Stories from Days Gone by
WE had a new regular visitor at our house, the young Sayori. Accordingly, we decided to hold a small welcoming party. I carried a selection of snacks and juice onto the low table, and we all enjoyed them in each other’s company.
“That reminds me…” As we lounged, Sayori, who cupped both hands and was steadily nibbling at her handful of dry fruits, spoke up. “When I mentioned to my great-grandfather that I met you, Mr. Mikura, he went to the warehouse of our house and pulled out a very, very old scroll. He mentioned that the name ‘Moriya’ was written on it, and he opened it to show me.”
This topic came out of nowhere, but I was already extremely invested. I widened my eyes.
Sayori continued matter-of-factly, “I think it’s called a historical document… According to the scroll, a samurai called Mr. Moriya came to the Beastly Wilds a long, long time ago. He worked hard and did lots of things to help this forest. Back then, it still wasn’t an autonomous region, and all the residents chose to live here as they liked. There wasn’t just beastfolk, there were also a lot of humans living here, and the scroll said that we all lived in harmony.”
She paused, recalling what she’d heard. “There was also a proper government official who came from the big city under…rele-gation? And it was pretty safe too. But… There were also people who wanted to disturb the forest and use it for their own gains. That Mr. Moriya was one of the people who came to the Beastly Wilds under the orders of a higher-up to obtain the treasure of the Beastly Wilds—things like the Fusang trees.”
I didn’t know how to react to that. To think that someone who might have been my ancestor came to this place with such a motive… But then, something occurred to me. Wait, if that’s true though, it wouldn’t make sense for him to gain a piece of land in the Beastly Wilds. So maybe he isn’t my ancestor?
The young girl with excellent memory resumed her story after a pause. “But the moment Mr. Moriya saw the Fusang trees and the scenery in the Beastly Wilds, he apparently fell in love with it. He betrayed the higher-up and chose to take the side of us beastfolk. It sounds like betrayal of samurai was a very big deal back then, because the higher-up got mad and sent a bunch of people here. But everyone sent got chased back. In fact, that samurai really got along with the residents of the Wilds and basically became someone in charge of talking on behalf of them. He talked with the people outside and helped solve all kinds of issues.
“He had lots of knowledge about the outside world, the laws, and so on. He was also a strong warrior. The government official I talked about earlier also took Mr. Moriya’s side, and to everyone’s surprise, they came together to assemble a team of humans to protect the Beastly Wilds. After that, the humans in that team married each other and left behind children, but maybe because they weren’t able to introduce new blood from the outside, their numbers went lower and lower with time… Everything I’ve said up until now were things written in that historical document.”
She paused to take a breath. “I know what you must be thinking. Did they not marry any of the beastfolk? Back then, people still didn’t know much about the illnesses of the beastfolk and how to cure those illnesses. People didn’t know what to do when beastfolk got sick or had to give birth. Plus, there was even superstition, so everyone believed that it was super dangerous for humans to get together with beastfolk. Even if they wanted to be together, they couldn’t be.
“And so, they kept marrying their friends and fellow humans who cared about the Beastly Wilds, sometimes marrying humans from the outside. That team had something like a…base? And apparently, that base was located exactly where this house stands. They had to talk with people from the outside, so their base was near the outskirts of the Wilds—near the border! That’s what Great-Grandfather told me!”
Once again, my eyes widened with surprise. A samurai lived here and was in charge of diplomacy? Meanwhile, my family, the Moriyas, was given a piece of land in the Beastly Wilds even though we’re humans… In that case, that samurai must be my noble ancestor. Possibly because the team kept marrying their relatives, the inbred genes caused their numbers to fall…and only the Moriya family was left? Is that what happened?
Hmm… If I remember correctly, Gramps married someone from outside—a human from the other side of the border. That was the case for my grandfather too, and when it came to my father’s generation, he even lived outside the border. We probably don’t have to worry about the effects of inbreeding now. That said…
After a moment of hesitation, I muttered, “If that’s true, that’s… Wow. Would that mean my ancestor was a samurai? Well, there’s a chance that they’re a complete stranger who’s got nothing to do with me though…”
Sayori giggled heartily before replying in a carefree voice, “The thing is, we don’t even know whether that scroll is telling the truth! Someone might have made it all up!”
I couldn’t argue against that. It was a historical document that we hadn’t even gotten a professional to appraise and date. Unless we got respectable research institutions on the case, I had no way of knowing whether the document was real or whether its contents were genuine too. Considering the circumstances surrounding the Wilds, trying to research and investigate into its history was definitely an uphill battle. I would probably never find an answer in my lifetime.
Techi offered her own opinion. “Tomiyasu and Mikura don’t have that samurai vibe at all. If I have to choose, they feel like farmers more than anything else. Their ancestors must be farmers who wandered into the Wilds before joining that team or something like that.”
Hm… I understand where she’s coming from. I don’t think I’m cut out for the samurai life either. Far from it.
Meanwhile, Kon expressed his enthusiasm. “Samurai! That’s so cool! Aww, that must be so nice. I want to have samurai ancestors too! Or ninja ancestors!” His answer was quite in character for him.
Sayori chuckled. “I mean, I heard that this house was built rather recently, and it doesn’t look like you’ve got any old katana or scrolls left lying around… It would be very hard to find evidence. If you had an ancient warehouse or treasury like in my house, it would have been a different story, but the warehouse in the garden looks new as well. Maybe Mr. Tomiyasu would have known a few things.”
She was right when she said that my house wasn’t all that old. Well, it technically counted as old, but it didn’t date as far back as the Edo period or a time when samurai had been active in Japan. Gramps had built this house, so it should be comparatively modern.
But I couldn’t completely cross out the possibility that something ancient and timeworn was hidden within its crevices. There was a chance that Gramps might have inherited items from the previous house or treasury here and had stashed them somewhere. I’d explored most of the house, and nothing in particular had caught my attention during the house inspection for the renovations either. That said, I had spotted things like antique boxes and a few objects that reminded me of wicker hampers lying around.
There were still plenty of boxes and containers I hadn’t checked. For some, I’d assumed that Gramps had stored his personal belongings inside, so I’d purposely avoided peering in. For others, I’d thought about taking a look later on, and that later on had turned into never. Could there be something historical hidden in one of those? At the same time, however, I knew that there was an extremely high chance that I wouldn’t find anything of the sort. More likely, they contained private possessions, clothes, or tools for the orchard.
Thinking that, I didn’t speak more about the matter, instead choosing to refocus on Sayori’s welcoming party. I stood up and walked into the kitchen to prepare even more snacks and food to entertain the young girl and Kon.