Prologue: Trial of White Steel
Despite the cold air of winter and the falling snow, the forest the man was observing was ablaze. Not with a wildfire, but with the sounds of battle. Through the digital binoculars in his hands, Nadatsugu Shirogane was able to see far more of the action within the trees than would otherwise be allowed with the shroud of night covering the forest. Even from his viewing platform, he could easily make out a shape darting through the trees, flashes of fire and wind blasting through the branches as other shapes lunged for the source of those blasts, each one kicking up the snowfall of the mountainside. The suited man drew the item down, pulling up a stopwatch and clicking it down.
"Hmm, Ren's gotten faster since last year. Much faster," he said with a chuckle. "At this rate once he's in Hagun he's barely going to be challenged by most of his peers."
"Don't be… making too many assumptions," a somewhat strained voice said, Nadatsugu looking to the side, looking down to the younger man sitting cross-legged with his hands clasped together. "Though… you may have a point. The kid's making it a trial and a half to keep my golems up for this test. Seriously, what the hell kind of training have you been putting him through? I know he's always been strong but… this is just monstrous!"
"The kind that would make sure Ren wouldn't get wrapped up in his own talent."
Nadatsugu raised the binoculars again, fiddling with the dial on them to sharpen the image as he focused again on the fight, a gout of fire bursting through a tree and a series of silhouettes darting through the new hole and down the hillside. Glints of red and green caught in the air, darting through the trees at blinding speeds as trees kept collapsing behind them while whatever had followed the shape gave chase.
"Sword of the Rift, Raijin!"At the echoing yell that reached even then, a boom of thunder sounded through the air as a flash of gold glinted through the trees, dust flying up into the air as a quite notable portion of the ground spiked upwards.
"Is Ren planning to rearrange the mountainside?!" the puppeteer lurched as he yelled, Nadatsugu laughing in response. "Now really does not feel like the time to laugh, Uncle."
"Relax, Ranmaru. Ren knows what he's doing… I think."
"Not reassuring!"
"He's not the same boy he was several years ago… he can control his powers, just watch."
Nadatsugu steeled his gaze on the fight as Ranmaru groaned. The man caught a lull as the fight dragged to a clearing, and finally he could get a clear view of his observation target. A boy no older than fifteen, dressed in black combat attire with his navy-blue hair matted by sweat. The yellow nodachi in his hands barely lilted its weight as he shifted his stance, the boy's amber eyes flashing as a wooden golem charged him. The nodachi flashed forward, the single swing bisecting the golem and ripping a gouge through the ground beyond it.
Another two golems lunged from the trees behind the boy. "Sword of the Squall, Ryujin!" The nodachi vanished in a flash of electricity and lotus petals, and with a burst of water and more petals was replaced by a blue bladed tachi. Water shot along the blade as it was swung, streaming outwards to extend it as the pressure of the slash tightened, felling the golems in a single swing that also took some ends of the treetops with it. "Sword of the Blaze, Kajin!" A burst of flaming petals produced a crimson uchigatana in the boy's other hand, finishing the golems off in a gout of fire. As the air now filled with steam, the boy, Ren Shirogane, stood there with barely a heave coming from him as he looked around for signs of any more enemies.
Ranmaru for his part slumped over as he panted, Nadatsugu kneeling and patting the young man on the shoulder.
"So… are we done with this dang test?" Ranmaru panted, letting out a long groan when Nadatsugu shook his head. "Ah come on! I can't keep this up anymore! Hasn't Ren passed? He's torn up this whole side of the mountain and barely even broken a sweat, he's more than ready!"
"Perhaps… but I want to do the last step myself. You rest up and head back, we'll meet up when I'm done."
Nadatsugu didn't wait for a reply before stepping off the platform. The air burst underneath the man, launching him through the air and towards the clearing, a few more steps on the air itself carrying him the entire way. As Nadatsugu lightly landed in the clearing, Ren turned to him nigh instantly without prompt. His instincts are sharper… good. The man lightly smiled at the observation.
"Dad…" Ren murmured; a bit of fatigue was now more apparent to Nadatsugu as the boy took in a deep breath. "Is the test done?"
"Almost," Nadatsugu raised his right hand, and Ren immediately fell into a defensive stance with his swords raised. Nadatsugu chuckled again. "I see I don't need to say what the final part of this test will be. Good. Form before me, Musashi!"
Nadatsugu clapped his hands together, drawing them apart as his fingers closed around the forming blue light between them. With a burst in the air, he now held two identical katanas, their silver blades glinting in the sparse light. And the same second that flash came, the man charged the teenager. The silver blades descended from above, light trailing behind the blades. Ren's swords flew up to match the blades, colliding in bursts of fire and water that matched the bursts of energy from his father's swords.
Ren flipped back as Nadatsugu's swords drove through the collision. He drove his blue sword into the ground, the stream of water it produced flash freezing and coating the ground in a layer of ice that rushed for Nadatsugu. The man's swords carried upwards, the force of the swings causing the rush of ice to arc upwards and miss him entirely. But it became clear the ice itself was not the intended attack, as the sudden glow of heat behind it made clear. Nadatsugu smiled as the ice burst apart from a gout of flames rushing through it, the man stepping to the side and feeling the heat of the flames rush past him. From quickly manipulating ice to limit his foe's movement to continuing the attack with flames… Ren's learned well how to channel his elemental affinities.
A swing of Nadatsugu's blades cast aside the flames and wall of ice, and as the air was filling with glimmering shards of melting ice, he caught another movement. His instincts led the man to react quickly, a green wakizashi coated in swirling air slamming into his blades as he blocked. "Sword of the Swell, Fujin!" The air around Ren's newly produced weapon swirled faster, carrying his stalled swing forward and pushing Nadatsugu away as he finished the movement, flipping the sword into a reverse hold as he carried the momentum into a second whirling slash combined with the flames from his still present crimson sword.
The air echoed as the four blades collided again, the weapons locking together at their guards as Nadatsugu stood his ground against the fierce attacks. As the weapons grated together from the two struggling to break the lock, Nadatsugu didn't feel surprised at all to see Ren bearing a strained yet excited smile as their blades rattled against one another. The man was sure by this point the fact this was an evaluation had slipped Ren's mind, and he was simply enjoying getting to fight with his father like this.
"That's a good expression you have, Ren!" Nadatsugu's swords flashed as he broke the lock, Ren moving back to avoid the follow up slashes, parrying one with a timely swing of his crimson sword. "But tell me, what is that smile for? Excitement at this fight for its sake alone, or at being able to use your abilities to their fullest?!"
"A bit of both!" Ren dismissed the wakizashi and gripped the crimson blade with both hands, blooms of fire in the shape of a lotus flower rising from the grip as tendrils of flame rose along the edge. "Didn't you say that's how it should be?! That the thrill of a proper fight is getting to go all out against people who can bring out the best in you?"
"Hehe, that I did say to you," Nadatsugu readied both of his blades as the flames coursing around Ren's sword intensified, the silver blades flashing white as he raised them. "I merely had to be sure that wasn't a smile of you thinking too highly of those talents… so, come at me! Let me see it Ren, the results of this training!"
"Then I hope you can take the hit!" Ren raised his sword high as the blooming fire intensified into a brilliant blue. "Rekka no Hana!"
The blue blaze intensified as Ren's sword descended, Nadatsugu meeting it head on as a wave of pure white flowed from his swords with his own swing. The two strikes collided between the two combatants. The air burst as the attacks stopped and exploded, dusting the air with flecks of white and petals of flame. And as Nadatsugu shifted to take stock of the situation, he found those petals being cast away as the red sword flashed into his vision, stopping a short distance from his face as Ren appeared before him, blade held steady.
"Nukiashi, hmm? You learned quite the nasty little trick from that old geezer," Nadatsugu chuckled as Ren lowered his blade. "You pass. Though perhaps a simple phrase isn't enough to do it justice. Your swords were just as excited as you to face me, and they rang in a way that held no ill intent. You've learned your lessons well."
"Well, I have had a lot of excellent teachers," Ren laughed as he laid the sword against his shoulder. "Enough of them to quite literally beat it into me the skills I was born with were only half of what I needed."
"I'm glad to know the lessons stuck," Nadatsugu mused. "And since you passed, this means you have my full clearance to attend Hagun Academy in Tokyo. Good luck there, Ren. I expect to see you at the Seven Stars Sword Festival this year."
"Like I'd be aiming for anything else!" Ren chuckled as he dismissed his sword, holding a fist out towards his father. "And I'll aim to face as many strong Knights as I can along the way. 'Cause I'm sure there's going to be plenty."
"That I have no doubts about. Perhaps even some who'll urge you into drawing your fifth sword… heh, to think there would be a time I can't even bring you close to drawing it against me, you really have changed."
"Ah come on dad, you know what'd happen if I used that one for a test. You yourself said I should only draw it against enemies I think are worth it."
"That I did, that I did…"
As Ren chuckled, despite that warm, almost joking smile the boy had, Nadatsugu was visualizing something else around the boy. Something that loomed above, towering over him as if it was trying to blot out the sky itself. The visage of a demon, the beast looming far overhead, the framing of its wild hair around its glaring mask staring down at him. What you've become Ren, what you turned yourself into merely by refining that wild power that had tried to restrict you since your childhood… what else could I call it, but a "Demon" given flesh?
The visage Nadatsugu saw in his one was one he didn't know the true meaning of. An omen of something to pass soon? Or was it an indication that, perhaps, the decision he made regarding his son had outcomes he couldn't imagine? That something about the boy had changed, so irrevocably, there was no longer a way to see where it would lead.
Whatever it was… perhaps it wasn't wrong the man felt nothing but an odd, optimistic excitement, even if that sign came from a "Demon."
