by Nikita Thorn
Mumei [Level 4]: (8 minutes ago) Come to Nanamura at sunset.
Ippei [Level 11]: (3 seconds ago) Thirty degrees northeast.
The message must have been combined and he must have missed a bird somewhere. Seiki did not know anyone called Mumei and he had no idea where Nanamura was. He wondered if he should write back and tell them they had sent it to the wrong person.
The second message, on the other hand, was quite clear. Seiki looked up and could make out the samurai on his black horse in the distance, in front of a group of people. Another bird fluttered down.
Ippei [Level 11]: (3 seconds ago) Pick up a piece of bone for the reward.
There were fragments of bone all around and Seiki—not quite sure which one to select or whether it would make a difference—grabbed a random one from the ground, before calling his horse.
As he approached, he saw that Ippei was just finishing his conversation with Himari of the Shinshioka Nobles [Level 25], who was in a very bright pink kimono with golden embroideries.
“Recruitment starts at Level 20.” Ippei turned to clue Seiki in on what they were talking about. “Must be unaffiliated for at least three months.”
“Unless your clan disbands,” Himari clarified, pleasantly. “If you’re a Master in any Trade, except Riding, you can start applying at Level 18. Contact me or Michio.” Her friend, an obake girl, called out to her from ahead, and Himari gave both Ippei and Seiki a smile. “Hope to see you soon.”
This somehow took Seiki by surprise. “You’re thinking about joining them?” Seiki asked after she had left with her friends.
“No way. They are a bit too…” He searched for a word. “Expensive,” Ippei concluded with a chuckle. “Not sure I’d ever be comfortable with that.”
It was true, and all of them had dressed to show. “Well, they call themselves the Nobles,” said Seiki. Even their attitude seemed to have reflected that.
“They pride themselves as the true aristocrats, with good reason, but lately I have a feeling they are being usurped by the Honor Warriors. You know, they used to make you run errands for months before they accepted you. Now they’re practically begging you to apply.” Ippei laughed. “Back in Beta, there used to be a parody clan who called themselves the Shinshioka Paupers.” He grimaced as he seemed to remember something. “And they were nasty pickpockets. Anyway, you got a piece of bone?”
Seiki showed him the jagged piece he picked up. “What’s it for?”
“The Shogun needs proof of public service,” said Ippei. “Could be any piece, but there’s a slight lottery element to it. You trade it for a reward box.”
Seiki sighed. “You really have to go to the Shogun for this?”
“Hey, didn’t the old man say not to hold grudges? Okamoto insisted on the execution.”
“Makes no sense,” said Seiki.
“That’s the only way to command an army. You break rules, you pay for it. No exceptions. What Okamoto did was insubordination.”
“That’s just stupid,” said Seiki. For some reason he could not shake the thought that when you broke rules, it was usually someone else who paid for it.
“Says a ronin.” Ippei shrugged casually. “Anyway, it used to be direct looting, but you can imagine the scale of the PVP that broke out afterward, since these world events can drop a sheathed weapon for you.”
Sheathed weapons yielded named weapons, which could be traded or looted from a dead body if unclaimed by a player. “Wouldn’t you just pull it and claim it immediately?” Seiki could not imagine how it would take longer for him to grab a blade and do a Focused Strike with it than it would for someone else to take notice and kill him.
“Some sheathed weapons have a level restriction and you must be a certain level or higher to pull,” said Ippei. “Usually, the higher the requirement, the better the weapon. I heard someone in the Nobles got a Level 30 Sheathed Blade that they’re still sitting on, since no one is even that high yet.” He then added, mysterious, “Plus, there’s this chance that you’ll pull a lost unique.”
“What’s that?”
“There are sixteen unique weapons. About four or five are unaccounted for at the moment. I think two have never even been discovered.”
“What’s the point of uniques anyway if they are just there to give an unfair advantage to only a few people?”
Ippei raised his palms up. “People say it’s to stimulate PVP, and it works perfectly. The first unique that dropped in Beta was from a fire god wreaking havoc right in the middle of Shinshioka. After they killed him, a sheathed weapon dropped for this samurai guy and, when he pulled the Talon, he asked his mates, ‘Hey, what’s a unique?’ And that was it. Nobody even knew what uniques were then but, when it said ‘unique’, everyone got greedy. Then pretty much everybody went to jail since the Patrols were right there. So, everyone learned not to go out in public with a unique unless you’re confident you’ve got protection.”
“Kiyosei Temple didn’t seem worried,” commented Seiki. “With their, uh, Oar of Time.” He wondered what it would be like if he could do three Upslashes in a row without the lockout.
“Only houshi can hold a staff,” said Ippei. “And they’re an altruistic bunch. I’ve heard they would even let you borrow it for a war event if you ask nicely.” The samurai kicked his horse into motion. “Let’s get to the Shogun to see what we’ve got.”
“Grats,” Seiki said, out of the blue. He had noticed that Ippei had leveled.
“Thanks.” Ippei smiled. “So, like I said, just go to the Shogun and get to work on those damn missions. War games are coming up at Fourteen. And that world event should give you a taste of what it’s like, but the real thing is even better, because you’re the one giving orders.”
Seiki chuckled as he looked at his friend. “Are you actually trying to recruit me?”
“Oh, it’s not you,” said Ippei with a straight face. “Just ronin. They’re hard to come by.” He then grinned. “And I don’t think I need to.”
Seiki laughed and shook his head as he followed Ippei down the path back to Shinshioka. In a way, the man might be right.
Chapter 03
The Shogun’s Palace was usually a lonely place, at least when seen from the outside, with its dense cluster of tall painted buildings and towers guarded by a thick white stone wall that ran from east to west and tapered off in a curve as it met the steepest parts of the sloping north hill. Seiki had never liked its austere atmosphere. But on this particular afternoon of the first world event, judging from the amount of crowd going in and out, it could very well have been Market Street.
As Seiki and Ippei approached the main gate, a large group of people, with varying degrees of satisfaction, were already coming out. One samurai was prancing around on his new white fully-armored war horse as he made sure everyone knew about what he had just received, while a few others looked strangely confused.
“What if you don’t know you have to pick up a piece of bone?” Seiki wondered. It had not been obvious at all that was what people were supposed to do. And after all that effort, it would be terrible to let it all go to waste.
“The Bureau of Public Services will eventually post one to you through a pigeon,” said Ippei, pulling his horse to a stop and hopping off right after they had passed through the gate. “It can be up to a week but, usually, the higher Shogun honor you have, the faster they do it. You still have to wait about a day, though.”
Seiki made a face. Somehow, he was not surprised that it was all about Honor points. He was about to ask why Ippei had gotten off his horse, when one of the guards approached him and told him that only Favored Members of the Court were allowed to ride inside the main gate.
Ippei absently handed the rein of his black horse to the nearest guards. “Take good care of him, officer. Remember, he only eats carrots and sugar cubes,” he said, casually, earning a giggle from Tomoka [Level 13], who was passing by.
Horses needed no mainten
ance but, for each one you owned, a small upkeep fee was automatically added to the total rent for all your active private territories. Seiki’s white snowstepper only cost him fifteen gold a month, but better quality horses could be much more expensive to own.
“How many honor points do you need to be a Favored Member of the Court?” Seiki asked, as another guard led his white horse away.
“Five hundred,” said Ippei.
“That’s impossible.” Seiki had to let out a pessimistic chuckle, considering he only had 35 at the moment.
“You’d be halfway there already if you didn’t hate the Palace so much.”
Seiki sighed. It was not that he hated the Palace. “It’s just these hoops that they make you jump through.” He wondered since when he had started to view things this way. He could not help but feel that he had jumped through enough hoops in life and that, in the end, it had earned him absolutely nothing.
They made their way on foot through the front pine garden. The ground here was paved, and along the wide road were carved stone lamps.
The Reception Hall, where the Shogun held his court, was a long high-ceilinged wooden building, at the entrance of which they were asked to leave all their weapons, whether equipped or not. Seiki was surprised to be told that he also needed to leave his woodcutting axe. Glancing at the people beside him, he saw that ryoushi needed to surrender their arrow-carving knife, and blacksmiths their hammer, since only Noble Lord and Ladies of the court were permitted to carry weapons on their persons in the presence of the Shogun.
“And how many Honor points to be a Noble Lord?” Seiki could not help but ask.
“Three thousand. Let’s just say some of the Shinshioka Nobles aren’t even that high yet.”
Seiki had nothing to say to that.
The Reception Hall was most likely more crowded than usual. The majority of people were sitting at the back on the wooden floor. Further down the hall was a large tatami area, where only Members of the Court were permitted. Then, at end of the hall was the Shogun, with his usual serious look, presiding over his court from his raised platform in front of a large wall panel that depicted dragons, koi fish and cranes, set with decorative pearls of all sizes. There was a simple black writing desk in front of him, but the nobleman appeared to be doing nothing.
The building, strangely enough, had no windows or light slits. Yet, it was incredibly bright with numerous floor lamps. Along the wall of the room were long lines of heavily armed Palace Guards [Level 33 Elite], as well as two additional Shogun’s Personal Guards [Level 35 Elite], in black and gold on both sides of the lord of Shinshioka.
The guards at the door told them to sit down and wait for their turn for the court officials, since it was impolite to stand over the Shogun. At every movement from the crowd, especially when someone was standing up or looking through their belongings, the guards glared at them suspiciously.
Seiki decided that his initial feelings about the Palace had not been wrong. “Is all this necessary?” he asked, nodding to the overly alert guards. “It’s not like someone’s going to try to kill the Shogun.”
“You don’t think?” Ippei dropped casually on the wooden floor. “At the beginning, the Shogun used to have only his two trusty bodyguards, but people went a bit too wild with their experiments and the man got paranoid. In Beta, a guy actually managed to run up and stab him.”
“Just to see if he could?” asked Seiki, looking down the hall, and he wondered if a full Slide would even get him within attacking range.
“Yeah. And the answer is yes, you can stab the Shogun, but he turned out to have a ridiculous amount of health. So, you can’t actually kill him.”
Seiki laughed. “And how many Honor points did they take away for that?”
“All,” said Ippei. “Plus, the bodyguards killed him on the spot, then dragged him from the palace morgue and threw him in jail for another 48 hours.”
Seiki blinked. “That’s, uh, harsh,” he said, not entirely sure if the punishment fit the crime. He could understand why Honor points would be taken away to discourage attacking other players, but it was not like the Shogun could even get his feelings hurt.
Ippei shook his head in amusement. “Well, you gotta give it to him. The guy’s got guts. That earned him celebrity status overnight and half the city went to visit him while he was sitting out his prison term. So, in the end, it was probably worth it.” Then he remembered something and added, “Even the overlords were impressed and they branded him ‘rebel’ before they released him.”
A girl beside them gasped in shock as she turned to look at them. “Hopefully with his consent?” she asked. Koharu [Level 12], a slim girl in gentle pink and yellow, had apparently been listening in.
Ippei tilted his head. “Oh, yeah. Don’t worry. The guy loved it. They even asked him where he wanted the tattoo. His name escapes me at the moment, but I wonder if he’s still around.”
“And where did he want it?” Koharu wanted to know.
Before Ippei could answer, a court official—marked Chamberlain Giichi, in a shiny black robe with long sleeves embroidered with red silk—approached them with a tray. “If you participated in ridding the world of that terrible monster, the Gashadokuro, show me your evidence,” he said, as he made his way politely through the crowd.
Seiki placed his bone piece onto the tray, which already displayed several specimens.
“This is kinda disgusting when you think about it,” commented Koharu, as she let her bone piece drop from her bag into the tray without touching it. “And it’s not like they’re going to know whose piece is whose.”
Chamberlain Giichi turned and smiled. “Don’t worry, ojo-san. I happen to have a perfect memory.”
“Yeah?” The girl laughed. She raised her brows playfully. “So you remember when someone stabbed the Shogun?”
Chamberlain Giichi blinked. “Of course. But we don’t discuss such things here,” said the man, seriously.
“You thought I was making this up?” said Ippei.
Seiki decided to join in and test the official too. “Do you remember Captain Tsujihara?”
The official blinked again. “Of course. He was a great army officer, but he chose to retire early. I heard he recently passed away.” The chamberlain sighed. “Commander Nakatani asked Lord Shogun to include him in the Memorial Hall.”
Somehow, the answer did not please Seiki. “And Captain Okamoto?” he asked, not entirely certain why he was giving the man such a hard time.
Chamberlain Giichi jumped. “That we certainly do not discuss.” He glared at them. “You people need to watch what you say if you don’t want to get yourselves into trouble.”
Seiki stifled a scoff. At least, they had the decency to indirectly admit it was a mistake.
“Uh, who’s Captain Okamoto?” asked Koharu.
“Stop saying that name!” Chamberlain Giichi whispered angrily, and he scuttled off.
“What did Captain Okamoto do?” asked Koharu again. “Was it really bad?”
“Nothing bad. Military stuff. The Shogun is just a… sensitive man,” Ippei said.
Seiki let out a long sigh. He knew full well that, even if he found a loophole, it would most likely not bring him any more solace. At the same time, though, he could not help but think that it might allow him to stop caring, and there were lots of things he had been trying to stop caring about lately. “Let’s just get the reward box and get out of here,” he said.
A thought crossed Ippei’s mind, and he turned toward the far end of the hall and shouted, “Is that right, Lord Shogun?”
“What’s that?” said the Shogun, almost in alarm, from his raised seat.
Seiki looked at Ippei, curious as to what he was trying to pull.
The nearest armed guard frowned, but Ippei ignored him. “That there are certain things we don’t talk about around here,” he said, loudly.
The Shogun raised an eyebrow.
“First
warning, young man,” said the guard, causing a few more people to turn around to check how far Ippei was going to take it, perhaps with avid interest in seeing someone go to prison. Kubo of the West Hills [Level 14] on the tatami floor, slightly ahead of them, had stopped admiring his new quiver and turned his full attention on the spectacle.
Ippei seemed to be enjoying the attention. Seiki had seen that look before.
“For example,” Ippei began. “How, without any real agency on one’s part, sometimes one might happen to make a decision that led to the tragic destruction of various lives and caused a long chain of inevitable events.”
Ippei glanced at Seiki mischievously as he continued, “And in such a case, even without any real agency on one’s part, one might also happen to lack a certain series of vertebrae to own up to what had transpired and is often instead forced to resort to suppressing uncomfortable speech. Is that right, Lord Shogun?”
Unable to parse that, the Shogun let out a doubtful humph and the guards cleared their throats.
Seiki was trying his best not to be amused. Ippei had just called the lord of Shinshioka a coward, perhaps for him, and somehow got away with it again. And to be honest, Seiki was not sure what he had been upset about anymore.
Ippei grinned as he continued, “And for those affected by the long chain of inevitable events, it could—”
“Fine,” Seiki interrupted him, as he finally understood what Ippei was doing. “I’ll do those damned missions.”
“Language, young man,” warned one of the guards.
Ippei seemed pleased, and relieved. “Thank you, my lord,” the samurai shouted to the nobleman, who was still processing the sentence from earlier. “Your ambiguous utterance has finally moved someone to forgiveness, so, instead of spending all his time venting his anger on Mother Nature, he can now finally rejoin society as a contributing member.”
Seiki jumped as if he had been bitten by a spider. “Hey!” he protested. It was getting a little too close and, perhaps, a little too public, as he was suddenly aware of everyone’s curious eyes on them.