x
The article stayed open on Luca's tablet, but his gaze had drifted elsewhere. The villa’s ceiling fan spun lazily overhead, casting revolving shadows that made the warm air shimmer. Elisa was by the pool again, lounging in her green one-piece swimsuit, sunglasses perched high on the bridge of her nose. She was reading something too, a travel essay by an American novelist about "ritual tourism" in Southeast Asia. But unlike Luca, she seemed to wear her curiosity with a coat of cynicism.
“Sex for wealth,” she said without lifting her head, as if continuing a conversation they hadn’t started. “Sounds like a scam. Or at best, a cultural kink dressed in folklore.”
Luca didn’t reply immediately. He scrolled back to the top of the article and re-read the subtitle:
‘Where sacred meets sin: the strange legend of Prince Samudro and the lovers who come to pray through flesh.’
“What if it's not just a kink?” Luca finally said. “What if there's a deeper—structural need? Some part of the Javanese psyche that's trying to make peace between the moral and the material?”
Elisa glanced at him. “You're sounding like an anthropologist now.”
“I studied architecture. Structure is everywhere. Even in beliefs.”
She tilted her head, half amused. “So, what’s the structure of a mountain where people fuck strangers to get rich?”
Luca smiled thinly. “Desperation. Faith. Cyclical economy. And maybe... erotic transcendence.”
That last phrase hung in the air longer than necessary. Elisa arched an eyebrow but didn’t challenge it. The line between seduction and satire was blurring, as it often did with them.
“I mean,” Luca continued, voice softening, “the article said most of the pilgrims are poor. Farmers, street vendors, single mothers. But there are also traders, government employees—people who’ve tried everything else. And they all come to this mountain to fuck a stranger and hope the spirits notice.”
Elisa sat up, peeling off her sunglasses. “Do they believe the mountain is watching?”
“No. They believe Prince Samudro is. Or... the curse he left behind.”
She leaned forward, now clearly engaged. “What curse?”
Luca showed her the screen. “According to Javanese legend, Prince Samudro had an incestuous affair with his stepmother, Queen Nyai Ontrowulan. They were caught and fled to Mount Kemukus, where they died in each other’s arms. Some say they were executed. Some say they vanished. But either way, the ritual was born from their act: to gain power, one must reenact the sin.”
Elisa whistled. “Now that is mythology with balls.”
She got up and crossed the space between them, towel in hand, droplets of water glistening down her collarbone. “So what? You want to go visit?”
Luca hesitated. “I think... maybe we should. Not to join in, of course,” he added quickly, “but just to see. To understand how something so ancient can survive globalization and shame.”
“Anthropology,” Elisa repeated, her voice a mix of mockery and intrigue. “Or voyeurism?”
He shrugged. “Why not both?”
That evening, their conversation shifted. Not dramatically, not with the weight of decisions made, but with the subtlety of questions reframed. They had dinner at a beachside warung—grilled snapper, spicy sambal, coconut water—and the air between them was filled with a new kind of tension. Not sexual, not yet. But curious. Stirred. There was something thrilling in the idea that beneath Bali’s curated perfection lay a different Indonesia—raw, mystical, unexplainable.
Back at the villa, Luca opened his laptop and searched for more. A series of YouTube videos—grainy, shaky, often narrated in hushed tones—showed glimpses of Kemukus: a hilltop mosque, dimly lit stalls, couples slipping into shadows. Some videos were blurred, censored. Others weren’t. The faces were always obscured, as if secrecy was part of the ritual’s power.
Elisa stood behind him, towel wrapped around her wet hair. “Is that it?” she asked. “That’s the sacred hill?”
He nodded. “Near Sragen. East Java. About an eight-hour trip from Yogyakarta.”
“Looks... anti-climactic.”
“That’s the point,” he said. “It’s not supposed to look magical. It’s just a hill. But people give it power.”
Elisa bit her lip. “Power born from transgression. That’s sexy. In a dark way.”
Luca turned to look at her. “You want to go?”
She looked at the screen, then at him. “I want to see it. I don’t know why. But yes.”
They kissed that night with a slower burn, a quieter hunger. Not out of desire alone, but because their thoughts were already climbing the hill they had not yet seen. The idea of the journey had already planted itself, like a seed nestled in flesh.
Two days later, they booked a flight to Yogyakarta. The itinerary was innocent enough—Borobudur, Prambanan, street food in Malioboro. Luca told himself this was about architecture and history. Elisa told herself it was about adventure and irony. Neither of them admitted the truth aloud: that they were being drawn by something unspeakable. Not for the sex. Not even for the myth. But for the breach—the moment where reason gives way to ritual.
At the airport, as they waited at the gate, Elisa whispered: “What if we did it? Just hypothetically.”
Luca turned. “Did what?”
“The ritual.”
He blinked. “You mean... with strangers?”
She smiled with only her eyes. “It’s just a thought experiment.”
Luca’s pulse quickened. “You’re insane.”
“Am I?” she asked. “Or just curious?”
The announcement came, and they boarded. But her question lingered, neither answered nor dismissed.
Hello everyone, hopefully in good health and a lot of fortune, I have just published my first book, please help review honestly on KDP, thank you very much.
https://a.co/d/aatSgwB
The plane lifted off. Below them, the island of Bali shrank into blue. Ahead lay Java: older, heavier, a land where kings fucked queens in the shadows, and mountains remembered sins longer than men remembered names.
ns3.142.166.23da2
