Enter the Cowardly Bard, Kinzo Shigochiyo part 3

Several years ago...

"Bakagari!"

A little girl had cheered, scaring young Kinzo awake as he yelped and fell off the thin cot of the sleeping quarters. His little sister, Kishi, was smiling brightly at him and flopping onto his chest in an attempt to hug him with her entire body. He let out a relieved breath but put a hand over his chest to stable his breathing and eventually simply laughed at the girl. No matter how dark the circumstances, Kishi always seemed to have a smile on her face. Her brown hair and blushing cheeks adding to her sweetness, she was beaming at her big brother. Dressed in her brown yukata, Kishi waited for Kinzo to get up. They were on water fetching duty today.

"You're gonna miss 'eakfas, niisan," Kishi said, crawling up to his face with inching movements like an excited pup. "We're at the wells today!"

Yawn, stretch, head scratch. Kinzo did his daily lazing before he tossed Kishi over his shoulder and said cheerfully, "Can't have you starving, baby girl. You'll lose that cute grin. Let's go!"

"You're such a bakagari, niisan!" Kishi cheered.

Together, the two washed up, ate their portion of rice with eggs and sweet peas, and proceeded to the wells. Demons were towering over them as the children of the onmyoji clan were gathering buckets of water for all sorts of projects that the demon slave drivers were engaged with. Piles of sugar garnets were being stacked at the storage tower while herbs were being burned to ward off other demons and the adults were forced to mine for something that the demons wanted. No one knew what that thing was. They had been overrun by these demons for little over a century now. Kinzo and Kishi were born into this horrid mode of slavery. They hardly saw their parents. This was to stop the children from coming into their powers too soon and starting a riot.

The breeding camp had to be the worst part of this enslavement. Women of about sixteen or older were chained to walls, had bags over their heads while the men were forced to mate with them, and had their powers muted with sugar garnets. These jewels somehow or another were able to close off an onmyoji's power. That's how these demons were able to control one of the most feared holy warrior clans. No one knew how they discovered this. Just that they found a way. Kinzo was close to breeding age. While he had time to find an escape plan for Kishi, his time was short. What was scariest about the breeding camp was really the bag and muffler that two mates had to wear. Because the man can't see the woman, he doesn't know if he's mating with an immediate family member or not. Likewise, because the woman can't hear the man speak, she can't tell who's touching her. The demons, luckily, have no interest in mating with human women. Only maintaining the number of slaves every decade. Kinzo and Kishi were birthed from the same parents. It was quite rare for the mates to be allowed to see or speak to each other and to be mated twice.

Kinzo and Kishi were considered to be some of the best workers among the onmyoji. Though they never heard them say this themselves, two of the overseers were speaking in private about it.

"Those two were made to do our bidding, brother. Look at 'em!" a blue-skinned demon said, narrowing his sights on the two. "Out carrying the others at top speeds. Tch! Our finest yet!"

"They are too young to be mated, but we will have to keep an eye out for the ideal woman for the boy. The girl still has time," a red-skinned demon said. "Their mother has not produced children in a while. Should we mate her again?"

"Hmm... we shall see. If we can choose at least two of the finest workers for each segment of labor, it will not be necessary. If not even one can be chosen, then yes. We might even take the boy earlier," the blue-skinned demon said, ominously staring at Kinzo. He dropped a large container of water by accident, but no water meant everyone had to be out longer.

SNAP! SNAP! SNAP!

"Ah! Ah!"

"Kinzo!"

"Niisan!"

The sting of the lash was enough to strike fear into everyone as the demon slave drivers whipped Kinzo mercilessly for falling down and dropping a pail of water. He tried to hold back his screams, but three whips from multiple sides and cutting his skin open couldn't be silenced. It burned. Feeling one of the overseers punching one of the cuts with a brass knuckle, Kinzo let out a final grunt and curled up into a ball to try to shield himself from anymore beatings. The demons stopped when he cowered. Their message got across to the onmyoji clan. Little Kishi, Kinzo's beloved girl, ran over to him when the overseers stopped and tried to hug him to make the pain go away, but she was slapped across the face hard enough for her head to whip violently.

"Kishi! No! Stop!" Kinzo begged. "Kishi!"

Kinzo tried to fight the slave drivers off him. His little girl's cries echoing in the forsaken caves as they whipped her and either slapped or punched her. Kinzo cried as he was held down to watch her be beaten. The other clansmen tried to plead with them, claiming that she was merely a child, but a child could turn into a revolutionary and there was no time to lose when such a mindset developed and spread. She had to be broken. He had to be broken. When they stopped, they released Kinzo and made him carry Kishi on his back including both of their shares of water as punishment. He was in tears the entire time. Kishi was unconscious.

By dusk, Kinzo was cleaning Kishi's wounds while in tears. Kishi looked up at him with a dazed expression and smiled while saying weakly, "Bakagari..."

"Kishi, I'm so sorry! I'm sorry!" Kinzo whispered, clenching Kishi tightly and rocking her back and forth.

"Evil begets evil, onmyoji," Kishi said with a growl. Kinzo jerked back, not recognizing his sister's voice, and gasped with fear at the sight of her eyes burning red with pure black irises. She snapped her head to him and rotated it so unnaturally to gaze into his soul from her position. She then opened her mouth to show fangs and a tattoo on her tongue. Kishi had come into her powers! No! She then continued in that possessed voice, "You have been chosen to deliver my wrath. The final strike to end this pain. Go into my temple with this child and you will be the new wayfinder."

With that, Kishi snapped back into her natural position and went unconscious again. Kinzo didn't think about his powers, didn't care that he was chosen. He was in complete fear of the demons knowing that Kishi had become the new oracle for the onmyoji. In the middle of the night while the demons rested or slept, Kinzo snuck into the abandoned temple. His father was there, body low in prayer, unable to sleep. When he heard Kinzo and saw him carrying Kishi, he rushed over to them with concern.

"Dad!" Kinzo muttered, tears restarting. "Kishi's..."

"What is it, my son?" he asked, wiping away his tears.

"She's the new oracle," Kinzo whispered, shaking. "They'll kill her!"

The look of fear from his father's entire form made Kinzo's blood turn cold, but the man snapped out of it and ran him deeper into the temple. They went as far down into the depths of the onmyoji temple as they could handle. It was a dungeon that stretched for what felt like miles, but it was where the oracles trained daily to maintain the connection between the power source and the new head of the clan. His father didn't even think to ask who the head of the clan was going to be. The oracle typically drifted over to him or her. They reached the pool and gates of the oracle's lair just on the other side. A beautiful lake was just below them.

"Place Kishi in the pool, my son," his father instructed, purifying the area with the last bit of salt in the sack near them.

His father went into prayer as soon as Kinzo did this. Objects within the temple began to gravitate and reformed the inner chambers of the dungeon. The gates around the onmyoji's territory had reformed and become more solid. No one could go in or out... unless the oracle permitted it...

Kishi's eyes snapped open again into that unnatural red and black and snapped to Kinzo to say, "Reach into my waters for your tool of power, onmyoji."

Kinzo's father slowly turned his head to his son and gasped lightly. His children... were the new leaders of the clan? Why? How? Kinzo looked at his father, gulped, and closed his eyes as he reached into the water. It was slimy and soft... until he hit something hard and almost round. He grabbed at it and pulled out... a biwa.

"You are not ready to use my might on this day, young Shigochiyo Kinzo. For seven years, you must wait to use my final strike. A survivor from the war of the gods will greet you at the lake. Practice this instrument as a biwa hoshi. I will train you in the night and watch over this little girl during this time."

"What did that monster do to my sister?" Kinzo asked, shaking.

"Your love is so pure, onmyoji!" the possessor complimented, making Kishi smile warmly at him. "This girl is terribly hurt. I could stand it no longer. The war of the gods has stopped me from saving my people! You have done great service to me. I am ashamed that I have left you to suffer like this. Forgive me! Use your music to heal your people until a doctor can be found. I will return in seven years. My hope is that the demon's strike on this child was not fatal. Her wounds are beyond my healing capability. You need the hand of another to aid her."

"Kishi, no..." Kinzo mumbled, dropping the biwa to enter the pool and hold his beloved sister.

"So pure, so pure!"

"Niisan..."