Gents Journey
Helping Men become the Gentleman they deserve to be. This Podcast is part inspiration part motivation. We discuss what it takes to be a Gentleman in the 21st Century. We also talk about how to deal with the internal and external battles that life throws at us. So come be apart of the Gents Journey!
Gents Journey
The Forgotten Samurai: The Steward's Burden and the Bearer's Choice
"True mastery is found in the details. The way you handle the little things defines the way you handle everything."
Hello and welcome to the Gentleman's Journey podcast. My name is Anthony, your host, and today we are in episode nine. We are almost done with the Forgotten Samurai series, so let's go ahead and let's get into it. The building didn't exist on any map, not in this city, not in this country, not in this timeline. It was always there and never there, depending on who you're asking. A black car pulled up to the curb, unmarked, no plates, no driver. The door opened without a sound, boots stepped out, heavy laced with ash. The fog didn't move around him, it stopped reverent, like it knew better. He entered the building like gravity. Differently for him, the front doors didn't creak, they exhaled. Inside the reception area was dim, walls too smooth, air too still. At the desk sat a woman, hair tied back, glasses hanging from a gold chain, face unreadable. But when she saw him, she stood, she tried to speak. Sir, he's not the figure raised a single gloved hand, not to strike, not to command, just to remind her he didn't answer to protocol. She sat without another word. She sat without another word.
Speaker 1:The hallway to the office was long, longer than the building allowed, carpet, deep and black, like walking on ink Pants, lined with walls, but they were blank, or maybe the memories in them haven't formed yet. He walked, each step echoed, not forward but inward, and just before reaching the end the door opened. Alistair stood in the center of the room, motionless, like he had been expecting him for hours. He wore no jacket today, no gloves, just the long dark tunic and his expression carved from polished stillness. The shadow king stepped through the door, shut behind him on its own. The office was larger before, much larger, not in size in presence. Shelves of impossible artifacts, scrolls that breathed, a carved blade suspended in midair, and behind Alistair, a map with no countries, just rivers of ink forming and unforming.
Speaker 1:As they watched. The Saddle King didn't sit. He didn't need to. He just stared at Alistair for a long moment and then spoke. You're letting him get close Alistair? For a long moment and then spoke. You're letting him get close. Alistair didn't flinch, closer than anyone before. He said evenly, the king stepped closer. That's not the point. Pause. Then you were supposed to weed him out by now. Test him, break him, make him choose wrong.
Speaker 1:Alistair's hands remained folded. He hasn't chosen yet. That's what makes him different. The Shadow King circled Not like a man, but like a warning. You know what happens if he finishes the armor. You know what happens if he's not the one. Alistair nodded. None of us ascend. The king's jaws tightened I already have.
Speaker 1:Alistair turned toward him now, eyes calm, unblinking. Then why are you still here? Silence, the fog touched the edges of the windows. Inside the room the lights dimmed slightly. The Shadow King approached the desk, tapped a single finger against the wood. You were chosen to guide him, not to believe in him. Alice just stepped forward once, not aggressive but deliberate. I'm not sure if there's a difference anymore. The king's eyes narrowed. There is, and if you forget it you forfeit your place.
Speaker 1:Alistair stepped to the armor diagram laid on the glass, the map of the plates, the sigils, the bearish path. He pointed he has the chest, the shins, the knees, the helmet, the throat, the arms and that's left. The king interrupted his choice. A beat. The king interrupted His choice, a beat. And we both know the choice is where they all break. The fog pressed hard at the glass. The room wasn't sealed for privacy. It was sealed to contain something. The king turned his back towards the door then paused If he fails, it's on you. Alistair gave a small nod. I accept that, but the king wasn't done. He looked over his shoulder, expression shifting slightly, not in anger, not in disdain, something like grief, because if he succeeds, it's on him. The door opened again, this time not on its own. Alistair lifted one hand. The king walked through and just before the door closed he whispered something too low to be heard, the kind of whispers that shifts the outcome of wars. And then he was gone.
Speaker 1:Alistair stood in silence long after the shadow king had gone. The echo of the door closing was still vibrating somewhere in the walls. But it wasn't the sound that stayed with him, it was the weight, the familiar weight of being reminded again that he was never meant to wear it. He turned slowly, eyes drifting to the artifact table. In the corner, one piece sat alone A small black scale, smooth as stone, carved like it had been a part of something reptilian or divine. He remembered the day he earned it. No, the day he thought he had. Here's the flashback the sky had opened that day, split wide like a wound.
Speaker 1:He was younger then, not by age but by hope. They told him you're the most precise, you're the most capable, the most composed. He believed them. His training had outlasted all the others. His trials were flawless, the sigils aligned, even the mist parted for him.
Speaker 1:And when he stepped into the hall of first metal, the armor was there, waiting. He reached for the chest pate first. It vibrated beneath his touch, accepted him, or so he thought. He placed it against his body and sealed without a sound. Then the knees, then the knees, then the arms, each one slipped into place like memory, remembering itself. He felt it move through him, the knowing. Until the helmet.
Speaker 1:He lifted it last. It was warm, like breath inside iron. He turned it in his hands, the inside lined with inscriptions glowing faintly, in pulse, and just as he brought it to his brow it cracked. Not a fracture, a rejection. The armor pulsed outward, not inward, knocking him back, flattening him. The chest piece tore itself off, the arms flung into dust, the knees burned back and the voice came, not from the sky, not from the ground, but from within. You are not the bear, you are the steward.
Speaker 1:He remembered lying there, not in pain but in stillness. It was as if the armor had taken something from him, a version of him that would never return. Then the fog came, not to consume him but to show him the way out. He woke up in a different place. The armor was gone, the sigils removed, only one remained, burned into his right palm the symbol of the steward. Not the king, not the weapon, but the memory keeper.
Speaker 1:Alistair turned his hand over now, years later, and saw it still faintly glowing in the low light. The same shape, the same brand. It had never gone away, only dulled, like a scar that no longer ached until it had to. He walked to the mirror, not the one that reflected, the one that remembered. In its surface he saw not himself, but every bear who tried since, some screaming, some proud, some broken halfway through, some begging to go back. All of them failed, except this one. He turned back toward the map, traced the sigils that had now lit up. Seven pieces, seven choices. Seven doors he opened and one left unopened. The final sigil at the center, it had no shape, not yet.
Speaker 1:He sat down at the center of the room, closed his eyes and whispered Don't break him. Not because he cared, but because he couldn't carry another one. He hadn't slept, not really. The clock said morning, the light said morning, but his body didn't trust either. The air was different. It was off, it moved wrong, pressed into strange angles against the walls, like something was breathing, not in the room but through it.
Speaker 1:The journal was open on the floor. He didn't remember opening it. He didn't remember writing this either. You were being measured. That was it. Five words, new ink, still drying, and beneath it a symbol A spiral inside a cage marked in red.
Speaker 1:He looked down at the armor, laid it out neatly Chest, shins, knees, throat, helmet, forearms, each one still humming softly. But the pitch hadn't changed. It used to be melodic. Now it was more like monitoring. He laid a lucky strike, flicked the brass zipper closed with a sharp little snap. He inhaled the smoke hit. Different too, not bitter, but watching.
Speaker 1:He sat down, palmed the helmet, held it like a question. And that's when it happened. The vision, not like before, no bull, no Alistair, just impact. Like his mind was dropping through a crack in time. He saw a field of armor bearers all turned to stone, a young Alistair screaming at the sky with armor in his hands, a mountain Covered in snow, something buried beneath it, a mask floating in the fog with his own voice whispering from inside. He snapped out of it. His chest was heaving Mouth, dry Cigarette ash burned down to his knuckle. The armor plates were glowing, not bright but alive, like they were finally seeing him.
Speaker 1:And on the floor, the journal flipped. Not a wind, not a hand. It turned itself, stopped at a blank page and began writing, not in English, not in Japanese, not in any language he knew, but it knew him. And when the ink dried, the last line flickered you are not the first, but you may be the last. He didn't know what he was preparing for, only that something was preparing him. And in the mirror behind him, just for a second, he thought he saw Alistair standing there, watching, not to interfere but to record. It was still there, right where he left it, wrapped in silk, set apart from the other pieces, almost like it chose to stay behind the mask. He touched it before, but he never held it, never invited it, until now he stood over it, cigarette trembling between his fingers.
Speaker 1:The kettle screamed louder than usual, not by much, but she heard it, just like she heard everything now the clock ticking one beat off tempo, the air vent exhaling warm air when the heat was off, the refrigerator humming a note lower than it used to. She didn't know how long she'd been awake, only that sleep had become more of a suggestion than a refuge. She poured the water. The tea leaves floated in slow spirals like they were trying to spell something. She didn't read it Didn't need to, she already knew he was changing. She hadn't seen him in a full day but she still felt him. She felt it, that shift, the stillness beneath the skin of the building, like the walls were bracing for something.
Speaker 1:She walked to her front window. The fog hadn't lifted in three mornings, it didn't even rise this morning. It lingered. And through it a building she didn't remember Three stories, no windows. On the upper floor, black brick, too clean, too deliberate. She turned away, tried the kitchen light, again Nothing. The bulb was new, the wiring was fine, still nothing.
Speaker 1:She sat, let the tea go cold and stared at the door across the hall, his door. It looked normal, but it wasn't. The knob flickered once, not turned, just flickered, as if the idea of being open was being tested. She whispered his name, not aloud, not consciously, just a breathless shape. And in the mirrors across from her, alistair appeared, not his full self, just the outline, the presence. She didn't turn towards it, didn't scream, didn't startle, she just said it's happening, isn't it? The reflection didn't speak, but the window fogged on the inside. A single phrase etched itself across the glass. We're running out of time. She closed her eyes, whispered something into her teacup, something old, something in Japanese. And when she opened them again, the mirror was empty, but the tea had gone black. Again the mirror was empty, but the tea had gone black. And outside the door she heard footsteps coming back. The Zippo clicked once, twice, then shut.
Speaker 1:No flame didn't matter, he didn't need more light, he needed answers. The mass hadn't changed. He was sure of it slightly subtly. He was sure of it Slightly Subtly. The metal looked less like steel, more like skin, not soft, not flesh, but something that remembers being both.
Speaker 1:He crouched slowly, knees creaking under the weight of everything unsaid, reached forward, unwrapped the cloth, the silk pulled back like it didn't want to be involved. And there it was, the mouthpiece shaped like silence, the eyes hollowed, but never empty. He whispered to it, not on purpose what do you want from me? The air didn't answer, but the armor did. The plates behind him shifted, repositioned, aligned, like they were waiting.
Speaker 1:He lifted the mask. It was heavy, heavier than it should be. But that wasn't weight, it was history carried, not in mass, but in memory. And when he brought it closer to his face, the journal flipped open again. One word this time Decide. He stared into the isolates, saw nothing. Then everything Flashes A battlefield soaked in black fire, katsu reaching for him in a hallway that didn't exist. Alistair screaming Too soon. The Shadow King sitting on the throne, made of failed bearers, himself wearing the full armor but unable to move. He pulled back. He's breathing hard.
Speaker 1:The mask hummed, now, not loud but steady, like a pulse from something that no longer had a body. He didn't put it on, not yet. But he made a choice. He held it fully with both hands, no silk between them, and the armor recognized it. Each plate behind him glowed brighter, now with acceptance, with expectation. And on the floor beneath the journal, now with acceptance, with expectation, and on the floor beneath the journal, a new object appeared, not brought, not placed, formed A key, black, twisted, ancient. He picked it up and the journal closed on its own.
Speaker 1:The fog curled beneath the door and somewhere far off, a train whistle blew. But no tracks ran through this city, not anymore. The knock wasn't loud, it didn't need to be. She opened the door before the second knock landed. Alistair stood there, coat darker than the hallway, eyes dimmer than the bulbs. For a moment they just stared at each other, like two pages of the same story in different translations. You shouldn't be here, she said. He stepped inside anyways. The door closed behind him with a soft finality. The apartment was smaller than he remembered. I mean, the armor made everything feel smaller. Now she hadn't moved anything, but it felt rearranged, like the room had decided it wanted a new shape.
Speaker 1:They stood near the table. The teacup sat there, still black, still cold. You've gotten too close to him. Alistair said finally. She didn't finch Because I care, no, because you're starting to believe. She turned. The others weren't like him. They all seemed different at first.
Speaker 1:He moved across the room slowly. Hands collapsed behind his back, posture of control, voice of someone already regretting something. You know what happens if he fails. I know what happens if we don't help him. She snapped in their silence, only the fog tapping against the window. Now you still think we're here to save him, he said quietly. She looked up, eyes sharp, and you've forgotten what saving even means. They stood still for a beat too long. Something ancient hung between them I remember. Neither of them wanted to name. You saw the map, she said finally.
Speaker 1:Alistair raised a brow. How he found it? No one finds it by accident. She didn't answer. He didn't need to. You've let him get in way too far. I guided him. No, he said, you protected him. She turned her back. The man in the corner reflected both of them. Not that they were, but as they had been Two guardians, two fragments of the same chain.
Speaker 1:You were supposed to test him, I did. You were supposed to measure him, I did, and she hesitated. Then he's the only one that hasn't looked away. Alistair's hands tightened behind his back. The fog outside swirled faster, like it was listening, like it was waiting. He's not ready. No one ever is. But if he's not the one, then let him die proving it.
Speaker 1:The room fell silent. Even the fog seemed to pause. Alistair turned toward the door, stopped before opening it, spoke without facing her. If you keep interfering, the fog will take you, kasu. It doesn't care how many times you've helped, it only cares about the rules. She looked down at a tea, then back at him. Then I hope it forgets me. He left the door, didn't slam, it sealed Like the room needed protection from what just happened. She stood alone, hands trembling, lip tight. She wasn't afraid of the fog, she was afraid of failing.
Speaker 1:There are moments in every journey where belief stops being something you feel and starts becoming something you carry. It's heavy, unforgiving, costly, not because it's wrong, but because it's real. And real belief always comes with a price. This episode wasn't about armor, it wasn't even about destiny. It was about what happens to the other people standing just outside the spotlight, the one, I should say, the ones really, who know what the road requires. You know the ones who've seen others walk it, you know and fall and scream and never turn, the ones who you, ones who stayed behind because someone has to watch Kasu and Alistair have seen what you haven't. They've seen the fog take people. They've seen men scream their names in final moments they could not prevent. They've watched the armor turn on the unworthy, devour the selfish, discard the false. And now they're watching you, or rather him, the bear.
Speaker 1:And it's not just a duty anymore, it's not just a job, it's personal, because somewhere along the line, what began as guardianship became attachment. And that's dangerous, because when you care, you stop testing and you start protecting. Sometimes protecting is the same as interfering and interference. It kills transformations. Alistair knows the rules, katsu remembers the consequences, and yet both of them had crossed the lines in this episode, because belief isn't clean, it isn't pristine, it isn't polite. Belief is dirty, it's bloody, it's twisted, especially when you're believing on the behalf of someone else. And that's what this part of your journey is really about. How far are you willing to go to believe in someone else? And, more painfully, how far are you willing to let them go, even if it means losing them, just to let them find out who they really are? See, sometimes love is loud, but the most dangerous love is the quiet kind, the kind that watches, the kind that waits, you know, that holds back without warning because the lesson matters more than the rescue. See, that's the love that Katsu is holding and that's why she's trembling now.
Speaker 1:So let's go ahead and let's do some of these reflection exercises, okay Now? Number one is who are you secretly guarding? Write down the name of someone in your life you're emotionally watching right now. What are you hoping they'll do? What part of the transformation scares you? Are you guiding them? Are you guarding them? Ask yourself have I become their steward without meaning to? Number two what's the fog in your life right now? You know that unknown space where rules start bending, where control starts slipping, where things no longer feel like they used to. How are you responding to it? Are you pretending it isn't there, or is it whispering to it like katsu? Where have you interfered with growth?
Speaker 1:Reflect on a time when you tried to save someone too early. Did it help them or rob them? Did you step in because of love or was it because of fear? What would have happened if you had just waited? And ask yourself this too. What would it look like if you would have trusted their pain next time?
Speaker 1:Now, number four. Who are you watching right now in silence, hoping they'll make it? What part of you wants to help them? What part of you needs to let go and what part of you is afraid that if they fall, it means you failed too? Last but not least, are you the bearer or are you the steward?
Speaker 1:Write down the last time you're one of the following, the test that someone had to pass the quiet voice. Someone needed the mere so-and-so on themselves, and you might not be the one walking through the fog, but someone is using your shape to navigate it. And you might not be the one walking through the fog, but someone is using your shape to navigate it. You can't understand that. Here's the thing about these exercises that I need you guys to understand that these exercises weren't meant to give you answers. They were meant to uncover what's already pulsing beneath your armor the love you have held, the fears you buried, the truths you've only ever whispered because, like Kasu, you may find yourself standing at the edge of someone else's transformation and the only thing that will matter is whether you help them walk through the fog or try to keep them from entering at all. Sit with these anthers. They're more honest than you think.
Speaker 1:Well, guys, I know that was a like. I said this was heavy and I just want to let you I know that was a like, I said this was heavy and I just want to let you guys know that there's going to be an episode 11 and I'm going to kind of go over what my I guess you could say inspiration was to write this series and everything. So watch out for that. And I just want to thank you guys for listening. We got to lighten the moment up here a little bit. Right, I got to give a shout out to somebody who messaged me yesterday saying that they're liking my voice and they're liking how I can make it low for Alistair. That was a really great compliment. So thank you for that. I needed that.
Speaker 1:But anyways, if you want to send me a compliment about this series, or you could tell me you hate this series I mean, you know it is what it is there's three ways you can contact me. Okay, first way is going to be through the chat function here. If you, on the description of this podcast, you click on it, it says let's chat, you and I can have a conversation about this series, this episode, about Alistair, the introduction of the shadow King, you know whatever you'd like to talk about, you and I could talk about whatever's on this podcast. Okay, and that's the first way. Second way is through my email. My email is Anthony atjensjourneycom, so please don't hesitate to reach out to me there. And, last but not least, you can go to my Instagram. My Instagram is myjensjourney. So again, guys, thank you so very much for listening today. And remember this you create your reality, take care.