by Nikita Thorn
He glanced at Ippei, but then decided that asking questions about mechanics was probably not what one usually did while defecting. So, he kept silent and simply observed his surroundings.
Seiki did not have time to properly look at Nanamura the first time he got there, and he had left through the back door of the White Crane Hall, which was pretty much at the end of the village. So, he was not sure what Nanamura, with its alleged seven picturesque bridges, was really supposed to look like. He might have remembered a cluster of houses, but what was now in front of him was completely unrecognizable. Every building was on fire and, next to one of them, a nameless man was shouting curses at the invading army, while an older woman on the other side of the street was wailing, picking up rocks and throwing at the passing Fuoka Army members, none of whom paid her any attention.
Seiki had expected fighting, but he had not quite expected this. “Okay, I see what you mean now by no moral dilemmas out the West Gate,” he muttered, as he avoided looking at an unlabeled young child, covered in soot, who was standing by the road and staring at him with a dazed expression.
Ippei did not seem too bothered. “They’ll respawn,” he said. “At least, you lose Clan Honors when you kill citizens, so it’s not like they want you to do it.”
“But why burn the whole village?”
“Trade villages are taxable every hour, and they give you this NPC merchant in the clan hall, so you need to cut off their resources,” said Ippei. “And imagine if you besiege a place and the NPCs are still living happily outside, giving out quests. Won’t that be completely unrealistic?”
“I guess,” said Seiki.
Mairin turned back into a human girl, with a surprised expression on her lips. “You can heal them, you know.” She sent out a burst of her healing kitsune flock toward the villagers, causing Hotaka to turn and yell. “No abilities!”
The kitsune girl glared at him, and then purposefully put her Spirit Mend on the man, perhaps to spite him, causing Hotaka to grunt in annoyance. His subordinates immediately responded to his mood and raised their swords.
“Whoa, whoa, easy,” said Ippei.
Maybe their levels were too low to be much of a threat. Hotaka decided to let it slide, and they continued their journey without further incident. Soon, past the first burning houses of the village was something Seiki finally recognized: the circular gray stone wall that protected the three-storied hall surrounded by a lily-filled moat; plus a collection of low storage buildings and gardens. Such a peaceful scene was now very difficult to imagine amid the smell of smoke and the deafening bursts of cannons.
“Looks like we’re in time,” said Ippei. “The wall won’t last for much longer, though.”
Again, Ippei seemed to be studying something, but Seiki was not quite sure how to pull up all this war-related information.
The Fuoka Army had formed a line about five hundred feet from the wall, where Seiki could see about a dozen cannons being loaded and fired by soldiers in uniform. As Hotaka led them behind the line, a shot burst out from the nearest Bronze Cannon [Level 24] right in front of them, and they had to jump out of the way as it rolled back several feet. Seiki was surprised to notice that it had a health bar.
“These things have levels?” Mairin said.
“Yeah. They work like stationary targets, so, the higher the level, the higher the accuracy, and the higher health they have,” Ippei answered. “And they catch fire. Once they do, they’re susceptible to magic, so an obake can Life Drain them.”
“Oh,” Mairin said.
The cannon ball had hit the stone wall, and part of the outer surface crumbled and fell noisily onto the dirt below. As Seiki squinted in an attempt to inspect the wall, he discovered several sections marked with different numbers, which seemed to change every now and then, and which he could not make any sense of.
“Can it hold?” Seiki asked.
“That’s a Level 23 wall,” said Ippei, before taking a quick peek at the line of cannons. “All these cannons are below 25, so they can only chip away.”
A bout of arrows flew from behind the gray wall, and they had to step back as a small portion of it made it to the line, killing one NPC and injuring several others. Cho of the Fuoka Army [Level 20]—a tall man in blue who was in charge of the soldiers—cursed before muttering something about the White Crane soldiers getting lucky with the wind.
Someone else galloped past, also with their train of subordinates. “Miners. Get some rocks in the resource box!” he said. “Shout for map!”
Further away, a girl cried in response, “Map please!”
Seiki had no idea what was going on around him, but the place was full of excited energy. He could only look around, overwhelmed and completely entranced by the scale of the battle. It was not until Hotaka shouted, “Eisuke! I’ve got something over here!” that Seiki was reminded of why he was there in the first place.
Eisuke was at the back of the line, commanding NPCs to reload cannons, and screaming to people to move more in. He did not appear particularly pleased to see them.
“What are you doing here?” said Eisuke, after having dismissed Hotaka and taken them a little away from the frontline for some more privacy.
Judging from the course of battle at the moment, Seiki had a feeling that no matter what he said right now was hardly going to make a difference. It was like how after someone had burst out laughing after mistaking something you said as a joke and you were put in a position where it was impossible to reverse the flow of the conversation. But now that it had come to this, there was no way for him to back out either. “Okay, the White Crane Order didn’t take the scroll,” he said. “It wasn’t them.”
Eisuke was not impressed. “You came all the way just to tell me that?”
“Uh, you don’t understand. It’s a setup. The whole thing.”
Eisuke let out a grim chuckle. “I know they tried to recruit you, so you might feel obligated to help. I’ve got bad news for you, though. If they’re innocent, they’re sure reluctant to prove it. Akihisa kept his promise to Hiro. He asked to see the scroll, and they downright refused.”
Seiki had not anticipated this answer at all. “Why would they do that?” he said.
“You know what Akihisa thinks? Maybe they hired the assassins, but things didn’t quite go as planned. Or maybe they weren’t behind the assassins but, when they found that Ichikeya had the key for sale, they bought it and took the scroll, and Akari used that information to blackmail them. You see, it hardly matters now. They’re running out of resources, and the wall’s not going to hold for long. The place is going to be ours in an hour.”
Seiki gritted his teeth. During the ride, he had planned a lengthy explanation of why the box was empty. But now that they did not even know if that was true or not, he was at a loss as to how to continue.
“Okay.” He ran his hand through his hair as he tried to think. “I need to talk to the White Crane people,” he said, glancing at the gray stone wall, which was still being bombarded with cannons.
“No,” said Eisuke. “You need to walk away from this. I told Renshiro I would keep a lookout for you until you get to Mannaka, but that was all.” An edge of harshness had crept into his tone, and Seiki had no doubt the man would not hesitate to send them to the nearest spirit shrine to get them out of the way.
Eisuke glanced around, spotted someone and cried out, “Hey, Takeru! Come take these people back to the city.” He sighed and added, “Kill them if they give you trouble.”
Takeru, the young man with ruffled hair and his jangling red bracelets whom they had met in the Fuoka Army camp before, turned to his clan mate as he reined in his horse.
“Why do these guys pop up everywhere?” asked Takeru, as he trotted toward them. Eisuke turned to explain.
This was not working, and Seiki was starting to get desperate. And when this happened, as Ippei had pointed out, he went for risky moves.
Seiki glanced a
t Ippei and whispered, “If I’m on the White Crane guest list and we’re grouped, they’ll just open the gate for us, right?”
“Right, but…” Ippei’s eyes widened slightly as it started to dawn on him what Seiki was suggesting.
Having heard Eisuke’s brief explanation, which Seiki had not been listening to, Takeru looked up at them. “Oh.” He smiled.
“Well, let’s go then!” yelled Mairin.
Almost immediately, she was on her horse, and had burst into a full gallop past the cannon line toward the large wooden gate. Ippei swore at the situation as he summoned his mount, and Seiki was so very glad they had practiced speed mounting in advance as he broke into a Slide, whistled to Fubuki and leapt onto her.
Ahead of them, to the left of the wooden gate, he could see one cannon ball hit the gray stone wall. There was a flash of some numbers he should not try to understand right now, before some more of the fortification crumbled, sending out small pieces of debris and a cloud of dust.
In his back, he could hear Eisuke screaming, “Shoot them!”
Seiki, still galloping at full speed, stole a quick peep over his shoulder. Since they were not from the opposing clan, it seemed that the NPC troops did not attack them on sight, but waited for orders from players.
Only archers had any real range, and only ryoushi had them under their command. It was perhaps lucky that there were not a lot of them around. One Level 16 girl was in the vicinity. But she had not seen the exchange, and she had to wait for Eisuke to repeat his order before snapping into action and drawing her bow. This gave Seiki and his friends a few more precious seconds.
Seiki turned back to look at the gate. In front of him, Mairin and Ippei were riding as fast as they could. He was waiting for the sound of bowstrings, which he strained his ears to listen for amid the firing cannons. And as soon as he heard it, he turned Fubuki around, dismissed the horse and landed just in time to sweep up his sword in an Upslash to counter the incoming arrows.
Five hundred feet was not a lot of ground to cover, and they were more than three quarters of the way there. Seiki could hear Mairin yell, “Open the gate! We’re friends!” as several arrows struck the ground around them, most of which had been depowered by the Upslash. Seiki had a split second to be delighted that he was getting better at this, and that none of the projectiles had grazed him or his friends.
On foot, Seiki pivoted and mapped out another Slide for as far as he could, before breaking out into a sprint. The gate loomed up before them, taller than Seiki remembered, and he glanced up to the rampart above, where a few White Crane Order members could be spotted, all looking rather confused. He then heard a familiar voice. “Seiki?”
Kiku of the White Crane Order [Level 21], in bright yellow, was peering down. She ordered, “Open the gate!”
After a split second, the heavy wooden door creaked open, and Mairin, having been galloping at full speed, burst into a white fox to take advantage of the narrow opening, her slim fox form easily passing through, and Seiki and Ippei quickly slipped in behind her.
Seiki panted as he tried to catch his breath. Behind him, the thick wooden gate, manned by a dozen or so soldiers in white and yellow uniforms, was quickly shut and bolted again. He looked up and found that the White Crane Hall was not as he had remembered. While Seiki could recognize the stone path and general layout of the storehouses, about half of the buildings had blackened walls or roofs, and one, still smoldering, had been reduced to nothing but ashes. Further away, the yellow-wood hall, protected by its location at the heart of the territory, was still unscathed, but its windows were unlit and empty.
All around, clan members were running, most taking up positions on the battlements. Swordsmen could still not do much at this point, since the enemies were still too far away, and apart from the few commanding troops to load cannons, only ryoushi seemed to be actively shouting orders at their troops. In the middle of the territory, some members were cutting down a large pine tree amid shouts for people to fill the resources crates.
A flutter of large yellow sleeves sounded as Kiku landed softly beside them, having jumped straight down from the battlement and taking advantage of the obake’s immunity to fall damage.
“Seiki? What are you doing here?”
There was no time for formalities. “Why didn’t you just show them that you didn’t take the scroll?” Seiki asked.
Kiku blinked.
“Or did you take it?” Seiki said. “Was all that more lies?”
“Seiki,” said a calm voice from the rampart. Seiki looked up and saw Sayahime of the White Crane Order [Level 27] in her deep red formal kimono standing on the stone walkway. “I suppose you can confirm what happened to Hiro?” she asked. “Susumu told me you were with him.”
That meant the ryoushi had managed to get away before the Fuoka Army got him, and he could warn the clan in time, which was perhaps why the wall was still standing.
Beside Sayahime was the ninja Ozuru of the White Crane Order [Level 25] and a swordsman in white and gray, Tatsui of the White Crane Order [Level 18], whom Seiki had never met. Both of them looked puzzled to see Seiki and his friends there, and Tatsui turned toward the ninja to ask who they were.
Seiki met Sayahime’s eyes. “Hiro asked me to relay a message,” he said. “He said he died protecting your honor, so you had better not disappoint him. I think you know what he meant.”
Sayahime’s gaze did not waver. “I did not disappoint him, Seiki,” she said. “We never opened the box. We never learned that the invasion was actually to leave the key in our territory. They left it in our low-level supply chest that only our new members use, together with all the basic skeleton keys used for simple bonus loot rooms in low-level dungeons, so no one realized what it was and no one thought to report.”
She slowly made her way down the stone steps, her dark red long kimono trailing behind her.
“And why did you refuse to open the box?” said Seiki. “That’s what Hiro got you with his seppuku: a chance to negotiate, a chance to prove your innocence.”
Sayahime shook her head. “Hiro had always fought to the death. The only reason why he let himself be disarmed was because he trusted them. And how did they return that trust? By forcing him to seppuku. You see, they knew Hiro had to accept, since his character would never allow him to be executed on enemy grounds. And he commands a personal unit of a hundred and twenty. That’s the largest unit in our army after my own.” She paused. “Do you know what I think the real motivation for this war is?”
She reached into her chest pocket and produced a piece of paper.
Mumei [Level 4]: (5 hours 47 minutes ago) Keimi of the Fuoka Army has reached Level 30 in Pottery. The Army is on the move toward the White Crane Hall.
Her eyes hardened. “We refused to open the box because that is exactly what they want now that they have someone who can learn the scroll. There is nothing stopping them from taking the territory and the scroll. They made Hiro seppuku just to weaken our clan. There is no use negotiating with people like that.”
That was something that had never crossed Seiki’s mind before, and he now realized how much misinformation there was on both sides. It was almost as if someone had been fanning the flames all this time, and everyone had fallen straight for it. Before Seiki could start to explain, an angry voice boomed from outside the wall.
“Sayahime!”
Sayahime obviously recognized the voice.
The Fuoka Army has proposed a 5-minute truce.
Sayahime let out a small chuckle.
The White Crane Order has accepted the 5-minute truce.
Truce in effect: 4 minutes and 59 seconds remaining.
“Sayahime!” said the man again.
Sayahime climbed the stone steps back up to the battlement. Kiku ran up to join her, followed closely by Seiki and his friends.
The battlement walkway was about six feet across, with a rather low parapet that barely reached the
height of a man’s chest, and perhaps a bit of crouching was necessary if you wanted total safety from incoming enemy arrows. The sound of bombarding cannons had stopped, and now clan members on the walkway, mostly ryoushi, were all peering down at the man below.
Halfway between the wall and the Fuoka Army line was a lone rider on a golden-armored black horse. Akihisa of the Fuoka Army [Level 28] appeared to be a man in his late thirties, cleanly shaven, with a long thick ponytail that reached his waist. On his back was a pair of golden swords that matched the gold on his horse’s armor.
The man was furious. “What are you playing at?” said Akihisa. “What was that? Did you try to bribe my lieutenant?”
Sayahime scoffed. “What are you talking about?”
“What did you want with Eisuke? He let these new recruits of yours walk in and out of our clan, twice. Why?”
Seiki now figured that Eisuke’s relationship with Renshiro was perhaps not a well-known fact, and the level of misunderstanding was starting to get out of hand.
Akihisa’s scowl deepened. “Sana,” he called out to a clan mate. “Remove Eisuke from his post.”
“Wait!” said Seiki. “No one has anything to do with this! The whole thing is a setup. Someone wants this siege to happen.” This was not the best explanation.
“Oh, I’m pretty sure of that,” said Sayahime, looking at the man on the horse off her territory wall. “We once considered you our greatest ally, Akihisa, until you betrayed us at Osu Valley.”
“We betrayed you?” Akihisa said. “When you were the one who refused to show us proof that could have stopped this war?”
“That’s the whole trap,” said Seiki. “Even if you check, the scroll’s not going to be there.”
Before he could continue, he heard gasps behind him, and that was when he realized this was coming out all wrong. The White Crane Hall was not even aware of the fact that the box was empty.
“What is this?” said Ozuru. “What are you talking about?” Immediately, the ninja’s hand grabbed Seiki’s neck and slammed him down against the cold stone embrasure. “This is your spy, Akihisa?” His other hand pressed a bare dagger against Seiki’s throat, before turning around and yelling to Ippei and Mairin, “You two stand back!”