The Lost Soul Of Darkness
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I’ve always wondered if it was a blessing or a curse that I was so familiar with the world of ghosts. When I first met my friend, I never knew there was such a place. And when he explained what the afterlife was like, I never thought anything could be worse than death itself. Now that I’ve met you, and experienced your world, I’m not so sure about that.
We were on our way back from a mission, heading towards the town where I used to live when we encountered a small band of brigands. I’d already decided to let them live, even though they didn’t seem all that interested in running away.
They’d been attacked by an enormous swarm of demons and lived through it only because they were too weak to fight off their attackers. It looked as if this particular band had come here to loot and kill instead of fleeing for their lives.
It was obvious what needed to be done, but something held me back from simply slaughtering these men. Something that told me I shouldn’t just kill them because they’re evil. But that wasn’t the end of it; something inside kept insisting that we should help them.
At least get them to safety first. And when I tried to take their weapons and run, they resisted. One of them grabbed me around the neck and threatened to choke me.
“Who are you to tell us how to live? Who are you to judge?” He said with an angry look in his eye. I couldn’t believe my ears. What kind of nonsense was this? Was he serious? I knew right away who these guys were—they were probably some poor refugees, and yet they had the gall to call themselves honorable.
My friend seemed equally surprised and irritated at this reaction. I could tell that he didn’t like being challenged either, but that didn’t keep him from saying a few words in reply. “Don’t you understand? You don’t get to judge anyone. The people we save don’t get to make that decision anymore.”
This was going nowhere, but before I could say anything else, my friend turned around and headed back the way we came, leaving me alone with two dead men. I couldn’t let him go off by himself, but there was nothing I could do to stop him.
As soon as we turned around, the brigands ran up to us. Their leader was one of those tough types you see in any fantasy film, armed with a sword and wearing heavy armor. This man looked like he could take on a horde of zombies with only the clothes on his back. If it weren’t for the fact that we still had our weapons, he’d have been in for quite a surprise.
Instead of killing him, or just taking off, my friend gave them the benefit of the doubt. He took his time and asked if they had anything worth trading. It sounded ridiculous even to me, and I could tell from his voice that he was annoyed, but he kept calm and spoke politely to these strangers.
“I think you should take these things,” he said. He was referring to our weapons, which we’d been carrying for years. The brigand didn’t care at all. They took everything, not because they were desperate, but because they felt they deserved to.
The next day, when I saw my friend again, I wanted to ask what had happened to these men. But there was no need. It was obvious from the look on his face that something bad had happened.
When he finally told me about the encounter, I couldn’t believe what he was saying. How could people act like that? These men were living in such an awful state of existence that I could see right through them. They weren’t really men at all. What a strange place this world of ghosts must be.
My friend and I talked more about the world of spirits and the afterlife, and he told me how I shouldn’t think so badly of them. We weren’t always so cold towards the dead. Our society has evolved into what it is today only in response to their needs. They can’t stay where they are any longer and live with the memories of the life they led.
It’s hard to know what I would have done had I met these men earlier before the world of ghosts came into being. Would I have been able to resist their anger? Maybe my friend and I wouldn’t be friends anymore, since we’re so different. There are some things that just can’t be understood by people who aren’t like you.
“You have to be a man if you want to fight,” my friend said. “The men of the past knew that. I think the same applies here.”
It was hard for me to agree at first, but after a while, I did start to feel the same way. If you don’t show compassion, you end up losing it all over time. People get tired of hearing you talk about all those wonderful people you knew in your youth. All of that is gone.
I’ve come to realize that the only way to find peace of mind in this world is to keep doing what feels right, even if it doesn’t fit within the norms of this society.
***
The first day of winter was coming fast, and it was already dark. A light rain fell, making everything slippery underfoot, and soon I saw a figure approaching from far away. My heart raced, as though there was an invisible arrow pointing straight at him.
It was impossible to miss. The man had the same face as my brother—the only one I’d ever known, who had died a few years ago. His name was Haruaki. But where was he going in such a rush? And why had he decided to return now, so many years after disappearing?
He was walking alone, which made it clear to me right away that something terrible must have happened. When I caught up to him, he turned around and gave me a big smile.
“Hey, Kon.”
His voice was just like the last time I saw him, but there was something different about his eyes.
“What’s wrong?”
Haruaki looked at me with a strange expression on his face, then he took off running.
I followed him as he ran, but there wasn’t any point. I knew that if I tried to catch him, he’d get away. There was no doubt that Haruaki was heading towards the city. We had spent our childhood in this very town, and I could remember all of the streets like I was standing in the middle of them myself.
But the closer we got to town, the more nervous I became because I felt that something terrible was going to happen. I couldn’t say what exactly it was, but there was definitely something.
Finally, after a long period of walking, Haruaki came to a stop. There were people around, but they quickly scattered as soon as they heard him calling my name. That’s how much fear there is around here. They can sense ghosts too, but the living doesn’t like us talking about this.
“Where did you go?” I asked. Haruaki was still holding onto some memories that we used to share, and I was starting to understand why they were so important to him. But he wouldn’t talk about it, which didn’t make much sense to me. “Why did you disappear before? Why come back now?”
“This isn’t where I went.” He looked down for a moment, then turned around to face me again. “The city doesn’t exist anymore,” he said. His eyes glowed with an indescribable light. It seemed as though there was nothing left in that direction. No, not nothing. Something… something that wasn’t there anymore.
I felt as though everything inside of me was burning up. What does he mean? The city disappeared? How could that even be possible? It didn’t make any sense. And yet I could see that he was right. All I had ever seen on the map of this area had been cities, villages, towns, and forests, but now there was only a large empty space.
The city was gone.
***
When Haruaki told me about the city vanishing, I couldn’t help but feel a strange chill go through me. My brother disappeared, then the city vanished without a trace… It all seemed so improbable, and I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
Haruaki kept looking at me intently, his eyes shining with an eerie glow, so I didn’t want to ask any more questions. But after a while, I realized I needed to know something. After all, my brother’s memory was still locked within him somewhere, and he wanted to find out what had happened.
“So… what really happened?” I asked. But Haruaki just smiled and shook his head.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “You’ll understand soon enough.”
***
After that, Haruaki began to change. I couldn’t say how long it took for his memories to start coming back to him, but I do know that the city vanished at some point. That’s the only thing that makes sense, given everything he had told me.
I’d heard many rumors about this town being hit by a huge fire, or destroyed by an earthquake. The most popular one, however, is that there was once an evil demon in the area who ate everyone’s minds. No one knows if those stories are true or not, but they were all the same in their main detail.
Haruaki had started remembering the day when the city vanished, so it was hard for me to think of anything else. It all felt like a dream to me—a nightmare I couldn’t wake up from. I didn’t even know whether he was alive or dead, which made it worse. He had never talked much about his past, so I couldn’t remember anything specific.
“Do you remember where your brother might be? Do you know why he left?” I asked him. His answer made me so sad I cried because I had always been worried about him and wanted to talk to him, but I didn’t know how to contact him.
“I don’t know exactly what happened,” Haruaki answered. “But I do know that the city is gone now.”
He must have thought I was talking about his brother, but this time I wasn’t. The city vanished without a trace, and so did his memories. He had said that the people’s memories went away too, along with everything that existed within them. It was as though all of it had vanished into thin air, leaving nothing behind. It made no sense. How could the entire city vanish?
It was just a story… something we used to tell each other to scare ourselves silly. There’s no way this can be real. But Haruaki was saying that the city was really gone, and it felt so real that I didn’t even want to argue anymore. Even so, I still kept thinking: Why did my brother disappear?
“Did he leave because of you?” I asked. Haruaki’s gaze turned distant for a while, and when he spoke again, it was in a strange tone.
“Maybe not,” he said. “But maybe I caused him to run away.”
What does that mean?
“I don’t know,” he continued. “But it looks like someone else knows, and is looking for us right now.”
Who?
I could hardly believe it, but Haruaki looked serious. He stared directly into my eyes without blinking once, then told me a single word.
“Shikigami.”
***
I still couldn’t accept what I was hearing. After all, the whole town had disappeared, along with everyone in it. If there were people left behind after that, where had they gone? The only way I could picture things was as if everyone had just vanished from the face of the earth. And yet there was something about Haruaki’s story that didn’t add up.
Haruaki had been telling the truth about everything so far, but I was still suspicious about whether all of it was true or not. I was convinced that there had to be something he was hiding. After all, if his memories truly came back, he wouldn’t have kept quiet about all this.
I’d always assumed that the person in question was his brother, and he probably needed some time to sort through those feelings first before saying anything else.
I wanted to ask him about it, but I held back. I didn’t want to say anything that would put a damper on his mood and ruin the good times we’ve spent together so far. I was sure that Haruaki had more information about all this that he wasn’t telling me. So instead of pressing him any further, I tried to distract him with other questions.
“What’s a shinigami?” I asked. Haruaki smiled faintly at my question and began talking.
“There’s a legend in this country called Japan,” he said. “It’s one of those stories you hear as a child. They tell us about an old god who lives in the mountains… the god of thunder, lightning, and wind. You might remember him. His name is Shiki.”
My eyes widened when he mentioned this name. There was something familiar about it. But I couldn’t put my finger on it right away. What was that story, anyway? Was it one of those scary myths I heard about as a kid? The kind of thing that makes you afraid to sleep by yourself at night?
But even though I knew what Haruaki was talking about, I couldn’t help but feel nervous. The last few days had been wonderful for me, but now the whole town had vanished, and he was talking about strange things I didn’t understand.
The very fact that he was able to do so was already pretty terrifying—if someone told me a story like that without explaining how or why, I would think they were crazy too. I wasn’t used to having so much trouble understanding people. Even if it was just a myth, the thought of not being able to grasp it still gave me the chills.
The whole time he was talking, my mind kept wandering off and I couldn’t focus. It took me some effort to listen to his every word and take everything in. When he was done, I finally understood what he was saying.
“Shiki…?” I repeated. “You’re telling me that my brother is Shiki?!”
“Yes, that’s right,” Haruaki said. “He has the same name. And since my memories came back, I’ve known who my real parents are.”
I remembered the person Haruaki was describing. The person from his childhood was a guy in white wearing a black cape with a red scarf around his neck. He was tall and slender and had a calm expression on his face. That person was the exact image of the person Haruaki was talking about.
I was completely shocked at this revelation, so I looked at him and said, “Wait a sec! Don’t you mean your mom’s the one who looks like Shiki? The real god?”
Haruaki nodded. Then he continued to tell me the story behind how he knew his mother was the one in question.
“Ever since I was young, I’d dreamt that I was in a forest with a boy,” he started. “I couldn’t see his face very clearly. He had a dark complexion and black hair, but that’s all I could see. The boy was always smiling, and we were both running through the forest together.
I couldn’t remember any details like where I was or why we were running, but that’s the only thing I ever dreamed about. It was always a very pleasant experience, like a peaceful walk through the woods.
“I never really paid much attention to it when I was younger, and I never thought about asking someone about my dream. I just let it slip my mind because I wasn’t interested. But then one day, after I got married and became a father, I realized there might be a meaning behind those dreams.”
When Haruaki said that, the meaning behind Haruaki’s dream suddenly came clear to me. He wasn’t dreaming about a guy who looked like his brother. He was dreaming about his own kid. This is what he had meant earlier when he’d told me about the things that happened in his past that he didn’t want to talk about.
It had been his son in those dreams. The little boy that he was running through the woods with. It was all because of Haruaki’s wife, who gave birth to a child they called Atsushi. And now that his memory had returned, he finally understood that the person from those dreams was actually—
“Hey, wait… you’re telling me that you don’t have any memories of having a baby?” I asked.
“I’m sure I must have. I don’t know why I don’t remember anything, but my wife says I must have since my memories came back right around the time she got pregnant. There are all sorts of explanations for it. One theory is that I suffered some sort of traumatic head injury during an accident and I’ve blocked out the memory of being in pain.”
Haruaki said that with a smile, but I felt sick. The thought of this man being responsible for taking away his memories of his own family was too much for me to handle. I felt like vomiting.
“Why are you smiling at a time like this?! You can’t joke around like that!”
“Sorry,” Haruaki apologized with a nod. “It’s just… well…”
He didn’t finish his sentence. He couldn’t look me in the eye as he continued, “After that… I started thinking about what would happen if Atsushi was really a god. If Atsushi really did come from the heavens. Then maybe it was true that there were other gods in Japan besides my father… like my mother.”
Haruaki’s voice was shaking and he stopped talking for a moment. The words were heavy in his mouth, and I could hear his breathing quickening. Then he slowly raised his voice again. “I knew if I found out for certain who my real parents were, the answer might destroy the world.
The End