The Tale of My Dulled Blade

[Frybread002]

Howdy YCM! Frybread with another story I've been working on. After rereading up on some of the lore of my favorite archtype, The Six Samurai, I've been meaning to do a story about them. With no serious plot or theme to focus on, this a light-hearted story that is meant to be a casual read. I sincerely hope you well enjoy this as I have when creating this. Please enjoy!

 

 

[spoiler=The Tale of My Dulled Blade]

With the sun glinting onto my eyes, the shutters that I left open last night to let in the cool night breeze allowed the sunlight to creep into my room and wake me up. While I didn’t have any complaints about the way I wake up, I couldn’t help but turn to my other side to shade my face. It was that time of the day to wake up and begin my day.

 

Groggy, tired and pretty much lazy at this point, the only thing that convinced me to get off my bed was the muscle memory my body grew accustomed to, of waking up early in the morning. Grabbing my robe and putting on sandals, I stepped out of my room and into the hallway of our dojo. The wooden floors creaked underneath the weight of my feet. Well, our dojo does have a lot of history, so I suppose its only natural for the building to be old and falling apart. Looking to my left and right, I focus my hearing to listen for the sounds that my friends might already be awake.

 

“Yariza-kun, you slept in again.”

 

“Irou-san!? G-good morning!”

 

Looking to my right, Irou-san had startled me when he opened his door. I’m probably still tired to be aware of the minute things. Anyway, Irou-san is my next door roommate in our dojo and his habit of greeting me each morning with his usual smile was a sign of him being patient with me. Today…I could hear the hint of anger and disappointment in his voice at my laziness.

 

“Hehe, well you know how the Chancellor is, he is a “productive” diplomat. So every time one of us has to escort him, we are bound to come home late.”

 

“Sigh…just tell me what time it is Yariza-kun.” Irou asked, scratching his head while looking down at the floor and trying to straighten his long hair. Clearly annoyed by my punctuality.

 

“Oh, its sunrise actually.” I replied with a smiley-yawn, grinning at him and trying to impress him the fact that we still woke up at dawn.

 

“Sunrise!? You know the Grandmaster will scold us for waking up late.”

 

“Hey, you could’ve woken up earlier to wake me up!” I lazily snapped back, a bit disappointed that he was not impressed with the time that we have woken up.

 

“I did, but I sat in my room for close to an hour, unsure if it was time for US to wake up.”

 

“Meh…let’s just go get breakfast…” I muttered underneath my breath, hoping his acute

hearing did not hear me.

 

With the hexagonal shape of our dojo, each hallway formed the layout of our home and my friends were each given a single hallway to share with a fellow samurai. The pairings were Zanji/Yaichi, Kamon/Nisashi, and Irou and I, Yariza, taking three hallways to ourselves to serve as our quarters. The remaining three hallways housed our diner hall, a single classroom and the room of the Grandmaster, Kizan-sensei.

 

As if it weren’t tiring enough, the hallway Irou and I shared, was in the center most located position in the entire dojo, so our rooms were the furthest away from anything.

“So how was the meeting Irou-kun?” Irou asked, having an interest in the escort duty I had protecting Enishi-sama late-last night. Due to his lack of eyesight, Irou’s blindness forced him to walk behind me while I guided him down the hall. Surprisingly, his blindness actually attributed to him developing his other four senses into such distinct sensitivity, that many of us had noted that even without assistance, Irou could still walk fine.

 

“Huh? Oh, well, it was indeed an interesting meeting…but…I found it not as important enough to keep me up all night. I mean, I barely had one hour of sleep.” I complained to Irou-san. Quietly, so that no one else would hear me.

 

“I see…no pun intended mind you.”

 

“Haha, sure you don’t.”

 

Still in our sleeping robes, Irou relied on me to wake up him up in the mornings, because the Grandmaster wanted us up before the sun would rise. So his punctuality solely depended on my actions and was a responsibility the Grandmaster bestowed upon me to develop a stronger respect for the bond of trust.

 

As part of our daily training as samurai, Grandmaster Kizen-sensei‘s instructions is to wake up before sunrise (at least a half-an-hour before). And during the time of summer, that meant sunrise was about 5:00 in the morning. With the sole purpose of training our bodies to adapt to any situation, the lack of sleep our body endures means a true challenge of our mind. That first challenge, cooking breakfast when all of us are half asleep.

 

Normally, we trade duties daily to keep us on our toes, but I cannot deny the fact that some us prefer being “specialized” in our chores. Nisashi was indeed the eager one and loves to chop woods each morning using the dual wield style of his katana and wakizashi. Taking an axe in both hands, Nisashi could deftly swing both axes with deadly precision, that he didn’t even need power chop a block of wood in a single swing. Proving his skill at his accuracy of his blades and the strength he had to use them. Yaichi was probably the only one who had a challenge with his chore; hunting the meet of boars, dears, and other animals such as tigers, Yaichi would take his bow to hunt for our breakfast. Well none of us doubt his aim, the pressure of being the one to provide us the food that must last us the entire day, Yaichi never prides himself in being the best archer in our group, but the best supporter of our family.

 

Despite the lack of connection of his chore to his skill, Kamon enjoyed the cooking and cleaning. Probably for his love of all things that explode, having the patience to properly setup is a required skill. So having the time to cook a proper meal is the only relation I can see to blowing up things…taking the time to setup I mean…

Personally, I am amazed that Irou has a deep admiration for scavenging. I mean, I do see that Irou has no fear of the darkness, but having to walk among the forest of pine trees that surrounds our dojo by himself, is definitely a task none of us would attempt alone. Looking for plants and animals for our meals, Irou usually accompanies Yaichi in the mornings while he hunts. Capable of foraging edible delights for us to consume, all of us are amazed that he has yet to feed us a poisonous mushroom. I remember Yaichi mentioning the success of his hunts, is attributed to the keen perception that Irou has of his surroundings.

 

As for my brother and I, Zanji is probably the only one who comes close to competing with Nisashi’s gung-ho lifestyle, that he strives to master everything he does; hunting, cooking, cleaning, and training, my brother is a truly a person you can rely on. Even our lord, Shien-dono, declared that my brother was a true student of budo. So what do I do in the mornings? Well, aside from the secret that my brother and I are adopted siblings, I am the smaller one and the one everyone looks down upon (and I mean that literally. I am the shortest among the six of us). Physically weaker than everyone else, I can only hope to keep up with them. So instead of competing with their strengths, I focus on their weakness and help them overcome that…I am, the family mom…

 

Yup, I said it, I am practically mom of the group. Scheduling training/chore duties, running maintenance checkups and establishing logistical support, none of the fancy tittles I give them can hide the fact that I am the brains of this group. Heaven forbid anything gets done when I’m not managing my friends. Even Kizan-sensei refers to me as mom…meh…

 

“Yariza, you’re late!” a voiced called from behind the door that led to the diner hall. While being bold and expressing its dominance over us, it was calm and collectiveness that caught Irou and I off guard.

 

“Honto ni suimasen Sensei! We woke up late this morning.” Irou quickly answered. Explaining the tardiness for the both of us.

 

Even before we opened the sliding door to the diner hall, the both of stopped and bowed down to show respect to our teacher, as if he were in the same room with us. I couldn’t help but feel a chill down my spine. I could only imagine what Irou-san was thinking when he bowed down as well.

 

Opening and going through the door, we once again bowed and made eye-contact with the Grandmaster to acknowledge his words. Even without his visor, the grey eyes of Irou could sense where the Grandmaster was and made eye contact as well. Another feat of his perception that amazed me.

 

“I understand Irou. Now come sit you two and join the rest of us.” The Grandmaster ordered, taking a sip out of his bamboo stalk cup. Judging by the smell of it, it was his favorite, green tea.

 

Standing straight up, everyone else was sitting at the knee-high table as we walked toward them. Sitting crossed-legged, Irou and I sat directly in front of each other, while the rest of the samurai and I sat around the Grandmaster.

 

“Well now,” The Grandmaster spoke. “I’m finally happy to see that everyone has their morning chore finished without the help of mom!” Chucking at his own joke (at my own expense), everyone soon followed suit and laughed as well. In his workout clothes, the ruggedness of his hakama (pants) and sleeveless kimono, our Grandmaster simply smiled while he looked at everyone. “So Yariza, we would like to know how the escort mission of Enishi-san went.” The Grandmaster asked me, using my first name. A sign of deep respect Kizan-sensei felt towards me. While the rest of us addressed him as sensei, Kizan-sensei genuinely cared for us, so he called us by our first names.

 

“Well, first of all, good work on your chores everyone and good morning. I am happy to see everyone is doing their part.” I said, everyone nodding at me. “ I am sorry for sleeping in late, but the escort service of Enishi-sama went extremely well in regards to his safety. As for the actual meeting…” I trailed off, unsure how to finish the next part.

 

“It’s okay Yariza-kun.” My brother replied. “Go ahead and finish.”

 

“Yes, of course Zanji-san.” I replied back, looking at him, then to everyone else. “I have great news, Enishi-san has successfully negotiated the end of shudo!”

 

“R-really!?” exclaimed Kamon. “You’re not joking with us now, are you Yariza-san?”

 

“Hold on Kamon-san, you know mom isn’t one to joke.” Nisahi-san chided in before I had time to respond to Kamon-san.

 

“I think I speak for everyone here, but shudo…really sucked…” Yaichi explained. “You have to back me up on this Irou.”

 

“Usually, I am quite reserved when it comes to politics that govern the land we reside in, but I must admit, I do agree with Yaichi-san that shudo was indeed…terrible…” Irou trailed off. I couldn’t help but look at him weird, that he would actually voice his opinion on such a matter.

 

“Well that kinda sucks.” Nisashi said coldly. (Well I do respect everyone’s opinion, the fact that Nisashi-san even said such a thing in regards to shudo, everyone just looked at him like he broke a taboo). “Hey, shudo has been a strong part of our tradition as samurai. And everyone here knows that I strongly practice our traditions to master myself.”

 

“Indeed you do Nisashi.” The Grandmaster nodded gently. Acknowledging his dedication to his beliefs.

 

“Losing shudo is like losing a part of myself! I will not allow it.”

 

“That’s not the only thing you lost.” I heard Yaichi-san retort under his breath. It was probably because Yaichi was sitting next to me for our breakfast, but with Irou’s acute hearing, he and I were the only ones who smirked at his joke.

 

“Zanji, you were called a true student of budo, you obviously know how important shudo is to our tradition.” Nisashi asked, looking directly at my brother, waiting for an answer. I gotta admit, Nisashi is correct, my brother also follows tradition strongly, so I am curious about his answer.

 

“Uhhh…” Zanji started. “Hmmm…well, I do practice our tradition, I must state that not all of us come from the traditional samurai family. I mean, granted that Yaichi and I were monks before our c-current profession…” Zanji trailed off. Trying to word it right. “I started my training rather…”late” compared to you Nisashi-san. So I was unable to fully study the practice of shudo…and, uh…p-practice it. So that gave me an “unique” perspective on the tradition of Shudo…soo…um, because I strongly honor our tradition, I did not want too…dishonor t-tradition by my lack of understanding. Therefore, I did not practice shudo, and as such, I will not miss the practice of shudo as much as y-you do Nisashi-san. B-but I will miss it nonetheless.”

 

“Uhh-huh.” was the only response Nisashi had.

 

“*Ahem* Well now.” I began. “With the most important news behind us, lets finish breakfast and begin with our day!”