Before the arrival of the oni, humans, merfolk, and skyfolk lived together in the land of Fusou. They lived separately back then, so there was much more distance between them. But there had always been stories of humans lost in the mountains being guided back to safety by skyfolk, or humans falling in love with merfolk who accidentally found themselves caught in fishing nets.
But as the three races began to grow closer, a problem arose: half-bloods started to be born among them. Though it was not easy for members of different races to have children together, it was not impossible.
Of course, the children themselves weren’t the problem, but the different ways of life among the three races meant their differences in raising children started to become a problem. My adopted son, Win, had the ability to see the spirits, and was better able to rely on their help than most elves, but he was lucky. As far as I knew, all elves could see the spirits, but that wasn’t the case for half-elves. It seemed about half—or potentially even more—couldn’t see the spirits at all.
Half-bloods born between humans, merfolk, and skyfolk would face similar difficulties...or even many more, due to the huge differences in the ways they lived. Half-bloods born between humans and merfolk typically had the fused lower body of the merfolk, meaning they had the same difficulty as other merfolk when it came to operating on land. However, only about half of them could control water or even breathe underwater like other merfolk. They could not live on the land with humans nor in underwater cities with merfolk, driving them out of both societies.
Half-skyfolk developed wings in all sizes, but at least those incapable of flight could still live on the surface without issue. On top of that, the difference between human and skyfolk life spans wasn’t especially large, so half-skyfolk didn’t have to worry much about that disparity.
The one advantage that half-merfolk had was the love merfolk had for their own people, including the half-bloods among them. Half-merfolk could only live in shallow waters and needed human help to survive. This had led to the merfolk as a whole growing closer with humans, in order to secure the help they needed to support these half-bloods. The difference in their ways of life and life expectancies were both huge problems for them, but those challenges had ultimately helped to unite the merfolk and human societies.
The humans found the merfolk’s beauty and longevity alluring, but they also understood that if their fishing activities angered the merfolk, they would sink all the humans’ ships. Though their domains were entirely different, they couldn’t survive in conflict with each other. Not everything worked out pleasantly; nevertheless, a number of villages populated by half-merfolk and humans had sprung up along the coast. In other words, the groundwork for large-scale cooperation between the two races had already been laid. The destruction of these coastal villages was what had ultimately led to the cooperation of the merfolk, humans, and skyfolk against the oni.
The existence of the oni hadn’t been widespread knowledge at first. They lived primarily in the north, where harsh mountainous terrain kept humans from exploring. There had been some human villages in the area, and even a country that united them, but intercommunication hadn’t been particularly strong. Most of the land was actually controlled by small skyfolk villages, who had yet to gather into larger communities. There had been some sightings of oni in the past, but they had been thought of as bizarre monsters rather than a race of people.
The other three races didn’t come to understand the strength the oni possessed until a number of the northern kingdoms had been conquered. But even then, they had only been recognized as monsters lurking in the mountains, so the divided human kingdoms had made no effort to deal with them.
The first ones to prepare for a proper war against the oni were the skyfolk after several of their northern cities had fallen. However, even back then, the armies of the oni had been reinforced by half-oni and could overwhelm the skyfolk with sheer numbers. The survivors gathered in the largest of the skyfolk settlements, the city of Tendake, and began to strategize. With their short life spans, which was in some ways an advantage, they could produce children and raise them into warriors quickly.
The defeat of the skyfolk had sent a wave of terror through the human kingdoms. These oni were no mere monsters. They were an unknown threat that was highly intelligent and extremely powerful, and most horrifying of all, they used humans to propagate and bolster their own ranks. The ensuing chaos led to the fall of even the larger northern human kingdoms, greatly expanding the territory of the oni. That was when the coastal villages were attacked and the half-merfolk were wiped out.
If the three races had banded together at that point, the aggression of the oni might have been checked. But even the humans were still settled between disparate, disjointed kingdoms, making such cooperation impossible. They weren’t able to truly unite until a hero was born.
That hero’s name was Takato. He had been a half-skyfolk, said to have particularly small wings that left him incapable of flight. However, his wings were small enough that they didn’t get in the way whenever he fought alongside the humans on land. Heading to the battlefield at a young age, he survived long despite being physically weaker than his enemies.
Together with his comrades in arms, he toppled the great oni responsible for conquering the northern kingdoms, though at no small cost. Unsatisfied with his fame, he used his hard-earned reputation to gather the other skyfolk to his cause.
Despite this victory, it wouldn’t be long before the oni had overrun the entirety of Fusou. The humans were able to flee to the mainland and find a new home among others of the same race. The merfolk could flee into the sea, finding anywhere they liked to be their new home; there was nothing that bound them there, and there were plenty of merfolk who lived outside of Fusou already. But the skyfolk had nowhere to run. If they lost Fusou, they lost everything. They had to join forces with the other races and fight.
Takato had then gone to the merfolk. While the merfolk had great power underwater, the oni lived on land, often among the mountains. No matter what the merfolk did, their hatred of the oni would never be answered. At this rate, the oni would simply ignore the existence of the merfolk and take all of Fusou for themselves. The merfolk had no choice but to unite with the other races in fighting the oni.
Finally, with the skyfolk and merfolk behind him, Takato approached the human kingdoms and forced them to dissolve and reunite as one. They then developed strategies that allowed the skyfolk and humans to fight in concert while mobilizing the merfolk for logistics. It completely turned the tide of the war. They also created a new code of laws to reduce friction between the three races, giving birth to a united kingdom of Fusou to stand against the oni.
Skilled in both the literary and military arts, Takato was lauded as a hero for his achievements, but that couldn’t change the reality of his being half-skyfolk—and the short life span that came with it. With no children of his own, he spent his later years writing laws and educating the people as well as delegating authority throughout the kingdom so as to prevent a war of succession after his death. These pursuits drew him away from the front lines, turning the war into a quagmire that saw no conclusion in his lifetime.
To summarize it all, the land of Fusou was originally a land populated by three races who lived amicably but separately. That had laid the groundwork for a half-blooded hero to unite them under a single flag when a powerful enemy threatened them all. When that hero finally passed away, the war settled into a deadlock.
I had thought the southern kingdom had been slowly driven back over time, leading them to where they were today, but if the current front line at Chinju had been established by Takato himself, then his arrival had brought them up to where they could fight on an equal footing with the oni.
The current kingdom of Fusou now existed in a precarious state of balance, all to resist the oni advance. Precarious enough that even the slightest interference threatened to topple everything.