Quiet autumn leaves fell all around in various shades of red, yellow, orange, and brown. The crisp air raked at Yuna's arms, making her body tremble and goosebumps raise at the sudden chill. If the temperature was anything to go off of, winter this year would be ruthless and icy for sure.
Nevertheless, the young woman grabbed her straw broom once again and continued her endless task of sweeping the dead leaves off the cobblestone stairs toward Katagari Shrine.
There were some odd 700 steps leading up the mountain path toward the shrine she and her family had inherited decades ago. And so far, she had managed to clean the leaves off of 27 steps.
"Ugh, this is pointless."
She lifted her gaze up the mountain path and squinted her eyes as the morning sun began to peak over the shrine, temporarily blinding her. She scowled quietly, hand tightening around the cloth-wrapped handle of her broom as she considered throwing it away.
"By the time I get up there, there'll be more leaves down here. What's even the point of doing any of this?"
"The point is to keep our home looking presentable to any who might pass by. Isn't that right, Yuna?"
The sudden voice made Yuna jump, nearly dropping her broom. She looked around for a moment, then two, until she found the source of the comment. A weary-yet-fit man with cloud-white hair and dark eyes wearing cream colored robes, a black platter with what looked to be green tea in jade-colored cups and rice balls.
"Master Kenichi, you scared me!"
The old man laughed, tens of new wrinkles forming around his eyes and forehead as he leaned back, his sun-weathered skin hanging quite loosely from his face.
"You were inattentive in all my classes and yet you still are, even when attending to your morning chores. Doesn't it bother you that a common bandit could sneak up on you and you wouldn't even know it?"
Yuna scoffed half offended, turning her back on the old master while pretending to be busy sweeping.
"I hardly believe any old bandit could come up all these stairs with steps as quiet and weightless as your own, Master. Even in your old age, you still manage to pull the wool over the eyes of all the boys at the dojo."
"Hahaha! Well, I do try. My body isn't quite what it used to be, though. Why, when I was a spry young man, I could run circles around all my teachers and rivals. Though nowadays, I find it a challenge to ascend and descend these stairs every noon and night."
Her heart squeezed at the admission. Time, as Master Kenichi once had told her, is a relentless river, never ceasing, never stopping. Not for anything. Not for anyone.
"Well, if it really is that much of a bother, you should consider asking some of the boys to carry you up and down the mountain. Have them carry you on their shoulders and make the trip easier."
The response made Master Kenichi recoil like she had just insulted his mother.
"I said that it was a challenge, not impossible! I may be old, but I am not decrepit. Remember what I taught you, Yuna: the core fundamental of a good Katagari–"
"Is to always rise up to the challenge, no matter how monumental or hopeless. Yes, I know. Practically carved it into my brain when I was a child."
"Nearly had to with your tendency to doze off. But enough of that. You must be hungry, seeing how you tend to skip breakfast. Mind putting that broom down and sharing some lunch with me?"
Yuna's stomach grumbled almost on cue. She was hungry and it annoyed her that her former teacher could read her like a book. Admitting defeat, she sat down on the steps and laid the broom beside her.
"I guess I could have a bite..."
"That's the spirit."
As they both sat next to one another, they enjoyed each other's company alongside bitter tea and warm rice.
Moments like these weren't rare at Katagari Shrine. In fact, they were rather plentiful. The shrine was so far away from the busy lives of farmers and the turbulent lives of gamblers and criminals that it almost made Yuna forget about all the pains and woes of their world. Almost.
"I heard they found Jun in the forest."
Master Kenichi paused, the rim of his cup close to his lips. His gaze darkened, a heavy sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. The old master simply shook his head and set his cup down with a sigh.
"Junichiro was... a troubled young man. Always craving more than the shrine and dojo could offer. I caught him sneaking out to go to that brothel house not too far from here, believe it or not."
"Brothel? Jun? Seriously? But I though–"
"You thought wrong. Junichiro wasn't a saint or some innocent sheep. He was a man. And like all men, he too had dark festering desires simmering right beneath his flesh. Those desires were his undoing."
"Still... Jun was like a brother to us."
Master Kenichi sighed again, this time less with the weight of disappointment.
"Junichiro was like a son to me. Still, we cannot excuse or accept his behavior. It brings great shame and dishonor to Clan Katagari."
"What, going down to a brothel? I'm not saying I condone it but even the Shogun's men partake in–"
In the blink of an eye, Yuna felt the sharp edge of a blade press against her throat. She stilled, her breath catching as she realized that the knife her master had raised was the very same one he used to filet fish and cut meats in the kitchen when dinner time came about: A blade he only ever used for beasts. She understood what he wanted to convey without him needing to speak. Right now, he was treating her no better than the meat of the beasts they consumed nightly.
"The Shogun... The Shogunate. They are all faithless dogs intent on enslaving man through the use of money. You know this, yes?"
Yuna swallowed hard and nodded.
"They are the ones responsible for the death and carnage that our homeland has seen for the past 150 years. They kill, defile, pillage, and slaughter indiscriminately. And that young man heading the table now... that blood-frenzied warlord bastard, Ryota Abata, is the one to blame for all this. Isn't that right?"
"Yes, Master..."
He withdrew the knife and sheathed it inside the sleeve of his robe, then raised his finger at her like it was a more lethal weapon.
"Then never excuse their actions, never condone their violence. It is because of carnal creatures such as them that the Katagari clan has had to work so hard to broker in this era of peace. Even if history might say that Abata landed the final blow, it was we who made warring men put their swords down in favor of peace."
The moment passed slowly, but when it did, Yuna and Master Kenichi both put their hands down and took a breath. She tried to understand her old master, really she did. He had to go to war for some 30 years and take the lives of so many young men. Despite being a master of the spear, he had never intended to use his gifts in such a way. She could only imagine how much guilt and blood he held in his hands and how often the imagery of those battlefields and small villages haunted him in his dreams.
Kenichi rose to his feet and looked down the shrine steps and slowly smiled. He then looked over to Yuna who was still sitting and after a moment, he reached into his sleeve and withdrew the knife again. This time, however, he handed it to her.
"Your father was always against me teaching his only daughter how to fight bigger and greater enemies than herself. But I believe, in these most uncertain times, the only thing apart from the Gods that you can be sure of... is yourself."
Yuna looked at the knife in confusion.
"Master, why are you–"
"I'm going down to the nearby village for a few nights to try and settle an arrangement with a few traders. Winter's coming and the shrine is going to need new furs to make some nice winter coats. Hopefully, I'll be able to trade for at least fifteen or twenty pelts."
"But the knife."
"Well, you and the rest of the boys need to eat, don't you? This is the only proper cooking knife we have. Would be a shame if I left with it for so long."
She rolled her eyes and reached for the knife, taking it by the cloth-wrapped handle in her hand.
"Oh, I almost forgot, Yuna. Tell your brother not to slack off while I'm away."
"Yuno? You mean, you've already begun to train him?"
Kenichi nodded and smiled a toothless smile.
"He's not half bad, you know. Might be a little young but I reckon he'll give you a run for your money someday."
"He's twelve. I mean, if we really aren't in need of an army, surely we don't have to start training someone like Yuno so young."
The old man shook his head.
"That's where you're wrong. Children are like sponges. They absorb all the knowledge you throw at the better than we do. The key to great warriors... is starting them young."
With that, Kenichi started down the mountain, whistling the tune of an old wive's song.
All of this had given Yuna some pause as she looked into her reflection in the knife. Ryota Abata, the current Shogun, leader of the Shogunate, the war hero that everyone touted as the War Queller. It was common knowledge that during the final battle of the Sengoku Warring Period, Ryota Abata had found an ancient weapon, thought to be lost by even the monks, and used it to end the war. Ameno-Gekiryū, Heaven's Countercurrent, known to all else as the Spear of Outer Heaven. It was hard to see such a man as a villain. If even the Gods had allowed Abata to succeed against his enemies, surely he must've been blessed or chosen.
Perhaps Master Kenichi was wrong about him.
As the sky turned bright mandarin orange and casted crimson shades against the trees, Yuna wiped the sweat off her brow, glancing at the work she had managed to get done.
It wasn't a lot.
Still, it was just about time to go back to the kitchen to help the other girls cook and set up dinner for the rest of the family living up in the shrine. While Yuna didn't particularly enjoy cooking for others, many of the training swordsmen had gone out of their way to compliment her on her dishes. She didn't pretend that their praises didn't inflate her ego a bit but her mind always came back to the same points: she was a Shrine Maiden, meaning she would never marry, would never have children, and would never leave this mountain. The reality of such a bleak and boring future haunted Yuna daily. The monotonous life her clan had set out for her was a blessing for her safety but a curse for every other aspect of her daily life.
She had nothing else, knew nothing else, would never be anything else.
"Haah!!"
Yuna heard the shout first before hearing the resounding crack of wood on wood.
"Hah! Hyah!"
Two more hits followed, each one harder than the last.
"And...!"
The last crack was softer, followed by the sound of a wooden something clattering to the ground.
"Agh! Dammit!"
She recognized that voice and it brought a warm smile to her face. She walked on over behind the main shrine to see a young boy, training with a wooden dummy target. A wooden training sword laid in the dust next to him as he crouched and bent over, blowing soft breaths into his wrapped palms. As she got closer, she could see the signature red splotching of a swordsman's training hands, no doubt blistered, bruised, and covered in splinters.
"You keep going like that and your hands might fall off, you know."
The boy jumped and spun around, lifting his gaze up to meet the eyes of his older sister.
"They will not. All the other boys are training just as hard as I am, if not harder."
Yuna crouched to meet her little brother's gaze eye to eye.
"Well, all the other boy are three years older than you, so their hands are a little tougher."
"W-Well, even so!"
Yuna took his hand in hers and gazed upon it, wincing then sighing in disappointment at the damage he had managed to accrue in just a few short hours.
"What are you doing, Yuno? I told you to steer clear of all this swordsmen training nonsense."
Yuno grimaced and took his hand back, reaching down to pick up his training sword.
"I'm too young to be made into a Shaman, I don't have the skills and strength to be an exorcist, none of the sorcerers will let me be an apprentice. Master Kenichi was the only one who would take me in and let me be somebody."
The wooden sword struck the dummy.
"But why do you need to–"
The sword struck once more, a distinct crack echoing as it did.
"So I can protect you!"
Yuno reached back and put his all into this one swing, causing the tip of the wooden blade to break off and go flying, embedding itself in a tree. Even Yuna had to admit she was impressed.
"You're my big sister and you have no one else around to protect you. Ever since Father left and ever since Mother died, I think about it, constantly. What if something happens to you? What if someone hurts you? I can't stand the thought of something like that happening and being powerless to do anything."
His response and caring for her was endearing. It made her heart swell to see him care so much for her. Yuna simply laughed and pinched his cheek, garnering an annoyed swat to the hand from Yuno.
"You are my baby brother. If anything, I should be the one putting my life on the line to protect yours. Thank you, Yuno, for caring so much about me."
Even with these words, Yuno still wasn't satisfied, looking back at the piece of his sword that had broken off. Yuna rolled her eyes with a smile.
"I'll tell you what: if you can beat me in a race back to the mess hall, maybe I'll let you protect me."
That grin on his face was all she needed to see to know that he was more than up to the challenge as they both set off on their way.
But just over the hill, a pair of unseen eyes watched, silently, in waiting for the sun to finally set.