The Kyoufu Warrior

The two children stood at the edge of the cliff, a magnificent thunderstorm raging in the sky above them. The entire village stood behind them, watching anxiously, including their parents, the chief and his wife.

Five years earlier the Tang village was united in celebration when the chief’s wife gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl. Not only was this a very ancient auspicious sign for the Tang, but the twins were also blessed by a prophecy from the village elder. Her prophecy read, one of these twins will restore peace to the people of the greater Ghuangzhou valley. The Tang interpreted this as it would finally be their time to reign over the sacred Jade stone. The villagers were eager to know which twin would bring honor and glory to their clan, however, according to the prophet, this could not be properly determined until the children were at least five years old. On the day of their fifth birthday, the children would succumb to a test. Whichever twin survived the test would go on to carry out the prophecy.

And so now the two children stood, at the tip of the cliff overlooking Guangzhou valley. The high priestess of the village stood directly behind them, waiting for a sign from the elder. The children’s mother was in tears, afraid she would lose both of her children on the same day. She gripped the chief desperately. But the chief stood fast, ignoring his hysterical wife. She buried her head in his chest, refusing to watch. The rest of the village looked out unto the group restlessly. The tiny five year old girl turned her head to look back at the crowd worriedly. Suddenly, the elder gave the signal, and the high priestess pushed the children off the cliff.

The crowd gave out a collective gasp.

* * *

Everyone in the village of Xia was put to work preparing for the wedding. In three days time the only son of the legendary chief Xia, was to be married to the most lovely daughter of the chief of the Tang clan.

This decision was by no means favorable with the chief Tang. On the contrary, marrying his most beautiful daughter off to the Xia was merely a formality, an unwilling obligation to the Xia, the possessors of the sacred Jade. Infact, the two clans were bitter rivals. But the Tang were forced to comply with the Xia’s unreasonable demands, because the Xia currently possessed the Jade, an ancient stone that carried with it the favor of the gods. The Tang endured mistreatment by the Xia for decades, and the Xia always intent on breaking the proud spirit of the Tang people, and grinding them in the ground.

Legend has it that long ago, Wu Xia’s grandfather Huo Xia the fearless warrior, single-handedly stole the sacred Jade from the Tang clan, fending off armies of men at a time with his bare hands. From that day on the Tang were made to bow down to the Xia in total submission.

And so it was for these reasons that the Xia worked feverishly to prepare for the giant wedding of the chief’s son, the women in charge of cooking, and the men building a royal hut for the new couple. They worked tirelessly through the night, pausing only to look up in wonder at the magnificent volcano smoking in the distance.

Miles away kyoufu warrior dips a brush in black grease and fills out a dark ring around the eye by the firelight. Kyoufu’s lips are painted over with a thousand tiny teeth, and lean body is covered in black tribal markings. With the help of an attendant kyoufu puts on the headdress, and armor, composed of the tusks and bones of sacred animals. In the background, another attendant sharpens the twin blades.

Meanwhile, the women of the Xia village chatter cheerfully as they prepare a feast for the wedding. Soon the new hut is finished, and Wu Xia stands admiring their work. He then takes his son by the shoulder proudly and reminds him to always keep new wife in line.

The kyoufu’s attendant sharpens the twin blades to perfection, then promptly hands them to kyoufu, who is now dressed in full armor. The tiny fame buried under layers of makeup and armor. Kyoufu swings the twin blades effortlessly, the attendants looking on proudly. They then bow low, as a small procession enters the hut. First is chief Tang, then his wife. A third attendant follows, leading a fattened boar. The attendant ties the sacrifice to a post in the center of the room. Kyoufu performs a sacrificial dance before them coming to a slow halt, and pausing for a moment. The chief Tang looks on excitedly. Kyoufu suddenly heaves the twin blades at the boar.

The ripened fruits give easily, spilling juices all over the wooden cutting board. The women of the Xia clan sit around gossiping excitedly about the young bride’s rumored beauty, as they prepare various delicious foods for the wedding.

Kyoufu smears the blood all over its armor, eyes wide open. It runs down kyoufu’s body, staining the armor, and spilling back onto the floor. Kyoufu then takes hold of the twin blades firmly, and tears them from the sacrifice, splashing blood everywhere. The chief Tang is beaming proudly. Kyoufu, their last and only hope, looked as though it would finally fulfill its one and only purpose: to restore honor to the Tang clan. Outside of that, kyoufu was utterly worthless to the tribe.

In the early hours of morning, the preparations for the wedding are finally completed. The people of the Xia village stand around wearily, amidst the new hut, and the many decorations and food dishes. But soon foreboding clouds fill the sky and it begins to rain. The villagers look up at the darkened sky, and the volcano still smoking in the distance, both inauspicious signs. But the Xia people are too weary to think, and so they return to their homes sleepily to prepare themselves for the wedding ceremony later that day.

The next day, the sun was burning high above the volcano when the chief Tang led the small bridal procession into the village of the Xia. Wu Xia hurried to meet Tang and his procession, and they began talking. His son, Lo, irritated by their businesslike attitudes, was about to protest when he caught sight of a spotted feather poking out from behind Tang’s back. Leaning in for a better look, he laid eyes on Kinou, who was absolutely breathtaking in her red ornate wedding dress. Her waist length black hair was braided on top of her head, and decorated with a gorgeous headpiece made of orchid. Her face was round and full of youthful freckles. Lo caught her eye for a fraction of a second, before she averted them. A quiet air of grace surrounded her. One look at her was enough to keep Lo stunned speechless throughout the entire ceremony.

Once the rites had been performed and the celebration was over, Lo showed his very soft-spoken new wife into their hut for the first time. She sat on the luxuriously fluffy straw mat for a long time looking around meekly, adjusting to her new surroundings. The house was decorated handsomely, with all sorts of expensive pottery, rugs, and even a gorgeous carved wooden dining table.

Kinou nearly choked when she spotted the gleaming sword on the wall, with its crudely carved red handle. Her eyes darted quickly to Lo’s bare chest, where she noticed for the first time, a massive scar running across his left collar bone. She began to panic as memories from that night flickered inside her head. Yes, she remembered very clearly now. Being pursued like a wild animal, desperately searching for a way to escape. Hurling that sword with the last bit of strength. The sound it made as it plunged deep into the flesh. Returning home bloody, alone and empty handed. The shame that sword symbolized was almost too much to bear.

Lo noticed Kinou staring at the sword. He took it off the wall, and pointed it at her menacingly. Kinou drew back all of a sudden, slamming against the wall of the hut. She stared up at him pale and horrified.

Lo noticed how upset she was and felt bad for joking around. He put the sword back on the wall, and gently tried to calm her. She seemed terrified of him, and her unspoken obligation to him on their wedding night. Lo was completely turned off by her timid behavior. Instead of forcing things he left her alone and slept across the hut on the floor.

Life went on for the married couple. In time Kinou fell in with the rest of the women of the Xia clan, while Lo spent his days with the men hunting and working the land. However, Kinou’s extraordinary beauty did not go unnoticed. She soon became the talk of the village, rumors of her beauty and gentle grace spreading like wildfire.

Lo arrived home from the fields early one afternoon, and found his young wife bathing in the privacy of their back yard. She sat on a tiny stool next to a large water basin. He watched her for a time from inside the house, then quietly crept into the yard and sat directly behind her. She turned, not at all surprised to see him. Lo sat there for a few minutes, soaping her. To his surprise, unlike the first night she was incredibly calm. After a while, he began washing her hair. Then he gathered it to one side to rinse it, revealing a huge black insignia on her upper back. Although startled, Lo continued calmly soaping her back, trying to conceal his shock. He calmly rinsed off her hair, dried her off and they went inside without a word.

That night Lo dreamt of an eerie serpent slithering around the Xia village, always just out of reach, and never there when he turned to face it. Suddenly it snapped its jaws in his face and he awoke from his dream startled. To his surprise, Kinou was not at his side. He got out of bed and cautiously walked around the hut. To his surprise she was not even in the house at all. Lo was looked up at the massive volcano in the distance, wondering where his wife was at this exact moment. Lo went back to sleep, still a little unsettled, although confident that Kinou had some reason, although still a little unsettled. However, the next night he awoke again to find his bed empty, his wife completely missing from the house again. Night after night Lo would awake from eerie troubling dreams to find his precious wife missing, moonlight from the open window spilling onto her empty rumpled side of the bed. Lo knew that he was betraying Xia custom of a husband’s supreme authority over his wife, but he mentioned nothing to Kinou, or anyone else.

Lo wondered about his wife sometimes. What she was thinking. What her childhood was like. He wondered about the strange symbol on her back. But he dared not talk to anyone about these things, because he feared looking like a fool.

Finally, one day Lo brought up his wife’s night time disappearances to the men in the field. They promptly laughed in his face when he explained the situation. Lo was both confused and annoyed at this response. “Just because he’s the heir doesn’t mean he isn’t a fool!” one of them joked. While the others continued laughing, one of the men pulled Lo aside and very gently explained that women needed to be satisfied, and that if they weren’t finding satisfaction at home, they would search elsewhere for it. In response to this, Lo tried to explain that quite truthfully he had never tried anything with Kinou because of her absolute terror on the first night, but he was met with all kinds of scorn, jokes, and laughter before he could even finish his explanation.

That night, tired of being humiliated by the other men, Lo came home from the fields determined to sleep with his wife. To his surprise, she did not refuse. He eventually seduced her into bed, and for the first time, Lo slept peacefully through the night with Kinou tucked snugly under his arm.

“Where were you last night?” Chief Tang demanded of kyoufu, who was kneeling before him on the floor of his royal hut. There was a long silence. Kyoufu did not dare answer, but instead stared down at the floor.

Tang’s fist came down mercilessly on kyoufu’s head, knocking kyoufu to the floor. Tang’s wife wailed in the background,

“How could you do this to us?! How could years of training be undone in a matter of months?!” Barely able to get up from the floor, kyoufu remained silent.

“Living with Xia is like living among the dregs of society, that is why,” said Tang, under his breath. The Chief Tang and his wife stared down at kyoufu in absolute disgust. Then, they looked at each other, silently agreeing on the severity of the situation. And so it was decreed then and there that in three days time they would use what was left of the warrior kyoufu to make their final move towards restoring honor and grace to the Tang clan.

Back in Xia village, Lo awoke from another vivid nightmare, a serpent slithering through the shadows of the town, and shuddered when he realized he was alone.

As the summer drew to a close, the Xia village held their annual festival celebrating the harvest by feasting, celebrating, making sacrifices to the gods, and most importantly, worshipping the sacred Jade.

On the third and final night of the festival, the village slept soundlessly. There was not a soul in the village who was not completely contented with the wonderful feasting and celebrations that had lasted for three days. This included the almighty Wu Xia himself. And so it was without any trouble at all that kyoufu crept into the royal hut that night and drew the twin blades high above Wu Xia’s bed. But when kyoufu savagely murdered Wu Xia in cold blood, it did not expect to find Wu’s mistress, who began howling like an animal as the blood spilled all over her porcelain skin. Startled, Kyoufu took flight, forgetting the Jade. A number of villagers awoke to the sound of a blood curdling scream. They gathered at Wu Xia’s hut, and when they discovered what had happened, a group of men began scouring the village for kyoufu at once.

Soon the village was in an uproar, and people young and old were already lamenting about the death of their great leader Wu Xia. Lo awoke just in time to see the men of the village sprint past his hut. Seconds later, he saw a shadow dash off in the opposite direction. Grabbing the sword from the wall, he hopped out the window. He chased kyoufu for a long time, skidding in and out of people’s yards, scaling fences, and trampling people’s gardens. Finally they reached a clearing and kyoufu suddenly swung around to confront Lo, poised to draw the twin blades. But kyoufu hesitated, and Lo seized the opportunity to tackle his father’s murderer to the ground. He pinned the kyoufu to the ground. Through the hideous mask he recognized flashing green eyes, and under the straw armor, that tiny waist, and delicate hands. They lie there in the sand, one frozen, the other overcome with disbelief. They could hear footsteps rapidly approaching. There was no time. He hissed at kyoufu, and swinging the blade at its terrible face, forcing kyoufu to react. Kyoufu dashed out of sight, leaving Lo alone on his knees in the sand. Seconds later, the villagers arrived on the scene, staring at Lo in horror and disgust. He had failed to avenge his father’s death. From the sand Lo looked up at them in desperation. Their faces began to blur into their torches and into the surroundings, and then everything just went entirely dark.

Lo awoke in his bed, alone and disturbed. He wondered if the night’s earlier events were a dream? It was still night-time, but a strange light shone on him from outside. He climbed out of the window and onto the roof. From here, he could see clearly the many thousands of candles the villagers had placed outside their homes, and all over the village to mourn the death of their great leader Wu Xia. Lo understood his father, their great leader was dead. He stepped backward, trying to distance himself from reality, but bumped into something hard. Lo turned around slowly and found Kinou perched on the roof, like a stone pillar, the kyoufu mask at her side, boney armor clinking eerily in the night air. She stared down at him, her eyes shining, the bloody double swords still at her side. All Lo could do was shake his head slowly in denial. He got down on his knees, hugged her waist, and buried his face in her sash, hating her, regretting her, and savoring her all at once.

Kinou lingered there for a moment, then broke away from him and darted off the roof onto a neighboring roof. Lo watched her dart nimbly from rooftop to rooftop. Suddenly he realized that she was heading directly for the chief’s royal hut. He watched her sneak soundlessly into the courtyard. Several minutes passed. Then suddenly there was an uproar, and almost instantaneously Kinou reappeared on the roof of the royal hut carrying something that glinted in the moonlight. The Jade.

Lo descended from his roof and headed quickly for the edge of Xia, where the villagers were gathered. Everyone was hysterical, chaotically firing arrows and anything else they could find at the escaping Kyoufu. No one could catch her. Lo commanded the Xia to stop firing at her. The villagers looked at him like he was insane, but uneasily followed his orders, lowering their bows. Led by Lo, the Xia villagers pursued Kinou outside the village limits on a narrow path headed for the village of the Tang.

Meanwhile, the Tang villagers were gathered at the foot of their village anxiously awaiting Kinou’s glorious return with the Jade. The were overjoyed when they finally spotted Kinou approaching with the Jade, but then equally disturbed when she suddenly turned off the path to the Tang and began heading north, straight for the base of the volcano. Led by the chief, her father, the Tang also began following Kinou up the gnarled path. She was heading straight for the mouth of the volcano.

Both villages gathered together at the foot of the mountain path and watched in horror as she nimbly climbed the volcano with the precious Jade tucked tightly under her sash. Seconds later Kinou reached the top of the volcano. She carefully took the Jade from her sash and held it high above her head for all the villagers to see. Then, without further hesitation, she calmly freefell into the volcano, Jade and all.