He was practicing swordstrokes against heavenly orchard-trees one afternoon when it happened--a tree shook before he had even hit it with the long stick.
It took him a moment, a little bit of surprise; he hadn't known he was that powerful. But when an upper branch shuddered without his even moving, he knew even this was out of his influence. So he climbed, rough-handed and boyishly nimble all the way up the smooth bark to find whatever it was to be found.
At first, he took it for a scrap of fine fabric, pausing on its path of divinely scented wind; then, he thought it was a huge and glittering bird, trapped in foul branches on its way to an even higher paradise; then finally, he saw that it was just a boy.
Even with his lengths of shining and carefully brushed hair tangled around grasping twigs, even with blood beginning to trickle from the long gash in his soft silken clothing, the boy peered so hard down his nose that he looked like a little lord on his throne, utterly and completely supposed-to-be-here, belonging in this precarious perch more than anyone had the right to be.
Tenpou didn't feel fooled in the slightest.
He only curled his fingers more securely around his branch, balanced there, and looked silently and smilingly back.
The boy seemed to struggle even more mightily with himself now than he had with the tree.
It wasn't long before he spoke softly down at his own feet, as if it would be Tenpou's fault if he happened to hear.
"--I don't know how to get down from this thing."
"Oh," said Tenpou, nodding and appearing to weigh this in his mind.
This time, it was Konzen who wasn't fooled.
"Look," he said carefully, clearly trying to find a way to turn things the way he wanted them: being back down on the ground would be a very good start. "I--"
At that very moment, Tenpou appeared to conveniently hear an imaginary chime.
"I'm sorry, but I'll be late for my studies." He waved calmly, smiled calmly, and calmly dropped out of the tree. "--By the way, all you have to do is jump!"
"Wait!" The soft voice above him was shocked and worried, clearly not considering this new suggestion as a valid solution at all. "Hey, hold on!" This time, the voice was a little less soft.
As he walked away, Tenpou heard the tree begin to shake again--this time with the tremulous rage of someone who doesn't know any curse words, but suddenly finds himself needing them.
From then on, Tenpou found pleasure in the thought that he had been the original cause of Konzen Douji's temper.
