The air was thick with the smell of burning and an overpowering stench of blood.
The flames of war across the battlefield mingled with the crimson glow of dusk on the horizon, dyeing the world in a brooding red.
A boy of barely thirteen or fourteen, clad in armor, staggered among mountains of corpses and seas of blood, searching for something.
Until at last he found the body of a general riddled with arrows, and the boy collapsed to his knees in the bloody water, his shoulders convulsing relentlessly.
"Father..."
Tears mingled with the blood and grime on his face, and in a trembling voice, the boy murmured these words, lying there motionless like a clay idol.
No one knew how much time had passed.
Far off on the battlefield, the banner embroidered with the character "Genji" broke and fell, mingling with the clamor of voices:
"The rebel Genji have been eradicated, their leader Minamoto no Yoshitomo is dead!"
