"Ok. You gotta tell me EVERYTHING you know, monk." I insisted. I was never this confident in my life. I'm finally catching some streaks of information of my own being.
"First of all," the monk put warm smile on his face. "I am like you. I am an asura, though not as young and strong as you are."
"And what the hell is Asura?"
"Asuras," the monk was choosing his words carefully. "Are demons, who have possibility to be enlightened, and become Buddhas. And yes, they are not from earth, from somewhere known as Hell."
"I knew it!" I exclaimed, regaining power that people took from me, with their doubts and their fear of the unknown.
"I THOUGHT you were like every others . So you are much older than you look that I couldn't notice? That is one great trick!"
"No." The monk sounded serious. "It's because I choose to stay here, not as a passerby, but as a buddhist. I lived here more than a century, to prepare for the Red Asura to come."
The monk sighed.
"I must tell you this. If an asura choose to stay here and walk the earth, they lose strength as time goes. And since I stayed much longer than humans-
I am pretty much same as other people. Now only power I have is just reading thoughts, and my kinds are easier to catch."
The monk rubbed his eyes. Not that he was sleepy.
He did not have eyes. What looked like human eyes, were just a disguise, some magical thing originally gifted to our kind, asura.
"I had to sacrifice my eyes to stay another 20 years. And this mountain, this temple is the place for asuras. Once I go down to the city, I would just loose everything and forever gone. "
"But don't you want to go BACK? like- I longed it so much to go back to Hell! This place is so dreadful to live for more than a hundred year."
"But you heard. I've been waiting for the Red Asura."
"What is the red asura? Why is it so important that you forced you to live?"
"Red Asura brings war. Normally, the Red Asura is born every 200 years, or more. The last master monk died from stopping the last Red Asura."
I couldn't make any sound. I might have put myself into trouble. This did not sound OK.
"And I have to choose, like every master monk did."
"I need to make a choice whether to kill you, or let you go live under civilization."
Shit!
"But, you said, that asuras can become Buddhas, right?" My voice was already in terror. I was not ready for this.
"Red Asura always, without exception, brings war."
'I just found my place'
'And now I need to die?'
The human bodily instinct did not want to die. I was just twenty three and a half year old in this body.
"And my choice," the monk looked never this determinded.
"Is to make you a hero in that war."
YOU ARE READING
The Art of Being a Creature
FantasyHwanhee Lee, is born in the wrong planet. Her human body, her flesh is just a cover. She knows her past lives in hell. She is the Red Asura, the demon who brings disputes and wars. She was told by her master monk Sung Cheol, that Red Asuras are born...
