AREKAI

A Codex of the Arekai: Walkers of the Spiral, Keepers of the Inner Clash

“Master thyself before mastering thy horn.”

From the wind-torn peaks of Myrr’Kael, where cloud meets crag and silence is broken only by breath, bell, or sudden impact, descend the Arekai—horned kin of discipline, humor, and the eternal spiral.

They are a paradox made flesh: contemplatives who spar mid-verse, spiritual warriors marked by both meditation scars and prank-wounds. To understand the Arekai is not to walk a straight road, but to follow the spiral—first inward, then outward—until meaning reveals itself only in hindsight.

All Arekai are born with horns curled inward—a physical echo of the self in its earliest state: guarded, doubting, untested.

As an Arekai grows through hardship, solitude, and clarity of spirit, their horns slowly twist outward. To outsiders, this is merely age. To the Arekai, it is revelation.

They say:

“The spiraled horn marks a spirit turned inward.
When thy horn faces out, so too doth thy soul.”

Thus begins the Path of Thyself, a lifelong discipline of self-mastery and reflection.

At sixteen, each Arekai youth must wander for nine moons. Their horns are wrapped and dulled, and they are forbidden from using them in battle. The lesson is simple:

“If thou canst not prevail without thy horns,
thou art not yet worthy to bear them.”

Many return changed. Some do not return at all.

Among the Arekai, conflict is not avoided—it is language.

Duels determine social roles, not through dominance, but evolution. Each bout is a measure. Victory raises one’s station. Defeat deepens one’s understanding.

“A loss addeth a brick to thy foundation.
Keep building.”

Elders have been known to relinquish rank willingly, seeking insight from lower perspectives. For in the spiral, all positions return in time.

Training begins at solrise with four beats of discipline. Stone courtyards echo with footwork, breath, and the distinctive thump of the Woolsmack—a padded shepherd’s crook wielded by mentors to realign both posture and pride.

Training disciplines include:

Calisthenics and balance trials

Horn-sparring (one beat, full contact, padded horns)

Rhythm combat set to bardic drums

Stillness meditation beside koi ponds

Between drills, humor flows freely. Mentors are fond of saying:

“Thy horn points forward. Why dost thou look back?”
“The louder the laugh, the heavier the thought it frees.”
“You call it a fight. I call it family therapy.”

Every Arekai raises a koi.

The koi is not a pet, but a reflection. Its movements mirror the keeper’s inner state—calm or frantic, free or confined.

Some raise their koi in glass tanks. Others build ponds.

The koi in the pond swims wide.
The koi in the tank paces endlessly.

From this observation arose a tradition that transformed chaos into ritual.

Once each score, on the sixth measure of Goldwane, at the seventeenth beat of Lunday, the horns sound.

Shatter-Tank begins.

For eight beats, Arekai whose horns face fully outward don padded wraps and descend upon homes where koi are caged in glass. Tanks are shattered. Fish are carried at full sprint to the nearest pond. Windows break. Pride breaks. Yet no blood is spilled.

“To the pond, fish-warrior.”

It is chaos—but sacred chaos.

As one elder declared:

“We all build tanks in our minds.
Once a score… we break them.”

Those with outward horns lead. Those still spiraled may defend their tanks, watch in silence, or reflect upon what they fear losing.

There is a meditation older than horns, older than stone.

It is said that within every Arekai swim two koi.

The Spiraled Koi whispers:
“I am not enough.
I must prove.
I must clutch, lest all be lost.”

It swims in circles of doubt and pride. It is not evil—but trapped.

The Unraveled Koi replies:
“I am not broken.
I am becoming.
My path is water, not stone.”

It moves freely, strikes with grace, and trusts change.

In Arekai teaching, the mind is a pond.
Still water reflects truth.
Muddied water distorts it.

“He who paddeth toward the spiral spins alone.
He who floateth with both arrives whole.”

They found him swaddled in burlap at the temple gate—a mule with no horns, no clan, and no understanding of the spiral.

Yet the Arekai took him in.

Ceremonial horns were tapped gently to his brow—not in mockery, but in welcome.

“Thou art kin.
Thou art spiral.
Thy journey hath begun.”

His strikes were brute. His steps stiff. When instructed to meditate, he often fell asleep with his hooves in the pond. But he listened. He trained. He stayed.

One day, a Mentor handed him a puzzle scroll: five letters, one word. The mule answered with three.

“There are five boxes,” the Mentor said.
“And?” replied the mule, untroubled.

The Mentor laughed.

“More Path of Thyself is required, Mule Koi.”

The hall erupted—horns shaking, tea spilled.

Yet the mule endured. He learned rhythm. He headbutted not to rise, but to understand. When asked if he would climb the ranks, he answered simply:

“I was not made to fight upward.
I was born to walk forward.”

And so he brewed a drink—wild honey, cocoa, cave mushrooms, and black desert coffee.

He named it Mule Fuel.

Wrapped in poncho patchwork stitched from old sparring mats and horn-spirals of those who found peace, he rode north—on a horse with no name.

When questioned, the Mentor only smiled.

“Aye.
‘Tis strange.
Yet strangely true.”

And when the dojo grows quiet and the tea tastes extra earthy, elders still murmur:

“He’s out there still.
Sippin’. Driftin’.
Mule Fuel in his veins.”

And the Path of Thyself continues.