PART 2
REBIRTH, START
I feel the wind pushing me down. My velocity is speeding like a blizzard. My vision is gone, the only thing I can see is the ground getting further from me. I'm falling. Falling. Maybe this is how I die. The
The last thing I experience in life is that sensation of falling. I've never felt this alive just before my death. I feel more alive than I have been living.
I remember that man Kekkan. He is gone. Kekkan is dead. And I have been born the prophet. Kekkan was weak and pathetic; he let so many perish as a result of
his foolishness. But I will be. I better close your eyes and your purpose is complete. You have vanquished evil. You have done well. A good job. Your ticket to salvation in the afterlife has been earned. This is perfection. No, that's not true. I can hear his voice in the back of my mind.
Gnawing away at my cerebrum. Kekkan thinks he can influence my mind. I will shun him out, there is no place in paradise for a parasite.
Close your eyes, imagine your ideal world and it will be granted. I see nothing, only feel the pressure of my back descending
. How did I end up here? Oh thats right i jumped i took the leap, the entrance to the next life to eternal peace. I passed the trial.
Kekkab can you hear me? If you're listening, I want you to know I've beat you. I'm the true being. I've given up on continuing on, it's all pointless now.
But he won't leave me alone; he is trying to corrupt me. I don't want to wake, I can't face the rest out there. My journey should end here. There's no point in going on. But he is so insistent that I keep on going
. For me to keep on living. So I open my eyes. I'm in a long hallway. The darkness is ahead, so I descend further into it. What am I doing here, what is there left
for me, the prophet? I sprint down and it repeats itself. I've seen this same loop run down this exact corridor tens of times. But nothing changes. What am I doing wrong? Is this my personal hell
The afterlife isn't salvation, it's punishment. For kekkans sins, why must i be persecuted for his sins. I won't allow it. I run and run. It never ends, it never stops. The same cycle will continue until my legs cave in. It's like bashing my head into a wall countless times expecting to break the wall. But I don't like
kekkan. If I improve, I will escape. Again and again, again and again. My forehead drips with sweat. My shirt soaked. A bone pops from my kneecap. But I push forward.
Pain is just an obstacle. I want it to end for it to stop. My shoulders tear from my body. I want the pain to end, living with so much of it. It is a terrible thing. I should give up. I want my body to rest. But my mind is telling me to live.
I dream of an end I want. But I also want more. But then I collapse on the floor. I gaze around the hallway and only grow. I want to let my tears overflow but I must withdraw them. Then a voice calls to me.
nen, nen korori yo, okorori yo.
(Hush-a-bye, Hush-a-bye!)
bōya wa yoi koda, nenneshina~
(My good baby, Sleep!)
bōya no omori wa, doko e itta?
(Where did my boy's babysitter go?)
ano yama koete, sato e itta
(Beyond that mountain, back to her home.)
sato no miyage ni, nani morōta?
(As a souvenir from her home, what did you get?)
denden taiko ni, shō no fue.
(A toy drum and a sho flute.)
It's that melody again. I know it all too well, or kekkan did. How do I retain his memories? When so much of him is lost. Or perhaps hidden.
When she stood in the shop. It was a toy shop, the decor was elegant. She wore that. Graceful kimono. With red and green floral patterning. Paired with a long high wasted red skirt. I can never make out her face, only her smile. She repaired that toy drum. After him.
Or was it i. Whoever broke it, we weeped and begged for forgiveness. But she never blamed us, she fixed it as good as new.
I haul myself forward and I must get back to my feet. I see that same figure from the dark.still singing that lullaby.
Dressed the same way she was back then with that drum. I gaze in awe at her. Being in her presence makes me want to let it all out, i can hardly hold it back and
my tears sink into the floor. She speaks so calmly. The Woman [please ******* Don't do that again. I'm worried if I wasn't there last time we wouldn't be here today.] What is she talking about? I don't understand.
Only fragments of her are contained in my memory.
The Prophet [ i don't understand]
She approaches me and kneels down next to me.
The Woman [Why ]
I raise my head.
The Prophet [To save myself from danger]
she slaps me in the face. It's the first time I've experienced aggression from her.
The Woman [why]
i respond
The Prophet [they would have killed me so i took a leap]
She grabs me by the collar. And stares into my eyes.
The Woman [your lying]
The Prophet [I swear I'm not]
she sways her head.
The Woman [you should know better to swear on a lie. That's a sin]
The Prophet. [what do you want from me]
She tilts her head.
[i want the truth *******]
The Prophet [I've already told you the damn truth]
she then sends a critical blow into the side of my face.
The Woman [i see your really this contempt on giving up. I've saved you so many times, but what's the point if you won't accept it. If you're gonna try again]
I'm paralysed. I cannot move. I stare into the ceiling shadows closing in on me. I lose my breath and clamp onto my neck. The pain shoots up at me like I'm suffocating. I can't breathe. My neck swells up red.
I remember back then. I wasn't the only boy. She repaired an old flute. For him I can't remember his face or his name. His hair was like mine is today, overgrown and messy. We used to play in that field of sunflowers.
But I don't remember him, but she is right. This isn't the first time. When I wrapped those chains around my neck I took a leap deep down. I was falling and falling. Until they caught onto something. And then I was hanging down. My neck was about to burst. But why did I do that? Why did it happen, I can't quite remember.
In the end it's strange what I reminisce about before I leave the world. But it was painful not just the chains that wrapped around me. But the life I lived, those times with that boy and this woman. Were truly the best times of my life.
Whatever happened to them I'm not even sure, that boy who he was, I wonder how he is today. And why does this same woman appear before me now? She bends down next to me and hands me the toy drum she repaired in my memory.
It was that same night the chains took me. I was so scared. They didn't respect me. Oh I remember now. But I can't, I don't want to.
Please let me forget, I don't want to dig it up. I shake in a twist and turn and I let out a screech.
The woman [you must endure the pain of love. The secret is how you will keep living.]
The Prophet [ but i dont want to live]
The Woman [you know that's not true]
I know the reason why I did it. Why I wrapped that chain around my neck and jumped Just like I jumped into the abyss today.
I jolt myself up. I can't see through my eyes, it's so foggy. She holds out her arms and I feel her warm embrace. She rubs her hands through my hair and I tell her my truth.
[I was afraid. I was running from it all, I'm afraid to die but I'm also afraid to live. It becomes so painful everything is so much. But I don't want to die. I jumped to escape that trial. They want me to see myself but I don't want to see that man. Kekkan is gone. I need to move away.]
the woman [now it is time to face reality. Wake love.]
I push myself away from her grasp. I stand up straight and sprint through the hallway. But now I see the light at the end.