Sengoku [Chapter 8] RAW (Patreon)

Chapter 8 - Foundations

“The Way is in training.”

- Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings.

For the first time in what felt like a very long time, Shimon Ayanokouji woke beneath his own roof. The thought came to him before his eyes opened, warm and comforting for perhaps half a second. Then he remembered that the roof had belonged to a dead man.

The realization, however, did not stop the young man from opening his eyes. Reality, however, could only be delayed and resisted temporarily.

Morning light seeped through the paper screens, and the room smelled of tatami, old timber, and cold wooden ashes.

The house was quiet. Not silent, for houses were never silent once one listened carefully enough. Timber settled, a bird scratched somewhere beneath the eaves, and from the courtyard came the soft scrape of a broom. Beyond that, muted by walls and distance, the castle town had begun to wake.

Still, the room felt empty in a way his apartment never had. There was no refrigerator humming. There was no router or a myriad of other devices blinking in the dark, no distant elevator shuddering inside the building. And, no Mochi pushing open the door to his bedroom with an insistent determination.

There were only the swords beside his futon and the dark upper corner of the room. Shimon stared at it, drinking in his current state and reality.

He had slept badly again. Worse than at the inn, perhaps, because this time there had been no Tarō on the opposite side of the room and no public corridor beyond the door. The house had offered privacy, and that quiet privacy had simply given his fear greater space to roam in the halls of his mind.

At some point in the middle of the night, he had awakened with the absolute certainty that something was watching him from the corner above the storage alcove. Thankfully, he had not seen a face, nor had he seen some great eye.

There had only been a deeper patch of darkness where the ceiling beams met, darker than the room should have allowed. When Shimon looked directly at it, it became wood and shadow. When he looked away, he felt attention settle over him like dust.

The chip, his erstwhile companion, had scanned his sensory data and found nothing. Of course, it had found nothing.

Shimon sat up, rubbed his face, and allowed himself a long yawn. He owned a house now, though instead of taking the usual route of applying to a bank for a loan, he had apparently chosen the more difficult path of killing demons. There was probably a metaphor buried somewhere in that, but this early in the morning, he could not quite get hold of it. 

It was his house, according to Lord Satomi’s men, or at least his for as long as his usefulness and obedience continued to exceed the cost of maintaining him. There had been no deed, no mortgage, no keys handed over by a smiling agent. A clerk had read out an assignment, two servants had bowed, and the dead owner’s remaining possessions had been removed from the storeroom.

The place was larger than his rented Tokyo apartment. That felt unfair. It had three principal rooms, a narrow kitchen building joined by a covered passage, a small courtyard, a shed, and a rear garden. 

There was also a privy.

Several minutes later, the former ronin rediscovered the privy and regarded its wooden opening with profound personal resentment. It consisted of a raised platform, a rectangular hole, a bucket of ash, and a rather offensive odor.

There was—of course— no heated seat, no bidet, and certainly no automatic deodorizer. It was a toilet stripped of every comfort modern civilization had devised.

“This is barbarism,” Shimon whispered to himself, but the privy being a privy did not care.

He completed the necessary process with as much dignity as could be preserved. Afterward, he washed at a basin in the rear passage, using water left in a covered jar. He scrubbed his hands, splashed his face, and cleaned his teeth with some sort of salt and the end of a small, softened twig the servants had left for him.

It sufficed, but that did not make him like the entire process.

His reflection waited in the polished bronze mirror beside the basin. The surface distorted him slightly, softening one side of his face and stretching the other.

His hair had grown untidy. His eyes looked bruised from lack of sleep. He wore a plain underrobe belonging to a different time and had a paper charm tied within it to discourage monsters from noticing him.

I am a samurai, Shimon thought.

He still found it ridiculous. In his mind, a samurai should have looked severe, disciplined, and certain. Shimon looked like a student who had spent three nights preparing for the wrong examination. The newly minted samurai touched the edge of the mirror and found that he very much wanted to go home.

The thought was not a new one. But here, in a house supposedly given to him, homesickness arrived with a different cruelty.

It had rooms waiting for habits he did not possess. A place for armor. A place for swords and weaponry. A kitchen. A sleeping room. A shelf where someone had once kept household records. An empty hook near the entrance where the former owner’s rain cloak might have hung. This place, this house, expected a life to be built inside and around it.

Shimon thought of his trusty spear and where it rested, then cast that sword aside. He very much wanted his old life back. He begged and pleaded for the System, or whatever it was, to give him a quest to find a way home. To give him a clue to let him walk that path, but fate and this world were not so forthcoming and generous.

No quest appeared. The System remained blank.

“Of course,” he hissed. “Life could never be that easy.”

His stomach growled. Homesickness, terror, and acid resentment all lost some of their dignity when placed beside hunger.

Shimon dressed more properly, tying the unfamiliar layers with the help of borrowed memories. He looked at his swords, and he hesitated before putting them through his belt.

Inside his own house?

He scanned through his memories. Tarō had worn his, and Nagai had worn his indoors, too. Letting the chip sift through the data, he could only conclude that everyone wore swords everywhere until specifically ordered not to, because this was a society that revolved around violence, or the threat of violence, wrapped up around the guise of honor. So, Shimon put them on.

The kitchen lay beyond the narrow covered passage. He found Tarō there, already eating.

The older Kume brother sat before a low table with a bowl in one hand and chopsticks in the other. He had recovered enough from his injuries that the bruising on his face had faded from purple to yellow, though one side remained swollen. His hair was tied back badly. His robe hung half-open at the chest.

He looked up when Shimon entered, then gestured with his chopsticks toward the empty place opposite. 

“Sit,” he offered.

Shimon sat and shrugged. “Welcome to my house,” he sighed. 

Tarō grunted and returned immediately to eating, and the sound was quite impressive. Rice vanished, and soup was drawn into his mouth with long, audible breaths. Pickled radish cracked between his teeth. Shimon had heard quieter industrial machinery.

A woman entered from the kitchen yard carrying a tray.

She was perhaps thirty, with a pleasant oval face, dark hair tied beneath a cloth, and the healthy strength of someone who spent much of her life carrying water, wood, food, and the burdens of men. Her robe was clean but plainly patched at one elbow. She had bright eyes and a mouth that looked used to smiling.

The woman knelt and placed breakfast before him. “Good morning, Ayanokouji-sama.”

Shimon had not yet adjusted to being addressed with honor in his own kitchen.

“Good morning,” he replied curtly.

The woman looked pleased that he had answered correctly. “I am Kiyo. My husband and I kept the house for Yamashita-sama before he went to battle. Nagai-sama ordered that we remain and serve the new master.”

Shimon looked past her through the open rear doors.

A grizzled man in a faded robe was sweeping the courtyard with the stooped aggression of someone personally offended by leaves. He had a broad, badly healed nose and a grey-streaked beard. A stack of cut firewood waited near him.

Kiyo followed Shimon’s gaze. “That is Genbei.”

The man looked up as if he had heard his name despite the distance. He gave Shimon a brief bow, then returned to his work.

“He does not speak much,” Kiyo commented.

“Wise man,” Tarō said around a mouthful of rice.

Kiyo smiled without looking at him. “He used to speak more before marriage.”

Tarō made a choking sound that might have been laughter.

Shimon picked up the lacquer bowl. The breakfast was similar to the inn’s meal: rice, miso soup, pickles, greens, and a small piece of dried fish. The bowls were less elegant than those at the ryokan but still beautifully made. 

Kiyo remained nearby, preparing tea and watching them with the frank curiosity of a servant who had already heard every rumor in town.

“Is the house suitable?” she asked.

“It has walls,” the young man replied dismissively, a little sharper than he had intended.

She blinked, so Shimon tried again. “It is more than suitable.”

Kiyo seemed to decide that the first answer had been humor. “The rear wall needs plaster before the rains. Genbei says the shed roof will last another year if the gods are kind and three months if they are not.”

“Three months, then,” Tarō said.

Genbei shouted something indistinct from the yard.

Kiyo raised her voice. “I told them the roof leaks!”

Another indistinct reply.

“He says it only leaks when it rains,” Kiyo translated as she poured tea. “You are both unfamiliar with this part of town?”

“Very,” Shimon said.

Tarō shrugged. “I passed through once. Years ago.”

“If Ayanokouji-sama wishes to see the town, the market lies west. The bathhouses are near the lower bridge. There is a good seller of sandals near the shrine, but do not let him tell you the blue cord costs more. It fades.”

“Useful,” Shimon said sincerely.

Kiyo nodded, warming to the subject. “And the women’s houses are below the eastern embankment.”

Shimon paused with the soup bowl halfway to his mouth. “The what?”

“The pleasure houses,” she clarified. “For your needs.”

“I do not have any of those needs,” he coughed.

Kiyo’s eyebrows rose.

“That sounded wrong,” Shimon admitted.

“It sounded unhealthy,” Tarō added.

Kiyo laughed. “There is no shame. Men are men. The houses nearest the gate are expensive. Farther down, near the dyers, they are cheaper, though some of those women are less than honest.”

The young man looked as troubled as he was puzzled. “That is very specific advice.”

“My husband used to go there whenever he had money.”

She pointed through the open doors. Genbei was now splitting firewood. At the exact moment Kiyo pointed, the grizzled man struck the block hard enough to bury the axe head.

Kiyo smiled sweetly. “He does not go now.”

Tarō laughed into his soup.

Shimon drank his miso and tried to disappear behind the bowl in embarrassment. The soup was rich, salty, and warm. Fermented bean paste, green onion, perhaps some small pieces of root vegetable. Familiar food from an unfamiliar kitchen.

He wondered what foods did not exist here.

No Portuguese meant no castella. No konpeitō. Perhaps no tempura in the form he knew. Without the westerners, the borrowed word “pan” might never have entered the language. Entire shelves of convenience-store bread removed from history because a ship had failed to arrive.

It was strange to mourn sweet bread while wearing two swords.

Across from him, Tarō continued consuming breakfast with such noise that Shimon could hear each stage of the process. Shimon glanced at Kiyo. She showed no reaction, which meant either Tarō’s eating was normal or she had achieved a servant’s professional detachment.

If Shimon’s survival depended on killing monsters, Tarō could help. However, if it depended on appearing cultured before a lord, Tarō might be an accomplice to his execution.

Shimon would need another guide for that aspect of his advancement.

A young boy’s voice called from outside. “Message from Nagai-sama!”

Genbei set down the axe and went to admit him.

The messenger was perhaps thirteen, narrow-faced and serious, his hair tied neatly and his clothes bearing the Satomi two-line crest. He entered the kitchen courtyard, bowed, and announced that Kume Tarō and Ayanokouji Shimon were expected at the castle training hall immediately after the morning meal.

“Our first lesson,” Tarō cursed, and there was no enthusiasm in his voice.

Shimon looked at the remains of breakfast. “Immediately?”

The boy bowed again. “Matsuda Jūbei-sensei said to bring you whether you have eaten or not.”

Tarō scraped the last rice from his bowl. “We have eaten.”

Shimon had not, and he looked at Kiyo. She gave him a sympathetic smile and wrapped two rice balls in leaves.

That, he decided, was why civilization needed women.

***

The training hall stood within the lower castle enclosure, near the barracks and not far from the yard where handlers drilled the smaller feathered dinosaurs. A man shouted something about a finger.

The messenger boy led them past without slowing.

The dōjō was a long wooden building raised slightly above the ground, its broad doors open. Practice weapons stood in racks along one wall: wooden swords, spears with blunted ends, staves, and several strange leather-covered lengths that Shimon’s borrowed memories identified only uncertainly.

Split bamboo wrapped in hide. A safer practice sword, though the “safer” remained very much a hopeful word. It still beat a bokuto, a solid wooden sword. 

Men trained inside. Some worked through paired forms with wooden swords, moving in measured steps. Others struck posts wrapped in straw. At the far end, two students grappled, one trying to control the other’s arm before being thrown onto the floor.

Yawara, the chip suggested. Kumiuchi.

Not judo. Judo had not yet been invented and might never exist here in any form Shimon would recognize. This was grappling developed for armored men: a brutal method of breaking joints, crushing bones, and driving a knife into whatever vulnerable gaps the armor left exposed.

The messenger stopped at the entrance and bowed.

A man stood waiting in the center of the floor, dominating the place. He was not large. That disappointed Shimon somehow. He had expected the martial instructor to be a mountain with eyebrows.

Instead, the instructor was lean, perhaps in his late forties, with a shaved crown, narrow shoulders, and hands scarred across the knuckles. His face was long and almost mournful. A wooden sword rested at his side.

He looked at Tarō, then at Shimon. His gaze remained on Shimon’s hands for longer than Shimon liked. Both new retainers bowed, but the older man did not return it immediately.

“I am Matsuda Jūbei. Nagai-sama has ordered me to make you proficient,” he declared. “His words were ‘as proficient as possible.’ That means he has doubts about you.”

Shimon remained bowed, but Tarō used that opportunity to grunt in acknowledgment.

Matsuda looked at him, eyes narrowing. “Do not grunt at me.”

“Yes, sensei,” Tarō replied hastily.

“Better.”

The instructor paced around them. “You have both killed?” he asked, but it was not a question. “Men,” Matsuda continued. “Perhaps yōma. Perhaps you were fortunate. Fortune is a fine companion until it notices another man.”

No one in the hall had stopped training, but several students were now listening while pretending not to.

“You are to be sent against things that do not fear wounds, do not follow the shape of men, and may not die when a sword enters them. Defense is not an answer for such work. Defense delays a question. You survive by ending what asks it.”

His eyes settled on Shimon. “You kill, or you give the enemy time to discover how to kill you.”

Shimon thought of the three grey creatures. He remembered the mouth opening too wide, and of Jirō’s spear entering another one and failing to stop it.

“Yes, sensei,” he responded earnestly.

Matsuda’s gaze sharpened slightly, as if he had heard something real beneath the answer. “Good. We begin by learning what lies Nagai-sama has been told.”

The first test used the leather-covered bamboo swords. The shinai.

Tarō went first. He removed his swords, tied back his sleeves with cord, his tasuki, and accepted the practice weapon. His stance was not elegant, but it was settled. His hands knew where to be.

Matsuda assigned two younger students to test him. 

The first was perhaps sixteen, and Tarō beat him quickly. Not beautifully. There was no exchange of perfect cinematic strikes. The boy attacked. Tarō knocked the weapon aside, stepped into him, struck the shoulder, and followed with a body check that sent the student stumbling out of the marked space.

The second junior lasted longer. He was faster and more careful. He tried to circle, changing the angle. Tarō did not chase. He waited until the boy committed, then took the strike on the stronger part of his practice sword and answered with a hard blow to the ribs.

The shinai dulled the impact, but not enough to spare him the pain. Pain, after all, was a teacher in its own right. The boy folded around the blow and dropped to one knee. 

Matsuda nodded. “Enough.”

Tarō’s breathing had quickened, but his face remained calm. He had an edge that did not come from skill points. He had killed, fought, lost, and survived it. He knew that a mistake meant a possible ending. Even if his technical ability had been exactly equal to the boys’, his mind understood consequence in a way theirs did not.

Matsuda called a senior student forward. The young man was perhaps twenty-three, broad-shouldered and composed. His practice robe was clean, and the way the others made room for him revealed his standing before anyone said his name.

“Sano Shinnosuke,” Matsuda said.

Shinnosuke bowed to Tarō, and the other man returned it.

Then, they began.

Tarō was good, but unfortunately, Shinnosuke was better. The difference appeared slowly. Tarō pressed hard, trying to impose the ugly practical rhythm that had beaten the younger students. Shinnosuke did not accept it. He shifted half a step, forced Tarō to turn, touched his wrist, then withdrew before Tarō could answer.

The second exchange ended with Shinnosuke’s practice blade resting against Tarō’s throat. Tarō’s expression darkened.

They reset. This time, Tarō attacked more carefully. Shinnosuke yielded ground, drew him forward, then struck his leading hand and swept his weapon aside.

The third exchange lasted longest. In this exchange, Tarō nearly caught him. He entered hard, shoulder lowered, and for a moment, Shinnosuke was forced backward. Then the senior student turned at the waist, let Tarō’s force slide past, and struck the back of his shoulder. Tarō went down on one hand.

“Enough,” Matsuda demanded.

Shinnosuke stepped back and bowed. Tarō stood where he was, breathing hard.

“You are useful,” Matsuda told him. “You know distance. You know what a weapon does to flesh. You rely too much on strength when angry, but that is a flaw with many companions in its company. Intermediate.”

Tarō bowed, and he looked faintly pleased. Shimon found that he disliked his expression.

“Ayanokouji,” Matsuda said, and the young man stepped forward.

The first junior attacked with an overhead cut, and the world simply slowed.

Not literally. Rather, his perception widened around the movement, stretching the moment. He saw the turn of his opponent’s shoulder, the rise of his hands, the front foot driving into the floor. The descending line of the strike became obvious before the weapon had traveled halfway. 

Shimon stepped aside and struck the boy across the ribs, scoring a point. The boy grunted and stumbled.

The second came quickly, perhaps hoping to catch him before he reset. But the new samurai’s body moved before conscious thought.

His borrowed sword knowledge supplied a parry, and the biochip refined the angle. His enhanced reflexes closed the remaining distance. The student’s weapon slid away, and Shimon’s practice sword touched his chest.

Matsuda’s face did not change, his facial muscles frozen in school neutrality.

A third junior was sent in, and Shimon beat him handily, too.

That one tried a low strike. Shimon saw the hips drop, read the line, and moved his leg before conscious thought had fully interpreted the attack. The leather-covered blade passed through empty air. Shimon struck the student’s shoulder with a downward strike that would have cleaved him in two with a live blade.

A quiet, appreciative murmur moved among the watching students.

Despite everything, Matsuda looked displeased. “Sano,” the instructor said.

Shinnosuke stepped forward again and bowed. Ayanokouji returned the gesture stiffly as they took their positions.

Shinnosuke did not immediately attack. That was the first problem. The junior students had moved with clear intention. Their bodies announced choices before the weapons completed them. Shinnosuke remained balanced enough that several choices stayed possible.

The chip watched through the new samurai’s eyes.

[COMBAT ANALYSIS ACTIVE]

Opponent stance: Stable

Probable attack lines: Multiple

Shinnosuke advanced, and Shimon found himself retreating half a step. The senior’s practice sword moved toward his wrist. Shimon parried, but the strike changed in the final instant, sliding toward his shoulder. He let it come, twisting away at the last moment and felt the leather brush his robe.

They separated, stepping out of the circle of their weapons’ range. Now, Shinnosuke’s expression had changed. Not fear, but a very healthy interest.

The next exchange came faster. Shimon blocked high, then low. His arms were strong enough to absorb, if not deflect, the impacts. Shinnosuke’s technique was cleaner than Tarō’s, each movement connected to the next without waste. Shimon’s own knowledge came in fragments: a remembered stance that had never been his, a foot angle, a cut, a parry. His Swords skill filled gaps, but not evenly. His Iai skill was, the art of the drawing cut, useless in this situation.

He knew enough now to recognize that he was rough around the edges. But the chip, his secret companion and weapon, helped him to adjust.

[OPPONENT PATTERN UPDATE]

Lead shoulder tension precedes committed strike: 0.18–0.24 sec.

Preferred recovery: Rightward.

Shimon tested it, showing an opening near his left shoulder. Shinnosuke, tempted, moved. Ayanokouji parried and countered, chasing him even as the senior tried to withdraw from the trap. But the samurai was faster, his feet moving quickly, carrying him faster than should have been possible. Shinnosuke’s practice sword tried to deflect Shimon’s attack, but his opponent turned his wrists and struck.

The tip touched Shinnosuke’s chest, a killing blow by any measure, and silence followed.

Shimon looked at the practice sword in his hand, an indictment on his opponent’s lack of skill and judgment. He felt his own superiority. Against the odds, he had done it. Not by accident, not by fluke, but by design. The thought rose warm and bright inside him.

I can do this. Good game.

“It is no good,” Matsuda said.

The warmth died, Shimon could only look at him askance.

“Go,” the instructor growled

Shinnosuke bowed and withdrew, face unreadable. Matsuda then took a practice sword from the rack and stopped opposite his newest, and most precocious student.

“Strike me,” the master ordered.

The young man hesitated.

“Are you waiting for a written invitation?” Jūbei asked, a single eyebrow raised in challenge.

Shimon attacked, choosing a simple direct cut, fast enough to test rather than injure. Matsuda stepped slightly to the side, and Shimon’s weapon passed without contact.

Out of nowhere, a light strike touched Shimon’s ribs.

“Again,” the master demanded.

This time, Shimon watched the instructor’s feet and attacked from the right. Matsuda’s weapon met his with a dry slap. Shimon recovered, parried the return, and felt satisfaction flicker.

He could follow this, he thought to himself with no small amount of pride.

Matsuda struck again. Shimon blocked. Again, then again in a series of blocks and parries, as he focused completely on defense. The instructor’s attacks were fast but not impossibly so. Shimon’s reflexes caught them, his confidence building with each parry.

Left, right, wrist, mid-section, then shoulder. The new samurai could see the pattern behind them as he met everything.

Matsuda’s gaze remained almost bored. “Your hands are quick,” the instructor remarked.

Shimon parried another strike.

“Your eyes are quicker.”

Then another came with increased tempo.

“Your feet, however, are stupid,” he stated with a shake of his head, as he thrust towards his student’s throat.

Matsuda shifted, but the movement was not an attack. Shimon’s attention went to the weapon anyway. Jūbei’s shoulders turned left, and his sword lifted for a cut. Shimon read the line, stepped to close it, and brought his own weapon across.

Nothing met it, for the instructor had not committed. His rear foot moved instead, sliding outside Shimon’s leading leg. His body vanished from the line Shimon had predicted in a sequence known only to true masters of the blade.

The chip screamed a correction, showing potential avenues of attack—far too many to make a proper decision.

[ANGLE CHANGE]

[BLIND-SIDE ENTRY]

More energy required to process data…

Shimon turned, but it was too late. He could not react to what he could not see. Matsuda’s practice sword struck the back of his upper arm. At the same time, the instructor’s foot pressed behind Shimon’s ankle, and the young man’s own momentum completed the lesson.

He tripped over himself, twisted, and landed in an undignified heap with one leg folded under him and the practice sword skidding across the floor.

The hall fell silent as the humiliated man stared at the floorboards. Pain radiated through his shoulder and hip, and his Health had fallen by several points. More troubling was the toll the struggle had taken on his Stamina. Only now did he realize how hard he was breathing. 

Only then did he realize that there was a notification that he had ignored.

You have gained 1 attribute point in Body.

At least I got something out of it, he considered with no small amount of bitterness.

His reflexes had worked perfectly, but he had reacted and moved to exactly what Matsuda wanted him to see.

The instructor stood above him, a towering presence. “Your foundation is rotten.”

Shimon pushed himself upright.

“Your reactions are excellent,” Matsuda continued clinically. “Your balance is not. Your cuts begin with the hands. Your feet cross. Your hips arrive after your weapon. You chase what your eyes are shown. A skilled man will lead those eyes by the nose.”

Shimon’s face burned.

Matsuda tapped the practice sword against Shimon’s shin. “I made you react incorrectly. Your hands are soft, your breath has smoothness to it, giving you poor stamina. Your shoulders rise when pressed, an easy sign to read,” the instructor added. “Your power, however, is satisfactory.

Shimon looked down at his palms.

They were soft. An ordinary life had left small marks, but they were not the hands of Tarō, Shinnosuke, Genbei, or anyone else in this world. 

“You have been given the roof of a house before anyone built the walls,” Matsuda said. “Until the foundation is corrected, you will not fight freely with the senior students.”

Shimon’s head came up.

The instructor shook his head. “You will train with the juniors.”

One of the boys he had beaten tried very hard not to look pleased. Tarō looked away, a ghost of a superior sneer on his face.

Matsuda pointed toward the end of the hall. “Stand.”

And Shimon stood.

Matsuda looked at him with a discerning eye. “Feet apart, like so,” he demonstrated.

He obeyed.

“Not like that.”

The instructor kicked one ankle outward, and Shimon almost lost his balance.

“Again, this time find your center,” Matsuda ordered, letting disappointment enter his voice.

And so Shimon Ayanokouji, Proven Yōma Hunter, killer of men, slayer of three grey monsters, bearer of an impossible Spirit Break spent the next hour learning how to stand properly.

***

Training continued until the sun stood high, and then continued beyond it—an endless, relentless feast of suffering.

Matsuda drilled Shimon harder than the juniors, though Shimon did not realize it immediately. He was too occupied with keeping his feet aligned, his weight centered, his shoulders relaxed, his grip neither too tight nor too loose, and his breathing joined to every movement in an endless sequence: raise, step, cut, recover, and begin again; raise, step, cut, recover, and begin again.

Again, and always again.

Tarō trained with the intermediate group, moving through paired forms and short exchanges. Every time Shimon looked over, Tarō seemed to be doing something interesting.

Shimon returned to stepping forward and cutting the air.

The extra points in Body helped. They did not make exercise pleasant with the ability to enjoy mindless repetition.

At some point a notification flickered at the edge of his vision.

You have gained 1 attribute point in Body.

You have gained 1 attribute point in Mind.

Shimon was too tired to celebrate, but a small corner of his mind noted it. 

Kenzen naru tamashii wa, kenzen naru seishin to, kenzen naru nikutai ni yadoru—A sound soul dwells within a sound mind and a sound body, he remembered as he saw the gains.

By the time Matsuda finally called for the midday meal, Shimon felt as though he were half dead.

He sat beneath the eaves with Tarō and ate the rice balls Kiyo had wrapped.

“You look pleased,” Shimon started.

“I am eating,” the other man replied dismissively.

“You were placed with the intermediate students.”

“Yes.”

“Still, I beat the man who beat you,” Ayanokouji continued.

Tarō chewed. “Then the sensei beat you like wet laundry.”

Shimon shrugged before biting into the rice ball. The filling was salted plum, and sourness struck his tongue.

Tarō looked at him. “My opponent, he cheated. And, when he faced you he was no longer fresh.”

“He did not cheat,” Shimon denied.

Shimon hated how Tarō could be, well, difficult. Admittedly he had not known him long, but something about him had changed. Perhaps it was his sudden jump in social status.

Ignoring him for the moment, he searched opened his status, searching for a missed notification. Unfortunately, much to his chagrin, there was no increase in his Swords skill.

Of course not. He had spent hours holding a sword, doing the most inane, and repetitive things.

Matsuda somehow snuck up and approached while Shimon was still looking at the invisible panel. “You are staring at the air.”

Shimon closed his status immediately. “Thinking, sensei.”

Matsuda looked at him as if was touched by something, then just handed Shimon a wooden sword. “Practice the first form. One hundred times before sleep.”

“Only that?”

Matsuda’s expression became colder.

Shimon corrected himself. “Yes, sensei.”

Homework, he silently sighed to himself. Looks like it caught up to me after college.

***

They returned to their respective homes after several more hours of training, unfortunately without any further gains to his Attributes.

Genbei had heated water in the bathhouse behind the kitchen. It was no modern bath, but Shimon lowered himself into the wooden tub with a groan of gratitude. The hot water stung every bruise the training had left behind. He sank deeper until only his head remained above the surface.

The bath smelled faintly of cedar and smoke. Light entered through a small opening beneath the roof. Outside, he could hear Genbei splitting wood. 

For several minutes, the young man felt almost human. Then he remembered he had one hundred cuts to perform. He sank lower, trying to escape that near future.

Dinner was served in the main room. Rice, simmered roots, greens, and river fish. Kiyo also brought a ceramic flask of sake, explaining that Nagai-sama’s household had sent it with the house allotment.

Tarō, having invited him yet again, poured one cup and then another. Shimon drank more slowly. In truth, he would have avoided the sake altogether if he could have done so without seeming rude. 

The vintage was rougher than the refined bottles Shimon had tasted in modern Japan: warm, faintly sweet, and sharp enough to crawl into the nose. But, Tarō drank it as though it were water. By the fourth cup, the older man’s usual silence had grown heavy and contemplative. By the fifth, his eyes had taken on a glassy intensity, his posture had loosened, and contemplation had become argument.

“I am the better swordsman,” Tarō announced.

Shimon looked up from his fish without quite looking at him. “Congratulations.”

“You struck Shinnosuke once.”

“Yes,” Shimon replied absently.

“He struck me three times…” Tarō paused to suppress a belch and failed. “…because I let him.”

“This argument has become difficult to follow.”

Tarō frowned at his cup as though it had betrayed him, then pointed it accusingly at Shimon. A little sake spilled over the rim. “I am still better.”

“Sensei placed you higher.”

“Exactly.” Tarō nodded too firmly and had to steady himself against the table. “There.”

“Do you want an award?”

“I have an award.” Tarō reached for the flask, missed it once, then caught it on the second attempt and refilled his cup. “I was placed at Intermediate.”

Shimon glanced toward Kiyo as she cleared the dishes, but she avoided his eyes with professional discipline.

Tarō drank again. His face had gone red, and beneath the liquor lay something darker—grief, poorly buried and beginning to surface.

“You move strangely,” he said, the words running together. “Too fast.”

Shimon sighed. “Thank you.”

Tarō leaned closer, swaying slightly over the table. “Your face is strange too.”

“I look that way because I am half asleep because you are boring me.”

“Your eyes.”

Shimon looked at him sharply. “What about them?”

Tarō squinted, struggling to focus. “Sometimes they look wrong.” His voice thickened. “Like Sakurai’s.”

Kiyo stopped near the door. And outside, Genbei paused over his evening meal and became very still. Neither knew the particulars, but both knew enough of the world to recognize danger when a name changed the air in a room.

Shimon’s fingers tightened around his cup. “That is not funny.”

“I did not say funny.” Tarō’s expression sagged, anger and grief failing to find a victor. “Sakurai looked like a man. Spoke like one. Walked alongside us. Then he cut Kuroda and called the grey things brothers.”

“I know. I was there,” Shimon replied testily.

Kume looked at him sideways. “You were there at the end. Alive, when others were not.”

The unspoken accusation landed, and Shimon felt something cold move under his ribs. Tarō blinked, perhaps hearing himself too late. 

But then he ruined everything. “Maybe you are a yōma too.”

A cold silence followed and Shimon very much wanted to hit him. The desire came cleanly and surprised him with its force. Not to draw steel, and most definite not to kill, not yet. Just strike Tarō in the mouth hard enough to send the sake cup across the room and shut him up.

Instead, he stood and Tarō looked up at him.

Shimon’s voice came out flat. “You should go home and get to sleep.”

“I will sleep when—”

Tarō swayed, then his eyes lost focus. He tried to rise, apparently to prove something, and failed halfway. He dropped back onto the mat, muttered his brother’s name, and folded onto one side. Within moments, he was asleep.

Kiyo knelt near the doorway. “Ayanokouji-sama—”

The young man schooled his face to neutrality. “He is drunk, could you ask your husband to get him back to his house.”

“Yes, of course, Ayanokouji-sama,” she accepted demurely.

Genbei coughed outside in agreement.

Shimon left the room, and walked into the thin moonlight of the courtyard. He took the practice sword from where he had left it beneath the eaves and walked further into the center of the yard.

One hundred cuts. He was angry enough to perform a thousand.

Shimon took his stance, and swung. The wooden sword made a soft sound through the air. His shoulders tried to lift, but he forced them down as he struck at the innocent air.

Again and again, he repeated the motion.

At fifty cuts, Shimon began to notice that he was not performing one action but several connected badly together. Separate pieces pretending to be a whole. At sixty, he tried to make them begin together and the sword moved smoother, if not faster.

Throughout it all, sensing its master’s intent, the chip had been comparing his movements.

[MOTOR PATTERN ANALYSIS]

Integrating observed motions dataset: 43% complete.

Movement consistency: Improving

Force transmission: Inefficient

Upper-lower body synchronization: 41%

Shimon gritted his teeth and continued through the form. Then, on the ninetieth swing, something shifted. The movement suddenly felt smoother, as though he had broken through some invisible barrier. 

You have learned Swords [7]

You have learned Spears [4]

You have learned Hammers [2]

You have learned Axes [2]

You have learned Unarmed [3]

You have learned Pain Tolerance [3]

Apparently, some elements of weapons training carried over from one discipline to another. Some principals applied to all things, or something like that. A quick check of his status also revealed that he was hair’s breadth away from the next level. Pain Tolerance, meanwhile, seemed less like a reward for his training and more like the System formally acknowledging his suffering. He had probably put more effort into training today than he had into every physical education class of his life combined.

On the ninety-seventh cut, Shimon felt something change. For a single movement, the step and the strike became one, and the sword seemed to travel not because his arms had driven it forward, but because his whole body had entered the line behind it. The bamboo blade came to rest with less strain than before, revealing something hidden within the form’s apparent simplicity, a principle whose edge he could sense without yet understanding.

The next cut was poor, and the one after it worse, as whatever he had discovered slipped beyond his reach. 

“Come back,” he muttered, though life had never shown much interest in being convenient. 

He finished the hundredth repetition and began again from the first, continuing until his arms trembled and sweat had soaked through his fresh robe.

Only then did he notice that the darkness beneath the eaves seemed deeper than it ought to have been. He had the distinct impression that something was watching him from within it, but when he turned his gaze directly upon the corner, there was nothing there. 

Shimon raised the wooden sword and pointed it toward the shadow. “I am not in the mood to deal with you!” 

The shadow remained only a shadow, and Shimon decided to ignore it and take another bath before sleep.

Shadows be damned.