You only die 1nce

Prologue

Yoshimura Tokutomi

Kyoto, Japan

Summer, 1996

“Don’t worry Iori, it will be done with soon.”

“It will never be over Shinji, our family will be a disgrace, my career as a Onmyoji is over.”

The cabin of the car was still, neither of them moved, neither of them blinked. Shinji gripped the steering wheel tight, listening to the soothing sounds of the rain bouncing off the windshield. Listening to anything that would take his mind off the sound of Iori choking back tears. Iori scrunched the fabric of her uniform in her palms, staring at the floor matt in disbelief.

“Are you one hundred percent sure It’s him, this is Tokutomi we’re talking about? Even if it is him, you really think we can stop him? Shinji we are way out of our depth here we need to tell the Board about…”

“WE CAN’T, THIS CAN NEVER GET OUT!”

Shinji’s anger got the better of him. He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath, collecting himself. This wasn’t Iori’s fault, no, the only person to blame here was their brother. Yoshimura Tokutomi, the greatest Onmyoji Japan never knew. Or Kansai, the name his devoted followers had come to call him. The sole person responsible for a wave of indescribable murders throughout the city. Ritualistic in nature, Shinji believed his brother was cultivating experimental magika at the expense of innocent lives, but he couldn’t figure out how or why.

“Iori, it is important that this stays between us. Mom, Dad, no one can ever know the truth. You’re one of the best practitioners I know, together we can do this. I can’t do it alone; I can’t face him by myself.”

He held the tears back as long as he could, but the tears flowed freely now, his thoughts running wild. He watched the rain wash over the car, wishing he could wash all this away. But that was something that wasn’t in the cards, this was a stain that couldn’t be washed away.

“How did you even figure it out?”

She questioned, turning to look at Shinji, his face pale, and his appearance disheveled. He swallowed his saliva, buying himself some time trying to string together the words.

“Something about the killings wasn’t sitting right with me, so I started poking around, you know see what I could turn up. Believing that our people inside the department might have missed something. So, I started digging into the cases myself, no magika was used, no traces of mana were found at the scenes. But I saw something I recognized from years ago, something Tokutomi-Chan had scribbled when we were young. “Tengoku” then I really took a good look at the handwriting found at the scenes. That is when I realized it was Tokutomi, I’ve followed him the past month and it looks like he has been building a cult following under the name “Kansai”. I also manage to identify his next target.”

He reached for the back seat of the car and took into his possession a manilla folder with information on the person they were attempting to protect from their brother. Iori opened the file, gazing at the contents her head was in a whirlwind as she tried to process all of it.

“Everything, what does that mean? What is the significance of it.”

“I don’t know, that is something that we are going to have to ask him ourselves. Look there he is.”

Shinji pointed down the road, guiding Iori’s vision to the shadowy figure walking in the distance. With keen eyes she followed the figure watching him approach the address on the file.

“I have already mapped out the apartment’s interior; I’ll use my threshold Magika to transport us inside. Once inside throw this scroll over his head creating an archway and I’ll take care of the rest. Be sure to follow behind before the doorway closes, after that just wait for my spell to activate then finish the deed.”

He instructed Iori, the two siblings solidifying their demeanor for what was to come next, the burden heavy on their hearts. They watched and waited for their moment to act, both with their hands on their respective doors ready to push them open. Tokutomi broke into the residence, Shinji and Iori exited the car. They rushed Tokutomi as he went to close the apartment door executing their plan. Shinji emerged from the coat closet and Iori from the bathroom. Tokutomi didn’t panic, he smiled genuinely curious what his little brother and sister were doing there. Iori arched the scroll over Tokutomi and Shinji tackled him through a threshold he created using the scroll. Not wasting a single movement, Iori slid under the scroll right before it hit the ground, closing the threshold.

The two brothers rolled around their new arena, crashing into a giant toolbox. He had made the needed preparation, charged the proper talismans all there was to do now was get the job done. At first, they engaged in close quarters, parrying one another with precise hand and leg flurries. It didn’t last long once Tokutomi started taking the situation seriously. Realizing the hexes Shinji had in places, Tokutomi demonstrated the vast difference in ability between the two of them. He bombarded Shinji with punches that sent tremors up his forearm and through his shoulders.

Shinji stumbled back, barely feeling anything that his older brother was dishing out. Tokutomi grabbed Shinji’s tie, wrapping it around his knuckles he yanked his little brother closer. Delivering punishing blows before releasing Shinji, who stumbled back regaining his fighting posture. Shinji returned to the fight and achieved the same result. Even when the youngest of the siblings tried to help it was no different. Tokutomi grabbed a hand full of Iori’s hair and tossed her across the warehouse floor into stationary van. Shinji managed to finally land a strike catching Tokutomi by surprise. He felt the taste of the blood starting to pool in his mouth, pieces of calcium grinded into dust under the pressure of his clenched teeth.

“Why Tokutomi, what are you thinking, what is the point in all of this?”

He smirked, rubbing his chin, he took small steps closer spitting out blood in the process.

“You sticking your nose were it doesn’t belong Shinji.”

“The trips abroad, something must have happened. You were never the same when you came back”

“No, brother this is who I always was, take a good look.”

Iori rose from the ground, her whole frame trembling. The once caring older brother she had come to know, wasn’t that man in this warehouse. Her shaky hand rose to her ponytail and slowly removed the long hairpin securing her hair.

“What is the significance of Tengoku, Tokutomi?”

Tokutomi stopped in his track caught off guard by the words that came out of Shinji’s mouth. He smirked; a little amused Shinji was able to connect the dots.

“It is my magnum opus, the Tengoku will be my…”

Tokutomi stopped midsentence and winked. The final piece to Shinji’s trap falling into place. Using echo magika, Shinji charged the word Tengoku to paralyze the person who said it a second time. Tokutomi’s eyes widened as Iori jammed her hairpin into his neck. Stepping back she watched as Tokutomi stood there paralyzed. Slowly suffocating, and bleeding heavy from the wound in his neck. The echo spell faded and Tokutomi dropped to his knees before slumping over on the cold hard ground of the warehouse. Iori walked around the body, trying her best not to look at it, Ashamed, of what she had done. But he was a monster, a monster that had to be taken down. This is what she signed up for when she became an Onmyoji. Striking down evil where it stands, no matter the form it takes, no matter how much it hurts.

They said nothing to each other; the whole building was silent outside the sound of Tokutomi’s body being moved. It was stuffed in the trunk of a car Shinji conveniently had outside the warehouse. Another one of the many details in his elaborate execution plot. It made him sick to his stomach, the whole situation, but what made him feel the worse was the twisted sense of euphoria he felt knowing he outsmarted Japan’s best Onmyoji. For hours the two of them drove through the mountains, through small villages enroute to Tokutomi’s finally resting place. Pulling on a dirt road, he continued to drive until he was some ways away from the main road before coming to a stop.

The trunk hood swung open and Shinji paused for a moment staring into the abyss. He reached in, pulling out the shovel first and handing it to Iori who took it without saying a word. Next, he lifted the limp corpse of his older brother out of the trunk and over his shoulder. The whole time, from the moment it was final, the whole drive up, Shinji never once stopped crying. Putting the body down and taking the shovel from his sister, Shinji started to chip away at the ground. Iori with her hands now free, used a simple spell to manifest a light source for Shinji while he dug. Pushing through the mental torture the two siblings rolled the body into the deep grave. Filling it with dirt one painful scoop at a time.