Becoming Who You Are

The red sun shone upon the sand. The cage crumbled around Kanji’s barrier.

Shit! Kanji expanded the liquid barrier so it flowed through the gaps in the shrinking cage. He hit the cage with the hammer. It wouldn’t budge.

I need something, some inspiration to break out of this. Teleportation? No, Yuki will deal with me the same way I dealt with Freedom!

He tried to dig into the ground with his palms desperately. The cage was so crowded he had to crouch.

How… How could I possibly win?

It squeezed against him in all directions. His lungs emptied of air as the cage pressed his chest inwards.

Swap.

The warm wind touched Kanji’s face as he appeared out of the cage. He gasped, filling his lungs.

The sound of crushing bones. Blood dripped from the tiny cage.

Huh?

Kanji stood between Family and Honor, who stepped in front of him. Hierarchy floated above them. Justice walked towards Yuki from the other side, and split into Equality and Freedom. More and more creatures that Kanji did not recognize surrounded Yuki.

They saved me?

“You again?” Yuki lifted her revolver at Honor, clenching her palm against the Katana.

“Sorry we took so long, hammer-bearer. We had to bring an old friend.” Family said.

Yuki raised her hand. Cages appeared out of thin air, surrounding each of them separately.

She can make so many?

“This is a fraction of my ability,” Yuki said, “I’ve seen too much to be defeated. Even a hundred of you can do nothing against me.” Yuki said.

“Maybe. But not a hundred of him.” Family said, pointing at the crushed cage.

The light dimmed as the pool of blood and crushed bone rose above the cage. It collected into a sphere. From the sphere, arms stretched outwards, and legs landed on the water. Its middle expanded into a torso. It soon formed into a complete figure. It looked like a regular human, wearing peasant clothes. A key dangled and rang on its neck.

The figure removed the key from his neck. Extended his arm, and a black keyhole appeared out of thin air. He inserted the key, and turned his wrist. At once, all the cages burst apart.

“Overcoming, take care of her.” Honor said.

Overcoming?

Yuki shot the figure in the head. He fell on his back, and blood pooled around him. An armored arm emerged from the gunwound. It curled and pushed against the ground, pulling another figure from the gunwound, dressed in full armor. The armor figure stood in front of Yuki, and she extended her arm again. Gunshot. The bullet did not make a dent on him. Yuki lunged herself forward, cutting his center in half with the katana in blazing speed, the blade flaming brightly. He dropped to the ground, and out of the bottom half climbed another armored man, holding a Katana. He blocked her next strike, and their swords clashed back and forth in intensity.

“We will distract her, boy. Take care of the separator.” Honor whispered in his ear.

Kanji nodded. He sprinted towards the tower.

Step. Step. Pant. Step. How do I take it down? Kanji had a simple idea, cutting into it with explosions, like cavemining. But for that, he needed Yuki’s revolver. No… I’ll just make it so the hammer detonates on impact!

Kanji threw the hammer at the tower. Boom. Kanji slid back from the shockwave. A charred hole appeared in the tower. It shook a little, but it was far from destroyed. The hammer appeared again in Kanji’s hand. Just a few more times. Maybe twenty or so. Then it will—

Slam.

A new monster landed in front of Kanji, making the ground shake.

A chiseled dragon-like creature, six times his height, with six hands. The dragon’s voice echoed.

“Did you think you could escape me, Okimoto Kanji?”

“Eh? Who are you?” Kanji’s voice shook.

“You will know very well when you feel my wrath.”

“Are you Apathy?” he said, but Yuki was still fighting behind them. “It doesn’t matter. If you get in my way, you’re going down!” Kanji hammered the ground. A pillar of earth rose beneath Kanji’s feet, sending him in a spiraling path towards the dragon.

Smack. The dragon sent Kanji flying with the back of his hand, making him slide and tumble painfully on the ground.

It hurt. His whole body hurt. But the pain somehow felt different than it should. He didn’t feel the pain in his skin and bones, but rather in his stomach, in his chest, in his arms.

The dragon leaped in front of him. The ground shook again as it landed.

“Well then, Okimoto Kanji. Do you recognize me yet?”

He could not help but recognize the feeling.

“You’re…” Kanji’s face went pale, his voice shaking, “you’re… my guilt?”

The dragon laughed seismically.

“That’s right. Didn’t you figure that if you destroyed the separator, it would force you to deal with me first?”

“I don’t understand… why?”

“We monsters appear here because you won’t let us appear in you. You’ve already figured out that much, haven’t you?”

The dragon grabbed Kanji, squeezing him hard in his grasp. Kanji’s gasped. He clenched the hammer and slammed the arm with it. The dragon wouldn’t budge, and it made him only tighten his grip.

His lungs emptied and his intestines felt as if they would exit his throat; his eyes felt as if they would burst out.

If it’s really my guilt…

Izanagi’s mistake was that he rejected his feelings, wasn’t it?

What if I… Even if it hurts so much… Instead of trying to fight it… Just let it hurt instead?

It’s crazy. It’s really stupid.

Kanji released his grasp, letting go of his hammer. A splash sounded as it hit the water.

The dragon thrashed Kanji against the ground again and again.

He saw Yuki. The old Yuki. Smiling and waving at him across the hall. He saw the gurgling Marcus, looking at the sky. The frightened kids in his class. There were more… weren’t there? Those I rejected. The soldiers he killed at the school who screamed as they burnt to ash. Honor, Family and Hierarchy, who just tried to care for each other. Justice, who stabilized the world. All the innocent people who got hurt because of him.

It hurt.

He hurt so many people. In so many ways.

The dragon kept bashing Kanji.

But Kanji smiled. He could do nothing but smile now. Not because he was happy about what happened. But because he stopped ignoring that he wasn’t.

The more the strikes hit the more obvious it was. The strikes didn’t damage him at all. In fact, they even started hurting a bit less each time.

The dragon held Kanji up from his feet. As if contemplating if to eat him.

Splash.

The dragon let go of Kanji and he hit the ground.

His feet stomped as he walked away.

The dragon walked to the separator.

Punch.

Its right hook dug and tore through the tower, rippling through. The tower collapsed on itself. It took maybe a minute and pieces were still falling from the sky. An ever growing pile of rubble.

Kanji coughed as he raised his head from the water. It… it collapsed?

White. An infinite white room.

Kanji laid on the floor. It had no texture or temperature, touching it felt like numbness.

In front of him Yuki stood. She didn’t have any weapons.

“Yuki?”

She stared at him expressionless.

“No… Apathy?”

“Justice’s ability is to create a parallel world, reflecting the mind of the creator, similar to Izanagi. This is the natural parallel world I can imitate. It has nothing, time doesn’t pass, and there’s no way to fight each other. I didn’t want to use it, but there’s no other way to prevent what’s to come.”

Kanji squeezed his hand. The hammer is gone?

“Why do you fight?” Yuki said.

“Eh?”

“Why do you fight me?” Apathy said.

“Why?” Kanji’s eyes widened, “Because you’re Apathy.” Kanji stumbled.

“What do you think Apathy is, Kanji?”

“Apathy is—”

“It’s not. It doesn’t matter what you think. It’s not that. If you understood you wouldn’t have been fighting.”

“Then… what makes you so sure?”

“What do you think makes man so great that it needs saving? That it deserves forgiveness?”

“Forgiveness?”

“Humans are the most horrifying species to have ever lived. No other species has committed nearly as many atrocities and inflicted as much suffering. Does your art and hospitals absolve the Holocaust or the Rape of Nanking? It does not.”

Kanji’s stomach turned. “I… I don’t understand.”

“Man is fundamentally broken, Kanji-kun. That’s why man must be overcome. That’s why we need to progress beyond man, beyond good and evil, beyond family or justice. These concepts are made by man, and seem so important only in the lens of man.” Yuki said.

“But… you judge the horror of man using that same lens, haven’t you?”

“There’s only one lens that’s unbreakable, and that is suffering. If you try to deny suffering, reality will soon prove you wrong.”

“Only if you’re human.”

“Yes, and you are one so proudly, aren’t you? Have now another look at Japan: A country obsessed with work and repression. The talent of us Japanese is unmatched. Our work ethic is unmatched. But where have our souls gone? They are either trapped in our youth and pastimes, where life once made sense, or trapped in our work itself. This is the Japan you want? I want to progress beyond it, to create a new Japan, one that progresses so quickly and so widely it would be incomparable to any other nation. A Japan so powerful it would redefine power itself, so rich it would invalidate the coin. This is what you want too, Kanji-kun, to save Japan, do not lie!”

“No.” Kanji said.

“What?”

“I don’t want to save Japan, and definitely not in that way. Japan doesn’t need me to save it.”

“Huh? Then why the hell do you fight me?”

“Because I want Japan to become itself. Not go back to the old Japan, but to create the new Japan by accepting the parts of us we don’t want to accept. Our true values, that we convinced ourselves aren’t real.“

"To become itself? Pfft.” Yuki said, “You read too much psychology, Kanji-kun. You don’t think far or think ahead.”

“Perhaps I don’t.”

They stood in silence.

“So… you’re not convinced?” Yuki said.

“No.”

“Then, let me show you one more thing.”

The white space below them became the sky above a major square in Tokyo.

Burnt buildings and smashed cars lay on the side of the road. Bodies spread next to the crosswalk, as if something hit them simultaneously. A line of abandoned babies on the sidewalk next to a nursery. The skies are a dark gray from the rising smoke.

“This is the Japan you are trying to let be, Kanji-kun. This is all that’s left.”

Kanji gulped.

Yuki continued, “It is a necessary sacrifice on the way to the new. But you want to stop everything half way, after all that. What do you think will happen once you cross that barrier? All the magic in the world will be gone, and Japan could never be saved. What’s the point of a world like this?”

“The point?” Kanji whispered.

“Yes. What’s the meaning of it? Go ahead and point at it for me.”

“I can’t.”

“Exactly. That’s wh—”

“This is what it looks like when you take the meaning away.”

“Huh?”

“This Japan, with its old values gone, it’s pure horror. Horror is where Apathy heads. Meaning was already there: In the bond between a mother and a son, in our collective decision as a society to protect each other, in our simple hopes and dreams. The mistake was to assume it wasn’t. We were desensitized.”

“That’s the stupidest thing you’ve said all day, Kanji-kun.” Yuki said, her voice cracking. She folded her arms.

“I think I’m beginning to understand you, Apathy. But I want to talk to Yuki now.”

“I… I am Yuki, how many times do I need to tell you?”

“Okay then.” Kanji said, “Yuki-san. Why did Apathy choose you to become her puppet?”

“How the hell should I know…” Yuki said.

“I think you know, Yuki-san. You know it very well.”

“I don’t get you. What do you expect me to say? Yuki-san is depressed, Yuki-san is sick in the head, Yuki-san thought her way out of the window? Is that what you want? The truth is there’s no reason whatsoever! There’s nothing particularly special about me!”

He walked up to Yuki and hugged her.

Yuki stood there. Her hands stayed beside her, not moving.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“You’re so stupid, Kanji-kun.” She said, crying.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“You’re still hugging me after I tried to shoot you?”

“Yes,” he said.

They stayed like that for about four minutes. Yuki didn’t speak or move the whole time. Kanji didn’t move or talk either, the only thing on his mind was staying with Yuki.

Yuki stopped crying after a while. She returned the hug.