Eye of the Typhoon (Itsuki)

A day had passed since Itsuki and his father had reunited. His training would commence right away, as his father had spoken to Higan that his son would be taking a week to recover from his mental health and come back more stable.

A second week away from school. Itsuki had his doubts about that, but his father had assured him: “In one week, I will turn you into a monster.”

However, he was only given two missions from his father: Punch that rock wall until his fists split open, ponder every meaning of his life and decisions up to that point, and hunt a boar every day, or try to.

Only rest in his sleep, and one meal per day.

He was doing that now. He pondered life. Or tried to.

The aching pain in his fists made it hard to think, but he struggled still.

Struggle.

A word that has been made into his acquaintance in the last few years.

Struggle; even as he felt heartbroken, his own body broken so many times, but it still stitched itself up.

Blood came out of his knuckles. Itsuki flinched, but continued to punch anyway. Each time a little different, with diverging paces and meanings.

Each pulsating ache in his flesh and bones was a reminder to his mind to think about what he had done up to that point.

An easy objective, but such a hard endeavor.

His every wince, every tear of pain held back, forced him to take focus.

To edge his view and sharpen his thoughts.

Once in his childhood, he was aimless, so happy, there was not a single thought afloat inside his head.

At that time, he followed the flow his father dictated to him, as well as the faint and now faded memories of his mother.

As that child grew up and took his first steps into this world, he began to follow in her steps.

It felt just right, as she knew best. She swung a stick and said it was her masamune. He followed after and helped her swing it better, helping that person just felt like the right thing to do.

The child became a teenager, and lost her. In that grief of his, he still followed in her footsteps, twisted as it was. Protect the weak, bully the bullies, shield people from the Nightmares.

When the teenager could no longer sustain the years of his youth, he became a young man. So lost in the flow of life, he followed after the broken and rugged path left in her death’s wake.

His life was no longer his, but a weird remix of past memories and each mistake of routes traveled. A fuzzy head and astray thoughts, guided by a girl who acted just like her, but was so different.

Now, that young man was backed against a wall, an insurmountable wall that needed to be broken.

Even as the challenge seemed above him, a challenge impossible to beat, he still tried.

Every mistake of roads now broken gave him strength.

Faith and hope, in himself, to try again, even as nothing is like it seems.

Tears of pain honed his mind.

A split fist bit like hell, but the bite of loss and the failure to protect bit harder.

For now, Itsuki didn’t know why he fought, or why he punched that rock, beyond a thought of “I have to get stronger”. He would like to know the reason why, but he was just a lost boy.

Even now.

Yet that boy now had new thoughts of happiness and positive flourishing inside his soul.

Those thoughts that told him not to give up, not without putting up a fight, not without protecting. What did he protect? That was a question for the later him.

An irony of fate.

Despite deciding to forget her, to go beyond those memories and that past, the path he went on was still hers in the end. He walked that path alone now, but it was definitely hers.

The past him would never wish to put a fight, just help others, never become the action behind change, never the one to be the first on the battlefield, and withstand the trial by fire. He would support her, them, to hell and back, but never be the first to change.

Ever since her death and now, he walked her road, the one that forced him to protect others, to be the first to barge in danger.

But what was wrong with that mentality?

That road was not his, that life was not his, true. All true.

But was it a problem?

Now he realized.

Then he walked that path because it reminded him of her as he grieved and rampaged, but that didn’t need to stay the same.

As flesh and bone collided against solid rock, thoughts overflowed from his mind.

That broken, rugged, and jagged path, he would make his now. He was the lyrics, she was the melody, even now.

But that melody would be changed into his, because he wanted to.

No longer would that fight be because of what he lost. It was now a fight for what he wanted to defend, and to discover about himself.

Figure out “who” Itsuki truly was.

And what it took to be the person he wished to be.

Hold people’s hands and hug them, cherish and nurture their warmth. Feel their humanity, and let them be humans, to cry and feel emotional pain, to partake in their happiness, and share his when they were sad.

That was the person, Itsuki was.

Now, he wanted to be like that again, but with the will to be the change, not just a reactionary person, but actively seek that change.

Solid like a mountain’s base, and unshakable like the tallest tree.

His father, however, saw something different.

Something in himself told him his son was not truthful to himself. Maybe it was something in his nature, or maybe in his nurture, but he knew his son was not someone selfless, well, not after her death at very least.

Kyo saw his son chase after an ideal he could no longer achieve. Like a hawk overseeing his son’s first flight, he stepped in. “Are you sure this is the conviction you have in your fists?” He questioned.

The blow he had delivered on that rock still showed, but the blood his son shed against it bore no fruit.

Itsuki stopped for a moment, and doubt infiltrated his heart. “What?”

Kyo sighed. “Itsuki, you know you haven't been fighting for anyone but yourself when I disowned you.” Itsuki looked away in shame. “Yet, when I look at you, I see you are trying to rationalize your actions, that you are fighting for others.”

His father’s gaze narrowed on him, judgmentally. “I fear you are lying to yourself. You fight for yourself, Itsuki. Don't lie to me that you don't like the thrill of the chase, nor know the pang of failure when you don't protect others.”

Kyo walked up to his son and placed a hand on his shoulder, while the other guided his hand to the rock wall. “Keep punching, but this time, remember: ambition, desire, selfishness are not to be discarded nor ignored; they are part of you as a human being, as essential as any other part of yourself. Use them as fuel as well. Remember why you have been fighting, what motivates you, not a utopian ideal you have made up, but the reality you can grasp and shape.”

His father's hand tightened around his wrist. “Take the good and the bad. If you don’t… You won’t achieve what you want, son.” Itsuki’s fist trembled.

He always thought, she always said, that egoism, using their gifts and blessings for selfish reasons and goals, was bad. It was the reason why he never tried to use himself for selfish reasons, until the day she died.

“Only one person can trace the steps of your journey, that’s you. Be strong to withstand what life brings you; life is a climb that only we climb. Stay strong, son. I will be watching you.” Kyo stepped away as he dropped Itsuki’s hand.

Itsuki closed his eyes as he fell deep in thought.

Was it wrong to enjoy the thrill of the fight? His battle against Matsunaga and that mummy came to his mind. He liked the challenge and the sensation of blood boiling in his veins.

He liked to help people because it made him feel great.

Doing the good things… was it because it was good, or because of the satisfaction he gained from doing them?

Momo, Koharu… they came to his mind.

Did he obey their orders because they made him feel great? The admiration, the trust? The soft look they rewarded him with after a mission was completed? After he toiled and bled for their sake?

Was it wrong?

His mind told him it was wrong, and he should feel ashamed.

His heart, though? It didn’t care.

What other reason did he need to do good? Either selfless or selfish, he was doing the right thing. Why care?

Itsuki swallowed saliva, a choked, pained sound came out of his mouth, and his eyes narrowed.

Maybe his father was right. No, he was right. He… would never willingly hurt Itsuki.

No.

He had to be right.

The deeper corners of his mind told him he was right. That goodness was one born of selfishness, that was an egoistic light inside of him, but… even if the root of himself was selfish, that didn’t mean he couldn’t turn that negativity, that desire and wanton want, into positivity.

Itsuki clenched his fists again. He punched that rock wall again, blood splattered on solid stone.

He called back to the days when he used a shinai. That shinai was not his to begin it; he just mimicked the style of someone else, that someone he loved.

That style was not his to begin with.

A way to keep her alive in his heart.

No, that was a lie.

It was because she was the strongest person he knew, so he tried to use that strong style she had. To be better at fighting.

Much like those ideals he had in his soul, he denied himself for someone else’s sake.

An ill-fitting mask. A veneer of purpose and righteousness to conceal a violent monster inside. The chiaroscuro cast from those ideals converged in him.

While he knew he had to shed that borrowed style. For now, he couldn’t. Not until he found something else, his own style and ideals.

And so, he punched the rock, again, and again, and again.

The sparks of conviction started to burn.

He was not as weak as to wait for destiny to change for him, or for a saviour to come. No.

He would not be that pitiful anymore.

To protect what he dreamed of.

Shield the little he had.

Cherish the few that he loved and loved him back.

Turn the wind of change into the typhoon’s eyes.

On these days, he will become one with the myriad winds of a nameless breeze.

Unite both good and evil inside of him.

Protect what he dreamed of.

Shield the little he had.

Before they wait for him, crush their enemies.

Challenge the misfortune in his soul, and win.

Conviction bled from his hands as bones creaked and flesh was torn against rock.

Each punch dug deeper into the stone.

Each punch made his blood go deeper in the earth.

Hairline creaks appeared on an insurmountable wall, and only went deeper, as sound echoed in the forest, and was answered with the cries and songs of the wilderness.

No longer could he be ashamed. He shouldn’t be fearful.

Bless-

(...)

Kyo stared at his son’s back. He sat on the ground, staring at a boar. His hands trembled, the bandages over his knuckles red with his blood. He was in no state to hunt or even chase after a beast like a boar. So all he could do was stare off in the distance.

Kyo didn’t expect him to be able to hunt a boar either. Until he saw all the paths before his eyes and realized himself, he wouldn’t be capable of bringing down a boar. ‘Life is an ocean of ambition, my son. A dragon should dive in that ocean with a grin.’

So much potential, packaged in such a small self. If Kyo had known his son would’ve turned out like his mother, then he wouldn’t have shielded him from that life either.

To expect his son to live a normal life away from danger was wishful thinking on his part.

Maybe it was natural in their blood to seek out power, power to protect. Even as he has been an exception to their family’s cursed nature, his son didn’t seem to have the same luck as he did.

Kusanagi.

A sword.

What was a sword without a master?

What was a blade that sought not to protect?

Maybe his mom was right; he would grow to be this way despite his best efforts. A life given to chase the call.

A man who could only grow through action and pain.

And with pain, the understanding of oneself.

Itsuki’s greatest weakness was his heart, a heart that couldn’t comprehend loss and pain properly, ready to lash out with built-up energy.

That heart also had a hard time comprehending others, keeping them close.

A heart that desperately wished to take its place among the sea of stars in the night, to form a constellation.

But that was impossible; he could never shine as bright or connect as deeply as those other stars.

For him, there was no constellation in the skies.

He shone far too close to the earth. He was far bigger than the sun.

The giant inside of him demanded a way out. Kyo was happy to oblige.

The giant in their blood should awaken.

“Don’t be sorry that you are not a star, son,” Kyo said as Itsuki got up. His bloodied hands trembled, but they were forced to clench into fists.

“Be happy that you were born a Super Nova.”

Itsuki rushed towards the boar.

For Kyo, the right choice would be to stay down and watch, think of new alternatives. Change himself, so he could change the environment and tactics of his foe.

But his son wasn’t like that, hot-blooded as he always was.

The boar sensed Itsuki’s killing intent and rushed it back. That animal could gore a fully grown man easily, and yet his son went head-on against it.

“Make yourself as surely as the rain that falls.”

His son grabbed the boar by its tusks, nearly manhandling it as the animal trashed powerlessly.

“Become as powerful as a great earthquake.”

Blood escaped Itsuki’s hand as he lifted the boar with all the strength his battered and bleeding hands had.

“Bless my past.”

Like throwing a bag filled with rocks, Itsuki threw the boar against a tree as its bark cracked and creaked, blood splattered on it, but the boar didn’t stop.

“Bear the tomorrow.”

It got up and rushed towards Itsuki. It sped up, its tusks raised right to gore up Itsuki’s legs.

A golden light escaped Itsuki’s eyes.

“Change my life.”

His fist went down on the boar’s head. The sound of bone rattling against a skull echoed. The ground underneath them trembled, as it shook even the trees, and birds flew towards the sky.

“Make this nameless breeze into a typhoon.”

Itsuki raised his fist to punch again, but the boar was stubborn and tackled Itsuki, who barely had time to grab it by the tusks again as the animal pushed him against a tree.

Soon, it was a power struggle between them, with one of his hands growing increasingly numb because of the punch.

Itsuki clenched his jaw as the tusks got closer and closer to his body, as the boar thrashed with animalistic rage.

“Soar the great skies with those feathers.”

Itsuki changed his position. he placed his feet against the tree’s trunk and flexed his legs, as if he were a spring. Using the trunk as a platform, he readied to launch himself against the boar.

And launch himself he did.

He flexed his legs and jumped from the trunk. He threw his head against the boar’s, blood splattered from his forehead and into its fur, but no matter how thick its skull was, even the small brain of a boar was rattled by the impact.

It gave Itsuki time to place his feet on solid ground again, and raise the boar in the air with all his might, even as his hand went completely numb, and slam its back against the dirt.

“Unite good and evil inside of him.”

He raised his only good hand.

“It's the birth of a life. It's the birth of a life.”

Like a spear, his hand descended upon the boar’s chest. It broke through thick hide and muscles and went straight towards its organs.

It was not a hunt, but much more like a brawl, but he had succeeded.

“Tonight, Jump into this era.”