Chapter Text
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小倉山峰のもみぢ葉心あらば Maple leaves on Ogura mountain: if you had a heart,
今ひとたびの行幸またなむ I would have you wait for one more royal visit
—Poem #26 in Hyakunin Isshu, by Fujiwara no Tadahira;
— — — — —
the house of red leaves
PROLOGUE :: autumn hunt
Upholding rules and labeling them as important traditions is something that humans have done numerous times over the years.
One such tradition that has endured the passage of time is the concept of the emperor going out with a royal entourage for an autumnal hunting trip. Another enduring tradition is the disposal of anything that could threaten one’s position in court.
Thus, one day in autumn, a young prince is oh-so-accidentally bound with hemp rope and then even more accidentally left behind in an area supposedly teeming with wild beasts.
Justification is in the form of reports from imperial astrologers who have supposedly divined his fate. A prince that’s born under a disaster star is a ticking time bomb, especially since the passing years show that he possesses an otherworldly appearance. Not only that, he has also shown immense prowess when it comes to martial arts and the art of sword. Standing out makes it easy for others to make him into a convenient target.
Regardless of whether this is a justifiable decision or not, nobody asks the prince for his opinion or agreement. He is thrown off a carriage and left with no other recourse, as poison still circulates in his blood. The amount of restrictions on his person should be a clear testament of how wary the royal family—the Nakahara family—is of him.
One day in autumn, this fallen, discarded prince should have perished as the royal family arranged.
But it’s on that same day that fate has intervened—or perhaps, played along with the woven threads of destiny. On that same day, there’s a man who comes to the most dangerous and secluded part of Mount Arashi. Not to participate in the autumn hunting trip, but the end goal is the same, with the death of a being too small in the grand scheme of things.
Prince Nakahara Chuuya is no more, and is instead replaced by someone who’s simply Chuuya. Tsushima Shuuji inadvertently saves him, in the name of stealing the hemp rope wound around his person, so he could fashion it over one of the skeletal branches of a large, barren tree.
With poison still restraining his limbs, it takes Chuuya herculean effort to stop Shuuji from completing his suicide.
“That hemp rope belongs to me,” Chuuya insists. He doesn’t say that it’s property of royalty. He doesn’t say that he wants to keep it as evidence of his own family’s contempt for his existence. He doesn’t say that he wants it as a keepsake to constantly remind him of a revenge that he must commit in the future. And that’s because he doesn’t think of those things. The only thing he thinks about is that rope belongs to him, and he doesn’t want it stained by the other’s death.
“Alas, death by strangulation is supposedly quite painful.” Shuuji’s disappointment at having his suicide interrupted is very short-lived. “However, I chose this place because I want to die amidst the beautiful scenery of blood-colored maples.”
“This is a dangerous hunting ground,” he points out to this person who doesn’t seem to have any recognition of the royal family or even just the barest sense of proper etiquette. “If you lie down on the ground, I’m sure some beast would come and eat you.”
Shuuji wrinkles his nose in distaste. “That sounds painful, so I’ll have to pass.”
“Death is death.” Absolutes are rare in this world, but death falls under that category. “Whether it’s painful or not, it’s going to end the moment you die. So why should it matter?”
“What a tragic lack of romanticism!” Loud lamentations echo throughout the forest carpeted by brittle red leaves. Shuuji dramatically falls down on the leaves, grasping his heart like he’s been dealt a massive blow. “If I’m to die, I want it to be cheerful, painless and absolutely beautiful!”
“A corpse is a corpse.” As the Prince, he’s seen a lot of corpses in the palace. Falling due to schemes, falling due to war, falling due to greed. Death doesn’t discriminate, the moment it falls under one’s star and causes it to dim forever. “Beauty becomes irrelevant.”
“Only someone beautiful would say that,” Shuuji continues to lament.
They don’t see eye-to-eye. They bicker while they lie down in that forest, using the fallen leaves as cushion for their two fallen forms. Beasts approach them with prying eyes and hungering mouths, but those beasts end up whimpering away with tails tucked between their legs. Whether it’s because Shuuji seems very unpalatable with his constant yammering or whether it’s because the disaster star that Chuuya supposedly lives under in is too powerful, it’s hard to say.
But eventually, the hours lengthen, and the shadows follow suit.
Shuuji has spotted an abandoned hunting cottage on his way to this spot, and the two of them end up conquering it away from the detritus that has started to make it its home. Time passes and their roots grow in this place with only the heavens and themselves for company. There’s a small river that’s constantly polluted by Shuuji’s half-baked attempts at drowning. There’s abundant small game, and flourishing trees and shrubs, all to nourish their stomachs.
They have nothing and everything at once.
They express their hatred for each other during daytime, and embrace each other at night in the absence of a proper heating system. The nightly embrace doesn’t dampen the fervor of their bickering once the sun acts as a distant, disinterested arbitrator to their arguments. They have a long list of things to disagree over, from their views on life itself and other philosophical matters such as whether milk is best consumed with honey or a pinch of salt.
In the few years of his life, Chuuya has already managed to make himself an eyesore in the eyes of many people in court. But he hasn’t felt incandescent rage towards them, not in the same manner that he feels burned by his emotions over Shuuji and his antics.
Case in point, one day in summer, Shuuji insists on sticking close to his back when not even shedding their clothes could relieve themselves from the blistering heat.
One day in spring, Shuuji insists on foraging for poisonous berries, because he claims that he cannot bear listening to Chuuya snore at night anymore, and death would be the preferable way of slumber. Chuuya refuses to accept such baseless slander, especially since royal etiquette lessons mean that it’s impossible for someone like him to snore and drool as Dazai accuses.
Then, one day in winter, Shuuji bemoans the lack of energy to even chew the food that they’ve rationed to last over the period of hibernation of the animals that Chuuya hunts for food. “I might as well die,” Shuuji laments like a sorrowful songbird. “If you end up starving, little man, you can go and eat me.”
“No amount of fire could burn away all the nonsense polluting your body, so I’ll have to pass.”
Shuuji continues past his rejections like always. “That way, I’ll stay inside you and my presence will end up haunting this place for all eternity.” A dreamy sigh. “To be able to rest somewhere while accompanied by a gorgeous brocade of red leaves sounds very beautiful, don’t you agree?”
Chuuya disagrees.
One day, his agreement and opinion doesn’t matter anymore.
He has spent a good chunk of his younger years being unable to grasp anything in his hands, decisions taken out of his grasp, reducing him to a leaf that could only fall from the branches, to be whisked away by the breeze. All of his goodwill drying up and leaving him as a brittle husk—if not for the fact that he has crossed paths with someone who has nourished his body once again with a lot of vitality, if only for the sake of being able to smack him into shutting up.
On this one day, Chuuya doesn’t smack him at all, but he’s dragged close to shutting up forever.
In preparation for this year’s royal autumn hunt, the kingdom’s best soldiers have been sent to clear the way ahead. An example of being at the wrong place at the wrong time: Shuuji goes out to hunt poisonous mushrooms to add to his collection, and finds himself hunted down instead.
On this one day, Chuuya could only clutch his fallen form close. The wound is too deep and serious, and removing the arrows would only hasten the bleeding.
“I’ve always wanted to say this,” Shuuji whispers against his neck. “You should stop wearing so much white, little man. When winter comes, it’s too hard to see you, as tiny as you are.”
It’s not winter, he wants to say, but maybe that’s not true. He doesn’t know the current season, he doesn’t know how much time passes as he kneels on the ground, holding Shuuji’s cooling body against his. He doesn’t know what to say to break the haunting silence, doesn’t know how to say a proper goodbye to someone he wouldn’t ever see again.
Even though he has first-hand experience of what it means to live in a cutthroat world, a part of him has started to believe that spring would always come for them, that it was a given that they would have plenty of time to spend bickering with each other.
“Chuuya, you must remember,” and it’s uttered with an imploring tone heavier than all the faked pleas that have reached his ears in the past. “We hate each other very, very much. So our separation should fill you with happiness, not sorrow.”
It’s rare enough that Shuuji says reasonable things. Chuuya finds himself unable to believe him, finds himself unable to do anything but hold him tighter despite the arrow still on his chest.
“You should celebrate instead of doing strange things like never forgetting me or never moving on from me.” Shuuji laughs with a broken timbre, until it dissipates into the air like a sigh in winter. “Impermanence is the only permanent thing in the world. So, it’s okay to forget me, Chuuya.”
And yet, Chuuya stays there, until the body in his embrace turns colder than snow, the frost seeping into his arms.
After all, he knows Shuuji well.
“A liar is what you are,” he whispers to the air, to the heavens, to the star of disaster that hangs over his head like an impending sword.
Chuuya stays there until drumbeats and warcries fill the air, until the sky is painted with smoke and crimson.
The land is in turmoil, and the Nakahara stronghold is on the verge of collapse. Fate is immoveable, and it brings soldiers upon soldiers to this forest, in the name of tracking down the disaster star that must have survived to cause more catastrophes.
Chuuya remembers that Shuuji once mentioned about wanting to sleep while surrounded in a brocade of red. Chuuya’s sewing skills are non-existent, but he could simply dye everything in red. The forest, the trees, the soil—all of it should be covered in red, as payment for disturbing Shuuji’s resting place.
Like a whirlwind, like an indomitable storm, Chuuya’s white clothes bleed with the blood of his enemies. Regardless of season, the barren trees bloom with fallen red petals, the earth becomes crimson as he slices past the formation one swing at a time. The heavy resentment that lingers in the air presses down on his shoulders like an unshakeable cloak.
Impermanence may be the only permanent thing in this world, but he does his best to overturn that kind of fate.
He enshrines Shuuji’s bones, and slowly builds a mansion over his resting place. Red from the forest that has been transformed to crimson from the lives that he has harvested. The seasons go on, and time marches on. The Nakahara royal family loses power, the land is occupied by new forces, the mountain erodes as the years pass.
Chuuya is human—used to be human.
As he stays rooted in this place where dangerous beasts lie and die, as he carries the heavy destiny of a disaster star, the heavier resentment of all those who perished under his hands—Chuuya becomes a beastly youkai over time. The mansion of red becomes a symbol of danger, then becomes forgotten by time.
Until humans come and go, until his memory fades, until everything disappears.
Everything, that is, aside from the desire to stay in this house of red, and believe that they can see each other again.
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暗き空へと消え行きぬ Vanishing into the dark sky,
わが若き日を燃えし希望は。 my young days’ blazing hope
夏の夜の星の如くは今もなほ Like a summer night’s star, even now
遐とほきみ空に見え隠る、今もなほ。 visible far off in the sky, even now
—Lost Hope, by Nakahara Chuuya;
— — — — —
EPILOGUE
the house of red, leaves
Chuuya doesn’t know how long has he remained in a certain position, head bowed down so he could whisper a meandering story against someone’s forehead, as if to directly weave the lullaby past the bone forts of his skull. All he knows it that eventually the sting on his eyes disappears, and the tears that form twin waterfalls over his face have also gone dry. All he knows is that he’s stuck in that position, as if a lance from heaven has pinned him in place.
But nothing lasts forever.
Eventually, he has to unfurl and ignore the creaking protests from his bones that have been locked in-place for so long. Eventually, he has to leave the bed that they have occupied for years. Eventually, he bathes Dazai’s body and dresses him in his clothes.
A human’s body swells and then shrinks come death. “You can’t complain about the clothes’ fit,” he tells the eternally-sleeping man in front of him. “You should consider yourself lucky. These clothes are very cool and gorgeous.”
The winter of bandages are so desolate against pale skin, so Chuuya’s being kind in dressing Dazai up in golds and reds. It would make him very recognizable, if he ever walks along the path that all souls must take. It would be quite terrible if Dazai is in white bandages while walking in snow; it would be similarly terrible if his stick-thin body walks across a forest of barren trees while wearing somber dark clothes. He should wear things as colorful as the various nonsense he’s so fond of spouting.
The camellias on the long sleeves melt together as Chuuya arranges Dazai’s limbs so that his hands are over his sunken waist. He arranges a proper cradle for the sleeping man and fills it with the flowers that have bloomed from their garden. All shades of reds and blues, so that Dazai wouldn’t have grounds to complain about things looking too boring if it’s just one type of flower accompanying him.
It would be a lie if he says that he doesn’t feel a sense of loss. It would be a lie if he claims that this loss isn’t more painful than everything else combined. He truly doesn’t remember anything from before, even if he knows that he must have met a lot of people and experienced a lot. He knows that he’s the type who’d care so much about something the moment he gets a chance to, which is why it also frightens him to know that he’s capable of a clear-cut way of forgetting.
If he possesses a hoshi-no-tama like the ones in all those legends and folklores, maybe he could have etched memories into that orb, in hopes of marking his soul permanently.
—But there are no ifs in this life.
So Chuuya buries Dazai on one beautiful day, the sky vividly red as if it’s also weeping along with him.
He’s not sure how he has passed the time in the aftermath. It’s as if he’s been submerged in bubbling water, washing away his senses in the tide.
Eventually, a letter arrives.
Chuuya picks it up and sees that it’s from the publishing house that handles Dazai’s novels. A very formal congratulatory letter, so far removed from the reality of Dazai’s disappearance from his life. It’s almost enough to make him wonder if he’s just in a contradictory dream, and Dazai is actually just playing a prank on him.
Almost enough, but not quite.
Under the formal letter, there’s another one. The names of Dazai’s friends are familiar to him. The one named Ango writes to him that Dazai has cleared his outstanding debts, so he shouldn’t have a lot of problems if he decides to accept the apartment that Dazai has transferred to his name.
Seemingly out of nowhere, Chuuya wants to leave. Wants to set out and experience the wide world that must be out there. Wants to see the place where Dazai has spent years existing in, prior to meeting him. Wants to see just how much lies Dazai has told him during their talks, wants to see if it’s really true that there are colossal pyramids built by human hands, that there are humans who could build rockets to reach the moon.
He’s not sure if he could actually walk away from this mansion. All he remembers is this home and this garden, and that it would feel akin to removing his heart if he leaves. But does it really matter, at this point? He must have lived for a very long time, so dissipating the moment he walks away isn’t that much of a frightening concept.
He’s never been the sort to be afraid of many things, preferring to face them head-on instead of hiding behind something. But there’s nobody around to tease him about procrastinating on his decision to leave, at least for a little bit.
During the time that Dazai’s been here, his movement has been kept to the rooms that Dazai favors. The fishy man likes to settle on certain spots, like a boneless colony of mold that has picked its home. It has nothing to do with clinginess or lack thereof; it’s simply because there’s some mysterious power that a house owner holds in the mansion.
Chuuya has never divulged this to Dazai—the man is already insufferable enough on most days, Chuuya wouldn’t want to give him ammunition to be more unbearable. There’s no doubt that if Dazai knew he has some level of control over the rooms Chuuya could enter, he would have surely used it to trap him inside the bedroom.
“…What an annoying bastard,” he sighs, and conjures an imagined laughter in response.
In preparation—or procrastination, depending on who is asked—for his trip to visit the apartment that has been bequeathed to him, Chuuya decides to check on each room of this mansion. He sweeps and wipes the dust away, attempts to bring the mansion to a spotless state. He covers the furniture and hides away the odd trinkets that he doesn’t remember ever purchasing.
Contrary to the prescribed method of cleaning, he leaves the topmost room last. It’s the attic that Dazai has taken a fancy to, perhaps due to his obsession with lording over his height upon others.
The topmost room in the mansion used to be impenetrable to Chuuya. Dazai’s teasing “It’s a secret~” whenever he’s asked about the contents of his work is enough to set the restrictions on Chuuya’s movement. Before, Chuuya could only wait for him outside and ignore his demands to be carried down the stairs.
Now, the attic has been untouched ever since Dazai has fallen too ill to hold anything properly. It’s not as messy as Chuuya expects, though there are a lot of scattered white leaves with black ink for veins.
It’s not that Chuuya has never seen Dazai work. It’s only the work that he’s been deliberately hiding in the attic that he couldn’t see. It’s not that Chuuya’s that interested in the words on the page either—Dazai likes to recite whatever he’s writing directly against Chuuya’s ears anyway. It works to send him to a calm doze, which is much needed to stop him from trying to punch Dazai whenever he insists on using him as a source of energy while writing. Dazai’s atrocious demands while he’s writing includes asking him to stay either atop his lap, or with his head pillowed on his lap, or while sleeping on the other side of the desk.
In any case, the point is: Chuuya has seen how the other works.
Everything is much cleaner now, which means that before he has fallen completely ill, Dazai has made arrangements for his last work to be published. There’s no leftover manuscript in the attic. There’s only a bunch of books that Dazai has recited to Chuuya’s ears. Some notebooks that are marked with numbers; a quick glance at the first pages tell him it’s not anything that he’d want to read if he wants to maintain a stable blood pressure.
Despite his insistence on affecting a noble air, Dazai’s pettiness is one of his most salient traits. There are dozens of notebooks detailing his grievances over Chuuya. It’s a diary full of life, complete with doodles of Chuuya as a dog instead of a fox.
“What an annoying bastard,” he sighs again, and decides to store these away from him, lest he ends up tearing the notebooks into pieces, or inadvertently watering them to blur out the words.
The mansion’s basement is full of things he doesn’t remember. Even with the dim lighting, he could pick out a small shrine, lacquered in red. He can’t help but touch it, and it’s then that he remembers that he must wear gloves if he goes out. The black-red runes on his palms are not something that humans possess, and he needs to disguise himself well if he wants to venture out incognito.
One day in autumn, Chuuya finally steps out of the mansion that has held him inside for a long, long time.
The moment he crosses the gate, the weathered plaque that once said ‘Nakahara Shuuji’ completely crumbles, dissipating into dust. Similarly, it seems as if the fox tail and ears have disappeared too, as if they have melted into his body since he doesn’t need them anymore.
Chuuya begins the long travel to Yokohama, the place where Dazai once lived in.
He sees many sights, hears many stories, discovers many things. He learns about the things that Dazai has told him about, he realizes the many small lies that Dazai has told him for the sake of teasing him. He breathes a world that’s not awash in red, walks the paths of people who have different feelings towards their daily lives.
The entire trip, he keeps his gloved hands tucked inside his sleeves. His attire is different from everyone else in the buses and trains, but the other commuters seem to regard him as some pampered rich man from the province, or someone into cosplaying some characters. He simply continues basking in the humanity that pulses around him.
Pollutants weigh down and taint the air, the further he is from the mansion. That’s why, it surprises him when he finds a spot that smells like a lot of leaves. His nose leads him to a bookstore receiving a big shipment of freshly-printed books.
It takes him several moments to breathe properly when he realizes whose books they are.
A Literary Treatise on How to Handle a Stray Dog fills the title page. Author: Dazai Osamu.
Chuuya hasn’t heard of this title from any of Dazai’s monologues, so this must be his last work, the one he insists would be his magnum opus.
Before he could convince himself that it’s a waste of money, he has already bought one copy.
“…I could just burn it if it’s crap,” he murmurs to himself.
He finds a nice secluded spot that overlooks the bay, and sits by the cliffside so he could read the book.
Only, it’s not just a simple book. Or maybe it’s too simple of a book, especially from the perspective of someone involved in the events detailed in the pages. It’s basically a personal memoir, a secret diary.
The contents make him a bit angry, especially because Dazai keeps on slandering him and calling him cute during moments he remembers being really serious and cool. More than that, the way some sentences start is a bit off.
He may not be a novelist like Dazai, but he considers himself to be adequate when it comes the written form. Some parts feel too deliberate, like Dazai wants to force a certain message.
“…Tsk. If you left me a message calling me a dog, I’m going to—”
Perhaps he does know Dazai really well. Finding the trick to the messages isn’t too hard once he actually looks at it. The book is divided into five arcs. Five numbers have stood out: 41-21-03-70-202. Five sentences have been particularly egregious.
His plans to laugh until his stomach cramps, his plans to tear the book to shreds if the message is especially annoying: all of it disappears the moment he realizes the message.
Arigatou.
A simple, straightforward thank you.
It’s probably the most honest Dazai has ever been.
Chuuya thinks back to all the time they’ve spent together, all the joys and all the aches, and finds himself at a loss at the thought that even a gloomy man like Dazai could earnestly thank him for their companionship.
Has he actually given Dazai happiness, during their time together?
Perhaps he would never know. Perhaps he has always known. Perhaps there is no need to know, and everything is already laid out in this message.
Chuuya would find sketches of his faces inside a box that’s been delivered to Dazai’s apartment in Yokohama. The five numbers would lead him to a certain address all the way to the north, at a place where Dazai once occupied in his childhood.
He would be taken to a journey to follow these little crumbs left by Dazai. He would probably dissipate too, if the belief of people about his existence would end up fading. He would probably become stronger, the more people end up reading Dazai’s last book that details their lives.
He would keep the book close to his chest during his travels, and it would feel as if Dazai would be there accompanying him every step of the way.
Perhaps his meandering trip around the human world would make him known as a god of travels. Perhaps he would end up unearthing tales about being a god of destruction so powerful that he turned an entire world red. Perhaps he would eventually become so consumed by his longing for a presence already-gone that he would turn into a being of pure fox-flame.
Perhaps, eventually, they would meet again.
But those things are possibilities that could bloom in the future.
On this certain day in autumn, Chuuya reads the book left to him once more, until the sun begins to be swallowed up the horizon, its dying embers dyeing the sky red.
Impermanence is the only permanent thing in the world.
Even so, Chuuya believes that even if everything is turned into dust, even if the body forgets, there is one thing that would never change—
Once upon a time, Chuuya meets a man with old-blood-red in his eyes, and deep in his soul, his presence is etched, from the beginning until the very end.
—
the house of red, leaves
END