"We can't thank you enough for protecting our farm from those ruthless bandits, brave samurai. Amaterasu be praised you arrived before those ruffians had the chance to deal more damage."
How long had she been gone, she wondered quietly in the back of her mind, listening to the joyful and jovial praises being blessed upon her by the elderly farmer, ferrying Kushiami to the nearest town by way of his rickety, ox driven wagon, while she bowed graciously with a gentle smile crossing her lips and brightening her face with such a sincere tone of light, even beneath the thin gray shadows of the gasa she wore upon her head, a parting gift or rather payment from a hat maker for escorting her from Nagasaki to Edo safely so she could sell her wares. Yes...it had been quite the journey since she had completed her long abandoned training and quite the trials and tribulations she had faced since then, a new collection of scars beginning to wear on her, about the same as her crude but slightly benevolent Natsume-Sensei. She hadn't slept that much among her travels and desperately was she hungry, her stomach churning, gnarling and tormenting her with its ravenous groans and aches for a bowl of sticky white rice with grilled yellowtail in a sweet teriyaki glaze. Hell, judging by how much her tummy was growling irritably, it would probably take twenty or thirty bowls to sate her notoriously gluttonous appetite, but alas....she didn't have much money at all, barely a single yen to her name it seemed, and as with much she toted in her small coinpurse, she would be lucky to at least purchase a crumb of sustenance.
"You're very welcome, Ishikawa-san." Calmly and gratefully did Asuka speak to the farmer, "It is always an honor to serve those in need, that it is. Tell me, how long till we reach Osaka?" She didn't wish to seem rude, but in dire need was the Ronin of a bountiful meal, or at least whatever food she could afford at the moment. The old farmer kindly grinned, a light tap of a birch twig to the back of his burly ox pulling along the wooden cart, "We should be arriving soon, samurai. Though I must warn you, tensions have been rather high in the city. There's been talk of demons and half demons being enslaved by the mortal population. It's not a pretty sight, I'll give you that." But as much as his smile was trying to show happiness, his tone of voice, not to mention the daunting words he spoke, were rather chilling to the Ronin, raising an eyebrow in a sense of tense bewilderment. "Slavery?" Asuka inquired, the tinge of her tone heightening to confusion and suspicion all at once. "Who would inflict such a terrible sentence upon someone, even demons dare I ask?"
"Not sure." The farmer replied, a slender, wrinkled hand moving to wipe the sweat from his brow and fix his straw hat from tumbling off his bald head. "This only occurred here recent, demons and half demons being brought to Osaka in chains, some so poorly mistreated, they looked like they haven't had a single bite in a day. It's tragic really, but I dare say nothing, especially with those scary masked men brooding about the city. Something tells me they ain't human neither, and I don't wanna stick around too long to find out. If this gets any worse, whose to say they won't start enslaving the humans of the city? I fear greatly for such, not just for me, but for my wife and my children." Deeply did the old man sigh, evident in his ragged, raspy voice the horror he must feel, imagining him and his beloved family, bound in the same cruel chains that were locked upon these mistreated few, possibly lashed relentlessly, kicked, beaten savagely by these nefarious men, cowards who could only attack those...who could not attack in return. The very thought, the very grisly mental image of a defenseless creature being abused and tormented so by those bastards, it alit the flame of a candle....a ritual candle to summon forth the bitter and vengeful Shi no Kaze. For the remainder of the journey, Asuka was silent, contemplating with a deep grimace to her once softened face how someone could display openly such cruelty, such malicious ill-treatment to the public eye, only to reinforce it with threats and violence.
"Well, here we are, samurai-san. Osaka. Thanks again for your help. I'll be seein' you around." The farmer said with a tip of his floppy straw hat before his ox trotted away with the man's wagon in tow behind him, and there it was...upon those bloodsoaked grounds of the forsaken city, Asuka had the misfortune of seeing these spoken horrors firsthand, pretty much....losing her once eager appetite at the grim sight of so many demons and half demons, infinite whip marks and vicious sores festering upon their burned, bruised and broken skin, caked in blood, dirt, and....whatever else these poor, tormented souls were forced against their will to sleep in, nothing left of them almost but tender flesh and painful, rickety bones. Such atrocities....such disturbing and tragic images that flooded the woman's eyes, daring to overflow with tears shed in the greatest sympathy ever for these enslaved and tortured demons, but soon....those very eyes were pulsing alive with a blazing hot fire of anger burning through every vein of her body, every nerve ending of her flesh alight with such fury. I will not allow this.... Came the fearsome growl of her mind, eyes narrowing in slits as she grasped tight the hilt of her Sakabato, daring to draw forth her sword, but not yet.
Boldly, she ventured into the city, the awful iron stench of blood ever emanating amidst the thick, suspenseful air the city of Osaka, and its few human residents, were putting off with skittish and hesitant vibes aplenty. Assaulting the woman's ears were quite possibly the most horrific sounds imaginable, groaning, screaming, sobbing, and it never ended, even if Asuka could just plug her fingers into the recesses of her ears, there was no way at all of drowning out those terrible noises. No....I will not allow this at all to go unpunished! This horror....it shall be brought to justice! Even if it was her alone....the samurai was determined beyond all resolve that she would lift from Osaka this dreadful curse of enslavement, domination and pure....inhuman abuse. Twas as she tarried a bit more, examining with vengeful eyes the madness taking place before them, that an ear piercing cry of agony grabbed her by the heart and pulled her southward, towards the center of the city.
"No!! Please stop! I-I....I beg of you!! Nooo!!"
She couldn't believe now what she witnessed..... amidst those terrible, heart wrenching screams from the battered neko girl, chained to a post, nothing but sullied and torn scraps of burlap to clothe her, leaving her pale white flesh exposed, followed the menacing crack of a leather whip, slicing through her naked skin and ripping into her ghastly wounds that spewed forth a thick flow of blood down her tarnished and brutalized backside. "Please stop! I didn't mean to...I...I'm sorry!!" She begged ever tearfully, shivering violently and whimpering with every burning drop of torturous melancholy that fell from her cheek..and with every trickle of viscous blood down her trembling back, only more brought upon by the sinister lashings that followed, and....the chortling, grotesque bellow of the whipmaster, "Shut up, demon! You don't know how sorry you are, but you will when I'm through with you!" The whip....it made Asuka sick to her stomach, nauseous with every crack, every tear of this defenseless neko's porcelain skin from her back, and such fire it ignited in her, especially upon seeing all these people....all these cowards standing about, gawking in absolute disgust and horror, yet none daring to raise a voice or a hand to this vicious, bruting tormentor, a coward himself how he bullied this girl...and concealed his ugly face in that daunting mask.
Finally.....Asuka had enough.....
"Hahahaa! Stupid, filthy de-!!! GYAAAAHHH!!! MY HAND!!!" In an instant was the brute to his knees, unleashing from his once putrid grasp the whip, his hand....nothing more than a bloody pulp of broken fingers, all the bones of his meaty digits shattered by one single blow from a sakabato. When the abrupt cloud of dust finally settled around the masked behemoth, he looked upon his attacker, glaring down upon his miserable, worthless soul....with Hell in her ever vengeful eyes. "YOU....YOU BITCH!!" Asuka snarled under her breath, such malicious and relentless anger spewing through her lips....the Wind of Death had resurfaced yet again. "I was hoping to fancy a peaceful stroll through the city, but it seems you had to interrupt my carefully laid plans with your idiocy and your blind brutality towards this defenseless woman. Honestly, what has she done, other than be a demon, to gain the ire of you and the rest of the dunderheaded brutes such as loathsome thee? Your prejudice and your disdain for such insults me, more so than the fact of a coward and a bully tormenting those who cannot defend themselves! What loathsome dishonor of thee!"
"Y-YOU DAMN.....I'M GONNA RIP YOUR-" He tried to reach for his whip, but too soon was that hand of his drawn back, before it met with the swift and equally brutal stab of Asuka's blade into the ground, a menacing shake of the woman's head as she resumed her growling of him "Unless you wish that other hand of yours to be shattered, you will relinquish that lash and all your prejudice to demon-kind, and begone from this place!" Frantically did the masked brute nod, right before pulling himself upward on knobby knees and skittishly sprinting away from the gathering crowd, retreating as the coward he was for Asuka's joy to watch fleeting away from her view. Once the man was gone, she sheathed her sword in triumph, stepping over to the shackled and beaten neko, unbinding the chains from her frail wrists with a comforting whisper, "Are you alright?" The neko, shaking and trembling before Asuka, nodded hesitantly, moving her tiny hand to wipe a few tears from her eyes. "T....T-thank you....s-samurai...." The poor girl whimpered amidst her painful quivering. Courteously Asuka nodded to her, before bringing the girl over to an older woman in the crowd she recognized as some sort of nurse. "You there, tend to this girl's wounds and see her safe travel out of this infernal city." She said to the nurse. The woman simply answered as well with a nod, ferrying the rescued girl away from the crowd, possibly doing as the fearsome samurai had commanded of her, lest she wished to anger Asuka further than she was.
This.....this was only the start.....
How long had she been gone, she wondered quietly in the back of her mind, listening to the joyful and jovial praises being blessed upon her by the elderly farmer, ferrying Kushiami to the nearest town by way of his rickety, ox driven wagon, while she bowed graciously with a gentle smile crossing her lips and brightening her face with such a sincere tone of light, even beneath the thin gray shadows of the gasa she wore upon her head, a parting gift or rather payment from a hat maker for escorting her from Nagasaki to Edo safely so she could sell her wares. Yes...it had been quite the journey since she had completed her long abandoned training and quite the trials and tribulations she had faced since then, a new collection of scars beginning to wear on her, about the same as her crude but slightly benevolent Natsume-Sensei. She hadn't slept that much among her travels and desperately was she hungry, her stomach churning, gnarling and tormenting her with its ravenous groans and aches for a bowl of sticky white rice with grilled yellowtail in a sweet teriyaki glaze. Hell, judging by how much her tummy was growling irritably, it would probably take twenty or thirty bowls to sate her notoriously gluttonous appetite, but alas....she didn't have much money at all, barely a single yen to her name it seemed, and as with much she toted in her small coinpurse, she would be lucky to at least purchase a crumb of sustenance.
"You're very welcome, Ishikawa-san." Calmly and gratefully did Asuka speak to the farmer, "It is always an honor to serve those in need, that it is. Tell me, how long till we reach Osaka?" She didn't wish to seem rude, but in dire need was the Ronin of a bountiful meal, or at least whatever food she could afford at the moment. The old farmer kindly grinned, a light tap of a birch twig to the back of his burly ox pulling along the wooden cart, "We should be arriving soon, samurai. Though I must warn you, tensions have been rather high in the city. There's been talk of demons and half demons being enslaved by the mortal population. It's not a pretty sight, I'll give you that." But as much as his smile was trying to show happiness, his tone of voice, not to mention the daunting words he spoke, were rather chilling to the Ronin, raising an eyebrow in a sense of tense bewilderment. "Slavery?" Asuka inquired, the tinge of her tone heightening to confusion and suspicion all at once. "Who would inflict such a terrible sentence upon someone, even demons dare I ask?"
"Not sure." The farmer replied, a slender, wrinkled hand moving to wipe the sweat from his brow and fix his straw hat from tumbling off his bald head. "This only occurred here recent, demons and half demons being brought to Osaka in chains, some so poorly mistreated, they looked like they haven't had a single bite in a day. It's tragic really, but I dare say nothing, especially with those scary masked men brooding about the city. Something tells me they ain't human neither, and I don't wanna stick around too long to find out. If this gets any worse, whose to say they won't start enslaving the humans of the city? I fear greatly for such, not just for me, but for my wife and my children." Deeply did the old man sigh, evident in his ragged, raspy voice the horror he must feel, imagining him and his beloved family, bound in the same cruel chains that were locked upon these mistreated few, possibly lashed relentlessly, kicked, beaten savagely by these nefarious men, cowards who could only attack those...who could not attack in return. The very thought, the very grisly mental image of a defenseless creature being abused and tormented so by those bastards, it alit the flame of a candle....a ritual candle to summon forth the bitter and vengeful Shi no Kaze. For the remainder of the journey, Asuka was silent, contemplating with a deep grimace to her once softened face how someone could display openly such cruelty, such malicious ill-treatment to the public eye, only to reinforce it with threats and violence.
"Well, here we are, samurai-san. Osaka. Thanks again for your help. I'll be seein' you around." The farmer said with a tip of his floppy straw hat before his ox trotted away with the man's wagon in tow behind him, and there it was...upon those bloodsoaked grounds of the forsaken city, Asuka had the misfortune of seeing these spoken horrors firsthand, pretty much....losing her once eager appetite at the grim sight of so many demons and half demons, infinite whip marks and vicious sores festering upon their burned, bruised and broken skin, caked in blood, dirt, and....whatever else these poor, tormented souls were forced against their will to sleep in, nothing left of them almost but tender flesh and painful, rickety bones. Such atrocities....such disturbing and tragic images that flooded the woman's eyes, daring to overflow with tears shed in the greatest sympathy ever for these enslaved and tortured demons, but soon....those very eyes were pulsing alive with a blazing hot fire of anger burning through every vein of her body, every nerve ending of her flesh alight with such fury. I will not allow this.... Came the fearsome growl of her mind, eyes narrowing in slits as she grasped tight the hilt of her Sakabato, daring to draw forth her sword, but not yet.
Boldly, she ventured into the city, the awful iron stench of blood ever emanating amidst the thick, suspenseful air the city of Osaka, and its few human residents, were putting off with skittish and hesitant vibes aplenty. Assaulting the woman's ears were quite possibly the most horrific sounds imaginable, groaning, screaming, sobbing, and it never ended, even if Asuka could just plug her fingers into the recesses of her ears, there was no way at all of drowning out those terrible noises. No....I will not allow this at all to go unpunished! This horror....it shall be brought to justice! Even if it was her alone....the samurai was determined beyond all resolve that she would lift from Osaka this dreadful curse of enslavement, domination and pure....inhuman abuse. Twas as she tarried a bit more, examining with vengeful eyes the madness taking place before them, that an ear piercing cry of agony grabbed her by the heart and pulled her southward, towards the center of the city.
"No!! Please stop! I-I....I beg of you!! Nooo!!"
She couldn't believe now what she witnessed..... amidst those terrible, heart wrenching screams from the battered neko girl, chained to a post, nothing but sullied and torn scraps of burlap to clothe her, leaving her pale white flesh exposed, followed the menacing crack of a leather whip, slicing through her naked skin and ripping into her ghastly wounds that spewed forth a thick flow of blood down her tarnished and brutalized backside. "Please stop! I didn't mean to...I...I'm sorry!!" She begged ever tearfully, shivering violently and whimpering with every burning drop of torturous melancholy that fell from her cheek..and with every trickle of viscous blood down her trembling back, only more brought upon by the sinister lashings that followed, and....the chortling, grotesque bellow of the whipmaster, "Shut up, demon! You don't know how sorry you are, but you will when I'm through with you!" The whip....it made Asuka sick to her stomach, nauseous with every crack, every tear of this defenseless neko's porcelain skin from her back, and such fire it ignited in her, especially upon seeing all these people....all these cowards standing about, gawking in absolute disgust and horror, yet none daring to raise a voice or a hand to this vicious, bruting tormentor, a coward himself how he bullied this girl...and concealed his ugly face in that daunting mask.
Finally.....Asuka had enough.....
"Hahahaa! Stupid, filthy de-!!! GYAAAAHHH!!! MY HAND!!!" In an instant was the brute to his knees, unleashing from his once putrid grasp the whip, his hand....nothing more than a bloody pulp of broken fingers, all the bones of his meaty digits shattered by one single blow from a sakabato. When the abrupt cloud of dust finally settled around the masked behemoth, he looked upon his attacker, glaring down upon his miserable, worthless soul....with Hell in her ever vengeful eyes. "YOU....YOU BITCH!!" Asuka snarled under her breath, such malicious and relentless anger spewing through her lips....the Wind of Death had resurfaced yet again. "I was hoping to fancy a peaceful stroll through the city, but it seems you had to interrupt my carefully laid plans with your idiocy and your blind brutality towards this defenseless woman. Honestly, what has she done, other than be a demon, to gain the ire of you and the rest of the dunderheaded brutes such as loathsome thee? Your prejudice and your disdain for such insults me, more so than the fact of a coward and a bully tormenting those who cannot defend themselves! What loathsome dishonor of thee!"
"Y-YOU DAMN.....I'M GONNA RIP YOUR-" He tried to reach for his whip, but too soon was that hand of his drawn back, before it met with the swift and equally brutal stab of Asuka's blade into the ground, a menacing shake of the woman's head as she resumed her growling of him "Unless you wish that other hand of yours to be shattered, you will relinquish that lash and all your prejudice to demon-kind, and begone from this place!" Frantically did the masked brute nod, right before pulling himself upward on knobby knees and skittishly sprinting away from the gathering crowd, retreating as the coward he was for Asuka's joy to watch fleeting away from her view. Once the man was gone, she sheathed her sword in triumph, stepping over to the shackled and beaten neko, unbinding the chains from her frail wrists with a comforting whisper, "Are you alright?" The neko, shaking and trembling before Asuka, nodded hesitantly, moving her tiny hand to wipe a few tears from her eyes. "T....T-thank you....s-samurai...." The poor girl whimpered amidst her painful quivering. Courteously Asuka nodded to her, before bringing the girl over to an older woman in the crowd she recognized as some sort of nurse. "You there, tend to this girl's wounds and see her safe travel out of this infernal city." She said to the nurse. The woman simply answered as well with a nod, ferrying the rescued girl away from the crowd, possibly doing as the fearsome samurai had commanded of her, lest she wished to anger Asuka further than she was.
This.....this was only the start.....
