This is a little pilot chapter (and bonus faux screencap) for my Koji & Kikami story; Kika doesn’t actually have a name until Koji starts calling him “Kikami (来神)” jokingly (since he likes to act so high and mighty about being “Kitaru Kami (来る神)” lit. Next/Future God), so he’s just referred to as the magician throughout most of this. I think I’m gonna work on finishing up the designs for Garlic’s Spice Rack of demons soon. I’m still trying to come up with a good working title, so hit me up with ideas or questions or comments! TW for cannon typical violence and injury
The mountainous countryside stood still in the early-morning breeze, awash in the sunlight and birdsong of a fine day. On the outskirts of a small village stood a run-down series of shacks housing a simple milkmaid and her few animals. She let the chickens out of their coop to roam before entering what few besides her would call a barn, a structure hardly large enough to house the three cows she had. Laying out their hay, she settled herself in to collect her livelihood. What she couldn’t sell today in the village she would age into cheese to sell on her annual trip to the nearest town.
She hummed lightly as she worked, nimble fingers squeezing much too tight at the sound of a thunderous crash. The cow on which she was working kicked in alarm, knocking the wind out of the milkmaid and tossing her onto the barn floor. Eventually, she caught her breath and wiped the muddy hoofprint off her apron as she slowly rose to her feet. Her cattle had huddled together in the corner opposite of the barn door, anxiously eying the source of the crash. Through the open door she saw her coop smashed in, splintered wood and feathers littering the ground. Adrenaline in her veins and a curse on her lips, she rushed out to assess the damage.
In the middle of the wreckage she found a mangled form that stopped her cold. She couldn’t quite discern what it was until it sputtered out a bloody cough. His blue gi was stained with what she could only assume was copious amounts of blood and torn into a tattered mess that had long since given up on covering his extremities. His leg was bent at an angle painful to look at and only a gushing stump remained where his right arm used to be. Bruises splotched his green skin purple where he wasn’t actively bleeding. His face was swollen, blood leaking out the corner of his mouth and smeared over his brow as he wheezed for air. She gasped for air herself, not realizing she had been holding her breath at the sight.
She certainly wouldn’t call herself blindly trusting of strangers who fall out of the sky, but there was simply no way she could just leave him to die. If she could get him into her home, she could dress some of his wounds and keep him sheltered until he gained consciousness; then she could clear up the questions that kept dancing through her head (“Who are you? How did you fall out of the sky? Why do you have claws? Are you an Ogre??”) and move forward from there.
Sizing him up, she felt her ogre claim might have some weight: he was enormous, easily two meters at least. There was simply no way she would be capable of moving him all that way on her own. She eyed the splintered boards that used to make up her chicken coop and then her barn full of cattle. Finding the largest plank of wood she could, she cleared the debris around the body before rolling him onto the makeshift gurney. Fastening a yolk onto the old and gentle cow that had walloped her earlier, the milkmaid led the cow out to the gurney and joined the yolk and plank with rope.
“Don’t worry,” she said more to herself than to her guest as she began the procession to her home, “I’ll get you fixed up.” The plank hit a stone jutting out of the ground, jostling the man roughly as he let out a pained groan. “…Or try to, at least.”
His eye was swelling shut. He had spent too much energy keeping pace with Garlic to stay in the air much longer, let alone regenerate his arm. He felt Garlic’s cruel laughter more than he heard it, a mocking sound that cut through his pride. In the beginning he was so confident he would win, so sure.
“I’ve had such a fun time putting you in your place,” Garlic punctuated with a focused ki blast into his shoulder. “It’s a shame I have to kill you now. Once I’m Kami, I’ll be sure to honor you with a statue…of you being ground under my heel.” Garlic cackled wildly at the image. Seizing Garlic’s momentary distraction, the magician launched a desperate eyebeam at his opponent, who easily dodged before disappearing from view. The battered magician frantically began searching for his opponent, chest heaving with the effort it took just to stay in the air.
He didn’t have the time to turn around before Garlic had swatted him to the ground. The ground was quickly approaching and the only sound he could hear was Garlic’s taunting laughter. The ground was getting closer, closer-
The magician shot straight up, chest heaving and eyes wild. Clutching his chest, feeling his body as solid, as present, he determined with relief that he was alive. He could still set things right! He moved to get up before exhaustion, blood loss, and delayed pain forced him to drop back onto the bed like a sack of bricks. A bed?
He certainly was on a mattress, much too small for him but a mattress nonetheless. Someone tucked a thin blanket around him and he found a damp cloth resting in his lap, fallen from off his forehead when he suddenly woke. It seemed to be a simple room, a small cabinet along the wall beside his head and a chair in the opposite corner. On the cabinet sat a glass of water. He was suddenly very aware of how dry his mouth was and he reached for the cool drink.
Oh, yes that’s right, his arm was gone. A searing pain went through the limb that wasn’t there as he recalled the injury, wincing sharply at the memory. Examining it closer, he realized that it was finely wrapped in torn sheets with splotches stained a faded red. If it was his blood that stained it, then the bandages must have been washed and his wound redressed. How long was he out for? Seeing his leg sticking out over the edge of the bed, he noticed it was splinted. He almost laughed at that, as he was fairly certain he had no bones to break in the first place. Whoever it was that found him was certainly not half-assing his recovery. All this kindness and determination from a total stranger. It was the kindness of people like this that motivated him to seek out Kami’s training, so that he might repay such kindness.
Hearing approaching steps, he decided to feign sleep to more covertly assess the situation he found himself in. The door opened into the little room as his host set down some ceramic vessel onto the cabinet.
“How did you get all the way over here?” The woman, he presumed by the voice, lifted the towel from off his lap. He heard a gentle splashing of water before the towel was dabbed against his brow. He remained tense in anticipation of it being pressed painfully against his antenna, but it never came. As the ministrations continued up his forehead, she was quite careful to avoid even brushing against them. When she had finished, she wringed the towel out more before laying it atop his brow again.
“Now I know the smelling salt didn’t work yesterday,” His mouth became impossibly dry at the word salt alone and he was reminded again of the cool water waiting for him on the cabinet. “But I was in the garden this morning and I think I’ve cooked up something strong enough to wake the devil himself!” He heard a rustle of fabric before the swishing of liquid in a jar as she unstopped the concoction directly below his nose. He couldn’t stop himself from gagging, bringing his one good hand up to shield his face as he began to cough. Oh goodness, were his eyes watering?
“It worked!” she cried out in victory. “You’re finally awake!”
“What is that?” His voice was even rougher than usual with disuse, not helped by the coughing.
Wiping the water from his eyes he was finally able to see his host. He noticed her bright eyes first, squinted pleasantly by the broad smile on her face. If the beauty-marks on her left cheek didn’t make her recognizable, he was certain he’d be able to pick her out by her hair alone. Bangs parted straight down the middle swept gently to either side of her face before forming a milkmaid’s braid on the crown of her head; what hair wasn’t accounted for in the braid sat neatly in a high bun. She wore a simple rust-red dress with broad sleeves that cut off plainly at her elbows, a golden shawl over her shoulders, and a plain blue apron faded near white from days in the sun.
His question seemed to catch her attention, as she brought a finger to tap against her chin. It wasn’t a good sign that she had to think about what exactly she had put into the concoction.
“Well, I muddled some broccoli and clove together and then there’s a good bit of onion suspended in vinegar, and-”
“Never mind, I don’t think I want to know.”
He moved to sit up, bracing himself on his one good arm as he did. His host turned towards the cabinet.
“How are you feeling?” She asked, returning with the cool water in hand.
“Like I fell 500 meters,” he laughed dryly at his own joke, moving to take the water she offered. He gulped it down greedily before handing back the empty glass. “Do you have anymore? I’m all dried out.”
She nodded and returned to the cabinet, opening the lower door and pulling out a full pitcher. She started to pour her guest another glass before he interrupted her.
“Uh, just the pitcher will be fine.” She eyed him for a second before holding the pitcher out for him. It certainly looked less comedic in his large hands than the little glass had. He drank from the pitcher just as greedily, chugging until it ran dry. He sighed in satisfaction when he was done, again moving to hand his host the empty vessel.
Having waited patiently for her guest to finish off what would’ve been a full day’s worth of water for her, she decided her questioning could commence. She took the pitcher from him and set it on the cabinet.
“So,” she said, moving the chair closer to the bedside, “How exactly did you fall out of the sky? Three days ago, I was just minding my own business and you drop out of nowhere and demolish my chicken coop. It’s not very common in these parts.”
“That’s…a long story.” He tilted his head back as he tried to think of a way to explain it all to some simple peasant. “When I was younger, I found that I was…uniquely talented, and I traveled the world to find someone else like me. In my travels, I never did find someone like me, but I did find someone willing to take me in and teach me what she knew. The great warrior-magician, Annin, saw in me the potential to do great things. Before I had ever crossed paths with her, she had taken in another prodigy, Garlic. Where Garlic excelled with his pure strength, I excelled in magical talent. I believe he resented me for that. She confided to us that the Guardian of this World doesn’t have much time left and sent us to seek his training. She said with more training, either of us could become caretakers of the Earth.
“We set off to search for the Sacred Tower and find the Guardian. As we began our journey west, I asked Garlic what he would do if he became Kami.” He remembered how Garlic’s aura had changed at the question, his smile taking on a sinister quality that was only recognizable in retrospect. “Garlic said that it was not an “if” but a “when”.”
“Annin works so hard to keep demons from Earth,” Garlic continued on. “When we have every right to it.”
Garlic stopped suddenly, crossing his arms over his chest. The magician followed suit, concern and worry creeping into his flesh.
“How…What are you saying?”
“You can be so naïve,” Garlic chuckled. “Once I eliminate this world’s life, I can give the Earth over to my creatures, the demons and the Serpents. Now that I have been chosen to take Kami’s seat, I don’t need to put out the Sacred Furnace. I can simply call over the invasion from the throne and rule over all.” He took a long look at his nails, picking the dirt from out of them as he spoke.
Garlic had always been cold, distant, and short tempered, but the young magician had never suspected him capable of such cruelty. Was this his twisted idea of a joke?
“Don’t say such things,” his voice was low, his eyes wide in disbelief. “Why would you tell me this?” Garlic began laughing, softly at first, before it racked his small frame. The magician balled his fists in frustration. “Answer me!”
“I don’t need any competition to stand between me and my throne,” he said. He rubbed at his chin thoughtfully. “I had hoped you would join me. You may very well be of the demon realm, too; you could assist your kind, build a world in your image.”
“Never! I cannot toss aside lives, Garlic, and I never will!” He took a fighting stance. “If I am of the demon realm, then I renounce my heritage! My heart and my soul belong to the creatures of this world, and so long as I live, I will not let you harm them!”
“Oh, how disappointing,” Garlic sighed. “You think you’ll live. Why do you think I’ve told you all this, dead man? You were never a very good sparring partner. I had hoped this would rile you up enough for some light fun.”
“I…I wasn’t prepared. I had never seen him wield such power before. He must have been concealing it that whole time.” He looked across the room to a small window, wondering how far Garlic could have gotten in the three days he was bedridden. “I must get to the Sacred Tower and warn the Guardian of his deception. I cannot…I will not allow him to get away with this.”
“Well you’re not going anywhere yet, not in this condition.” He noticed some concern set deep into his host’s eyes. “I think you need to get some more rest. You hit your head pretty badly and you lost a lot of blood.” She pressed her palm against his chest, the light pressure guiding him to lay back down. “You get some more sleep, and I’ll be back with some more water, alright?”
He would’ve insisted that he didn’t need sleep if he hadn’t known her words were well-intentioned. He begrudgingly obeyed with a sigh and roll of the eyes. Mindful of his bruising (and moreso of his bruised ego), she gave his chest a delicate pat in gratitude. She gathered up her pitcher and quietly shut the door to the small room, leaving her guest to his own thoughts. He heard her shuffling about in the adjacent room and the closing of a heavy door. His ear twitched at the sound of mumbling outside, an annoyed frown taking root at the words he heard.
“Poor man, his fever must have been worse than I thought.” The milkmaid carried two large buckets on a yolk down to the nearby stream. She was going to need as much water as she could get if her guest was dehydrated to the point of delusion. She had been trying her hardest to remember how her parents had cared for her when she was ill, but clearly she must have missed something. “Maybe some white willow will clear up his delusion? Or no, maybe it was yarrow? Unless I’m confusing yarrow for yerba…” It was getting so jumbled up in her head. She was certain white willow would clear the deluded fever up, but what if she was wrong? Lost in her spiraling self-doubt, she realized she had finally reached the stream. She tried to refocus on the coldness of the water, feel it glide past her hands as she steeled herself.
Beyond the cool stream, further on to the arid west, a demonic bunch sat around a campfire. In the cool desert night, they jeered and taunted one another as they ate their day’s kill. They didn’t notice the lone figure approaching from the inky darkness. It wasn’t until the dismembered leg of a T-rex fell between two of the boulders that made up their bench that they fell silent. They turned in their seats, a combination of anger, annoyance, and confusion wrinkling their faces as the silhouette stepped into their firelight. An intimidating figure, he was not. His pale green skin and petite stature gave him a delicate appearance, only challenged by the intensity of his eyes. The flames reflected in them as his lips crooked into an almost-smile.
“Hello there,” he said. “I come barring good news.”
