Akuma
I spent another week or so in Discord. Tommy and I did some sight-seeing, saw a really good concert one night. It was fun to actually spend some time together without a crisis to get in the middle of it.
Flora wanted me to stay a little longer, I think she gets kinda lonely with just Kuro to talk to. But I need to not get complacent. It’s really easy to just stay in one place and lose track of time.
Besides, I think I’ve had quite enough of Cowell for a whole lifetime.
It just occurred to me… should I even keep writing in this journal? I know for a fact that someone’s watching me, after all. I guess it’s been almost kind of… helpful to organize my thoughts though. You don’t mind, do you, Mr. Griffin?
I’m not gonna lie, I half-expected him to respond.
Griffin has a habit of mentioning other realities off-hand in his entries. I think he might do it on purpose, actually. So I ended up asking the peanut gallery for some direction. They all recognized most of them, and we were all discussing where I should head next, when something happened that kinda… surprised me, I guess? Kuro pointed out one and said that was the one I should choose. He’s usually pretty quiet.
Turns out it’s his home reality. When I asked him about why, his only response was that “the food is good.” You know, there are worse reasons to choose a destination. The rest of the crew thought it’d be reasonably hospitable, so here I am.
What do you have to say about Akuma, Mr. Griffin?
Akuma is the largest reality I’ve ever seen retain its stability. Most realities of its size eventually tend to implode under their own weight. It’s difficult to maintain so many ideas and people without the whole thing falling apart. Most realities, as I’ve mentioned in several entries, tend to expand and contract around one central location. Akuma is not like this.
It is constantly manifesting not one, but two continents at all times. The only reality I know that may come even close to rivaling it is Ravden, but even it only maintains a large country-size’s worth of space. Two entire continents is almost inconceivable. Yet like so many things in this cosmos, it defies logic anyway.
Of the two, the far larger is primarily home to the kingdom of Shenzhou, with several smaller neighbors surrounding it. The smaller continent is more like a rather large island, but its culture is distinct enough from its neighbor to be considered its own entity.
This continent is controlled exclusively by the kingdom of Yamato, albeit loosely. The island is home to many smaller cities, holdings, and villages that all swear fealty to the Yamato, but little else.
That being said, there’s a reason for that.
Okay, maybe I’m getting ahead of myself, but do those names sound vaguely… Asian? And the layout of one much smaller continent next to a larger one… I guess I just got back from the 1920s the other week, so I shouldn’t be surprised at this point.
Kyuden, the capital city of Yamato, is entering a sort of renaissance. The arts and especially the sciences are flourishing under the current emperor, and much work is being done with steam engines in particular. It should come as no surprise then that any lord or other city wishing to revolt would have to throw themselves at an arsenal unrivaled by nearly any in the whole of Akuma. And the emperor keeps the construction of these weapons very close at hand.
This sudden advancement has led to much prosperity in Yamato. However, there is one downside. As people are wont to do, as they become increasingly reliant on science, they lose their sense of faith. Normally, this isn’t much of an issue, but in Akuma, there are real gods one can easily anger.
There are numerous forces of the supernatural at work in Akuma. Spirits and yokai roam the wilds, sometimes playing mere tricks and sometimes committing more serious acts against those who cross their paths. Kami inhabit every forest, mountain, and temple, and over in Shenzhou, masters teach their disciples the secrets of immortality.
Many different gods exist there, in many varied forms.
But what happens if different beliefs clash? How does it all exist as once?
With no contradictions, I’m sure you mean. The answer is that it doesn’t. Belief systems in Akuma are not mutually exclusive. Ideas and stories weave in and out of different traditions. Monks from two different temples will claim to follow the same path and yet practice it in two entirely different ways. Stories from one conception of the cosmos may interact peacefully with those of another. There is no one “gospel” or even truly organized religion, no orthodoxy. There is, however, a wealth of material on spirituality, legends, treatises, and folk tales of all kinds.
(Someone should write a book about it.)
Many have written books about it, (!) yet I doubt any have or will ever succeed in unveiling the sheer breadth of it all. The most fascinating part is that as distorted as much of it is by time and hearsay, a good portion of it is true.
Of particular interest to the greater cosmos at large are the loose race of beings known as “yokai.” Though other, similar sorts of spirits reside in Shenzhou, the yokai primarily originate in Yamato. I say “loose” because a yokai can be nearly anything. I’ve personally witnessed a paper umbrella with a personality. Unlike most supernatural beings that have legends told about them, yokai seem to appear after people invent them.
Perhaps because of this loose connection to existence, one could consider the yokai to be a close cousin to your average daemon. Many of them undergo a sort of rebirth, transitioning from human into something else, and just like daemons, yokai are fully cognizant of—and fully capable of traversing—the Other. “Akuma-cho,” sometimes colloquially referred to as “Little Akuma” or “Monster Town” in Discord was founded by adrift yokai.
Kuro is a Tengu, which if I remember correctly is a type of Yokai in Japanese folklore. So that explains why he’s just… there, in Discord. But why did he leave Akuma? And Mr. Griffin, what do you mean by “rebirth”?
The yokai are frankly merely the tip of the iceberg, but to cover everything would take up the rest of this tome.
As I previously mentioned, despite the wealth of interesting entities and gods, as the people gradually move into the cities, they have begun to lose their knowledge and connection with the land and spirits. And in a reality where those forces are very real, one can see how that may make them rather upset.
Some spirits and Kami have always been malicious, yet the amount of spiritual strife has increased intensely over the years.
In order to combat this, a whole class of wandering swordsmen and exorcists has risen to meet it. There has always existed this sort of glorification of the lone wanderer in Yamato’s culture, going all the way back to the glory days of the samurai, and if presented with any sort of opportunity to actually live out these ideals, people will inevitably take it. Especially young people who want to make something of their lives.
Nothing is wrong with that mindset, of course. But against Akuma’s host of supernatural threats, most are woefully unprepared for the task. If unfamiliar with the techniques to calm or exorcise each individual opponent, a young warrior may find themselves maimed, cursed, or dead. In the worst case, they may join the ranks of those which they fought against in the first place.
But should one survive unscathed, one could achieve fame and glory. Possibly. On a personal note, a life of battle and hardship seems unwise and foolhardy to me, but I am in no position to judge the human heart.
It’s not something I would ever do, but I can see why someone might desire that. It would certainly be more exciting than living a normal life. Probably people are just bored. You know, like me.
An interesting thought.
Regardless, the reality of Akuma is rife with opportunity for both the scholar and the warrior, and its certainly not the most bleak world I’ve come across. Would I the time, I would have liked to stay a spell. Alas, there is much more to survey, and I must stay ahead of you somehow, yes? So, shall we away?
Indeed we shall. I’ll find you eventually.
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