Life of a Reaper

## Nativity

The coldness, darkness, and silence of the Void faded away with the warm vermillion light of the setting sun and a voice like leaves rustling in the autumn breeze. Eyes still closed tight, a surge of confused thoughts and shapeless ideas, nebulous whos and amorphous wheres, rushed around her mind as her quaking hands clenched at the white spider lilies at her side and her bare heels dug into the soft earth lying beneath her. Her body thrashed while with heavy breaths and gasps she drew in the still air.

"There there," the voice rustled as she could feel the firm warmth of another's palm resting upon her cheek and thumb gently stroking away her tears. *Why am I crying?* the first coherent thought formed within the turmoil of her mind, and her trembling lips tried in vain to mime the words. "Hush," the voice rippled, "Hush," another hand pat her head while its fingers softly kneaded and caressed her hair.

Her internal storm subsiding, she breathed in deeply for the first time as her quivering body released its final few shivers. Soon all but her chest was still as her breathing became smooth and her initial trauma became soothed. She felt sleepy, but she was not certain whether or not that was because she had just woken up or perhaps because she was still in a dream. "You can rest if you're tired," the voice rattled, and she faintly nodded in return. "Rest well," the voice whispered, but then another thought occurred to her, *Just how long have I already been asleep?* She shook her head and began to stir once more.

Through her drowsy haze, she perched upon her elbows, tilted up her head, and drew open her eyes. She saw that she was lying upon the side of a hill blanketed with pristine white flowers. She lay atop a bed of spider lilies with a pitch black cloak draped lightly over her. Hers eyes glanced briefly upon the silvery, mercury waters of the river at the base of the hill before drifting upwards towards the vermillion sky, then suddenly meeting the gaze of the dark cloaked figure that was seated at her side. For a moment she froze, and yet her breathing was still calm and her body did not tremble. *Why am I not afraid?* She pondered as she began to more carefully examine the 'face' of this unfamiliar figure. Its head was nothing but a skull of bleached bone with dark sunken pits where its eyes should have been, and from those blackened, abyssal eyes a glistening stream of tender tears flowed. She sat up and curiously stared at the expressionless, weeping skull before her. "Why are you crying?" She asked in a gentle voice.

"Am I?" The creaking voice from the skull returned. The figure's body rattled mildly as it chuckled, "Why yes, I suppose I must be," it continued as it wrapped its cloaked arms around her. She could feel that the figure was nothing but a skeletal frame beneath the layers of thick cloth, and yet somehow it still felt warm. Its embrace was a touch stiff, yet it was gentle and full of care. "I must be, because I am overjoyed," warm tears from the skull dripped onto her shoulder, "I never thought that I would have a child. I shall name you Lily. Lily Crocus. I'm Crocus," the rustling voice trailed off. While she still did not fully understand her current situation, Lily could sense the sincerity of Crocus's emotions and chose to accept the previously unfamiliar feeling of familial affection that was budding within her heart.

## Meeting

Crocus spoke to Lily of what she had somehow already known. He explained that they were Shinigami, and unlike most beings in Kyogenkai, they were not born with fresh minds imprinted only vaguely with palimpsests of past lives, but rather they were created by the Yama with the instinctual knowledge of how to perform their role. They were the Yama's Reapers and it was their sole duty to provide Her with the harvest of souls; all other aspects of their being were merely incidental.

Lily sat there with Crocus at her side for some time, though she knew that there in the eternal land of Higan, atop the mound of pearl white flowers beneath vermillion light of the ever-setting sun, time meant nothing. She breathed in the stale air surrounding her, and began to carefully examine Crocus to see if he was breathing to, but to her faint disappointment, she could hear no breath from her grim and doting guardian, and his raven cloak did not appear to rustle at all even when he spoke; she realized that other than herself, there seemed to be no motion at all on that windless hill. Curious, she got up and properly donned her own cloak that Crocus must draped over her body while she slept, and then began to make her way over to the mercurial waters of the Sanzu River. Crocus soundlessly arose as well, and silently followed his child down the flower-strewn hill.

There, standing at the bank of the Sanzu River, Lily saw her own face for the first time. The pristine silver stillness of the river clearly reflected her shoulder-length platinum hair, and she gazed intently into the calm, amaranthine nebula within her eyes. Her lithe frame was little more than that of a young child's, and, as Crocus stood beside her, she could see that the top of her head just narrowly rose above where she reckoned his waist ought to be. As she looked upon her reflection, she could not help but ponder, *Is this really me?* as she watched the being on the water's surface crouch down as she did in order to get a better look. She reached her hand for her reflection's, but her wrist was caught by Crocus's warm and bony grasp. "You should avoid contact with the mercury waters while you are still so young. Leave the river to the old timers," his voice rustled.

"You're the one that brought me here, right?" Lily began to inquire in an innocent tone, "What was I before becoming a reaper?" She stared intently into the blackened pits of Crocus's eyes, but she could not read any emotion from the stagnant mien of his skeletal visage.

"That I do not know," he rattled. "This last harvest, I dredged up a great many souls that had long been submerged in the depths of the river. The eons worth encumbrances brought down by the full force of the water's weight made them all completely unrecognizable even to a veteran such as myself. Only the Yama would know what you once were," his voice trailed off. With a slight twinge of disappointment, Lily began to frown, but Crocus reaffirmed his grip on her hand, knelt down beside her, and placed his other palm upon her shoulder as he, as gently as he could, reassured her, "It does not matter what you were before, all that matters is what we are now and what we will do."

In turn, Lily steeled herself and both nodded and hummed in agreement. "That's the spirit," Crocus ruckled, "Now come along to my ferry, it is time for us to leave this place." The two of them stood and began to depart. Lily held onto Crocus's hand and followed closely behind as he led her along the river's shore.

## Outset

Crocus's ferry was little more than a shoddy oaken rowboat with two darkly varnished planks set across the front and back for seats. Crocus sat in the back and took tarnished, mercury-stained oars in his bony hands while Lily settled into the front. Without speaking a word, Crocus soundlessly dipped the oars into the viscous silver river and began to row. Slowly, but steadily, the white flowers of Higan began to vanish behind them, and the vermillion sky faded away into the deep mist of the Sanzu River. Before long, the two were completely enveloped by the fog, and it was as if they and their rowboat were all that there was in the world. Lily looked over the gunwale and gazed once more upon her reflection, but she found it to be too distorted by the ripples in the water carved by the bow and drummed by the oars. The river possessed an inherent stillness when only in the presence of lifeless beings such as themselves, but still their actions could cause it to subtly stir.

As they sailed onward, Crocus began to hum. Before when he had spoken, it had been as though his words were little more than wind rattling through a hollow ribcage, but now when he hummed, it seemed to somehow possess the natural quality of the strumming of vocal chords. With the reverberation like that of a lyre, he hummed a song that held the warmth of lit hearth in the chill of dark winter's night. It sounded so sweet, but was surrounded by an overwhelming bitterness and dread. Lily listened like a fluttering moth longing for the stars as she stared down into the silver water that reflected nothing but fog.

Their journey across the Sanzu did not last long, and soon enough the shore was within their sights. The two were already well aware of their first assignment together. They were to head to the Yasuida (安抱) Cemetery for Lily to harvest her first soul. Their walk there was nothing out of the ordinary. Indeed, outside the timeless land of Higan, it was late springtime in Kyogenkai. The sun was just beginning to rise in the pale azure sky and a gentle breeze rustled through the tree tops of the dense forest standing before the two reapers as they side-by-side strode away from still and foggy riverbank, leaving behind their wooden ferry hitched to an obsidian post. While the graveyard was within Hitoiki, it was faster for them to travel there through Kemonoryo, the Realm of Beasts, and so they did.

Lily delighted in the simple sights of butterflies landing atop flower petals and simple sounds of the songs of birds chirping in verdant branches up above. While animals possessed an innate sense for the presence of Reapers, none of them seemed to be terribly concerned about the pair walking through their midst, and they all went about their ordinary business; swarms bees busily buzzed as they gathered their nectar, scurries of squirrels squeamishly squeaked as they foraged for nuts, and a family of deer watched cautiously from the distance as they continued to chew upon their cud.

While Higan had plenty of flowers, none of them had any scent to them and there was no pollen carried in the stale air, but here, Lily could breathe in the life of all that was around her. There was heat from the sun, cool from the breeze, sound from the leaves, dust from the dirt, weight from the world, and a pulse beyond just that of her own heart. *Is this what it means to be alive?* She thought with a cherubic smile. But therein lurked a shadow of doubt. *Am I even alive?* She wondered. She possessed knowledge of all sorts of beings within Kyogenkai, she had plenty of information about Humans, Animals, Celestials, Asura, Gaki, and the nameless sinners, but she knew very little about Shinigami such as herself. She quietly worried to herself. She and Crocus were supposedly one and the same species, family even, kin, and yet they seemed to be so very different, flesh and blood and bare-bone.

Just then, an acorn fell from a branch up above and plonked against Crocus's hollow skull. The elder skeleton came to a sudden halt, and so too did the young Lily who looked up to him with mild confusion and a touch of concern. Just then, Crocus's entire body gave out an intense shutter, and his whole being rattled before he collapsed into nothing more than a pile bones strewn about within an empty robe. Lily's jaw nearly dropped as well from the shock, but just then a voice from Crocus's skull rustled, "Just joking around," and his bones levitated back into place as he reformed himself. Perhaps it was from the jubilee of her relief, or perhaps it was because just how ridiculous the event she had just witnessed was, but Lily then broke into a bout of laughter. Crocus pet her head with his warm, bone hand, and his voice returned, "That's better. Frowning doesn't suit you, you know. You are much more lovely when you laugh." Crocus knelt down and picked up the acorn, popped off its cap, and placed it before his face where his lips ought to have been. He blew out a wind that caught in the cap of the acorn and sounded of a whistle or a flute. He then handed the cap to Lily, "Go on, try."

Lily pressed the acorn cap against her lips and began to blow, but she could not seem to make so much as a squeak. Crocus coached her on how to form her lips, showed her the best angle to hold the cap, and instructed her on how she might change the pitch once she gets the hang of it. Lily seemed to forget all about her brooding, and before long, she whistling the acorn like an expert. Beneath the trees of Kemonoryo, between the warm streams of sunlight and the cool shade of the leaves, Lily gleefully played tunes like the chirping of the song birds as she and Crocus made their way to the Yasuida Cemetery.

## Yasuida

Humans, for the most part, are readily able to die on their own without the assistance of Shinigami. It can happen at any time, a sudden and unfortunate accident, a strange and dreadful disease, or savage violence from the hands of criminal or loved one. The grim truth of death is omnipresent, pervading into every aspect of Human life. Yet, even knowing full-well that death is the ultimate reality that awaits them all, most Humans do not expect it when the time comes. Even the terminally-ill and mortally-wounded tend to believe that they will live to see just a few more sunrises, or hear just a few more chimes of the clock tower, or breathe in just a few last breaths. Perhaps it is this reason why so few journey on their own to Higan and why so many Souls tend to linger around their Bodies even long after they have deceased. Indeed, even as their funerary rites are being performed right before their unseeing eyes, they still do not understand, believing that perhaps there has been some kind of tragic clerical error that will be sorted out soon. And so, they wait by their Body hoping that it will all be resolved and that they can get back to business as usual, and it is not until they see the pitch black robes of the Shinigami coming to escort them that they realize that there was no mistake, that it truly was the end of them, and that their life as they knew it is no more.

The Yasuida Cemetery was a dingy, somber, and yet somehow immaculate place for the dead to rest. The natural impurity of the corpses housed there is stifled by the pure, soft marble tombstones whose gently etched engravings weather away in just a few years, and endless barrier walls and sacred seals protected the graves from scavenging beasts and the lingering Souls from the possible predation of outside Oni. The living seldom came to visit Yasuida, but when mourners did come, they would only stay briefly before leave behind flowers that would soon wilt upon the lifeless marble or light candles whose fleeting flames would flicker for but a relative instant before being consumed by the oncoming eternity of darkness.

The shining spring sun was engulfed by bright grey clouds as Lily and Crocus walked along a grey river-rock gravel path on their way towards the main entrance to the cemetery. Upon their arrival at the massive obsidian Torii Gate standing before the entrance, Crocus walked over to the stone lion statue on the left side and place a gold coin into its open mouth, and then he sauntered over to twin statue on the right side and similarly placed an acorn upon its tongue. He then returned to the center of the pathway and passed beneath the Torii Gate, beckoning Lily to follow. She did so and two made their past the countless nameless markers of the ancient graves and trod on to the inner sanctum. The cemetery was, as one would expect, a truly lifeless place. The many barriers prevented the airy breeze of the outside world from entering, and the poor quality of the consecrated ground gave rise only to a stiff and sickly kind of grass as not even common flowers and weeds would dare to grow in such a solemn and melancholy place.

The gray sky above them grew darker still by the time the two had reached their destination, a site of fresh graves deep in the heart of the venerable cemetery. So untouched were they by the perils of the rain that their shallow engravings upon the polished stone had not yet even begun to fade, and Lily could read their names and memorials. It was here also, that Lily could see the Souls of the departed for the first time. Atop the pinnacles of some of the newer markers floated the ethereal flames of the Soul; it was as though the sheer weight of the tombstone bearing down upon their buried corpse had squeezed the Soul from their body and out onto the surface like a siphon. Crocus gestured for Lily to go forward and rattled, "Your first assignment is to shepherd any one of these Souls back to Higan as you so desire. You can leave the rest to me."

There were about a dozen Souls hovering idly above their graves, and for a moment Lily was unsure of which she ought to approach. However, it was not long before one of the Souls floated down on its own and drifted about in a circle around her knees, its natural coldness sending a shiver up her spine. Nevertheless, she bent down and caught the icy orb of flame in her hands, and upon doing so so was immediately overcome with tears. She cried out as she felt the pain of her heart sinking to her stomach before being torn asunder, leaving her chest empty save for the drowned lightning of sorrow and thunder of frustration. The grief, anguish, woe, and failure were almost too much for her to bear, but yet there was still a faint shimmer of something beautiful held within, the light of hope that cast itself into the darkness and could shine through the shadows over any heart. Lily set the Soul down and it followed behind her as she made her way over to its tombstone and read its epitaph in silence. With the Soul in tow, she then returned to Crocus, who nodded and proceeded to gather the rest of the Souls.

Lily watched patiently as Crocus worked. Some came down to him of their own accord while others he carefully coaxed to come down from their markers into the warm embrace of his fleshless arms. One by one, he gathered them all. Having collected them all into an orderly flock, Crocus nodded once more to Lily to signal that it was time for them to return with their harvest.

## Deliverance

As the reapers and their souls departed the cemetery, the ashen clouds above them began to softly weep a gentle shower. Lily held her right arm forward, outstretched her fingers, and felt the cool patter of the raindrops on the palm her hand. It was a sensation very different from the warm glow of the sun she had experienced for the first time just a few hours prior. Her exposed skin began to glisten in the dimmed light of the overcast sky and the water drenched into the locks of her platinum hair and the dark fabric of her robe. Even though it was merely a sprinkle, it was not long before the girl was soaked through and through. The once pleasant breeze that shook the leaves of the trees now chilled her to the bone. Her teeth chattered and she held herself in her own embrace, quivering and rubbing her shoulders and arms for warmth.

"Ah, to be young again," Crocus rattled, "I had almost forgotten what it was like." There was a hint of something in his voice that Lily could not quite recognize, she thought that perhaps it might be remorse. "Sorry, I should have noticed sooner, allow me to show you," Crocus held his bony hand in the air and manifested a scythe with a long, hooked, Ebon Wood shaft and a Dark Iron crescent moon blade. The skeletal reaper then held the scythe above his head, and as he did so, the blade flattened and fanned out into the shape of a dome as the shaft straightened and shifted into a more manageable length, bottoming out with a crook handle. Indeed, what was once a grim scythe mere moments ago had become an ordinary nightshade umbrella. "Our Scythes are for more than just the Harvest of Souls. They are our will made manifest. We are not allowed material wealth, for our Scythe is our only blessing." Lily instinctive knew how to manifest her scythe and held forth her hand to do so. Naturally, her scythe was much less imposing than that of Crocus. Indeed, its bandaged handle was so short that it barely matched the length of her forearm, and both the handle and its silver blade curved together to form almost a complete circle. It may have been more accurate to call it a chakram rather than a scythe.

Even so, she held it above her head and tried to will it as a tool to keep her dry, but perhaps because of the shape and size of she could not properly imagine it transforming into an umbrella, and so it transformed into a simple, rounded hat which she placed upon her head; while the brim of the cap was too narrow to keep the rain off her whole body, she felt that nonetheless it would suffice. Crocus rustled and breathed forth a gust of hot air that steam dried Lily's cloak and warmed her right back up; she smiled and clapped her hands together in thanks. Crocus held up his large umbrella between the two of them and then once again, side by side, the two were on their way.

As they walked, Lily could not help but wonder if the Souls too were bothered by the rain. She looked back to them, and saw as the rain drops passing through their ethereal forms, transforming into crystalline shards of ice before falling to the ground and then melting into water once more. The Souls were completely silent and unfazed by the unnatural process.

Eventually, the rain faded away into the perpetual mist as they all approached the Sanzu River. Crocus waved the many Souls he had gathered away and wished them well on their journey to Higan. The Souls too faded away into the mist, and Lily was uncertain as to whether or not they had begun to cross or had decided to stroll around the shore as they built their courage, but regardless, that made no difference to her mission. Crocus, Lily, and the Soul that she was to Shephard to Higan were all that remained in the fog. Together, they found the oaken boat floating on the mercury water of the river's edge, and together they climbed aboard Crocus sat first on seat at the bow and took the two oars into his hands; the Soul floated over to the seat by the bow; Lily sat upon Crocus's lap. They set sail into the mist.

As the vague remnants of the world around them vanished, the Soul began to regain a Human form. He had the form of a young man, well-built through years of hard labor and hearty meals, adorned with short, ruffled raven hair, and sporting the light, unkempt stubble of a man prone to shaving but had neglected to for the past two or three days. He sat with his one thigh crossed above his other knee, hunched over with his elbow resting on the gunwale and his prickly chin resting atop the palm of his hand. He was staring blankly out into the fog with dull and tired eyes accented with dark rings.

Other than the gentle sound of the oars sinking and rising into the viscous water of the river, there was silence. Watched the man intently, and she shifted about uneasily on Crocus's stiff lap. She had placed her hands upon her own lap and clenched her cloak, "Um, Mr. Zeiko (噬嗑)," Lily almost choked on the words as they left her mouth. Slowly, the man's weary gaze drifted over toward Lily. She swallowed her nerves, "I've been meaning to ask..." she paused, "Was it really an accident?"

"Hmm?" the man, Zeiko, responded, raising his eyebrow in a manner that seemed to be more out of politeness than a genuine inquiry.

Lily fumbled for the words, "It, it was on your epitaph, tragic accident,"

Zeiko, shrugged, "Dunno, hard to say, I had been drinking, so that whole morning is just kind of a blur to me," the man's eyes drifted away from Lily as he turned his head back to the bow and crossed his arms over his chest. Lily looked down at her own lap and loosened her grip on her cloak.

Lily could feel Crocus's entire body vibrate around her as he rattled the words, "Drinking on the job then, was it?"

Zeiko did not turn back but uncrossed and recrossed his legs. "Yeah, that was it," he replied curtly.

Crocus said nothing in return, but simply continued to row.

Lily's voice rose in her throat again and chimed, "Did, did you have any regrets?"

Zeiko looked up towards the grey fog above them as if in thought before responding, "My manager, Shinfu (震風), do you know what happened to him,"

Lily bit her lip, Crocus responded, "He is not dead, if that is what you are asking,"

Zeiko lowered his arms onto the gunwales and looked towards the reapers, "No, I didn't mean anything like that, I just wanted to know like if he got fired or anything."

Crocus responded, "My apologies, Shinigami are not aware of the matters of the living, but you may ask the Yama when you face Judgement and she should be able to give you closure."

"Alright. Thanks," Zeiko replied before turning away once more. He briefly looked over the side of the bow, but grimaced at the sight of his own reflection in the silver waters below. He turned back to the reapers, "Yeah, he had actually just given me a suspension a month ago for violating safety protocols and being too reckless..." He trailed off.

Zaiko opened had opened his mouth to speak once more, but Lily interjected, "What happened a month ago? Sorry, if you don't mind me asking..."

Zaiko chuckled and shook his head, "I don't really know... Well, I guess it was just a culmination of things."

Crocus responded, "It often is. We are all the culminations of our own stories."

Zaiko nodded, "I guess that the big thing was, well, I mean, it was about a woman. I know, you guys probably hear about rubbish like this all the time." Lily but her lip again and Crocus made no discernable expression on his blank skull of a face. "We weren't even ever dating or anything, but," Zaiko rubbed his temples and pressed his hands onto the side of his face. "Well, long story short, she ending up going away, and she never wanted to see me again... And not like the kind of 'never want to see you again' that people who are close have in rough spots or anything, it was for real, revulsion, hatred for me that had been brewing for over a year by that point." Tears had been starting to well up in his eyes, "I had loved her, for such a long time, but it was just the circumstances, and then I just kept fucking up again and again. She was the only thing I really cared about and I fucked everything up with her repeatedly. I'm a fucking failure." Zaiko rubbed his watery eyes. Lily felt as though she might start crying too, but she was trying her hardest to think of something to say to comfort the man. Crocus kept rowing. "You guys probably think I'm an idiot for wasting my life over such a stupid little thing."

"Yes and no," Crocus responded. "It is true that you allowed your egotistical obsession with that woman to blot out your sight of the beauty of the world and ultimately destroy you, but, at the same time, if it really did mean so much to you, then it really did matter. The world of men is a wonderful place, full of color, warmth, sound, but it simultaneously is a dark, cold, silent world beyond the meaning mortals give unto it. We know that the stars far off in the night sky are blazing balls of flame beyond our wildest imagination, and yet, they are so far away, and the gentle flicker and heat of a lovely candle by our side can matter so much more. It is no wonder so many give themselves as moths unto the fire. You were no fool, but a slave and victim to the whim of your passion in a life, in a world where things did not quite work out as you had melodramatically hoped. I do not know what comes next for you, for your fate is in the hands of the Yama alone, but I pray that in your next life that you are either more fortunate so that heart's fantasy may be reality or that you are more well-reasoned so that you might better cope should your romantic dreams once more come tumbling down."

Zaiko did not reply, he seemed to have more he wished to say, and he seemed to only partially agree with the reaper's assessment of his love, but nevertheless he accepted what had happened. The vermillion light bleeding through the clouds was a sign that they had arrived at Higan and that this was truly the end. As they reached the shore, Zaiko climbed out of the ferry and bowed to the reapers before starting his ascent up the flower strewn hill beneath the eternally setting sun. Lily waved him goodbye and Crocus plucked a white rose and cast it into the river as a gesture to impart one final blessing on the man's Soul. Then, together, the two reapers returned to their boat and Crocus began to row once more.