SECTION 3: [A RAPID CURRENT]
[Chapter 1] The Truth About My Departure From Malice Mizer
[Chapter 2] Losing Kami
[Chapter 3] Pledging a New Beginning at the Okinawa Training Camp
[Chapter 4] The Last Revolving Lantern
[Chapter 5] Duel in Madagascar
[Chapter 6] The Birth of My Family

Section 3, Chapter 1
Malice Mizer Dattai no Shinsou
[The Truth About My Departure From Malice Mizer]

When I talk about Malice Mizer, even now in my heart there are complicated feelings. Since I went solo, a part of me has hoped that one day I would be able to talk with you about Malice Mizer again.

I wanted to become a better person [lit: achieve a higher level] than who I used to be before telling the story of Malice Mizer, so while going solo, I was desperately working to get up to that level.

Malice Mizer is still something that I take pride in, and I wouldn't change a thing. As a band, I was proud of the many and varied things we came to represent, and the members were each extraordinary individuals.

Each of the members was not just one in five of a five part group called Malice Mizer. The strength of the power that was gathered there in five people by one driven individual brought forth the power known as Malice Mizer. Because of that, we each acquired the ability to go solo. From the time I joined back then, I continued to tell the members that. If we could do that, Malice Mizer could conquer Asia! That was that image I had for the band.

I joined in the fall of '95, and Malice Mizer, which was experiencing conditions that had it on the brink of breaking up, began their revival tour. It was almost two years till our major debut. We even realized our dream of playing at the Budoukan.

Malice Mizer was able to do it. We were able to conquer Asia. I thought that there was nothing that could go wrong with my dream. Howevercthere was obviously a point from where our gears started going out of order.

At that time, it was around the end of the "visual kei" boom period. Though there were many bands who did not want to say that they were visual, I said clearly, "We are visual kei." There was no resistance at all to me saying that.

In all honesty, I really didn't care what people said. If I have my own beliefs about things, then if other people want to criticize me, whatever they do is fine with me.

If I think about it now, the cause of Malice Mizer's breakup was my own individualism and self-confidence, and the widening difference between things that the other members were concerned about .

The first time our relations became strange was when the performance at the Yokohama Arena was drawing near (July '98). The final straw was when I wrote the music to "Le Ciel." Until then, I was going to be the lyrics writer and either Mana or Kozi was going to write the music. "Le Ciel" was the first time I became a member that handled both the music and the lyrics. Among the members, I was the only one who kept doing more of these kinds of tasks, and I completely isolated myself.

When I was honest with myself, I was shocked. Within the members of the band, with it being me versus the other four members, we parted ways cordially. There was no mediator, and no one followed up on me.

Though I said, "shouldn't I have done what I did with 'Le Ciel?'" a short time later, I really wanted to go back to the band. But in the end, that didn't happen.

But above everything was the problem of money. Money is a dreadful thing. I learned all about this when I was working as a host [note: from earlier chapters; Gackt worked as a host and dealer in a casino]. Suddenly, if you gain a whole lot of it, you'll pass into the phase of not caring about the value of anything.

For example, there are people who have a lifestyle of 150,000 yen a month. Lunch is 500 yen, dinner is 1000 yen, and occasionally they'll spend 3,000 on some splurge. But then, one night when they wake up, it suddenly doubles by a hundred and they end up making an income of 15,000,000 yen a monthcwhat happens then?

The value of everything is about 1/100th now. The 500 yen daily meal special feels like 5 yen. If that's the case, then spending 3000 yen every day on dinner is all right, isn't it? That's how people think. However, the 3000 yen that you feel like you're spending at that time is really 300,000 yen.

Whenever you suddenly acquire lots of money, that feeling is always near. From the price on the price tag, you feel like just removing two zeros from it. If a 28,000 yen shirt seems like it's 280 yen, then spending money is normal.

When I was in Kyoto, my sense of finance went a little crazy, and I developed a habit of buying everything. I was in the mindset of "it's ok, it's ok, I've got money." However, as this happens, your circle of friends changes. Your friends up till now pull away completely, and the people left behind are those whose only purpose in life is money.

If you earn money, a feeling of "won't some misfortune happen to me?" will spring up. However, that's not the case. Not being able to let go of the mindset of earning money is what makes you an unhappy person. Money wakes a strange sense, like a gush of hot water, and those who don't have it don't think about it at all.

After I went to Tokyo, I quit being a host and a dealer. Naturally, I quickly ran out of money. "Are?" I said. I was completely broke. At that time, I couldn't believe it. When I saw what was left of my bank deposit, it was such a strange feeling that I thought, "I've got to have been robbed by someone!" I didn't stop thinking about 30,000 yen shirts as 300 yen, but those 300 yen I wasn't even earningc

As a little time goes by, you return with bitterness and regret to the source of that feeling. And then, you begin to reflect and say "what a stupid idiot I was!"

Money makes people crazy. In truth, I was just driven crazy by my own selfishness.

From everything in this lesson, when Malice Mizer went major, even though we were making lots of money, my heart wasn't shaken. But that wasn't true for everyone.

When you make a lot of money, some people drift away, some people grow closer. When that happens, rumors get whispered around and people change. In the band, when we started making more money, I told the other members about the mistakes I had made in the past. I said, "Money will definitely make you do strange things. So please, wake up!"

But it seemed like they didn't understand my true intentions. If they didn't experience it once personally, then they probably wouldn't know what I am talking about. I believed that one day they'd realize this.

Then one day in 1998, around when the summer heat was beginning to cool [lit: when we were beginning to leave behind the summer heat], they called a members' meeting. Though usually at the meetings, only members attended, that day, when the appointed time came, all of the other members and the president of the office were all there and waiting for me.

"Why is the president at a members' meeting?" I asked. And someone answered, "because Malice Mizer is over."

Huh?

And right after I thought that, they said it.

"We can't work anymore with you."

In that instant, I didn't really feel anything much. So, I said that I would like Malice Mizer to continue even if I did quit. But the band's answer was, at any rate, just that they were unable to do that.

All right, everyone, I will say no more. I won't be obnoxious.

In this case, I couldn't say that. If this was the end, there was also a way to erase that. No matter what would happen at the end, could I shut the curtain in the face of the fans that have helped me along until now? That was the most important thing.

As I was saying these things, someone else started saying nasty things.

"Isn't it good enough that we put out a CD? We're selling copies, at least..."

At those words, I got angry.

"Don't joke around! Don't make fun of the fans!"

In my anger, I got up from my seat and left. The sadness that I felt even more than the anger was accounting for most of what I did. I was miserable.

That is the truth about my departure from Malice Mizer.

This is not a story for me to cast blame. It was a problem of suddenly having too much money. Of the band members' differences of conciousness. Of a driving obsession. Malice Mizer = what I once was = an anxiety that made me what I wasn't. There were things that weighed heavily on us, and they became a vicious circle and ended up hurting everyone.

There was no other way, back thencthat is the only thing I can believe.

Section 3, Chapter 2
Kami o Ushinatte
[Losing Kami]

was right before the beginning of summer. In the middle of a photoshoot, I suddenly felt something terrible. I was dizzy and I couldn't stand up. I thought it was something to do with my intuition. If something had happened to a loved one...

I called all of my friends and relatives. Everyone said nothing was wrong. Nothing was going on. But the weird sad feeling wouldn't go away.

When my friends and family left and I was alone again, a phenomenon occurred. I became really worried that someone had died. But who, I didn't know. It just was very painful. It hurt to breathe and my breathing became very irregular, to the point where I just couldn't do any of my daily activities.

I knew it was some kind of foreboding. After that, I called the members of Malice Mizer that I still talked to. "Is anything wrong with any of the members?" I asked frantically, confronting them, but they all said "I saw them today and they seemed to be fine."

But even then my fears didn't go away. I went to see some other people who were close to the Malice Mizer members. Though it was the middle of the night, I told myself that soon I was going to confirm if anything was going on with any of the members. But in the end, that confirmation didn't happen.

One week afterwards, the official announcement of Kami's death was made.

"June 21, 1999. Kami, the drummer of Malice Mizer, passed away of a subarachnoid hemorrhage."

Though I knew of this later, from the moment immediately following Kami's death, I already had a bad feeling.

In the end, I heard about Kami's death through the grapevine. The funeral was already over when the news got to me.

It was exactly in the middle of recording, and I locked myself away inside the studio. I couldn't keep my mind on anything. But I had to keep busy. I told myself that. If I didn't do anything, everything would become strange...

Too many regrets remain.

Why didn't I call Kami directly? All during the time when I was worried, why didn't I try to talk directly to Kami?

I still have not completely grown up. In becoming an adult, I've showed my feelings openly and gotten knocked around a little, and so I've wondered if I can ever be close to others people. Children don't think twice about hurting others. Because of this, their relationships are short-lived. But when the tempestuous feelings of adults pass, they look at the situation calmly, comparing things objectively, and then decide on the friendship.

At that time, I couldn't do that. We never found a good interpretation of the circumstances and confronted each other. Basically, I was hesitant to confront him.

Even before that, how many times have I had a bad premonition? And each time, though Kami and I were connected through other people, in the end, I still didn't call Kami directly. Now I wonder if we couldn't call each other because both of us were childishly obstinate and hesitant.

However, if I had called him back then...

Maybe I still couldn't have done anything. Maybe it's presumptuous of me to think I could have. It doesn't really matter now.

If, back then, we could have talked directly...

The first time I went to Kami's parents' house was the following year on his birthday, February 1st. I thought, "I want to see Kami again. I want to go to his grave." I wasn't able to go to his funeral. I wanted to clap my hands [note: I think this refers to Japanese funeral rituals], and anyway, I wanted to see him.

I knew what town his parents lived in, but I didn't know exactly where his house was. So I drove around and asked about the general vicinity of the neighborhood that they were in. After a while, though people would say "It's close by," it was a fairly large, rustic city, so I went to random houses and rang doorbells, asking things like:

"I'm looking for someone. Do you know these people? I heard that they live around here in this neighborhood..."

I left Tokyo in the morning and arrived in Ibaraki Prefecture around noon, and spent the rest of the day searching. Finally, I got directions to the place and managed to find my way to the house around 7 PM that evening.

I was asking myself, "When they open the door, will they recognize me?" Kami's parents have gone to a lot of lives, so they recognized me immediately.

"Come in, we're glad you came," they said, and they invited me inside. With this kindness, I started crying and couldn't stop.

Everyone in the house was sitting down to dinner, and as they shared food from the dishes, his parents told me lots of stories. I heard various stories of when Kami was a child. Afterwards, they said to me:

"Though we still cannot forget him, you've given us proof that he lived, and that has given us the will to continue on."

When I heard that, I felt liberated. The thing that has allowed me to continue on is proof that Kami lived.

After that every year, on Kami's birthday and death anniversary, I go to visit his parents. Since they said "Come over any time," I might abuse the privilege a little.

Though I think it would be good for me to go visit his grave a little more, in the end, I manage only to go on his birthday and his death anniversary every year.

However, with all that has happened, his mother and father welcomed me, and now I truly feel like they're my parents too. His parents also feel like I'm one of their children. I think it's like they see Kami in me.

That first year, there were a lot of people going to see his grave, both on his death anniversary and his birthday. It's been four years now, and little by little, people have stopped going...

If you go, don't go because it's the trendy thing to do. If you go see his grave, don't do it because you want him to come back to life.

But...

To me, thinking that people will be able to forget him, that is... so painful.

To this day, I have never stopped chasing after the dream that Kami left unfinished. That is proof that Kami existed on this earth, proof that he lived.

Even now, Kami is alive inside of me...

Section 3, Chapter 3
Saishuupatsu o Chikatta Okinawa Gasshuku
[Pledging a New Beginning at the Okinawa Training Camp]

The summer of the year I went solo, I went with all the members of my band to Okinawa. Because I wasn't very healthy, we stayed at a training camp in Okinawa for a long four and a half months to heal my body and my heart.

It was a physical training type boarding camp. In a place where there wasn't much of anything, we would wake up at 8 or 9 in the morning, go running till we got to the beach, train, and then go back.

Then we would write songs, and once it became evening, we'd go running again, eat dinner, take a break and talk, and then write songs till morning. We did this day after day every day.

The owner of one of the small restaurants we frequented always would smile at us and tell us "Ganbatteru ka~!" To me, he would say "Practice hard!"

For some reason, he seemed to think that we were part of a karate team from Tokyo.

When we trained, we didn't just go running, but we also punched sandbags, and with protective equipment, we practiced hand-to-hand combat. All my band members learned the basics of martial arts. Because of this, their fists were always extremely tired.

Seeing this was why the restaurant owner thought we were members of a karate team.

All of the band members are tall. My three bodyguards that I brought along were all 185 to 190 centimeters tall. Compared to them, at my 180 centimeters, I was shorter and slimmer.

Because of this, the owner thought I was a stand-in member on the team.

"Ganbare, karate team! I hope you soon become a regular member!"

Whenever he said this to me, I always remembered to keep calm.

One of my objectives in going to Okinawa was to write my album, but also the band members and I wanted to make ourselves stronger and tougher.

The first half of the year that I went solo was definitely not a smooth road. I had been under so much overwork and stress that I had been suffering from insomnia. The other members were also exhausted from stress.

So when the members, including me, felt it was time to heal ourselves, my relatives in Okinawa cooperated with us.

Until then, I hadn't been back to Okinawa in ten years. A part of me inside had always been keeping Okinawa at a distance.

There was a part of me that denied my heritage, but there is also a part of me that wanted to protect that heritage too. I was proud to be an Okinawan and of the Ryukyu race. On the other hand, a part of me was ashamed of that.

I have a lot of respect for my great-grandfather. Of course, I've never met him, but people have told me that he revitalized the town and that he was the founding father of my family. Ancestor worship still goes on in Okinawa, and to my family, my great-grandfather is like our "god."

Though everyone in my family looks different, one thing they all say is that I look exactly like my great-grandfather. They say that all the spiritual phenomenon that happens to me also happened often to my great-grandfather.

There is a word "kamidari" in the Okinawan language. In Okinawa, the ones who call up spirits and hear the words of the gods are mainly women and are called "shiro," "noro," or "yuta." It is very rare for a man to be born with these abilities.

My grandfather was one of those men who often experienced these "kamidari" abilities. So he would be able to see things before they happened.

This was told to me when I was a child, and though I respected my great-grandfather, originally I didn't like the thought of gods and ghosts.

There were times when I would forcefully do things out of my own pride. In times like those, I most likely pushed Okinawa further away from me.

The Okinawan training camp had just started when this happened:

In my family, in the group of the "shiro" that we had, the one with the most power was my grandmother, and she came to the camp. So she told me this.

"You've finally come home. Go to your great-grandfather's grave. Then, do what you believe is right. Because you don't need to worry. Instead, when people need your strength, then obediently lend it to them. Once in a while, come home, visit your great-grandfather's grave and let him see your smiling face. This is what you should do."

These words were difficult for me to understand. I didn't believe in spiritual things, so what was she talking about? There were also other related things. Gathering up my soulscthings like that.

She said that I had confronted death on a constant basis because I hadn't been taking care of my souls. People all have many souls, and when you lose all of them, that is when you die. However, when a shock actually happens, without thinking about it, you leave a soul behind at whatever place it happened at. My grandmother told me this.

When I was seven years old, I drowned in the Yanbaru sea. Because I surely left one of my souls behind there, she said I was going to go get it back.

Yescthat was the first time I'd ever heard about something like losing a soul. I felt like saying to her, "How many years have passed since I was seven? Just hurry up and talk faster."

All the ceremonies and rituals didn't mean anything to me. "Am I supposed to pick this up?" I thought to myself.

I had always been in denial of all things such as sorcery or witchcraft. That's not to say that I believe in any of that now, either. It's just that I don't deny it all anymore. I have come to realize that if I sort through the things that were said by my grandmother and my great-grandfather and the senior members of my family, there is definitely meaning in them.

The things that I experienced as a child don't bring me any pleasant memories. They're very painful. So because of that, I came to have a part of myself deny all of it.

However, at this Okinawan training camp, being one of the descendents of those members of my family, I felt that I had found an accepting attitude towards my culture.

I think it is because of that. I become able to look myself in the eye in the mirror. My smile in the mirror became happy. Until then, I hadn't wanted to see myself, but I finally became able to. Should I say that I've become able to accept myself as I really amc.?

Now every year during my yearly visit to my great-grandfather's grave, I return to Okinawa to let my family see me.

If I think back on it, since I've gone to Tokyo, I always restrained myself wherever I went and continued to endure everything patiently. I convinced myself that I had to do this.

However, when I went to Okinawa, my grandmother told me, "You were called and you came home. Now once more, start again from here." When she said that, my heart became joyful again.

With that, I can finally fight. It felt like a huge burden had been lifted. Instead of suppressing myself altogether due to the surrounding circumstances, fighting back and making progress forward is much more suited to my character.

Back then at that time, I decided to be the leader to my band members, to fight, to keep running straight ahead with my vision of my solo career.

Section 3, Chapter 4
Saigo no Soumatou
[The Last Revolving Lantern]

We stayed in the Okinawa training camp for about 3 months.

If you drove out about 3 or 4 minutes from the headquarters by car, you would reach an island. Then, further off from that island, you could see another island. Though usually you would get to that island by boat, I started wondering if I could try and swim there.

Since I almost drowned as a child, I had always been terrified of the ocean. That didn't mean I didn't swim. At this boarding house, I got the idea that I was going to conquer my fear of the ocean.

I swam halfway there and then swam back. I would do that every day, and then I said, "Today I'm definitely going to swim out there to that island!"

I went out swimming with the keyboardist of my band.

That day, the tides were farther out than usual, and the waves were higher.

When I looked over, he wasn't there anymore. We had gotten separated.

Had he already gone ahead? Did he go back? Did he get here and then turn around?

Floating in the choppy water, I anguished about this for a while, but because I'd promised that I would swim to the island, I once again aimed myself towards it.

I just barely managed to make it to the island. My keyboardist wasn't there. I walked around for a little while looking for him, but I couldn't find him. All the while I was thinking that he must have turned around and gone back earlier, but anxiety flitted through my mind. Was he safe?

I immediately did a U-turn.

The trip back was very intense. The tides were even stronger, and I realized that I would quickly be swept out to the open sea. As I was swimming back, with all my might, I was thrown under by the waves.

"Ah, I'm going to die."

In my own mind, that revolving lantern began to spin. Bits and fragments of memories from my childhood until that moment began to surface one after the other. Along with those fragments, the faces of different adults floated up. Friends, fans who had cheered for me, staff, my familyc

"I'm so sorry. I'm sorry for dying like this."

I apologized to everyone. As I fell, I began to lose consciousnesscand then, suddenly, the revolving lantern stopped.

"Everything before thiscwhen did it happen?"

As I was conscious of my death, the thought of sex suddenly floated up into my head.

For three months since we had been in Okinawa, I hadn't had any. I was always training and songwriting. I hadn't been connected with a woman.

"Can I really die like this?"

The instinct inside me was whispering.

"If you die, it will be after you've done it."

At that moment, my consciousness became clear, and within a dream, I began to swim. I didn't even know which way was up, but I kept swimming. At the moment that I reached the surface of the ocean, I vomited out all the ocean water that I had drunk. With that, I came to my senses again.

"I have to rescue him!"

Already forgetting that I had just almost drowned, the only thing in my mind was the guy who I had gotten separated from.

I arrived back on the beach, and when I finally got there, the sun was beginning to set. Because we'd started out to the island at noon, I realized that we had been drifting out there for a long time. I was exhausted from using all my strength, but I started running. It was a long way where I was to the point where we first started out.

Finally I reached our starting point, but the keyboardist hadn't returned. I even thought about preparing to send a search boat out for him.

While I was doing all this, he returned by himself. It was about an hour after I landed on the beach.

He hadn't gotten to the island after all, but midway he had made a U-turn and had been pulled under by the waves. No matter how hard he paddled, he couldn't make any progress, seeming to be swimming towards a tanker he had seen from far away. He drifted to shore about three kilometers near it, and walking back had cost him time.

Anyway, we were both glad we were safe. We were told by the other members things like, "That was stupid," "At any rate, you came back," and "Don't be so reckless!"

That night, as the two of us were reflecting on what had happened, we watched "Titanic."

The scene in which DiCaprio sank into the icy ocean coincided perfectly with what had happened to me.

In that instant for the first time, I felt true fear. From the next day on, I wouldn't go near the ocean, and I discontinued my swimming training. Though I had believed I would conquer the ocean, now I was even more afraid of it. It was a mess.

That time, I thought, "I can't die before I have sex again." If I had had sex the day before, then as I was seeing the revolving lantern at the last moment, I would have died.

However, even as I thought "I'll probably die," my body responded, "Damn it, I can't die like this! I can't die without leaving any descendents!" And at the last minute, I switched.

For the first time, I understood the reason that often, a boxer will abstain from sex the night before a match.

That was the last time I ever saw the revolving lantern. It's been 3 or 4 years since then. In order to recognize my own limits, thinking about when I pushed myself to the brink of death and saw the revolving lantern, I changed myself.

When I was a child, I thought I wanted to become a terrorist. I was going to completely destroy human life. I wanted to erase everything. People were the guns of the world. They were the most useless thing on the face of the earth.

If you ask me today if I have changed my mind, I didn't change it because of what happened. If the existence of humans makes them into the guns of the world, even now, I still believe a part of that.

However, is that all?

Denying that would be easy. Thinking about it, denying it, becoming nothing. It doesn't take a great effort to do that. There would be no meaning in living. Certainly, humans may be the guns of the world. If that's true, in order to become something else, won't we have to struggle harder? Not only thinking about it, acting it out, experiencing it, we begin to see the things that are wrong. Isn't that the meaning of being born on this earth?

Believing that, that is the kind of person I am now.

When I wanted to become a terrorist, I was struggling. In the Okinawa ocean, I switched my view on life. Still, I have to continue to struggle. I can't just sink. I have to keep on floating.

When I was floating on my own, then I thought of my friends. There was a time too when I was hungering for friendship. I felt inferior, and it was a time when I didn't trust in anyone or anything. However, I still struggled during that time, fighting with loneliness and myself.

After returning to Tokyo, I met with the most trusted person on my staff, who was like my right arm. I talked with him and told him this:

At first when I returned from Okinawa, I was like broken, fragile glass. It was almost as if I was afraid even to speak. I was always in a frenzy. It so bad that it was like I projected an aura of "if you touch me, I will kill you."

Though it was just me alone, I was fighting till the end. I was full of spirit and energy.

That spirit inspired the staff member I was talking to.

"If it's him, isn't he doing something for me? If it's me, then isn't there something that I can do for him?" he started to think.

Because of my struggle, I made a friend. Now, he is the most important member of my family.

Little by little, I started to change the people around me. Maybe on that day, I took another step across what it means to be human.

Section 3, Chapter 5
Madagascar no Kettou
[Duel in Madagascar]

Three years ago, I went to Madagascar. A small island country on the east side of the African continent, its area is 1.6 times the size of Japan and it has a population of about 1,600,000.

I went to do some work for NHK. When they told me about it, I thought that I could do some soul-searching there. At that time, I was really in need of that.

It was my second year going solo. While I was continuing with my musical activities, I was searching for how I could aim for what I wanted in my own style.

We went to villages where things like "Madagascar Wrestling" and "Madagascar Boxing" were popular.

Truthfully, it was amazing. When we arrived at the village, the villagers were all high from smoking marijuana [#1]. And yet, because each and every day they would walk many kilometers, draw water, till the soil on their land, such a lifestyle molded their bodies into something resembling sculptures.

These guys get into really spirited fights without using boxing gloves.

It must be instinct.

People form a ring around these fighting guys, and the women and children of the village watch the fight. It's actually like a fight between two male lions to see who gets the female lion. It was also a place to test the strength of the men.

Naturally, there were also people who went in there who were insignificant. That was really frightening. Just by watching it, I was also feeling very afraid. The muscular strength of the fighting men. All the African people had muscles of steel.

At first, I was just watching. Then, the director started asking me.

"Gackt-san, do you want to go in?"

"When you say 'do you want to go', are you going to make me go?"

At that time, someone finished their match, and I decided to go. I wanted to fight a Madagascar person!

About 100 people, adults and children, gathered around, forming a giant circle around me.

It was the first time this had ever happened. In that fashion, in the midst of people I didn't know, I was standing alone, surrounded.

Being the underdog like this was also a first for me. From the bottom of my heart, I was insignificant. However, at the same time, my heart was pounding. In this event, there was no place I could run to, and in this kind of dangerous situation, I was really excited and nervous.

I was standing in the center of a ring of sand, which made for a lousy foothold, and right in front of me I could see 4 or 5 energetic African guys.

On that side, in a reckless, wild tone, a guy who seemed like a coach was stirring up people. In the native language, he would say things like "You can pick anyone you like."

I was a competent fighter. Was I going to become stupid? We exchanged words. I glared at the man and said:

"Can't you fight me? I want to fight you."

In that instant, all the villagers around me burst out in a loud roar.

"Coach, you can do it!"

Their eyes gleamed with excitement.

"Me?"

Seeing their facial expressions, the man unfastened his garment and took it off. Under it appeared pure black skin without a trace of fat. He was definitely a suitable opponent!

It was no wonder that the villagers cheered loudly. No, no, he had one of those unbelievable physiques. I couldn't compare him to any other opponent.

However, I didn't draw back. Above the crowd of villagers that was being stirred up, I felt a strange tension rising.

I didn't really know the rules. It was no good to punch or kick, and it was explained to me that the only way to win was to make the person's face or shoulder hit the ground.

It was a very primitive sort of explanation. However, it was enough for me. If I tried it, then I would know if I could do it or not, and with that, I challenged him to a match.

However, the second the match started, I was punched.

"Hey, you just said that I couldn't hit you!"

And then, a change came over me. The battle that had been sleeping inside me awakened.

In that instant, I thought that I was going to kill my opponent. It was an awareness of my own self that I had forgotten, and I was prepared to break his neck. His neck was just below me, twitching. All the villagers and the referee came running in a panic, taking my hand and stopping me.

Then, the match was ended. Though they had promised me three fights, it was stopped only after one.

My opponent was also very agitated and excited. After he got back up, he was saying "Let's go another round!"

"What are you saying? You almost died!"

I would watch the footage of that time over and over after that.

My eyes were very dangerous. The staff in the office said severely, "We can't let the fans see that!"

However, I had already clearly confirmed it. This was my true nature.

I thought that that part of me had been buried deep inside me from a long time before. With this foundation in place, it didn't mean that I was a violent person, but that more and more, I had to liberate this spiritual side of me.

At that time, not being able to pursue the things that I felt, the things that I fought for, and also the works that I wanted to produce was no good. More and more, it was no good if the weak parts of myself and the dangerous parts of myself couldn't come together.

When I was ten years old, I was a dangerous cluster of things.

However, before I knew it, I had completely suppressed the dangerous parts of myself.

I was bound up by rules, and it was like I had been imprisoned inside of a jail cell of myself. Whenever the wild part of myself would appear, I concealed it, and at that time, I really felt that I had curbed that part of me.

After the match, the village chief came out and said:

"In this far land, in the midst of hostile soil and many spectators, you put forth strength, took a step forward, and fought this battle. This strength is now sent out to all the young people who were watching you fight. Thank you."

That was what he thought.

I said, "What I was meant to do, the way that I was meant to fight, the way that I was meant to becit was this way."

After I came back from Madagascar, I wondered if I had changed a great deal. I became sociable. It was strange to be sociable with others. I became more conscious of the other people around me.

One explanation is that whenever I thought the situation was becoming dangerous, I would ask myself if I should start become active or not, and I would always act more actively than I had in the past. Regarding who I used this on, I would fight anyone, even if they were a friend. However, if that was the case, I began thinking about that recently.

More than just curbing my lifestyle, I was killing myself by not being able to put essential parts and dirty parts into the same person. That applies both to my activities and the things I produced. I became more aggressive than I had been before.

The people around me also began to change. After I came back from Madagascar, until then I had by a mysterious twist of fate, been meeting many different people. Now, around me are people who I call my "family" and are bound to me through mutual relationships.

I think that this thing called "fate" is something that comes forth from each individual person, and it carries us along.

My inner self changed, so did my fate change as well?

When the power of thoughts meets the power of action, a result is born. That is what I think.

[1] マリファナでキマって、飛びまくっていた。

Section 3, Chapter 6
Boku no Family no Tanjou
[The Birth of My Family]

I would die for my family.

The thing I call "family" is not my actual family. It consists of friends who I have a mutual understanding with.

At present, my family consists of, at most, around 10 to 15 people. They have various jobs, and there are both men and women. The circumstances of our meetings were also varied.

It's strange, but until I went to Madagascar, I hadn't met most of them yet. At any rate, I feel like I have a great group.

Out of these 15 people, most of them can be called "owners." They are the ones who remain at the top of any family. There are also some that are involved in politics.

If I include everyone up and down the line, I will end up with quite a lot of people in the group. It's not a matter of 1+1=2. If everyone in a family meets everyone else face to face, the numbers will increase all at once. Though we call this "the rule of family," it's a very mysterious increase.

However, that's not the reason we come together.

The top people who have always been by my side have mostly fought their battles in loneliness. It's not just that the people under me cannot show the weaker parts of themselves. It was also that they had a responsibility to stand up on their own, and no matter how you look at it, being burdened with the lives of others made them very mature [lit: have an exact understanding].

Since I went solo, I've become self-aware and have gained a viewpoint of associating with other people who are self-aware. We run towards the front. There's no excuse, and we can't escape it. If I stop running towards what lies ahead, then they will also feel like stopping. In the past, I always thought that.

It's said that fighting through life [lit: tatakau=to fight a battle] alone is the easiest thing to do.

However, in recent times, I've thought about this very keenly. Certainly, fighting through life alone may be the easiest thing. Still, those who fight while believing in something are certainly strong!

In the past, until I joined Malice Mizer, because I was a fighting man, I didn't care if I fought to the point of collapse. And when I collapsed, I would only think that at least I'd thought that would happen before it did.

Now, however, I don't do that anymore. Because I don't fight my battles just alone anymore. Now I have a family. I have people at my back supporting me.

Though there were times that I thought that I was supporting them, truthfully, I began to feel like I was being supported by them. They are the people who watch my back. So, if they hold me firmly, I will never fall.

I think, now, that people's hearts have the ability to become just as strong as if they were wearing a protective amulet.

The top people in my family also feel this way.

While they individually were struggling through in loneliness, being all together in the consciousness called family gave them the feeling that they would not be beaten by anyone. There is family and there are rivals, and we can provoke each other or we could have a good relationship.

The number one reason why I believe in them is that they are not people who only are concerned with simple and easy things. At stories of positive things, they smile from the bottoms of their hearts. At stories of bad things, negative things, they know that it's not definite.

In general, why is it necessary to tell stories of worrisome and painful things? It's because telling them will ease the pain, right?

If you lick the wounds that you carry, then certainly they will become a little less painful. However, if you stop licking them, the pain will begin again.

So even though it hurts, you should stich up your wounds quickly. It will really hurt while they're sewn up, but after it's over, you'll be on your way to being healed. In other words, it's a relationship between our hearts.

Talking about things that are painful to each of us and licking each others' wounds is something that other people besides us can do as well. Whenever someone is carrying a heavy burden, what's important is how much we can help that person stitch up those wounds.

Sewing the wounds up will be extremely painful. There isn't any anesthesia, not in the words that we use. But after it's over, we heal without having even a trace of the scar left [lit: not knowing where the wound is]. That is how things are.

For example, the business that one of the people in my family was running was in trouble. He couldn't really tell anyone else about this. By himself, not talking to anyone about it, he could have dealt with it.

However, he told us this news. Because he told us in person, we realized how grave the problem was. So, not working with anyone else, we all individually wondered how we should help him. No one said "Let's all work together and help him out." So our help progressed very slowly.

Helping someone isn't just "one way." You have to choose which is the best way to do it, and it's hard work. In his case, that was necessary.

Of course, can we all continue to succeed all the time? No one knows that. But when we have to ask ourselves that, we don't just sit there and say "poor guy." That's just rude. Saying "poor guy" to people who are fighting hard isn't just showing compassion. It can be said that people get weak to the point where they don't have any more strength left [lit: cannot put out power], and they fall. For this reason, I think, we don't lick each others' wounds, and no matter what is going on, we all must walk forward.

Though there are misunderstandings, we're not a family because we each succeed on our own. That's not a requirement for a family. The important thing is that whenever something comes up, we can have a truthful [lit: without getting lost] mutual understanding with each other, and that we can have fun together. However, if we don't believe in one another, we can't act.

In my family, whenever someone is hurting, I don't sit by that person and say to them, "Oh, that's too bad that you're hurting," but rather, I take the position of saying, "you can do it!" In order to do this, I should become stronger.

It's good for all of us to live as if we have an amulet protecting us.

When someone was doing something and ran into a problem, when they looked into their own pocket, they pulled out the amulet...

I think we should all live like that.

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