Chapter 4

“Take this!”

The bandit’s sword came down swiftly toward Akihiro’s head.

But before the blade could touch him, another flash of steel struck from the side.

Clang!

The sound of metal colliding shattered the forest air.

Daigo stood between Akihiro and death, holding nothing but a short knife in his hand. His movement was fast, far too fast for a man his age.

The attacking bandit staggered back half a step, startled. “You damn old...”

His words were cut short as Daigo moved.

He did not attack wildly. He did not shout. He did not snarl.

He simply… flowed.

His short blade slipped beneath the descending sword and sliced across the bandit’s wrist. A scream tore through the trees. Blood sprayed. In the next breath, Daigo pivoted and drove the knife into the man’s throat.

One down.

Four remained.

“Kill them!” another bandit shouted.

Two charged at once from left and right. Daigo stepped back half a pace, lowering his body. The first sword whistled over his head. He kicked the second bandit’s knee, there was a sickening crack.

The man collapsed, howling.

Daigo’s sword, no one had even seen when he drew it, flashed once.

A red line appeared across the bandit’s chest.

He fell before finishing his scream.

Akihiro stood frozen.

This was not mere combat skill.

This was the level of a battlefield general.

The remaining two bandits hesitated.

“Damn it! He’s no ordinary ronin!”

One lunged from behind. Daigo moved as if he had eyes on his back. He turned, caught the attacker’s wrist, twisted hard—there was a pop as the joint dislocated—then slashed open his stomach.

The bandit dropped to his knees, clutching his spilling entrails.

The last one stepped back twice,

Then fled.

The bandit with the broken knee crawled away as well, choosing survival over pride.

The forest fell silent again, save for Daigo’s steady breathing and the thick scent of blood.

Akihiro stood stiffly.

“Th-that was…”

Daigo sheathed his sword without expression. “You’re still alive. That’s what matters.”

“But you, you fought five men alone.”

“And they were not five men worthy of being called warriors.”

Akihiro stepped closer, disbelief still in his eyes. “You said you only survive. That wasn’t surviving. That was… like watching a legendary samurai.”

Daigo snorted softly. “If I were a legend, I would’ve died long ago.”

Akihiro bowed deeply. “Thank you.”

Daigo looked at him for a long moment.

“I won’t always be by your side.”

Those words cut sharper than any blade.

---

Months passed.

The seasons changed slowly. The wound in Akihiro’s abdomen dried completely, leaving behind a long scar that would never fade.

One morning, Daigo tossed a wooden sword toward him.

Akihiro caught it by reflex.

“Starting today,” Daigo said, “you train.”

“Train… with a sword?”

Daigo nodded. “One day, I’ll be too old and too slow. And you must never again stand waiting to be cut down.”

The first lesson was simple.

Stand.

Hold the sword.

Swing straight.

One hundred times.

Two hundred.

Three hundred.

“Your wrist is stiff,” Daigo corrected. “Power doesn’t come from the arm. It comes from the hips.”

Akihiro repeated the motion.

Sweat poured down his face. His hands felt as though they were burning. Each movement made his old wound throb.

“Again.”

“I already,”

“Again.”

The days grew harsher.

Footwork drills on slick ground.

Cutting hanging branches.

Blocking wooden strikes from every direction.

Several times Daigo struck him hard enough to knock him down, leaving him coughing on the dirt.

“Get up.”

“I can’t...”

“Get up.”

And he rose.

At night he often burned with fever, shivering on his mat.

Daigo gave him bitter herbal medicine.

“If you die from training,” Daigo muttered one evening, “that would be more shameful than dying by an enemy’s blade.”

Yet beneath the brutality, Akihiro changed.

His movements grew lighter.

His cuts cleaner.

His gaze calmer.

One evening, as the sun nearly set, Daigo attacked him relentlessly with a wooden sword.

Akihiro blocked one, two, three strikes.

For the first time, he countered with a slash that forced Daigo to step back half a pace.

Only half a step.

But Daigo gave a faint smile.

“You’re beginning to understand.”

“Not enough,” Akihiro panted.

“It is never enough.”

A few days later, Daigo entered the hut and returned with something wrapped in old cloth.

He sat before Akihiro.

“This was mine,” he said quietly.

He unwrapped it.

A katana with a simple black scabbard, well maintained. The hilt was wrapped in faded cloth.

“I carried it when I still served my lord.”

Akihiro remained silent.

“I failed to protect him,” Daigo continued without looking up. “This sword witnessed that.”

He lifted the blade and held it out.

“Now it is yours.”

“I… am not worthy.”

“No one is ever truly worthy of a sword,” Daigo replied. “We simply decide to bear it.”

Akihiro accepted it with both hands, bowing deeply.

It felt heavy.

Not only steel.

But history.

---

One day, when Daigo sent him to a nearby town to buy salt and cloth, Akihiro walked alone along a path outside a village.

The sky was overcast. A dry wind drifted through the trees.

Then he heard screams.

Not one.

Many.

He quickened his pace.

Outside a small village, around twenty bandits gathered before the home of a wealthy merchant. Carts and chests were scattered. A middle-aged man and his wife were tied to a post. Their two children cried in terror.

The bandits laughed.

“Burn it!” one shouted. “Take everything!”

Oil was splashed against the wooden walls.

Akihiro stopped at the edge of the road.

Twenty men.

He was alone.

He could leave.

No one knew he was there.

Like that night.

Like when he had knelt helplessly.

His hand touched the hilt of Daigo’s katana.

He breathed slowly.

Then stepped forward.

Several bandits turned.

“Hey, another one.”

“A young brat? Hah! Today’s our lucky day.”

Akihiro stood tall before them.

The wind lifted the ends of his hair.

He slowly drew the blade from its sheath.

The sound of steel sliding free rang clearly in the dusk.

His gaze no longer trembled.

Before him, twenty bandits laughed in mockery.

Akihiro raised his sword into a ready stance.

---

Akihiro stood alone before them.

He gripped Daigo’s katana. The steel felt cold, but steady. He did not know if he could win. He did not know if he would live another five seconds.

He only knew one thing, He would not watch again.

“Young man,” one bandit sneered, “are you lost?”

Laughter followed.

“Go home before you become a corpse.”

Akihiro did not answer.

He stepped forward.

The nearest bandit attacked first, eager to end it quickly. His swing came from the right, rough and without technique.

Akihiro moved.

Months of training guided him. His foot shifted diagonally. His hips turned. Steel met steel.

Clang!

A small burst of sparks.

One clean counter.

A diagonal slash from shoulder to chest.

The bandit froze for a breath, then fell.

Silence for half a heartbeat.

Then they charged together.

Akihiro did not think. He did not count.

He moved.

The horse-stance footwork Daigo had drilled into him kept him from standing in the same spot for more than a second. A straight cut. A swift pivot. A short parry.

A bandit thrust from behind.

Akihiro dropped low, feeling the blade pass above his head. He spun and drove his sword into the attacker’s abdomen without looking.

A scream.

He pulled the blade free. Blood splattered the earth.

Four down.

Five.

Six.

Panic began to spread.

“He’s not normal!”

“Attack from both sides!”

Their voices sounded distant, like echoes. His body felt light, almost not his own. Every motion flowed from months of training that had left him feverish, vomiting, near collapse.

Daigo’s voice echoed in memory.

Power from the hips. Waste no motion. Don’t chase. Wait for the opening.

A large bandit charged with a spear. Akihiro sidestepped, cut the shaft in half, and in one clean rotation severed the man’s neck.

Warm blood sprayed across his face.

Seven.

Eight.

He stopped counting.

The men who had laughed now turned pale. Too late to retreat.

One tried to run.

Akihiro did not pursue.

He waited.

The man slipped on blood-soaked earth. When he scrambled up, Akihiro stood before him.

One short slash.

Finished.

The sky darkened.

The final scream faded.

When silence finally settled, twenty bodies lay across the ground.

Akihiro stood among them.

His chest rose and fell. His hands trembled.

He looked around.

Did I… do this?

He had not even realized when it ended.

The merchant, freed by his wife, sobbed openly.

“Sir! Sir!” The man rushed forward, nearly collapsing at Akihiro’s feet. “You saved us!”

His children clung to him, crying.

Akihiro slowly sheathed his sword. Blood dripped from the scabbard’s tip.

“I was only passing by,” he said quietly.

“Passing by and killing twenty men?” The merchant stared at him in awe and fear. “Who are you?”

Akihiro had no answer.

The merchant ran inside the half-burned house and returned with a heavy cloth pouch.

“Take this.”

Akihiro shook his head. “No need.”

“No need?” the merchant’s voice rose. “You saved my wife! My children! My entire life!”

“I didn’t do it for money.”

The merchant grabbed his hand and forced the pouch into it. “That is precisely why you must accept it.”

Akihiro hesitated.

The money was heavy. Heavier than anything he had ever held.

At last, he accepted it.

Not because he wanted it.

But because he saw the fear in the family’s eyes—and their sincere gratitude.

He turned and walked away before more villagers could gather and ask questions.

His steps felt light… and strangely unfamiliar.

---

That night, in the forest hut near the bay, Daigo was sharpening a blade when Akihiro entered.

His clothes were stained with blood.

Daigo glanced at him. “You’re late.”

Akihiro sat without speaking.

“How many?”

Akihiro lifted his gaze. “Twenty.”

Daigo stopped sharpening.

“Twenty?”

“They were attacking a merchant’s family. They would’ve burned the house.”

“And?”

“No one escaped.”

A long silence.

Then,

Daigo laughed.

Not mockery.

Not amusement.

Satisfaction.

“Good!” he said, rising to his feet. “At last, you are worthy to be my student.”

“I don’t know how I did it,” Akihiro said quietly. “I didn’t think. My body moved on its own.”

“That means your training has sunk into your bones.”

Akihiro looked at his hands.

“Have I… become something dangerous?”

Daigo studied him carefully.

“Anyone who carries a sword is dangerous,” he said calmly. “The only question is, for whom are you dangerous?”

Akihiro said nothing.

He felt neither pride nor regret.

Only… uncertainty.

---

Several quiet days passed.

Until one morning, an unfamiliar sound shattered the forest’s stillness.

The thunder of horses.

Many of them.

Daigo was already standing before the riders emerged.

Akihiro stepped outside the hut.

About eight mounted soldiers halted before them, clad in full armor. The crest upon their chests clearly bore the mark of the Miura Clan.

One dismounted.

His face was stern, his eyes sharp.

He stepped forward.

Daigo instinctively moved to stand before Akihiro.

“What is it?” Daigo asked flatly.

The soldier looked at both of them.

Then spoke in a clear, commanding voice:

“We are searching for a young man who, three days ago, killed twenty men.”

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