User blog:FateAlbane/Golden Orb Nephila (3/3 - Finale) (5)

Part 5 (Conclusion) of Chapter 3.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

To those who depart... (Conclusion)
(Recommended Song) - You heard her talking to me before. I’m sorry you had to go through that, but Atlach asking questions was just a formality that embellished her trap. She could hear your thoughts as though they came from her own mind. - … - This is no time to be down in the dumps. You should know she has every capacity to fulfill her threats… And that’s why you should also know that her offers will be fulfilled too, just like she did to me. What she wants is to push you over the edge. I doubt her end is to betray you after your choice is made as much as it’s what she already achieved: Leaving you in this state over what you should answer. - How can you be… So calm after all that? Even after what you just saw? - Let’s just say Hell lives up to its reputation. Once you see that for yourself, you’ll realize there aren’t that many things left that can scare you away. - …I don’t think I wanna get to that point. - Either way. You should make that choice soon. Meanwhile… Amaterasu pointed to Yuji’s whistle, signaling for him to blow on it, which he did without ceremony. - It’s time we went our separate ways. I’ll go back to search for my own path. Yuji… Despite everything, I’ll part with you without saying farewell. Let it be "I hope we meet again". When that happens, you can tell me of your resolution. - You sound like the kind of person who would choose the mass murder without a second thought. So you’ll not wait until the end? - I’m of the supernatural side as much as you’re still of the natural. That you are having trouble over a choice that would be so easy for any youkai (or generally less nice humans) is enough proof of that. As the hour of meeting evil spirits approaches its end and gives way to the sunrise, I depart to other planes not of the material. My power is not yet enough to maintain an influence as strong as mine in the world of the living in broad daylight. - I see. I wish you a good journey, whatever it is that you do, Amaterasu. Don’t go overboard. - And you… Whatever you do, don’t regret it. - I make no promises of that being possible. Not when I already have a lot of them to deal with. - I take it that if no one died yet, someone will? – were the Tengu’s words as she arrived with a Gust of wind and leaves out of nowhere, with a sound like the blowing air on the bamboo forest. Words she soon took to heart that were insensitive, even though she had tried them as a joke. Amaterasu vanished just as she appeared, leaving Yuji alone with Chiasa. She floated him in the air and brought him along with in her flight back. To an outside observer it would look much like an “air carriage” was bringing him along as she flew. - Well. You might say it was luck that she even gave you a choice, instead of outright asking that you killed them all or eating you on the spot. Taking this into account, the Spider Master was probably serious when she told you that she was in a good mood today. …Were her first words as she was informed of his current situation. - And so? What will you choose? - …Life is full of these situations, is it not? - Well, if you have a trouble with it, what’s so hard about choosing here? - …You’re right. She was just showing me this again. Just as I was required to kill the insects to save those spiders, she gave me the exact same situation, but with humans. I will not become an assassin. And I will not kill the one who gave us all a chance either... I feel like I’m just too tired of it by now. Perhaps in choosing this, I’ll meet her again by tomorrow, and then she’ll laugh at me as I become her plaything one last time. But I was half ready to die when this started. It’s just that the way it happens became a journey, instead of a whimper. I think I learned some with it, too. I… Have made my choice. With this life I was granted by Father’s care, I’ll protect everything he had his heart and labor dedicated towards. The village, these fields, that house… And even that spider, who helped me. - So you have decided… - Yes. The one to lose his life will be this man named Yuji. I think it’s quite the exchange: Before this I was just going to die and everyone along with me. Now I die and everyone else lives happily ever after. What a tradeoff! - …The logic is kind of twisted, but can’t say I disagree. Or rather, can’t disprove it. Still, it will be lonely to not be able to bicker with you in the fields anymore… Goodbye, Yuji. All things aside, I’m glad I met you. - Maybe you’ll guide me again to that hag by tomorrow’s end! - Perhaps. Until then, and if we don’t have such luck… Goodbye. By the time he was left back at the human world, Yuji could see the frontier between the two worlds receding like the tides at the shore as the sea itself seems to suck them back to its interior. The many supernatural phenomena, the souls and the spirits around - as numerous as a swarm of fireflies in the dark of the night - went more and more transparent, until even their presence was gone and back to their own world, that was now fully separated once again. Yuji’s powers too, left him in a visual sensation that looked much like a bluish aura, of similar aspect to mist or the smoke of burnt out flames rising and being pushed away by a smokers pipe. He was left by the door of the house, and soon noticed that only in his pockets, something was left behind. - A Sessho-seki sealed in… What is this? Shimenawa? Indeed it was a rock within a transparent glass, crystal-like box, somehow tied with a rice straw rope, a few centimeters long. So it goes without saying that they weren’t nearly as big as the ones he saw back in those many tooris, but quite similar in looks still. Attached to it, was a “label” that looked very much like one of those omamori charms you’d find at Shinto shrines. It was written, in no uncertain terms, above a blank space free for a signature: “The name of the one to be Prey.” Now that his mind was clear, Yuji knew very well that this was just another formality, no wordplays involved. In the human world, the killing stone would send to the dead whosoever he had in mind at the moment he unmade that seal. Because of that, and as his mind was long since made up, he was about to sign his own name in there, not allowing himself any second thoughts… When he was reminded of the Orb Weaver waiting for his return. - If I signed this here, I might drop dead on the spot without coming back. I did promise Nephila that I would come back. Would hate to leave her thinking she was responsible for what’s about to happen… When Yuji entered his house, for what he believed to be the last time, he had a smile on his face as he greeted Nephila. It was the smile of a man without a worry in the world, and raising his thumb, he told her about how everything had went well. As they talked through what was left of the night, the spider… Along with him, she laughed like an old friend. She enjoyed, and felt happy, just as a human does. And the beautiful golden threads she once weaved soon changed, as with the seal broken and her four hundred years of age reached, she was made a beautiful, wise looking girl, wearing a dress the color of sunflowers in their fields. The many accounts of this story do not speak much of her. The point they all agree in, however, is that she was one of the most soothing figures one could lay their eyes on. Very much unlike the seductive, voluptuous women most spiders of her kind would opt for as they reached this stage of life… *** (Recommended Song) …Where they would now devour humans. That night, Yuji’s scream echoed across the fields as he woke up to a sight no human would desire to see. His voice was said to pierce the very skies, and when others searched for him in the following morning, that man was nowhere to be found. *** 

“How sad, Yuji. She outsmarted you… The right choice was to kill the spider. At four hundred years of age, an orb-weaver turns youkai. No longer does it feed on insects… But humans, just like you. ... ................ ...Regardless...” *** What Atlach said as she sipped her tea was the truth. Yet, in a sense it was wrong. Nothing she said about Nephila was wrong. But she could have been wrong in saying that killing her was the right choice to make. *** <p style="text-align:center;"> “I’m sorry for making you sleep so deep, ‘big brother’. <p style="text-align:center;">You’ll probably be mad at me when you wake up to see what I’m doing, but I can’t go on like this. <p style="text-align:center;">I find no fault in you. So in exchange for what you had to go through, I’ll tell you everything. <p style="text-align:center;">Hisashi, the one you called father. <p style="text-align:center;">He was the one who arranged for all this to happen. <p style="text-align:center;">In the past he was a conceited warrior, who visited Master’s temple and in losing to her in battle, questioned the purpose of the webs you laid your eyes upon to hide his shame. <p style="text-align:center;">He swore to heavens and to Earth that to have such a device had no meaning other than the treachery of a coward in battle, when in truth, that had always been in defense of All Things in Creation. <p style="text-align:center;">That was the one time master did not tolerate insult from a human. <p style="text-align:center;">Hisashi was cursed, and these lands along with him. He was to live four hundred years in penitence without leaving these lands, and offering sacrifices for her, while dodging death by any other causes that were not the old age. <p style="text-align:center;">The stories you have heard of those who approached the temple meeting with death, he was responsible for those happenings. <p style="text-align:center;">While I was dispatched to this house to observe his deeds and gather the collective energy from all those he sacrificed in master's name... Like your father, and your mother, who as you know... Fell to a plague induced by the same stone you carry, and the air of the Land of the Dead. <p style="text-align:center;">For the master, that was like a sweet wine aged just for this occasion – the power I put in your hands as you went to meet her. <p style="text-align:center;">The seal I was in was my master’s own. <p style="text-align:center;">And the last sacrifice Hisashi had to make was you. <p style="text-align:center;">Yes, you. <p style="text-align:center;">Someone not of his lineage. <p style="text-align:center;">You were raised just to be handed as prey to me. <p style="text-align:center;">At this point the curse would be finally broken and he would regain his honor, enjoying the gift of immortality. The same way you exchanged the fates of those insects with mine – or now yours with the village – he wanted to trade his with your own. <p style="text-align:center;">In death, your very soul would be cursed and treated as a toy, until it was sucked dry and left as one of those carcasses you saw hanging from the threads. <p style="text-align:center;">…Hisashi may have been among them. <p style="text-align:center;">Because master is manipulative and perfidious, It may be that she never truly harbored any feelings of forgiveness. The one you know as Chiasa was ordered to use the very same spell you have witnessed, to send a storm to these lands. <p style="text-align:center;">Master manipulated the very hearts of the leaders that she had delegated to these lands, and made the living conditions impossible enough for a riot to take place around the same time. <p style="text-align:center;">Your father was inevitably caught in the flames of rebellion and burned along with them with charges of treason, when closest to his objective. <p style="text-align:center;">Now the only thing left in the weaving of her web against that man is for me to devour you. <p style="text-align:center;">She will have no qualms with restoring these lands as promised. Her final purpose here is only to ridicule his last living effort at saving himself, you. <p style="text-align:center;">If I devoured you now, I would be taken and saluted as I climbed the way to her castle, respected by my equals and joining her as the guest of honor in the festival she is having at this very moment. <p style="text-align:center;">Four hundred years of humble servitude is what I have just lived through… As my hunger for humans has just begun to act, I can hardly stay by your side and not desire your flesh. <p style="text-align:center;">Even more so when you sleep, defenseless, right here… <p style="text-align:center;">Yuji… I’m sorry.” ***

<p style="text-align:center;"> “You were different from your fellow children, were you not, Nephila? <p style="text-align:center;">You were different from me. To think you’d willingly dive into the abyss of eternal death at this, of all moments. <p style="text-align:center;">I can’t say I’m happy at your decision, but I cannot disrespect it. <p style="text-align:center;">A promise is a promise, after all... Now I understand that even I was wrong. <p style="text-align:center;">The right choice for this man would have been to end his life with the Sessho-seki without returning to meet with you. <p style="text-align:center;">Could be that you alone saw through it all... <p style="text-align:center;">From the moment you told him the words about making a promise, and to come back..." *** <p style="text-align:center;">(Ending Song - Town, Flow of Time, People) <p style="text-align:center;"> “How lucky for you, Yuji.  <p style="text-align:center;">You didn’t play your hand the best you could, but your opponent gave up for you… They sincerely felt like the only way they could win was through loss. I guess at this point, it’s up to me to weave this to the end, is it not?  <p style="text-align:center;">…Very well.  <p style="text-align:center;">Much like the story of the temple had its many versions, the way Yuji’s tale ends differs greatly from mouth to mouth, and it may be that the sole truth is long lost.  <p style="text-align:center;">''Some say that he fell into despair when he woke up to see Nephila had been on his side to the very last moment.  <p style="text-align:center;">That little girl, who barely caught a glimpse of her new life...'' <p style="text-align:center;"> ...Let herself bleed to death, as the blood left her veins much like life slipped through her now cold hands. <p style="text-align:center;">''A small mark on her neck being the only hint at the circumstances of her death, her only mement was a letter, her final apology and an orb of golden silk, as her small body finally disappeared in his arms...  <p style="text-align:center;">His scream, they believe, was one of anguish and not fear, as he followed her in suicide.  <p style="text-align:center;">Others say his heart became warped as Atlach wanted, and he soon grew to become as much of a tyrannical ruler as the spider master that led him to this.  <p style="text-align:center;">While many claim he took a different name and set out on a journey of his own, hoping for revenge against the Spider Master, and to forever bind her in Nephila’s name.  <p style="text-align:center;">Still, there is word about Yuji having discarded his humanity altogether, willingly consumed in the path of the demonic powers he was given back.  <p style="text-align:center;">Perhaps this tale will fade with time.  <p style="text-align:center;">Or perhaps someday, its answers will be made clear.  <p style="text-align:center;">On this note, I conclude this story of a man who could not redirect his Fate, but could not accept either.  <p style="text-align:center;">If we ever meet again, It may be that his life will no longer be so short.  <p style="text-align:center;">After all, when that time comes... We *will* know his name.  <p style="text-align:center;">Until then, I leave aside the pen, as the only ones left to work are the imaginations of you humans.'' <p style="text-align:center;">To those who depart? <p style="text-align:center;">''Like Nephila herself... I bid you all, a bittersweet farewell.”  '' 'GOLDEN ORB NEPHILA - THE END. '