Stopping Time and sitting down to examine the Naga Book of Secrets, Yuki sees that much of the embroidered script on each of the four hundred plus silk pages has been unraveled and pulled out.
What had once been decoded as a nothing more than a random collection of obscure Shinto Prayers now proved to be something else entirely – and Yuki realized abruptly why "Not even the wisest in all the world could decipher a copy," of the Book of Secrets.
Those numerical sequences that they had originally discovered were not a code after all – they were coordinates. They pointed to a letter on each page that was to be pulled out.
Yunikawa had discovered this secret and done so – unraveling the text and with it, changing the very characters on each page as the threads were drawn out.
What remained was perfectly legible Old Realm.
Yuki flipped the pages and began to read.
---
The Naga Book of Secrets contained a very long-winded and ponderous history of not only the doings of all the Emperors and Shogunates of Nippon from the beginning – even revealing Rai Go-Uda as the true Heir to the throne of Nippon and mentioning a bastard brother, named Takaharu Tenno, as a last resort – but also contains the history and information on the Naga Shrine itself and, more importantly, its purpose.
In addition, it also details with agonizing minutia the maintenance and upkeep rituals used to empower the Shrine, as well as the names and genealogies of every Naga ever associated with its preservation – and lists human contacts friendly to the Naga, including the Kai Shugyo family and other Ninja Clans and mercenary forces used throughout the millennia in times of need.
The result is a very difficult read, with tremendous effort and concentration needed to wade through the four hundred and some pages of endless triviality just to get a scrap of something specific to what one is looking for.
After what was (to her anyway) almost two days of arduous research, Yuki finally gleans the following relevant history –
Out of the Ocean came the Naga, to help Man destroy the Oni. And Foremost of these Oni was Masaki-Dai-Oni, the First and Immortal Oni; the Bastard Child of the Sun and Earth; the Father of all lesser Oni …
The lesser Oni were easy prey, but Masaki-Dai-Oni could not be killed. His will was so strong, that upon death he would simply reincarnate himself into life anew…
Massaki Dai-Oni also tricked the Five Gods into sending their Elemental Heralds down to him to discuss terms for a possible surrender. But through great cunning, he managed to corrupt them, changing them into Five Elemental Dragons to serve as his personal guard - The Order of Shades.
The Order of Shades also could not be destroyed, because to destroy them would be to destroy the very Elements they represented, to which Man had come to rely on.
The only option then was imprisonment – to somehow contain these terrible powers.
A plan was first made to capture the Five Elemental Dragons and in time, with the help of the East and West Winds, the Naga managed to subdue and bind three of them – Umbrunus of Air to the Will of the East and West Winds; Desolikus of Earth into the Bowels of the World; Abysmael of Water into the very Depths of the Ocean.
But the two most powerful - Infernumis of Fire and Lothorum of Wood could not be defeated or bound - proving to be equal to the god-children in every way.
Only when their battle took them into the corona of Umani herself, did Lothorum suddenly remember who he was. Turning on Infernumis - and with the help of East and West Winds - Lothorum drove Infernumis deep into the Earth and sunk roots in to hold him fast. Infernumis raged with rock-melting fire, burning Lothorum horribly - but the Wood Elementals rallied to their Sire to join with and strengthen him.
There, under the Mountain Fuji, they remained, struggling against each other for hundreds of years, until Infernumis finally tired enough to fall into a deep sleep. With it however, came a terrible price - Lothorum grievously wounded and on the edge of oblivion - allowed himself to petrify, turning into stone, in order to prevent his loss to Creation; while the Wood Elementals surrounded the two and produced poison blossoms to keep Infernumis from ever waking.
To this day, the Wood Elementals stand Vigil over their Sire and the sleeping fury that is Infernumis.
After the Five Elemental Dragons had been dealt with, the Naga then created a Great Shrine, and using the most potent magic, created a prison for Masaki-Dai-Oni himself. The Naga would battle him one last time, and if successful, would be able to kill him. At the moment he would reincarnate himself, the Nagas’ magic would take effect, diverging his being into six separate paths – each into the body of a newborn Man – a ‘Sacrifant’ – so known, because it would be sacrificing the fullness of its life to preserve mankind.
Broken in this manner and with the weakness of Man, each piece, in its human vessel, could be forever bound to the Shrine.
The plan worked and all was well for five hundred years, but slowly the pieces of Masaki-Dai-Oni regained power and oneness of mind. After this span of time, the Great Demon managed to will each of his human vessels dead. It was Masaki-Dai-Oni’s plan to reincarnate himself yet again, but the magic of the Shrine was still in effect and when he did so, he came back again into six new vessels, once again losing himself. These new human vessels were then tracked down and captured or slain by the Naga; and having no knowledge of their true identity or powers, were easily redirected into the Shrine prison upon death.
After another five hundred years, Masaki-Dai-Oni once again slew his vessels with the same results. Though not completely foolproof, this then became the accepted situation. The Naga would go out into the world and recapture each new batch of Sacrifants every five hundred years, and thus it still is to this day.
It is the duty of the Naga to maintain and upkeep the magic of the Shrine. Should the Shrine ever lose its power or be destroyed, Masaki-Dai-Oni would be free to rejoin himself into one. This must never happen, as the Naga have dwindled over the millennia and could never again defeat Masaki-Dai-Oni in his true form.
Should Masaki-Dai-Oni become whole, he would thrust Man into the Spirit World and rule the Earth with his Oni minions forever . . .
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Topic: Mythic Nippon Adventure VI (Read 183308 times)