The Sakura Shroud
Many years ago, it was rumoured that there stood a powerful Shinobi village at the foot of a sleeping volcano; Tucked away amongst the moss-laden trees and atop the lava-ridden soul of the vast forest and hidden from all those whom did not belong or know of its existence. Shrouded by a thick curtain of magic, the settlement had managed to remain untainted for hundreds of years and kept the inhabitants from harm, but they all knew that to be complacent of their safety was a mistake.
When the reason for your home’s creation was to hide a mighty and profoundly dangerous secret from the outside world, resting on one’s laurels was an impossibility.
Betwixt the Japanese Maple and Cherry Tree, was where the largest of the bewitched buildings stood, guarded by the fiercest warriors Japan would never remember, for the entrance of the village was only visible to those who knew where to look. To outsiders, there was simply a mossy mound at the most south-eastern point of the Aokigahara forest. But, to those with a well-trained eye, there was a slither of light that signalled the gateway to another realm.
Within the monumental structure in question were a many number of rooms, all of which appeared to be somewhat ineffective and unspectacular. That is, all bar the largest room at the most central and deepest point of the architectural masterpiece.
This room held a treasure that appeared to be nothing special at first glance - much like everything created and maintained by the same mystical energy which allowed the hamlet to be cloaked so effectively. A length of aged parchment held together by golden orbs at either end may have looked like nothing more than any other ordinary scroll to begin with, but once the supernatural power caused every fibre of one’s being to hum and the perfectly painted letters shone through the material they had been written on, no-one could deny that it was extraordinary.
Those lines, dots and dashes inked upon paper had been penned by a scholar of old who had - in his uncontainable excitement - immortalised in scripture the discovery of the building blocks of all existence. Being a man of pure heart, with not a single dark desire but only a thirst for knowledge, he had neglected to think of the evil that such power and words could inspire.
The legend had historically lead men on a fruitless quest that would ultimately lead to their untimely and brutal demise.
For those who had a more successful expedition, and a stronger moral compass, believed that such a secret was better known by no-one, but each attempt at its destruction had been to no avail. The letters themselves seemed to form a protective barrier, to preserve them, for eternity, never to face oblivion.
Unfortunately, that therefore meant the burden of guarding an artefact fell onto the shoulders of those who would be deemed incorruptible.
The people in the exquisitely built, but simply adorned houses in close proximity to the scroll’s underground prison.
Despite their simple means and lack of extravagance, they were anything but ordinary pest ant folk. They’re were all masters in the art of ninjitsu, being moulded into the peaceful but fierce protectors that they needed to be, along with the burning jizamurai heart that all possessed so that they would fight fore their village until their last breath.
Upon the dwelling’s creation, the Elders had decided amongst themselves that their children and all future descendants would be burdened with making sure no hands - human or otherwise - would be able to touch that paper ever again.
Though, of course, not everyone could resist the temptation. The almighty power of the object would whisper to those with a weaker impulse control, then scenarios plague their waking and unconscious mind to further lead them down the dangerous path. Would a small change to one’s life really affect the grand scheme of things? A simple yes becomes a no and vice versa?
Any who had a conscience knew that these questions were hollow, even if only asked internally. No matter how small a change may seem, the consequences would be cataclysmic. Once the voice of the scroll had whispered into a man’s ear, all hope for recovery was lost.
There was only one way to end the suffering and put a stop to the inevitable fall into madness, with a hope that they shall be born again with a cleansed mind and an innocent heart.
Whilst the scroll called to those who were easy to manipulate, something about the aura of the village called to a number of lost souls. Abandoned and orphaned children often found their way to its metaphorical doorstep, and then swept under the protective wing of a village adult. This practice had been long standing and served two important purposes: to give the displaced youths a place to call home, and to keep the bloodline fresh to avoid inbreeding.
One such person was the young woman named Kagone, a lost and abandoned child who would have never survived the thick snow that engulfed her fragile legs to the knees ion the night she had been found. She could barely remember her life before the village - just flashes of images - but it was something that she was strangely grateful for. She couldn’t imagine it would have been a happy one, or else she wouldn’t have attempted to find solace amongst the frozen moss.
Her zori clicked over the loose gravel path that lead to one of the reasons she had so much joy in her life. As the finely polished wooden steps collided with delicate sole of her shoe, it loudly announced her ascent, which caused a chortle from a deep, smooth voice within the building she called home.
A middle-aged man awaited her arrival with a large smile on his face. The outer-corners of his dark eyes crinkled into their familiar laughter lines as they met those of the woman she loved. He swept away one of his loose, rare grey hairs amongst a near full-head of black and flashed her a wink.
Kagone mirrored his movements, though with a beam more bashful than his as her heart raced and her cheeks burned the way they had when she realised she was in love with the beautiful man before her. The butterflies in her gut had never lessened, and she loved him more with each passing day. \Once she’d made it to the top, her pepper-haired lover took both her hands to lead her over the threshold of their home.
Kagone let out a gleeful giggle whilst she looked into the warm eyes of her considerably older spouse.
The women of the town had gossiped once their entanglement became public knowledge, as one would have expected - crudely accusing the young thing of being after the man’s money, which was easily disproved by the fact they were a zeitgeist societ6y in their protective bubble.
Others questioned why a man of his age would have fallen for a girl with little more than. Twenty-one years under her belt.
Truth be told, he fell for her when she nursed him back to health after a fearsome encounter between himself and a yurei of the forest had left him mortally wounded.
It was evident that she possessed wisdom beyond her years, whilst her eyes contained a pain that someone so young should never have experienced.
When he was laid upon the cold wooden floor, tucked between course blankets and wrapped in bandages, it was only her kindness and gentle nature that brought him comfort. He’d have waited all night and day just to hear her melodic laughter, listen to her light-hearted stories and feel her touch on his bruised and battered skin. It hadn’t taken long for his injured soul to mend and call out for the one that completed him. The difference in age hardly mattered when their hearts beat as one.
Kagone hardly had time to slide their entrance door shut before her mouth was covered by a passionate kiss. She let out a muffled laugh before gently pushing him back. “Fujisawa Hayate,” She chortled, though a little breathless, “What if someone should see?”
“Then they would be trespassing,” Hayate quickly replied before he buried his face into the crook of her neck.
She felt the need to protest, say something about propriety and such, but failed to utter a single word. Instead, her eyes closed whilst she melted under his touch once more. His lips explored her throat and collarbone as hers parted to release a demure sigh of ecstasy.
“How do you always leave me weak?” She asked in a distracted whisper she had to fight for her voice box to create whilst she laid her hand on his cheek.
“Perhaps we are two halves of a whole,” He said in a seductive tone that caressed her skin like the finest silk. He looked up at his love with a mischievous smile when she shivered because of his touch, then continued the romantic assault by kissing her palm and wrist, lowering her defences even further.
She began to breathe heavier and bit down on her bottom lip as his kisses set her desires alight.
Hayate hastily untied her sash, pushed her kimono open and slid it off her shoulders before taking a step back admiring his wive’s figure that the material had hidden within.
She flashed him a flirty smile, before his hands ventured underneath what remained of her clothing. his fingertips’ delicate touch made her quiver. Her want for him became a yearning, then a need before it was finally a desperate desire so intense she feared she may die if he did not make love to her.
Just when she was ready to give in, a horrendous roar shook the ground beneath them.
They clung to each other, sharing the same petrified look as a flash of lightning highlighted their raw terror and the heavens opened.
They separated and sprinted outdoors, weapons in hand.
The purple sky rumbled aggressively above them whilst the air gained a putrid aroma.
Hayate’s expression fell and his cheeks grew visibly pale.
The lovers held hands tightly as they prepared for the impending doom.
It was terrifyingly evident: The shroud had been breached.
The young woman hastily fastened her sash to make sure she was as decent as the time constraints would allow before she plunged into the panic below.
Children cried, trainers started to lose their heads as their lessons swam aimlessly through their befuddled minds, the elderly and infirm squirrelled themselves away behind closed doors, and the gravelled plaza became little more than a glorified swamp against the sudden monsoon.
The mighty red panels that made up the village gates shook violently against the exterior attack as the village’s frontline warriors assembled before it with clenched fists.
Whomever or whatever the opposing party may be, their strength was immense and intimidating.
The gates’ hinges were being pulled away from the imperial wall that held them, grinding the ancient structure to dust.
Though every adult had been trained for an invasion, had undergone torture exercises to withstand even the most painful of punishments to keep the village’s secrets, none had expected they would ever need to utilise them.
The veil had stood the test of time without there having been even a hint in their records that any knew the place existed.
Apart from the occasional stray yurei, none ventured close enough to see the entrance’s gates, let alone touch them - not even the wildlife would set foot within the clearing.
However, the splintering of painted wood and clouds of stone dust told the anxious Shinobi that their new enemy was certainly corporeal.
Hayate pulled his sword from its sheath and grimaced as she stood full-square. With rain dripping off his weapon, soaking his hands to hinder his grip and his clothes to add the weight that would affect his agility, he wasn’t at his most confident against this opponent, but he knew that could not matter. Whatever the circumstance, regardless of his feelings, he had to fight with everything he had in what would potentially be the most important battle of his forty-six years.
In their four years of courtship and six years of marriage, Kagone had never seen her husband’s face adopt the expression that it wore whilst awaiting the breaking and entering of their home. His happy, jovial mannerisms had melted away to reveal a steeled warrior within, and she had to find her own with the help of her twin blades, or else her life and everyone else’s would be in grave danger.
A massive explosion, followed by a shower of splinters signalled the obliteration of the final barricade.
If that display of brutish strength hadn’t been enough to terrify any on-lookers, then the eventual sight of those who planned to bring their doom would have made their blood run cold.
The creatures stood approximately ten-feet tall, had reddened faces and a mouthful of razor-sharp teeth. The winged beasts curled their talon-tipped fingers and tilted their huge heads so their lengthy noses could inhale the scent of their destruction deeply.
The tallest creatures sneered down at the tiny humans before him and licked his lips with a freakishly long tongue. A wordless threat that seemed to satisfy a part of his malicious soul.
The younger Shinobi slurred panicked words between themselves, a number of them stuttered as their knees quaked whilst the monsters the faced awakened a fear in them that their youth failed to help them quell. They all knew what they would be facing, and the prospect of it was enough to chill all the village’s soldiers to the bone - even those who did not show it.
The supernatural beings that had forced themselves through their door were the Tengu. Terrifying lovers of war that gained the most pleasure on the battlefield, satisfying their bloodlust by bathing in that of their enemies. The only thing they loved more than non-gratuitous violence was power, and they would have moved Heaven and Earth to get their enormous, disgusting hands on anything that would have granted them every one of their fiendish desires.
And now, they had broken the Sakura Shroud and were no doubt prepared to tear the scroll’s protectors limb-from-limb to claim the power it held for themselves.
Kagone and Hayate exchanged a glance, then shared a deep, steaming breath. The battle to save the village and the scroll had begun, and there wasn’t a chance that any Shinobi would back down.
The leader of the pack, presumably a Daitengu, took a step forward and gestured towards the mortals at his Ippon Geta-clad feet with overgrown and yellowing nails that end of his bruised toes.
If there had been more time, the humans would have been revolted, but they barely had the allowance to think such a thing, and definitely not to express it.
One of the smaller Kotengu performed a forward roll, forced the single wooden stilt of his Geta into the stomach of a terrified Shinobi and sent him, flying through the wall of a house more than ten feet away.
His compadres remained as strong and focused as they could despite the man’s agonising screams doing their best to unsettle them.
Bile rose in Kagone’s throat, which she was forced to hastily swallow down.
Showing the smallest inclination towards weakness was a fatal mistake when facing a Tengu of any kind.
There had once been a time when they had been protectors of the forest, or at least considered themselves such, but then came humankind and its corruption. It had been man who gave them their first taste of blood, who taught them that the most powerful language was war, and that humans were not worth protecting, only obliterating.
In the Tengu’s minds, mankind had shown them their true nature on the battlefield - one of beastial violence and cruelty.
Perhaps the worst part of their discovery was the fact they had enjoyed the sight wholeheartedly, and it irreparably distorted their DNA for all time.
Much like the scroll’s destiny, the battle that had fallen onto the village folk’s shoulders was not one of their making, but another that they would have to bring an end to, whether they were prepared or not.
