Demon City Shinjuku: The Complete Edition Read Online Free PDF Page A

on as a pupil. Genichiro understood that as well, and so trained you from the time you were in diapers.”
    Kyoya grimaced. “You know what? Sometimes flattery won’t get you anywhere. I’ve got no opinion about how great and wonderful my dad supposedly was. Anyway, I really don’t think this is one of those like-father, like-son things.” He got up from the sofa and waved his hand. “I’m leaving, if you don’t mind. Thanks for the drinks.”
    â€œWait.”
    â€œFine.”
    With one word from the Master, Kyoya returned to the sofa. He didn’t feel compelled in the least. More like being gently turned at the shoulders.
    â€œGenichiro apparently didn’t explain his reasons for developing his nenpo techniques.”
    â€œNot in the slightest.” Kyoya shook his head.
    The memories of the harsh training on Mt. Daisetsu came alive in his thoughts. The purification rituals, concentrating the mind under a pounding waterfall; kneeling under a freezing night sky in Zen meditation in order to become one with the spiritual energy of the universe; training with his fists and the sword until his body throbbed and he coughed up blood.
    Why his father went to such lengths—why he drove him so hard—as far back as he could remember, his father refused to respond to any questions or doubts. One of the reasons Kyoya eventually rebelled.
    â€œYour father and the sorcerer Rebi Ra, the mastermind behind this latest incident, were both my disciples. They both trained under me.”
    The Master’s quiet voice yanked Kyoya back to reality, and back to the reality of what he’d just said. “What the hell!”
    â€œWhat did you just say?” This was obviously news to Section Chief Yamashina as well.
    â€œThirty-seven years ago, two young men came to Tibet, to my hermitage in the mountains, to pursue their studies of yoga’s mysterious powers. They were both twenty-five at the time. Despite their quite different nationalities—Japanese and Egyptian—they both possessed the burning desire and qualities necessary to conquer the heights of spiritual power. With this in mind, I took them on as disciples. As expected, they progressed at an amazing rate. What had taken me a decade in my younger years they mastered in three. At that pace, they would surely achieve that desired oneness with the cosmic mind, at the extreme boundaries of the yoga art. But two years after that, the two left the mountain.”
    A touch of bitterness colored the Master’s voice. Beneath the backdrop of this incident was a buried and dark history. Kyoya and Yamashina leaned forward and listened with rapt attention.
    â€œBecause Rebi Ra had tasted the raptures of the Demon Realm. An undiscovered country at the borders of this one, where the wicked lie in wait to corrupt the virtuous and add them to their growing number, promising to turn loathing and hatred to joy, and fashion reason out of fear and hopelessness. How many capable acolytes have I seen fall into their poisonous grasp? They should have shrugged them off and steeled their wills to reach higher states of self-enlightenment—treat these temptations as a phase of their training to be risen above, just as Buddha was tempted beneath the banyan tree and Christ was tested by the devil in the wilderness.”
    The Master sadly shook his head. “But Ra succumbed. While tempering his body, his spirit chose the pleasures of the Demon Realm over the joys of the spirit. One day he abruptly departed. As a disciple of the Demon Realm, he could not enjoy even a single day of peace or calm, and he left to make use of the skills he had acquired thus far. I should not have let him return to the ordinary world. At the time, I could not imagine he had fallen as far as it turns out he had. For a while, I heard rumors of a warlock who possessed powers unheard of in times past or present, and regretted my decision. And then