Hellooo guys! So I'm back again - a tad earlier than usual for my fortnightly gig xD

So we start a brand new arc this time! I'm really excited about this update - primarily, because this idea hit me when I was working on the first arc, and (thus) secondly, it allowed plenty of time to do ample research on making it all work. This basically covers the somewhat ambiguous notion of the Sento and the Possessed variation in-game. I asked the comic writers on Twitter a few times on whether we'd get an explanation on how Kenshi broke the Sento, and why is he possessed, but to no avail. Hence the idea for this arc was born :'D

I must thank BrutusSilentium, Hell-On-Training-Wheels, PunkRoseBlitz, Poe's Daughter, RoseScytheElysium, iceangelmkx and Freakygumdrop for reviewing the last chapter. Thanks so much for all your heart lifting comments! Additional thanks to Firebending Master for favouriting and following this! :) *gives chocolate brownies and ice cream to all*

I sincerely hope all this works out fine.. I've a feeling this new arc will either be a hit, or a big miss - so please do let me know how it went ultimately. And extra references are at the end of this chapter, below as always :)

Disclaimer: I own nothing, except for the emotional and now, physical suffering I like to dish out to my fave characters. Sorry (not sorry) :'D

Additional Note: Before I begin, just a heads up, before anyone gets confused.. There is a lot of internal bickering going on in this chapter, inside Kenshi's head :P So the voices from the Sento are written in plain italics. Kenshi is not doing a lot of internal thinking 'I think this, I think that, etc' here, but he does have one or two thoughts of his own - those are also in plain italics. The voice from the foreign entity is in bold italics -and is totally separate from the voices in the Sento.

The Takahashi Family Saga

Of Bonds of Blood

I

Five years later

Somewhere in the Primorsky Krai District,

Russia.

'Wake up, Kazimir. Glory awaits you…'

His mind swam, his heart pounded in his throat and he was freezing. Wheezing, the swordsman struggled to breathe, every inhalation resulting in a spurt of blood to gush forth from his punctured lungs, in small, gory fountains, staining the pristine white snow below him a haunting crimson.

Thunder clapped and rolled in the distance – yet snow continued to fall unperturbed, covering the swordsman in a thin, white blanket - as if unaware of the carnage wrecked onto his being hours before.

Twin wounds in his back, broken bones, torn muscles, a shattered collar, and countless black and blue bruises adorned his gravely injured body; as he lay bleeding to death on the cold forest floor.

Blood flowed incessantly from his mouth and nose, and with the remaining bit of strength he had left, he managed to prop himself up on his forearms. Sweat poured from the sides of his face, as he shivered from the cold – running an unusually high fever that had pushed him to the point of delirium.

'Return us to where we belong, Kenshi.'

'Kenshi is dead. Kenshi remains dead. And you have killed him…'

No. The voices were real – they may have been inside his head, but the swordsman was acutely aware of his hearing – his ears were not fooling him.

He grunted with effort, commanding his limbs and body to cooperate with his yet undead mind – though they seemed as heavy as if they were laced with lead. With a tortured groan, he collapsed in a heap, fresh blood erupting from his wounds – numerous aches rising to a furor in every muscle of his tired body.

'Or maybe, he never was alive. Maybe he was but a thin veneer covering your true face, Kazimir.'

The demon's presence simmered and cooled within his veins, lending him a peculiar kind of strength – one that dulled the voices of the Sento, and even his own thinking, in lieu of making the simple act of breathing easier for him. It was so easy to listen to its cooing tone, so easy to believe that all that he had accomplished in the past two decades amounted to nothing.

Eventually, the pain – its sharp currents, its dull throbs and sore aches – all began to subside. It was as if fresh life was being breathed into him.

Yet every breath he inhaled filled him with smoky shadows – foreign and vile. Dark, spidery markings – black woven with sickly red, carved their way into his injured form – as the swordsman lost the remnants of innocence still left in his soul; one that allowed him the capacity to love.

'Yes! Give into me, Kazimir… It is your destiny!'

But he was aware. Somewhere, in some part of his instinct – that he was being violated. That the demon brought with it no deliverance.

He would make such an ideal servant – the call of the demon so much truer than that of the katana. If only he could silence the annoying ancestral hum in the back of his mind…

'You forsook your lineage once, Kenshi. We cannot allow you to do so again!'

The second voice was stern, yet comfortingly familiar to Kenshi. He managed to put himself in a crawling position, even as his head spun viciously, and bile rose to his throat.

His ancestors. Their unified voice had managed to silence the demon, even if for a bit; providing Kenshi enough reprieve from the evil that threatened to consume him, to try a final time, to save his life…

"S-sonya!" Kenshi gasped into the com link he had fished out from knapsack. It was the basic human instinct to fight for survival that dictated his actions presently. Logic and duty had been forgotten long ago. It did not matter who he was or what he was – he just did not want to die a nameless death this evil night.

Static.

"Do-you-r-read-… me-" Kenshi managed to grind out from between clenched teeth. He shivered uncontrollably as the wind picked up, plastering his wet hair onto his feverish forehead.

"G-od-damnit-MAJOR!" he mewled, as a bloody cough racked through his being – ripping through his ribs and lungs as if they were being freshly sliced with a razor blade.

More static. There was no response from this far out into the woods. Kenshi let the device slip from his fingers and fall into the snowy ground below him – despair managing to creep its way through his utter desperation like fog clouding clear glass.

'This… this is it…' he was able to find his own voice from the myriad of whispers in his mind. His eyes rolled at the back of his head as he exhaled carefully. He leaned his head back, until it touched the trunk of the tree.

'Don't run away, child. Your blood is powerful... I will amplify your strength, Kazimir - and reunite you with your loved ones…'

"Suchi-n…." he whispered, his body rocking with the direction of the wind. He wished he had not given into the demon's strength – the thought, the image and the shame of losing his beloved pierced and bore into his soul with the intensity of being branded alive with a white-hot rod.

'Suchin is no more – but our heir is still alive, Kenshi. For his sake, move forth!'

It was a voice from the Sento…

The Sento…

The swordsman stretched out his right arm, his fingers brushing against the hilt of the ancestral heirloom. With a pained heave, he shifted his body toward the sword, until his gloved hands finally made contact – grabbing the katana and bringing it to his chest, breathing spastically from the effort.

The effect of the dark sorcery receded significantly; and the physical pain of his fresh injuries washed over him like a million tsunamis - drowning all lingering essences of the dark power he had leaned upon.

While the pain temporarily freed him from the demon's malicious hold, it brought with it the glaring revelation; that he would not survive. Not without the aid of the dark magik that would heal his wounds and give him strength.

Yet the sword lent to him some clarity of thinking. Kenshi brought himself to his knees, leaning against the tree trunk as he slowly regained his footing. In spite of his strained effort, his legs simply did not comply, and he fell in heap once more, against the base of the tree – exhausted, and on the brink of unconsciousness.

'Return us to our resting place, Kenshi. After you, we belong to Takeda.'

"Tak-eda…" mumbled the swordsman, trying to make sense of the Sento's directives in his muddled mind.

'Disown the Sento, Kazimir – and give into me once more. I will reunite you with Takeda..'

A small but powerful thought flashed in some forgotten corner of his mind – like a bright star shooting across the pitch-black night.

As it registered, he almost heard a ringing; an alarm bell. A red flag.

Disown the Sento? That can't be right.

'Your death is nigh, Kenshi. But die honourably, in the audience of your ancestors…'

The blade left his grip, and levitated in its blue aura in front of him, addressing the swordsman. He was now able to hear the ancestral voice as clearly – as if it was the only sound in existence.

"There is… no honour left…" Kenshi whispered trying to muster the strength the mentally reply back to the blade, but realising that once more, as his consciousness wavered – he could no longer discern the whisperings of the demon, his ancestors and his own mind.

The sword spoke to him once more – chasing away his confusions just as light chases away darkness.

'There is no bigger honour than becoming one with the Sento… Let that be your destiny, Kenshi…'

'Disown the blade, swordsman! Your ancestors have already forsaken you…'

He spat a glob of blood in disgust at the entity's vile recommendation.

Kenshi's response was a throaty growl, emanating somewhere from within the center of his heaving, battered chest – not founded in any conscious thought, but pure instinct of a fiercely independent man, who had never been fettered by anything or anyone, even when he direly needed to be.

"N-never…"

He had made his choice.

The demon was enraged. It roared and howled with a carnal ferocity within Kenshi's being, filling him at once, with an unparalleled strength, and a crippling heaviness that threatened to crush his insides and turn his skin inside out.

Visions danced in front of him – a bullet tearing into Suchin, Takeda brandishing a blade and attacking the thunder god, Raiden… the Shirai Ryu temple, engulfed in flames.

It would not let such an ideal host slip away so easily.

The Sento moved towards Kenshi, who brought up his left hand and grabbed it as he had done so countless times, drilled into him as if in second nature.

The swordsman huffed and growled to himself, deciding to use his pain as the fuel required to accomplish his final task...

He was the battlefield. He was the prize. He was the victor, and he was the loser.

And with whatever that was left of his benumbed, torn mind, he crawled forth – compelling the blade to give him enough strength to make it to the House of Pekara, before he bled to death in the woods surrounding it.

'My mind holds the key…'

Two hours ago..

'My body is a cage… that keeps me … from dancing…'

He did not remember where he had heard the mournful poem before. He did not care what the words meant, or if any of them made sense or not. His head swam, and he was so very tired...

Kenshi had long lost count of the number of punches that were rained down on his ribs, chest and face. He had long forgotten about the currents of agony that rippled through his leg, his sternum and his shoulders from shattered bones.

Even the pain – as hard as it was, it had reached a point where it simply overwhelmed his nerves. It existed no more for him. Neither did Mavado's words, as he stood over him, sweating from the effort of pummeling him to madness.

Mavado was, undoubtedly, a worthy opponent.

And tonight, the swordsman had been bested by the Red Dragon leader.

Except Takahashi Kenshi did not care. He did not care about Mavado, he did not care about the pain nor the humiliation. All he cared about was the sight unfolding in front of him.

In front of his eyes.

'with the one I love…'

"Suchin…" the swordsman whispered, tears brimming his eyes, before rolling down the sides of his bloody face. His blindfold had been pushed up to his forehead, where it was stained from the sweat despite the bitter cold of the night.

The cursed whites of his irises flashed prominently against the backdrop of deep crimson-red eyes. But that was not the most damning aspect of it all.

He could see her.

There, right underneath the shadows of the trees – glistening pale red under the silvery moonlight, was his beloved. Suchin. Her long hair, darker than the night above them, flowing behind her, her face pale, lips rosy with the hint of a teasing smile, as if harbouring a secret she would deliberately not share with him…

'…but my mind…'

'Is it not worth it, Kazimir? To be able to see her for once…'

The dark voice echoed in his mind, silencing the cries of his ancestors for a moment - dripping with malice, yet sickly sweet in its ministrations, its false promises.

'Suchin is dead! It's a mirage, a lie! Do not forget so, Kenshi! Your mind holds the key!' a number of ancestral voices spoke, but the words of the demon still rang with defiant resonance in his ears.

The message was enticing, the darkness ever so near…

Kenshi was beginning to forget what his name was. Did it matter? Did it ever matter at all? He was but a man, waging a war he had no means of winning by himself – cursed by his own, estranged from his family, drowning in his own shame…

He felt himself standing right at the brink – teetering along the lip of an abyss that called out so gently to him. The fists, the blades, the kicks that knocked the breath out of him, pouring onto his crushed body – what were they all but fragments and figments of self-constructed sensory perceptions imposed onto the world, and deemed 'reality.'

No. It had never mattered. He had never mattered – to anyone. So why even entertain the false notion?

Kenshi tilted his head to the side, to gain a better view of his beloved. His breath came out in bloody coughs, spilling blood down one side of the face in a murky, crimson river. Mavado continued to punch his chest – right where his rib-bones met at the point of his broken breast-bone. Every blow splintered his sternum further, eliciting a sharp, searing pain that shot through lightning all over the swordsman's body, making his breathing almost impossible.

The swordsman's eyes merely narrowed slightly in its acknowledgement – he was absolutely entranced by the image before him.

Mavado ceased in his efforts, and smiled deviously at his accomplishment.

It was working.

'She's beautiful, isn't she? But there is more…'

A small, dark head appeared – peeking from behind Suchin's stationary form. He recognised the cerulean eyes, his own eyes staring back at him from the face of the little boy barely taller than his mother's elbow. Suchin looked down, smiling graciously at him, before allowing the boy to pass in front of her.

He shyly moved up front, fixing his gaze toward the swordsman, as Suchin held his shoulders, affectionately. The boy smiled a crooked grin. His mother bent down, whispering something in his ear. The child suddenly laughed; letting out an innocent giggle that fell on his ears in a pleasant cascade echoing through the air.

He had been right, the boy was his spitting image, yet with his mother's soft smile.

"Tak-eda…" Kenshi rasped, bringing his arm from underneath him, extending his hand from his position. With trembling fingers, the swordsman tried to grasp the wisps of the effervescent image before him. He gasped, smiling a gleeful smile – with the incredulous, serendipitous delight of a weary traveller dying of thirst, coming across an oasis in his dying moments.

Suddenly, a tortured expression immediately replaced Suchin's serene face – her eyes widened, hands shooting up to her chest as a blood-curdling shriek escaping her. Takeda hid his face, scared, into his mother's skirt.

"N-no… Do-n't…"

Suchin let out a long, tired sigh. Yet it accompanied a perfect circle of blood-red, forming in the middle of Suchin's chest. It grew larger and larger, enveloping her entire bosom in its wake. The little boy sobbed endlessly, clutching at her limp hand, her eyes staring ahead, dead, unclosed… exactly as they had been when he'd found her, dead in Lampang.

Her final sigh rang in the swordsman's ears; howling with the force of a hurricane, as the wind picked up all around them in the woods.

They began to fade into the darkness of the night – becoming grayer, more transparent, until he could see the woods behind them.

A whisper of a cry escaped the swordsman's throat. And then, the woods themselves drowned themselves in a familiar gray-black darkness – as his blindness set in again.

"C-come back…" Kenshi croaked, his voice hoarse. He brought up his arm again, waving it in front of him wildly – as if it had been the first time his vision had vanished into nothingness. "P-please... c-come back…"

Mavado laughed humourlessly at his pathetic efforts. There was never anything in the direction where the swordsman had wistfully looked at, and was now reaching for at this current moment. The cult leader shook his head in disbelief, wondering if there was any depth left for the swordsman to fall further.

It was as desperate as he could get; the pinnacle of sheer degradation. Mavado relished the moment like one would an exquisite sight.

'Ahh.. you overreach, swordsman. This was merely a sample; your end of the bargain is yet unpaid…'

'Don't listen to it, Kenshi!'

'It's all a ruse, you know better than that!'

'Mere smoke and shadows cannot bring down a Takahashi!'

'You owe it to us to fight: to us, to yourself, to Suchin and Take-'

'Blood for blood, Kazimir… It's that simple…'

"AAAAARGH!" the swordsman cried as the voices echoed incessantly in his head, bouncing off the walls of his utterly confused mind, merging into words and phrases that stopped making sense to him, drowning out his own inner thoughts. He brought his hands up to his head and held his temples, writhing, convulsing in a psychosomatic agony that had nothing to do with his current beating.

Kenshi. Kazimir. The demon. His ancestors. The Sento.

He could not make out any of them. He could not remember his name. He could not remember anything. He could not hear himself think amongst the maddening cacophony echoing endlessly in his ears.

'No. Kenshi. Remember who you are.'

'The wraith was right: what use is a blind man than to mull over mere names?'

"Stop… Just-stop…."

Mavado got up on his knees, and brushed himself off. This had been far too easy for him – had he been alone, the swordsman would have surely defeated him.

Before he'd brandished the dagger, Takahashi Kenshi had had the upper-hand in their duel. Calculating, meticulous and unnaturally aggressive; he had not even bothered to grace the conflict with his usual banter. Kenshi had attacked Red Dragon with an ice-cold fury that was distinctly his own.

Mavado smirked at the sight of the swordsman trying to sort his mind out, as weak as he could be. Nitara's blood magik would overwhelm him soon enough, given how he was already delusional and semi-coherent.

He'd come running like a hapless dog to their service soon enough. Daegon would most certainly be pleased.

Raising an eyebrow, Mavado paused for a second though, frowning thoughtfully. He had been quite a persistent annoyance to their operations in the past five years, since his betrayal; leading them to a wild goose-chase across the entire continent, before ending his journey in the heart of the hell-wraith's territory. Hao's demise, the idiot - flash in the pan that he was, yet still had set back the Red Dragon.

Indeed. Daegon would not be in need of his services this…. urgently.

With an evil grin, Mavado drew his hookswords once more, twirling them around his wrists expertly, purely out of habit. With a satisfied tilt of his head, he plunged the blades deep into Takahashi Kenshi's back.

The swordsman howled in agony – his cry ricocheting off the bare woods – breaking the silence of the night. Kenshi did struggle to break the Red Dragon's hold, yet the latter merely held his head down by bashing a heeled boot to the back of his skull, as he kept pushing his blades deeper yet still into the swordsman's broken body – until he felt the steel would pierce and come out from the opposite end.

Mavado then pulled his hookswords out, jerking Kenshi along in such a manner that the swordsman was practically lifted from the ground. The blades pulled out fragments of the swordsman's ribcage, puncturing his lungs so that sickly, gargling noises was all that he could manage in the throes of agony.

"That, was for your treachery," Mavado calmly remarked, as he holstered his weapons, and turned to take his leave – to return the dagger to the Red Dragon Temple in Linxia, China.

"Wipe yourself, now. You've yet to collect your due from Daegon."

These were the last words Kenshi had heard before he succumbed to unconsciousness.

House of Pekara

Unknown location,

Primorsky Krai District, Russia.

Present

The warrior-ancestors resident in the Sento, had been defeated long, long ago. Their silence, greeting Kenshi for the first time since he was blinded, was almost welcome.

It now a battle in between the demon, and whatever was left of Kenshi's sanity.

"Turn back, swordsman – your intentions are vile!" boomed a cacophony of voices in the catacombs, bouncing off the stone-walls of the labyrinth in the ancient structure. What spoke as manifestations from the Sento, now rang throughout the chamber, as if the walls itself were made of Takahashis' spirits.

'Kenshi is dead. Kenshi remains dead. And you have-'

"QUIET, DEMON!" roared the swordsman, his own shout echoing now, morphing into an animalistic sound, one he had never before heard.

He was near the Well of Souls – he could feel the dread, the dark memories invade his ravaged mind as he doggedly dragged his profusely bleeding body through the maze.

Though blind to his own countenance, Kenshi was dishevelled and injured beyond recognition. His once neatly combed hair was now matted with crusting blood over his forehead, his nose broken and bleeding into the patchy beard that was growing on his face.

The man, priding himself on his perfect posture, was now bent over at the waist, leaning against the wall for support as he shuffled painfully – clutching his chest and trying not to breathe for as long as he can, to ease the pressure in his lungs.

Yet his skin, glistening with sweat, muddied with blackish blood, was criss-crossed with the markings of the demon.

Kenshi had relied on its evil strength to get this far, but this was his prerogative – Takahashi Kenshi was firmly in control of whatever was left of his mind.

'Your struggle is pointless, Kazimir.'

"You-will-get-out-from-me," Kenshi enunciated each word threateningly to the demon. "One-way, or the other…"

'I will deliver you, Kazimir. Your bloodline will survive through me…'

"Turn back, trespasser!" the unison of ancestral voices rumbled with a chilling finality. Kenshi had heard it before, back when he had sauntered into the catacombs before being blinded.

Before, when he was called Kazimir, the restless, arrogant young swordsman.

But now, the motive of his return to the place of his judgement, was not to adorn his arsenal with a worthy sword, but to cleanse, to depurgate himself from the clutches of the blood demon.

Destiny had written one final draw of blood to his name, from the legendary blade, before he finally returned it to where it belonged.

He reached the Well of Souls after a deafening silence, from both the demon and the House of Pekara itself. With his grossly weakened spiritual vision, he could make out the cylindrical structure, sitting atop the raised platform, enclosed with the statues of the long-dead Takahashi ancestors.

The Sento was at home. Kenshi could feel it, as he closed the distance in between him and the ancient structure, feeling the strength that carried him thus far, now slip away as he collapsed at the base of the Well.

The entire underground chamber lit up then, cerulean flames sparking out from torches high up in the crevices of the cavern; washing everything in an eerie electric blue hue.

'Kazimir, what are you…'

Kenshi crashed to his knees, fresh bleeding erupting from his chest and back, flowing in rivers down his crouching form, his head spinning. He steadied his swaying body, and tried to straighten himself as much as he could on his bent knees, hissing in pain from the effort.

The statues of the Takahashi ancestors looked down upon Kenshi as crouched, form in judgement, just as they had looked down upon, and handed out their sentence to the brazen Kazimir decades ago.

The swordsman took off his torn blindfold, as memories of his past ordeals began to flash in his mind – his blindness, his struggle against Shinnok, the loss of his family…

It had all come to pass – culminating into this point in time. He drew his face up, stretching his neck, taking in the aura of his ancestral temple and inhaled deeply despite the pinching, cutting pangs.

He had been spared, in a way, now that he came to think of it. This was his last chance of salvaging some modicum of honour.

Kenshi wiped his hands off his upper arms. He began to then wrap the blindfold midway along the blade of the Sento with unusually steady hands.

He found himself chuckling. He scarcely believed how traditional his actions had turned out to be, despite his careless dismissal of tradition in his youth.

It did not matter, just as nothing else did.

'Kazimir, NOOO!'

"Kazimir is dead," Kenshi whispered, as he braced himself, and took his position. "… And soon, you will join him."

Barely a second passed since his final declaration; Kenshi plunged the Sento deep into his abdomen.

A deliberately muted groan escaped his lips in the wake of his act. The demon screamed a long, terrified shriek as if set aflame from within – threatening to shatter his eardrums.

With a tensely gritted jaw, one that threatened to crush his molars, the swordsman slashed the blade from left to right. The demon's inhuman shriek echoed in the chamber even though Kenshi deliberately tried to disallow the demon any disgraceful display as long as he remained its host.

A mouthful of blood stemmed from Kenshi's mouth, flowing in thick streams down the sides of his lips, as the swordsman felt the gray-darkness of his vision blend into nothingness.

With a last, final show of strength, he clutched the clothed blade again – and without a moment's worth of hesitation, he thrust it into his heart with a guttural cry – feeling the cold blade against his hot, throbbing muscle, before pulling it back out, and placing it beside him.

As Takahashi Kenshi's dying heart slowed down, his body slumped, face first, falling onto the cool stone ground below him. The darkness claimed him in its entirety now, as the demon's shrieks faded away.

Several long moments passed, yet even in his dying moments, he never registered the crackling sound of metal cracking, as the Sento's blade first glowed, then shattered in the same threads of Takahashi blood still clinging onto its steel surface.

Neither did he hear the distinctly deafening clap of thunder resounding within the ancestral chamber, as the echoes of the demon's scream finally began to fade away, nor the sound of footsteps hurrying toward him.

All he saw was Suchin - once more, walking softly to him; crouching beside him, and kissing away the kenshi's tears from his blind eyes.

Nameless. Worthless. It did not matter. No one carried a name in death, anyway.

The swordsman would die with Suchin's spirit as his audience.

He had salvaged much more than honour this night.

Ohhh dayyyummm! Kenny-boo, what did you doooo?! :O *dodges rotten fruit and eggs headed for her way*

Anyhow.. xD tehhehe that's actually a very evil cliffhanger - I do apologise :P There are obviously a lot of plot-dynamics at play here, but fret not - all will be explained in the next two updates. This particular arc is going to be maximum 2-3 chapters, but there is still a lot of explaining left. I've a few thousand words of research compiled for Kenshi's/Takahashis' backstory, so expect a hefty slice of history in the next updates :)

So here are some references which are important to this :)

Main inspiring song behind this: My Body is a Cage by Peter Gabriel. This is a cover, though I haven't even heard the original myself. An extremely haunting track, one I believe is incredibly apt to this and I highly recommend reading (or re-reading this) after giving it a listen.

Kazimir: "famous destroyer (of peace)": Russian name, of Slavic origin that has many variants and alternate meanings as well. More will be explained in the next update, but Kazimir was Kenshi's real name, since Kenshi itself means 'swordsman' - based on his father's name. (I've dropped hints earlier about this as well).. After he was blinded, Kenshi renamed himself as per what he'd taught Hanzo earlier - letting his struggle be his identity, thereby deciding to go by the simple word 'Swordsman' instead of his real name (Kazimir) which I believe he would now hate with a passion.

"... (Kenshi) is dead, (Kenshi) remains dead..." : inspired directly from the quote "God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him." By the famous German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, published in the Gay Magazine and perhaps in other works as well, including The Madman, which was a topic of study in a course of mine, last year. It's a short article, eye-opening even if the statement is a bit controversial.

Hara Kiri: also known as 'Seppuku' - traditional Japanese form of suicide. Considered an honourable way to die, preferred by the noblemen and warrior classes. I used Wikipedia as a reference point for this, but this is also inspired by the Hara-Kiri in MK: Deception.

The McGill Pain Questionnaire: Before y'all raise your eyebrows and judge me (yes, I studied Psychology in first year :P) let me explain :P This is a medical questionnaire, available online easily - which basically asks patients to tick the correct description and intensity of pain they are experiencing. What this helped me with in this update, was ranking and describing Kenshi's pain in this chapter, after his hefty beating at Mavado's hand (ALSO, in line with the original timeline :3). I highly recommend it to those who want to write action scenes or about pain in general, it was quite helpful :)

Blood Demon:Yep, the very same one from the MKX comics! The Takahashi lineage, though existed centuries ago, have enough links to sorcery to be able to cast wardings and curses - such as the one that caused Kenshi's blindness initially. Yet the effects remain in the blood - while others succumbed to the call of the Blood Demon, Kenshi was able to resist it, thanks to the power lent to him by the spirits in the Sento, as well as his lineage. Though not entirely, of course - he was more or less a battleground in between the Sento and the demon.

So that's all from me for now, folks! :) I really hope you all enjoyed this update.. Please do review, and let me know what you thought of the dialogue, the expansion of the comics - what you liked, what could be better - anything, please feel free to let me know how it went! It truly means the world to me! Thanks and enjoy! :)