Arashi (嵐)
They called him Arashi, though the name meant nothing.
It was simply a sound he invented on a suffocating night—
a night when he had grown tired of being summoned only as
"Boy."
At the edge of the forest, the village clung to the mountainside as a dead insect clings to a torn tree trunk.
Mud houses rose above the old ash, and children were taught from an early age how to bow before the stone.
At the heart of the village stood a forgotten shrine—doorless, priestless.
Only a disfigured statue of a spirit they called Kakushin:
half a woman's face, half a serpent's, with a hand outstretched as if asking for something…
yet granting nothing in return.
The elders would say:
"Kakushin protects the village.
She loves the consecrated children.
And she despises those who break the rituals."
But Arashi understood nothing.
He did not know who she was, nor why he was required to bow.
He visited the shrine every morning for a single reason:
he had met a girl slightly older than himself, named Ayana.
He came to call her his elder sister,
for he had met her once within the sacred shrine.
Although he spoke to no one, Ayana was the only person he felt truly understood him, even if only slightly.
She was drawn to him by the strangeness of his questions.
He poured forth his inquiries, probing everything about Kakushin:
"Why do the gods always choose those who do not wish to be chosen?
Is the sacred selection a blessing, or a meticulously disguised method to kill the innocent?
If the rituals save the village, why do the fields wither after every sacrifice?
Does faith demand silence… even if the stone hears nothing?"
She would simply smile and say, "Do not ask too many questions, Arashi… some questions anger the gods.
We do not worship them because we understand them, but because we cannot bear to live without faith."
Yet she was lying.
He saw her cry when she believed he was not near.
She would hide behind the idol, whispering something resembling an apology, then swiftly wipe away her tears.
She wept every day, and he watched every day, yet he never asked.
He took refuge behind the shrine's doors, harboring a deep resentment toward the so-called deity, Kakushin.
For a fleeting moment, he felt different; no whisper of faith stirred within him at the sight of Kakushin.
There was no emotion to touch him—an imperceptible sensation, yet in recent times, he had begun to notice it, as if Kakushin's magic held no sway over him.
The influence of the deity did not reach his heart; he simply chose to disregard it.
Weeks passed in the village, and as the crops withered, one of the elders dreamed of "one of the chosen."
This time, the vision was unmistakable: it was Ayana.
The following day, the elders convened a swift meeting.
They sat in the shadows, hesitant. The crops were withering, and the previous sacrifices had proven insufficient.
Then, one among them conceived a bold idea: to communicate with Kakushin.
The others whispered among themselves; some notions sounded mad, yet the village's declining yields left them with no choice but to act swiftly.
A brief silence fell before they began to accept the plan. Finally, the village chief asked,
"Who shall be the next sacrifice?"
One replied, "Kagiura Ayana.
We must offer the sacrifice without delay."
They stood before Ayana's parents, justifying their choice as an "honor."
They told the villagers that this time would be different, that they would attempt direct communication with Kakushin, as their ancestors once had.
One of them spoke with a trembling voice:
"She shall ascend the sacred mountain… join Kakushin… and bless the land through us."
They spoke these words while the weight of silence pressed heavily upon their chests.
Ayana felt fear, yet in the villagers' eyes she glimpsed something akin to empathy… or perhaps mere illusion.
She wanted to believe that the sacrifice would save them.
But what of Arashi?
The question that burned within him was like a relentless ember:
"Kakushin… is she merely a spirit that preys upon our loved ones, consuming them to satiate her own desires?"
The night was heavier than usual, the wind whispering around the shrine's pillars like furtive secrets.
Ayana sat before the idol for a long while, her eyes glassy and distant.
She wondered silently:
"What if Arashi's questions… are the truths we refuse to see?"
Yet she feared belief itself,
for to leave the rites incomplete would exact a price no one could bear.
At dawn the next day, the village awoke to an unfamiliar silence.
Not the hush of mist, but the hush of absence.
Ayana's door stood open; her bed lay cold.
Her footprints vanished at the path leading up the mountain.
The elders who had accompanied her were nowhere to be found—three men had disappeared with her.
On the threshold of the shrine, they discovered a fragment of her garment, torn as if by a claw… or a stone.
When the village chief saw it, his features vanished for a fleeting moment before he spoke in a sharp, cutting voice:
"The rites… have concluded successfully."
The remnants of her garments were burned, the ashes scattered across the walls.
No funeral was held in her honor.
Arashi stood near the shrine as the news reached him.
He did not move.
He did not cry out.
His body froze, like a stone left exposed to the open wind.
The air felt dense, searing into his lungs like smoke.
His throat was parched, tasting of iron.
His feet trembled—not from fear, but because the very ground beneath him had grown strange.
The only sound he could hear was his own heartbeat, like the slow drums of a distant battle.
He reached out toward the idol… and felt nothing.
Not even hatred.
There was something else—something that had shattered within him, extinguished without return.
The crops withered once more.
The villagers whispered:
"Kakushin is angered… we should have chosen another child."
And on a winter night, Arashi departed.
He slipped away silently, without casting a final glance.
Some claimed he had followed a call heard in a dream.
Others said he had made a pact with Kakushin to reclaim Ayana—but the spirit had deceived him.
The truth?
It is not spoken… only read in his eyes.
When the ashes of Kakushin scattered into the wind, so did the remnants of Arashi's past. The next night
, far from the mountains, the same wind whispered across another fire...
The Spirit slowly opened his eyes.
The suffocating darkness surrounding him… dissipated, revealing the scene before him, bit by bit.
He lay on the ground near a towering pine, a small fire flickering in front of him, guarded by a man in dark garments, and beside him, a silent child seated beneath the tree.
He coughed violently, expelling the lingering spiritual rot that had filled his body.
The air was thick with the scent of charred coal, burnt fish, and pine… a strange aroma, yet curiously warm.
Moments later, his gaze fell upon the child beneath the tree. He scrutinized him: wearing a tattered robe with frayed edges, his state pitiable.
He wanted to speak, but his throat was too dry.
"W…where…?"
No sound emerged.
His chest tightened, and the cold enveloped him as if it had crawled straight out of an abandoned grave.
As for the Perfumer, he sat motionless, eyes gleaming in the firelight, staring at a small bottle burning between his fingers.
The Spirit saw him, but he paid no mind… as if he were invisible.
The wailing of a black horse tied to a carriage behind the Perfumer heightened the tension.
The Spirit tried to gather his thoughts, but they were slow, scattered… like a child attempting to comprehend the world anew.
And though it might have seemed foolish to the Perfumer, this was all the Spirit could grasp in the thick, oppressive atmosphere.