War Priest: The Complete Series, page 68
Was it Chimaura? Had it been Thunderaura? Or was it something else entirely?
For the time being, it didn’t matter.
“Right…” Arik looked from Hojo’s headless body back to his daughter. “Let me… let me heal you first.”
****
A wall of water shot before Arik and Tayaura, tossing a few of the Crimsonian blades out of their direct path. Arik now wore Hojo’s conical hat with the slit in the front, partially shielding his eyes. He sent the Whispering Sword to the side, the blade splintering past a group of false shinobi who were trying to rally together.
“Almost there!” Meosa hovered behind the two, a pillar of water carrying Hojo’s body and his severed head. “Keep pushing forward!”
Sheathed at Arik’s waist was Hojo’s blackened blade, the disciple not yet ready to wield two weapons, the Whispering Sword when paired with the Mask of the Fallen strong enough to ward off anyone that came their way.
Even if he was able to handle the majority of their assailants, Tayaura made it a point to engage whoever the Whispering Sword spared in its hurricane of strikes, her movements fast and precise, not unlike the way Arik had seen Hojo fight. Thinking of the master illusionist brought a lump to his throat, but the disciple knew he needed to press on and reach Basha, Istvan, and Nyoko.
It was what he wanted, the disciple had to remind himself.
Arik swallowed the urge to turn back to the smoke and fire in an attempt to find Nobunaga. Not only that, there was Tatum, Sonjin, and the female blade, all three of whom seemed to have disappeared. Arik kept anticipating that they would join the fight in some way, but they hadn’t, which led him to believe that they had escaped with Nobunaga to serve as his protection.
He’d seen horses earlier. But there were ways to travel quickly, and if Arik and Tayaura moved fast enough, perhaps they could catch up with the warlord himself.
We need to make it out of here first, Arik thought as a Crimsonian blade shot toward him, the man much faster than those the Whispering Sword had already cut down. He was older too, Arik recognizing this immediately in his form and his overall body language.
Arik’s blade zipped forward and the Crimsonian blocked each of his rapid-fire strikes with one large blade. His frenzied movement caused Arik to take a step back, the Whispering Sword retreating and reforming into a solid piece.
“Let’s do this together, my boy!”
Inspired by Meosa, Arik went for his opponent again, the disciple focusing on mirroring the man’s cadence and breaking it. Their swords collided; Arik was forced to take a few steps back. He looked up, and as he did the Mask of the Fallen revealed the best place to strike, the red beam connected to the side of the man’s thigh.
The disciple was just about to send the Whispering Sword forward when the Crimsonian man gasped. The tip of a sword bloomed from the front of his robes, courtesy of Tayaura, who stood behind him, a dark look on her face.
Arik caught up with the female illusionist and the two continued on, Meosa floating Hojo’s body behind them.
They reached the front of the first camp to find even more fighting, the merchants and other civilians adding to the chaos. It appeared as if many had seized on the opportunity, some robbing and fighting, others seemingly trying to get revenge on a Crimsonian blade who may have been harsh to them.
A flash of fire drew Arik’s eyes, especially with the unnatural way that it arced up and came swinging back down. Arik spotted Istvan, the northern man with his shirt off fighting several Crimsonians at once, a couple of charred bodies near him.
Fighting beside him was Nyoko, fast with her axe, the Jadean woman’s face partially hidden by the mountain lion cap. Basha swung his femur club behind the two, able to take out several false shinobi at once. Even the bravest Crimsonians seemed to have a hard time summoning the courage to fight Basha, at least until a man who carried himself like a commander pointed his two swords at the gashadokuro and charged.
He was soon sent flying directly into the pillower’s tent, which just so happened to be on fire.
“You’re here!” Istvan said, his eyes leaping from Arik and Tayaura to Hojo. Even though he barely knew the master illusionist, a mixture of sadness and shock traced across his face. He grunted, and smacked an incoming false shinobi with his hammer. The man’s body ignited; Istvan kicked him away.
“We need to keep moving,” Tayaura said, her voice a bit haggard, face now partially obscured by Hirokuni’s black conical hat as she spoke to Istvan and Nyoko for the first time.
“Are all three camps on fire?”
“As far as we know, yes,” Arik told Istvan. “It worked. The flaming sparrows worked.”
Istvan glanced back to the smoke and fire behind them. “I can see that. Nyoko, it’s time to go. Basha! Wrap it up!”
The gashadokuro was too busy swinging his giant club to hear Istvan.
“I’ll tell him,” said Meosa. “Just focus on getting to safety, all of you.”
“This way!” Istvan ran toward the woods, and as he did he began winding up his hammer. He stopped, and sent a pillar of flames forward, igniting anything it came into contact with. “Come on,” he said, motioning toward Arik, Tayaura, and Nyoko. “The path won’t be clear for long.”
Arik could feel the heat as he ran alongside Istvan, Tayaura behind him, Nyoko at the back. He slowed to let the others pass, just in case someone needed healing. The four reached the start of the bramble, and as a group they pushed further into the forest, away from the calamity, the flames and explosions.
They reached a small clearing, Istvan catching his breath as he asked. “Where to now?”
The disciple glanced from Tayaura to Meosa, who still carried Hojo’s head and body. “Is Basha coming?”
“He said he’ll make his own way back. I think it’s best, my boy. It will be much easier to disappear without a towering bag of bones following after us. Do not worry about him. He can handle himself, I’m sure.”
“Where to now?” Istvan asked again, the northern man still charged with adrenaline even though the flames on his hammer had petered out.
“Nobunaga escaped, but the leader of the false shinobi is dead,” Tayaura said.
“Nobunaga escaped?” Istvan squinted toward the south. “Then that would mean that he headed to the border, or maybe to Iga to regroup and then head to Omoto. Is that where we will go? If we act fast…”
“No,” Arik said with finality. “Not yet, anyway. We need to deal with his body.”
“The master illusionist?” Istvan nodded quickly. “What about Iga? They have a warrior cemetery there.”
Arik shook his head. “Hojo wasn’t a warrior, and he deserves better. He deserves… he deserves to be buried in Moonagwa, before the Mourning Courtyard.”
“Moonagwa?” Tayaura asked.
Arik slowly nodded. “There is a crypt there that is empty.”
“Do you have the rights to the crypt?” Nyoko asked.
Meosa laughed. “Rights?”
“The crypt has been abandoned. It is where I got the Whispering Sword. And it is where Hojo will be buried. He will be remembered for what he did, he must be. If it wasn’t for him, Nobunaga would have made it to the north. The war would have started, and there would have been little we could have done about it. Nobunaga was planning to leave tomorrow,” Arik told Istvan and Nyoko. “Hojo’s strategy prevented a war.”
“Judging by the fire and explosions, your father should be remembered as a hero,” Istvan told Tayaura.
Tayaura merely nodded. “Moonagwa, then the Crimson Realm to finish what we started and rescue your sister.”
“There are itako in Moonagwa who may be able to speak to your father,” said Nyoko.
“Itako? You believe in those superstitions?” Istvan asked.
“I do,” Arik told him. “Itako have pointed me in the right direction twice now. I wouldn’t have the Mask of the Fallen or the Whispering Sword without them. So we can meet with an itako, if you would like to do that, Tayaura.”
“Yes. I believe he may have left a double somewhere. I would like to find it.”
“A double?” Istvan asked Tayaura. When she didn’t respond, he glanced from Nyoko to the disciple and shrugged. “I guess I’ll figure that part out later.”
“Let’s just get to the campsite and go from there.” Arik could smell smoke in the air, but he could no longer see the fire, nor could he hear the turmoil they had left in their wake.
A wave of determination washed over him as they started deeper into the woods.
Arik would rescue his sister. He would kill Nobunaga, and he would stop any more Crimsonian advances. In doing so, he would honor Hojo’s legacy, and whether he liked it or not, Arik would become the War Priest.
He was already halfway there.
Book Three: A Summer’s Snow
Part One
.Chapter One.
“Before you deceive others, you need to understand how to deceive yourself.”
–Hojo de Minami, a master illusionist, one of the last instructors of the classic School of Illusion, killed in Year 1599.
Tayaura stood in front of Arik Dacre holding her blackened sword, a hint of silver running down the fuller. The estranged daughter of Hidden Warrior Hojo, the man who had affected Arik’s life in profound ways, wore her kitsune-mask beneath her hood as she moved into position.
As always, he couldn’t get a read on her.
They had traveled for two days now, and during that time, there had been no indication in Tayaura’s behavior that she had lost her father. Only once had Arik caught Tayaura palming the crystal kunai that her father had received from Sukitoma, the kami that lived on a sacred lake far outside Moonagwa. Recalling that brief moment caused him to pause, which turned out to be a near fatal mistake as Tayaura feigned an attack, transitioned around Arik, and brought her sword from shoulder to shoulder across the top of his back, instantly drawing blood.
“Are you trying to get yourself killed?” asked Meosa, who was on the sidelines, alongside the other two that had joined them, Istvan with his flaming hammer currently put away, Nyoko, the mountain woman, with her axe resting on one shoulder.
Arik, who was shirtless, yet who wore the Mask of the Fallen and Hojo’s slitted conical hat, brought his shoulders back. As he did, his recent wound began to stitch up on its own, the blood that had already appeared trailing down the lumps of his exposed spine, mixing with beads of perspiration.
Arik swept a strand of his long dark hair out of his face. “Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize to me, apologize to yourself,” Meosa told him. “At least you are smart enough to remove your robes so you don’t ruin them. And why? Why do we have to do this in the first place? You never trained in such a brutal manner with dear Hojo.”
Arik glanced down at the Whispering Sword, which was currently no different than any other weapon. His eyes dropped to the other sword sheathed at his waist. He now had Hojo’s blade as well, but the disciple had yet to use the two swords together. He had drawn them at the same time, feeling the change of weight in his hands as he held the two blades. It was hard enough using one weapon, especially a weapon like the Whispering Sword and the way that its blade would elongate and split in two, operating as two sharp whips. It should have given him an advantage, but he’d never trained with two distinct blades before. And against an opponent like Tayaura, his current skill level only showcased how advanced her sword training was compared to his.
Like Hojo, Tayaura used a mixture of Chimaura and Thunderaura, a ‘bastardized interpretation’ of the latter, according to Meosa. This meant her strikes came with an extra push, better speed, sometimes sparks of electricity. The sudden trickery of her attacks through feints and other ways to take an opponent off guard made her very hard to defend against. Yet she hadn’t exhibited any of the more advanced techniques that Arik had only seen a few times from Hojo, like when he had morphed his face, or when he had replaced Tayaura at the very last moment, saving her from Sengum Minamoto’s deathstrike.
That occurrence, that terrible final act of self-sacrifice by her father, had played out in Arik’s mind dozens of times over their journey toward Moonagwa, where they intended to bury Hojo at the mourning courtyard. Throughout their journey, Meosa had been responsible for carrying Hojo’s body and his severed head, both of which were now draped in spare robes. Anyone coming upon their group would have stumbled upon a strange sight indeed—a cloth-draped body that appeared at times as if it were floating behind them; Tayaura wearing the black conical hat of her father’s teacher, Hirokuni, the illusionist often in her kitsune mask; Arik dressed in a similar manner and with two swords, his mask that of a demonic entity; Istvan with a big hammer and his haori cape tied around his waist and his completely shaven head, no eyebrows; and Nyoko, with her mountain lion cloak and her axe.
They should have certainly drawn attention to themselves, yet the group hadn’t encountered anyone as of late, not even any yokai. Not only that, having Nyoko in their group had come with an instant advantage, the hunter able to devise traps, track animals, and find better paths that even Tayaura hadn’t noticed. Arik was glad to have Nyoko around.
“We can go again,” Arik said as he got back into position in front of Hojo’s daughter.
As he did, the blade of his sword began to split into two, Arik’s control over the legendary weapon at the point now that using it felt completely natural. Even so, the red line connecting the tip of his weapon to a perfect kill zone on Tayaura remained solid. This was the true curse of the Mask of the Fallen, the mask unable to differentiate friend from foe.
Tayaura lowered her blade. “You could be an itako in the way that you bleed,” she said, referring to what Arik knew to be a Jadean shamanic practice of self-harm for divination purposes.
Istvan stretched his arms over his head and yawned. “Does this mean the two of you are done?”
“I’m ready for more.”
“Give it up, disciple,” said Meosa. “The shinobi-ess is clearly out of your league.”
Istvan approached Arik with little concern that Arik was still in a combat stance. “I think we can make it a few more miles before we rest for the evening. What do you think?”
Arik confirmed this with Tayaura, and once it was clear that training was over, the Whispering Sword returned to its dormant form.
Istvan continued: “In the morning we can part ways for now, as discussed. I think it is best for Nyoko and me to meet the two of you in Omoto whenever you are done. We will be right there on the border, ready to go with you to the Crimson Realm. In the meantime, we can continue to train through warrior pilgrimages.”
“They don’t have the kind of training that you are looking for there,” Arik told Istvan, “not like they have in Iga. No warrior courtyards in Omoto, not that I saw anyway.”
“You were there?”
Arik nodded. “I spent time working in an infirmary in one of the arenas they use for slave tournaments.”
“Slave tournaments?” Istvan lowered his gaze. “Always was more brutal toward the border. What about on the Crimsonian side? You wouldn’t suppose they have courtyards for warrior pilgrimages there, do you?”
“They do,” Tayaura told Istvan, her hood pressed back now, kitsune mask up on her forehead. She wiped her face with her arm. “I’m sure you’ll find plenty of people to fight down there.”
****
Even if Hojo was covered traveling with his corpse both sad and complicated. Yet no one complained about it, Istvan and Nyoko both understanding the importance of honoring Tayaura’s father. To Arik, it felt like there was a true void in his life now, one that he didn’t think possible after the attack on his Academy. As strange as Hojo was, the man held more knowledge than the famed libraries of Ezochi. His death was a true loss, one that Arik knew would continue to have ripple effects through his life.
As Arik sat that night in what was supposed to be meditation, he recalled the story that Hojo had told him about a man named Johmar de Avarga, who had left a double behind to spend one final night with his brother. He had learned from Tayaura that both Hojo’s replicating ability, and the power to leave an imprint, were known in the School of Illusion as forgotten techniques. Since her father’s death, he had yet to ask her any more about this skill. Had Hojo left a double behind? And if so, where?
Arik let this thought filter away as he calmed his breath. He knew what chi felt like, that it was all around him, and as he sat there, his heart growing quiet, he could suddenly sense the universal stream of power at his fingertips. He could also sense a core of energy currently within him, one related to his Wound Transfer ability and the cuts he had received in their sparring earlier. From what he had studied through the Divine Branch of Wound Transfer, this stored chi filtered away over the course of a night, only to be replenished again.
Through his years of training, Arik had learned to self-gauge his current levels. There was no object that he knew of that would help him better understand how much chi he currently had stored, what he could feasibly transfer. It was entirely instinctual. And there was always a caveat regarding what he was able to do—to transfer the pain of a wound out of himself, that stored damage, required him to take injury. It still hurt. Even if smaller injuries didn’t carry the same pain that they used to, other ones, especially injuries where he would need to regrow bone or repair an internal organ, could be quite painful.
