17 The Monkey's Paw

  [Player: Kazuki Arata]

  [Level: 4]

  [Waza: Black Hand, Thread Cutter, Aura Sense, Dark Rider, Retribution, Eviscerate]

  [Kegare: 22%]

  ---

  Misty rain drifted down from above as Suzume tightened the straps of her Water Lily Cloak. Her hands trembled, not from fear, but from weakness. They had been crushed by the oni-kappa of the forest just days before and while her reishin healing had returned them to their original form, it would take time for their strength to return.

  She flexed her fingers experimentally, wincing.

  "Let me try first," she said, eyeing the rain-slicked ridge that cut across the mountainside like a torn piece of gray paper. Its stones glistened in the cloud-filtered light, promising a treacherous climb even for someone uninjured.

  Kazuki opened his mouth, but Suzume was already moving. She approached the base of the ridge, testing the first handhold on the cold, wet stone. She pulled herself up, found another grip, and continued.

  Three meters up, her right hand betrayed her. As she reached for a jutting rock, her fingers spasmed with pain. Suzume gasped, her grip faltering. She slid down the ridge face, scraping against stone before landing in a crouch at the bottom.

  "Not this way," she conceded, examining her bleeding knuckles with a scowl. "Not for me. Not today."

  "The stairs?" Kazuki suggested, his voice carefully neutral.

  Suzume nodded grimly. "I'll take the pilgrim's path to the Grand Shrine. Confront Karaba directly."

  "That's suicide," Kazuki said, the Crimson Scale at his throat pulsing faintly.

  "For you, it would be. But Karaba won't hurt me," she corrected. "Besides, my foster brother won't be looking for you if he's dealing with me. Find the back entrance through the Stone Mother's passage."

  Fleet took her wet, scraped hand in his, his fox ears drooping with concern.

  Suzume pulled the young fox-yokai to her, hugging him as she said quietly, "Keep him alive, Fleet. However you have to."

  The fox didn't reply.

  "Sunset," she said, releasing Fleet and turning to Kazuki. "If you're not inside the Grand Shrine by then, Karaba will be looking for you."

  "We will be," Kazuki replied.

  They watched as she vanished into misty trees, her cloak shimmering in the dampness.

  "She'll be okay, right?" Fleet whispered.

  Kazuki's expression was grim. "Yeah, Fleet. She will. Now, as for you and me..."

  A chittering laugh cut through the rain. Konkon the monkey chieftain, perched on a mossy boulder, his silver fur slicked flat, had been watching them the entire time. The Luminescent Marble glowed faintly through the pouch around his neck.

  "Lead the way," Kazuki said.

  The macaque bared yellowed teeth and leaped towards the ridge, scaling it effortlessly and pausing occasionally to hoot mockingly at their struggles.

  "He's... laughing... at us!" Fleet gasped, claws scrabbling for purchase on the wet stone.

  Kazuki's boots skidded on the slippery rock. The wound in his side throbbed in time with the kegare's whispers. Let go, it urged from the darkness inside him. Let the shadows climb for you.

  He shoved the thought down. "Why'd we trust a monkey?"

  "Because he's cute!" Fleet yelped as Konkon lobbed a pebble at his head with surprising accuracy.

  Konkon vanished over the crest. When they finally hauled themselves up, he was waiting beside a gnarled pine, picking lice from his fur. Beyond him stretched a narrow valley choked with yet more mist.

  "Tears of the Stone Mother?" Kazuki murmured.

  A waterfall roared in the distance. Through the light rain, it almost looked like a woman weeping, her sorrow feeding the pools and streams below. In the forest beyond the ridge ancient trees towered overhead, their trunks wider than village wells with moss hanging from branches in green curtains.

  Mushrooms the size of dinner plates erupted from fallen logs, their caps patterned with hypnotic spirals. Kazuki could hear the occasional calls of unseen creatures that sounded almost, but not quite, like human laughter. Ferns populated the forest floor like miniature green civilizations. The ground was soft and pine needles seemed to breathe beneath their feet, rising and falling as they walked.

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  Konkon bounded ahead, disappearing for minutes at a time only to reappear clutching stolen treasures; an iridescent beetle, a perfectly round stone he pointed at them like an unblinking eye.

  "Ask him how much farther," Kazuki grumbled, ducking beneath a branch that seemed to reach for his hair.

  Fleet chirped a series of hoots. Konkon paused, sniffed the air deeply, and replied with a noise that sounded like a wet sneeze.

  "He says... sniff... 'when the earth stops lying'?"

  "Great. A philosopher monkey."

  The macaque leader scampered back, suddenly serious. He jabbed a clawed finger at Kazuki's chest, where the Crimson Scale hung beneath his rain-soaked clothes.

  "Konkon-kon!"

  "He says... um… rot follows rot?" Fleet's ears flattened. "That's not good, right?"

  Konkon's eyes gleamed. He leaned in close, his breath reeking of fermented fruit, and whispered something that made Fleet recoil.

  "What? What did he say?" Kazuki demanded.

  The fox forced a laugh. "Nothing! Monkey jokes! Let's keep going!"

  But his tail stayed tucked between his legs as they continued deeper into the forest.

  The Stone Mother's tears led them to a crack in the mountainside; a corridor of weathered stone, its walls carved with reliefs of monkeys, painted in vivid colors. They were dancing? Bowing to... something? The entrance was nearly hidden behind a curtain of hanging vines.

  The macaque hesitated at the threshold, his fur bristling along his spine. For the first time, he looked afraid.

  "What's wrong?" Kazuki asked.

  Fleet translated the macaque's rapid signs. "He says... this is a holy place. We have to... move quietly."

  The air inside tasted different somehow - like rusty water. Fleet's Luminescent Marble, now strapped to Konkon's chest, flickered sporadically, casting jagged shadows on the stone walls before going out.

  "Do the carvings look... recent to you?" Kazuki whispered, brushing a hand over the stone.

  "Nope! Definitely ancient!" Fleet's voice cracked. "Super normal ancient carvings!"

  Konkon hissed a warning.

  The corridor narrowed, forcing them to walk single file.

  Ahead, the passage split. Konkon pointed left. He cooed encouragingly, looking at Kazuki with a… smile? Then, a loud bark and he lunged without warning, claws raking Kazuki's arm.

  "Hey!"

  The macaque screeched, all pretense gone, and bolted down the right path.

  Kazuki grabbed Fleet. "We need to go back!"

  But when they turned, the way they'd come was gone - a gate of thick though rusted iron where the entrance had been.

  Somewhere ahead, Konkon laughed.

  They followed the only path available, until suddenly the narrow corridor gave way to an opening and the light of a clearing early afternoon sky.

  They stood at the edge of a small colosseum; a hollowed crevice in the mountain whose core had been carved away to create tiered seating that rose in concentric rings. The misty rain had stopped and now the sun slanted through clouds, casting moving bands of light and shadow as clouds passed through the sky.

  Monkeys were streaming into the colosseum from unseen entrances - hundreds of monkeys, moving like a liquid, like a mob. Small macaques skittered along the lower tiers while larger, battle-scarred veterans claimed the higher seats of honor. Mothers cradled infants to their chests as they sucked on their teats while adolescents tussled for better positions, and elders sat above, watching the newcomers with suspicious eyes.

  Behind them, the gate to the corridor slammed shut with a bone-rattling boom that silenced the chattering crowd momentarily before the noise resumed at twice the volume.

  "Oh," Fleet whispered, "This is bad."

  Across from Kazuki and Fleet at the end of the arena stood a raised dais carved from a single massive boulder. Konkon appeared atop it, seemingly from nowhere, the Luminescent Marble now held aloft in his grip. Its glow intensified in the sunlight, becoming a miniature star that commanded attention.

  The macaque king rose, spreading his arms in mock benevolence, and barked a command that echoed across the colosseum.

  The crowd fell silent.

  Then the earth shook.

  A gate creaked open loudly from beneath Konkon's perch.

  From the shadows emerged a macaque of impossible proportions. Standing fully upright, it towered over four meters tall, its shoulders wider than three men standing side by side. Muscles rippled beneath matted fur that bore the scars of a hundred battles, patches missing to reveal skin that had hardened into natural armor, dark and cracked like volcanic rock.

  Its face was a grotesque parody of its smaller kin—eyes yellowed and crusted, one partially sealed shut by an old wound that had healed poorly. Its muzzle was split into a permanent snarl, revealing teeth that had been filed to jagged points and stained with the rust-brown of old blood. One ear was completely gone, the other torn to ragged ribbons.

  In its massive hands, it clutched a weapon that appeared to be the thigh bone of some enormous creature, wrapped with metal bands and studded with teeth and claws from prey long defeated. The weapon dragged behind it with a loud grinding, scratching sound.

  This was no mindless beast - calculation gleamed in its rheumy eyes as it surveyed the newcomers. It sniffed the air, and its split lips peeled back in what might have been a smile.

  The crowd erupted in frenzy, howling and hurling rotten fruit and nuts into the arena. Some beat rhythmically on the stone seats, creating a thunderous percussion.

  Fleet's ears flattened against his skull as he shouted to be heard. "I TOLD YOU THEY WERE TRICKSTERS!"

  The giant macaque's chest swelled as it inhaled deeply, and then it roared - a sound so primal and overwhelming that it rattled teeth and shook bones. It raised its makeshift weapon high overhead and charged across the arena floor with shocking speed for its size.

  The club smashed into the ground where Kazuki had stood half a heartbeat before, cracking the stone and sending fragments flying like shrapnel. He rolled to his feet, the kegare inside him surging at the proximity to violence, whispering promises of power if only he would surrender to it.

  He was sealed in a ring of screaming fur and stone as the afternoon sun cast the shadow of the monster across him. Fleet tugged at Kazuki's sleeve. "Please tell me you have a plan that doesn't involve dying!" Kazuki's hand moved to the Crimson Scale at his throat, feeling it pulse with hungry anticipation.

  "I might," he answered grimly. "But you're not going to like it."

  ---

  [Achievement Unlocked: King of the Swingers]

  [Next Chapter: Death and the Colosseum]

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