The Month of the Monkey, 759
Temple of Lost Gods

It was raining outside, heavily. Osano Wo's rage could be felt with the shaking of the wood every time the thunderer let loose another bolt. The monks who tended to this place had all but locked everything up to bed down for the night when the guest arrived to pray to the fortunes here. There had been confusion, shock and even a little consternation. Nobody was accustomed to guests coming to this place, least of all ronin with not but the clothes on their back and a few humble offerings to the gods here. Yet, the monks were honor bound to fulfill their duties to this place, and when she had offered to tend to the cleaning in the facilities that night in return for the privilege, they had been more willing to comply with her requests.

This place was quiet, even by the standards of its usual sparse foot traffic. Savage hordes from the north had only recently been fully repelled from these lands and the Dragon, so travelers were few and far between anywhere, least of all ronin. Yet, somehow, this woman had travel documents with her signed by an ambassador of the Dragon, and one from the Phoenix that would run through the fall months. How a ronin had acquired the chop of someone like Agasha Poemu was beyond these men, but apparently she had managed to convince others to vouch for her, and was bold enough to travel alone through the war ravaged lands, following some time after the wyrms and their riders were cast back to the North.

For their part, the monks had done their due diligence for the day and wanted nothing more than to sleep off the wretched, hot summer storm that was pouring down around them. The one serving on duty bowed low to the woman whose name he had already forgotten and thanked her softly for sweeping up afterwards before closing the door, leaving her in peace and privacy as she hung her straw cloak and hat to dry nearby. There were rooms, he had said, in the building adjacent, and she was welcome to claim an unoccupied one for the night. Nobody really expected her to stay. No one ever did.

The doors clicking shut left the room a hollow, grave sort of silence. It was a place that was forgotten, and for good reason. She did not understand the history of this place, that she had been within mere miles of the man responsible for its existence or the fortunes within. History was not her strong point, and she no longer had any interest in it, but what she did not know in terms of the history of those enshrined in this place, she made up for in first hand experience with the weight of an Imperial Decree, what it could do to the fabric of reality.

By an Imperial Decree, a people could be proclaimed to no longer be a clan, and to be made part of another, and if that clan made a choice that altered the very state of their people's souls, then that Imperial Decree could change them forever, by no will of their own, by no kharmic debt that they owed, as a result of no action that they took. They need only have existed and the Emperor and their agent, the Clan Champion could proclaim it, and it was so. It was the only way that the Fortune of Dung could possibly have existed.

Tengoku had no need for Fortunes to watch over foolish things like Leather, Torture or Dung. As she walked between each of the altars, she marked them all, every last one of the thirteen shrines focused on some filthy, shameful thing that would never have needed the tending of a god to observe it, to protect people from it or provide blessings within it. What did people need a shrine to the Fortune of Dung for, to beg them to never step in such things themselves? It was insulting, and such a Fortune must have had a very lonely, futile and above all eternal existence. It was an act of torture.

Only an Emperor could be so cruel. Only an Emperor could be so bold. Only an Emperor could make the order stick. The blood of the kami's favored son conferred upon it a power that no mortal man possessed. It moved even the Sun and Moon to obey, moved the ancestors to acknowledge and bow. When the Emperor decreed, the heavens moved. Perhaps Hantei Genji, son of the glorious Hantei himself had truly, fully understood the gravity of what it was to bear the blood of a god in his veins, to serve as the guardian and shepherd of heaven's authority in Ningen Do. She would like to have believed that he did, if the old stories of his magnanimity were true.

But that was Hantei II, and today the young Hantei XXIII sat upon the throne with his regent mother behind him. The blood had thinned and human frailty infected its mind and will. Whatever nobility the Shining Prince Genji had held, it was not shared in such purity in generations to come, and however blasphemous it was to think this, the woman standing there did not think of the emperors today as anything more than men, mortal fools who did foolish things. The Steel Chrysanthemum had been a raging, angry and bitter monster out to reconquer his empire even after death. Hantei XXII had been a fool who did not imagine the implications of his choices. No, they were long and far from the Shining Prince, but the power that they wielded was as potent now as it ever had been, because Heaven obeyed that authority, and what was decreed by the Son of Heaven on Earth was accepted as divine Law above.

The woman brought out a bowl and drew one of her scrolls from it. She began with a humble prayer to Inari, a fortune who was indeed loved in the empire. Who did not love the fortune of rice? And yet, she begged him to turn his head towards his 'kin' in a moment of pity. The prayer was answered in kind, as it so often was, and there a quantity of rice was arrayed before her in small little balls held by nori. Simple, flavorless fare, but fitting as an offering to gods who were never cared for. She knelt first before the fortune of Dung's shrine and clapped her hands. How often did anyone ever try to get his attention? Tojo was a man's name. It was a him, right? She placed before him a cup of sake and a pair of the rice balls, kneeling and praying in a soft murmur.

“I need nothing from you, other than that you guard my feet as I walk the streets in the next week, to keep them clean of offal, great fortune,” she whispered softly, her voice etched with pity. “But I wished... to offer this to you as a gift. I too know the power of the word of heaven in mortal lips. I pray that your service in the heavens would be less onerous. Please accept the prayers of one who has become little more than dung herself, offal the empire would wash itself free of...”

She continued, one after the other. There were thirteen of them, one of them far newer than the others, and each of them was as bad as the previous one. She tried to come up with a prayer, something to think to ask. Perhaps to ask that the Fortune of Torturer would keep the magistrates far from her, that her flesh would never be violated by the torturer's tools. Yes, that was fair enough. Each, she tried to offer a fervent prayer, to acknowledge what they were and to offer them pity.

She pitied them all. It was a genuine emotion, not the lies that came to her as smoothly as breathing did. They were beings who deserved nothing but pity and sympathy, for the only reason that a ronin came before them to pray today was a selfish wish to speak to one of their number, to beg their favor when she doubted seriously that any true fortune would ever wish to offer. Nobody would ever pray to these but the monks who tended their forgotten, pitiful duties. And all of them were in this state because someone who had the blood of the Hantei one day, long ago, had proclaimed that they were a fortune of such a wretched thing. It was the only reason that they could possibly exist, and the cruellest punishment imaginable. An eternal suffering, all because of the vile will of a man who happened to have heaven's blood running in his veins.

She pitied because she understood. She saw her cousin's face as she prayed, as she saw it night after night when she woke from a nightmare in a cold sweat. Such a brash boy he had been, so full of the purpose of the Kitsune. When the Imperial Decree had dissolved the charter of the Fox Clan and named their family to be Unicorn once more, he had raged, had protested. He'd held his tongue until they had finally reached the Plum Blossom Pass.

The vision of that night had been etched forever in her mind, for she had been his second. There were so few of them, that her uncle had begged him to reconsider, but his mind had been made up. He would perform Kanshi, he would make the Unicorn understand with his death before he stepped one foot in their lands north of the Spine of the World. They had been named Fox, given a sacred charge, by the Shining Prince, to honor his aunt now far afield and ensure that they were protected. The Kitsune Mori was their charge, their home, and he would make the Unicorn remember as he died.

Bitter, tears like rain,
Water leaves of forgotten glades
My hands serve no more

His final poem stuck with her even this long after his death. He had performed the three cuts with such strength of will that he managed never to utter a single sound. There had been no shame, as he died from the cuts themselves, even as she had hesitated to take his head. It had been too painful and one of the others should have served in that moment, for it had all been sundered, had all been ruined.

The Unicorn guard who had been assigned to the task of helping their escort had learned of the kanshi too late, and had arrived, shrieking for it to stop, marring the sacred moment as her cousin had risen to his feet. His eyes were sightless, lifeless and soulless. He had howled with the rage of the undead, tearing past her and racing towards the south, towards his new home. He didn't make it. It was all too simple for as many as were present to hunt down one meager zombie and bring them to a final rest, but the horror had settled into the very bones of the family that day. It had broken them. She had seen her mother's tears, the horror in her father's eyes. When the Unicorn had explained the Onyx Bargain, had told them the deal that had been struck by their champion, even if they had not known the particulars of why, only the price that their lord had demanded, the awful truth was there. The Emperor had sold them to the Unicorn, who had thought their bodies, their souls, were of so little value that they had traded them like rice for whatever bauble they had received in turn.

Nearly seven centuries, they had kept their charge, had watched and waited, had served as a protected clan, a people separated but who kept the faith. Centuries, they had watched over that quiet wood in service of a place that nobody cared much about, living their lives forgotten by most. And centuries of service, the blood, sweat, tears, lives, souls and honor of their whole history was worth nothing more than the stroke of an Emperor's pen and a bargain by a champion they had never known. Their souls were safe, the Unicorn assured them, but they did not know Jigoku. They wandered the sands, far from the gaping wound in Ningen-Do's side where Fu Leng had fallen. Ogres sometimes drew so far north as to reach the Kitsune Mori. The Fox knew of these horrors and the guests of the Crab knew them intimately, lived in sight of them all their lives. Jigoku would claim its prize eventually, and any bargain to trade them so, it damned them all.

She saw mortal terror in their eyes that day. The next, they had sworn that kanshi would not be performed so long as the Onyx Bargain held, and they pledged to protect the lives of the people there on the Plum Blossom. She remembered the tears in her father's eyes when she had gone before her lord and requested the warrior's pilgrimage, that she would search the empire for the truth that now eluded her, that she might return to her lord with that insight, to aid the Kitsune in their new role. She hadn't been the only, though by now most of the protestors' backs were broken and nobody wished to leave. They hudded, ashamed, horrified, furious and broken, but they clung to each other for comfort. Her father had been sad, but neither he nor her lord had the heart or the will to deny her. She had been granted a pilgrimage that nobody believed would ever end. She could not perform kanshi, for there would be no understanding in death, only abomination, so she would leave.

The Kitsune were trash, offal in the eyes of emperor and lords and masters, mere tools to be forced to play out the same sad play that had happened, undermanned and understaffed in the face of the Lion's greed, held in check only by misfortune in recent years. So, she could feel pity and sympathy for these fallen gods, surely each of them molded as a sick joke by a person who did not deserve to be considered Emperor. Their souls were forfeit, even if they did not want to believe it. So, before the god of shit, she could pray with a certain fervency, a certain understanding.

It was to the sixth of her prayers, however, that was different. Arya, Fortune of Maho. That was what the tablet said. What blasphemy, to see a fortune of heaven devoted to corrupt blood magic, which could not but spread the taint of jigoku. How Tengoku must have loathed her very existence. The gods must have watched her closely to ensure that the taint would never touch and defile their holy, perfect realm. A cruel, blasphemous joke that showed the one who had named her cared so little for the celestial order that they would raise up a fortune of the service of hell in the ranks of heaven. She smiled and bowed before the shrine, clapping her hands once again to get the goddess' attention.

There on the altar, she first placed rice and sake, a gift fitting for any fortune. But on a platter, she set a scroll, a scroll of blood magic she had carried since finding it in a bolt hole in the Kitsune Mori. Penned by some forgotten tsukai centuries now dead, it was a prayer of the spreading of the darkness, o sharing the taint with others, ostensibly to protect the mind of the tsukai themselves from the dangers of taint. Mari lit incense and prayed to the fire kami within the flames and embers that burned. “Burn this scroll for the fortune, consume it and destroy it, little flame. I give you the privilege of consuming a scroll of maho and destroying it that none ever read its words again.”

The flame was eager to obey such a request, blessed with the favor of destroying such a foul thing. It consumed the tainted scroll in bright, acrid smoke and flame. Kneeling, she bowed low and smiled darkly as her words were barely above a breath. “Fortune of Maho, I come before you, I who was once known as Kitsune Nanako. I am no longer this woman, by the Imperial Decree, first made a servant of Unicorn, and by the will of their champion, sold to the service of my new Lord and Master. I will not defy the will of heaven, will not deny what Heaven has proclaimed that I am to be. I will serve, fervently, carefully and humbly, the wretched little dung and worm that I am. I give to you this scroll, destroy it for it does not belong in the hands of man. It denies that the taint, the touch of Jigoku will consume those who wield it willingly utterly. None deserve to have such freedom who do not acknowledge what they truly are. We each serve our master, and I will serve mine, as the Emperor has decreed. I am Mari, servant of hell, and I give this sweet smelling incense to you, decreed by heaven as Fortune of Maho.”

She bowed low, pressing her head to the floor. “By your grace invested, I pray to you for greater understanding of that which you are Fortune and Master of. I pray that you would guide me in the study of maho, not to avoid the fate that awaits me. One day I will be consumed, destroyed forever as the plaything of demons. I know this, you know this. My fate is sealed, but until that day, I pray that you would guide my studies, indulge my prayers and strengthen my weavings with new scrolls, with new secrets and greater power. I pray that you would grant me a prayer, by which I might one day bring into this world a fellow servant, a guide who would work beside me until the day my sad, worthless little journey comes to an end. I pray this of you, great Fortune.”

With the prayer done, she rose, clapping her hands to announce that she was leaving. Rice. Sake. Scroll, all were burned and gone and the little fire kami was back to consuming the incense, flickering and happy. She smiled and took the rest of her rice with her to give to the other fortunes, her true task complete.

* * *

The rain had let up by morning. Mari stood at the entrance to the small temple compound and bowed before the abbot of the shrine, who thanked her for cleaning up the night prior before she returned the bow and departed with a wave of the hand.

“Where will you go, ronin? I am certain that the Phoenix would have a place for one with the gift of the kami in their ranks.” He asked it as she turned to leave and blinked as she gave him a weary smile, looking over her shoulder.

“I am certain that the Phoenix have a home that they would wish to give me, if they saw my skills. They treasure those with unique gifts, and the prayers I was taught in my childhood are special things, but to give them up would profane my sensei and I cannot do this. I am a pilgrim until my pilgrimage is done, and then I will return to my lord and master and bow in service if they will have me back. Serve well, monk. Yours is a sacred charge, and none will thank you for it.” She inclined her head.

“But this pilgrimage... where will you go next?” He seemed to want to plead with her to give up the journey, to join them here. He did not know what it was that he asked.

“There are a thousand fortunes. I will pray before all of their shrines, and there is one that I wish to pray before specifically now, whose shrine is far to the south. I will venerate all that I come across on my way to his shrine, for I have need of his guidance.” She smiled and tipped her hat before continuing, hand waving over her back once more. “Do not ask his name. You would not wish to know, anymore than people wish to know of this place.”

The monk bowed sadly and began to return to their duties. It was going to be another lonely day, even if he knew not that her departure was indeed a blessing and not a price. Mari was company no man truly wished, if they knew what they were dealing with. She walked on, her eyes on the road, hand on a staff and a song whistling in her every breath.

“Oh Koshin, Fortune of Roads, watch my step, for I go to Hofukushu's side, and the road is troubled and dangerous. Keep me far from bandit's blade, for I seek his wisdom, to plead my case. May my journey see me safely there, for I am a servant with a new prize,” she said, patting her scroll satchel, including the strange and inspired writings she had penned herself in cipher the night now gone. “I would not wish Arya's gift and insight to go to waste, done poorly, would I? Not right to treat a fortune's favor so.”

_________________
Ronin Shugenja * Bland * Earth * Yarnspinner
Status: 0.0, Glory: 0.0, Honor: Untrustworthy
Wears/Carries: Shabby kimono. Wakizashi. Scroll satchel. Medical Kit. Straw Cloak.
Description, Character Image