Who was Oda Nobunaga? What had compelled such a man or woman, to turn from a slouch so lazy, one of their tutors killed themselves in a pique of anguish, to the demon king that conquered half of Japan, whose subordinates united the country after their death.
Issei tossed and turned in bed. The fires of the Mount Hiei had left no physical marks, no scars or burns. All Issei could remember was the pain, the all-consuming inferno he had burned in. Back and forth, Issei turned. Sleep only came in the early hours of the morning, a reprieve.
She was crying, her tears of bitter regret streaming down her face. But instead of sadness, she was angry. Furious at the world, her family, but most of all, herself. Ice cold stares full of disdain, came from all sides, watching her bawl head out, watched her scream in rage. After what felt like an eternity, she had brushed past all the fine dressed men and ladies, to be alone. Heaving desperate breaths, she slammed a fist against the wall. It stung like hell, but she had never cared much for pain. She pummeled it again and again, until her fist was mangled and the wall had a large gaping hole.
The absolute fury she held toward the world, had died down. She'd barely even known the man she cursed, the man who called father that only could give disapproval. Not once did she remember a time when she had been viewed with anything other than disappointment and distaste. Her mother, her siblings, they all stayed away from her foolish self. The last time she'd seen her shitty old man, he'd labeled her the future head of the Oda clan to the horror of friends and family.
Why, why the most useless child, the so called Fool of Owari, why her? She cursed again, cursed her father, her mother, her siblings, everything. After she let out all her curses, all the things she had wanted to say, into the silent courtyard, the only thing that remained on her face was a smile.
It was the first time she had such a smile of contentment. It would not be the last. When she cut her treasonous Uncle's head off, a devil in the night. When she crushed the other fools in Owari, becoming the province's sole leader. When she had laid low her foe's armies, their demoralized fragments absorbed into her own. When she had kindly told the Shogun she was in power now. When she had found witnessed the wonder of foreign armaments, guns and the change they represented. When she had stood upon the burning husk of Mount Hiei, every single person who had lived there dead. When she had watched clan leaders commit suicide in front of her, their skulls repurposed as vessels to drink from. When she had died, her own sword in her chest as the temple of Honnouji burned around her.
For now though, all she could do was smile. The disapproving whispers surrounded her, the vicious words from faces just out of sight babbling like a brook. Nobunaga, the fool. Nobunaga the lazy. Nobunaga the useless, they whispered.
Soon the vipers in this den would learn respect, or barring that, fear. If they would still spit and hiss on her, they could also learn death.
Issei woke with a smile on his face. He had a dream, but he had forgotten its contents. His grasped at the fragments, but the few images he remembered slipped away too as he rubbed his eyes and yawned. Making his way to the drawer, he was about to get dressed when his eye landed on the uniform and cap left on his dresser.
He froze and whimpered. Dropping into a ball, tears began to stream out of his face. Suddenly, they dried up, and his body pushed itself off the floor to face the window.
"Boy," his mouth said, "we all die. Me, you, your parents, everyone dies. Me killing your parents? They'd die one day no matter what I could do. From the moment we are born, our final destination is determined. Don't fear death." Issei wanted to deny her words but he couldn't.
"Pain, injury hurt," she continued, staring at the wispy reflection in the glass, "don't feel good do they?" His right arm rose and pinched the left. It was a stung, yet paled in comparison to the hellfire Issei had endured. Even though a bruise was forming under his fingers, comparing the hurt he felt now to yesterday's events. "Doesn't hurt much does it?" she asked. "Sometimes hardship makes us stronger."
Issei would have nodded, except he was not in control. Nobunaga stopped moving, and stared into the glass. A frown made its way onto Issei's face. Issei tried to move after a whole minute of silent staring had passed. He couldn't.
"Overgrown lizard," Nobunaga muttered. "What was I talking about? Ah, pain." As if she had never paused, Nobunaga resumed talking. "You fear me because I can hurt you, hurt your family. How do you solve this problem?" she asked.
Issei thought as fast as he could, but had no answer. His left eye began leaking tears as he awaited her punishment. A scoff erupted from his mouth.
"All you need to do is get stronger. Will crying or living in fear solve your problem? Will you escape your despair, you suffering if you live in your fear? You hold great strength within you. You've already experienced the fires of hell, nothing in this world can compare to the pain you endured. No opportunities come freely, the future must be seized!"
Nobunaga's voice rose with every sentence, from a whisper to a near shout. Her words echoed around Issei's brain, a goal, a destination, an answer.
Three loud knocks sounded on the door. Nobunaga twitched and fell backward onto the bed, ruining the serious mood she had cultivated.
"Is there something wrong?" came a muffled voice.
"Nothing, just messing with my voice," Nobunaga responded, lifting herself back up into a sitting position.
"Okay, breakfast's ready too," Mrs. Hyoudou called out.
"Don't dissapoint me," Nobunaga whispered, relinquishing control to Issei. Expecting the switch this time around, Issei caught himself from falling down. He pushed down his tumultuous feelings, and stood up, taking a deep breath. The phantom pains were crushed by his will, his will to grow stronger, but mostly in an attempt to not disappoint Nobunaga.
There had been a long talk at breakfast with Issei's mother and father. After answering every question they had, Mr. and Mrs. Hyoudou were forced to acknowledge, yes, their son had somehow become a girl. While Issei's memory was not stellar, Nobunaga interjected the answers he had forgotten sometimes. His lack of knowledge related to certain trick questions only cemented his validity.
After his interrogation and subsequent tearful apologies from his parents, the conversation moved into a more awkward direction. Even if Issei had transformed into a girl, unless his records had transformed too, there would be issues. As a young child, Issei didn't really know the difference between boys and girls. Boys were boys, and girls were girls. Becoming a member of the opposite sex was more discomforting due to the fact that his face and voice were the same as Nobunaga's than the fact he was now a girl.
Records couldn't be changed. Until Issei was twenty, there was nothing that could be done legally to change the gender on his official documents. When Issei's parents raised the extreme option of surgery, Nobunaga rose to shut that option down. She rather liked her body.
Other problems included the fact Nobunaga only held a passing resemblance to Issei. Red eyes were also not natural or acceptable at all. Thankfully, contacts could rectify it as such. Issei himself had no idea what his parents were talking about half the time. The stressed expressions on their faces stopped him from interrupting. He wasn't suicidal enough to ask Nobunaga questions either.
The sword lay in the center of the table, another unanswered question. The discussion had gotten so serious Issei's parents sent him to his room, trying to shield him from the topics they now discussed. Issei laid back on his bed, listening to the muffled echoes of his parents talking. His Gameboy reminded him too much of yesterday's events, and he didn't have the enthusiasm to read a book or manga.
It occurred to him Nobunaga had never presented a way for him to grow stronger, merely encouraged it. He tried out some pushups, and was surprised to find they were easy. So easy in fact, he quit not out of fatigue but boredom, losing count somewhere in the hundreds. He hadn't even broken a sweat. Sit ups, stretches, they all were too easy. He kept on doing them not for exercise, but to keep his mind from wandering back to yesterday's events.
Lunchtime arrived late, and Issei found his appetite near bottomless. Food and drink disappeared down his throat as if it were a black hole. He hadn't felt hungry though, just eating and drinking failed to make him full.
A certain familiar feeling struck him, and he made his way to the bathroom automatically. Thankfully his mother had noticed, and rushed over to avert the mess that could have been created.
Mrs. Hyoudou decided to pause her talk with her husband to give Issei a crash course on being a girl.
Dinner was a somber affair somehow, the worries and doubts hanging over the table like a sword. It was dead silent, each of the eaters lost in their own thoughts. Issei left after the meal, still puzzling on ways to get stronger, each more ridiculous than the last. He flipped through some of his favorite manga, looking for inspiration in hot-blooded shounen protagonists. Sometimes Nobunaga would assume control, pausing to reread an interesting page. He tried his best to ignore it.
Taking a bath was rather same, except for the hair products loaded upon him that his mother insisted on. What happened afterwards, drying and combing the veritable carpet of hair was where the difficulty lay. His mother helped, but it still took far longer than washing did. It had been a messy tangle, but now he looked like Nobunaga even more now.
His body was close enough in size to his previous form that he could wear the clothing. A little baggy, but definitely wearable.
He fell asleep after hours of tossing and turning again, lulled to sleep by the sound of his parents talking from their room. Eventually their conversation ended as they too went to sleep.
The house was silent, it's occupants resting. In the early hours of morning, something scratched against the front door. When no response came, the sound of scrabbling against a lock came, and the door opened silently. Eight inhuman limbs made their way into the sleeping home.
A/N :Spend more time to write less! Find the repeated spelling mistake in the last chapter fixed in this one! This chapter took so much uncomfortable googling...