Yuji The Wise

Diary

Yuji The Wise, self-appointed chronicler of his own decline, set up an ironing board among the koi ponds of the Dojo gardens one humid morning, determined to press his kimono into something resembling the discipline he used to embody before the wars ended and the vices aped in. He narrated the whole affair to no one in particular, as if the herons and bonsai trees were scribes recording his triumph, while the iron hissed and the fabric finally lay flat and dignified for the first time in months. He'd meant it as a single act of order, one small rug pulled back from chaos, but somewhere between the third crease and the second bowl of leftover sake he declared himself reformed and strutted off feeling like a man reborn, floor of his old samurai pride fully restored. It was, of course, a rugpull of his own making, since the kimono was crisp but the man beneath it was still three days behind on sleep and one bad bet from ruin. Still, he walks the Dojo grounds now with his chin up and his sleeves sharp, a proud man by appearance, a degenerate by every metric that matters, and utterly convinced the two are the same thing.