Find the Man of the Nightmare

- "Okay then, Tokuri. If you help us, then maybe the Celestial Assh..." Peri swallowed the rest as Sarevok glared at her, "the Celestial Ones will let you move on to Meido. See, there is some bad stuff afoot and it may turn out to be very heroic if you can help us out. I know this may have kind of surreal quality to it, but hear me out. We were on a ship, traveling to Kozakura from Lo'Shan. The ship was loaded with refugees and..."

- "Refugees?" the ghost asked.

Peri sighed.

- "They don't exactly keep you informed, do they?" she said. "See, there is a war in Shou Lung. There is this warlord from the Plain of Horses who seems to be out to create an empire and she has conquered a good part of Shou Lung. The civilians who can make it to the peaceful provinces try to travel to Kozakura... but that's beside the point."

- "So anyway, here we are, happy as a pie, on the deck of the ship and travel some time," she continued her tale, "when whoops from the sea pops a live mountain that didn't seem very friendly. All the passengers drowned except for us, since we have two powerful mages here who could levitate us until we found land, which then happened to be this island of yours. So, while we survived, the beastie headed for Shou Lung and well... the way it moves it creates tsunamis and storms... it could easily destroy the whole coast of a country. So we thought perhaps it would be civil to do something about it. And call me paranoid but somehow I doubt it is a coincidence that it up and emerged just when we were passing by."

The ghost looked very grave.

- "Your speech patterns are very strange to me, gaijin... but what you describe sounds like Kusatte Iru."

- "I vaguely recall that name," Winski said, frowning. "It was something about... ancient legends of Kozakura..."

- "You are well informed, gaijin," the ghost said. "Kusatte Iru is a horrible beast."

- "We kinda figured that one out," Imoen said.

- "It is spawn of the First Oni, the lord of Jigoku, and the greatest horror upon Ningen-do."

- "Whoa! Slow down. Not everyone is as informed as Winski, and that was a shitload of foreign terms," Peri said.

- "Is ghostie-thing talking about Planescape where yellow people go!" Cespenar piped up. "Jigoku like Abyss, oh yes! Nastybad thingie there manymanymany and oni is the same as demon, yes?"

- "The creature is right," Tokuri said. "Ningen-do is the Waking World, the land of mortals we tread."

- "In other words, material plane," Winski concluded.

- "So, the First Oni is some sort of demon lord, like Demogorgon," Peri suggested.

- "Is more badbadbad dangerous. Main demon, veryverynasty can kill and kill everyone oh yes!" Cespenar said.

Peri sighed.

- "Great. I have this feeling that this beast, for some reason unknown to us, has something against us," she said.

- "The First Oni has been imprisoned. He sleeps a magical slumber somewhere, but I do not know where," Tokuri said. "Upon the early times of Kozakura, and the creation of the clans his most malevolent creation, the Kusatte Iru, was awakened. It did not defeat the armies of the Badger clan and the Sparrow clan - as saying 'defeat' would imply that a battle took place. It merely crushed them under its feet as if mere insects, without slowing down. It completely ravaged their lands, destroying all the fortifications and the city of Kahara. It might have destroyed the whole country, but the Emperor and his imperial wu jen and shukenjas created a ritual that allowed them to possess the creature's mind. They steered it into the depths of the ocean and magically put it into slumber. The wards are maintained by the Water Magic school of Renkuy. I do not know who could possess the ability to loosen the wards - or why would someone do such a thing."

- "You said you were from Wa. How come you know all this stuff?" Imoen asked.

- "Look at the map, pink one. Wa is just next to Kozakura - and would the creature be awakened, Wa could be destroyed as well. Not only that, I was a proud samurai of the shogun's bloodline - I could hardly have dishonored myself by not possessing detailed knowledge of the history of the clans of our potential threat."

- "That makes sense," Jelena nodded. "By what you say it seems that the creature has indeed been awakened. Sarevok, what was in that nightmare you had back when we were traveling the Golden Way?"

- "I saw an old man warning me from coming to Kara-Tur... and there was some sort of magical conduit, other people casting and combining their forces. I told him I would not turn away, and then there was a vision of... shadowy creatures. They rode ghostly horses, and wore the gear of samurai - but they looked like zombies with minds, twisted, suffering. There was an army of them..."

Tokuri shuddered.

- "Shadow samurai. A fate terrible to fall upon one! There is foul magic to bind a dying samurai's soul, or sometimes the circumstances of a samurai's death can make him one. They are twisted abominations of what honor they held in life, but they are still bound by the laws of bushido to their evil master. The difference is that they don't do it out of the honor of a free soul, but by binding evil magic they can not escape."

- "Agreed, sounds like a shitty thing to do to someone," Peri nodded.

- "Powerful beyond the power of mortals you must be, gaijin, if you were able to survive Kusatte Iru. You must find and defeat this man of the nightmare. I don't think I can tell you anything useful beyond that."