The Rock Samurai and the Wind Maiden
Even an immovable rock will be shifted by the caress of a gentle wind" --Metha Metharom
This is the story of love, a love which cannot be broken by any sort of intervention.
On a lonely beach sits a huge boulder, surrounded by rocks, and sand, it faces the sea, with a huge cliff standing behind it. For a human it would have been a lonely life but for a rock it was the life.
Unlike any other boulder it could think, it was sentient, it had become so like anything that has survived the test of time. In its mind it wishes for nothing else, nothing but the caress of the wind, which soothes its cracks and wounds, cooling its surfaces from the ever hot sun. Its enjoyment from the wind also too was that the wind would tell it stories of far lands and places.
The wind too, its only companion, who too has been around for a long time has become sentient. It likes to travel, without any place to go but for some reason it always feel the need to come back to the lonely boulder that sits in front of a cliff face. It loves the smoothness and calmness that the boulder offers, but what it would really like to do was to become a human, for it has seen these people smiling and laughing in their delight as they meet new things. Though limited by their bodies, it only seems to make them happier, so it wishes to become human.
As time passes by the heaven becomes sympathetic to the wind, and granted its wishes but that leaves the boulder to itself alone facing away from the cliff face, saddened by the loss but happy for the wind.
The Wind Maiden who now was reborn as a human became a maiden of beauty. Her personality and delightfulness attracted many a suitor. As a human she is a daughter of a silk merchant who travels far and wide. Her pursuit of happiness was in the arts, her main interest was sculpting, for some reason this is so because she enjoys touching the surface of the rock and to chisel slowly away its roughness to reveal its true form. It was a strange thing because she was never once taught in this art.
One day while travelling the high seas with her father and one of her many suitors, her boat suddenly hit an outcrop which brought the ship to a stop. As the crewmen scurry about trying to fix the boat, she and her father go on a row boat to look for food and water. As they row the boat, they came on a deserted beach. On it was a huge boulder, with many cracks, and wounds, burnt down by the sun, but aside from that it stood stronger than any man she has known. It was love at first sight.
On her insistence, she persuaded her father to get the crew to help get it back on the ship so she could bring out its true form. As their ship was repaired they continued on their way home.
Once she got back her only thought was to carve her new boulder into a form worth admiring straight away. In her travels she had found a culture that deeply attracted her, the culture that has many honours and bravery attached to it. Within that culture were warriors known as Samurais, and within this huge rock she saw a brave, and handsome Samurai who could face all kinds of hardship without being broken.
Into him she carved, all day all night, for many weeks on end ignorant of all things surrounding her, until the perfect Samurai was formed.
Like all her carvings she would set it in the studio coming back to and fro to check on it, but for some reason she felt that this Samurai was not happy where it was, so she set it in the garden.
One of her suitors, a man of great standing, one she too found strong and powerful had noticed that she longer paid him any mind but only has eyes for the rock Samurai.
From day and night she would go into the garden and admire her Samurai, no longer feeling the need to travel far from her no longer lonely stone Samurai.
It was a strange thing because ever since the Samurai had come into her life, the amount of burglary attempts has lessened as if someone or something was watching over her. In fact every night it always seems as if an ever watchful but ever warm and protective set of eyes was on her.
One night as she was walking the garden she found that the Samurai was nowhere to be found in the centre of the garden where he usually was. The Samurai too was surprised for he was content in watching over her from afar and not really having to be with her. Instead of fear and surprise she realizes at long last she was in love with him, he too was overjoyed and they talked from dusk till dawn. It was a happy occasion, but eyes watched from a corner of darkness with envy and hatred, which belonged to one of her suitors. Thinking that this new appearance was a new human suitor he plotted.
One night under the cover of darkness the suitor walks to find the Samurai. With knife in hand he plunges it as hard as he could into the surprised stone warrior. The knife broke but did not shatter on impact leaving the suitor stunned and in fear for his life. Unluckily for the maiden, she saw the whole thing and rushed to her Samurai’s aid, still acting in fear and not thinking straight, the suitor plunged the broken knife into the maiden's heart.
The blow was fatal and could not be taken back. In rage the Samurai struck with all the force in his body, killing the envious suitor instantaneously.
In his sorrow the Samurai held the beautiful girl in his arms weeping openly. For he had always known that the maiden had always been the Wind Maiden that had left him behind but now was human who is now leaving him again.
As he held onto her the heavens open up, feeling sympathy to their plight, and granted their wishes to be together.
In the morning all they found was the dead body of the suitor, death from unknown circumstance, a bloodied knife in his hand but the maiden and the stone Samurai were nowhere to be found.
Together at last the heavens had granted their wishes as two gulls flying and travelling so far in the sky, until the day they will die.