People believe that the reason for mastering swordsmanship is to be able to cut down one’s enemies. For myself, however I seek to master swordsmanship because through it I seek divine principle. If once I attain this, my heart will be as still water, calm and quite, like a clear mirror lucid and bright, able to cope instantly with any situation.
#ThrowbackThursday Tenchu: The Forgotten Ninja Series
#ThrowbackThursday Tenchu: The Forgotten Ninja Series
Many people around the world watch the Ninja Warrior and Ultimate Beastmastergameshows. Centred around a comically oversized and carefully padded obstacle course, the shows are an absolute triumph of non-lethal contraptions, with exaggerated commentary from various entertainment personalities as competitors negotiate awkward hurdles and tumble into water hazards. There are no shurikens but lots…
It looks like Fujieda Baian was not the only inspiration for Tesshu fujioka. Another bald headed assassin called Nenbutsu no Tetsu from 1973 Hissatsu Shiokinin TV series. Checkout those bone displacement techniques complete with X-Ray shots
So! It’s been quite a while, creatively. I haven’t done much with my OCs no thanks to my fandom obsessions cycling back around, and I’ve been stuck in Sonic for a while.
There is another story that’s been in the works. I’ve posted Jasmine and Auberon’s fateful meeting, so now I’m going to treat y’all to a work-in-progress of Roan and Tesshu’s own meeting and their subsequent friendship. It’s very sparse, only a couple pages, but I like what I have so far and I thought I’d post it here for now. The title is a WIP too, I dunno if I’ll keep it. I might if I don’t think of something better, since it pretty much encapsulates what kicks everything off.
I appreciate any and all feedback! Related art here and here
He did it! He finally did it! A safe, unsupervised, unassisted teleportation spell! Roan felt so proud of himself, he could barely contain his excitement! Wait until he told everyone!
That is, once he figured out where in the world he ended up. The lad's original intention had been to rematerialize in a desert area, not in the frozen tundra in the middle of a windstorm! Not only that, it was supposed to be spring, yet the chill told him that winter still held the land in a tight frozen grip. How did it happen? Did he make a mistake somewhere? Perhaps his mind faltered, or he lost just enough concentration. Roan was too disoriented to figure out where he went wrong. He had to find shelter or risk freezing to death in the new and unforgiving land.
Being so far north he knew he wouldn't be able to mentally contact even Ellah, his present teacher. If he had more training, perhaps. Roan hugged himself and rapidly rubbed his arms to keep from losing too much heat, then started off southward. He could figure out his exact location once he either found some shelter, some people, or a coastline. He could worry about the locals' reaction to his appearance later.
The wind howled relentlessly, battering the stranded elf with a mix of rain and ice that cut into his cheeks and frosted his white-silver hair with crystals. Visibility was dismal, as Roan could barely see in front of his face. Somewhere in the distance, wolves howled, and in response the grunts of some kind of deer warned of the preadtors' approach. The animals weren't that far, prompting Roan to put his guard up. If the pack deemed him easy enough prey, his tribe could send their prayers in memory of his recklessness.
"For once, I think I agree with Auberon's favorite nickname for me," he muttered through chattering teeth. "I can just--brr!--hear him now... 'His stupidty finally got him what he deserved! An icy death in the middle of nowhere!'" A gust of wind silenced him, the bitter cold too much to talk through.
Thousands of miles southeast of Roan's wayward location, in the woods known to the local humans as The Big Thicket, the elfin elder Ellah tried her best to pinpoint Roan. Her mental ability was the strongest of the tribe's, but even that had its limits. Back in her race's beginning the power was much stronger, but most elves nowadays hardly had any use for such a long mental reach. Roan had the makings of possessing the same ability as she, but he required extensive training and mind disciplining.
Ellah sighed to herself, resting her cortex for the moment. Wherever Roan ended up, he was too far to reach. The deserts of the American Southwest would have been reachable for her, but much farther than California would be pushing it. Just where had the lad ended up? She brushed stray gray strands away from her nose and sat on a fresh stump, wondering how she would tell anyone that she lost a tribesman's whereabouts. A student, no less! That made everything her responsibility. There wasn't much else to do but wait a while and keep trying, and pray that Roan was safe.
How in the world could a place be so damnably COLD in the SPRING?! Roan had heard of the arctic and antarctic having such low temperatures, but experiencing that firsthand was jarring to say the least. His body shivered and his legs burned. It took so much energy just to keep himself standing, even more to walk straight. The sounds of pack, herd, and flock were long gone, leaving the elfin lad truly alone for the first time in his life. He shuddered at the realization. And at the cold. Curse this cold.
Roan walked on for what seemed like forever. The terrain finally gave way to a wide valley, but the storm raged on. He thought he smelled smoke for an instant before getting pelted by yet more ice. He couldn't feel his face, and his extremeties were numb. So tired... Did he even shiver anymore? He still couldn't see a damned thing beyond the icy curtain of sleet and snow. He could feel his strength ebbing, but his will kept him staggering forward. Being so ill-prepared for anything going wrong would wind up costing him his life. Roan grit his teeth and took another unsteady step, his toes unexpectedly catching on an exposed rock.
And so, Roan learned the ground and the stones up north felt one and the same. He landed hard on his face and chest, his grunt puffing up a little snow and grass. The elfin lad tried to get up, but it was as if two great weights on his back held him in place. He quickly realized he no longer had the strength to move. How long had he been walking? Surely not that long. Perhaps he was just that weak to any extreme cold. Perhaps ... if he just rested for a moment, he could rise again and continue...
The winds seemed to only pick up as the day wore on. To anyone caught out in it, it could mean certain death. Even a hastily-built rickety wooden and metal shack would have succumbed had it not been built under a protective rocky outcrop in the valley's foothills. Tesshu sighed to himself, resolving to check for any damages once the storm subsided. For the time being he would nurse his fire and listen to those haunting howls as the air funneled itself through the mountains before billowing down to the valley at full speed.
The young man had just reached adulthood, and as such his father decided to send him on a fool's journey to get him used to senses he already made full use of. Whatever Tesshu's full-demon father wanted the boy to learn or discover, the blonde couldn't think of anything. He already obtained his Soul Scythe, been to several Reaper Clan ceremonies, and even guided a few souls to either Heaven or Hell for their afterlife. All he really needed was some finer tuning of his skills. Then again, he thought, this just might be Father’s idea of "fine tuning".
Though generally scorned by both humans and full-blooded demons, half-demons like Tesshu tended to have as great or greater abilities coupled with features unique to mortal humans. Tesshu's father was one of the few who embraced his halfling spawn, even going so far as to properly marry Tesshu's human mother. Luckily, the Reaper Clan in general held a more lax attitude about the situation, so long as the child learned the Clan ways. Thus, Tesshu wound up living a normal ... ish life.
The young half-demon decided to turn in for the night, confident the shelter would hold up, but suddenly a familiar kind of pull tugged at his heart. Tesshu instantly homed in on it, and he recognized the aura of a living soul weakening in order to leave its body. Tesshu might have ignored it if it wasn't so close. It also had a distinct resonance, something he never sensed before. What kind of being held a soul like that? The normally stoic halfling softly gasped at the fact the soul was fading fast. The storm, of course!
With an unusual sense of urgency, Tesshu donned his parka, boots, and gloves, then headed out into the cold that became colder by the minute.
Yamaoka Tesshu was a tutor of the emperor. He was also a master of fencing and a profound student of Zen.
His home was the abode of vagabonds. He had but one suit of clothes, for they kept him always poor.
The emperor, observing how worn his garments were, gave Yamaoka some money to buy new ones. The next time Yamaoka appeared he wore the same old outfit.
