What is honor? They say it isn't gray. It's black and white, like the Oda code.
Ima Yoshimoto's army marched into Kyoto in 1560, overwhelming our border castles. During their celebration, under the cover of darkness, we ninjas attacked.
Rain pelts enemy tents, cloaking death in the shadows. I am one of Oda Nobunaga's ghosts, sent to slice through the confidence of a superior force.
Why don't we remember what came before birth? Whatever lies on the other side is either too brief or too bad to remember. Much like death.
Tonight, I am that death.
Something about your entire body being wrapped in dark linen makes you feel a false sense of safety. But behind the mask, under all the layers, you're truly terrified. Bravery is an attribute held in high regard. But when there is no choice to cower, is fighting really brave?
The only solace during combat is that the drawn sword takes up your soul. Bravery? Perhaps disassociation.
I've been told that the quickening—when your consciousness merges with your blade—is what makes a true samurai. A warrior who can empty himself completely, becoming nothing but the cutting edge of steel. I didn't believe it until I felt it. Until I became it.
Moments ago, I was part of a larger movement—fifty dark-clad figures spreading silently through Yoshimoto's camp like poison in sake. Now I'm alone, just me, my blade, and the mission.
The sounds of first contact reach me—screams, metal clashing. No reflections—our blades covered in ash to prevent detection.
Wet mud squelches beneath my tabi as I slip between guard posts. Sliced throats cool in the rain, silenced by my brothers before me.
Lightning illuminates the camp for half a heartbeat. I freeze, becoming part of the shadow cast by a rice cart. Thunder masks a sentry's death rattle. My mask is too wet to breathe through, so I pull it down under my chin.
Ahead, I spot Yoshimoto himself—not within his tent as expected, but outside, engaged in fierce combat with General Naga near a row of supply wagons.
I move closer, watching. Naga, disarmed, struggles against the larger warlord, holding out only by pinning Yoshi's sword hand in his armpit.
Yoshimoto's headbutt explodes Naga's nose. "You come into my camp?" he roars. I feel déjà vu.
Yoshimoto kicks Naga away, lifts his sword for the killing blow.
"Now," Yoshimoto bellows, as the storm approaches its peak, "you can go home to Oda on the wind—"
Fear slows time. I soar over a barrier, preparing to draw.
His sandal advances for the strike.
Then it happens. The quickening.
I am no longer Hiryu. I become the blade, slicing toward Yoshimoto's neck. Impossibly, he parries, recognizing me. His concentration breaks.
When you've never known mercy, you never think twice.
Yoshimoto's hesitation in that recognition is his end. I complete the arc as my blade.
For the briefest moment, his head remains atop his shoulders, as if debating whether to accept its fate. Then his body drops from beneath his head with all the tranquility of a severed marionette.
Consciousness returns with the click of my blade in its sheath.
General Naga is already stuffing the head into a rice bag when a messenger relays that only two enemy officers survived the assault. They've joined our ranks—wise choice.
The western wood thickens with our forces. Ninjas storm past tents only occupied by the dead. Naga's heartless gaze flickers in the torchlight. Orange reflections dare me to take credit for the kill. I submit, knowing the command tent beside our fight remains unsearched. Looking down, I listen as he barks an order and tosses his trophy to a passing ninja.
Rain grays out the whipping canvases of the temporary homes. Shadows bound from cover to cover, their backs heavy with the loot of the fallen—a death sentence if found on return.
Actions crossing the line of honor are suicide. The Shogun's vague rules of war rely heavily on one's conscience, though Oda's generals blur that line.
From the corner of my eye, I watch General Naga leap light-footed onto the crest of a clay rise—a ridge quickly becoming a bloodied channel to the Sakai River.
A crack of lightning electrifies the humid air. Sparks spray from a cypress branch. In the bright light, I see teeth below a bloodied nose—Naga's smile or grimace, I can't tell which.
In the moment of light-blindness that follows, I hear something coming for me through the dark. Splintering branches from the lightning strike almost drowned out its approach.
Yoshimoto's hell hound has come from the tent.
Before my vision can adjust to the darkness again, I thrust my left forearm out, intercepting the dog's jagged vice grip. My soft skin is saved only by the dense bamboo guard strapped there.
The beast's weight drives me back, its jaws working furiously to crush through my armor. But below the dog's unforgiving grip is my true target.
For a second time since Yoshimoto's bitter end, I feel the quickening. The blade slides from its scabbard, my soul from its shell.
In the brief time it takes to dispatch the animal, the makeshift town has become deserted. Our ninjas are retreating home along the trade route south of Kiyosu Castle.
Another flash of lightning floods the late Yoshimoto's tent in pale orange.
A silhouette moves inside.
I should be following my brothers back to Oda territory. My mission is complete. There's nothing more for me here than the risk of tardiness. That, and a shadow that dares me to stay.