(3500words)
Such questions and unsettling events plagued Togashi, even as he tried to live a normal life. They stood like pillars blocking his path each time he attempted to move forward.
The cryptic words of the old sage echoed in Togashi's mind, leaving him deep in thought. Grasping their meaning was no easy task—or so it seemed at first…
Togashi's eyes scanned the temple from his perspective. He saw stone statues and a throne-like chair directly before him, behind which the old man stood in silent wisdom.
Driven by these thoughts, Togashi took his first step forward, his voice tense and loud: "W-Who are you?!"
The old man stroked his beard, produced a staff out of thin air, and began approaching Togashi with slow, deliberate steps. "Did I not just tell you that I am the Sage of the Eight Planets? Or do you wish to hear it again?"
As he spoke his last words, he raised his staff toward Togashi's face, causing him to step back anxiously.
The sage then turned away and said, "No one has visited this temple in years. Long ago, these halls teemed with life and energy, but all that is now past. Your name is Togashi, is it not?"
Togashi glanced at himself, then back at the old man. "Yes… How do you know me?"
The sage replied with another question: "Do you remember nothing from your past?"
Togashi was taken aback. That particular question had haunted him for a long time. Let us go back a few years…
When Togashi was only six years old, he awoke to find himself at an orphanage—an old wooden building in one of the older districts. His brother Zentaro was eight, and their sister Sana was still an infant. They had been left by the door, abandoned without mercy or pity.
When the orphanage matron stepped out that morning to fetch supplies, she was shocked to find Togashi and his siblings asleep there, as if discarded like unwanted objects.
As these memories flooded back, Togashi realized that his presence in this mysterious temple was no accident. Something hidden stood right before him, something he could not see—something that whispered of drowning in questions with no answers.
After gathering himself, Togashi looked at the old man and said, "I have no memory of what happened before the orphanage. And to be honest, I don't want to know. I was treated like an outcast, and the stares of the students at the academy made me hate whoever left me there. Even Sana—we never sent her to school. A girl as young as her couldn't endure that treatment."
The old man smiled an enigmatic smile. Togashi couldn't decipher his expression, but the sage said, "I see you're growing accustomed to this place. You speak more naturally now."
Togashi reacted with tense, jerky movements. "Of course not! Can't you see how suspicious you are? You ask me questions but offer no answers. Why am I here?"
The old man laughed, tapping his staff twice on the floor. "My apologies, my apologies. To be honest, I was trying to find a way to communicate with you. But perhaps it was fate that brought you here, Togashi."
He began circling Togashi slowly, whose nervousness was palpable. Then the sage moved toward an ancient manuscript, touched it with his staff, and it turned instantly to ash.
"Since you've come this far," the old man declared, "I would like to test you—a quick trial. Do not worry, it won't take long. But first, there are rules you must follow…"
After listing the rules, the sage gave Togashi no time to react. Togashi didn't understand the purpose of these strange trials.
The old man stood at the center of the stone hall, his wooden staff tapping indifferently on the marble floor. His voice was soft, like wind passing through the cracks of an ancient door. "Begin, Togashi."
He did not elaborate on lengthy conditions—no need for many words. His face was a tapestry of life's wrinkles, his eyes two cold lanterns observing without pity. The room was little more than a dark circle surrounding them, with candles hanging in the air and the lingering scent of old books.
The world seemed to close in, the air growing thick. Togashi's grip loosened, then tightened without warning. Something in his chest pushed him forward, as though the earth itself were driving him toward a trial by fire.
The old man raised his staff swiftly—one touch, and a black chasm opened at Togashi's feet. From its depths came a faint whisper, fleeting as a fly on a summer night, in the voice of a young girl: "How weak he is."
It was not an auspicious first test…
Suddenly, everything changed. Togashi found himself in a small room, inhaling sharp blue water that filled his lungs like heavy sacks. The water rose rapidly, and Togashi struggled to resist, swimming upward while screaming, "Please, please, no no no! Stop this! Stop it!"
This was the same water that haunted his dreams night after night—now welcoming him into reality.
Each time he tried to swim to the surface, the same voice whispered, "The water takes you as it took others before." Flashes of his childhood at the orphanage appeared: a door closing, small hands cast aside. Pain dug its claws into his heart, and his nose filled with the taste of mud. He nearly lost consciousness from suffocation, but something within him began to take shape—an image of young Sana shining before him, a memory of Zentaro reaching out.
The water rose above his head until he was fully submerged. He clamped his mouth shut, his eyes turning red as the situation worsened. The water enveloped him completely, until…
At the last moment, he pulled himself free with brutal force, breaking from the water like a lame man waking from a nightmare. His escape was simple: he held his breath for a minute without inhaling again. He had passed the test.
He returned to the hall chaotically, as if the room had shattered around him and the water vanished.
Kneeling on the ground, arms trembling, he breathed heavily, gasping and exhaling with effort as if expelling water from his lungs with every breath. When he finally regained some composure, he spat, "You're… insane! Why are you doing this? Send me home!"
The old man's yellow smile illuminated the space once more. Ignoring Togashi's outburst, he said, "Congratulations on surviving. Remember—everything you do counts as either loss or victory."
Not every trial Togashi endured was meaningless. Perhaps his coming here wasn't logical, happening so suddenly in a single day. But the dreams had pursued him since the orphanage—he simply never tried to interpret them. The water, this place… it was all connected, though he had never sought to understand.
Togashi didn't even try to stand as fragments of a false sky opened before him. He hadn't recovered his full memory—a lost name, an echo he'd never heard, whispers and faint voices encircling him…
His breath still shook. He thought it was over, that he had passed. But the old man showed no reaction.
Instead, the little girl's voice whispered: "This is only the beginning, stubborn little one."
Unbeknownst to Togashi, another trial awaited—one testing his endurance once more. As he lay on the ground…
He closed his eyes only to find them forced open upon a battlefield of lies. Countless mirrors surrounded him, each reflecting a paler version of himself, each holding in its gaze a familiar shadow—a version of him smiling with crimson teeth.
He was embraced by a horror that was both him and not him. Memories were ripped away, childhood moments twisted into venomous pits. Each time he shut his eyes, the mirrors forced them open to a more gruesome image. He tried to scream, but his voice emerged as a shattered echo.
When he tried to smash one mirror with a decisive punch, his hand was thrown back, escaping the field of breaking. It was as if the mirror itself had imposed its own laws. He tried to break it, but it wouldn't shatter. All he gained was more physical pain.
The child's voice whispered in faint reproach: "See? If you hadn't stuck your nose where it didn't belong, you wouldn't be suffering now." Then came a rush of a memory he'd held of his father—it scattered, becoming a shadowy gathering whose parts he could no longer grasp.
He tried to run, clutching his painful shoulder, but he fell, blood streaming from his head. Still, he rose again. He didn't know his destination, but he wanted to escape these false images showing him everything he'd tried to ignore.
The faces in the mirrors began laughing at him—everyone he'd loved, everyone he'd hated—overwhelming his senses until he collapsed from the pain and bleeding.
One last time, he tried to strike one of the reflections, which began to cower as Togashi aimed his punch, begging him not to. But he shattered it anyway.
He succeeded—by a thread—in refusing to hide in the mirror. He kept his consciousness, but he lost something: a name of one of his ancestors evaporated from his memory, like an erased seal—not that he remembered it anyway.
When Togashi returned to the hall, he was strangely calm. The old man asked, "Are you ready, Togashi, for the next trial?"
Togashi: "No. Send me home. I don't think you'll like the results of the next test."
Togashi lay on his back, staring upward. As the old man approached, he bent down and began muttering strange words while raising his right finger, until…
Togashi fainted instantly, feeling a cold sensation—a chilly yet gentle feeling, as if wiping over his body and placing him in stasis. All that had happened in the past hour had been too much for him. He didn't want to endure this torment and regretted ever entering the forest…
In a local clinic in his village, Togashi lay on a white bed, the room smelling of simple disinfectants. His family and Takuma surrounded him—Takuma sat guiltily, of course, the first thing he felt. Their entanglement in that eerie place was due to their recklessness and disregard for danger.
Togashi's hand twitched. Sana noticed immediately and cried out, "He's awake! He's awake!"
Everyone turned to him, watching intently as his eyes slowly opened—then widened instantly. He gasped, lifting himself quickly from the pillow just as he had during his first trial, shocking everyone with his reaction. He looked at them with confusion, and they returned the same bewildered stares.
Togashi's mother rushed to him, hugging him as she began to sob. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry I didn't take better care of you. It's my fault this happened to you."
Togashi looked at her, then at his father, whose face was etched with regret and sorrow. He returned his mother's embrace, patting her back. "Don't blame yourself for my recklessness. I went to the forest out of curiosity, and this is what happened."
He didn't notice his uncle standing slightly apart, leaning against the wall and watching him expressionlessly until he stepped forward.
Togashi's uncle had long hair tied back, somewhat cold features, and wore a black robe the color of his hair.
Togashi turned to his uncle after his mother stepped back. His uncle said, "Oi, Shin, are you going to stay silent like this without saying anything?"
Hearing those words, Togashi's mind swirled with questions once again. It was all he could do—simply let questions swirl in his mind without attempting to answer them.
His uncle, named Bangel, wasn't always a serious person, but at this moment, he needed to be. That's what the situation demanded. The last time Togashi had seen Bangel was at his tenth birthday.
But all of this became trivial when his father spoke: "We… or rather, I'm sorry for losing you for five months."
What? Had those hours really been five months spent unconscious and unaware? The thought struck Togashi immediately.
Just questions—yes, damn these questions posed without any answers in sight. That's what haunted him. Five months in that place? The time he'd spent there hadn't even been an hour. So why did he find himself here after five months? The questions made him dizzy.
He rested back on the pillow, as if unwilling to part from it. He didn't want to return to that torment. He knew nothing awaited him but pain. Finally, he said, "I feel… unwell. I need to rest for a while. Please, I'd like to be alone."
Zentaro picked up Sana and said he'd await Togashi's return home. Takuma followed, apologizing to Togashi and saying he'd wait too. Togashi's mother continued crying as her husband led her away, glancing brokenly at Togashi before leaving the room.
Only Togashi's uncle remained, unmoving. In a steady voice, he asked, "What happened to you?"
Words like these were unexpected from him—no, perhaps Togashi should have expected it. Bangel was the only one who would understand him unlike the others. He had always been the one pushing Togashi forward from the shadows, starting with securing his admission to the capital's academy.
Without hesitation, Togashi recounted everything to his uncle Bangel—from the dream to entering the forest with Takuma, to meeting the old man and his overwhelming trials.
With every word Togashi spoke, Bangel grew angrier, though he didn't show it. But when Togashi mentioned something midway, Bangel could take no more and interrupted, "I understand, I understand. No need to continue. Stay here; I'll be back soon."
Togashi was puzzled as he watched his uncle grab a long bag from one of the room's tables and leave immediately without even saying where he was going.
---
Let us go to another place—an elegant room with the usual tea. A young man flipped through a book as usual, sipping tea while a creature, now revealed to resemble a black cat, stood on the other side of the room speaking with him.
The young man said sarcastically, "Five months lost to him as if it were a single hour. This kind of time-play, Lucaroji, isn't the work of some amateur sage testing passersby in a temple. This is the mark of an older hand—something that grips time by the neck and squeezes until it bends."
That young man had a name, of course—everyone has a name that distinguishes them…
Lucaroji replied, "If I told you, Adom, that Bangel is on his way here, what would you do? It's almost amusing—he'll arrive any moment now."
The creature's name was Adom—a name fitting for a demon without identity.
Adom stared with half-lidded eyes, a faint, mocking smile on his lips.
"Bangel… what a mood-spoiling name."
He leaned back against the wall with his shoulders as if it didn't concern him.
"Well… I won't prepare, and I won't flee. If he comes, let him come. Let's see if he has what it takes to make me move from this spot."
He lowered his voice slightly, his tone growing more sarcastic.
"You expect me to be flustered, don't you? Unfortunately… I'm not that type."
Lucaroji poured more tea and said, "Who said I expected you to be flustered? Any fool would expect that from the demon of surprises. Now, look toward the door."
The door to the room burst open, revealing an angry Bangel glaring furiously at Lucaroji.
Lucaroji said, "Well, well, Bangel. Would you like to have some tea with us?"
Bangel's face darkened further. "You call this torture training? How could you do this to a boy at the beginning of his life? And you, Adom, do you serve him for no purpose? Or was it you who gave him that idea?"
Adom didn't move from his spot, still leaning against the wall with his hands in his pockets, watching Bangel with a half-smile as if observing a boring scene he'd seen a thousand times.
"Ah, the guardian of virtue has arrived… I was wondering when you'd show up."
He tilted his head slightly to the side, then let out a soft, dry laugh, devoid of warmth.
"First… don't mix things up, Bangel. I don't give orders, and I don't plant ideas. Lucaroji does as he pleases, and I…"
He moved his fingers in the air as if drawing an empty circle. "…I simply enjoy the show."
He raised his left eyebrow slightly, gestured subtly toward Lucaroji, then returned his gaze to Bangel.
"And second… if you see everything as torture, why not consider it harsh training? The difference between the two often lies only in how you look at it."
He moved from his spot and took one step forward, his tone dropping to become colder and less sarcastic, yet still sharp as a knife.
"As for my service… I serve no one without purpose. Had I wanted to hinder what's happening, I would have. My presence here isn't to justify your actions or Lucaroji's… but to ensure the boy isn't broken before his time."
He tilted his head to the left, his gaze hovering between calm and provocation.
"Now, did you come to deliver speeches, or to sit and drink a cup of that tea Lucaroji insists on valuing as if it were more precious than his life?"
Bangel couldn't tolerate Adom's provocative words and lunged at him with the sword he'd hidden in that bag. But Adom evaded him effortlessly.
With Bangel's first lunge, Adom's shadow vanished from before the blade as if it had evaporated, leaving behind a small swirl of dust. In a fraction of a second, he reappeared leaning against the window frame, his right leg dangling in the air and his right arm resting on the ledge, while he waved his other hand as if mockingly greeting Bangel.
"Tsk… So that's it? I almost believed you came for tea."
He leaned his head back slightly, his eyes gleaming with sarcasm and deadly calm.
"Bangel… if you truly knew what you were facing, you wouldn't have raised your sword against me. You're attacking emptiness."
He tapped his fingers lightly on the window frame, as if enjoying irritating Bangel.
"Don't tire your arm. You won't touch me even if you try a hundred times. But…"
His tone suddenly dropped, becoming quieter and more dangerous.
"One more strike like that, and I may stop playing."
Then he smiled with the corner of his mouth, a cold, mocking smile, and pointed at the seated Lucaroji.
"If you're angry at his methods, direct your anger at him. Don't waste your time trying to butt heads with the air."
Here, Lucaroji began to clap and said, "Alright, alright, playtime is over, you two. Let's discuss the matter now. Bangel, please rest on the chair."
He took a sip of tea and picked up the book he'd been flipping through.
"I didn't expect that old man of the planets to actually do this. We asked for harsh training, not psychological or physical torture. Besides, you were present at the time."
Lucaroji then gestured to Adom to pour some tea for Bangel and rest in the other chair, handing him the book he'd been holding.
Adom took the book from Lucaroji's hand lightly, as if it weighed nothing. He glanced sideways at Bangel with a look half-mocking, half-indifferent, then shrugged carelessly.
"So that's how it is… A tea session instead of exchanging blows. I call that progress."
He sat in the opposite chair with a lazy slouch, the edge of his cloak draping over the armrest, and placed the book on his knee while reaching for the teapot with his right hand and pouring himself tea as if he owned the place.
"Training, torture… different words for the same result sometimes. The problem is that the first strengthens the soul, while the second breaks it."
He raised the cup to his lips but froze for a moment, shifting his gaze from Lucaroji to Bangel as if reading their reactions. Then he took his first slow sip, leaving a brief silence before continuing coldly.
"Bangel, before you draw your sword again, remember—you're not angry with me. Togashi passed what he did because he needed to draw something out from within himself… not because I whispered in his ear. I did no more than watch."
He flipped a page of the book with his index finger without looking down, then added with a sideways, mocking smile.
"And now, since the host of this gathering wants discussion… let's listen. I'm not used to long lectures, but I'll endure it this time, as long as I have a good cup of tea."
---
Their simple gathering began with tea and the exchange of information. From this moment on, the next decision would determine Togashi's fate, and what was to come would reveal even more.
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This is only the beginning. Perhaps I'll describe it as I did before: Chaos in a Serene Beginning. But always beware of the question that begins with "Whether" and ends with a full stop at the end of the line.
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To be continued…