Chapter 4: The Flame Deity
Satoshi fell asleep on the ground, his stomach making miserable noises. He dreamed a about a delicious menagerie of food, from yakisoba with noodles and vegetables to egg rolls filled witth shrimp and cabbage, making his mouth water. Satoshi woke up and put a hand to his stomach, feeling absolutely wretched. He tried showing human principles to Kohaku, but he had been so stupid and stubborn and insisted that he ddin’t need the food and he wouldn’t touch it.
I should’ve taken the food, Satoshi thought forlornly to himself. Now I’m laying on the ground, without a soft blanket and my stomach is cramping because I’m so miserable with hunger. Kohaku was right, my human notions have no sense out in the wild. Why does my stupid pride get the better of me?
As these depressive thoughts started to make his way in his mind, Satoshi began hearing the voice of the aragami that corrupted him years ago, and Satoshi put his hands to his head, trying to block out the noise, though the voice continued to mock him uninterrupted.
Give into your dark impulses, the voice said to Satoshi. You could always kill the deity and eat her flesh. She was going to eat you, right? In the law of the wild, it’s either eat or be eaten. Dine on her, and you will become immortal.
Satoshi shook his head frantically. That voice always suggested lunatic things to him when he was sleeping or in a moment of weakness. He convinced himself he wouldn’t let the darkness overtake him, though Satoshi felt certain he could feel the curse marks creeping their way across his body.
After his fitful half sleeping half dreaming, Satoshi became fully awake when Kohaku roused him from sleep. Before him was a bounty of food, a cornucopia of a delectable fruits in every color. Satoshi blinked tiredly, before saying, “Where’d you get this, Kohaku?”
“Don’t concern yourself with the details,” Kohaku said absentmindedly while she idly played wit her tail in humanoid form. “If you’re worried that I stole it, don’t worry. I didn’t. Just help yourself and eat. I knew that you were starving.”
Satoshi looked at Kohaku, then the bounty of fruit, before he took a handful of grapes and began popping each seed into his mouth. It was bursting with sweetness an dSatoshi almost cried at the sheer taste of delicious food. He looked at Kohaku curiously. Where could have Kohaku gotten all this fruit from? She must’ve searched very far, as Satoshi didn’t notice any area where fruit grew in this amount and in this bounty. Still, he musn’t question it. Food was food, and he was going to survive after all.
Satoshi bit into the flesh of a pale pink fruit that was sweet beyond words. It was delicious, and it was the greatest bounty of fruit that he’d ever seen—like something that you’d see served up to the Emperor himself, rather than an exiled Elementalist Prince. Once Satoshi suckled his fingers to get the last remnants of juice, Kohaku looked off into the distance.
Satoshi stood by her side and asked her, “What are you thinking of, Kohaku?”
“I’m just wondering about the journey that lies ahead of us,” Kohaku said, before she turned to face him. “You believe that finding all the Deities in the world will help remove your curse, don’t you?”
“I’ve got to try,” Satoshi said, before looking down at his hands. “To be honest, I’m not so sure. I’ve heard about the great powers of the Deities and the miracles that they perform…but this curse is strong. What if I find all the Deities and they can’t help cure me of my curse after all?”
“You can’t let self-doubt get in the way of your thinking,” Kohaku said while shaking her head, and she bit Satoshi on the arm his her wolf form.
“Yowch! What was that for?”
“For feeling self-doubt. As said, a wolf doesn’t concern herself with the thoughts of sheep. Stand tall and proud, and move ever onward on your path. It doesn’t matter if it’s the best choice of the worst choice, or if it’s a choice that seems to be a waste of time—all that matters is that you put your heart into it and you’ve taken a step forward from where you were yesterday. If a wolf concerned herself with such thoughts, then she would never survive in the wild. So learn to think like a wolf, Satoshi.”
“I see,” Satoshi said. “Once again it looks like I’m in your debt again, Kohaku.”
“Don’t mention it,” Kohaku said before she stretched her limbs and arched her back to work out the cramps in them after sitting so stiffly for so long. “So how do you figure that you will find these Deities? Do you have some sort of plan?”
“Not in particular,” Satoshi said as he slumped his shoulders forward. Not having a plan could prove to be fatal, and the curse within him was only growing stronger. He needed to find a cure soon—though at least he stopped feeling self doubt. It seemed that every time that he felt a sense of self doubt, the darkness within him would rise and that voice would whisper sweet temptations and vices to him to stray from the path of a human and to that of a demon. He wouldn’t allow that to happen! He just couldn’t! His mother spared his life, and for that he must give back to her and honor her for her sacrifice. Surely she lost her position as the head of the Hiroyuki.
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“I need to learn the powers of the Deities so that I can get rid of this curse,” Satoshi murmured to himself. “So first I must find an Oracle who divines to these deities, right? But hm, I would have to travel across the world for that…and I have nothing but the clothes on my back. I need to find expenses such as funding a sailor to sail us to the North Pole for the Water Deity. Though…I hear that there are two Oracles for the Water Deity?”
“That’s what I’ve last heard,” Kohaku said as she sniffed the air before letting out a great yawn. “But how do you propose that we raise the money for getting a ship there?”
Satoshi thought about it for a while, before saying, “I could always find a town or something. Maybe they’ll have work there.”
“There is a town nearby,” Kohaku said, before she leaned down on all fours and presented her back to him again. Satoshi got on, and then Kohaku traversed the wild greenalnds like the wind. When the greenery faded away into little settlements and huts along the way, Satoshi knew that they reached a small civilization where he could gather his bearings and talk to the people there. When Satoshi arrived, an Elder male hailed him on the back of Kohaku.
“Kohryu?” The Elder said, stroking his long mane of a beard. “Is that you?”
“I’m afraid I’m not he,” Satoshi said. “Though I am his son.”
“Then you must be…Satoshi-kun. Ah yes, I have foreseen this meeting. Forgive me, I am an Oracle that sees many different pats and futures. The whisper from the flames have told me that a person of great importance will come back to this village and help solve our dilemma.”
“Dilemma? What kind of dilemma?”
The Oracle stroked his beard again, before saying. “I’m sure that you’re weary from your journey. Please help yourself to my humble adobe and get something to eat and drink. Then we will discuss the matter further, after you’ve been fed and get a clean bath.”
Satoshi nodded, before he made his way to the Oracle’s humble adobe. He washed and cleansed himself in the wash basin, using scented soap to scour away the dirt that creeped on his flesh, before putting on his clothes again. When he made his way to the dining hall, the Oracle was ther waiting for him with a bounteous feast of fruits and vegetables that was befitting for the arrival of someone of great importance. Satoshi marveled that this must’ve been a village that revered and loved his father for his good deeds.
“I’m actually on a quest searching for my father,” Satoshi said. “And I seek the various Deities of the world to learn the elements and hopefully gain control over this curse that has hold over me.”
“Ah yes, the curse,” the Oracle said, looking at Satoshi thoughtfully. “It’s a very strong one. I think that through the power of all Deities you will be able to achieve something important and get rid of the curse. It all has to do with teh Final Element, though no one knows what that is. People have sought on long hard journies trying to seek this Element, and have died without ever knowing it. Still, young Satoshi…you’re seeking Master Kohryu? We have not known where he has disappeared too, though he disappeared as soon as the Eclipse that threatened to overtake the world started to shadow the realm, though he hasn’t been seen since. In fact, it was sixteen years ago that our beloved Flame Deity was frozen…”
Satoshi cocked his head. “The Flame Deity? Frozen? How is that possible?”
The Oracle shook his head, before continuing on. “A corrupt Elementalist used powerful Ice Magic to seal the Fire Deity. The Ice Magic is slowly eating away at the Flame Deity’s magical reservoirs, and it weakens and is going to be in a state of permanent sleep soon enough; in a state of neither death nor life, but rather a half-existence with it’s flames snuffed out.”
“I see, that’s terrible. I will do anything I can to help. In order to help your people and save the Flame Deity.”
“Yes,” The Oracle breathed. “There’s also something else that you must know, Son of Kohryu Hiroyuki. The Deities throughout the world have been weakened and sealed away from their powers. You may not know this, though the Oracles have communicated through one another through dreams say that the Deities have weakened. Mankind is building their terrible structures of steel and weaopnry, things that may surpass the Deity’s power if left unchecked…”
“Man has grown so far that he seeks to surpass the power of the gods?” Satoshi questioned, and the Oracle nodded.
“The world is changing…the magic is being depleted from the land. Which may explain the weakening of the deities. The landscape and world has changed so much…though it was probably inevtiable that the Ecipse would take its course. For you see, Kohryu Hiroyuki hasn’t completely stopped the Eclipse, but merely delayed the effects of it. But soon…an Eclipse will shadow the world, and leave the world in darkness due to mankind’s darkness and greed…”
Satoshi remained silent for a while, contemplating of what he should do. Though Kohaku remained in her wolf form, she seemed rather restless and wanted to say something, though she continued to keep up the guise of being his pet dog.
“I will find a way to unfreeze the Flame Deity,” Satoshi said. “It there anyway to nullify the Ice Magic that surrounds it?”
“There is a way,” The Elder said. “Though it will be a treacherous journey indeed. It involves going to a mysterious island where the moon is always red. The moon that oversees that island gives an anti-magic residue that might surely melt the frost from the Flame Deity, though it’s very dangerous to go there…those who have attempted it have always failed.”
“I need to bring back the Deities,” Satoshi said as he stood up, with a firm resolve in his eyes. “To be able to get rid of this curse that afflicts me. I will find a way to do it, Oracle. I swear I will.”
“Then I shall help you.”