Chapter 1 It had been years since there was anything close to a normal way of life in Japan. There had been many changes to Japan in the 17th century. The year was 1605, and Japan was hit by the effects of a devastating earthquake and tsunami at around 8 p.m. on February 3, 1605. The earthquake had a magnitude of 7.9 on the surface, which triggered a devasting tsunami. It was higher than expected, given the projections. There had been thousands and thousands of deaths in the four regions that had been affected. Along with deaths of people, 700 homes were destroyed, many castles were completely destroyed, and others had severe damage that would take years to rebuild, since at that time they didn’t have the supplies and things used in more modern eras. There were 5,000 that were killed during this event. But Japan was in a world completely by itself and in a different period of time than the rest of the world. The devastations were hard to imagine, as areas were completely destroyed, people in the thousands were left dead. Animals, people were wiped out in a matter of seconds. It was nature raging against a way of living. There was nothing that anyone could have done to prevent such a life-changing event that led to so much destruction. The regions that had suffered the most damage—that word could not come close to describing the destruction—were the Chuba region, Kansa Region, Shikokus region, and the Kyushu region. The southern coast of Honshu runs parallel to the Nankai Trough. It marks the subduction of the Philippine Sea, beneath the Eurasian Plate. Not too far from there was a town called Okla, which had felt the tsunami worst of all, as it destroyed and killed many in that disaster. It was a booming town where families had lived and settled and farmed and done the things that most families had done in order to survive. All the rural area had been destroyed and had been left flooded for what seemed like years and years, and never seemed to be the same ever again from that one moment in history. As time passed, it had been difficult for many to even begin to go back or attempt to return to see what had become of their homes, and how bad the destruction was in Okla. The idea of attempting such a thing was dreadful. It was very painful to look at an area and understand how your town was destroyed by nature. Not one person would be able to stomach something that so fundamentally changed their very existence. There were so many things that weren’t going right in the very early 1600s. That was one thing that held in many beliefs in so many things. How would the people in these areas survive? They had no roof over their head, no shelter from wild animals or anything in Japan. The castles that ruled over the people were destroyed or washed away. The land was in ruins, and nothing left for the people to live on or for. Some had survived, and others had the opportunity to get far enough away from the regions that the tsunami hit the hardest. There had been some in spurts as some people had come back, but why would they? That would be the greatest question. It is something that we do as humans; we tend to go back to what we know and things to which we have formed attachments. It is in human nature to go to what we know best. So many things had changed in that span of time and years. A whole rebuilding process of Okla, and the shoguns had been completely wiped out and a rebuilding period begun from every way—from rebuilding an army to rebuilding the area that seemingly had to begin anew. The Japanese people knew how to survive and learned how to adapt to the things that were presented to them. It was a very bleak picture that had consumed them with things that were near impossible to think about. There were more questions than answers. Shattered homes, and pieces that had scattered across the beach and the land, from the four regions where broken lives had been destroyed. You often saw the heartbreak of the people and the surrounding areas. Any given person felt the heartbreak and the loss of life, young or old, newborn and others. You felt the heartache from so many angles. The rulers in the castles had been killed, and even the seventh wizard had died. Rincewind was dressed in his yellow cloak and his balding head. In months before, his time was nearing at a competition held in honor of the emperor Tashbi. Radagast, the seventh wizard, had seen young apprentices who seemed eager to learn the world of magic and become his replacements. As the seventh wizard, he had consulted the ponytailed emperor, and after killing his father, he blamed it on his sister, as he had set her up and pinned the death on her. Months before the tsunami, Emperor Tashbi had let the ultimate abuse of power come over him. He had ordered the beheading of his only sister. He knew the truth and felt no remorse about his actions. Tashbi’s father had run a simple but peaceful empire. He was one of the rare ones, and under his rule, most shoguns and people had gotten along. But, Tashbi’s view was filled with nothing but death and destruction. It had followed the many emperors before him. Tashbi’s father was rare, but Tashbi himself was the ultimate. However, his view of death, and with that, his rule, didn’t last long, only a matter of months. The seventh wizard, Rincewind, who lived in the castle with Emperor Tashbi, was aging. Secretly, away from the castle, he had done something the six other wizards of time had never done. He had brought him to the most forbidden place, the place only dead or retired wizards had gone. Radagast, the new trainee, was young and full of life and innocence. He had been training for the most powerful position. Over months and years, Rincewind had taught him, and the time would soon come when both of them would leave earth and go to the Temple of Time, a forbidden act that the other six wizards of the realm were very much against. Each one’s power was very different from the other’s. Rincewind had seen many things and was trying to tell them of Okla’s destruction, but it was more than what he and others could understand. As he stood in the battle room, the other six wizards took quite a different approach. They were incredulous and could not believe what he had said to the others around the magical realm in the Temple of Time. Where they stood seemed like a completely different place, and a very unfamiliar area. The other six wizards stood bickering at Rincewind and all his reasoning at the big table. They all protested, as though their reasoning was better than Rincewind’s offering. But Rincewind was able to see far past the future, as he moved his hands from left to right, and opened what seemed like a white magic cloud. He was able to reveal the events and timeline of the different things that had transpired, and how they had happened. It was Rincewind who had pleaded with the magical wizards in the Temple of Time. He knew, and when you believe in something so strongly, you both believe it and feel it as well. That was how Rincewind showed the six wizards that surrounded the magic realm table. They all sat around and even now they looked at each other, still unwilling to believe him. They saw every event that had occurred. Rincewind had showed them in the air, and a temple of magic and mystery of everything would float, everything and anything that you could imagine. From magical books to a book of spells. A bookcase that stretched to the ceiling and even beyond that. Rincewind stood on the open seal of the Wizard Realm and pleaded as he held his hands tightly together, begging for mercy, and he looked at each of them as he wished for hope. He seemed to be the last hope, the one hope that his country and others still had. Each different wizard and each cloak that they wore had sat around the table, and each color had represented something different. As they all had their specialty in something that was so unique and so much more powerful than the next one. Rincewind looked at them and waved his magic all around them, vanishing them all to what was an image, and placing them directly in what he had tried to show them, but which they had refused to see or believe. As Rincewind stood behind them with Radagast, he didn’t know what to think. He was so young, and he was the last of a long line of generational wizards: the eight wizards of the Temple of Time. As there were eight chairs, they constructed this oversized large table, which had spells and everything else you could imagine. But it also had a book containing the things in time that were controlled by the Temple of Time, and details about how and why this temple existed. They each had a large part of history and had played a role in saving it from many crucial events, good and bad, over the periods of time. It was a way of controlling the balance in the world wherever they were needed. Rincewind, in his yellow cloak, seemingly was third-most powerful to the others, and he was shocked that he had done that to all the others. As he looked at all of them, and Rincewind called his young apprentice, he felt something building up, and he was fighting for him, as he had a gift of every wizard within his magic and power. It could have possibly been the reason why the others were so afraid of seeing what he himself believed in giving Radagast the red cloak. The red cloak was the most powerful of them all. The first wizard wore blue, and others wore different colors, never the same. Radagast had listened and believed everything that Rincewind had said and showed the others. “There is a war coming and that war will bring forward death and turmoil in ways that you can’t believe. I am seeing this, and I feel the pains and suffering on a daily basis. There are things I will show you,” he said as he talked to all of them. “We see what you are doing,” the blue wizard had answered with his longest beard, as he was the most powerful. “We will not be influenced by your mind power and powerful thoughts.” Rapidly, he snapped them back from the Temple of Time to the board room. “No!” Rincewind yelled, as he realized, based on their current surroundings in Okla, compared to what they’d seen, this event was to happen almost twenty-five years into the future. It was scheduled for the year 1650: the birth of The Master. As Rincewind stood, he froze time for them all. He thought that if it was going to be that way, then the Temple of Time was to become a real temple somewhere that would never be found, in the deep part of the Amazon rainforest. Rincewind froze them, walking slowly, cursing them and cursing himself as he aged so quickly. Soon he became a frozen statue among the temple, which would later become a piece of art work in the temple, along with many other pictures on the wall. His body crumbled to dust, and as the dust swirled away, the wind picked up his last words. “Don’t let him ever live…” Rincewind’s passion inspired something even greater, as Radagast felt he had to win the competition that Emperor Tashbi had set for the kingdom. There was something about the passion that he had, and there was something that had lured him even more. The things Rincewind had shown Radagast were going to be used as a greater source and a greater power for him. His life would not last as long as the others, but being as one of the more powerful wizards he would be, he would be part of something hundreds of years into the future. Radagast had accepted this truth and believed he was the right man for the job as well. It was something he would not back down from. He knew who and what he was and what needed to be done. # After Radagast teleported himself back, his return made it seem as if he were gone for months. Yet it had only seemed like days to him. In fact, it was much longer, nearly four months having passed. By the time he had returned, Emperor Tashbi had sent out a search party for his yellow cloaked wizard. He went into the kingdom and approached the guards that were near. He asked to speak with them, but a lot of them were very hesitant to do so. Looking around, he whispered a spell and moved all of the guards forcibly away, throwing them into the wall that wasn’t far from where he stood. Frightened, they agreed to his request. They knew that Emperor Tashbi had been looking for the seventh wizard, and as Emperor Tashbi had been looking for the yellow cloaked wizard, there seemingly was no sign of him until this moment. As he regarded the emperor and began to approach him, he sensed that there was great trouble. The red cloaked wizard knelt before the emperor and took off his red hat. He was very young to be this powerful, the emperor mused as he looked at him. “Stand up,” Emperor Tashbi commanded the wizard. As he listened, and as he noticed how things were different, he wondered if maybe it was much more time that he had been gone. Radagast couldn’t remember how much time had passed. Maybe the Temple of Time messed with his brain on how much time had gone by as well. He couldn’t understand what really happened, and why Rincewind had fought so hard for him, the apprentice he had taken under his wing from a very violent upbringing. Rincewind had killed his parents to save Radagast from a brutal death. That was something that he had to do, a moral obligation. So Radagast had been more than grateful for a gesture in return. Rincewind had saved his life and from the very early age of 10, he had been training him since. As Radagast approached the emperor, he knew something was up. The emperor had ordered him to kill all the other wizards that challenged him. He had ordered all the others and had a horn blown for a wizard battle. Everyone realized what was happening, as they walked outside towards the castle. Emperor Tashbi had told Radagast to rise to his feet and follow him to the battle ground. The emperor didn’t believe that he was simply given the red cloak. He thought that he had killed for it, just the way that he had killed his sister as well. “You would now,” he responded and smirked. The emperor grabbed him and slammed him against one of the large pillars that held the castle together. Radagast was a bit of a wise guy as well. He smiled and looked at him. “The truth lies with me, as I know everything about you.” Instantaneously, Radagast was grabbed by the emperor and plowed right through the people in his castle. As his approached his throne room, he slammed the door shut and the guards were positioned right outside the door. They asked if he needed them inside the room. “No!” he answered with a booming, angry voice that they all understood. Radagast walked around with his cloak on and his robe closed, his hands closed as he walked around. His arrogance and cockiness were more convincing to the emperor through his actions and body language. That was something that made him respectful of him. He saw himself in the young wizard, and he liked that. The fact that he had recognized such tendencies in Radagast assured him that his relationship with the new, powerful wizard would be a long-lasting one, and not one that would cloud his judgment at all. The emperor wanted supreme power to destroy anyone or anything who believed in his rule or not. Radagast would make a fine ally, he thought to himself. As Radagast looked into his eyes, he saw what he was going to do within time. As he had said, the destruction of this land would take years to rebuild, from 1605 and the tsunami that had killed thousands. He saw everything that the new emperor was going to do, and Radagast had no choice but to let things fall into place the way that Rincewind had told him they were going to happen. There was no saving him from anything the emperor was going to do. The destruction would come and the people would see the things that he had seen, all in due course. “ I will support you in anything you do,” he said as he bowed towards him. “You are my emperor.” He kneeled before him on the wet gravel of the castle and waved his two arms. “Stand up,” the emperor told him. Radagast stood slowly and brushed the dirt off his knees. He smiled. “You must do what you have to do as well.” The emperor smiled, and without saying much, both of them knew that the one secret that Emperor Tashbi had tried to hide, the eighth wizard, Radagast, had known. He was careful not to say anything that would make him think too deeply about it. Radagast had chosen his words very wisely. In the end, they both smiled and they both shook each other’s hands. As they performed this gesture, the undercurrent between them was palpable. Were they both shaking each other’s hand as they were shaking it with the devil? That remained to be seen. Radagast the red cloaked wizard, the eighth and final one, had constructed the Temple of Time realm. He knew things had to be the way that they were transpiring. His time would be short, but it was in that time that he had everything to fall to him, and in the end, he would become what Rincewind the seventh wizard was, the one who saw the greatness and the fall of the world. Something that he made sure that Radagast would be able to see and understand as well. He took it to heart as well. It was something beyond his control, and he was told never to change things in the end. Emperor Tashbi walked out with his armor in place. The faces that appeared on his armor represented the descendants of the kingdom who had ruled and protected it. As one of the few castles in the region that hadn’t been completely destroyed by the massive tsunami, they had years of work to do to rebuild and to get the people back. The castle, as much as they had wanted the town of Okla, was something that would not work for them. Radagast advised him that this would never work. It seemed the emperor had a decision to make, and he would make it after the true test of the wizard. They departed the throne room together, and walked out into the open yard, where the battle ground was being set up by the emperor’s guards. The crowd was sparse, as most of the people had either moved on from the great disaster or died. The destruction was evident, as most things were all over, weapons and other debris strewn about from the massive destruction. As the emperor had known in his heart, it would take a miracle to live and survive in Okla. It was in ruins, and there was nothing left in it. Why should anyone stay if there wasn’t anything that was left for them to live for? As Emperor Tashbi, with his long ponytail, looked around, and saw everything that was in shambles, he contemplated that he had to convince them that Okla was dead, and what was once a booming town was now a desolate town with no life, and if there were any lives left, they would soon die. A town with hundreds of families, which stretched for about fifteen miles, and houses set along the ways, it was more populated than any town along the coast of the Shikoku Region. Okla wasn’t far from the mountains, as it had an entrance up and the same entrance down. A water source wasn’t too far from it either. This was the source that had destroyed the town. The emperor had asked any of the training wizards to step forward as they all lined up to do battle as had been requested of them. Even Radagast stood with his red cloak. He knew what he wanted. The emperor cast his eyes on them and waved before the others could say anything or attempt a more powerful spell on him, which would be highly unlikely, but he didn’t want to take any chances. He noted that Radagast, the young-looking wizard, for the most part had no facial hair and was lucky he had enough hair to wear the red hat that he had donned. Just then, Radagast snapped both his fingers, and the challengers exploded, all eight of them. Blood went flying all over from the other apprentices that stood in the yard waiting to attempt to win and become the emperor’s wizard. The emperor surveyed the scene before him, including the guards and some of the people who stood covered in blood from what had been done to them. It was extremely gruesome and it looked as if pints of blood were everywhere, and covered from head to toe, from the people that remained in the kingdom to the guards. The Emperor was taken aback by the turn of events. It wasn’t something that he had thought of, or ever would have imagined to show how vicious he could be. That’s what the wizard had said to Emperor Tashbi in his throne room. He had to prove it, and Radagast had done just that. He had made his point regarding how seriously he would take being loyal. The Emperor liked brutal and painful death. He showed him, while the Emperor made all wizards compete for his loyalty, and he did something so brutal that no one could come close. The way he’d done it, with two snaps of his fingers, making everyone explode one by one was brutal. The blood. The bones and body parts going all over, and whatever organs remained flying into the crowd. It was something that he liked and enjoyed, evident by his smile. The emperor now knew what a vicious wizard he had in his power, a killing machine. In the years to come, with his help, they would cause something greater than Japan had ever seen. As that day came to an end, time was headed in a direction that surely revealed how the world at that time had been changing. # Radagast eventually found a place to sleep. There wasn’t much left of one of the few castles that hadn’t been washed away from the water that crashed upon the shore. He had looked around and lay with the rotting animals that had been slaughtered and were destroyed from animals that had managed to survive. There were smells that the human nose couldn’t stomach or ponder what it might be either. There was too much going on, and the life that been destroyed was something far greater than what the true cause of everything was. Emperor Tashbi had his own intentions. He, too, knew that from what he viewed and how he needed to come into power was by building his army. He also knew that this would take time, much more so than some might think. After such a crushing blow to that area of Okla, and losing almost 5,000 people between the four regions, it made it so terrible and devasting to all areas. It was like starting all over from something or bringing a new time to something. As the kingdom had less than fifty people, compared to what was once the booming town of Okla, Radagast knew that even though it had to happen eventually, no one in their right frame of mind would come back to where destruction had occurred. That was one thing that most people wouldn’t think twice about. Finding places to sleep were hard, as it was cold, damp, and wet, and even for most to find shelter, not to mention the things that would possibly threaten them, made it harder to wonder what could happen, what harm could befall them, while their eyes would be shut at night. But the emperor wondered, not about his people, but rather how his army could grow and how much more dominating he could be. He could become one of the most powerful emperors of his time and be the baldest one of them all, a distinction that would set him apart. With great power, the sky was the limit for him, and with Radagast as his right-hand man, there wasn’t anything or anyone that would deter him or tell him no. The rise and fall would be his own undoing, and that was something he couldn’t and wouldn’t control either. While most had searched for places to sleep, the emperor didn’t help any of them in their search, as he wanted the people to figure it out. That wasn’t his problem. He had to move away from Okla and that was his concern. Where could he go? Emperor Tashbi had a few of his soldiers that remained, in the destroyed castle. He looked out into a mist of the land that was covered in a thick fog. He wasn’t sure what to do, and, as many people before him, he was following in the same footsteps. He wanted death and total destruction. Radagast wasn’t too far away. He had traversed the wet, soiled land in order to try to help some of the scattered people find someplace dry and warm, which was extremely hard to do. There had been bales of hay that, just looking around, seemed like the warmest place for those people he had seen alive. They had lacked food, water, and supplies to live. Radagast spent the next few hours toiling, trying to help the people survive another day. Finally, he stood up, after he had reunited some of the children with their mothers and fathers, if they had survived, which in some cases they hadn’t. He had to find others who would take them under their wing. It was heartbreaking, and whatever warmth he could provide for them, he took upon him as his duty, as he knew the emperor didn’t care one bit about anything like that at all. To him, it was all about power and control over the people and the land, and that was all that mattered, whether anyone liked it or not. Radagast had walked for a bit with a walking stick that fit perfectly, even though he was the youngest to be appointed a wizard by the emperor. He glanced back over all of the destruction he had walked through, strewn about the whole area. He had walked for nearly an hour, and he had reached a point in Okla that intrigued him, as Rincewind had seen and told Radagast that his death would take him to Okla It was the town that he was currently in, and a destroyed town, too. Slowly, he approached the area that Rincewind had revealed to him in his visions; it was somewhere he had to go. Radagast, against Rincewind’s wishes and warnings to the contrary, resolved to press onward. It was something that he had to do for his own piece of mind. He emerged from the destroyed nature forest, or what was left of it. There were patches here and there, and practically no trees. It was mostly dirt and some grassy patches, and a lot of water buildups along the path he took had walked. But it was very dark and gloomy where he had walked to. It wasn’t the large town he was used to, and just looking around, he saw as much, if not more, damage as he had seen from the castle area. It was practically unimaginable. But he saw animals dead, people dead, hundreds of destroyed houses and farm lands—there was nothing there. As he looked around, turning his head in all directions, the sights were equally dismal, no matter where he looked. Dark, as if Hell itself had taken over. The Okla mountains were a few miles south of where he had approached a hut. It had looked like the weakest thing that he had seen, standing. But how could it even stand when all the other surrounding homes and things were completely destroyed from the tsunami? He couldn’t understand it. Radagast walked towards it, crossing into a territory that was well beyond where he should have been. It was something that Rincewind had strongly advised him not to ever do. Radagast, however, was headstrong and didn’t listen to his mentor. As he advanced, he started to see flashes of images, things that Rincewind had seen. A war that would stir up years later, and from that, a great evil that would rise. He saw all the horrific images, of death and destruction, and along with them, one man and one person named “The Master.” Just as the images of destruction began, they were quickly cut off; he wasn’t meant to see so much. Radagast fell to the muddy soil in front of the hut. He couldn’t fully comprehend the images he had seen. But the warrior in his vision looked fierce and mean. The Master. With a skull as a face, and red eyes, he was a warrior much more intact than anything he had seen before. It terrified him, and he quickly backed away from the hut. As he pushed his hands through the mud as fast as he could, there was something about the hut that he saw he could get into. But that was clearly not the case. It was like something was magical about the place or was something that Rincewind the magical wizard had done; or else, he knew that Radagast would go there after telling him, after seeing the images that Rincewind had shown the other six wizards from the Temple of Time. As Radagast had his hands and feet caked in the mud, his heart raced extremely fast and scared the life out of him as he continued to back away. He attempted to slow his breaths, unable to shake the residual feelings from seeing things that he shouldn’t have. But, seeing the images that Rincewind had shown the other wizards from the Temple of Time, he found that it was much more powerful to feel the images, then see the images as well. It was something that was more difficult to feel. It was stressful and gave him anxiety to a point that made him confused about what he was feeling. But, for Radagast, it was a bit of many different things all at once. He couldn’t quite understand what those emotions were either. It overwhelmed him. He had gradually gotten to his feet, and he thought about what he felt and saw. Now, he was worried. This was what Rincewind had been talking about, that his destiny had already been written for him, and the sacrifice that he was going to make later years in life was preordained. The words echoed in his brain as he stood up with his walking stick. He was in his early 40’s at best. All the other previous wizards had lived for hundreds and hundreds of years through times of turmoil and changing events. It was what Rincewind knew would be his ultimate sacrifice, and, being the much more powerful red wizard of the rest of the seven previous wizards, he knew it was his duty to make things better, though time and events he could not change. Radagast walked back toward the direction he came from, and as he did, he could have sworn he heard laughter—a very evil laugh. He wasn’t dreaming or imagining things. He knew he had heard something, but he didn’t know where it had come from. It was something evil, that he had sensed, and a much more evil presence than he had ever known about. It was something on top of what he began to know was something mysterious. A loud voice that covered the land and an echo that couldn’t be unknown to the land. This made him even more worried, as things of this nature terrified him to a level that he couldn’t understand at this point. # By early morning, Radagast had finally gotten back to where the castle was. He looked at the sky and couldn’t understand how the sun had been replaced by clouds. It was Okla had been cursed, with no trace of sunlight or any light whatsoever. It had made Radagast wonder what and where he had just been. What was Okla? At least that part of it seemed completely separate from the early parts where the castle was? He couldn’t completely understand, and he wouldn’t until the time came to do so. As he returned to what was left of the castle, he searched for Emperor Tashbi. Radagast had walked up the broken castle stairways very carefully and watched the cracks in the stairs, as there were many that had been damaged from the tsumani. He finally reached Emperor Tashbi, walking over and around the damage’s debris from the castle and broken fragments that had blocked some doors and rooms. Radagast was the youngest of all the wizards, which made him better equipped to jump and use his agility to his advantage. When he finally got to where Emperor Tashbi was, he looked at him and kneeled before him, then stood up again. “It is time to move,” he said solemnly. “It is going to be safe for the people.” For once, Tashbi had agreed. This was no place to build an army of any kind. While Tashbi saw something, Radagast saw something opposite. Their visions were aligned, but Radagast had seen something that was completely beyond what he had wanted to see. It was a sign of something or something quite out of the ordinary but served as a warning of things that would occur. From his short stature, Emperor Tashbi examined Radagast, covered in mud, his cloak that was usually red stained brown from the wet and soft soil that was in Okla. “What happened?” Emperor Tashbi asked. Radagast went on to tell him with a smile how he went exploring to see what he would find, and he had fallen into some soft spots with mud in them. The emperor had laughed seeing him, and he made fun of his story, and of all the dried mud all over his red cloak. Radagast brushed off what remaining dirt he had on himself. He smiled and they both laughed. It was time, the emperor said. Time to move on, like he was told to by Radagast. Tashbi had gathered his people where the top of the castle used to be. It had been destroyed from the tsunami, and most of the top part of the castle was missing. Tashbi had called, and they all asked what was left of the courtyard, where they all stood when he would call the people to listen to him speak. They stood and looked up to him. He looked around and the few people that had remained looked at him with a glimmer of hope and survival instinct. As they listened, the emperor told them it was time to move on. It was what most of them wanted to hear. From what he had seen looking down at the people, the conditions of the way of life were worse than any conditions that peasants had to live in. There was some hope now, as Radagast had given Tashbi. At some point, he had to get the shoguns involved somehow, to show him what he needed to do. Sometimes it was the only way that he was able to see what he truly wanted to see. Tashbi had his own intentions that were far greater than anything he had thought about along the line. There was truly no comparison to anything else, either. The people had cheered a bit at the emperor’s proclamation, and Radagast smiled as he stood next to the armored emperor. He said, “I think they are starting to like you a bit.” Emperor Tashbi smiled and laughed. “I guess I can’t make a habit of that?” he said. It was something that they both laughed about a few times. The people of Okla were given 24 hours to pack whatever things they had. It was the only way to give them enough time to find anything they had left. It was understandably the right thing to do. As Radagast had told him, it was the wise thing to do as well. Not that he was all about doing the right thing, as Tashbi was more about himself and building up the shogun army once they had found a safe place to rebuild. Those was his intentions, and they were very strong ones. “Are you coming?” asked Tashbi as he walked away. Radagast responded that he wasn’t. He needed some time to think about things. As he stood on one of the broken stones that had been split in the castle, one of many that existed throughout the castle, he looked up at the sky and pondered, as he so often did, what voice, and what future he signed up for. At the time, he wanted to be great, but he did not realize the sacrifices or the way his future would be written long before the years would approach. # The next morning, he had still been up on the same rock. He appeared to be a statue of some sort. Tashbi saw him in the same spot as he had left him. He almost looked like he was praying, but he wasn’t at all. It was his way of thinking. There were so many things that had to get done. The emperor had assembled most of the people, and now he had looked for Radagast, finding him in the same area where he had left him. “Are you okay?” he smiled. Radagast knew that despite how ruthless as he was acting and his intentions being very evident, he seemed to care about Radagast. But this was merely a guess. As it was time to head out, the emperor waved his hand to come down from where he stood on the remnants of the castle. It seemed as if there was really now more hope for them, and a better place awaited them, away from Okla and this decaying and destroyed castle. Radagast knew this and yet he felt fearful that the next time he would be there would possibly be his last. But he realized it was part of his destiny as well. He looked back at Emperor Tashbi as he walked away from Radagast and headed towards where the people waited for their emperor. As he turned his head, the emperor yelled in his native Japanese language and waved his hands for him to come towards him. He smiled, knowing it was going to be a place that he would not see for many years, and soon, Okla was going to be a far-off land. But that time would go by quickly, as he had given it one last look of fate that would be met. It was only 1605, and there were many more years to go. As he answered his emperor and headed away, he bowed towards the town, knowing that his fate was written. Knowing all the things that the seventh wizard had showed him, he was more accepting of it at this point. He had realized that there was a higher plan of attack to some degree. Radagast followed the emperor towards where the people had waited for him to be at his side. He cast one final look at everything and smiled. He then went with Emperor Tashbi. He followed his careful footing over the cracks in the stone, and the pieces of pillars and stone that had begun to shake loose from the castle, making it seemingly unsteady. With the way the structure had fallen, and the precarious way the things leaned against each other, it was only a matter of time. Emperor Tashbi had ordered his soldiers to search the broken castle for anyone who had possibly wandered off to places that they couldn’t escape from. It wasn’t like they had many people to leave the group. It was simply going to be the best way forward they could possibly have. The emperor finally decided it was beyond the right thing to do. He had gathered and waited for all the guards to come back, as he had counted the number of soldiers that he had, along with all their weapons. He hadn’t really known what to expect from what was out there. Some of the people were afraid of what could be awaiting them. Others were afraid of what could have been if they had stayed at the castle as well. There wasn’t much that would happen that would be good. A battle of things that could possibly attack as far as wild animals were concerned. The survival rate for them was less and less with each passing day. That was the one thing that they all could agree on. They all needed to survive to each new day, as Radagast had to convince Emperor Tashbi as well. He knew that all the things Radagast had said had always made sense, and a 40-year-old wizard was by far one of the youngest wizards, and also one of the wisest with common sense as well. As they headed out of that area for the last time, they had gotten the few remaining stragglers that had crept away for some reason or another. As the emperor had seen, they had taken a few of the lost treasures from the castle and wanted to use it for trade to get supplies that they needed as well. Radagast looked on, as the emperor instructed the soldiers to hold them. The two guards of his fallen and destroyed kingdom walked along the broken debris, plants, and trees, and moved much farther away from everything. They had gone much more inland, far away from an area where this could ever happen again, they hoped. It had been about a half day’s trip, and they finally came to an area that had some life to it, and a castle that looked deserted, as if nothing had been there for about twenty years or so. Radagast, searching alongside the emperor, saw a machine that was built to behead people. The two soldiers saw that there were numerous of these guillotines in front of the castle. When they saw them, the emperor told the soldiers to put the two thieves there, as the soldiers had sorted out the criminals. He looked fiercely out at the people and said, “No one steals from me.” The soldiers swiftly placed them in the machine. Their heads were locked away, along with their hands, through a piece of wood. It looked impossible to get out, and there were chains to lock them in. The wood was all covered in dried red blood. As he spoke to his people, he took out his sword, as the emperor had done. He walked over towards each of them, and he cut off their heads one by one. Emperor Tashbi had no mercy and didn’t care about people who stole or did things against him. He stood before a castle, his people, and what was left from the tsunami that had destroyed the lives of so many. He stood in front of a castle and called it home. It appeared to have been deserted for what seemed like years now. It was now Castle Alanga in Shizuoka, Japan. Chapter 2 There hadn’t been many people that were left from the tsunami. Emperor Tashbi stood there with Radagast, having found the castle, and he saw less than fifty people who had dragged their things. He knew that there were many things that he had wondered and thought about, as he had seen the great destruction over the years. The red cloaked wizard had much to learn. But he had also gained so much knowledge, as he was far more powerful than any others that had come before, given his power and seeing what he had seen. His power was far greater than any of the other wizards before him. As he followed in the footsteps of the evil and twisted Emperor Tashbi, he had seen the destruction of many over the years and just complete chaos. His ideas of power and destruction were far greater than he had believed. The emperor was obsessed with destruction and death. Even if anyone had looked at him funny, it would be beheading fo
Chapter 1
It had been years since there was anything close to a normal way of life in Japan. There had been many changes to Japan in the 17th century.
The year was 1605, and Japan was hit by the effects of a devastating earthquake and tsunami at around 8 p.m. on February 3, 1605. The earthquake had a magnitude of 7.9 on the surface, which triggered a devasting tsunami. It was higher than expected, given the projections.
There had been thousands and thousands of deaths in the four regions that had been affected. Along with deaths of people, 700 homes were destroyed, many castles were completely destroyed, and others had severe damage that would take years to rebuild, since at that time they didn’t have the supplies and things used in more modern eras. There were 5,000 that were killed during this event.
But Japan was in a world completely by itself and in a different period of time than the rest of the world. The devastations were hard to imagine, as areas were completely destroyed, people in the thousands were left dead. Animals, people were wiped out in a matter of seconds. It was nature raging against a way of living. There was nothing that anyone could have done to prevent such a life-changing event that led to so much destruction.
The regions that had suffered the most damage—that word could not come close to describing the destruction—were the Chuba region, Kansa Region, Shikokus region, and the Kyushu region.
The southern coast of Honshu runs parallel to the Nankai Trough. It marks the subduction of the Philippine Sea, beneath the Eurasian Plate. Not too far from there was a town called Okla, which had felt the tsunami worst of all, as it destroyed and killed many in that disaster. It was a booming town where families had lived and settled and farmed and done the things that most families had done in order to survive. All the rural area had been destroyed and had been left flooded for what seemed like years and years, and never seemed to be the same ever again from that one moment in history. As time passed, it had been difficult for many to even begin to go back or attempt to return to see what had become of their homes, and how bad the destruction was in Okla. The idea of attempting such a thing was dreadful. It was very painful to look at an area and understand how your town was destroyed by nature. Not one person would be able to stomach something that so fundamentally changed their very existence.
There were so many things that weren’t going right in the very early 1600s. That was one thing that held in many beliefs in so many things. How would the people in these areas survive? They had no roof over their head, no shelter from wild animals or anything in Japan. The castles that ruled over the people were destroyed or washed away. The land was in ruins, and nothing left for the people to live on or for. Some had survived, and others had the opportunity to get far enough away from the regions that the tsunami hit the hardest. There had been some in spurts as some people had come back, but why would they? That would be the greatest question.
It is something that we do as humans; we tend to go back to what we know and things to which we have formed attachments. It is in human nature to go to what we know best. So many things had changed in that span of time and years. A whole rebuilding process of Okla, and the shoguns had been completely wiped out and a rebuilding period begun from every way—from rebuilding an army to rebuilding the area that seemingly had to begin anew.
The Japanese people knew how to survive and learned how to adapt to the things that were presented to them. It was a very bleak picture that had consumed them with things that were near impossible to think about. There were more questions than answers. Shattered homes, and pieces that had scattered across the beach and the land, from the four regions where broken lives had been destroyed. You often saw the heartbreak of the people and the surrounding areas. Any given person felt the heartbreak and the loss of life, young or old, newborn and others. You felt the heartache from so many angles.
The rulers in the castles had been killed, and even the seventh wizard had died. Rincewind was dressed in his yellow cloak and his balding head. In months before, his time was nearing at a competition held in honor of the emperor Tashbi. Radagast, the seventh wizard, had seen young apprentices who seemed eager to learn the world of magic and become his replacements. As the seventh wizard, he had consulted the ponytailed emperor, and after killing his father, he blamed it on his sister, as he had set her up and pinned the death on her.
Months before the tsunami, Emperor Tashbi had let the ultimate abuse of power come over him. He had ordered the beheading of his only sister. He knew the truth and felt no remorse about his actions. Tashbi’s father had run a simple but peaceful empire. He was one of the rare ones, and under his rule, most shoguns and people had gotten along. But, Tashbi’s view was filled with nothing but death and destruction. It had followed the many emperors before him. Tashbi’s father was rare, but Tashbi himself was the ultimate. However, his view of death, and with that, his rule, didn’t last long, only a matter of months.
The seventh wizard, Rincewind, who lived in the castle with Emperor Tashbi, was aging. Secretly, away from the castle, he had done something the six other wizards of time had never done. He had brought him to the most forbidden place, the place only dead or retired wizards had gone. Radagast, the new trainee, was young and full of life and innocence. He had been training for the most powerful position. Over months and years, Rincewind had taught him, and the time would soon come when both of them would leave earth and go to the Temple of Time, a forbidden act that the other six wizards of the realm were very much against. Each one’s power was very different from the other’s. Rincewind had seen many things and was trying to tell them of Okla’s destruction, but it was more than what he and others could understand.
As he stood in the battle room, the other six wizards took quite a different approach. They were incredulous and could not believe what he had said to the others around the magical realm in the Temple of Time. Where they stood seemed like a completely different place, and a very unfamiliar area. The other six wizards stood bickering at Rincewind and all his reasoning at the big table. They all protested, as though their reasoning was better than Rincewind’s offering.
But Rincewind was able to see far past the future, as he moved his hands from left to right, and opened what seemed like a white magic cloud. He was able to reveal the events and timeline of the different things that had transpired, and how they had happened. It was Rincewind who had pleaded with the magical wizards in the Temple of Time. He knew, and when you believe in something so strongly, you both believe it and feel it as well. That was how Rincewind showed the six wizards that surrounded the magic realm table. They all sat around and even now they looked at each other, still unwilling to believe him.
They saw every event that had occurred. Rincewind had showed them in the air, and a temple of magic and mystery of everything would float, everything and anything that you could imagine. From magical books to a book of spells. A bookcase that stretched to the ceiling and even beyond that.
Rincewind stood on the open seal of the Wizard Realm and pleaded as he held his hands tightly together, begging for mercy, and he looked at each of them as he wished for hope. He seemed to be the last hope, the one hope that his country and others still had. Each different wizard and each cloak that they wore had sat around the table, and each color had represented something different. As they all had their specialty in something that was so unique and so much more powerful than the next one.
Rincewind looked at them and waved his magic all around them, vanishing them all to what was an image, and placing them directly in what he had tried to show them, but which they had refused to see or believe. As Rincewind stood behind them with Radagast, he didn’t know what to think. He was so young, and he was the last of a long line of generational wizards: the eight wizards of the Temple of Time. As there were eight chairs, they constructed this oversized large table, which had spells and everything else you could imagine. But it also had a book containing the things in time that were controlled by the Temple of Time, and details about how and why this temple existed. They each had a large part of history and had played a role in saving it from many crucial events, good and bad, over the periods of time. It was a way of controlling the balance in the world wherever they were needed. Rincewind, in his yellow cloak, seemingly was third-most powerful to the others, and he was shocked that he had done that to all the others.
As he looked at all of them, and Rincewind called his young apprentice, he felt something building up, and he was fighting for him, as he had a gift of every wizard within his magic and power. It could have possibly been the reason why the others were so afraid of seeing what he himself believed in giving Radagast the red cloak.
The red cloak was the most powerful of them all. The first wizard wore blue, and others wore different colors, never the same. Radagast had listened and believed everything that Rincewind had said and showed the others. “There is a war coming and that war will bring forward death and turmoil in ways that you can’t believe. I am seeing this, and I feel the pains and suffering on a daily basis. There are things I will show you,” he said as he talked to all of them.
“We see what you are doing,” the blue wizard had answered with his longest beard, as he was the most powerful. “We will not be influenced by your mind power and powerful thoughts.”
Rapidly, he snapped them back from the Temple of Time to the board room.
“No!” Rincewind yelled, as he realized, based on their current surroundings in Okla, compared to what they’d seen, this event was to happen almost twenty-five years into the future. It was scheduled for the year 1650: the birth of The Master.
As Rincewind stood, he froze time for them all. He thought that if it was going to be that way, then the Temple of Time was to become a real temple somewhere that would never be found, in the deep part of the Amazon rainforest.
Rincewind froze them, walking slowly, cursing them and cursing himself as he aged so quickly. Soon he became a frozen statue among the temple, which would later become a piece of art work in the temple, along with many other pictures on the wall.
His body crumbled to dust, and as the dust swirled away, the wind picked up his last words. “Don’t let him ever live…”
Rincewind’s passion inspired something even greater, as Radagast felt he had to win the competition that Emperor Tashbi had set for the kingdom. There was something about the passion that he had, and there was something that had lured him even more. The things Rincewind had shown Radagast were going to be used as a greater source and a greater power for him. His life would not last as long as the others, but being as one of the more powerful wizards he would be, he would be part of something hundreds of years into the future. Radagast had accepted this truth and believed he was the right man for the job as well. It was something he would not back down from. He knew who and what he was and what needed to be done.
#
After Radagast teleported himself back, his return made it seem as if he were gone for months. Yet it had only seemed like days to him. In fact, it was much longer, nearly four months having passed. By the time he had returned, Emperor Tashbi had sent out a search party for his yellow cloaked wizard.
He went into the kingdom and approached the guards that were near. He asked to speak with them, but a lot of them were very hesitant to do so. Looking around, he whispered a spell and moved all of the guards forcibly away, throwing them into the wall that wasn’t far from where he stood. Frightened, they agreed to his request. They knew that Emperor Tashbi had been looking for the seventh wizard, and as Emperor Tashbi had been looking for the yellow cloaked wizard, there seemingly was no sign of him until this moment.
As he regarded the emperor and began to approach him, he sensed that there was great trouble. The red cloaked wizard knelt before the emperor and took off his red hat. He was very young to be this powerful, the emperor mused as he looked at him.
“Stand up,” Emperor Tashbi commanded the wizard.
As he listened, and as he noticed how things were different, he wondered if maybe it was much more time that he had been gone. Radagast couldn’t remember how much time had passed. Maybe the Temple of Time messed with his brain on how much time had gone by as well. He couldn’t understand what really happened, and why Rincewind had fought so hard for him, the apprentice he had taken under his wing from a very violent upbringing. Rincewind had killed his parents to save Radagast from a brutal death. That was something that he had to do, a moral obligation. So Radagast had been more than grateful for a gesture in return. Rincewind had saved his life and from the very early age of 10, he had been training him since.
As Radagast approached the emperor, he knew something was up. The emperor had ordered him to kill all the other wizards that challenged him. He had ordered all the others and had a horn blown for a wizard battle.
Everyone realized what was happening, as they walked outside towards the castle. Emperor Tashbi had told Radagast to rise to his feet and follow him to the battle ground. The emperor didn’t believe that he was simply given the red cloak. He thought that he had killed for it, just the way that he had killed his sister as well.
“You would now,” he responded and smirked.
The emperor grabbed him and slammed him against one of the large pillars that held the castle together.
Radagast was a bit of a wise guy as well. He smiled and looked at him. “The truth lies with me, as I know everything about you.”
Instantaneously, Radagast was grabbed by the emperor and plowed right through the people in his castle. As his approached his throne room, he slammed the door shut and the guards were positioned right outside the door. They asked if he needed them inside the room.
“No!” he answered with a booming, angry voice that they all understood.
Radagast walked around with his cloak on and his robe closed, his hands closed as he walked around. His arrogance and cockiness were more convincing to the emperor through his actions and body language. That was something that made him respectful of him. He saw himself in the young wizard, and he liked that. The fact that he had recognized such tendencies in Radagast assured him that his relationship with the new, powerful wizard would be a long-lasting one, and not one that would cloud his judgment at all. The emperor wanted supreme power to destroy anyone or anything who believed in his rule or not. Radagast would make a fine ally, he thought to himself.
As Radagast looked into his eyes, he saw what he was going to do within time. As he had said, the destruction of this land would take years to rebuild, from 1605 and the tsunami that had killed thousands. He saw everything that the new emperor was going to do, and Radagast had no choice but to let things fall into place the way that Rincewind had told him they were going to happen. There was no saving him from anything the emperor was going to do. The destruction would come and the people would see the things that he had seen, all in due course.
“ I will support you in anything you do,” he said as he bowed towards him. “You are my emperor.” He kneeled before him on the wet gravel of the castle and waved his two arms.
“Stand up,” the emperor told him.
Radagast stood slowly and brushed the dirt off his knees. He smiled. “You must do what you have to do as well.”
The emperor smiled, and without saying much, both of them knew that the one secret that Emperor Tashbi had tried to hide, the eighth wizard, Radagast, had known. He was careful not to say anything that would make him think too deeply about it. Radagast had chosen his words very wisely. In the end, they both smiled and they both shook each other’s hands. As they performed this gesture, the undercurrent between them was palpable. Were they both shaking each other’s hand as they were shaking it with the devil? That remained to be seen.
Radagast the red cloaked wizard, the eighth and final one, had constructed the Temple of Time realm. He knew things had to be the way that they were transpiring. His time would be short, but it was in that time that he had everything to fall to him, and in the end, he would become what Rincewind the seventh wizard was, the one who saw the greatness and the fall of the world. Something that he made sure that Radagast would be able to see and understand as well. He took it to heart as well. It was something beyond his control, and he was told never to change things in the end.
Emperor Tashbi walked out with his armor in place. The faces that appeared on his armor represented the descendants of the kingdom who had ruled and protected it. As one of the few castles in the region that hadn’t been completely destroyed by the massive tsunami, they had years of work to do to rebuild and to get the people back. The castle, as much as they had wanted the town of Okla, was something that would not work for them. Radagast advised him that this would never work. It seemed the emperor had a decision to make, and he would make it after the true test of the wizard.
They departed the throne room together, and walked out into the open yard, where the battle ground was being set up by the emperor’s guards. The crowd was sparse, as most of the people had either moved on from the great disaster or died. The destruction was evident, as most things were all over, weapons and other debris strewn about from the massive destruction. As the emperor had known in his heart, it would take a miracle to live and survive in Okla. It was in ruins, and there was nothing left in it. Why should anyone stay if there wasn’t anything that was left for them to live for?
As Emperor Tashbi, with his long ponytail, looked around, and saw everything that was in shambles, he contemplated that he had to convince them that Okla was dead, and what was once a booming town was now a desolate town with no life, and if there were any lives left, they would soon die. A town with hundreds of families, which stretched for about fifteen miles, and houses set along the ways, it was more populated than any town along the coast of the Shikoku Region. Okla wasn’t far from the mountains, as it had an entrance up and the same entrance down. A water source wasn’t too far from it either. This was the source that had destroyed the town.
The emperor had asked any of the training wizards to step forward as they all lined up to do battle as had been requested of them. Even Radagast stood with his red cloak. He knew what he wanted.
The emperor cast his eyes on them and waved before the others could say anything or attempt a more powerful spell on him, which would be highly unlikely, but he didn’t want to take any chances. He noted that Radagast, the young-looking wizard, for the most part had no facial hair and was lucky he had enough hair to wear the red hat that he had donned.
Just then, Radagast snapped both his fingers, and the challengers exploded, all eight of them. Blood went flying all over from the other apprentices that stood in the yard waiting to attempt to win and become the emperor’s wizard.
The emperor surveyed the scene before him, including the guards and some of the people who stood covered in blood from what had been done to them. It was extremely gruesome and it looked as if pints of blood were everywhere, and covered from head to toe, from the people that remained in the kingdom to the guards. The Emperor was taken aback by the turn of events. It wasn’t something that he had thought of, or ever would have imagined to show how vicious he could be. That’s what the wizard had said to Emperor Tashbi in his throne room. He had to prove it, and Radagast had done just that. He had made his point regarding how seriously he would take being loyal. The Emperor liked brutal and painful death. He showed him, while the Emperor made all wizards compete for his loyalty, and he did something so brutal that no one could come close. The way he’d done it, with two snaps of his fingers, making everyone explode one by one was brutal. The blood. The bones and body parts going all over, and whatever organs remained flying into the crowd. It was something that he liked and enjoyed, evident by his smile.
The emperor now knew what a vicious wizard he had in his power, a killing machine. In the years to come, with his help, they would cause something greater than Japan had ever seen.
        As that day came to an end, time was headed in a direction that surely revealed how the world at that time had been changing.
#
Radagast eventually found a place to sleep. There wasn’t much left of one of the few castles that hadn’t been washed away from the water that crashed upon the shore. He had looked around and lay with the rotting animals that had been slaughtered and were destroyed from animals that had managed to survive. There were smells that the human nose couldn’t stomach or ponder what it might be either. There was too much going on, and the life that been destroyed was something far greater than what the true cause of everything was.
Emperor Tashbi had his own intentions. He, too, knew that from what he viewed and how he needed to come into power was by building his army. He also knew that this would take time, much more so than some might think. After such a crushing blow to that area of Okla, and losing almost 5,000 people between the four regions, it made it so terrible and devasting to all areas. It was like starting all over from something or bringing a new time to something. As the kingdom had less than fifty people, compared to what was once the booming town of Okla, Radagast knew that even though it had to happen eventually, no one in their right frame of mind would come back to where destruction had occurred. That was one thing that most people wouldn’t think twice about. Finding places to sleep were hard, as it was cold, damp, and wet, and even for most to find shelter, not to mention the things that would possibly threaten them, made it harder to wonder what could happen, what harm could befall them, while their eyes would be shut at night.
But the emperor wondered, not about his people, but rather how his army could grow and how much more dominating he could be. He could become one of the most powerful emperors of his time and be the baldest one of them all, a distinction that would set him apart. With great power, the sky was the limit for him, and with Radagast as his right-hand man, there wasn’t anything  or anyone that would deter him or tell him no. The rise and fall would be his own undoing, and that was something he couldn’t and wouldn’t control either. While most had searched for places to sleep, the emperor didn’t help any of them in their search, as he wanted the people to figure it out. That wasn’t his problem. He had to move away from Okla and that was his concern. Where could he go?
Emperor Tashbi had a few of his soldiers that remained, in the destroyed castle. He looked out into a mist of the land that was covered in a thick fog. He wasn’t sure what to do, and, as many people before him, he was following in the same footsteps. He wanted death and total destruction.
Radagast wasn’t too far away. He had traversed the wet, soiled land in order to try to help some of the scattered people find someplace dry and warm, which was extremely hard to do. There had been bales of hay that, just looking around, seemed like the warmest place for those people he had seen alive. They had lacked food, water, and supplies to live.
Radagast spent the next few hours toiling, trying to help the people survive another day. Finally, he stood up, after he had reunited some of the children with their mothers and fathers, if they had survived, which in some cases they hadn’t. He had to find others who would take them under their wing. It was heartbreaking, and whatever warmth he could provide for them, he took upon him as his duty, as he knew the emperor didn’t care one bit about anything like that at all. To him, it was all about power and control over the people and the land, and that was all that mattered, whether anyone liked it or not.
Radagast had walked for a bit with a walking stick that fit perfectly, even though he was the youngest to be appointed a wizard by the emperor. He glanced back over all of the destruction he had walked through, strewn about the whole area. He had walked for nearly an hour, and he had reached a point in Okla that intrigued him, as Rincewind had seen and told Radagast that his death would take him to Okla It was the town that he was currently in, and a destroyed town, too.
Slowly, he approached the area that Rincewind had revealed to him in his visions; it was somewhere he had to go. Radagast, against Rincewind’s wishes and warnings to the contrary, resolved to press onward. It was something that he had to do for his own piece of mind.
He emerged from the destroyed nature forest, or what was left of it. There were patches here and there, and practically no trees. It was mostly dirt and some grassy patches, and a lot of water buildups along the path he took had walked. But it was very dark and gloomy where he had walked to. It wasn’t the large town he was used to, and just looking around, he saw as much, if not more, damage as he had seen from the castle area. It was practically unimaginable. But he saw animals dead, people dead, hundreds of destroyed houses and farm lands—there was nothing there.
As he looked around, turning his head in all directions, the sights were equally dismal, no matter where he looked. Dark, as if Hell itself had taken over. The Okla mountains were a few miles south of where he had approached a hut. It had looked like the weakest thing that he had seen, standing. But how could it even stand when all the other surrounding homes and things were completely destroyed from the tsunami? He couldn’t understand it.
Radagast walked towards it, crossing into a territory that was well beyond where he should have been. It was something that Rincewind had strongly advised him not to ever do. Radagast, however, was headstrong and didn’t listen to his mentor.
As he advanced, he started to see flashes of images, things that Rincewind had seen. A war that would stir up years later, and from that, a great evil that would rise. He saw all the horrific images, of death and destruction, and along with them, one man and one person named “The Master.” Just as the images of destruction began, they were quickly cut off; he wasn’t meant to see so much.
Radagast fell to the muddy soil in front of the hut. He couldn’t fully comprehend the images he had seen. But the warrior in his vision looked fierce and mean. The Master. With a skull as a face, and red eyes, he was a warrior much more intact than anything he had seen before. It terrified him, and he quickly backed away from the hut. As he pushed his hands through the mud as fast as he could, there was something about the hut that he saw he could get into. But that was clearly not the case. It was like something was magical about the place or was something that Rincewind the magical wizard had done; or else, he knew that Radagast would go there after telling him, after seeing the images that Rincewind had shown the other six wizards from the Temple of Time.
As Radagast had his hands and feet caked in the mud, his heart raced extremely fast and scared the life out of him as he continued to back away. He attempted to slow his breaths, unable to shake the residual feelings from seeing things that he shouldn’t have. But, seeing the images that Rincewind had shown the other wizards from the Temple of Time, he found that it was much more powerful to feel the images, then see the images as well. It was something that was more difficult to feel. It was stressful and gave him anxiety to a point that made him confused about what he was feeling. But, for Radagast, it was a bit of many different things all at once. He couldn’t quite understand what those emotions were either. It overwhelmed him.
He had gradually gotten to his feet, and he thought about what he felt and saw. Now, he was worried. This was what Rincewind had been talking about, that his destiny had already been written for him, and the sacrifice that he was going to make later years in life was preordained.
The words echoed in his brain as he stood up with his walking stick. He was in his early 40’s at best. All the other previous wizards had lived for hundreds and hundreds of years through times of turmoil and changing events. It was what Rincewind knew would be his ultimate sacrifice, and, being the much more powerful red wizard of the rest of the seven previous wizards, he knew it was his duty to make things better, though time and events he could not change.
Radagast walked back toward the direction he came from, and as he did, he could have sworn he heard laughter—a very evil laugh. He wasn’t dreaming or imagining things. He knew he had heard something, but he didn’t know where it had come from. It was something evil, that he had sensed, and a much more evil presence than he had ever known about. It was something on top of what he began to know was something mysterious. A loud voice that covered the land and an echo that couldn’t be unknown to the land. This made him even more worried, as things of this nature terrified him to a level that he couldn’t understand at this point.
#
       By early morning, Radagast had finally gotten back to where the castle was. He looked at the sky and couldn’t understand how the sun had been replaced by clouds. It was Okla had been cursed, with no trace of sunlight or any light whatsoever. It had made Radagast wonder what and where he had just been. What was Okla? At least that part of it seemed completely separate from the early parts where the castle was? He couldn’t completely understand, and he wouldn’t until the time came to do so.
      As he returned to what was left of the castle, he searched for Emperor Tashbi. Radagast had walked up the broken castle stairways very carefully and watched the cracks in the stairs, as there were many that had been damaged from the tsumani.
He finally reached Emperor Tashbi, walking over and around the damage’s debris from the castle and broken fragments that had blocked some doors and rooms. Radagast was the youngest of all the wizards, which made him better equipped to jump and use his agility to his advantage. When he finally got to where Emperor Tashbi was, he looked at him and kneeled before him, then stood up again.
“It is time to move,” he said solemnly. “It is going to be safe for the people.”
For once, Tashbi had agreed. This was no place to build an army of any kind. While Tashbi saw something, Radagast saw something opposite. Their visions were aligned, but Radagast had seen something that was completely beyond what he had wanted to see. It was a sign of something or something quite out of the ordinary but served as a warning of things that would occur. From his short stature, Emperor Tashbi examined Radagast, covered in mud, his cloak that was usually red stained brown from the wet and soft soil that was in Okla.
“What happened?” Emperor Tashbi asked.
Radagast went on to tell him with a smile how he went exploring to see what he would find, and he had fallen into some soft spots with mud in them. The emperor had laughed seeing him, and he made fun of his story, and of all the dried mud all over his red cloak. Â
Radagast brushed off what remaining dirt he had on himself. He smiled and they both laughed. It was time, the emperor said. Time to move on, like he was told to by Radagast.
Tashbi had gathered his people where the top of the castle used to be. It had been destroyed from the tsunami, and most of the top part of the castle was missing. Tashbi had called, and they all asked what was left of the courtyard, where they all stood when he would call the people to listen to him speak.
They stood and looked up to him. He looked around and the few people that had remained looked at him with a glimmer of hope and survival instinct. As they listened, the emperor told them it was time to move on. It was what most of them wanted to hear. From what he had seen looking down at the people, the conditions of the way of life were worse than any conditions that peasants had to live in. There was some hope now, as Radagast had given Tashbi. At some point, he had to get the shoguns involved somehow, to show him what he needed to do. Sometimes it was the only way that he was able to see what he truly wanted to see. Tashbi had his own intentions that were far greater than anything he had thought about along the line. There was truly no comparison to anything else, either.
The people had cheered a bit at the emperor’s proclamation, and Radagast smiled as he stood next to the armored emperor. He said, “I think they are starting to like you a bit.”
Emperor Tashbi smiled and laughed. “I guess I can’t make a habit of that?” he said. It was something that they both laughed about a few times.
The people of Okla were given 24 hours to pack whatever things they had. It was the only way to give them enough time to find anything they had left. It was understandably the right thing to do. As Radagast had told him, it was the wise thing to do as well. Not that he was all about doing the right thing, as Tashbi was more about himself and building up the shogun army once they had found a safe place to rebuild. Those was his intentions, and they were very strong ones.
“Are you coming?” asked Tashbi as he walked away.
Radagast responded that he wasn’t. He needed some time to think about things. As he stood on one of the broken stones that had been split in the castle, one of many that existed throughout the castle, he looked up at the sky and pondered, as he so often did, what voice, and what future he signed up for. At the time, he wanted to be great, but he did not realize the sacrifices or the way his future would be written long before the years would approach.
#
The next morning, he had still been up on the same rock. He appeared to be a statue of some sort. Tashbi saw him in the same spot as he had left him. He almost looked like he was praying, but he wasn’t at all. It was his way of thinking. There were so many things that had to get done. The emperor had assembled most of the people, and now he had looked for Radagast, finding him in the same area where he had left him.
“Are you okay?” he smiled. Radagast knew that despite how ruthless as he was acting and his intentions being very evident, he seemed to care about Radagast. But this was merely a guess.
As it was time to head out, the emperor waved his hand to come down from where he stood on the remnants of the castle. It seemed as if there was really now more hope for them, and a better place awaited them, away from Okla and this decaying and destroyed castle. Radagast knew this and yet he felt fearful that the next time he would be there would possibly be his last. But he realized it was part of his destiny as well.
He looked back at Emperor Tashbi as he walked away from Radagast and headed towards where the people waited for their emperor. As he turned his head, the emperor yelled in his native Japanese language and waved his hands for him to come towards him.
He smiled, knowing it was going to be a place that he would not see for many years, and soon, Okla was going to be a far-off land. But that time would go by quickly, as he had given it one last look of fate that would be met. It was only 1605, and there were many more years to go.Â
As he answered his emperor and headed away, he bowed towards the town, knowing that his fate was written. Knowing all the things that the seventh wizard had showed him, he was more accepting of it at this point. He had realized that there was a higher plan of attack to some degree.
Radagast followed the emperor towards where the people had waited for him to be at his side. He cast one final look at everything and smiled. He then went with Emperor Tashbi.
He followed his careful footing over the cracks in the stone, and the pieces of pillars and stone that had begun to shake loose from the castle, making it seemingly unsteady. With the way the structure had fallen, and the precarious way the things leaned against each other, it was only a matter of time.
Emperor Tashbi had ordered his soldiers to search the broken castle for anyone who had possibly wandered off to places that they couldn’t escape from. It wasn’t like they had many people to leave the group. It was simply going to be the best way forward they could possibly have.
The emperor finally decided it was beyond the right thing to do. He had gathered and waited for all the guards to come back, as he had counted the number of soldiers that he had, along with all their weapons. He hadn’t really known what to expect from what was out there. Some of the people were afraid of what could be awaiting them. Others were afraid of what could have been if they had stayed at the castle as well. There wasn’t much that would happen that would be good. A battle of things that could possibly attack as far as wild animals were concerned. The survival rate for them was less and less with each passing day. That was the one thing that they all could agree on. They all needed to survive to each new day, as Radagast had to convince Emperor Tashbi as well. He knew that all the things Radagast had said had always made sense, and a 40-year-old wizard was by far one of the youngest wizards, and also one of the wisest with common sense as well.
As they headed out of that area for the last time, they had gotten the few remaining stragglers that had crept away for some reason or another. As the emperor had seen, they had taken a few of the lost treasures from the castle and wanted to use it for trade to get supplies that they needed as well.
Radagast looked on, as the emperor instructed the soldiers to hold them. The two guards of his fallen and destroyed kingdom walked along the broken debris, plants, and trees, and moved much farther away from everything. They had gone much more inland, far away from an area where this could ever happen again, they hoped. It had been about a half day’s trip, and they finally came to an area that had some life to it, and a castle that looked deserted, as if nothing had been there for about twenty years or so.
Radagast, searching alongside the emperor, saw a machine that was built to behead people. The two soldiers saw that there were numerous of these guillotines in front of the castle. When they saw them, the emperor told the soldiers to put the two thieves there, as the soldiers had sorted out the criminals.
He looked fiercely out at the people and said, “No one steals from me.”
The soldiers swiftly placed them in the machine. Their heads were locked away, along with their hands, through a piece of wood. It looked impossible to get out, and there were chains to lock them in. The wood was all covered in dried red blood.
As he spoke to his people, he took out his sword, as the emperor had done. He walked over towards each of them, and he cut off their heads one by one. Emperor Tashbi had no mercy and didn’t care about people who stole or did things against him. He stood before a castle, his people, and what was left from the tsunami that had destroyed the lives of so many. He stood in front of a castle and called it home. It appeared to have been deserted for what seemed like years now. It was now Castle Alanga in Shizuoka, Japan.
Chapter 2
There hadn’t been many people that were left from the tsunami. Emperor Tashbi stood there with Radagast, having found the castle, and he saw less than fifty people who had dragged their things. He knew that there were many things that he had wondered and thought about, as he had seen the great destruction over the years. The red cloaked wizard had much to learn. But he had also gained so much knowledge, as he was far more powerful than any others that had come before, given his power and seeing what he had seen. His power was far greater than any of the other wizards before him.
As he followed in the footsteps of the evil and twisted Emperor Tashbi, he had seen the destruction of many over the years and just complete chaos. His ideas of power and destruction were far greater than he had believed. The emperor was obsessed with destru
