1 Act I: Inferno [Flashback/Training/Private] Tue Dec 24, 2013 1:40 am
Bokuden
D-rank
“I’ve been having these strange dreams lately… I should know better, they are just dreams, but it all seems so real. The biting cold, the harsh winds… the darkness. I can’t help but feel there is something more to this… some deeper meaning. Am I finally just losing it? Some say that dreams are the royal road to the unconscious… a reflection of one’s true self and the heart’s deepest desires. So why do these dreams fill me with such distress? Is this really what I am? These shadows that lurk in the back of my mind and beckon to me at all hours… how long can I run from them? The ghosts of my past… my sins… they seem to be closing the gap that I had once thought I had made and now invade even the sanctity of my dreams. It appears now that it is only a matter of time before they consume me. I can run from the darkness no longer, I must face it. One way or another… this will end…” -Bokuden
~The Straight Way to Salvation~
“Where am I?” Bokuden thought to himself as he sprung back into consciousness, “And why am I running?”
With knowledge of neither where he was or by what circumstance he had arrived there he Bokuden fell back onto one of the few things he did know; he was running, and if that was the case there was more than likely a reason. And so he continued in the full sprint he found himself in, one leg jerking out violently in front of the other as he made his way through the dark woods in which he found himself. The loud crunch of debris and brush beneath his feet sounded with each stride he took, accompanied by a symphony of sounds creeping out from the darkness all around him. The howling wind, the rustling in the shrubbery, and the chirping of the crickets in the night joined in the almost sinister melody of the place he found himself in, but with all of the noise going on around him, there was only one that he could bring himself to focus on.
For whatever reason he was unable to pinpoint the source, but it was there without a doubt; another sound, that of someone… or something else in these woods with him. The sound seemed to come from every direction and no matter how far or fast Bokuden ran the sound never seemed to relent. The way that whatever it was matched his pace led Bokuden to believe that it was not a matter of him simply not being alone in these woods, but rather him being pursued. Despite him having no recollection of what he was doing running through these dark woods at night, the idea of something being in pursuit of him certainly provided a logical explanation for this whole situation. Although… that only created more questions in his mind… specifically what it could possibly be that could force him to run.
It was almost surreal. How many times had Bokuden been in a situation like this, but on the opposite side? He had always been the pursuer, not the pursued. The irony of the whole scenario was delicious, but what occupied Bokuden’s thoughts now was curiosity. There were so many questions that needed to be asked and they were seemingly there to be had in the form of his shadowy pursuer… all he had to do was stop running and face it.
Training: 590