Ilysveil: Tigers Can Remember

Everything had changed. Yunha had just returned to her homeland from her long study abroad in Solradia. As soon as she left the port, she was entranced by a public signboard, the snow on top glistening from the glow of a magic crystal streetlight. The capital city Shinra now even had modern lights. At the center of the board was a large notice stamped with the red imperial seal.

“Imperial Edict of September 1, Civilization and Enlightenment Era Year 20 (Solar Year 1895). As of this date, slavery, the owning of persons, and involuntary servitude are hereby abolished.”

Finally. Slavery had long since been abolished in Solradia, but Radiaurora had endured unchangingly for hundreds of years. But not even this nation was immune to time.

Her big brother Jangmo had always been an earnest believer in changing with the times. Her last memory of him was him saying goodbye to her as he left the village to become an apprentice to a blacksmith in the capital. She was the only one seeing him off; their parents hadn’t shown up.

“Blacksmithing is beneath your station as a noble,” their father had said to Jangmo.

As Jangmo left, he had said to Yunha, “I’m going to learn new things and come back one day. There are all sorts of new technology from the West that can improve the lives of our servants. I’ll become a noble who can be relied on, not just someone who rides of the backs of the commoners.”

Had Jangmo made his dream come true? She hadn’t received any letters from him in years. It was worrying, but he must have had a reason. She couldn’t wait to see him after so many years.

A loud bell rang, and a trolley full of people passed by. The passengers were wearing Ilysveilan suits and dresses rather than traditional robes. Western technology and customs had even reached the remote Radiaurora. It felt strange to see her fellow tigerborns’ furry ears covered by brimmed hats meant for humans, though the men’s suits had been modified. Their orange-black striped tails still stuck out a hole in the back. With slender figure wrapped in a pink overcoat from Solradia, Yunha fit right in the new Radiaurora.

“Ma’am?” a young tigerborn in dark blue uniform said. Judging from his clothes, he was a police officer. He looked much different from the blue-robed law officials she had seen in her childhood.

“Yes? What is it?” Yunha asked.

The officer’s cat-like green eyes glowed against the backdrop of his black billed hat’s shadow. “You seem to be lost. Can I help you?”

“I haven’t been in Shinra in fifteen years. So much has changed. But aside from that, I’m looking for a man named Jangmo Bak.”

“What’s your relation to him? I can’t give out personal information without a reason.”

“I’m his sister.”

“Please come with me to the station, and I’ll look up his records for you,” the officer said.

She followed him to the police station, passing by new sights and people. Other than tigerborns, many foxborns walked the streets, their fluffy red tails unmistakable from behind. Elves, dwarves, dragonborns, and humans were all here too. Had Radiaurora been conquered without her knowing it?

At the station, the officer went into a back room and came back out a little later.

He looked down. “I regret to inform you I found a Jangmo Bak, but he passed away ten years ago.”

Yunha gasped. “No… Big brother…” Her elation after having arrived in Radiaurora evaporated. The one person she had looked forward to reuniting with the most was no more. All the new technology in the world couldn’t replace that. But something didn’t add up. “But why? He would’ve only been twenty at the time.”

“It’s unknown. He disappeared, and the investigation was closed with no leads. As per protocols, he was declared deceased three months later.”

“Why wasn’t our family informed of this?”

“As far as we knew then, he didn’t have any family. We couldn’t find his name on any family register,” the officer said.

That was impossible. Jangmo would’ve been in her family’s register. He disappeared from the records too? She couldn’t leave this be. “Where did he live?”

The officer scribbled down an address and handed it to her. “I doubt you’ll find anything. But if it’ll satisfy you, go here.”

“Thank you.” Yunha took the note, bowed, and promptly left the station. The police wouldn’t reinvestigate the death of a nobody from ten years ago. Jangmo wasn’t a nobody to her though.

She took the trolley to the neighborhood where Jangmo had lived. It passed bustling streets with all manner of new shops. An Ilysveilan-style bakery advertising strawberry shortcake. A Solradian clothing store selling both suits and colorful kimonos patterned with flowers. A dwarvish blacksmithing workshop. All lit by streetlights so people could tour the shops even at night.

Shinra was nothing like the capital city of Radiaurora she remembered, an ancient oasis of tradition where merchants and craftsmen were seen as lowly. Ordinarily, she would take her time wandering the shopping district like she had in Solradia, but she wasn’t in the mood for that now.

Yunha hopped off at her stop, a slum at the outskirts of the city. From the pungent smell, she surmised that modern plumbing hadn’t reached all the way here yet. After navigating the labyrinth of narrow streets while avoiding suspicious puddles, she arrived at a traditional house.

Black half-cylindrical shingles formed a trapezoidal roof over a one-story wooden structure with papered-over sliding doors. It was a fairly large house.

A human in a black cape and top hat stood knocking at the front door. “Excuse me!” he said in Ilysveilan. What was a foreigner doing all the way out here?

A round-faced, middle-aged tigerborn in a garish scarlet dress slid open the door. “Who are you?” she asked in Radiauroran.

The man switched to Radiauroran and said, “I’m Edmond La-Pierre, a missionary. One of the members of our church is ill, and I was told he lives here. I wish to offer him some prayers.”

The lady scoffed, her whiskers twitching. “If you want to offer him something, offer him medicine. Jain’s been praying every day, and your gods haven’t lifted a finger to help him.”

“Are you going to let me in or not?” Edmond asked.

“Fine. But don’t go evangelizing to the other tenants.”

Edmond stepped into the house and slipped behind the landlady.

“And what do you want?” she asked, looking at Yunha.

“I’ve come looking for Jangmo Bak.”

For an instant, the landlady’s face darkened, but she caught herself and smiled. “Jangmo Bak? Do I have a tenant with that name? I’m sorry. You must have the wrong address.”

What was the landlady afraid of? Jangmo was only a minor noble, and he came to Shinra nearly penniless. Yunha shook her head. “He doesn’t currently live here, but I’m told he lived here and passed away ten years ago.”

“I’m afraid I don’t remember all my tenants from that far back.”

The landlady had reacted to Jangmo’s name. She clearly remembered something about him. “You must have records though. Please, he’s my brother. May I have a look?” Yunha tried her best puppy-eyes impression.

“Fine. Come in. I’ll look through my archives. It won’t have much more information than his room number and rent payments though.”

“That’ll be enough. Thank you. I’m Yunha Bak, by the way.”

“You can call me Madam Wu,” the landlady said without looking back.

She followed the landlady into the house, past a narrow hall of wooden floors and sliding doors, Madam Wu went into a study and pulled a bound book from the shelf. She flipped through the pages, then motioned Yunha in.

“Here, this is all I have on this man.” She pointed to an entry on the rental record and set a candle beside the book.

Jangmo Bak. Room four. Security deposit on May 1, 1884. Yunha looked through all the mentions of his name. He didn’t miss a single rent payment for over a year, and then was never in the record again after the September 1, 1885 payment. “Do you know what happened to him after this date?”

“No. Maybe he moved. I don’t remember. Like I said, that’s all I have.”

There was no entry showing that his security deposit was returned, however. Had he really just moved? But according to that police officer, Jangmo had disappeared in 1885. That lined up with the date in the rental records.

“What happened to his belongings?” Yunha asked.

“I probably threw out whatever he didn’t take with him.”

“I see…” Yunha searched for current tenants that had been here since before September 1885 but turned up empty. “May I go see the room where he lived?”

“Sure, if the tenant himself lets you in.”

Yunha made her way to room four and knocked.

“Who is it?” a weak voice said.

“My name is Yunha Bak. I wish to speak with you about an important matter.”

“Can you let her in?” the weak voice said to someone else in the room.

It was the human, Edmond, who slid open the door with an annoyed expression. Or maybe his thick black eyebrows and slight wrinkles on his forehead just made him look like that naturally. “Jain is sick right now. I advise you not bother him.”

“This is very important to me. I won’t be long,” Yunha said as she moved past him.

It was a simple room with only a dresser and a small table. Jain was a middle-aged tigerborn lying on the floor in a futon. Streaks of his black hair and fur had greyed, so, combined with his orange patches, it appeared he had three colors of stripes. He glanced over as she sat down beside him. “So, what did you want to discuss with me?”

“I learned from Madam Wu you’ve been here for almost ten years. The previous tenant was my brother. Have you ever met him?”

Jain coughed. “This room was vacant when I arrived. Some of the other residents in the house said this room brought bad luck, but they didn’t go into details. Nothing’s happened to me until now, and I doubt the flu is the work of any curse.”

“Do Radiaurorans even practice curse magic?” Edmond asked.

“Not in the last few hundred years,” said Yunha. “This dynasty’s founder made it taboo. Though maybe things have changed recently.” She looked at Edmond.

“Why are you looking at me? Yes, Ilysveilans use curse magic, but I personally can’t use any magic. And regarding Radiaurorans’ practices, you should know more about it than me. You’re a tigerborn.”

“I’ve been studying abroad in Solradia for quite some time. As strange as it sounds, you probably know more about the last ten years in Radiaurora than I do. Do you know what happened here in 1885?”

“Maybe. There was a big commotion around this neighborhood when I first arrived.”

“What do you know about it?”

Stroking his smooth grey beard, Edmond recounted, “I didn’t exactly live in this neighborhood, but I passed by it often. Soldiers were patrolling this area for some reason. I could have sworn I heard gunshots one time. The soldiers blocked off a section of the neighborhood, and I wasn’t too keen on getting involved in a magitech rifle shootout, so I stayed away.”

“What was that all about?” Yunha asked.

“I’m not sure. The soldiers had their lips sealed, and I didn’t have any reason to press further. Can’t do the gods’ work if I’m dead.”

“Oh that,” Jain said.

They both turned to him.

“You know what happened?” Yunha said.

“Most people around here know about it, though they won’t talk about it in public. It’s taboo.”

“Still, I must know. Please, tell me.”

“It was a riot, an uprising, or a full-scale revolution depending on who you ask. My knowledge is second hand too. But the gist of it is that the slaves and butchers were unhappy and rose up against the Imperial regime. I don’t know any details about how it ended, but since Emperor Kojo is still on the throne, I assume they failed.” Jain pointed to a scroll pinned to the wall next to him. “Take off that scroll.”

Yunha did so. Underneath it was a small paragraph carved into the wall. “This is…”

“It’s probably the reason people say this room is bad luck. I put up the scroll to hide it since it creeps me out. No one knows who wrote it. Judging from the contents, it has something to do with the taboo slave rebellion.”

The characters on the wall read, I leave these words as both encouragement and a warning to my comrades and posterity. The world is far from fair. The downtrodden must stand up again and again. But our enemies are many. Do not lose sight of the enemies of afar for fear of the enemies close. There will be countless sacrifices. Today, that is me. Tomorrow it may be you. But never forget: this must never become the tale of a hero, and we will fade into forgotten legends like the truths of dynasties past.

A tear rolled down Yunha’s cheek. “This is my brother’s handwriting. Big brother, I’ve found you.” But this only raised more questions. A sacrifice? She couldn’t rest until she knew what her brother had truly felt about his last moments.

“So that’s your older brother?” Jain asked. “He must’ve been involved in the rebellion and died in a battle. I’m sorry for your loss.”

“May his soul rest in peace,” Edmond said.

Yunha shook her head. “No, I don’t think that’s quite right.”

“Pardon?” Edmond asked. “It seems very clear.”

“If he died during a battle, how would he have had the time to write this in his room? This could have only been done if he knew he was going to die.”

“That’s true. What if he wrote it before he went to a battle though? Knowing he was likely to die, he left a message,” Jain suggested.

“The phrasing is off. It says there will be countless sacrifices, but today it is him. Why specifically sacrifices? And he said the sacrifice is him. He wouldn’t go into a battle alone. So why is the sacrifice him and not ‘us’ or his comrades too?”

Edmond said, “You have a point, young Ms. Bak, but there’s not enough information to say. In fact, there are several parts of this with ambiguous meaning. This isn’t the tale of a hero. Why not? There are enemies close and far. Assuming the government was one of his enemies, who are the others? I can’t say.”

Yunha wrote down the passage in her notepad and slipped it in her overcoat’s pocket. “Thank you both for helping me. I’ll be on my way now.” She got up and bowed.

Jain coughed and nodded in her direction. “I wish you luck. If you can clear up the truth about this, I’d feel better too. Beats hearing rumors about curses and bad luck.”

“I should get going too.” Edmond rose.

Yunha and Edmond left the boarding house together and headed out onto the dirt road.

“What are you going to do now?” Edmond asked.

What was his interest in this matter? “I need to gather some more testimonies about what exactly happened in the slave rebellion ten years ago.”

“In that case, why don’t you come to the church? A lot of the members have lived around here for many years. They might know something.”

Of course. He did say he was a missionary. Religion was of little interest to Yunha, but she had no reason to refuse. “That would be helpful. Thank you.”

“Come along, then.” Edmond strutted toward the center of town, and Yunha followed.

As she walked along the street, a foxborn man in dark blue uniform appeared from around the corner, and they bumped into each other. Yunha stumbled back a step.

The fur on the foxborn man’s pointed ears stood on edge, and he pointed a magitech rifle at Yunha, the magic gem on top of the stock glowing blue as it activated. “What’s the meaning of this, tigerborn?”

For a moment, Yunha was at a loss for words. Was this man out of his mind? Not to mention, he had a rifle. Not just anyone could have one. Judging from his uniform with its golden lines and black-billed cap, and the fact that he was a foxborn, he was likely a Solradian soldier. “I’m sorry for bumping into you. I’ll be on my way now.” She took a step forward, but the man grabbed her by the wrist.

“What are you going to do about this?” He pointed to a smudge of dirt at the cuff of his pants.

“It’s only dirt. It’ll wash off.”

“You’re just a lowly tigerborn. How dare you talk back to me!” He pointed the rifle squarely at her head.

Edmond stepped in between them. “Now, now. There’s no need for violence. I’ll have it cleaned for you if you’re that concerned.”

The Solradian foxborn soldier clicked his tongue. “An Ilysveilan. Tell the woman to watch where she’s going.” He stormed off.

“Belligerent toward someone from a weak nation and bowing to someone from a strong nation. The world is as twisted as ever,” Edmond said.

“Thank you, Mr. La-Pierre. What was that all about though?” Yunha asked.

Edmond sighed. “The Solradians have already modernized. They want to exert influence over the still-modernizing Radiaurora, so they’ve sent over some soldiers for ‘peacekeeping’ as they call it. They’ve already been here for ten years.”

“I see…” Things had certainly gone a troublesome direction in Radiaurora while she had been away. Yunha remembered her roommate, her teachers, and the lady of the boarding house she lived in while in Solradia. Until now, she had nothing but fond daily memories of Solradia. Seeing the other side of its modernization inspired mixed feelings within her.

At a cleaner part of Shinra, still considered the outskirts but closer to the center than the slum, they arrived at the church. It was a magnificent large building in the Western style of bricks and stained glass windows. The building must have cost a small fortune, likely more expensive than some of the nobles’ houses. Whether intentional or not, the church itself served as a symbol of Ilysveil’s financial might.

A bell tolled at the top of the church, under an arch with metal shaped in the wing of a bat on one side, and the wing of a crane on the other. She could see why the Ilysveilans called their religion Dualism.

“Ah, the night classes must have just ended,” Edmond said.

“What are these night classes for?”

“We teach Radiaurorans how to speak Ilysveilan. It’s an important skill in these times. People are just getting ready to leave. Now’s your chance to talk to them.”

Yunha nodded and walked in the church with Edmond. A group of tigerborns in white robes were packing up. They were all commoner women. She had received education as a daughter of a noble, but for commoners to have access to any education, even if it was at a church, it felt as though Radiaurora was progressing little by little.

Edmond introduced Yunha to the women at the church and gave a vague explanation that she was looking for someone from the slums from ten years ago.

The women had a mix of bored and irritated looks on their faces. They hadn’t come here to be questioned by a noble after all. Yunha didn’t let that faze her. “What do you all know about what happened in the slums ten years ago?”

Whispers swept through the small crowd. Many knew something. Whether that information was reliable was another matter.

One short woman raised her hand. “There was a slave revolt.”

“What was the cause?” Yunha asked.

“Lady, have you seen how slaves were treated until now? Why wouldn’t they revolt?” a sharp-eyed woman in the front said, her arms crossed.

A fair point. “I’ll ask something related then. Why did the revolt start in the slums? The slaves would have been living on the nobles’ property.”

“The person who organized it was from there, or so I’ve heard,” a woman with round cheeks said.

Was that person possibly her brother? They wouldn’t know that much though. “How did the revolt end?”

“The slaves lost, and the incident was swept under the rug,” the sharp-eyed woman said.

“Why was that?” Yunha asked. “In the slums, that incident was a taboo to talk about.”

The woman with round cheeks shrugged. “Even though it seemed like a big deal, the police and the military denied anything happened. There were rumors going around about a creepy message cursing the world from one of the rebels. It just feels like bad luck.”

An incident everyone wanted to forget. “Why did Emperor Kojo end slavery if the rebels lost?”

“Because it’s the right thing to do!” the short woman said emphatically.

If only the right thing to do was what drove politics. “If that was the case, he would’ve ended slavery twenty years ago when he took power.”

Edmond interrupted, “I will point out that slavery ending this year was not a total surprise. Ever since I got here, the laws have been tending in that direction. They gave slaves some basic rights like protection from physical abuse in 1885. That was after the incident though, so maybe it was related.”

So, the government defeated the slaves but made concessions to them anyway until eventually ending slavery altogether. But why? The military was able to put down the rebellion well enough to cover it up, and even if it had gotten out of hand, Radiaurora could always call in assistance from the dragonborn Centrosian Empire as it had historically done.

She had gotten all she could from them. Yunha thanked them and left the church with Edmond. Outside, she took a coin out of her purse and handed it to Edmond.

“I can’t accept payment for this,” Edmond said.

“Please, think of it as a donation to aid their education. As a noble who hasn’t lived here for fifteen years, money is all I have for them.” Yunha pressed the coin into his hand. “Would you like anything personally other than money? Do you want me to join the church?”

“No. If you personally wish to, I would of course welcome you with open arms, but not as a returned favor. My job as a missionary is to do good and let people know of the gods. Whether someone accepts must be their own decision.”

“I have been wondering why you helped me.”

Edmond looked back at the church with the colorful warm glow from its windows juxtaposed against the black night canvas. Perhaps to the commoners here, its light was more a paradise than any afterlife that could be promised, a respite from the bleak oppression of the nobility. “A lot of members are former slaves. The girl who talked back to you was one of them, though she tries not to bring it up. When I realized your brother was connected to the slave rebellion, I wanted to know the truth too. No matter what anyone says, this is undoubtedly the tale of a hero.”

The tale of a hero. The part that had been bugging Yunha the most. Did Jangmo really feel that his actions weren’t heroic? Why, when the essay called others to action, did he say that it wasn’t the tale of a hero? No, wait, that was how Edmond had paraphrased it. She pulled out her notepad. The exact words were, Yunha said out loud, “This must never become the tale of a hero.”

“Pardon?” Edmond asked.

“I misremembered,” Yunha said. “The text on the wall said that this must never become the tale of a hero, not that it wasn’t the tale of a hero.”

“What’s the difference?”

“The meaning of this changes completely. Whether or not he considers the actions heroic is irrelevant in the actual text. If it must never become the tale of a hero, that raises the question why? What happens if it does become the tale of a hero?” Yunha ran off. “Follow me.”

“Where are we going?” Edmond jogged after her.

“I’m positive Madam Wu knows everything. I now have enough pieces to force her to talk.”

Yunha knocked on the door of the boarding house, and soon Madam Wu peeked her head out.

“You again? What do you want?” Madam Wu glanced at Edmond who was standing behind Yunha. “The missionary too?”

“I know what happened to my brother. I want you to tell me the whole truth.”

Madam Wu glanced around skittishly. “Let’s talk inside.”

She led them into her personal room and slid the door shut. They sat down cross-legged at a low table with a candle on it.

“What are you saying you know? For the record, I don’t know anything.”

Yunha said, “Based on testimonies, the gist of the story is that a slave rebellion occurred here. Slaves wouldn’t be living here though, but the leader of the rebellion was, and he wrote a message in one of the rooms here.”

“Hmph. I’ve heard that much from the rumors,” Madam Wu said.

“And do you know what happened to the leader of the rebellion?”

“No. But if I had to guess, he was caught and executed, just like every other rebel leader that shows up.”

“That’s what I initially thought. My brother was the leader of the slaves. He led them to rebellion, and they lost. He wrote the message in your boarding house room, then was captured and died. But that’s not the whole story.”

“There were several gaps in the story,” Edmond said. “I didn’t know what they meant, but I could tell something rotten was afoot.”

“Exactly. I have three questions,” Yunha said. “Why was it necessary to cover up this slave rebellion and erase Jangmo from the records? Who are the enemies near and the enemies afar? And why did he say it must never become the tale of a hero?”

Madam Wu didn’t say anything. The candle’s flame flickered, and the shadows of the past stirred.

“The answer to my first question comes from the result of the rebellion. Jangmo mentions that he was the sacrifice, and over the next ten years, slaves gradually gained more rights until they were freed this year. My brother didn’t simply die in battle. He was a sacrifice in exchange for the eventual freedom of slaves.”

“But what was it that motivated the government to accede to his demands?” Edmond asked. “Even if your brother agreed to give up his life, the government could crush the rebellion anyway.”

“Ordinarily, the government would never give in. Even in the worst case scenario, they could always call in help from their ally Centrosis. But by 1885, the situation was no longer ordinary. Remember what you told me when we ran into the Solradian soldier?”

Edmond nodded. “They’ve been here for around ten years.”

Yunha continued, “With the objective of ‘peacekeeping.’ That helps answer the next question.

The message specifically said not to lose sight of the enemies afar. That means the enemies who are close were obvious. The government. Then who are the enemies afar? Who is further than the government? Who wants to take away their freedoms? The Solradian Empire. If a rebellion got out of hand, then Solradia would have justification to send in more troops to quell it.”

“I see. So, the rebels had to think not only about the Radiauroran government but the possibility of Solradia seizing control of Radiaurora,” Edmond said.

“That leads into the last question. Why must this incident never become the tale of a hero? What would happen if it did become the tale of a hero? Let’s say my brother died as a martyr and it was widely known.”

“Others would presumably rise up,” Edmond answered.

“Right. First, Solradia would know of the incident, then following rebellions would create an easy justification for Solradia to send troops, and Radiaurora wouldn’t have the power to stop them. The Emperor knew this, and that’s why he freed the slaves in exchange for keeping everything secret. That’s why my brother warned others to not let their resistance against the government become a hero’s tale, to keep their activities as hidden as possible. Because if it did become a hero’s tale, the downtrodden would lose to the enemies afar.”

Madam Wu sighed. “If you knew all that, why did you come here?”

“There’s just one thing I want to know. Who came up with the idea? Did the Imperial government, seeking to maintain its power over Radiaurora, propose to free the slaves in exchange for my brother’s life and secrecy? Or did my brother voluntarily propose to sacrifice himself to end slavery while preserving Radiaurora’s sovereignty?”

“Why do you think I know the answer to that?”

“You reacted to Jangmo’s name when I first mentioned him. You at least knew of him, enough to be shaken up. When we came back, you agreed to talk to us. If you truly didn’t know anything, you would have turned us away. Lastly, the message on the wall of his room. You’ve had years to replace that part of the wall or cover it up, but you didn’t.”

Yunha stared down Madam Wu. “No matter how much trouble it brought, you couldn’t bring yourself to do it. That’s the behavior of someone who cares. Someone who didn’t want the last trace of his existence to be erased.”

Madam Wu smiled faintly and threw her hands up. “You’ve truly seen right through me. Yes, I knew Jangmo well while he was a tenant. I knew about his activities. And when I heard you were his sister, I didn’t know what to do. To keep everything a secret for the sake of his sacrifice, or to tell you what you undoubtedly had the right to know. In the end, I was half baked as usual and let you look at his room and nothing more.”

“As usual? What do you mean?” Yunha asked.

“I wanted to support him, so I let him use his room to hold meetings and harbor fugitives. But I didn’t want to go to prison, so when the day of his arrest came, I pretended not to know anything and didn’t protect him.”

“You don’t need to feel guilty. My brother was someone who wouldn’t have wanted to drag down others with him. So, please, answer my question.”

“Yes. He did it.” Madam Wu clasped Yunha’s hand. “Your brother made the proposal and voluntarily sacrificed himself. He was arrested unofficially, taken somewhere, and executed. In exchange, the lives of his fellow rebels were spared, and slavery finally ended this year. He wanted to be forgotten, but I couldn’t forget.”

Edmond held his hat in his hand and looked down. “He was a hero.”

How had Jangmo felt at his last moments? She hadn’t been able to close the book on this case until she knew that. Smiling, Yunha said, “Yes. Even if no one else does, I shall remember him as a hero.”

J. H. Zech