Which City exactly?
Fumeiyona City. Right in the center of the Ashen Sky Quarter. Also known as, The City of the Dishonored.
Through Clan warfare and the savage dismantling of established Samurai by a heiress gone rogue, all that was left was reminders. Powerful Clans left in an eternal phase of rebuilding. Cemeteries for miles. Curses. Crime. Ghosts feeding off the pain and strife built up over generations.
"Isn't this where Sensei lives?"
I side eyed her, "How do you know that?"
She sneered, "That's my business."
I had nothing to say to that as we snaked our way through the long alleys full of empty sake bottles, scorched spoons and used pipes.
"I bet you also didn't know Sensei's one of the last members of the Cursed Clan. It's said the Rogue Heiress gave birth to a single child before she was taken by the Beast-Men. She took all the money and resources with her, leaving him with only one item. The Cursed Blade. Apparently he unsheathed the blade a single time and finished off every relative of his clan in one night." Yuki whispered as the sounds of arguing families and crying babies spilled from the homes around them.
"You shouldn't blindly believe myths." I replied.
"Two thousand years ago the Kappa were a myth, fool." Yuki retorted.
"Then tell me the story again in two thousand years and I'll believe you."
"You'll be dead, Ghost."
"So will you."
Slowly, the city became more destitute in the brief showings between the alleys.
Faded gold walkways lined streets once packed with expensive hybrid stone. Hanging street lights filled with buzzing predatory bugs swayed overhead. Buildings as tall as the clouds stood broken in and held together by cobwebs and soot.
It was probably beautiful once. Now it was a memorial.
As Yuki said. The Rogue Heiress laid waste to much of the city. And there was no part worst than the south end. She committed so many horrors the mere mention of her name was banned.
Aiko. Her home.
Now his home.
Stripes.
They stood in the thick of it.
"No use hiding anymore." Yuki attempted to move out into the night.
I caught her hand, "I wouldn't."
"Let go of me before I remove your eyes."
I let her go. I need my eyes.
"Just because you're afraid doesn't mean I am." Yuki dusted herself off.
"No. It means you're foolish."
Yuki turned on me, ready to unleash her specific brand of wild violence inside the alleyway only to be interrupted by something snarling in the distance.
It stood out especially since the city was empty.
We both froze and listened for any other signifiers of what it could've been.
I knew what it was. No use telling Yuki. She wasn't interested in collaboration. I wasn't either.
I continued my journey. Mere minutes left. Minutes until the Full Moon reached its apex. Minutes until we reached the house on the hill. The southernmost home, standing half dead on a cliff face with the turbulent ocean at its backside, reflecting the moonlight off its shimmering waters.
We reached it in good time.
Yuki didn't speak. As brave and brash as she was, she could feel the eyes in the shadows. She could hear each hair began to stand on end with every step they made towards the home on the hill. A home that wasn't a home and more so a den, housing a beast. Its pungent urine marked every inch of the building. Screaming, "Go away." So loudly into their nostrils it burned like smelling salts.
It wasn't much. Even for the The City of the Dishonored.
It was a simple building crafted over a blacksmiths shop. Broken blades and unconventional arrowheads were spread across a crafting table out front.
An old furnace glimmered faintly in the shadows within.
Recently used.
I walked around the building and hugged the sides, staying low. My quads burned from the weight of the Goblin slung over my shoulders. My hands still shook from my battles with the DireRats and Kappa trio.
Thankfully, I reached my destination.
Yuki and I crouched under a window at the bottom floor. Burnt metals from the blacksmith equipment rode the night winds and made the stars feel that much closer. Like it was them— burning near my face, smoking like balls of spacial fire. Eye to eye with intensity. It felt fitting.
Large sea creatures whined beneath the waves beyond the cliff side ahead.
Monsters everywhere.
I dropped the Goblin right under the window between me and Yuki.
As she peered through the windows like the nosey action prone child she was, I took off the cloak id stolen from the Goblin— now covered in my scent and rubbed it along the wall of the building. I threw it against the grass. I fanned the winds. And then, I wrapped the Goblin it.
Yuki turned away from the foggy glass with a dirty face twisted by irritation.
"What the f—"
"RAGHSH!" Something inside the home snarled and a crash resonated. The shattering of something fragile.
Yuki brandished her dagger. "You stupid ass foreigner! Did you take us to meet more monsters stronger than we can handle?! We can't always be as lucky as the sewers." She held onto the fact that the Kappa encounter was based on luck. Her problem.
"No. I came for Sensei." I pulled open the window and Yuki peered inside.
He lay in a flat bed in the center of the backend of the blacksmiths shop. Covered in cold sweats, shivering so violently he could've been seizing. If you paid attention as you peered into the dark you could see the spirals of steam rising from his red tinted tight skin.
"He's sick." I explained.
Yuki wasn't one for sympathy. But her eyes roamed as she peered inside Sensei Stripes' dilapidated home. Like many children in the Ashen Sky Quarter with nothing, she was one for opprotunity, "He's loaded."
The dark room was a mess. Dirty clothes strung about everywhere. Broken dishes splattered old moldy food everywhere. But amidst the mess, old familiar artifacts hung from the walls and in lock boxes of expensive design.
Yuki side eyed me, "Why did you go through all this to get here?"
"He's sick." Was all I repeated.
"Ok. So you came to help our Sensei. The same man who makes you fight everyone and lets students lie on you about everything…."
I said nothing.
"Maybe this is his Karma. If you say anything tomorrow, I'll kill you in your sleep. You check on Sensei, don't worry about me and what I'm doing." Yuki explained.
She hopped inside.
I waited. Watching her step deeper into the darkness, silent and oblivious to what stirred at her entrance.
The moment she was well within his home, I began my climb to reach the upper floor.
By the time I reached the next window two floors up she would've been turning back questioning my disappearance, but Stripes was already awake.
As I silently crawled through and found myself in a dusty attic, I listened through the floorboards. I waited for my chance to strike.
"S-Sensei…. I uhh…. I heard you were sick."
"What…. What is that A JOKE!? Why are you in my home, girl? Do you know what tonight brings? Are yo— URGH!…"
Something fell with a heavy bang. Based on Sensei's bone chilling grunt of pain I'd assume it was him. The Lunar magic spilling from the moons rays being absorbed into his very being at searing hot speeds was probably disorienting. I planned on it being so.
"Damn foreigner!" Yuki screamed as growls and the sounds of tearing flesh ate up the silence.
"Don't run, child. You'll excite me! Fight me. Just like I taught you… ALL OF YOU! I'm not a Hunter. I'm a warrior. I don't take down prey…. I have my Samurai Honor still. You have to fight…. Yo—"
Yuki's footsteps were so loud they could've been bombs going off in a clan dispute. She ran. As any sane child would. Even the toughest.
"RAAAGHHH!" Stripes lost all composure and took off after her with a beastial roar that was completely absent of all things even remotely human.
The floorboards beneath my feet shook as he pounced on her.
She didn't even make it outside. I could hear her ribs snap from the impact like glass wrapped in rubber.
She kicked and screamed as Stripes dug into her soft flesh. The smell of coppery blood and urine tainted the air. It was over in seconds but it felt like an eternity before her neck snapped.
I was making my way down the stairs by then. Moving every-time he bit down on her limbs loudly. Every time he cursed himself— cursed her… for running. For making him live out what he was.
I didn't understand it at the time. But my instincts have always been strong.
I reached the bottom stair. I stood directly behind him. Most of Yuki's body hidden except for a leg missing massive chunks of both flesh, muscle and bone.
Sensei Stripes crouched over her. A massive hulking mass. His shirt was gone. His skin was torn— like weak cloth. Bloody strips hung off around his waist and arms, revealing the stripped fur and waves of muscle beneath. One of his legs was contorted hideously— halfway caught between the transformation from man to beast.
He was hideous. A human husk broken open to reveal the creature and its intentions within.
Finally he stopped long enough to reason and his head rose up from her body. Twitching and scenting the air.
He laughed, "Right…. Foreigner. Those eyes were always so calculating, Ghost. How long have you known, huh? How long have you trained as my student and plotted as my killer? HAHA!? Can you take me, boy? Can you give me Honor? Give me war? I'm not a hunter…. And you're not Prey like Yuki was. This is what I train you all for. Through you students I am more than a cursed beast. You are— URAGH….. you… are the sheath to my Muramasa Blade. Hold in my chaos— AHH!"
He lunged from where he was crouched over Yuki, smashing apart the wall to the window Yuki came in through. Drawn in by the scents of….. me.
He dug into the cloth wrapped Goblin covered in my smells. Completely forgetting his entire monologue about combat and honor. Not that either of those things mattered in the grand scheme of things.
He was a lost cause.
And I no longer had a master.
Now standing behind him, close enough to touch, I ran my sword through his heart in one smooth strike. Like lightning.