I’ll never beat him.
The fact was just as plain as his latest set of bruises, and hurt just as much. Even with the power of the Kuzu-Ryuu-Sen, even with his greater size and the speed of his strong young body, he still was no match for his smaller and older master.
“You done sulking, boy?” Seijuurou Hiko growled.
“I wasn’t sulking, Shishou,” the young man replied guiltily, springing to his feet.
“Liar. Go do your chores.”
All my strength, all my size… they’re worthless against his speed! How can I ever be as fast as he is? I thought I’d mastered the Kuzuu-Ryuu-Sen, but against him I might as well be standing still!
The buckets sloshed water down the sides of his hakama as he lugged them from the stream. What could be faster than the ultimate speed of the Kuzu-Ryuu-Sen? He thought about it all during dinner, through cleaning up, the puzzle followed him into sleep.
He dreamed of fighting. He faced opponent after opponent, until his arm went beyond aching to numbness, his chest was on fire, and his sword weighed as much as two full water buckets. He flashed through technique after technique. Ryuu-Tsui-Sen, Ryuu-Kan-Sen, Ryuu-Sou-Sen, Ryuu-Shou-Sen, Kuzu-Ryuu-Sen. There was something he had to protect, something of supreme importance to him. He didn’t think about what it was, in the dream, but he knew he could not lose. Finally, one last enemy stood before him, swift as wind, fierce as fire, immovable as a mountain. His superior in power. I cannot lose. I must not lose. The enemy took his stance. Kuzu-Ryuu-Sen. What can beat it…
And he knew. He knew how he could be faster than his master’s Kuzu-Ryuu-Sen. One little change, an eyeblink shaved off the time… his left foot slid forward and he dropped into battou-jutsu stance. The shadowy figure started forward and his own blade flashed out…
“Well, baka deshi? Have you discovered a technique that can beat me?” Even though he had long ago passed his master in height, the older man seemed to tower over him. It annoyed the hell out of him.
“Maybe.” He grinned. In formless stance, sword sheathed, he waited for his master’s attack. With a cry, Seijuurou Hiko rushed at his pupil. The young man’s left foot slid forward, just as he practiced, and his blade snapped from the saya…
Hiko’s rush carried him past his pupil. With a snap the youth did chiburi; blood spattered on the spring grass. Blood? What…
“Well done, boy,” said his master in an approving tone. He turned. Hiko was beaming at him, his smile nearly as wide as the crimson gash across his chest… and then he toppled forward.
“SHISHOU!!”
“You’re the first… to ever beat me,” the dying man whispered. “Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu… is your school now. Your… succession… technique…” His eyes closed, and he no longer breathed.
“Shishou! SHISHOU!!”
No… you can’t be dead. I can’t have killed you! I didn’t learn the sword to kill, only to protect! And you were supposed to be better than me, you were always supposed to be better! He stared at the body in disbelief, while the sun climbed higher and the day warmed, until the buzzing of insects reminded him of the need to bury the dead.
It took him the rest of the day to break the hard, dry ground open with the mattock, to scoop up the soil with his hands until he had a hole big enough to accept his master’s stiffened body, deep enough that the animals of the forest would not dig up the remains. He set up a stone to mark the grave and poured sake over it, and sat by the grave as he had sat by the body, unmoving through the long hours of the night.
“Baka deshi!”
He looked around to see where the voice had come from. There was nothing there, nothing except the moonlit grave. I must be dreaming. That’s it, I’m asleep. Shishou can’t really be speaking to me.
“Stop acting like you knocked over the rice pot!”
He winced at the memory of the time, early in his training, when he had gotten carried away with practicing Ryuu-Tsui-Sen and upset the cookpot into the fire. Shishou had never let him live it down; it had always been a reminder not to go overboard with new techniques. But he’d wrecked worse than dinner this time.
“Have you forgotten everything I taught you? Remember a sword’s true nature, that it’s a weapon for killing and nothing else. Every time you unsheathe your blade, you must be prepared to kill – and just as prepared to die.”
“Shishou…”
“No more.” There was a smile in the voice. “Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu can only have one master. That name is yours now.”
“Shishou… don’t go…”
It was morning, and he was still sitting beside the grave, alone. It was real, it hadn’t been a bad dream. Shishou was still dead.
He knew he should move on. He knew he should leave the house with its memories, find people who needed his protection, eventually find his own student and pass on his skills. But he couldn’t bring himself to leave. It was as though his spirit was paralyzed. So he tended the small vegetable field, practiced his forms… and waited.
He was harvesting burdock roots when he saw the three men walk past. They had the weathered skins and stooped bodies of farmers, with a drawn look about them that spoke of too many bad harvests. They peered at him as though they were looking for something, walked past, and then a little while later came back again. They stopped and spoke among themselves. Finally one of them was bold enough to call out to him.
“Excuse me… do you know of a swordsman called Seijuurou Hiko who lives around here?”
Shishou? What could they want with Shishou?
“Swordsmen are trouble,” he replied. “Best to stay clear of them.”
“We have heard that Seijuurou Hiko is different,” one of the peasants answered.
“Our lord went to fight in a war,” they went on. “We paid little heed – wars are the business of lords and samurai, not farmers. When no one came to collect our taxes we thought it a blessing. But then the bandits came and took our harvest, and no soldiers came to protect us.”
“We went to our lord’s castle and found it in ruins. So we have no lord, and there is no one to protect us.”
“We looked for swordsmen, but everyone we found wants to take service with powerful lords. No one is interested in helping ordinary people. But long ago we heard of a man called Seijuurou Hiko, who fought on behalf of peasants and townsfolk, so we came to see if he could help us. Do you know where we might find him?”
His eyes went to the mounded shape of the grave. Sorry, I killed the man you’re looking for.
They followed the direction of his eyes, and their shoulders slumped. “Naruhodo. If he is no longer in this world, then there is nothing we can do to save our families.” They turned away.
It tore at him. What did I learn the sword for, if not to protect people like these? And yet, there was no way he could ever explain to them how Shishou had died. Swordsmen might understand, but not peasants.
The answer came to him in his master’s words. Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu can only have one master. That name is yours now.
He smiled. For the first time since Shishou’s death, he felt whole, and he knew what he needed to do. He put down the mattock, picked up his sword from where he had rested it against the stone wall of the field, and thrust it through the ties of his hakama as he walked toward the farmers, smiling.
“I’m Seijuurou Hiko.”
NOTES, EXPLANATIONS ETC.
The underlying assumption behind this whole series is that Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu didn’t come into being as a finished creation. Something that has existed for nearly three centuries would naturally evolve over time. So… what if Amakakeru Ryuu no Hirameki wasn’t the original succession technique? What might be the feelings of the master who developed it?
We’re still back in the Sengoku here, with petty warlords fighting each other, and the peasants getting forgotten about (except at tax time). I can see a small village getting lost in the chaos, and then having no one to turn to when bandits attacked. (Okay, so I’ve been watching Seven Samurai again…)
And of course, the really Interesting Times are yet to come!