akizuki would do this. She was supposed to be a kind and nurturing person!
“Do I need to jog your memory?” Akizuki removed a bit of her makeup, revealing a big burn scar over her face. “Now do you remember?”
Hanaka now remembered who Akizuki was. She was that big fat girl who once knocked her down in the hallway back during their student days. The humiliation Hanaka suffered, being that year’s leading noble woman, was so immense that everyone laughed at her, and even more so when that snake dared to try and ‘help’ her.
So annoying! The feeling never subsided even to this day, just forgotten and now resurged. If only Kazuya was the one to do that. You wouldn't have dared to get the one up on me otherwise.
Hanaka had so many things she wanted to say to her, but held it in and just walked away. Had she stayed, Akizuki might’ve just taken her back and prepped up boiling water. The thought terrified Hanaka, for a daughter of Fukuzawa could not possibly be scarred by a lowlife commoner.
Everything was perfect, right in place like her father’s glass statue collection. This wasn’t supposed to be it. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.
Why on Antyrion is this happening to me? Why? WHY?
“Hanaka-san?” a familiar voice came from her side, as Hanaka stopped at an intersection and met up with Kazuko Ryosachi, her ex-husband’s twin sister. “It’s been a while. How have you been?”
“Do I look alright to you?”
“Always as prickly as I remember. Then I’ll change the question. How’s your father’s condition?”
“Not great. The tumor has spread to his eyes,” Hanaka replied. “The doctor says that he only has a month to live.”
“You sound ecstatic.”
“Of course I am. That man is about to get what he deserved. The nerve he had to not appoint me as successor, choosing my idiotic brother, who’s now off and about drinking and sleeping with a bunch of women. The Fukuzawa name could’ve retained its place had he not been the head.”
“Is that so …,” —a small pause fell on their conversation— “And you believe that you would’ve done better?”
“Who do you think I am? I am the Fukuzawa Hanaka, the pinnacle of every noble woman in Hoshikuni. Or at least I was.”
“It’s good for you to admit that. Admitting your own faults is the first step to move forward.”
“I’m not your student. I am perfectly capable of analyzing my faults and strengths as any other adult could,” Hanaka said, as they walked along the same path. “I didn’t expect you to come through this street.”
“I’m here on duties as Head Organizer of the Founding Day Festival, taking care of clients and setting up relations that require my personal attention.”
“Why would a teacher be the Head Organizer of the festival?”
“Vice-principal,” she corrected. “The current festival will be held on Maginaku Island, right in front of the academy, thus the festival is now centered around the youth. Ninety-percent of the competitions will also be for children only, and I’ll be looking forward to the potential seen brewing within the children of Hoshikuni.”
“Then I assume Keika will be participating in one of the competitions.”
“She is. Although the competitions haven’t been announced, I’m quite confident she’ll participate in either in Battle Ensemble Royale or Original Music Creation.”
“Perhaps I’ll take a look. It’d be nice to listen to the shamisen again.”
“No, Keika will be playing that Skaajordian instrument, a guitar.”
“You’re joking.”
“I’m being serious. I’m really looking forward to her playing it and maybe she’ll play that new song she’s been cooking up in her room.”
Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.
“If this is one of your jokes, then you shut that mouth of yours,” Hanaka urged. “Keika will be playing the shamisen. It’d be a complete waste not to use the skills she’s been taught.”
“Aren’t the two similar instruments though?” Kazuko pointed out, which Hanaka flat out denied. “... My son has now for a while shown interest in drumming, yet he’s still interested in playing the piano. However, should he make the decision, I would gladly have him join another drumming class or even quit his piano class if juggling two different classes proved too hard for him. A child’s happiness is the parent’s happiness.”
Hanaka disagreed. A parent’s happiness stemmed from the worth their own child could give and the fastest way to do so was to either gain a high position of power or to marry someone with said power. The rest didn’t matter, for whoever tried to stray from the noble path would be discarded and no longer be within the heaven's watch.
“Then you ought to make sure that the happiness he chose is the right kind of happiness,” said Hanaka. “Some forms of happiness are just too dangerous to be allowed. These fiends for instance. Their happiness is a sin.”
“Well, I wouldn’t say I disagree,” her downcast eyes spoke from experience. “However, isn’t a good thing though, to fall in love only to have it be broken in the end? Everyone should be far more careful in who they choose to love.”
“I took your advice and look at what it has gotten me.”
“And yet here we are talking as equals.”
The two stopped in front of a flower shop, with a variety set up in display ranging from native wisterias and peonies, to foreign moon orchids and plumerias. Among them, Kazuko grabbed a stalk of hyacinth and took a scent. The silver blue flower from Zagaron neared her nose and glinted upon the radiant sun. Kazuko seemed to like it a lot. However, her mind seemed to be placed elsewhere.
“Fukuzawa-san,” Kazuko cast an anxious look upon Hanaka. “Be honest with me. Do you not resent me for what I did?” she calmly asked. “I gave you bad advice. Advice that cost you and my brother everything the two of you have built.”
Certainly, part of Hanaka blamed Kazuko for it, even went as far as to detest her. But at the end of the day, Hanaka herself was the one who took it.
“It is a fault of mine that I acknowledge. A wrong I can never make right. Perhaps that’s why the heavens don't look at me anymore,” she spoke truthfully. “But just because I was in the wrong, I wasn’t the only one to blame. That brother of yours left me and Keika all alone with no love to spare. Work and work and work and never once gave an ounce of care for us. And now, I hear that he’s become a saint toward our daughter? Ha! What a joke.”
Kazuko made no rebuttal. Deep down, she must’ve known that the pain her brother caused for Hanaka, maybe to the point where she would agree to even give Keika to her, and yet, at the crux of the trial at court, she chose her brother’s side.
If Kazuko Ryosachi had a weakness, it would be her family. No matter who was right or wrong, she would always prioritize family above all else. A useful trait for clansmen, but a target behind a fool’s back when utilized in the manner she used.
“We’ll have to part here,” Kazuko said, having chosen this flower shop as a potential partner for the Founding Day Festival. “I do hope that you get your life back on track. Maybe even take the opportunity to see Keika at the festival.”
“If what she chose is not noble, then I’m afraid it’ll be fruitless to do so.”
“You won’t know unless you try it. Seeing Keika play might enlighten you with a new perspective.”
“Giving me another piece of advice now?”
“Yup. Just because I gave one bad advice, doesn’t mean it’ll degrade the others that have managed to be helpful, and I rather focus on the good things rather than the bad.”
The two separated, leaving without so much as a smile or a word of goodbye. That was just how it was for both Hanaka and Kazuko, and as far as their relationship extended.
After heading back home, at this shamble of an apartment the family finance was somehow able to afford, the day went about as usual. Hanaka’s relatives nagging at her and demanding for money, their children running around freely devoid of the concept of discipline, and her younger brother, the esteemed clan head, laying on the floor half-naked and halfway through the door with a bottle of booze still in his grasp. Just thinking about how far the Fukuzawa clan had fallen turned Hanaka's stomach inside out, as she then was faced with another burden to the family.
Her father, Muyo Fukuzawa, the former Head of the Fukuzawa Clan, bedridden and attached to clear fluids and monitoring machines. When was the last time he was awake? Hanaka wondered, having forgotten to count the days since her father last opened his eyes.
“If it were up to you, what would you do?” a man standing on the corner asked.
“Unplug them. We’ll be able to survive for another three months if so,” Hanaka answered. “But the Murikami Order would surely discover any tampering and send me to jail right away. Jigokuni ain’t exactly paradise which I assume you’re already well acquainted with.”
“That would be the case if I were ever arrested.”
“Sorry. Your voice is so raspy that I mistaken you for having your throat damaged due to a brawl with an inmate. I heard the denizens of Jigokuni don’t take too kindly to liars and swindlers.”
“And you take me as a liar?”
“Of course I do. However, only the most logical of lies hold some truth to them and yours fit the criteria. You may not have been an inmate of Jigokuni, but you certainly have been through hell despite your rather clean appearance. Not even I could give someone that look for so long.”
Hanaka demonstrated by casting her magic on her father, turning his elderly appearance back to his youthful days, but lasting on a second before he reverted to his old self. I’ve spent too much magion already.
“Do know that just because my relatives have allowed you entry, does not mean you can just come in so casually. Our kind and yours are as different as night and day. Normally, looking at me like that would result in your eyes plucked out. For the law to change is such a pity.”
“I wouldn’t mind doing so,” he said. “Say the word and I’m willing to trade my eye for your cooperation.”
If someone was to be called crazy, then the man in front of her definitely fit the bill.
“Fukuzawa Hanaka, I’ll ask you again, do you wish for things to return to how they were?”
“A low commoner like yourself could not possibly grant me that wish. The heavens deny your existence since the beginning, and while their eyes are now set on your kind, I have faith that the heavens shall once more set their gazes on their righteous blood.”
“So you still haven’t changed your mind,” the man sported a sly-looking smile, as he then took out a silver pendant of swallow, a sparrow, and a falcon chasing flying with their feets tied by a vine.
While Hanaka did not know which clan it was, the sophisticated silver engravings glinted a crimson shimmer near the window, a feature known only of metal forged by the embers of the Ranshao Mountains. They said when the Lhongzie Kingdom’s capital fell to hellfire rain, the heavens blessed its scorched mountains with mystical stones capable of imbuing any metal with the Heart of Flame which shone only upon the heaven’s light.
Moreover, Heart of Flame items chose its owners, with the shimmer ceasing to be once traded to the hands it didn’t find fitting, and only nobles were known to be capable of bringing out its crimson light. Granted, aesthetic and reputation aside, there were no other benefits to owning one, however, this certainly proved that the man in front of her had the backing of another noble. But the question was who?
No ordinary clan could have purchased or let alone discovered such precious treasure. The five high noble clans, in their long three-hundred years of existence, couldn’t even own more than three of them, with the Fukuzawa Clan having only a pair of rings though both were sold due to the Noble Accountability Act. A very tough item to procure, since Heart of Flame items only appeared in secretive auctions and never on the market.
Neither the Fukuzawa nor the Ryuugen Clan could be it, and the Zhou and Minamoto Clan have been utterly obliterated by the instigators of the Great Rebellion, which thus left the Changsha Clan as the remaining suspect. However, their emblem was the Yanqiang Wall located south of Hoshikuni, not the three birds as shown in the pendant he man held.
“Have you heard of the Tenjiyu Clan?” the man answered Hanaka’s question, but Hanaka shook her head, having never heard of the clan. “It’s fine to not know. The Tenjiyu Clan operates in ways no other clan could, which allows us to evade the Noble Accountability Act.”
Hanaka doubted it. No noble clan was safe from the eyes of the Ten Seats. They knew everything there was to know about Hoshikuni. That being said, the Great Rebellion did happen, so perhaps there was a hole in their observation.
“I understand your skepticisms, but it is the truth,” he continued. “In a matter of fact, the Tenjiyu Clan’s success is attributed to a defect, or should I say a principle of Thoth.”
“And who is this Thoth?” her face perplexed, and the man too responded with the same face.
“Oh, did he not tell you? I was so sure that your ex-husband had told you this.”
“He and I have never seen eye to eye during our marriage,” Hanaka replied. That proud and dignified self of his was lost ever since we graduated. I can’t begin to feel the shame his family felt.
“No matter. The Tenjiyu Clan will explain everything you need to know, but in order to do that, cooperation is a necessary aspect for every business deal,” the man extended his hand. “So, may we have your assistance, Fukuzawa Hanaka?”
Many doubts still lingered within Hanaka, knowing full well that this was a bad idea. Everything about the man had been suspicious from the start. However, what other options were there?
Poverty was slowly approaching her door. The insurance money acquired from her father’s death wouldn’t be remotely enough to pay a fifth of the Noble Accountability Act remaining number, and her relatives would surely try to do whatever they could to seize it for their own by any means necessary.
Either I die waiting or die fighting.
As much as she hated it, Hanaka made her decision, accepting the mysterious man’s offer for the small chance of it working and for the family prestige she yearned to regain to be within her grasp at last. No matter the consequences she would face, everything would be absolved once that promise came true.
Where else could dreams come true if not in Hoshikuni?