Inaki held his Diamond hilted sword in hand and tried his best not to cry. He found himself doing that a lot these past few days, and that made him feel like even more of a disappointment.

Takehito and Gonten were training in the garden, and sounds of their pleasant laughter, their conversations, flooded around Inaki, but he did not feel any of their emotions.

He had drunk three cups of Takehito’s tea, and two cups of a spicy, exciting tea, that would keep him awake. The spicy tea made Inaki want to cut things in half, while the calming tea made him want to sleep. The two mixed together to make Inaki feel mostly normal, except for the fact that his hands weren’t as shaky.

What do I have left? Inaki thought as he slashed his shaky hand forward. Hassai was sitting in the room and meditating. He had been sitting in the room while Inaki trained for the past week and a half since Inaki got his sword. He didn’t say anything, but just was there to call the monks to Inaki if he fainted. A host of the healer monks had been called to stay in the castle.

Inaki raised his sword and slashed it once again. The other Hassai, the cruel one, still spoke in his head. “Predictable. You telegraphed that strike like you’re asking an enemy to kill you, now try again.”

The voice in his head had become quieter, but strangely it wasn’t gone. Inaki did not know why. Inaki slashed one more time, and before his anger could take control of him, he sheathed his sword and put it on the stand next to the walls. He took a wooden practice sword, much better to take his anger out on.

He ran his finger over the length of the wooden sword, feeling its wooden ridges in his shaky hands. He remembered once being able to feel the wooden ridges like he was touching his own skin. But now it was foreign to him. Inaki stepped forward and continued his onslaught of slashes, until he began feeling tired. Which was only a few minutes later.

A week and a half of constantly having these stress induced seizures, and instructed Inaki of his limits. Which is why after barely even an hour of training total. He put the sword away.

“Are you done?” Hassai asked, as Inaki put even the wooden practice sword in its stand on the wall.

“Yes father,” Inaki said.

“Today I have invited the monks,” Hassai said. “Maybe see if you’re interested in religion?”

“No,” Inaki said. “How many times have I told you I’m fine with art?”

“It’s my responsibility as a father to make sure that you test out every avenue to see which one you like most,” Hassai said. “What if you are interested more in religion than you are in art?”

“You said that for poetry, accounting, science, politicking and a few more I can’t even remember,” Inaki said. “I think art is enough.”

“Okay, but at least entertain the monks for today,” Hassai said.

“Fine,” Inaki said

Since Inaki fainting had become more regular, Hassai had been following Inaki everywhere to make sure he was well. Inaki wasn’t used to this, and he felt extremely awkward.

“Father, I am going to go and put on some better clothes before I see the monks, you don’t need to trail me all the way,” Inaki said.

“Okay,” Hassai said, then followed Inaki all the way to his room anyway. Inaki got changed into a fresh pair of robes, they were looser than the robes he usually wore, but they were still black swordsman’s robes, with a little bit of embroidery to seem more ‘fancy’. Inaki stepped out of his room to find his father still waiting there.

“We still have a day to cancel the duel,” Hassai said. “My main purpose to get you your sword is so that he doesn’t challenge you, an Iron challenging a Diamond.”

“Father, I can’t run away from this duel,” Inaki said.

“It’s not running away, should I start obliging every clanless Wooden who comes challenging me,” Hassai said.

“No,” Inaki said.

“Then why should an Iron be allowed to challenge you?” Hassai said.

“Because I am not a Diamond,” Inaki said. “I might have been one in the past, but I haven’t been one for nearly three weeks now.”

Inaki stormed off, Hassai followed, leading Inaki through the maze that was the Tomoka castle. Inaki entered the room, and saw that there were two monks, and one of the monks was Takehito.

“Weren’t you just training Gonten,” Inaki said.

“I got done with that,” Takehito said. “Now come on, sit here, let’s talk religion.”

Inaki reluctantly sat down, and they began talking about religion. Just as Inaki thought, it was boring. So boring that Inaki forgot about most of it since most of the talking was done by the other monk, who was so boring that Inaki didn’t even remember his name. Takehito just butt in to make jokes instead of offering anything actually insightful. The monk told Inaki about the beginning of the universe, and the birth and the two hundred year rebirth of Okan, and how our life's purpose is to become like Okan.

When Inaki walked out of the room about an hour or two later, Takehito followed him.

“Do you believe any of that,” Takehito said.

“I don’t care,” Inaki said.

“Exactly what I expected,” Takehito said. “But let me tell you a secret.”

“What,” Inaki said.

“I don’t believe in that stuff either,” Takehito said. “Who is Okan to tell us the purpose of our life?”

“God?” Inaki said.

“Why should God decide your purpose?” Takehito said.

“Okan gives us our talents,” Inaki said. “Our talents become our purpose, thus God decides our purpose.”

“Well said,” Takehito said. “But I disagree.”

“How?”

“Well, a man makes shears, gives it a long handle, with two blades, and sharp, perfect to cut grass. The man then begins selling them. Now shears are much cheaper than swords, so one day, a bandit buys shears from the man, and walks away. And with those shears, he is able to rob, kill and commit all sorts of other crimes. The man, when creating the shears, gave it the purpose of cutting grass, but the shears had other purposes too, undecided by the man.”

“So you’re saying that we can put our talents for unintentional uses?” Inaki said.

“Well, yes,” Takehito said. “Gonten is taking the sword meant to kill, and using it to cut grass, hah, the opposite of the story I just told you.” Takehito then took the next few seconds to laugh at his own statement, and then continued walking, Inaki and his paths diverging.

“I hope you win your duel,” Takehito said before walking away.

Standing in one of the hallways of the oversized Tomoka castle, Inaki didn’t know where to go. What to do. He couldn’t train, there was nothing to do in his room. He kept walking towards his room, not knowing what he was going to do next. His hands began trembling slightly. Gonten had warned Inaki that drinking too much of that tea could be lethal, but he wanted to drink some of it more, to stop the horrible tremor.

He walked into his room, and laid on his bed, he laid there, and stared at the empty ceiling. There was nothing else to do for him.

After some time of lying in bed, Inaki got up and walked into the training hall. It was instinctive to Inaki. In the sea of swords he had nothing to do, so he just sat down and stared at them. The different wooden practice swords, all ornately carved. The steel blades that until recently, Inaki was forbidden from even touching. He looked at the dummy, and saw each of the cuts he had made through its length, almost breaking it, but never enough. Wait, there were new wounds on the dummy.

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Inaki got up and ran to the dummy.

There was another cut on it. Inaki couldn’t believe his eyes, a straight cut through, that was so precise that Inaki nearly didn’t notice it. Just above Hassai’s cut. Was this done too with a wooden blade? Was this done by Hassai when he was bored? Inaki’s mind raced with questions. He couldn’t believe this. It was one thing for Gonten to be better than Inaki as he was in his current state. But how had Gonten in less than a few months shot past even Inaki. Inaki couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He felt a knot forming his stomach. He ran to the wall and picked up his Diamond-hilted sword. Uncaring that this challenge was only for a wooden sword.

Without any proper focus techniques, just running up at it, Inaki swung. His sword hit the wood. The wood splintered, but more than anything, Inaki’s sword cracked. Chips of it flew everywhere, A large enough fragment of it shot at Inaki’s face, reopening one of the scars on his face.

Not just any scar, the scar that Inaki had given himself, in fear of Taral. Inaki held his broken Diamond hilted sword in his hand. He stared at his own reflection in the broken blade and then screamed in anger, rancor, jealousy, hatred.

He threw his sword uncaring where it went and he fell to the ground, a crying, screaming lump. Inaki felt pathetic. Every day was the same. Get up, train, make no progress and go back to sleep. Every day that Inaki spent as this weak shell made him more and more want to fade away. His head was throbbing in pain. He held his head in his arms as he lay sprawled on the ground.

Inaki held his head tighter, and moved his tongue to back of his throat—he had bitten his tongue too many times now. He felt his consciousness slipping.

He woke up in his room, with some of Takehito’s tea at his bedside. Hassai was sitting there, but when he saw that Inaki had woken up, he silently got up. “Your new sword will be here soon,” Hassai said. Inaki wanted to say something, but not only did he not know what to say but he also felt too exhausted to say anything.

Tomorrow was Inaki’s duel. He got up from where he was sleeping. His body still felt a little sluggish from the fainting but he still stepped into the training hall. He saw Gonten in the garden, training alone without Takehito. He had a huge smile on his face, and wasn’t even holding a sword in his hand.

“Oh, I see you’ve woken up, come here, look at this,” Gonten said. “Come look at this.”

Gonten almost had tears in his eyes from happiness, Inaki looked and saw that there was a small flower there, a flower with petals with rings of colors, with an outer purple ring, a middle red ring, and an inner yellow ring. It was unlike any flower that Inaki had ever seen in his life, and he couldn’t name it.

“What is this,” Inaki said, in awe of the plant's beauty. “It’s beautiful.”

“It’s a rare plant, you can’t find it anywhere else in the entire Province. It’s a Trinitimum, because of the three colors. Takehito got these seeds last year at the Great White Peaks. He gave me a few seeds.”

“It’s wonderful,” Inaki said.

“I know,” Gonten said.

Inaki stepped back, and was about to walk back into the training hall and said, “Gonten, were you the one who sliced the dummy?”

“Oh yes, you want to see,” Gonten said.

“Yes,” Inaki said.

“Well, I hope that yesterday wasn’t a fluke.” Gonten said, grabbing a wooden sword from one of the walls. Seeing him hold the wooden sword in one hand was amazing. Takehito had completely changed him, giving him a brilliant poise.

Gonten held the wooden sword out, and after a few seconds of focusing on the dummy, he ran at it. He jumped up and slashed. Gonten cut through it as if it was nothing.

“Bravo,” Hassai said, clapping, as he entered the room.

“Father,” Inaki said, bowing. Gonten bowed too, smiling.

Gonten put his sword down and went to grab the glue. “A little help here,” Gonten said. Inaki ran to Gonten, and held the broken half of the dummy. Gonten put the glue there, and then Inaki put the dummy on top of the stump, fixing the dummy, which now had three distinct yet subtle cuts, all close to each other.

It pained Inaki, that none of those three were from him.

Inaki spent the next hour training, it was as fruitless as it was yesterday, and the day before that, and the day before that. Every single day since his injury was as fruitless as the previous.

That night, when Inaki was about to go to sleep, it was the first time that Inaki felt scared before a duel—fighting Platinum’s notwithstanding—and he didn’t know how his fight would go.

Was it worth it? Taral’s voice rang in his mind as he slept.

Inaki woke up the next morning in a cold sweat. His duel would be in the afternoon. Inaki rushed into the training hall without even going to eat breakfast. He picked up a wooden practice sword and frantically began swinging. He hadn’t drank the tea, and his anxiety meant his arms were even more shaky than usual.

Inaki didn’t know what to do. He practiced his katas, but kept falling over. Then soon enough, he realized he had hit his limit that he could do without fainting, and then there was no training left for him to do.

He was feeling anxious, he wanted to run, do something. But there was nothing for him to do. He was a Diamond, yet his fear was the same as when he fought Taral.

He didn’t even know who Gero was. Yet he might as well have been a Sage instead of an Iron. Inaki dropped his sword to the ground, and ran into the garden. Takehito and Gonten were sitting there, and just meditating on the grass.

“Care to join us,” Takehito said, opening one of his eyes.

“I thought you don’t believe in all of this,” Inaki said.

“I don’t believe in Okan,” Takehito said. “I do believe in myself, and meditation is just a conversation with myself. Come on, sit down.”

I have enough conversations with myself.

But since Inaki didn’t have much else to do, he sat down and meditated. Takehito gave instructions, and Inaki followed. Taking deep breaths in. Imagining his spirit expand exponentially with each inhale, and only becoming slightly smaller with every exhale. At first he imagined his spirit fitting in the garden, but soon it became too big for it, the entire clan, then the entire Province, then the continent, the size of the planet, then the stars, and soon, Inaki felt his spirit become one with the heavens.

He then opened his eyes feeling calmed.

“All the best for your duel today,” Takehito said, smiling. Then he turned to Gonten and began talking about plants. Inaki couldn’t understand any of the words they were saying, they seemed to be talking about plants with more complicated names than any swordform.

Inaki stepped into the training hall, and then walked through the castle. He went to the room where all the Tomokas sat in rows, and ate their breakfast together. Very few people were still there, but at least Inaki was early enough to actually get something to eat.

Inaki then walked out of the castle to the temple dueling arena, and saw Hassai sitting there ready. Inaki’s opponent would be there in an hour or so, and Inaki had nothing better to do but sit there. Waiting for his opponent to arrive.

Hassai was looking extremely sad, Inaki did not know why, which is why he walked up to his father and said, “Father, are you sad because I refused to cancel the duel?”

“No,” Hassai said. “I am sad because I am—no, I was—a very bad person.”

“What happened,” Inaki said.

“Your mother, she has left the castle,” Hassai said. “She has moved away to a house of her own, and is going to continue living there.”

“What happened,” Inaki asked.

“I was a very bad man to her. I’ll tell you the details after your duel. Now come on.”

After some more time of waiting, doing nothing but thinking, Gero arrived.

“My name is Gero-son-Jotar Heoin, and I am here to challenge the Great Swordsman Inaki-son-Hassai Tomoka to a duel.”

“Then we decide the terms of the duel,” Hassai said. “Due to the injury that my son is still recovering from, the duel shall be fought with wooden practice swords. the duel shall be till three points, where every attack landed is one point. That and leaving the arena, and submission will count as a loss.“

“Fine by me,” Gero said.

Gero was a thin spindly youth, a few years older than Inaki. Hassai handed him a wooden practice sword, and allowed him to examine it. Hassai gave Inaki a practice sword and allowed him to examine it.

Inaki took a deep breath in, and stepped into the ring.

He was shaking, his hands trembled even more than usual, and Gero had a huge smile on his face seeing this, but only honorable words came out of his mouth.

“Are you ready,” Gero said.

“Yes,” Inaki said.

“Then let the duel commence,” Hassai said.

Inaki entered the bullstance, which he hoped he would be most comfortable in, since it was a more grounded stance. Inaki rushed at Gero and slashed, but his hands meant that his slash went wild. Gero easily dodged it, and slashed at Inaki’s neck.

Inaki tried to dodge it, but instead of dodging it, he hit the ground. Inaki rolled as Gero slashed at him. Inaki tried his best to stand up, but the first time he tried he fell again. The second time he tried he was able to properly stand up.

Gero rushed at Inaki, and slashed at him. The Heoin used the animal stances too, so Gero was using Cheetahstance, which was probably the perfect stance to fight Inaki, since his problem was being able to keep up with speed. Though he probably couldn’t defeat even a man with a strength-based stance.

Inaki tried to block, but it was in vain. He felt his shoulder bruise.

“One Point to Gero,” Hassai said. The point announcement didn’t mean that Gero needed to stop, his onslaught continued. He rammed his sword forward, right in Inaki’s sternum. He screamed in pain, as he stepped back.

“Two points to Gero,” Hassai screamed.

Inaki tried his best to dodge but the next one, a swift strike to the hip, hit him hard. He fell to the ground. Defeated in barely a few seconds.

“Three points to Gero. Winner, Gero,” Hassai screamed.

“Thank you,” Gero said, bowing at Hassai. “I thought you were injured, but what injury causes this?” he whispered to Inaki. He then walked away with an unsatisfied look on his face.

Inaki looked at Gero walking away, and felt his consciousness leave him.