Soujiro Seta looked up at the snowy Yokohama heavens from outside the window and smiled, which wasn't unusual of him to do in and of itself.
However, his insides were currently filled with butterflies and heart palpitations that somehow made the smile plastered on his face feel more real than usual, which was actually unusual for him.
What was he feeling and why was he feeling like this?
All the same, he smiled.
Perhaps he wanted to prove something with his upcoming, inevitable fight against Kinta Minakata.
Not to Kinta (who was a stranger to him), but to himself.
If for all intents and purposes, the Mimawarigumi Battousai was a match against the likes of his namesake, the Hitokiri Battousai, then how would Soujiro, the boy who almost defeated Kenshin Himura, fare against Kinta Minakata?
Now wasn't that the million yen question?
On one hand, the Heaven Sword gave Kenshin all he could handle, breaking his sword and slashing his back. On the other hand, Himura still defeated him in the end.
Would it be the same for the hatamoto-class retainer swordsman turned millionaire heir?
Modern Evolved Iaijutsu versus Classical Self-Taught Battoujutsu. Swordsmanship by blood versus swordsmanship by choice.
Both Kinta and Soujiro were born in the Kanagawa Prefecture yet both ended up so different.
An impoverished bastard child of farmers who learned swordsmanship from a hitokiri rebel versus a rich swordsman with actual samurai lineage who had the privilege to learn swordsmanship from the top masters of the land by birthright.
Maybe after this upcoming fight, Seta would find his will to power. Know what his truth was.
'Ah. 'Will to power', huh? You learn something new every day,' he thought, remembering his earlier conversation with Rin Akahori.
Rurouni Yahiko
A Rurouni Kenshin Fan Fiction Continuation Story by Chester Castañeda
So which of the two combatants represents talent or skill?
Disclaimer: All characters used in this fanfic (save some others) are the rightful property of Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha, Shonen Jump, Viz, Sony Studios, Fuji TV, Studio Gallup, Studio Deen, and ADV. This disclaimer also covers all the other copyrighted material that are far too many to mention here. Don't sue me please, I'm very poor.
Chapter 48: Talent versus Skill
After hearing Mieko Minakata and Genzo Sakaguchi's plan to bring the rest of the Sakaguchis into the mix to deal with the Brigands Guild, Kinta Minakata's response was quite simple.
"No."
"What," Mieko Minakata said, not asked, seemingly waiting for him to take back what he said. To reconsider his foolish words. "What did you say, Grandson?"
However, he wasn't the same kid who cried when his grandmother banished his adulterer mother after his father committed ritual suicide to save face from being cheated on with a foreigner.
Nor was he the child who helplessly watched as his so-called relatives took away all of the properties of his parents while claiming custody to him to justify their theft.
He wasn't the lad he was when his childhood pet broke expensive pots and was punished by a servant girl forced to do so by his grandma.
He certainly wasn't the model grandson who mastered Musou Madden Ryu and joined the ranks of the Mimawarigumi at a young age in order to keep up with the high-achieving legacy of his family composed of an elderly business woman, a banker uncle, and a lawyer uncle.
Nor was he the same rebellious teenager who decided to mostly ignore and never talk to his grandmother except for nods and grunts when spoken to, only to realize a year later that she never noticed the difference.
Nor was he the same adult who only after reaching the highest ranks of the Mimawarigumi and facing off with some of the deadliest hitokiri of the Ishin Shishi (which was enough to earn him the respect of his foes when they took over the government) did the Minakata Matriarch start acknowledging him as kin.
Or as heir to their great fortune. As though he was only worth as much as the good reputation and honor he could give to his family.
He didn't need or want her approval. Not anymore. He knew better.
Even at the risk of getting banished and disowned by his family like with what happened with his estranged mother, he repeated, "I refuse, Grandmother."
Sighing, Mieko opened her paper fan, strode to her grandson, and said while fanning herself, "You don't have a choice. I've talked to the Yokohama officers and to your nurse. As superb you are with the sword, your health since you've come back from Shimabara has been a little..."
Abelia La Cerca. So Abelia told Mieko all about his lung problems. Not that he'd ever blame the childlike Latina(?) girl for that.
"...I'm fine. I can take them all out."
"Listen to your Mama Mieko. Listen to reason. We will not let you risk your life and limb alone or have incompetent officers end up failing to protect you, your uncles, or me from these foreign invaders!"
Kinta insisted, "I can handle them."
"No, you can't. If you could, then you would've done so by now, but you haven't and those cops even let some of the assassins escape. They're still at large and you yourself almost died dealing with them!"
A fuming Mieko struck her folded paper fan on the railings of the window-enclosed deck with a loud ping.
"Those villains they caught shouldn't even be jailed! They should be hanged if not deported to wherever hellhole they came from! What's taking the Yokohama judiciary so long to execute them? Give them the firing squad! I can even volunteer Kaneda as their prosecutor for good measure!"
Genzo interjected, "They might fear having to deal with another Namamugi Incident, Milady." To recap, that was the event where a British national was murdered by samurai they inadvertently offended, causing the Bombing of Kagoshima.
The Matron of the Minakatas harrumphed. "Nonsense. They're felons with no national allegiances, like those pirates Toshiro used to battle at sea. Even their countries of origin have no intention of protecting them!"
She then leaned towards Kinta and said, "Even though you can probably give even your Papa Toshiro a run for his money in swordsmanship, I cannot depend on you alone any longer, especially since you're one of the heirs of our fortune. My only grandchild."
"..."
She folded her arms, turned towards Genzo, and exchanged nods with him.
She then said to the Minakata grandson with finality, "Like before, during the days of the Bakumatsu, it's the obligation of the Sakaguchi Family and the Musou Madden School to safeguard us Minakatas from our enemies, whoever they may be."
"'Obligation'?" The cross-shaped scar on Kinta's face that intersected on the bridge of his nose "clenched" into existence as his features hardened. "The samurai class was abolished long ago. The Sakaguchis are under no obligation to follow 'our' orders."
"...Then it's not a matter of obligation. The Musou Madden School was made to protect the Minakatas, Kinta-kun. Samurai are supposed to be loyal to their masters," said the Sakaguchi Patriarch.
Genzo wasn't just a founding member of the sword school based on moon phases and Hasegawa Eishin Ryu (an iaijutsu koryu founded by Chikaranosuke Eishin Hasegawa from 1716 to 1736 in the Late Muromachi Period). He was also a feared demon of a swordsman back in his day.
But that was a long, long time ago. This was clearly not the case any longer, with his frail body, white complexion, occasional nausea, and sickly disposition.
The Minakata grandson turned his neck and faced his master. A savage movement. "You're too old to fight, Master Genzo."
Genzo nudged the pommel of his cane into Kinta's gut, which made his student grunt. "I'm in no better shape than you are, Sonny Boy. And I'm not gonna fight alone either."
"NO," Kinta said, raising his voice. "You are samurai no longer."
The Sakaguchi Patriarch shook his head. "The Meiji Government might've abolished the samurai class, but the swordsman blood still runs through my veins and the veins of my kin. My generation and the next generation. We are warriors by blood and by choice."
The ex-Kagemusha (Shadow Warrior) of Shogo Amakusa stood his ground. "Who is left to fight? You? Your granddaughters? Your daughter?"
As he half-expected (or wholly suspected), his grandmother soon after slapped him on the face, which made it unclench enough to get his scar to disappear altogether.
"You care about his granddaughters so much, but you don't care about what happens to you? To me? To my sons, your two uncles?" she spat. "You'd rather protect them than your family? Your own flesh and blood?"
"Samurai don't exist anymore. We are not their masters. This is not their fight," insisted Kinta.
"I will do what I have to in order to protect this family. I won't have it massacred by hooligans hired by whoever enemy your late grandfather made as the Minakata Conglomerate rose to the top! And I'm not ordering them to do this, I'm asking them a favor. And your master agreed with me."
He turned towards Genzo, who nodded and confirmed, "Yes. We're doing this for Mieko-sama because we want to and we owe a blood debt to the Minakatas."
"NO," he still said, unwilling to give any ground. "I work alone."
"OHO! Just like how you saved the lives of the cops and soldiers under your watch when you acted as a double agent against that lunatic cult leader?" Mieko smirked and chuckled, her fan covering her mouth. "Be a good boy and get some help for once!"
"NO," repeated Kinta, which gave him flashbacks of the time he rebelled against his intimidating grandmother, insisting that she was wrong about his dog breaking her damn vases and taking the fall for him.
He said, "If you're afraid of being in danger, worry not. Don't involve more people into this mess. I will bring the Brigands Guild down on my own."
Mieko opened her fan and hit Kinta's head repeatedly with it.
"How dare you talk back to your grandmother like that! Are you implying I'm some sort of coward to ask for help from family friends? You disrespectful INGRATE! Isn't it enough that I let you live in our many mansions? Eat our food? Live a life of luxury at a time when many samurai end up starving and homeless? That I even let you carry the proud Minakata name? That you're written in the will in the first place?"
He blocked the rest of his grandma's strikes with simple hand parries before backing away from her and escaping with Genzo into another part of the hideout, his grandmother in hot pursuit.
"COME BACK HERE, YOU INGRATE!" shouted an out-of-breath Mieko.
"...Your son-in-law is already helping me out. That's enough," Kinta said.
Genzo harrumphed. "Him? That wimp? My granddaughter is better at Musou Madden Ryu than he is! He only joined the school to impress Nonoko enough to marry him! He's a talentless copper otherwise!"
"...DON'T FORGET ME! Hic!" the drunk Sho Kojima shouted, who had Abelia piggyback-riding him on his shoulders.
The smile from La Cerca disappeared when she came into view. She then whispered to her "horsy" to put her down.
"I-It's not what it looks like," the little (well, short) girl said before the drunkard let her off, making her go "EEP!" and altogether hiding away from the confrontation happening before her.
Genzo bowed at the hobo. "Sho-kun. It's been a while, hasn't it? You're looking well. You've grown so much. You almost remind me of your father."
Instead of a drunken quip, Kojima scratched the back of his head and bowed back at his master. "I do hope it'sh because of mah looksh and not becaushe of my father'sh tendenshy to drink! Hic!"
This kind of took the youngest Minakata in the room aback, if only because he'd never seen Sho so... sheepish before.
The Mimawarigumi Battousai then overheard Genzo request Sho to, "Talk some sense into Kinta-kun, will you?"
"KINTA! Minakata-shama! The shtar pupil of our Mushou Madden Ryu, our preshtigioush shwordshmanship shchool!" said the drunk in loud, colorful clothing, his breath reeking of rich wine worth a small fortune.
With his arm over the Minakata heir, Sho said, "Yer grandmother and our mashter jusht want the full forshe (force) of the," he paused, licked his lips, and whispered, "Sheiryu Clan into the mix. She'sh jusht worried about yer wellbeing like the resht of her shonsh (sons) and family. If thingsh go well, then Kyoko-chan and Shatshuki-chan won't have to...!"
Kinta shrugged off Sho's arm and stormed off, which made Abelia call out to him, "K-Kinta-sama?!"
After the Togakudan left the inn and Soujiro prepared to sleep, he reconsidered and thought about staying up with the nocturnal Rin, since knowing her sleeping habits, she was going to be asleep all day long.
However, he needed his rest and a normal sleep cycle.
The Seiryu Clan's volume of the Black Book was on the line, and he might soon engage battle against someone possibly stronger and more experienced than Kaede Morinaga, whom he barely scored a draw against back in Shinshu.
However, as soon as he saw the snow as white as Rin fall from the sky, coalescing with the girl sitting beside the window, he changed his mind.
He wanted to talk to the Yuki-Onna (Snow Woman)... his Yuki-Onna... before him, entranced by her cream-colored hair, her pale skin, and her shaky silver eyes that turned red at a certain light.
"What are you reading?" Soujiro asked.
Rin looked up and adjusted her spectacles before answering, "'Thus Spoke Zarathustra' by Friedrich Nietzsche."
Wow. Soujiro couldn't even imagine himself reading something so... highfaluting. Rin sure was smart. "What's it about?"
The Young Akahori put the book down and turned to Seta, her spectacles slipping down on the bridge of her nose, her silvery irises shaking in place, brimming with seeming emotion that wasn't actually there.
One poker face facing another poker face.
"It's about a lot of things. The death of god. The superman. Eternal recurrence. Will to power. The ridiculousness of religion. It's hard to summarize."
"Oh." Seta gulped, unsure of what else to say to that. He was in over his head with such a subject matter. "It sounds like something Akahori-san... I mean, your father... would talk about."
"Hmm? Really?" said Rin, her eyes shining with a hint of red in the irises. "What do you mean?"
"Something about the way he killed Amakusa and his godliness, I guess. That's what I remembered him say. Prove an ideal wrong and you turn a god into a myth."
Rin nodded. "Gott ist tot. When god is dead, all that's left is you. You stop depending on god and his absolute values to dictate how to live your life and instead discover your own main driving force. Der Wille zur Macht. The will to power."
Soujiro shrugged and smiled. Perhaps genuinely this time. Because, "I have no idea what you're talking about."
The Akahori daughter considered her words carefully. "Your truth. Your ikigai (reason for being). That's what 'will to power' means. Everyone has this driving force to give meaning to their lives."
Oooh. Now that, Seta understood. Once upon a time, Makoto Shishio taught him that, "The strong shall live and the weak serves as food for the strong."
Then when he was defeated by Kenshin, his truth became, "I never wanted to kill anyone after all," and "I am strong, so I want to protect the weak like Himura-san," to atone for his past crimes.
However, he realized that neither of those truths was true for him. To protect the Akahoris from harm, he killed again, betraying both those truths at the same time.
He did something that neither Shishio nor Himura would be able to stomach.
'Sorry, Himura-san. I'm not the paragon of nobleness you are. Sorry, Shishio-san. I'm not as strong and emotionless as you think I am.'
Soujiro smiled, like he always did when he didn't know what to think. Or feel.
Tired of arguing to and fro against his grandmother, Mieko Minakata, and the Grandmaster of Musou Madden Ryu, Genzo Sakaguchi, Kinta retreated to his quarters.
He then heard a tap on the door, which made him go grab a lamp and swing it at the darkness by reflex (his Akatsuki katana was put away somewhere else), only for it to be blocked by twin kunai.
Talk about déjà vu.
"..."
"Kinta-sama. Greetings," a female voice said.
"...Who are you?"
"I'm Kozuki Misanagi, Kaita's big sister. I'm here on his stead," said the kunoichi (female ninja) with a cloth mask.
Minakata put away the lamp and relaxed his guard. "Misanagi," he called the Leader of the Sanada Ninja Clan by name.
The head of a modern ninjutsu clan named not after their leaders but their master, Yukimura Sanada (historically known as Nobushige Sanada), composed of the descendants of the Sanada Ten Braves.
She emerged from the shadows rather than retreated in them, her long ponytail whipping behind her.
"You're handsomer than Kaita described you."
"..."
"Quieter too."
Incidentally, Kaita was her Sanada Clan co-leader who dealt with the Brigands Guild back in Kinta's ancestral home.
Somehow, they had found the location of the secret Minakata sanctuary that even Kinta wasn't aware of. Impressive.
"Have you found out anything about the Seiryu Clan?" the Minakata heir asked.
Kozuki cleared her throat and answered, "We still need a decoder to decode all the documents we got so far. However, we were still able to piece together a bit of backstory behind the Seiryu Clan, at least."
"Tell me," prompted Kinta. "Tell me everything you know."
"You might not like what you'll hear," she warned him.
"I'll be the judge of that," answered the former Kagemusha.
The sooner Kinta found the rest of the Seiryu Clan's secret documents and declassified the information in them about the bakufu (shogunate), the better chance he'd have of... fixing things.
Making them better. Keeping the rest of the Sakaguchis from being involved in Minakata affairs.
Or at the very least keeping things from getting any worse. Especially when it came to this supposed Prodigal Son that was after his family.
Back at an inn in Yokohama...
"By knowing your will to power and achieving it, then you can become the superman. The Übermensch," continued the female Akahori.
"So what is a superman supposed to do? Protect the weak? Fight for their rights? Become a symbol of truth and justice? Live for the sake of others?" asked Seta, remembering how much of a superman the incorruptible Kenshin seemed to him after they'd fought.
To his surprise, Rin answered, "Sometimes the weak doesn't want, need, or deserve to be saved. Sometimes you shouldn't enable them to be excessively dependent upon the great, encouraging them to waste their own potential for greatness in favor of taking advantage of their betters."
"Deserve...? But you can't abandon the weak in favor of yourself! You shouldn't!" Soujiro protested with a smile, which probably made him look more incredulous than upset, he realized.
He perhaps projected a bit with his outburst, remembering how helpless he felt when his own adoptive family tried to murder him.
How desperately he wanted someone strong to save him then and there instead of killing them all to ensure his self-preservation. Justifying his crimes as the way the world really worked.
The Law of Nature.
"...I help out of the kindness of my heart. Like the time I saved you and your father from those mercenaries when we first met," he reminded.
"And I appreciate your help. Both my father and I do. You saved our lives and we're eternally grateful," she said in turn. "There's nothing wrong with helping others if you want to, Seta-kun. I mean, what would we do without you?"
After a brief pause, the smiling Seta then prompted, "'But..?'"
"However, something is wrong when you place your welfare above others to a fault. That's why we're looking for the rest of the Black Book ourselves. So we Akahoris can overcome our own problems even without you. So we can save ourselves instead of dragging you into our own messes."
'Finding the Black Book might actually be the reason why you're having troubles with rebels and hired guns in the first place,' Seta wanted to point out, but he didn't want to be rude.
"Why is being self-sacrificing such a bad thing?" he instead asked aloud, although he should've known better. He knew what had happened to Kenshin in the end, when he retired from active practice of swordsmanship.
She answered, "Self-sacrificing your whole self for other people's sakes or the greater good isn't as noble as it sounds. It hurts both yourself and the people you're supposed to protect."
"Why? How? Isn't the strong supposed to help the weak? Why shouldn't I share my gifts by saving others?" Soujiro reasoned, Kenshin's uncompromising selflessness still fresh in his mind.
"Who asked you to become their savior? Did they ask for one? Do they need one? Who are you to judge when they need help or not? Even if they ask for help, should you help them? Would they really be better off having someone else take care of all their problems for them, depriving them of the opportunity to stand on their own two feet?"
"I help out of the kindness of my heart! It's because I don't want to be selfish with my abilities. You're supposed to help those more unfortunate than you. That's what makes you strong. That's the right thing to do."
"It's more selfish to protect the weak and keep them weak rather than to let them fend for themselves. Feed a man a fish, and he'll become your parasite for life. Let him learn how to fish and even without your daily fish stipend, he'll survive and earn his keep by himself. Help them help themselves."
Shishio himself employed the same "Sink or Swim" principle Rin currently espoused by giving Seta nothing more than a wakizashi (short sword) to protect himself. He himself didn't lift a finger to help Soujiro.
"'Survive'? What do you mean? Survival of the Fittest?" asked Seta, going by what he knew. What he was taught. "You should only depend on yourself because the weak is food for the strong and protecting the weak is selfish, maybe even abominable?"
She shook her head. "No. That's not it either. Don't eat the weak, show them how to be strong. A real man is motivated by the desire to achieve rather than by the desire to beat others. It's all about self-betterment rather than competition. Be the superman."
"Be the superman?" repeated Soujiro.
"Yes. Yours is a strength that could not be defied. Take control of your life before someone else does so for you. Don't compromise. Don't let your potential for greatness be squashed by poor judgment."
Seta smiled, admiring his captivating view of Rin's silver eyes turning an otherworldly red, unsure if they'd actually done so or it was just his imagination (and wishful thinking) running wild.
Like the eyes of the youkai that ignorant servants, strangers, and neighbors had accused Rin to be as a child.
"Don't be selfless. Don't abandon yourself for others. Don't make the same mistakes that Cousin Kinta or Amakusa-san made," she said. "There's nothing wrong with looking out for yourself. Be selfish for once."
Even her words sounded like something a demon would say, following a strange code of conduct that was the exact opposite of what civilized human society believed to be true.
What was heroic about being selfish anyway? Or was he meant to play the role of the villain after all?
There was no such thing as the Seiryu Clan. There was no such thing as the Black Book. Officially, that was the case, as far the present Japanese government was concerned.
All evidence of the existence of the Seiryu Clan or any of the other clans named after Chinese Constellation Symbols was destroyed after the Bakumatsu.
However, the truth of the matter was that... like the average camouflaged member of the Sanada Ninjas... what couldn't be detected wasn't necessarily nonexistent but simply unnoticed.
Other than the pro-imperial nationalists and the shogunate forces... the two most prominent factions of the Bakumatsu... many other secretive and not-so-secretive organizations attempted to use the chaos of the times to seize personal power.
Like the Clans of the Four Gods. Or the earlier incarnations of the Jiyu Minken Undo (Free Civil Right Movement or Jiyudo), whose extremist members caused the Chichibu Riots to happen.
Unable to find a trace of the Seiryu Clan's Black Book volume, the Sanada Ninja Clan had to do another type of research into the Minakata Family, particularly the origins of its family business.
The Minakata Foreign Trade and Pharmaceuticals Conglomerate.
Some were taken from public documents, others were pure speculation, particularly information regarding the family's connection with the Black Book.
Even when growing up, Kinta found it unusual for his (dishonored) samurai family to somehow end up as merchants for a foreign trade business.
Then again, his late grandfather, Toshiro Minakata, was truly the kind of "psychic" hatamoto (under the banners) retainer who thought ahead, seemingly foreseeing the fall of the samurai class when the new age began.
The same Minakata patriarch who "received" Mieko not as his wife, but rather a bonus prize with his dowry or perhaps his reward for all his proud samurai accomplishments during the Sakoku (Locked Country) Period of Japan.
To be more specific, even back then, before the Minakatas settled into Yokohama thanks to Commodore Matthew C. Perry's forced opening of its port for foreign trade, the family had been in the forefront of international relations as backed by the bakufu.
The ancestors of the Minakatas were the samurai nobles that dealt with European Trade and the Dutch Factory in Nagasaki's Dejima. Nagasaki was also the place where Chinese trade took place.
The Satsuma Domain (from where most of the Ishin Shishi rebel leaders came from) was in charge of Ryukyu Kingdom trade, the Matsumae Domain in Hokkaido was in charge of Ainu trade, and the Tsushima Domain was in charge of Korean trade.
In fact, the Hokkaido-based Matsumae Domain was where the Akahori Family belonged to as well.
The seeds of what would eventually be the Minakata Conglomerate (formed by western medicine exportation and foreign trade) came about due to the family's experience in dealing with European and Continental trade, from Chinese junks to the Dutch East India Company.
This was also the reason why none of the surviving Minakatas even batted an eye at the fact that foreign invaders were specifically gunning for their heads.
They'd made a lot of enemies, local and foreign, throughout their history and family tree, particularly when it came to their absolute trade control and privileges that rubbed certain clans, domains, businesses and their owners, dignitaries, families, locals, and gaijin the wrong way.
Furthermore, thanks to the 1825 Shogunate Edict to expel foreigners at all costs (also known as the "Don't Think Twice" or "Ikokusen Muninen Uchiharei" policy) that remained in place until 1842, Toshiro had actually crossed swords with gaijin way before Kinta dueled with John Rathbone.
The Sakaguchis incorporated the Minakata Patriarch's experience in dealing with the "barbarians" from overseas and their superior steel weaponry, giving Kinta an edge against foreigners that few samurai had.
Many pirates, smugglers, drug dealers, black market merchants, and criminals in general were also after the heads of the Minakatas from their days in Nagasaki up until their move to Yokohama when it opened its port to foreign trade at Commodore Perry's behest.
Many Minakata family members had been kidnapped for ransom, outright assassinated, or had otherwise gone missing throughout the years as well.
The forward-thinking and foreign-influenced Toshiro knew that Japan was headed for change one way or another, way before the Black Ships (Kurofune) of Perry arrived in the country.
Back in the mid-19th Century, Japan was a feudal society with primitive tribal elements to it. As for its hierarchy, the military class was at the top, followed by peasant farmers, then craftsmen or artisans, and finally the commercial or merchant class.
The people who traded rather than endure physical labor in the fields... the merchants... were the anomalies in Japan, and even the artisans didn't fit that well into peasant society.
It was this middle class (in terms of finances) that fascinated Toshiro.
As much as he believed in his birthright as any other shogun, daimyo, samurai, or hatamoto in his period would, he also wanted to earn his birthright and not end up a simpering fool of a nobleman who thought that the past achievements of his ancestors applied to him even when he himself did nothing of note.
He knew about the French Revolution of the last century that gave rise to the French peasant and merchant class in influence and power over those privileged to rule by blood.
Toshiro learned all this from his travels abroad and his multiple bloody engagements against pirates and foreign ships who weren't permitted to enter and trade in Japanese shores, earning him riches, land, honor, and the attention of women from all walks of life (i.e., of different nationalities).
Come to think of it, although Uncle Kaneda never inherited his father's good looks, he instead got Grandpa Toshiro's insatiable lust, indulging in carnal pleasures from one red-light district to another.
Kinta's gramps traveled everywhere, impregnating women left and right with his bastards from all over the world without worrying about political implications of his womanizing because they lived in a world where what was expected for men was immoral for women.
His grandfather was a stud and his mother was a whore for doing the same things, according to society.
Toshiro spread his seed all over Europe and Asia as though he were the notorious Chinese pirate Limahong, but the one time Kinta's mother rebelled against her arranged marriage and had an affair with a British Dignitary, she ended up banished and disowned.
Unforgivable.
So even as Toshiro consolidated his influence and swore allegiance to the shogunate, he also planned a way for him to escape the ruination of the Minakatas by joining the Clans of the Four Gods and sharing top secret intelligence to the Black Book.
Thanks to their family's "involvement" with the secret spy clans, they were able to survive with most of their wealth intact even after they were stripped of influence and warrior class privileges later on.
They shifted focus from being a blueblood warrior family working under the generals of the emperor to a capitalist merchant family who gained privilege by wealth.
An ancient Chinese proverb that both his late grandfather and his Uncle Tatsuya regularly cited was, "With money, you are a dragon; without it, you are a worm."
After a week or two of recovery from his surgery and regular updates from his Sanada Ninja informants, Kinta decided to make his move.
At the dead of the night, the recently awoken Kinta had found the stairs leading back to the dilapidated Japanese-style home above ground.
He did this while the rest of his family were asleep and their army of martial-arts-trained servants garbed in French maid outfits and English butler uniforms guarded them by trading shifts day in and day out.
On his feet was one of the same unconscious servant guards, whom Mieko presumably ordered to keep the Minakata grandson within the premises of their safe house.
The Mimawarigumi Battousai had knocked out the innocent butlers and maids with his sheathed katana, which he finally found in a secret armory somewhere in the cavernous basement building with the help of his ninja ally Misanagi.
"...Where are you going, Kinta-sama?"
"..."
The person who caught him escaping, to his surprise, was Abelia.
Kinta answered, "To find out more about the Black Book."
The little girl sighed, looked around, and handed him a hookah filled with Indian hemp. "Take this with you in case you have breathing problems again. That strain has pain-killing properties to assist with your stitches."
"...Thank you."
She then turned her back and walked away, allowing Kinta to escape before the rest of the servants, guards, and his family found out about it.
"So he really did it, the madman," a shadow told La Cerca after she bid a silent goodbye to Kinta from the catacombs where the stairs leading to the surface were placed.
The figure flipped a coin in the air and caught it repeatedly with a huge, six-fingered hand.
Abelia sighed. "Que raro (Spanish for "How rare"). I mean, mezurashi (Japanese for "How rare"). It's weird seeing you sober, Kojima-san."
"You think that's weird, Abelia-chan? How do you think I feel?" said Sho Kojima with a pout, who had a black eye and a bump on his head after Tatsuya, the banker son of the Minakatas, caught him rummaging the wine cellar red-handed.
The drunk soon after got beat up by an even more violent drunk with the assistance of the martial artist servants of the family, with no booze to show for it when everything was said and done.
A particularly tall and lanky servant... a newly hired employee of the family... gave him the black eye while Tatsuya broke an empty wine bottle over his head as though he were yakuza instead of the heir to a multinational company.
Henceforth came the speculation or conspiracy theory part of the Sanada Ninjas' reports on the Black Book.
The surviving members of the fallen shogunate demanded deniability from the Seiryu Clan's Black Book exposés in exchange for... certain favors from high places for the Minakata Conglomerate's benefit.
Literal blackmail.
These former shoguns and ex-samurais from the last government somehow became part of the new government that was mostly dominated by the Satsuma Domain and the rest of the Ishin Shishi rebels.
The Seiryu Clan's volume of the Black Book contained vital information about the shogunate that the new government couldn't do without, which allowed the Minakatas to prosper with a Meiji-approved carte blanch to do anything they wanted even as their samurai privileges were revoked.
It was these officials who enabled the Minakatas to maintain their influence in trade and get the leeway they needed to build the Minakata Conglomerate, particularly when it came to the importation of western medicine.
Like how the Mitsubishis were able to make their own businesses flourish throughout the Meiji Restoration through their links with the Rikken Minseito Political Party and the Imperial Japanese Army.
It was the same deal with the Mitsui Group's connection with the Rikken Seiyukai Political Party, which acted as a governmental extension of the conglomerate.
Just as there was the Shidai Nikuya (Four Butchers), there was also the Shidai Zaibatsu (Four Conglomerates) of Sumitomo, Mitsui, Mitsubishi, and Yasuda.
Sumitomo and Mitsui were rooted to the Edo Period. Mitsubishi and Yasuda trace their origins to the Meiji Era.
From the Meiji to Showa Eras, the government employed the financial expertise and powers of groups like the Minakatas and the Mitsubishi zaibatsu for various endeavors, such as foreign trade, tax collection, and military procurements.
These financial groups became the heart of the industrial and economic activity of the Empire of Japan, giving them unchecked influence over Japanese foreign and national policies as well as connections from ruling parties.
While the Minakata Foreign Trade and Pharmaceuticals Conglomerate was a burgeoning, second-tier company compared to the aforementioned four giants, it was a still fast-growing financial group in its own right run by an ex-hatamoto family that was used to having heavy political influence since the Edo Era.
Greatness was in their bloodline and legacy.
However, once upon a time, the family was on the verge of bankruptcy when they fell out of favor from the shogunate thanks to the illicit affair of Kinta's mother with a gaijin.
An unforgivable scandal that served as a microcosm of increasing Japanese fears of foreign powers invading the country, taking their women, and destroying their culture forever.
The Minakatas were ostracized and had reduced political influence for a hatamoto-class samurai family because this was during the height of Japanese xenophobia and paranoia over an invasion by foreigners with superior military armaments.
Sonno Joi (Revere the Emperor, Expel the Barbarians) was the battle cry of the day. Fear was rampant in the Land of the Rising Sun.
It didn't help that Kinta's father, a member of the Akahori Family, committed seppuku immediately after murdering the British lover of Kinta's mother in order to save face and gain back a little dignity after being cuckolded by his wife.
They served as martyrs to the cause, but the family was treated like lepers by the shogunate.
Even after the banishment of the Black Sheep of the Minakatas, they lost a lot of political leverage that they'd enjoyed back when Grandpa Toshiro was sailing the seven seas and dealing with foreign trade issues for the bakufu's sake.
"Mama Mieko" would never admit it, but it because of the prestige that Kinta brought back to the family name through his heroic exploits with the Mimawarigumi that the Minakatas were able to win back the favor of the bakufu and gain enough influence to be of use to the Four Spy Clans.
Kinta had fixed something what was broken, putting gold lacquer over something that should've been, for all intents and purposes, thrown away.
All that was left was to find the missing piece to put this pot back together again.
Several Yokohama offices of the Minakata Financial Group were raided recently after it came to light that the Seiryu Clan's Black Book volume was hidden in plain sight in one of those places.
The Sanada Ninjas suspected it was the work of rival spies.
According to them, there were suspicious discrepancies and redundancies in the paperwork they received from Kinta's ancestral Minakata mansion.
The texts from certain duplicate documents covering financial statements, ledgers, tax returns, rules of conduct, company policies, and the like were replaced and reworded.
However, other than paraphrasing, no other significant edits were done to them.
By their experience in exchanging hidden messages and ciphers that were a little more complicated than heating up scrolls filled with secret passages written in invisible ink over candlelight, they posited that the Black Book's volumes were concealed in these extraneous documents.
However, the Sanada Ninjas lacked the cipher that would've allowed them to learn the secret messages from all those documents (if there were even any to be found).
At the suggestion of (a sober) Sho Kojima, the ninjas made copies of everything relevant to their search and leaked info to certain busybodies regarding how the Seiryu Clan's missing Black Book volumes were probably buried within these seemingly innocuous documents.
The idea here was to let the infiltrators take the papers then follow them back to their hideout and their bosses, since they could have the means to decipher and unlock the clandestine code themselves.
The Sanada Ninja Clan already had a good idea of who these other spies were and why they could help unravel the mystery behind the Black Book.
Soon after, the spies took the bait, stole the documents from the Minakata headquarters, and returned to a teahouse and restaurant inn at Yokohama housing a certain VIP guest.
Rin Akahori, the cousin of Kinta Minakata, and her bodyguard, the always smiling errand boy of Tetsuo Akahori that served as his eyes and ears throughout this hunt for secret government documents and ancient spy clans.
The same Akahori who knew the most about the Black Book and whatever ciphers and cryptography was used to hide the classified intelligence of the bakufu and Ishin Shishi from prying eyes.
This was where Kinta ended up after Misanagi and her best ninjas tracked down where the Togakudan went.
Right across the tearoom of the inn was Rin Akahori, quietly sipping her tea.
Supposedly six years older than when Kinta last saw her, she'd barely aged since then.
Same thin build. Same hypnotizing eyes. Same snowy paleness. Same quiet demeanor. Just like her mother.
Like the shorter, cream-haired, and silver-eyed version of his favorite aunt, in fact. His late aunt from his father's side.
"Cousin Rin. Good evening," Kinta Minakata greeted with a bow.
"Cousin Kinta. Hisashiburi (Long time, no see)," she answered, bowing back and putting her book down. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
"Where is he?"
"Who?"
"Your father."
"He's not here. He's off to do his duties as a daijin (minister)."
Too bad his cousin's sullen personality was more reminiscent of his uncle than his aunt.
Minakata frowned and changed the subject. "He didn't tell me about the attempt on his life."
Rin nodded, adjusting her glasses. "You were busy."
Fair point. "Where are the documents? And the cipher to decode them?" the Mimawarigumi Battousai went straight to the point.
The Yuki-Onna of the House of Akahori then lifted her book up, opened it, and unfolded one of the papers taken from the Minakata offices that she'd used as a bookmark.
"It could use a little bit more work, really. It bored me to tears."
Minakata snatched up the paper from his cousin's delicate hands, but it then vanished into thin air, a gust of sudden wind blowing from within the restaurant.
The pale Akahori daughter, for her part, went back to reading her book, "Les Fleurs du Mal", a translated volume of French poetry by by Charles Baudelaire that was first published in 1857, a good 27 years ago.
By instinct, Kinta turned towards the direction where the sudden burst of wind hit his hair, his eyes locking gazes with... a happy fellow in purple and white garb.
Holding the same piece of paper that the ex-Kagemusha lost.
The boy smiled, bowed, and introduced himself. "My name is Seta Soujiro. I'd been expecting you, Minakata-san. Or should I say, Mimawarigumi Battousai-san?"
Things got curiouser and curiouser.
"Watch out for Seta Soujiro," came one of Misanagi Kozuki's many reports during the time when the Minakata grandson was still recovering from his wounds.
"Who is he?" Kinta had asked Kozuki.
"He's the new bodyguard of your uncle, Tetsuo Akahori. He was the one who fought off the assassination attempt at Shinshu against him by Amakusa Shogo as well."
Kinta's features (and scar) tightened upon hearing those names.
He remembered the Yokohama Police Squad mentioning that certain members of their group died because of Amakusa's attack.
It was a visit from Tetsuo and his daughter who looked so much like his Aunt Sakura, the white-skinned and cream-haired Rin, when it all began.
It was Tetsuo who served as the Meiji Government's liaison to him. It was his father's brother who requested that he infiltrate the Hidden Christians and quell their burgeoning rebellion from within.
It was another opportunity for him to ensure that the relations between the Minakata Financial Group and the government remained solid.
Another layer of gold lacquer to cover the cracks of the pot that ruined it.
It was a mission that ultimately ended in bittersweet disaster. A successful failure.
"Oh, by the way, Kinta-sama, this Seta boy goes by another name, when he was still an anti-government rebel. He is the Ten Ken (Heaven Sword)."
Kinta didn't know what to expect when he first heard of the Heaven Sword.
The last thing he imagined was a cheerful boy greeting him with a polite bow and a gentle voice.
They ended up at some shady back alley, away from curious onlookers still wandering around at the dead of the night.
What a name he had, though. Then again, this young man was as heavenly and confident as a Bodhisattva that had achieved Nirvana, by all appearances.
Had Seta not sported a sheathed sword, Minakata would've sworn that the kid was a literal messenger boy for the Akahoris instead of their Amakusa-defeating bodyguard.
"I have what you want," said Soujiro. He took out a cylinder containing scrolls from the folds of his kimono, which he unrolled and put together with the paper he took away from Kinta.
The Heaven Sword then read aloud, "The Four Gods Spy Clans... the Genbu, Byakko, Suzaku, and Seiryu Clans... all shared vital political and military intelligence with each other, covering both sides of the civil war." He turned over the page.
"For example, in exchange for information concerning Prime Minister Ii Naosuke's activities that assisted his 1860 assassination at the Sakurada Gates of Edo Castle, the Seiryu Clan received reciprocal intel from the Suzaku Clan that led to the Ikedaya Affair in Kyoto a mere four years later."
"!?" was the unspeakable sentiment written all over Kinta's face. The Sanada Ninjas were right? Those redundant documents did contain hidden messages and top secret intelligence and from the Seiryu Spy Clan?
Unbelievable.
Soujiro rolled the papers, put them back into the container, and hid them inside his kimono.
"We don't have the cipher you're looking for here, but I suppose that the deciphered message we do have is enough to pique your interest."
"You'll return all of that to me, including that deciphered message," said the Mimawarigumi Battousai, who fell into his Waning Stance.
The rest of the Sanada Ninjas were on standby, searching the premises for the Togakudan and whatever info or document they had with them.
From there, Seta... giggled, his eyes twinkling with... delight? Was this young man really the person who beat Nagasaki's One-Man Army?
"Back in the Edo Era, the act of unsheathing your sword to attack an opponent from the start was called battoujutsu. In modern times, it has evolved into iaido and iaijutsu."
The Heaven Sword fell into his self-taught battoujutsu stance that he learned from some scrolls he inherited from Makoto Shishio.
"I wonder. Has modern iaijutsu progressed by leaps and bounds from battoujutsu, or are classical teachings still the best?"
"..."
Their katana blades flew out of their wooden saya (sheathes) in perfect cadence with their footwork. Who was the quicker draw between the two?
Minakata soon realized that the boy was a more hands-on bodyguard than he anticipated.
Earlier, the Sanada Ninjas were supposed to offer a bit of token resistance in keeping the documents away from the Togakudan to prevent suspicion of them being bait.
However, even under Misanagi's watch, the documents were spirited away, right under their noses, and none of the camouflage masters could explain what'd happened.
The Sanada leader suspected that it was the Ten Ken's special ability that allowed him to effortlessly steal the documents away from even highly trained shinobi.
Kinta confirmed as much as he ended up hitting nothing but air.
'What...?'
A few weeks back, when Kinta was recuperating and getting reports from the Sanada Ninjas...
"...Why is he called the Ten Ken?"
"We have no data on his skills, where he came from, and how he ended up as Akahori Tetsuo's bodyguard. But we do know where he got the name."
Kozuki shuffled some papers and unfurled some scrolls.
"Seta used to belong to a rebel group led by Shishio Makoto, the Hitokiri Battousai's successor. One of his top ten henchmen from the Juppon Gatana."
"The Ten Swords," Minakata repeated. He vaguely remembered a rebellion had happened around the same time he had entered the ranks of Shogo Amakusa's own Kakure Kirishitan (Hidden Christians).
Around the period when he became the Kagemusha of the leader of another rebel group.
What a fascinating character, this Soujiro Seta.
"The Ten Ken defeated Amakusa Shogo and his accomplice, although they got away."
'Accomplice...?' thought Kinta, who licked his lips and rubbed his chin. Could that accomplice possibly be...?
Taking down Shogo wasn't an easy feat. Just ask the hundreds of Nagasaki police officers and soldiers from the Imperial Army that he killed.
However, today's Amakusa was a spent force. A shadow of what he once was.
"Why exactly did the Ten Ken let Amakusa and his accomplice escape?" Kinta asked Misanagi then asked himself, 'How did this Seta fare against the Battousai of Speed?'
How well did he fare against a dangerous warrior nearing or at the peak of her abilities?
'As Akahori-san predicted, his nephew fell for his bait hook, line, and sinker,' thought Soujiro, the bait in question being the cipher that revealed the secret code hidden in the Minakata office's redundant files, contracts, and policies.
It was actually a naval code, appropriately enough.
After all, the Four Gods Spy Clans were founded during the Sakoku Period of Japan (with its strictly controlled sea-based foreign trade policies) and mobilized during the Bakumatsu, in the aftermath of Commodore Perry's forced opening of Japan.
Essentially, the different spy clans united under the Black Book were rooted with the sea and foreign relations.
At any rate, instead of drawing his sword all the way and risking it breaking against another blade that, as the Togakudan reported, once cut apart a European longsword, Seta had other plans.
The Ten Ken feinted a battoujutsu strike by half-drawing his sword, slipped his blade back into its scabbard, dashed back, and did a follow-through swatting motion with his sheathed weapon in case Kinta drew his blade quicker, then waited for the right opening.
The opening never came.
Instead, Soujiro was forced to do a split-second battoujutsu strike for real because his whirling dervish of an opponent cut the distance between him and his backpedal with an insane amount of reach usually reserved for the lengthy nodachi rather than a tachi or an ordinary uchigatana.
Because they both backed away to avoid their own blades, they ended up mostly slashing at thin air.
It was the Full Moon Slash versus Soujiro's Self-Taught Battoujustu in action.
Unless Soujiro's eyes were deceiving him, that one strike from Shogo Amakusa's Kagemusha turned out to be twin strikes in rapid succession, with the second centrifugal-assisted supersonic strike moving so fast the combination attack looked like one attack.
As expected of a swordsman who'd been training iaijutsu his entire life. A talented and skilled ex-samurai through and through, born with privileges that a peasant farmer's bastard like Soujiro could only dream of.
How could the illegitimate child of a family who abused him ever win against this swordsman heir who had it all since birth?
He smiled, remembering the countless advantaged, well-trained samurai and soldiers he faced off against and defeated.
All of them murdered by the mere bastard son of a peasant family.
"How" indeed.
He still smiled even as he felt his heart twinge in remembrance of the deaths of these proud warriors under the logic of "The Law of Nature".
He could never change that about himself.
Regardless, it was probably time for him to become the superman that Rin thought him to be.
Kinta almost chuckled to himself after seeing that the "battoujutsu" or "classic iaijutsu" that his uncle's bodyguard supposedly knew was just a standard sword-drawing slash that every iaijutsu beginner knew how to do.
And nothing more. No variation. No nuance. No style.
That was his idea of battoujutsu? What a joke.
It was like a person claiming to know karate, but he only knew how to do a karate kick. Or someone saying he knew how to box, but all he could do was a right hook.
In any case, Kinta almost had him. He clipped the agile, supersonic Soujiro with his blade.
His follow-up strike actually touched the retreating Ten Ken after all, forming a cut on the kid's shoulder that sliced right through his clothing, drawing blood.
However, this came about at the tail end of the second rotating strike of the Full Moon Slash rather than the initial range-finding cut of the first strike.
This was the first time Kinta met someone who could avoid the second strike of his Full Moon Slash at the last second, when it was usually too late to dodge it.
Even Gensai Kawakami, whom Minakata injured with the Blue Moon Slash, wasn't that fast.
This boy's kenjutsu wasn't as technically sound as Rathbone's fencing, but he was, as Kojima would say, "Helluva lot fashter."
Soujiro giggled again. "You scratched me but I scratched you back."
Minakata blinked and looked down on himself. Sure enough, there was a cut on his arm, and he hadn't even noticed it.
It looked worse than it felt, but he was bleeding all over the place. Also, if he overexerted himself, his stitches could come undone.
What a precarious position he found himself in.
From there, as soon as Seta sheathed his sword, he attacked again with a second quick-draw strike, and Minakata barely had time to flip a pebble upwards and do the Tsunami to save himself from decapitation.
Again, his slashes hit nothing but air. This time, he couldn't even scratch the Ten Ken.
Did the bob-haired kid have disappearance and camouflage abilities like the Sanada Ninjas possessed? He was even more untouchable than the Faceless.
Soujiro disappeared out of thin air, then reappeared out of thin air an eye blink later. Right behind the Minakata grandson.
"This is the Shukuchi, a technique that even defeated Amakusa-san's Shinsoku (Godspeed) and Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu," informed the Heaven Sword.
Minakata attempted a second Full Moon Slash counter, intending to turn it into the Blue Moon Slash or the ougi (succession technique) of the Musou Madden Ryu on short notice, but he simply couldn't catch or counter someone he could barely see or detect.
His sword slash cut through nothing again, the kid teleporting into his blindside like a certain other annoying kid within Shogo's inner circle who was unpredictable as the weather when it came to fighting her.
What was worse was that, for some reason, he couldn't detect any malice or bloodlust from the young man.
Detecting bloodlust was something gaijin like the Faceless or Cain Merrick couldn't do or weren't aware of, which gave Kinta an edge in reading their feints, attacks, and intentions when they had battled.
This was probably the first time he ever encountered someone whose bloodlust was so faint when he attacked, it was practically nonexistent.
Just who was this kid? Where the hell did that hitokiri rebel find a child like him?
Who was this prodigy in swordsmanship whose every vein oozed with talent at such a young age?
He was probably a commoner's son, at that. After all, the Japan that valued the skillfulness of its warrior class was no more thanks to the integration of automatic rifles and ordinary citizens into its military force.
The samurai had become outdated. The protected were now the protectors.
This was certainly the case with volunteer militia like the Sekihoutai, Kiheitai, or the current Imperial Army (that was able to bring down the likes of Saigo Takamori and his fellow samurai during the Satsuma Rebellion).
Soujiro probably wasn't a samurai by birthright, but he fought like one: More proof that the samurai had become obsolete in a New Japan where even commoners could become warriors.
Somewhere inside a Yokohama Inn, during the time when the Togakudan discussed with Soujiro their current target two weeks ago...
"...Minakata Kinta infiltrated the Hidden Christians as a government double agent, achieving enough influence in the cult of rebels to be included in Amakusa's inner circle," said... or rather, recited... Togakudan Member Kaemon Minamoto as his lazy-eyed leader Mikio Nagaoka yawned and rubbed his eyes.
"Eventually, when he caused the collapse of the cult from within and the Imperial Army tested their mettle against these modern-day Shimabara rebels, he came to be known as Amakusa's Judas Iscariot by the other Kakure Kirishitan."
"J-Judasu Isuka...?" a blinking Soujiro attempted to pronounce the unfamiliar foreign name with the limited phonemes of the Japanese language. "Who exactly is that anyway?"
"Long story short, Judas is a follower of Jesus Christ... the central god figure of the Christian religion... who betrayed him to the Romans for money, which led to Jesus's death by crucifixion," informed the owl-eyed Taku Okazaki, his gaze hypnotizing (and somewhat unnerving). "Understand?"
"I think so," said Seta. "Let me get this straight. Minakata-san betrayed the god of the Hidden Christians; their Jesus Christ equivalent, Amakusa-san. He might've even taken him down in a duel, at that."
"Yeah, he betrayed their magical undead savior who's half-man, half-god that was born from a virgin and whose body they have to eat in the form of wafers so they could go to heaven," mocked Nagaoka. "Or so their backwards cult would claim."
"I'm not so sure about this betrayal theory of yours, guys. Still, since you've manhandled Amakusa so easily, then certainly his Kagemusha should be a cinch for you to beat. Right, Soujiro-sama?" chimed in the jiggling Ranmaru Obata.
"We'll see." Soujiro rubbed his chin. "All we know is that we both beat Amakusa-san," he said while wondering, 'Did he have problems dealing with Morinaga-san as well?'
Wait a minute. Kinta had seen this disappearing act before, but not from Kaita, Misanagi, or any of their ninja underlings.
Amakusa could reach these speeds and beyond it whenever he did the Amakakeru Ryu no Hirameki (Heavens Gliding Dragon Flash), the ougi of Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu.
The speed that surpassed Shinsoku.
Before he got stabbed (like before with Rathbone) or slashed from behind, the Mimawarigumi Battousai shifted his weight from one foot to another, going from Waxing to Waning Stance in an instant.
His sword's direction hidden by his back, Minakata slashed low in order to take out Soujiro's legs so that he'd have less trouble with the Heaven Sword's amazing footwork (which moved even faster and farther than the more exacting dance of Rathbone).
However, Seta expected the attack since Shogo tried the exact same thing against him with the Amakakeru Ryu no Hirameki, hitting him on the thigh and making it difficult for him to reach top speed while battling Kaede.
Like shadow, like master. The Kagemusha thought just like the person he impersonated.
Instead of backpedaling, the Heaven Sword ran past Kinta so they'd end up face-to-face again.
Minakata had already let his sword fly at the area where Seta was supposed to be before he slipped past him.
It was during that gap between realization and reaction that the Ten Ken attacked.
Sparks flew as Soujiro's battoujutsu again clashed against Kinta's iaijutsu... or rather, his noutoujutsu (sword-sheathing technique)... that he used to cut the Faceless down in their duel, his missed slash turned into a parrying kaeshi (riposte) as he sheathed his sword back in an instant.
"You only know one type of battoujutsu," noted Minakata.
His kaeshi then turned into a Tsunami after Seta burst forth with a Kuzu Ryu Sen from out of nowhere (that he learned from watching Kenshin do it once on him).
Afterwards, the Heaven Sword learned that the Kagemusha didn't nearly have the same hand speed as Kaede, the ground crumbling underneath his slippers when he recoiled from the multiple strikes that he couldn't block at the same time.
Droplets of his blood splattering all over the snow-covered ground.
And that was while using the version of the Shukuchi with one step before it. Seta wasn't even going at top speed.
"...That's not your top speed," concluded Kinta, as though reading his mind.
"No, not quite," confessed the Heaven Sword.
"You might as well use it."
His pride as a commoner beating a nobleman on the line, Soujiro didn't take Minakata's advice and kept attacking at his Shukuchi's lowest speed.
He paid for that mistake by getting disarmed after a second attempt at the Nine-Headed Dragon Flash.
In hindsight, Seta should've known better than to use a technique that Shogo's Shadow Warrior was intimately familiar with.
Soujiro shook his head to clear it. He had to be careful. He couldn't afford to be overconfident.
There was no way he'd allow a repeat of what had happened in Shinshushin with his fight against Kaede Morinaga.
To Be Continued...
When it comes to writing Mieko's character, I keep in mind a rather famous Louis C.K. quote, "Boys fuck things up. Girls are fucked up." Come to think of it, that's also applicable to how Rin is written, really.
Salamat,
Abdiel