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gabriel-gabdiel · 1 year

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Rurouni Yahiko Chapter 54: The Prodigal Son Strikes Back

The identity of the Prodigal Son has been revealed. He can now enact his revenge against the Minakatas.

The rest of the chapters of my Rurouni Kenshin fan fiction are available here. Enjoy.

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Immediately after Yahiko Myojin's loss to Satsuki Sakaguchi in their "friendly" sparring match at the Sakaguchi Dojo...

"BANZAI! (HOORAY!) BANZAI! BANZAI!" cheered the kendo students of Musou Madden Ryu after witnessing their amazing blonde bombshell of a foreigner teacher show that upstart kendo master from Tokyo what for.

Abelia La Cerca got caught up in all the cheering too, but instead of "Banzai", she repeatedly shouted, "VIVA SATSUKI!" over and over instead.

"I wouldn't celebrate if I were you," said Genzo Sakaguchi, the grandfather of Kyoko and Satsuki Sakaguchi (A.K.A. May Brooks). His arms crossed. His sourpuss face glaring at every one of his embarrassing students who got defeated by a teenaged kendo master from Tokyo and their own blonde gaijin (foreigner) English teacher.

A collective shudder and multiple groans filled the dojo as past memories of endless drills and grueling training filled the minds of all these Musou Madden Ryu students.

"Man, it's true what they say. They grow up so fast," whispered the pompadour-wearing Sho Kojima to Kinta Minakata.

Sho wore a haori and hakama with flowery colors so loud they looked like they belonged in a parade or festival. After all, he didn't wear colors. He wore flavors.

Kojima then reminisced, "I 'member when Satsuki-chan was just a wee lass. Look at her now. She's even better at naginatajutsu (glaive technique) than many a native practitioner I've personally seen."

Kinta could only nod, but more in agreement with his Master Genzo's sentiments over the pathetic state of the Musou Madden School's students (that he overheard) rather than with Sho's own praise of May Brooks (which fell on deaf ears).

He found it unacceptable that these so-called men were this terrible at swordsmanship. Were they so weak that they'd force women and children like Satsuki and Kyoko to act as bodyguards for the Minakata Family due to their incompetence? Had they no shame?

Meanwhile, Miss May Brooks herself noticed the intense stares of her two seniors and waved at them thusly.

May Brooks walked towards them with quick thumps of her socked feet on the wooden floor. She and Sho then greeted each other with respectful bows.

"Whaddya think, Sho-sensei? That Tsunami wasn't half-bad, right?" Satsuki said with a wink. "It looked as fast as one of your Tidal Waves, innit?"

"Not bad. Not bad at all. You still need to work on your close-range slashes like the Mangetsu Tsuki O Nari (Full Moon Slash), but your sense of maai (range) is superb as usual. You flogged him like a racehorse. Although I expected more welts from him."

"Blimey, he's a slippery one, he is. I was so gutted that Joshua-kun (Yahiko-kun) avoided so many of my strikes! He even left me gobsmacked with that last technique of his! It was mint! "

"...Uh, you're speaking gibberish again, Satsuki-chan."

"You wot, mate?"

Kojima sighed and scratched his cheek, smirking. He then said, "Are you havin' a giggle?" to the best of his abilities, with the words coming out more like, "Aru yu habingu a giguru?" thanks to his accent.

This seemed to wake Miss Brooks up. "Oh. OH! sorry guv'na! I mean, sorrymasen, Sho-sensei!"

With a chuckle, Sho patted May's golden-haired head like he would a cat.

"Good job. Just don't forget to work on your defense. That last exchange with that samurai kid almost gave me a heart attack. I thought you'd lost for sure."

Satsuki pouted adorably. "Stop treating me like a kid, Sho-sensei!"

***

Rurouni Yahiko

A Rurouni Kenshin Continuation Fan Fiction Story by Chester Castañeda

And now back to your regularly scheduled Japanese soap opera at Chinatown.

Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted materials that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.

***

Chapter 54: The Prodigal Son Strikes Back

***

Back at the Sakaguchi Dojo...

The juvenile-in-appearance Abelia La Cerca—the poster child of neoteny herself—asked Kinta, "Do you think Satsuki is good enough to take on the likes of my brother? Or the rest of the Brigands Guild?"

"If it were up to me, the Sakaguchis would not be placed anywhere near the Brigands Guild," Kinta answered, which surprised Abelia. He usually spoke much terser than that.

"Did you see me beat Joshua-kun, Kinta-sama?" May Brooks asked while blowing kisses at the morose swordsman. "I dedicate that fight to you!"

"It was splendid, Brooks-san," he said flatly, which made May pout.

"Call me Satsuki instead, Kinta-sama!" said May. She then "went there" after spotting Abelia, the "little girl" whom she'd only met for the first time then and there.

"Aw, and who's this? A new family friend? Is she going to be another member of the Sakaguchi Family?" she asked with twinkling, shining blue eyes.

"Q-Que paso? (W-What's happening?)" stuttered Abelia, her hazel eyes wide open and her face paler (than usual). "Who is this again, Kinta-sama? How does she know you?"

"Hello there, luv. What's your name?"

"Eh, hola! I mean, hello! My name is Abelia. Abelia La Cerca." Miss La Cerca bowed to Miss Brooks.

Brooks herself reminisced how her "Grandpa Genzo" rescued and adopted her as part of the Sakaguchi Family. She even got a Japanese name added to their family registry and everything after she was orphaned and stranded in Japan as a child.

Was this La Cerca girl a newly adopted daughter or granddaughter of the Sakaguchis?

"Aw, you're such a cutie," said Satsuki, who resisted the urge to pinch Abelia's cheeks.

The shy Señorita La Cerca pouted, moved behind Kinta, and tugged at his shirt.

Satsuki's jaw then dropped as she looked at Kinta, Abelia, then back to Kinta and said, "Oh no. Kinta-sama, don't tell me...!"

Kinta raised an eyebrow at the blonde in askance.

"Don't tell you what? What do you mean, Satsuki-chan?" Sho asked for Kinta's sake.

With tears in her bejeweled eyes, Satsuki said, "Blimey! Is she Kinta-sama's love child? Who's the mother? How could you betray me... uh, us this way, Kinta-sama!"

Kinta didn't do things like face-fault or drop face-first into the ground in exasperation—he was more the straight man than the idiot in a comedic sense—so thankfully Koijma was there to do such things for him.

"Now wait a damn minute! Abelia isn't Kinta's love child, you blonde bimbo! Jeez!" Sho decried for Kinta's sake, the corners of his mouth quivering as he resisted the urge to smirk, smile, or laugh out loud.

Then, with tears in her eyes, Abelia told May, "¡Ay, perdone! Señorita, por pabor! (Pardon me! Please, Miss!) I'm actually 20 years old!"

Everyone just stared at her afterwards, which led her to murmur, "Madre mia (My Mother)," under her breath.

Abelia appeared prepubescent, so she could pass herself off as half that age.

However, she actually lied about her age. No, she wasn't younger than 20 years old. She was older than that. As old as her brother Cain Merrick, in fact.

***

Several weeks later, at the Yokohama Chinatown...

Kinta Minakata had just confronted his alcoholic banker uncle, Tatsuya Minakata.

They were inside one of the offices of an affiliate company (a money trader outfit) that their front company, the Minakata Pharmaceuticals and Foreign Trade Corporation, bought out like the burgeoning zaibatsu (megacorp) that it was.

These offices crawled with bodyguards made up of police escorts, personal security guards, ex-samurais or ronin, ninjas, and even outright mercenaries-for-hire.

Uncle and nephew talked about the shady business dealings of Tatsuya's father and Kinta's grandfather, Toshiro Minakata.

About how, as a hatamoto-class samurai in direct service to (and thus only answerable to) the Tokugawa Shogunate, he took advantage of his position to supply opium to China during the Opium Wars of the 1830s to the 1860s.

He then invested his drug money to build the family fortune, seemingly taking cues from the rising Japanese middle-class full of merchants and businessmen.

Normally, samurai were closely associated with the middle and upper echelons of the warrior class. They trained as officers in military tactics and grand strategy.

As a decorated military veteran given the task of dealing with Chinese trade at the Port of Nagasaki during the Sakoku (Isolationism or Locked-Down Era of Japan), Toshiro not only policed the seas against Wokou (Dwarf Pirates). He also approved of practically government-sanctioned opium delivery to China that he and his family profited over for decades.

During the Tokugawa Era, samurai didn't need to build their wealth since they were privileged from the start. His peers called him greedy and corrupt. However, Toshiro was actually being as cunning as a fox.

In the height of irony, Toshiro established a pharmaceutical company that truly utilized the full potential of his family fortune from the Sengoku Jidai (Warring States Era) onwards, with the business doing double duty as the manufacturer of high-quality opium and laundering all that money back by making western-style medicine available to the Japanese citizens.

Toshiro basically used his spy history and connections, coded language, and secret intelligence tactics to pull the wool over the Shogunate's eyes and profit over China's own misfortune against western superpowers.

Then, before he could get caught with all his multimillion yen drug dealings, the Bakumatsu (End of the Shogunate Era) happened. The Minakatas were able to keep all their ill-gotten wealth as isolationism and the bakufu (shogunate) ended, with them easily handling the transition from one government administration to another.

The samurai class ended but they were able to transition as part of Japan's new ruling class, the oligarchy.

Meanwhile, even though Kinta Minakata was part of the Shogunate forces as the Mimawarigumi Battousai, his family didn't suffer from them choosing the losing side of the war.

Like with Hajime Saito of the Shinsengumi, he (and his family) ended up in good political standing with the Meiji Goverment exactly because of his strength and reputation.

Ironic, seeing that the likes of Takamori Saigo—an actual Ishin Shishi (Royalist)—ultimately got betrayed by his own allies despite being in the winning side of the war.

***

Yahiko was supposed to do some more sparring and training at the Sakaguchi Dojo in general and with May Brooks in particular when he caught wind of the recent news.

Their sparring session was canceled in favor of a trip at the nearest Chinatown in Yokohama.

From his conversations with May/Satsuki, he found out that the Minakatas were being targeted by a foreign mercenary group named the Brigands Guild.

This Brigands Guild had apparently closed in on the Minakata Family, leading to an emergency meeting filled with all their personal bodyguards, including the Sakaguchis.

Several of which were martial arts students from the Sakaguchi Family itself like Kyoko, Satoru, and Satsuki.

Should he interject himself into their personal business though? Yahiko was mostly interested in the Battousai Group, not the Brigands Guild.

The samurai kid shook his head. There would come a time when he'd end up face-to-face with Kaede Morinaga's Battousaigumi.

Then again, Kaede mentioned that Minakata also had connections with Shogo Amakusa's Hidden Christians as well.

She called him Amakusa's Kagemusha (Shadow Warrior) or something. She also called him a traitor to their cause.

Maybe Kinta was a past member turned enemy of the Battousai Group? Regardless, it was something worth checking out down the line.

For now, if Myojin could help his new friends out with the strength he gained from his adventures with his old friends—the Kenshingumi—then he would do so.

Besides which, what would Kenshin Kamiya (nee Himura) do in if he were in Yahiko's shoes right now? Would he not interject himself into other people's business for the sake of helping out?

Yahiko had to do this because Kenshin would do the same. He'd help out anyone in need before him in the best of his abilities, even to the point of self-sacrifice.

The young lad chuckled in remembrance of how Kenshin's stubborn nature when it came to sticking his nose into other people's business was how he was able to save him from a lifelong debt to the yakuza.

This strong sense of justice was what made Battousai Himura such a fearsome figure during the Bakumatsu.

Personally, it wasn't in Myojin's nature to pry into the affairs of others like some sort of interloper with a savior complex, but... maybe sometimes, being like Kenshin was the right thing to do.

So that was what Yahiko did. He became as Kenshin-like as he could muster while undergoing his Musha Shugyo (Warrior's Pilgrimage).

Involving himself with the Sakaguchis and Minakatas should also help him with his kendo training. Kind of.

There was no better way to sharpen his skills when it came to kendo than by roughing up some criminals and foiling the plans of gaijin assassins.

This was how he ended up tagging along with the Sakaguchis as the Minakata's extra security detail while one of the heirs of the fortune, Kinta, discussed disturbing family secrets within their Chinatown offices.

He thusly snuck into the room next to the offices where uncle and nephew were having a meeting of the minds, with them hurling accusations, dirty laundry, and skeletons in the family closet all the while.

He'd feign shock regarding how the Minakatas gained their wealth—though political connections, abuse of authority, and illegal drug dealings around the time when Japan limited its foreign trade—but his exposure to the likes of Jusanro Tani and the yakuza had long ago awakened him to the ugly truths of the Japanese elite and its corrupt oligarchs.

Meanwhile, the "empty" room he stayed at actually teemed with family bodyguards, among whom were several "ninjas" laying in wait using camouflage techniques and everything.

There was no way the Brigands Guild could possibly penetrate their impenetrable defenses, right?

***

Back in the offices of one of the Minakata Zaibatsu's affiliates...

Tatsuya reacted well enough to Kinta's probing questions. By physical force instead of words.

He'd already swung a fist at his nephew, who dodged it easily.

Kinta said, "You haven't answered my question. Was the company just a front for grandfather's drug cartel?"

Tatsuya harrumphed and straightened out his crumpled western-style suit.

"I remember the way you'd piss yourself whenever I came home pissed off and drunk. How'd a wet spot would form on your pants. Whenever you were in my way. Whenever you bothered me," Tatsuya, the banker of the Minakata Family, jeered at his nephew.

His sister's son. The son of the black sheep of the Minakata Family.

Kinta's uncle took another swing at Kinta, which made the nephew almost push the uncle to the floor in self-defense.

He would've done it too had he not sensed another fist headed his way from behind him that he had to block using an open palm with a loud smack.

One of Tatsuya's bodyguards—a man as tall as a lamppost—towered ominously over even the infamous Mimawarigumi Battousai, who himself was already taller then the average Japanese man.

This person then backed off, seemingly sensing the bloodlust of Kaita the Sanada Ninja, who'd by then unsheathed blade on instinct.

The camouflaged ninja then sheathed his kunai back and hid his presence.

Kinta grunted in acknowledgement of his uncle's strange guardian. The both of them then eyed each other warily.

So Tatsuya brought with him some extra insurance. Or protection.

Something about the lanky bodyguard's face left Kinta unsettled, though. He couldn't put his finger on just what.

"I don't care if you're the Mimawarigumi's version of the Ishin Shishi's Battousai. To me, you'll always be my younger sister's bratty li'l kid," said Tatsuya with a dismissive harrumph.

Kinta frowned as his uncle grimaced at him in kind. Tatsuya's sister, huh?

A memory floated in the surface of his mind. That of a mother he never knew who brought dishonor to their family.

"Don't you forget that, you insipid pissant. Learn your place," said the sneering Tatsuya, who smoothened out his ruffled western-style three-piece suit. "We could've banished you along with your shameful mother. Have a bit more gratitude, you ingrate!"

Kinta's mother and Tatsuya's younger sister had a name though.

The Black Sheep of the Minakata Family. The daughter who was disowned by her own mother and his grandmother, Grandma Mieko.

Kinta's estranged mother.

Her name was Aoi Minakata.

"Hearing" her name in his mind left him with a complicated feeling in his heart. Or several feelings. A mixture of pity, guilt, longing, betrayal, and shame.

Kinta's father was the husband she cheated on with a foreign dignitary. The man who, in turn, killed that same gaijin and then took his own dishonored life to save face and his family's honor.

Save face? More like take the coward's way out.

His name was Azuma Minakata (nee Akahori).

Under the bushido ideal, if a samurai failed to uphold his honor, the only way to regain it was by seppuku (ritual suicide).

It was just like his belligerent Uncle Tatsuya to air out the family's dirty laundry when confronted with the skeletons in their closet.

On the other hand, Kinta did force him to do so by accusing their beloved patriarch, his grandfather Toshiro Minakata, of being a drug lord who laundered all that blood money into legitimate pharmaceutical and medicinal businesses.

Their family fortune sat on a throne of lies, greed, and corruption.

"Should I go to the authorities instead?" asked Kinta. "Grandfather left quite the paper trail. You and Uncle Kaneda worked as accomplices to his graft and corruption. I'm sure they'd love to investigate one of the Akahoris' connections for crimes."

Tatsuya's scowl ran even deeper.

Nevertheless, Kinta felt like he had to do this. He had to get into the bottom of what the Seiryu Clan was and learn more about the so-called Black Book of his uncle from his father's side, Tetsuo Akahori.

This was the key to solving the mystery and conspiracies behind who hired the Brigands Guild and why they were assigned to take out their entire family. Their privileged clan.

Kinta sighed. His intention was to get dirt on his Uncle Tetsuo and all these clans their families were associated with, but the paper trail the Sanada Ninjas decoded instead pointed him to the skeletons in his family's own closet.

Was it intentional? Was this Akahori's gambit all along?

That son of a bitch. What a goddamn manipulative, magnificent bastard.

Growling, Tatsuya said to Kinta, "Fine. What do you want to know?"

"The truth."

"...Can you handle it?"

"I need to know it in order to protect this family."

Kinta wanted to know exactly what he was protecting here. Warts and all.

Tatsuya spat at the floor and slapped his forehead, brushing his sweaty bangs back. "Dammit, I need a drink."

The Minakata nephew and grandson clarified, "Why is the Brigands Guild after the Minakatas? Is it because of Grandfather Toshiro's drug dealings? Or his connection to the Seiryu Clan?"

The sullen Tatsuya poured himself a bottle of whiskey while his nephew kept staring at him all the while with the eyes of a hawk.

Eyes that reminded Tatsuya of Kinta's honorable-to-a-fault father Azuma, to be honest.

'They're both fools too concerned about honor,' Tatsuya merely thought, but his disdainful eyes practically shouted that sentiment at Kinta. 'Seeing such a holier-than-thou goody-two-shoes in action make me sick.'

A second later and Tatsuya finally spoke.

"Probably Seiryu Clan business," was his uncle's terse reply before gulping down a shot of alcohol and pouring another shot afterwards.

"Who are the Seiryu Clan?" asked Kinta.

"We are the Seiryu Clan, you idiot," answered Tatsuya. "Our secret society was divided into four families in accordance to which region they were from in Japan and what connection we had with the government. Our spy group got dissolved due to in-fighting. The marriage between my sister and your father was supposed to fix it. For all the good it did."

"My father belonged to another clan?" asked the former Mimawarigumi Battousai. "I mean, the Akahoris did?'

"Yes. The Genbu Clan. Then your mother ended up having an affair with gaijin, which severed the ties between the Seiryu and the Genbu. With that alliance broken, the Seiryu is now just another enemy of the Genbu as they... or he... made his move to take over this collective intelligence the clans have gathered through the decades."

"He? Do you mean Uncle Tetsuo?" Kinta asked but more like answered.

Tatsuya nodded. "These assassination attempts on our family members have all the earmarks and fingerprints of your other uncle, if you ask me."

Tetsuo Akahori. The younger brother of Kinta's father, Azuma Akahori.

The wily manipulator of the House of Akahori and the Genbu Clan, which were the spies responsible for keeping tabs with the Ishin Shishi royalists.

Tatsuya laughed a hollow chuckle while swirling the drink in his glass.

"And, as usual, you can't pin anything on him. There's no way we can prove he's behind all this nonsense. He always has his tracks covered, just like how Father used to when he was alive. But it sure stinks to high heaven of him. He probably found a way to hire the Brigands to take our entire family out."

"Why? For what purpose?" the nephew further queried. "What is he after?"

"The same thing Father was after, probably," said Tatsuya. "Your grandfather wanted power. Prestige. Fame. Privilege. Making his mark in this world. Maybe even helping rewrite our shameful family history. It's in our blood, kiddo. And in their blood as well. The Minakatas and the Akahoris are cut from the same cloth."

Oh right. The Minakata name was a stolen one, taken from a dead family of privilege back in the Sengoku Era by a band of roving disgraced ronin (masterless samurai). They were originally ochimusha with their chonmage (topknots) cut off.

These dishonored samurai thieves ended up becoming the ancestors of the current Minakata line, with the original line killed off during the Warring States period. It was stolen valor, plain and simple.

"Tetsuo-ossan could seize power with the Black Book?" asked Kinta.

"From what I understand, our family belongs to one of four spy clans. The Seiryu Clan. The Black Book is nothing more than a record of government secrets used for blackmail. No more, no less."

Under the hands of someone like Tetsuo Akahori, it served as his multitude of clues to every last sin, crime, or manipulation of all the major political figures and dynasties in this country.

His codex of the many schemes perpetrated by the current administration of former royalists.

A Black Book that listed out these politicians' debts to society, just like how a literal black book worked.

"My brother-in-law is a real piece of work," said Kinta's other piece-of-work (or piece-of-something-else) uncle without any irony. "He wants to take all of us out and steal our thunder the same way our ancestors did with the original Minakatas. Imagine that."

"Was it because of some sort of grudge?" asked Kinta, remembering another dearly departed relative from all this talk about Tetsuo.

His Aunt Sakura. Tetsuo's wife, Sakura Noe.

He felt his heart twinge and throb in remembrance of her. His gentle mother figure in lieu of his real, estranged mother he could barely even remember at this point.

He then felt shame wash over him for feeling that way. He shouldn't let his emotions overcome him like that, the same way his passionate mother did that fateful day she got caught by his father cheating on him with her lover from another country.

Unbridled passion and emotion could push a person to do something drastic, like betray his or her spouse. Or country.

Therefore, Kinta pushed such feelings deep in his heart before it could take control of him.

The Bakumatsu was indeed a tumultuous time.

It was one thing for his mother to have an affair with another man from under his father's nose. However, it was a whole other kettle of fish for her to do so with a foreigner around the time foreign relations were strained.

She inadvertently became a symbol of the shogunate's weakness against foreign invaders, leading to bloody revolution.

However, Kinta also thought the Minakata Family immediately disowning her was too drastic a decision. He felt sick at how quickly his relatives banished her for the sake of saving their hides. Their so-called "honor".

Then again, he did somehow owe the Minakatas one for taking him in despite kicking off the black sheep of the family, abusive as they were to him.

His uncles treated him as though he were the bastard spawn between Aoi Minakata and her foreign lover rather than the legitimate heir to the family fortune.

As if reading his mind, his uncle said, "You should know better than to antagonize us, boy. We raised you. We bathed and clothed you. We even allowed you a share of the wealth, the so-called 'blood money' you feel contempt for yet still enjoy because we acknowledge you as a legitimate son of the family."

Uncle and nephew glared at each other eye-to-eye.

"You know what it is about you that makes me sick to my stomach, you ingrate? Your holier-than-thou attitude. The way you look down on us after everything we've done for you. How dare you."

Kinta couldn't deny that allegation. He'd considered many a night to disavow his wretched, criminal family. Especially now that he had proof of their illegal activities.

His uncle continued his rant.

"Understand that you'd be trash without us and without the Minakata family name. Know your role and shut your mouth. If it weren't for our magnanimous decision to keep you around instead of disowning you, you'd be no better today than my sister's other bastard gaijin lovechild."

The air inside the office felt so thick it suffocated the people inside. As though they'd just drowned in stale air. Thick, humid air.

He also had a name, by the way. The Prodigal Son of the Minakatas banished away along with his traitorous mother.

"Minakata Takuto."

This gave both Minakatas pause.

"W-What...?" trailed off Tatsuya, whose eyes then traveled back to the person who said that forbidden name.

It was Tatsuya's exceptionally tall bodyguard who spoke those words. That name.

How did he know the birth name of Aoi Minakata's bastard son?

The bodyguard chuckled then talked further.

"Takuto, huh?" he said in Japanese with a slight accent. A foreigner's accent he didn't have a few minutes ago when he talked to his boss. "It's been years since I was called that. I have a new name now. Lucas. Lucas Grant. The name my father intended to give to me before he died."

***

In the office next door...

Yahiko's eyes narrowed as he strained to hear what was going on in the other room.

Not because he had trouble hearing the words but more because his mind had trouble processing their significance.

Wait, what? Who was it that said "Minakata Takuto"?

Oh. The guy who said that was Takuto Minakata.

Who was Takuto Minakata? Weren't they talking about a gaijin lovechild from a disowned family member?

Jeez. He felt like a nosy housewife eavesdropping on her quarrelling neighbors as they aired their dirty laundry next door. He felt dirty just listening to all this unsolicited info.

However, he steeled his resolve. He felt something was definitely afoot.

This wasn't merely simple internal drama between family members. It was a power grab by one of their own fellow elites. Possibly by the person whom the Tokyo Samurai Descendant (and friends) had just saved from his own assassination.

Tetsuo Akahori.

Yikes. It saddened Yahiko how he had to protect oligarch nobility whose daily drama directly influenced the state of society and the wellbeing of the Japanese people.

Even though these wealthy people and V.I.P.s—the ones who belonged to the upper-echelon oligarchy of Japan—stunk of the same uppity attitude of Jusanro Tani, they didn't deserve cold-blooded execution.

To be honest though, Myojin was more concerned with how the Sakaguchis were somehow dragged into this mess due to old family ties and historical subservience to the former hatamoto-class samurai family.

This honor-bound sense of duty among past superiors reminded Myojin of the same debt of honor Tsubame Sanjo and her family had over Mikio Nagaoka and his family, even after the samurai class was abolished by the Meiji Government.

Or how Yahiko himself had to serve as the errand boy and pickpocket for the yakuza after becoming an orphaned child of samurai in Post-Tokugawa Japan.

Nearly all ex-samurai families faced such messed-up circumstances ever since Japan's upheaval from the Sakoku Era to the Bakumatsu to the Meiji Era.

Nearly all of them, anyway. Obviously, this wasn't the case for the Minakatas or ex-Ishin oligarchs.

The Son of Tokyo Samurai then heard anguished screams from an ensuing scuffle inside the office next door.

He turned to investigate along with the rest of the alerted bodyguards, only for one of them to unsheathe his saber and slash at everyone present with frightening efficiency.

Yahiko himself drew the sakabatou (reverse-edged sword) in time to block the blade, which wasn't actually a saber but instead a... a... rapier, was it?

A foreign sword forged from a solid metal bar of carbon-rich steel.

He remembered its name from the stolen foreign swords he saw used by the Wokou under the leadership of Shura's maritime nemesis, the Pirate King Hananuma Masakichi Inoue!

'What the hell was going on here?!' thought the flabbergasted young man. 'Who the hell is this guy? Wait… The Brigands Guild! This guy is probably one of the Brigands Guild!'

'Hmmm,' thought The Faceless after his blade clanged against the unexpectedly thick spine of the Japanese sword swung at him.

Once he shed his policeman guise and brandished his rapier, he expected to massacre the room-full of bodyguards and their brittle Japanese-made sabers or katanas.

Only for this teenaged upstart to block his strike with an unusually robust sword for something made of pig metal.

The Faceless realized something else. 'This li'l boy with the weird sword has some fight in him.'

***

Meanwhile, outside the money changer office...

Lieutenant Satoru Sakaguchi told his daughter, "Stay here with the rest of the security guards! Secure the perimeter! The Brigands Guild is probably attacking from the inside right now!"

"Father, wait..!" cried out Kyoko Sakaguchi, but she turned around too late. Her father was gone. He'd left her with the other Minakata hired bodyguards (or secret service).

She considered following him because the outside office perimeter had the patrolling May "Satsuki" Brooks to protect it, but Officer Sakaguchi ordered her to stay regardless.

So she followed his orders like the good daughter that she was.

Kyoko also probably said a few other things, but Satoru couldn't hear her gentle voice amidst their loud footfalls on concrete floor as he charged along with several other Minakata family bodyguards armed with swords, pistols, and rifles as well as the top students of Musou Madden Ryu.

A feeling of déjà vu filled Satoru's gut to the brim. This sneak attack reminded him of the one done to Tetsuo Akahori back in his hometown of Shinshushin.

So much for the 1880s being peacetime in the Meiji Era! What was with all these assassination attempts of top officials one after another?

The aftermath of the Chichibu Riots remained fresh in the minds of the police force, at that. However, they'd recovered enough from the trauma to provide better protection for the Minakatas than they did with the Akahoris.

However, the Yokohama Police Force sometimes refuses police protection to private citizens no matter how influential to the government they were.

Therefore, Satoru had to go there in his own time (and dime) to act as the Minakatas' bodyguard, along with the rest of the family and several of their school's best students.

He wondered if the Brigands Guild were somehow affiliated with the rebel Shogo Amakusa and his Hidden Christians before pushing such thoughts aside. Now wasn't the time for such idle musings.

He had to pursue these gaijin invaders properly so that the casualties here would be minimized compared to the disaster that happened in Shinshu.

He hoped against hope that these so-called brigands weren't a collection of Amakusas in remembrance of how Shogo single-handedly decimated multiple police squads like a one-man army.

That one man Kinta had faced off previously in his Uncle Kaneda's home certainly was Amakusa-like. That person with no face could fight toe-to-toe against the Mimawarigumi Battousai himself.

Satoru would be more at peace if Akahori's bodyguard, Soujiro Seta, were there with them right about now.

If there were members of the Brigands Guild like The Faceless, they'd all be all screwed.

They might as well evacuate the offices and just burn the place down to the ground to rid of these foreign vermin. Or at least fumigate the bastards.

***

Back inside the main office...

Both Minakatas, nephew and uncle, turned as white as bed sheets as they stared at the tall bodyguard before them.

What was once a man that resided in the background had ended up in the forefront of their attention. Like a marble statue that had come to life.

Lucas "Takuto Minakata" Grant bowed at both Kinta and Tatsuya as though this was a curtain call at a theater play and he was one of the actors taking a bow to the audience.

Like May "Satsuki Sakaguchi" Brooks, he was another person with two names and a foreign lineage involved with the Minakatas.

"It's a pleasure to meet you after all this time. You know me as Minakata Takuto, but to my comrades, the Brigands Guild, I'm instead known as Lucas Grant."

They should've noticed him earlier, what with his unusual height, length, and lankiness.

Sure, several other bodyguards with them matched his tallness. However, they didn't match his musculature and thickness.

Especially when he took off his Japanese disguise, his chiseled facial features showing hints of English or even Nordic features mixed with East Asian blood.

Speaking of which, after a couple of seconds of hesitation, the other bodyguards thusly dog-piled Takuto.

Smiling, Lucas grappled and threw the security around like rag dolls. Or little children. They made a mess, crashing into furniture and smashing into walls like they were flimsy matchboxes.

And now that the Minakatas were focused on him, they also noticed his blood thirst. His manic eyes belied his calm demeanor.

The camouflaged ninja from earlier attempted to attack Lucas with knives, only for him to bat them all away with his sheathed western sword, the half-breed foreign invader eyeing him and his cloaked movement in the corner of his blue eyes.

"So you now know the truth about your family, samurai?" said he Prodigal Son of the Minakatas to Kinta Minakata. His half-brother from another father. His mother's bastard child.

Takuto Minakata. Lucas Grant.

"So you're now aware that you belong to a corrupt lineage of crooks and thieves? Or even demons on earth? But maybe you already knew about that from the start. Maybe you're a bloody little devil yourself, Mr. Mimawarigumi Battousai."

Kinta couldn't believe his eyes. Takuto was there. In the flesh. The living proof of his mother's betrayal of his family.

For a change, Tatsuya Minakata was at a loss for words. His little sister didn't only have one brat but two. And now he had come back from banishment to enact his revenge against them.

Against the family that abandoned him and his mother.

Now it made perfect sense why the Brigands Guild was after them specifically.

They weren't just hired guns. They were his hired guns. The (literal) bastard found a way to rise from poverty and fund his revenge against the family that threw him and his mother away like trash due to her betrayal.

Was it the "Grant" family who funded this? Did Lucas find the relatives of his dead father and then waited all this time to get his long-awaited vengeance?

Kinta could've sworn it was Akahori who manipulated events to end up this way though. Call it a gut feeling based on past experience.

'Dammit,' thought Tatsuya. They—the Minakatas—had his sister marry the brother of Tetsuo specifically to avoid ending up in the Genbu Clan's warpath.

Sure, it was also to gain enough leverage for their family, the Seiryu Clan, to take control of the Black Book themselves, but that was to be expected of the politics of nobility.

'All's fair in love and war.'

Lucas grabbed hold of what looked like a book or even a tome as thick as the Christian bible, waving it at the Minakatas' faces like an arrest warrant.

"I have the smoking gun... or guns, as the case may be... of the Minakata Pharmaceutical Company being a 'habitual line-stepper' in terms of criminal activities. Your company wasn't only founded by laundered drug money. It also grew into a powerful multinational conglomerate through illegal marketing and medical practices."

Some of the knocked-out guards started coming to while the others remained unconscious.

Grant had enough presence of mind to beat the hell out of the awakened ones using his thick tome or callused knuckles before they regained their senses enough to be a threat to him.

All the while, he kept on talking.

Even as his fists got stained with their bodyguards' blood, he kept going with his long-winded spiel, spewing venom and bile all the while.

"Even before the Bakumatsu, Minakata Pharmaceuticals had been engaged in bribing physicians and suppressing adverse trial results. Since the 1860s, around the time the Meiji Restoration came about, your wretched hive of scum and its subsidiaries have been assessed with millions of yen in civil penalties and criminal convictions that have been swept under the tatami mat through your influence and connections with the Meiji Government."

With gleaming eyes and a fist dyed red with blood, Lucas asked Kinta again, "Do you support your family of criminals or not?"

Tatsuya had just about enough of his estranged nephew. "You son of a bitch...!" he trailed off, a pistol in his hand that he drew from a hidden pocket inside his overcoat.

"Hey," said Lucas, looking across the barrel of the gun like he would a wall, his glare focused more on the person holding the firearm.

His sweaty, half-drunk uncle, to be more specific.

The Minakatas then noticed the sheathed sword at Grant's side. They had concluded earlier it was another straight-bladed saber like the police officers had, but that was an optical illusion.

"Don't insult my mother like that. Call me the bastard all you want, but don't you dare sully my mother's name by calling her a bitch, Uncle Tatsuya."

Lucas then unsheathed his humongous sword.

In light of how tall he was, the sword did look like an ordinary saber when he held it. But only because it was proportional to him.

To anyone else who wielded it, it would've been obvious it was an extra-large sword.

The Prodigal Son of the Minakatas brandished a "hand-and-a-half" sword. Otherwise known as a bastard sword.

***

Right inside the next room...

As their swords clashed again, The Faceless got a better look at Yahiko's weapon that didn't break apart as easily as all the other brittle katanas and sabers that surrounded him.

'What an unusual Japanese blade. The sharp end is at its inside curve like a scimitar or scythe yet this boy uses it like a blunt bat or steel pipe.'

Curiouser and curiouser.

The Faceless donned a new mask before falling into his fencer's stance, which meant he shifted into his fencer disguise or perhaps even personality—the honorable duelist gentleman, Duke John Rathbone.

Rathbone embodied The Faceless' his extensive knowledge of western martial arts. The same honorable Englishman that took on the likes of the Mimawarigumi Battousai to a draw, with their matching skills in swordsmanship.

Yahiko went into basic neutral Chuden-no-Kamae (Water Stance) instead of his favored aggressive Jodan-no-Kamae (Fire Stance) in reaction to the somewhat unfamiliar sword style of this person before him.

He had to. Unlike when he dueled against local ronin, former samurai, or May Brooks, the thin, tall man before him fell into a stance he'd never seen before.

This masked man was probably one of the so-called Brigands Guild that was after the powerful Minakata Family of Yokohama.

One of the foreign invaders coming to the shores of Japan in order to fulfill the bloodthirsty desire of revenge by an abandoned half-gaijin child born from the Bakumatsu Era.

Where had Yahiko seen this situation before? 'Is this Lucas person the Englishman bastard version of Yukishiro Enishi or something?' he thought.

With a flourish, Rathbone then introduced himself to Myojin, saying in accented Japanese, "Greetings and salutations. My name is Duke John Rathbone of the Brigands Guild. Prepare yourself. En garde."

'Rasubo...?' thought Yahiko, unable to put into words the syllables of Rathbone's foreign name since Japanese lacked the sounds needed to pronounce it natively.

The teenager then saw the Duke move his lead sword hand like a metronome or a probing, one-handed Tsuki (Throat) strike, startling him.

This was the first time he'd seen the stance, but it looked somehow… familiar.

There was something hypnotic about the way the deceptively thin rapier blade swung to-and-fro from Rathbone's ready position.

Yahiko did probing swings of the sakabatou at the seemingly half-hearted thrusts of the tapered but strangely dense blade.

Little did he know the sword used high-grade steel instead of the katana's lower-grade steel mixed with powdered carbon during its smelting process.

Myojin whiffed on a strike that Rathbone baited him into doing, but countered with a cross-wrist Hadome (Sword Halt) to shield him from a mid-range stab to the heart.

He then stopped short of doing a Hawatari (Sword Crossing), turning the aborted counter into a feint that allowed him to sidestep and parry another thrust.

His sweated bullets and gulped hard, unable to find an opening to hit the fencing master without him getting countered with a stab in turn.

For one reason or another, he couldn't time him as well as he did the long-ranged strikes of Satsuki Sakaguchi.

Yet something nagged him at the back of his mind. Those constant thrusts timed with stomping footwork—where had he seen them before?

Did they remind Yahiko of Hajime Saito's Gatotsu or Hiratsuki? No, that couldn't be it.

Or maybe even someone like the elusive Aoshi Shinomori and his Ryusui no Ugoki (Water Flow Movement)? 'Nah.'

The Faceless smirked to himself inwardly, wondering, 'How far can this pup go?'

Rathbone and his pendulum of rapier strikes then started controlling the distance, mastering Yahiko's timing, and setting the boy up to hit him without getting hit in return.

The same thrusting sword served as John's shield too, parrying every attack attempt from Yahiko and thrusting afterwards, thus the samurai boy couldn't commit to any full-force attack.

Measured aggression. A swordsmanship clinic.

It felt like Myojin was swinging Kenshin's reverse-edged blade at a ghost. That somehow stabbed back.

A phantom nest of scorpions. A million suicidal bees with their stingers at the ready.

'God dammit,' thought the nicked and cut Yahiko, gritting his teeth.

What had he been practicing endless drills and sparring for if not to take down mercenaries like these?

He could barely dodge all this thrusts and slashes to his person, his wrists already raw from all his bare-skin blade blocks.

In Japanese, Rathbone told the bleeding Yahiko, "I have seen the best that Japanese swordsmanship has to offer, and you're not it."

***

Back at the main office...

Kinta himself fell into his modern iaijutsu or iaido stance that the Mimawarigumi confused with the Hitokiri Battousai's classical battoujutsu stance, moving in front of his uncle to protect him from, well, his own bastard half-brother.

His bastard half-brother with his bastard (or hand-and-a-half) sword, to be more specific.

The hand-and-a-half sword, by the way, was a late 19th Century term. Before that, this weapon type was only known as a "bastard sword", which referred to any blade that was an "irregular sword" or "sword of uncertain origin".

Meanwhile, the French "épée bâtarde" and the English "bastard sword" originated in the 15th or 16th Century.

Elizabethans used terms like "short", "bastard", and "long" to focus more on blade length. As for any sword that could be wielded by two hands, they called "two-handed".

By the 20th Century, the "long sword" or "long-sword" term referred to the rapier in the context of Early Modern or Renaissance Fencing.

Regardless, Takuto sneered, wielding his lengthy medieval, double-edged straight sword made of pure high-grade European steel.

"So you've chosen your side. So be it, big brother. I'm a little disappointed in you, though."

"Little brother," said Kinta in kind, pausing as though balking at the "aftertaste" those words left in his mouth.

Did they taste bitter as medicine? Or did they have a surprising sweetness to them that left him longing for a long-lost family member?

Perhaps even both. A bittersweet flavor.

Regardless, Lucas couldn't tell. The Mimawarigumi Battousai had quite the poker face.

Lucas continued. "I've been watching you all this time. You seemed like a stand-up guy. Certainly an honorable samurai when compared to someone like Cain Merrick."

He chuckled to himself. "You're one of the good ones, Minakata Kinta. However, you've chosen to protect criminal masterminds. The representatives of Japan's Oligarchy. But of course you'd do so. You're also one of them."

"That's enough from you," said Tatsuya, who then fired his pistol at Lucas Grant's face to preemptively assassinate the assassin.

Lucas ducked from the shot, the bullet grazing his shoulder as the cold bite of supersonic steel drew blood.

He then rose up in one fluid motion, his gleaming eyes leaving a streak of blue as he swung his bastard sword towards his Uncle Tatsuya's neck to give him a taste of the cold bite of his own (superior) steel.

Kinta himself reacted almost as quickly, even before any shot was fired, his wide eyes noticing Lucas' muscle twitch fast enough to activate his hair-trigger twitch reflexes and let his katana fly from its sheath.

The Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash) from Kinta's curved blade clanged hard against the upward strike of Lucas's straight longsword, thus turning it more of a Hangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Half Moon Slash) instead.

Because Kinta's inherited sword, the Akatsuki (Red Moon), was forged using steel melted from the stolen weapons of the Wokou pirates as well as the swords of European invaders, it used the same grade of steel as his little half-brother's bastard sword.

'Just like Cain Merrick said,' thought Lucas. 'His sword is made of high-grade steel. It's sharp enough to cut apart European swords. But more importantly, his strike was able to block my own even though he has the shorter, thinner sword.'

The reverberation from the vibrating swords sung a solemn hymn of Cain and Abel that reached the two brothers all the way to the bone.

'He really is the Kagemusha. A true-blue samurai. The last of his kind.'

The floorboards splintered beneath their feet, the wood shards flying across the room.

Tatsuya himself tumbled to his posterior from the strength of the diametrically opposed blows, his second pistol shot veering wildly to the ceiling.

To Kinta, Lucas said, "You were the chosen one between the two of us. The favored son. Or grandson. Or nephew. I understand. Even if you ended up in a family of criminals, why would you abandon them after they've given you all of your precious privileges and political influence?"

The clash of blades neutralized their respective strikes, so Kinta couldn't do his signature quick follow-through that would've turned into a second Full Moon Slash, otherwise known as the Blue Moon Slash.

Kinta realized one more thing as he sheathed the Akatsuki back to its scabbard in anticipation for another attack. His gaijin half-brother stopped the Full Moon Slash with a one-handed slash from his heavier bastard sword.

Lucas wielded a heavier sword (48 inches or 120 centimeters) approaching twice the length of his katana (24 inches or 60 centimeters) with enough power in one hand to cut the Mimawarigumi Battousai's strongest attack in half or quarter strength.

"Unfortunately for you, that means you're now my target. Understand that this is nothing personal between you and me, big brother. I want your family dead. You're just collateral damage. Sucks to be you, bro."

***

At the gates of the moneychanger affiliate office...

Kyoko Sakaguchi considered disobeying her father's orders to follow after him, with the reassurance that Satsuki remained there patrolling the surrounding area with her naginata (glaive) in tow.

A festival occurred from beyond the gates across Chinatown. From what Kyoko had heard among the locals, it was for the Dongzhi Festival or a celebration of the Winter Solstice.

The parade would've served as the perfect cover for a team of international assassins in masks and costumes.

They would probably otherwise stick out like sore thumbs, but then again they were also capable of donning subtler disguises. Like the shinobi of yore in Ancient Japan.

She closed her eyes and tried to calm herself down.

Her excited hyperventilation ironically suffocated her rather than give her lungs the right amount of oxygen, her breath forming puffs of white smoke like from a kettle or a steam locomotive.

She then overheard the following conversation from several of the Minakata bodyguards beside her.

"Ugh. Why do we have to baby-sit the lieutenant's daughter? Jeez."

"I'm fine with it. She's kind of hot in a girl-next-door sort of way."

"She's just a kid, you pervert! And it's not like her stick-up-his-ass father would approve! He'd cut you down like he did that guy back in his hometown."

"Ha! I can wait. Just like Genji Monogatari (Tale of Genji)!"

"Shut up. That's enough from you two. She'll hear you."

She opened her eyes and chanced upon the bodyguard that leered at her from head to toe, making her cover herself by reflex.

The other bodyguards had the courtesy of looking away and pretending not to see her, which was a courtesy that the shameless man could not afford her.

Realizing that she'd noticed his gaze, the man winked at her and licked his chops. Like an eager wolf to a lamb.

The leering, creepy man reminded her of Keisuke. Not in appearance but in action.

'Ew. Gross.'

Something about the face she made must've made him realize the error of his ways, because soon enough, he looked away and whistled an off-tune folksong, his back turned at her.

She heaved a sigh of relief. In the past, she would've wilted like a freshly picked flower left on an empty vase over such male attention, which she heard gave them the wrong idea.

At least that part of her personality changed for the better.

However, on the flipside, sometimes a disapproving frown, a look of disgust, or an outright "No!" wasn't enough for men like him to take the hint.

Regardless, the double pony-tailed girl gripped her grandfather's sheathed sword tightly as she clasped her hands together in seeming prayer.

She vaguely remembered "Grandpa Genzo" talking about the Fuyutsuki (Winter Moon) and how their family inherited it from a legendary samurai's old pair of Sengoku Era swords.

Technically, the present Fuyutsuki wasn't the original Fuyutsuki but what was left of a tachi (ancient Japanese long sword) and wakizashi (secondary short sword) named Kogetsu (Little Moon) melted together to form the extra thick steel spine of the current version of the sword.

Unlike the Ship of Theseus—where all of the original boat's parts were replaced, so it was questionable whether the ship could still be considered the original or a brand new ship—the Fuyutsuki was a brand new sword born out of melting an ancient longsword and its short sword companion into one sword.

Like the reverse Ship of Theseus, almost. The separate ship made of the wood taken from the old Ship of Theseus to build a new boat altogether.

It was through the Fuyutsuki that Kyoko gained the confidence to go through the strenuous swordsmanship exercises required to master Musou Madden Ryu. It served like her grandpa's helping hand for her personality flaws.

Like a cane or crutch, almost.

Incidentally, the Ship of Theseus was one of the topics she learned from the personal bodyguard of Tetsuo Akahori, Soujiro Seta.

She wished Soujiro was there with her now.

Even though they weren't the same age, he wasn't that much older than her and he was the only boy a shy girl like her could talk to ever since Keisuke… made her family limit her interactions with boys her age.

Soujiro never looked at her that way. She could trust him.

He was instead enamored by the daughter of the Akahori Family. The hauntingly beautiful girl with porcelain white skin and snow white hair: Rin Akahori.

Just to be clear, Soujiro never looked at Rin with lewd eyes either. The gaze he gave her was one that Kyoko wished she'd get from a man she cared for in return.

Loving, caring eyes instead of the dirty gazes from lustful men that made her feel filthy and exposed.

By the way, Rin was the one who taught Seta about the Ship of Theseus, among other western ideas and literature. In turn, he brought the subject up to Kyoko.

Kyoko sighed and stared into the cold, moonlit sky. Soujiro had Rin. Kinta had... her Big Sister Satsuki.

No one within Satsuki's age range could beat her in long-range weapons combat, especially when she found her range.

The blonde bombshell turned adoptive daughter of the Sakaguchi Family proved herself a sharpshooter with a bladed stick. She might probably be the strongest female practitioner of Musou Madden Ryu, even.

Quite unlike Kyoko, though. She only started studying the family martial arts for the sake of protecting herself from the likes of Keisuke. For self-defense.

Someone as gentlemanly and reputable as Lord Kinta deserved having a foreign goddess like May Brooks as a wife instead of her: The lowly daughter of a Yokohama cop and a soba restaurant cook.

Satsuki and Kinta belonged together. Like an eastern prince meeting up with a western princess. Like an "East meets West" sort of deal.

All four of the security detail at the front gates of the office then heard a loud bang from above them. It sounded like it came from the roof.

"Huh? Was that a cat?" said the perverted security guard from earlier, scratching his cheek.

Another guard walked to the courtyard to get a better look at the top of the building.

The leader of the guards warned, "Careful now. The Brigands Guild is a tricky band of mercenaries. Don't be surprised if they have some flying freak shows with them."

Kyoko vaguely recalled the briefing she, her father, and the rest of the hired swords and guns got from the longest serving bodyguards of the House of Minakata.

So far the assassins had with them a man who used a poison-coated sword, a man with a thousand disguises, a huge burly lumberjack with a battle ax, and one other weird member.

The one who used grappling hooks and whirling blades to attack. The supposed lone pure Japanese member of the Brigands Guild.

Another shot that sounded like a firework rang out, followed by the scream of a fallen comrade.

A rope spear plucked itself out of the guard's chest, which gushed a fountain of blood.

Startled, the two remaining bodyguards took out their pistols.

The black-clothed man spun around like a whirling dervish, his blades gleaming in the moonlight before staining the sky and ground red like it was the Bakumatsu all over again.

"Who the hell are you? Identify yourself!" said one of the guards.

The swinging, kicking, and slashing shinobi rebutted, "Dead men don't need to know my name."

The guard presumably in charge barked out, "It must be him! The tumbling ninja with the rope spears! Shoot at him! Blast him to hell!"

Gunshots fired at the flipping and jumping ninja in dark clothing and an elaborate gas mask with goggles on it.

"Hey, he speaks Japanese! Are you Japanese?!" demanded the man who winked at Kyoko earlier, his pistol firing in the darkness. "You traitor. You're a ninja from Japan, aren't you? How dare you betray this country and ally yourself with foreign invaders!"

The goggled brigand harrumphed. "I have no allegiance to this country. My only allegiance is to myself."

The leering man ran out of ammunition and got his neck punctured with a rope spear while he fumbled to unsheathe his sword. He then slumped to the ground, gurgling.

The remaining bodyguard told Kyoko to run inside and get help before he himself had rope wrapped around his neck.

The Brigands Guild mercenary then used his body weight to lift and pull the guard up to hang him from the branch of a nearby tree.

Kyoko gulped, resisting the urge to flee. Her whole body screamed at her to run and hide.

She was the one who insisted to go with her father regardless instead of stay at the dojo with the rest of the students.

'Father. Grandfather. I'm sorry. I must fight.'

She just had to do it. She felt compelled to do so. Perhaps more for her sake than even for the sake of safeguarding the Minakata Family.

Before the guard could reach all the way up to the branch, Kyoko charged and let her Fuyutsuki sword fly from its scabbard, cutting down the rope and saving the man's life.

As the bodyguard's body dropped to the ground, she sheathed her sword back in a fluid motion. Just like how she practiced it countless times against straw dummies.

The goggles of the acrobatic man gleamed in the darkness before more rope spears flew from his wrists with a flick of his arms through a strange mechanism of some sort attached to the side of his hips.

With her heart in her throat and her hand firmly grasping the handle of her grandfather's refurbished ancient sword, Kyoko aimed for those contraptions in particular as she dodged the spears and dashed towards the strange man in black.

She proved elusive care of the ingrained sidesteps that she practiced to perfection care of the Young Moon Slashes she constantly avoided when sparring with Satsuki and her long-distance attacks.

The invader ended up within range of her slash.

Thanks to Grandpa Genzo letting her borrow his Fuyutsuki, she was able to finally do a perfect Mikazuki O Tsuku Nari (Crescent Moon Slash) at the ninja.

She had yet to do a Hangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Half Moon Slash) or Mangetsu O Tsuku Nari (Full Moon Slash) though.

As an amateur swordswoman, every other slash below the Crescent Moon Slash, like a Young Moon (Waxing Stance) or Old Moon (Waning Stance) Slash, she could do.

Darn it. Someday, she'd do a Full Moon Slash and show the rest of her family she wasn't the deadweight.

Today was not that day though.

As she prepared to cut through the rope spear devices attached to the brigand's hips, his body rolled along with the slash, the Fuyutsuki cutting nothing but air.

"Eh...?" she said before she got slashed apart from behind by the somersaulting ninja.

The cut would've been deeper had she not shifted her weight and changed stances from Waxing Stance to Waning Stance.

This allowed her to follow-through her missed strike with a Crescent Moon Slash to the rear that deflected the blade that almost cut all the way to her spine.

***

To Be Continued...

I'm still not over having to rewrite Chapter 52 from scratch. Regardless, I promise to be more careful in saving my work in the future so that I won't pull a Sisyphus and keep on rewriting things I've already written! Dammit!

Also, it needs to be said. Ever since Nobuhiro Watsuki wrote a continuation of RK involving the Hokkaido Arc, this story is now an "Elseworlds" kind of story set a little after the original ending of RK.

Danke, Abdiel

#last blade #kaede #prodigal son #rurouni kenshin #るろうに剣心 #rurouni yahiko #るろうに弥彦 #fan fiction #fanfiction.net

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