Yashima Chronicles 7. Enlistment (Patreon)

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Before I left the village, I also had to say goodbye to Mama Matsu. She took the news surprisingly well. I hadn't expected it, but she said she had long known that my destiny wasn't to be tied down to our little town.

She gave me a handkerchief wrapped around a ball of rice and a small pouch of silver. I tried to refuse, but it turned out that magic wouldn't help me resist a mother's insistence.

Our village was fairly close to the seat of the Ota clan's power, as such things went. I didn't have to use any magic to rush through the journey. After the first day of travel, I stopped at our neighboring village that also served as the halfway point of my trip. A nice couple was willing to give me an evening's meal and shelter in exchange for some basic chores. The next evening found me approaching Kiyosu Castle, the seat of Lord Ota.

The town surrounding the castle wasn't much to write home about by the standards of my previous life. After spending years and years in a village where everybody knew each other by name, though, finding upwards of ten thousand people living in close proximity felt like walking into a grand metropolis.

The castle had been built to overlook the intersection between the central highway, a road that covered much of the length of the island, and a major pilgrimage route that was popular among those who made an effort to visit the nation's oldest shrine. I didn't waste any time playing tourist, though, instead proceeding straight through the town and up the hill to the castle proper.

I may have been reborn into an era of war-torn near anarchy, but one nice thing about it was that there weren't too many layers of bureaucracy between the ordinary citizen and the movers and shakers of the government. I suppose bureaucratic measures weren't needed to keep schedules free when a citizen who wasted the daimyo's time risked losing their head. My cause, though, was just, so I approached the castle without fear.

Generally speaking, sword saints were identified young and trained by their family. They would then serve the lord that their family served. There was no real process for recruitment, not as far as I knew. Therefore, I had concluded that the best thing to do was to petition the lord directly to be allowed to serve under him. So long as I met the minimum standards, I didn't see any reason he would say no.

Some of the stories talked of sword saints toppling mountains and parting rivers with a swing of the sword. I was hoping that those stories had been mostly hyperbole and that I'd be able to sign up even if I wasn't Shibadai Katsuie reborn. 

The standard of being able to cut a bullet out of the air seemed more directly useful as well as more attainable. If all went well, I would rack up some basic military achievements and transfer into an administrative role after showing off the knowledge I had brought with me from the future.

If I wasn't good enough to make the cut, at least I could return home knowing I'd tried my best. Maybe I’d try my hand at being a small town samurai instead.

There were a pair of armed guards standing out front of the main gate. I couldn't sense any magic from them. They were either ordinary swordsmen, or truly extraordinary magic users. Either way, it behooved me to be on my best behavior. I stopped well outside of arm's reach and greeted them with a bow.

"What's your business, girl?" one of them asked me.

"I'm here to petition Lord Ota," I replied, doing my best to behave courteously.

"He isn't here," the guard replied.

"I'll wait," I said.I bowed politely in farewell before walking away.

A few paces to the side of the entryway there was a small nook that was protected from the weather by an overhanging eave. I settled myself there, sitting in seiza. Kneeling and sitting on the back of my legs wasn't the most comfortable way to sit, but in pursuit of magical training I'd grown comfortable with even more extreme positions. If I wanted to make a good impression, I needed to sit as the nobles did.

I rested in place and sank into meditation. One thing that I had learned over the years was a trick that let magic substitute for food and water. It involved a lot of sitting still and concentrating, which meant that I wasn't able to use it much when Kana was around. Now, though, it was the perfect way to pass the time. I always enjoyed playing around with magical techniques.

I let a little bit of magic drift out of me, forming an invisible cloud a few feet around. I naturally wouldn't extend my domain towards the guards. I didn't want to do anything that might be interpreted as an aggressive action. Still, I was going to be focusing almost exclusively on my magical practice for as long as I was waiting, so I had to set up something to rouse me when the guards finally decided to come get me.

Fiddling around with magic made time fly, as it always did. I was dimly aware of the passage of time, mostly because of the small clock in the system interface that showed up when I pulled up my character sheet to track my progress. The first day came and went in the blink of an eye. I started wondering just how long Lord Ota would be out during the second day. By the time the third day came to an end, though, I was thoroughly engrossed in the fine points of my magical technique.

The days continued to turn, even though I paid them no mind.

Eventually, somebody stepped within the realm of my magical domain. I opened my eyes to find a guard staring at me. I gave him an expectant look.

He cleared his throat. "Lord Ota will see you now."

"Wonderful," I said. I stood, grateful for the thousandth time for magic as I was able to move without any soreness despite sitting in one place for what was, according to the little blue box, a week and a day.

I followed the soldier inside, his partner on my heels. As we walked, I took a look around. Kiyosu Castle was a beautiful example of an antique Japanese fortress. Or, rather, a beautiful example of a fairly modern Japanese fortress. The courtyard protected by the outer walls was large enough to hold most of the population of the city below in a pinch, while the central keep where the Ota clan lived and carried out their business towered above us, built to withstand the most fearsome siege engines.

The guards led me through the outer courtyard and up the path to the central keep. There I was handed off to another pair of guards who led me inside to the great hall where Lord Ota held court. Indeed, as I entered I could see that he was holding court now. 

Even seated, he cut an intimidating figure, with his broad shoulders and neatly trimmed mustache. He sat comfortably on a small chair at the center of the room, while his guests were kneeling on the floor. He was regaling them with a story as I walked in, delivering what seemed to be a punch line judging by the laughter that followed. As the crowd fell silent, he turned his attention to me.

"You're the young lady who has been waiting outside all week?" he asked. "What do you want?"

I bowed politely as best I could, feeling some regret that I had never managed to learn any real etiquette. "I know you don't like to waste time or mince words. So, please have that man shoot at me."

I nodded towards one of his guards standing along the back wall. Lord Ota followed my gaze, gave the man a look, then turned back to look me up and down. After a moment, he shrugged.

"Ichiro!" he barked out. "Shoot her!"

The guard brought his musket to bear, then hesitated. Lord Ota noticed, his countenance darkening.

"When I tell you to shoot, what else is there to do?"

The man shrank back at the rebuke, then turned his attention to me. In the meantime, I had hardly been idle.

Of course, I wasn't going to make an aggressive move towards Lord Ota in the heart of his power, but for the purposes of the demonstration I thought it perfectly fair to spread my magic out through the air between myself and Ichiro. He didn't resist, didn't even seem to notice as my magic spread around him.

I had a pinpoint understanding of his every move almost before he made them. I could feel the slow burn of the match clipped to the action of his gun. I could feel his muscles tensing and untensing as he prepared to pull the trigger. Finally, I could feel the motion as he fired.

I was so keyed up that I started to draw my sword early. Fortunately, I could feel the bullet as it traveled down the barrel and realized my error in time to pause. Nobody but the sword saints in the audience should have seen the mistake, and even they may have been distracted by the roar of the gun and the cloud of smoke that belched forth as it fired. A beat later when the moment was right I drew my sword free and up in a single motion, reinforcing it magically to cut through the musket ball in flight.

I held the pose of the follow through for a moment, then drew my left hand free from the sword. I tucked the sword back into my belt while I held out the other. The magical power in the air wasn't enough for me to disable a human opponent, but it was more than enough to guide the fall of the two halves of the musket ball that I had deflected upward. They landed neatly in my hand.

I kept my expression neutral as I confirmed with my eyes what I had already felt through my magical senses. The cut wasn't even. Sixty-forty, if I was being a little generous. I knew from the stories that sword saints could cut bullets from the air. I had thought that I had trained enough to cut with the same level of precision. I could only hope that this was close enough.

I dropped the bullets on the floor in front of me.

After the roar of the gunfire, the hall had fallen silent. The soft thud of the bullet halves against the tatami mats could be heard clearly throughout the hall. The cloud of smoke gradually thinned away, wafting up into the rafters.

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