Chapter 7: Life, Redux_Reincarnated As A Peasant

Chapter 7: Life, Redux

Genji - aka: Sakura

I woke on a shifting mountain. Something under me swayed with a momentum I had never felt before. My body ached, and my head felt like it was about to split open as both the ground under me, and my head swayed slowly back and forth.

“Where am I?” I asked, as I tried to open my eyes. All I found was blackness and tiny pinpricks of light far above me. They shifted and danced in a beautiful display that only worsened my dizziness.

“The stars,” I whispered to myself as my vision refocused on the twinkling black up above, and stopped swaying as badly. I found my voice cracked, my throat dry. The sight was gripping. A beautiful display I didn’t expect to experience again after—

A hand gently brushed my long, black hair away. And a beautiful face of a woman who was clearly mixed race stared down at me. She looked half Chinese and half Korean. Or perhaps another of the Indo-Pacific groups that I wasn’t familiar with. Her smile was as wide as the world and her eyes lit up like companions to the wheeling stars overhead.

“Ren! Ren, our daughter is awake!” The woman spoke softly but emphatically. It was then I realized I was resting my head on the woman's lap. When I tried to sit up, she shushed me and gently guided me back down. I simply didn’t have the strength to fight her.

Daughter, who does this woman think she—

Memories flooded my mind. Memories of another life, of another me. A girl with my last name, as her first, and who had a very privileged, and even sheltered existence. That is, until . . . until. . .

“Calm yourself, daughter. You are safe.” Yu gently ran her fingers through the ends of my hair in a comforting, and familiar gesture.

The woman, this woman’s name was Yu. She had been my mother. No, she had been the other girl’s mother. Loving, kind, and perhaps a little over indulgent. She was Yu, of the house of Gamra, of which I, Sakura, was scion.

Sakura. My last name from Earth.

Now was my first name. Or, one of my first names? The memories mixed and faded into a fog. I felt my mind and this other girl’s life twisting around each other, slowly integrating. But the process was confusing.

It was a girl, a young girl. And she had been named for much the same reason as I. Sakura in Japanese meant cherry blossom, and she, the girl from this world, had been named so for the trees that grew on the back of the—

Giant tortoise city?

Where the hell am I?

“Ga—mera?” I whispered up at the stars in the eyes of the woman I now knew as mother. My confusion slowly ebbing, and the exhaustion I felt in every limb of my body preventing me from properly reacting.

“Yes, daughter. We are returning home. Close your eyes and rest. The stars won’t go anywhere.” Yu’s face disappeared for a moment and I could hear her speaking with someone else.

“Yu! How is our daughter?” A man's voice came from not far away.

“Sakura’s fever has broken. The healer's medicine has worked.”

“Oh, thank the Gods and Spirits. We will offer sacrifices and offerings when we return.” I heard genuine relief in the man's baritone voice. “I will sacrifice an entire herd of cattle and appease every spirit and god in my lands. A grand feast for all. My daughter lives.” His voice choked up, and after a moment, I could hear soft sobs fill the night air as the man worked to regain control of himself. Once he did, my new mother spoke in a teasing voice.

“We only have one herd of cattle, dear.” Yu sounded amused.

“Ha! So we do. Perhaps my pride, and joy, overrode my sense for a moment. But we will have a feast, and we will give many offerings of coin, blood, chie, and magic to all the Gods and spirits. And I will personally inscribe a letter to the emperor and his line thanking them for the healer they pay for at the royal court. With that letter I will include Sakura’s first weaving of silk, chie, and mana made from the finest materials I can find.”

As his proclamations grew more reasonable, I began remembering things from Sakura’s life. This was her father, now my father, from this world. Sakura, the girl whose body I was now inhabiting and whose memories I had inherited, loved and respected Ren. He was a kindly man who doted on her, even more than Yu did.

Which I remembered, had caused Sakura’s illness.

“Mana poisoning.” I whispered, and my mother’s starry eyes brimmed with tears.

“Yes Sakura. That was what the healer said you had. We—your father and I failed you. We allowed you to go too long without learning how to manage your mana. Instead, allowing you to focus on your chie cultivation, and your work among the lower castes. You have a kind heart my daughter, and we only wanted to allow it to grow.” The look of guilt on the woman’s face pained me almost more than the throbbing that was slowly growing in my head.

“Our lack of discipline in this allowed your mana to build, and rage a fever in your body. The only reason you survived as long as you have, is your chie cultivation. The Iron stage at your age is impressive, even the royal healer thought so.” There was pride in her eyes, as well as shame.

“Instead of learning to harness the power of magic as is our duty, your power grew out of control and nearly killed you.” Ren’s voice came from a small distance away. “But you’re on the mend now girl. Sleep, and when you wake we’ll talk more.”

Bits and pieces of what they were saying came to me in flashes. Sakura, or the version of myself from this world, had been among the poor helping to build infrastructure and provide employment opportunities by opening up small businesses, investing in farms, and new technology. Things that were often seen as unnecessary thanks to the prevalence of cultivators among the nobility, and even among some of the higher members of the merchant classes.

The last one I remembered working on was a small textile mill along a small stream on the fringes of our family’s territory. The project had gone well, and during the community celebration I. Or rather, Sakura, collapsed with a fever so intense the wet rag the peasants had brought to cool me had literally produced steam.

The memory of it sent shivers down my spine.

Whatever was going on was very strange. What this place was, who this girl inside my head was, was going to take a while to sort out and get used to. On top of that I was exhausted, and my body was covered in cold sweat. The fever it seemed, had broken only recently.

“I see.” Was all I could think to say.

I tried not to sound disappointed, or despondent. But my body was so tired, and my mind was reeling with the new memories and information. I was sure some of what I was feeling leaked into my voice, as my mother, Yu covered her eyes before her tears could fall on me.

“We promise Sakura. When we return home, your studies into magic will take precedence until you have achieved full control over it.” Yu grabbed me lightly and pulled me up into a hug.

It was then that I realized, this girl's body was, well, just that. I was in the body of a teenager. Not even that, as Sakura from my memories was only twelve years old.

“I know that upsets you Sakura. But, if you let him, I am sure your brother will take up your little work projects until you are safe.” Ren was trying to be placating, yet firm. It was amusing, given what I now knew of the man.

But if my memories of Sakura’s brother were to be right, he would turn them into some kind of competition.

Genji, my old self, didn’t mind that idea.

People should prove that they were worthy of opportunities such as loans to start a small business, rather than them being handed out based on need. That was something my experience among Communist China had taught me through negative experiences. Dolling opportunities out to people based on blood, was as equally unjust as handing them out based on nothing more than need.

Meritocratic competition, as long as it was fair, was not always a bad thing. No matter what the Party said. It ensured the right resources got into the hands of those best suited to use them.

It was a lesson I could only recognize now, with Sakura’s memories and education. The part of me that was Sakura, when exposed to the memories of Communist China, its inefficiencies, corruption, graft, and naked use of power to suppress the weak, was revolted. But still there were many good things to be taken from my former home. Unity, willingness to work for the greater good, and more.

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The Sakura side of me didn’t think that people should have to earn the ability to simply provide for their families. To earn the right to work. Every person had the right to put in the effort needed to support themselves. Not to free handouts, but rather the ability to create, to serve, and to profit from it. In short, a right one’s own labor.

It was essential to any working society and system. And . . . and there was so much more.

I could feel the stirring of new thoughts I had never conceived of before. New ways of thinking, that my jaded Genji self wasn’t exactly ready to confront or tackle just yet.

“I, I need to sleep.” I said, as my vision swooned again.

Yu offered me some water, and I drank the traveling skin nearly dry. Then, satisfied, I curled up in her lap and drifted quickly into deep sleep.

***

When I woke, the sun was high in the sky. Yu was gone from where I had last seen her. When I finally forced my sore body to sit up, I nearly shrieked.

I was riding on top of a giant, lumbering tortoise. A creature easily the size of the metro train I took into work every morning.

Or, used to.

I had to bite my tongue to keep from yelling in terror. Which only caused me to make some rather unpleasant pain related sounds that I also tried to stifle.

“Sakura? Sakura, are you alright?”

Yu stood from outside the basket that had been tied to the top of the tortoise’s shell to provide a safe riding space. She had been sitting next to Ren, who was sitting at the front end of the creature’s shell. He was holding tight to a set of rains embedded in the shell's underside.

I knew from Sakura’s memories that those reigns couldn’t actually hurt the beast. What they did was instead provide very light pressure on the base of its neck to tell it which direction its rider wished to go.

The swaying stopped, and Ren stood up and joined Yu at the basket’s edge peaking over its sides to check on me. “Are you alright daughter?”

It took me a few slow breaths to get control of myself. I knew I couldn’t let on I wasn’t these peoples daughter. Well, I mean, wasn’t i? I had her memories, and her thoughts and body. The only thing different about me was the fact that I had lived an entire life of hellish toil and poverty in a completely different world.

One without giant tortoises.

I decided I knew these people enough I could and probably should at least tell some of the truth.

“I, I didn’t realize we were riding one of the great shells. Father.”

Ren and Yu’s faces went from concern, to needing to cover their nearly instant smiles.

“Oh. Yes, well. We took Crash instead of a carriage because, well, he is faster and more sturdy than any team of horses. No matter what your uncle says.” Ren winked and, failed, to suppress a smile as he turned back to take up guiding the massive Crash. Crash was the pet name for the giant creature.

When my mother joined him, I could hear them talking as Crash picked up his long, swaying steps and the pressure from the wind on my face increased.

“The healer did say her mind might not be the same after the fever.” Ren said in a hushed tone. “At least, for a while.”

“Do you think it is as bad as that? That she will be a different person then she once was?”

There was a long pause as Ren thought before he spoke. Something that I found rather admirable about the man I now knew as father.

“The healer said that a change in personality, or a difficulty in recalling the past, might happen. Either way, we have our daughter back. She is alive, and, Gods and spirits willing, she will continue to recover. Let us be thankful for that and navigate the waters of that recovery as we come to them.”

I heard the sounds of ruffling cloth and peaked over the lip of the basket they had left me in. I saw Yu had sidled up next to Ren, and held him close. Like he was her life raft amid a storm.

“As you say, husband. We will do this together. No matter what comes.”

***

The rest of that afternoon, as we traveled towards what my memories called home I sat and meditated.

Shia, my mother from Earth, had taught me this trick to dealing with stress. It was a practice that I had abandoned for some time. But looking into my new memories as Sakura, I found that meditation in this world granted far more benefits than simple stress relief.

As I sat trying to ‘cultivate’ for the first time, I felt someone sit next to me in the basket. I opened my eyes and found Yu sitting in the same pose as me, smiling slightly and patiently waiting for me to finish whatever it is I was supposed to have been doing.

“Trying to cultivate after such an extreme illness might prove difficult.”

I knew what cultivation was of course, thanks to my new memories. Sakura was practically a genius at the art, having reached the Iron stage, the third stage of cultivation, before she was even a teenager. My Genji self on the other hand, was just trying to sort through my memories and thoughts about what had happened.

“Oh. I am simply meditating, mother. As you and father said before, it would be wise to focus my energies on preventing another bout with mana poisoning.”

Yu’s smile was genuine. “I’m glad you have seen wisdom my daughter. In truth, your father and I were worried we would meet some resistance from you on this topic.”

I took a long moment to consider that, sorting through Sakura’s thoughts and trying my best to guess how she would have responded. “I . . . I feel I must pick my battles. I am sufficiently ahead in cultivation among my peers that switching that focus to learning to control and use magic would not be an imposition.”

This child was remarkably formal when she was upset with her parents in the memories I had of her. She didn’t yell or scream or cry. She did those things in private.

No, Sakura attacked things from a logical empirical perspective. Applying logic where other twelve-year-olds might apply tears.

None of that was to say that she didn’t have emotions. She certainly did. Sakura had been driven by what she saw as injustice in the world. She loved her family, but also saw many of their policies as backwards, or unjust. Perhaps not cruel per se, but lacking in nuance and steeped in slow to adapt traditions.

If the Genji version of myself had been a survivor, having the will to cling to life despite being forced into the edges of society? Sakura was one to bend reality to suit her sense of justice through sheer force of will, and logic.

And I honestly wasn’t sure how to balance the two. At least, not yet.

“I . . . see.” Yu stiffened in a way that I recognized as familiar. She was preparing for a battle of logic with her daughter and her body language screamed ‘here we go again’. “And what battle, as you put it, do you wish to reserve your strength for?”

“My economic diversification projects of course.” The poverty relief efforts were ones that I felt my new parents’ lands desperately needed. “We rely too heavily on agriculture and animal husbandry.”

The words were unfamiliar to my tongue, but to Sakura, the girl who now was a part of me in every way as much as Genji was, they were filled with meaning and importance.

“During drought years, we have been forced to abandon the smaller outlying villages, forced to consolidate our people on the efforts of extracting as much value as we can from the Kame, and Gamera. A little diversification might help us cling to those settlements in a more permanent fashion and save us the expense of having to reinstall peasants, cultivator lords, and the like every few years.”

Yu’s expression turned confused for a moment. “What do you mean?” I felt my heart race. Here was an opportunity to explain my, explain Sakura’s project and its impact!

“The project I had been working on before my illness is a perfect example to demonstrate my point mother! You see, it will help the entire northern forested region. We added a sawmill, which will allow them to produce a steady stream of high and mid quality wood. Instead of just timber. Allowing the area to bring in more coin that the local lords can reinvest in rejuvenating agricultural methods. As well as water reclamation efforts. Trust me, next time there is a drought, we will have half the refugees we would normally have from that region.”

I watched as a set of complex emotions ran over Yu’s face. The Genji side of me picked up on the subtle hints of her annoyance and displeasure at being forced to confront uncomfortable truths that might make her look bad. The skills I had picked up to ensure my bosses back home, like Mr. Lee who had given no reason to fire me.

While the Sakura side of myself recognized the slight quirk of a smile, and the tension leaving her shoulders. Slowly being replaced with mild annoyance at old arguments and disagreements, for what they were.

Relief that I, or rather her daughter, was not gone completely. In short, her body language was screaming her relief, love, and familiar ground tread too often.

“We will have to speak to your father. But, if you will work as diligently at your mana control as you were at your cultivation? It might convince us to allow you to resume your . . . work among the poverty-stricken. But only once we are sure you are in no more danger.”

I smiled, something Sakura did when she got her way. Which, with these two, was most of the time. It helped that the girl was wildly competent and trustworthy. “Thank you, mother.”

“Good, now no more talk about matters best left to merchants.” Her mother’s disdain for economics was clearly written on her face. A moment later and the flash of disgust was gone. “If you are healthy enough to win such a battle with me, then you are strong enough to begin your work with magic.”

Yu smiled wickedly, and my heart skipped a beat. Ren was by far the better cultivator of the two. That fact had largely been why Sakura had so heavily focused on the art. Ren was only a middling cultivator by Duckal standards, but he was an excellent teacher. Something that had brought their house much acclaim and fortune during his leadership. Learning under Ren had been both easy, and unbelievably rewarding.

Her, my, mother on the other hand, was one of the most renowned enchanters and magic users in the southern kingdom.

And a terrible teacher.

I had seen what she did to her apprentices. The constant stress, the exacting standards, and nights of tears and hardship. More than a few scions tutored under her only to leave a few weeks later to find more approachable teachers.

“Now, don’t think because I am your mother I will take it easy on you. You will learn, or you will shame us all. As your parents, we might not have insisted on your learning up until now, and that is our fault. But we begin making up for it here. That being said, you never once sought me out for a lesson. You have some blame to share, so I expect your best effort. Understood?”

I nodded and swallowed the lump that had already begun growing in my throat. My mother scared me.

“Good. Close your eyes, and let us begin.”

Chapter 7: Life, Redux

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