Fateful Encounter II

In Kotsu the colors seemed drained, devoid of any real beauty. It was as if the red paper lanterns hanging from the roofs were not there to illuminate the night sky but rather to draw away the attention of any passerby from the wretched and grime-filled alleyways. The rancid stench of piss, sake, and burnt offerings thickened the air, crawling into Yatsuho's nose like poison. He fought back the bile rising in his throat, yet even his disgust felt too sharp, too intense. Kotsu had a way of distorting feelings—amplifying them until they no longer belonged to him.

Passing through Yatsuho saw humans in the shape of pigs their faces slick with grease, snorting and chewing without pause, wasting away their lives feasting on the pork and sake, never stopping as if it was not their stomachs that they had tried to fill but rather a bottomless pit.

He saw humans in the shape of rats, their beady eyes darting as they slithered through the crowd. Their quick fingers and silver tongues lured easy prey into their schemes, stealing coins from the foolish. Nearby, snakes coiled in envy, their forked tongues flicking with desires to strike it rich in the gambling dens.

At the edges of the streets lay the dens of foxes, their faces painted with white and red hidden behind crimson veils. every time their crimson lips parted drunken and lustful men disappeared off the street and into dimly lit rooms they went—dens of lust and ruin that bathed in the hue of red. The air hummed with soft laughter, yet every step deeper into those rooms was a descent into destruction

Yatsuho's gaze lingered on a corner where slothful snails reclined, their drunken drooping eyes half-closed as they watched the chaos unfold. They paid no mind to the wrathful ape, its fists slamming tables in rage, nor to the prideful hyena, its mocking laughter echoing as it baited the ape further. The scene was an ugly symphony of anger, arrogance, and inertia, each feeding off the other in a never-ending cycle.

Kotsu was a place like no other, a city that didn't just corrupt—it consumed. It was alive its pulse beat with unchecked emotions, unbound desires, and forgotten guilt. Yatsuho was beginning to understand that he wasn't just walking through Kotsu—he was being drawn into it. His own emotions were being magnified, and distorted. Disgust at the filth, greed, and rot—burned in him, hotter, sharper, and more dangerous. But beneath it, another feeling was stirring—pride.

The thought hit him like a flash. I am better than them. The realization came swiftly, as though Kotsu itself whispered it into his ear. And in that moment, Yatsuho believed it. He was above this chaos, above these beasts. He would be the lion that ruled over them all.

The rat that had brushed against him in the crowd was swift—too swift, too confident. Its fingers moved too quickly, and before Yatsuho even thought, they had already fished through his pockets. In precise;y five seconds, Yatsuho grabbed the rat by the arm, lifting it effortlessly off the ground. With a sickening crack, he broke its hand, his own pride rising with every broken bone.

For a moment, everything stopped. The chaos around him seemed to pause, waiting. Then, like a tide breaking, the madness surged. The pigs snorted louder, the rats scurried in fear, and the foxes cackled from their dens. The ape's rage roared through the streets, matched by the hyena's mocking laughter. Kotsu's pull had reached its peak, and its inhabitants, drunk on the emotions it had drawn from them, unleashed their fury.

Yatsuho's heart hammered in his chest, his every step driven by the savage ecstasy that now consumed him. The city roared in kind. The streets turned into a battleground, the scene was nothing short of pandemonium. The air hummed with the sound of tearing flesh, shattered bones, and the shrieks of those who had lost their way. Yatsuho moved through the wreckage, his senses sharp and burning with the intoxication of power. The more destruction, the more glory. The more chaos, the more control.

Then, as if from a distance, the sound of guards' boots reached his ears—too late. It took them half an hour to reach the heart of the chaos, but by then, the city was already alive with the violence Yatsuho had stirred. Bodies lay broken in the streets, flames flickered against the fading light of the red lanterns, and the bloodstains were already drying into the filth beneath.

Yatsuho paused for a moment, his chest heaving, but in his eyes, there was no regret. He stood tall as if the city had bent to him as if Kotsu had surrendered to his will. His hubris had led him here, and he felt invincible.

But somewhere in the back of his mind, a whisper nagged at him—was this truly his doing? Or had Kotsu, with its unholy pull, simply used him as its instrument of destruction? For the first time, doubt flickered in his mind, but the roar of victory quickly silenced it, the pride of knowing he had become the lion.

And then it stopped.

Yatsuho's breath hitched as his foot caught on something. He glanced down and froze. It was a body—a child's body, limp and lifeless. The blood pooling around the small figure was still warm, its metallic tang searing his nostrils. His hands, trembling, were stained red. The intoxicating haze lifted, replaced by the crushing weight of realization.

He looked around. The streets were strewn with corpses, the lanterns above casting their crimson glow on a scene of pure carnage. The pigs, the rats, the snakes—they were all just people now. Some were dead, some dying, some cowering in terror at what they had become.

Yatsuho staggered back, bile rising in his throat. His chest heaved as the weight of his actions came crashing down on him. He saw his reflection in a broken shard of glass—a monster, eyes wild with pride and violence. He was no lion. He was just another beast, no different from the ones he had despised.

The whispers of Kotsu were gone now, leaving only silence and the gnawing pit of shame. Yatsuho fell to his knees, trembling. His hands covered his face, but he couldn't hide from what he had done. He wanted to scream, to claw at his skin and erase the filth that had consumed him. But no amount of screaming or clawing would undo the chaos he had unleashed.

Kotsu had tested him. And he had failed.