Prelude - Genji, Hakusa, Kenji, Tomoe

Hakusa did not rush into the situation, despite its seeming urgency. Not that he could move with any great speed anyway. The focus of aiming helped him see further as his sight became one with the arrow shaft. He could see that their battle armour, deteriorated as they were, could still absorb most of the impact of his shots. He could see them move unwaveringly in a straight course, and that was significant, because they didn't seem to turn to the left or right, but only threatened to attack whoever was in front of them. What he could not figure out was how to get them to change their course.

That meant that the few travellers who were either too slow to get out of the way or too stunned to react were in the undead warriors' direct line of sight. One of the farmers tried to drop his wooden backpack in haste to run faster, but the deadly blade of one of the yurei samurai felled him with one clean stroke, cutting through both man and wood!

Genji sees more clearly now. These are not mere rogue samurai, these are evil undead. Yokai! Yurei! Genji's hand move instinctively to the silver talisman hanging from his neck, hidden in his robes. He watches as a poor peasant is cut down with a swift strike. The yurei continue to amble on. There are to many people in the village. Old. Slow. Defenseless. More will die.

Genji looks around at more samurai at this teahouse than he has seen in years. Are they frozen in fear? Genji knew now was the time for strength... for fortitude, and he would show that now. With surprising grace he moves quickly down the path away from the teahouse toward the undead.

Genji was not one to judge quickly. Yet there were samurai present in the teahouse but none of them had immediately taken action yet, too caught up in their own code of conduct. Saito was focussed on the raggedy one-armed samurai, and the one he had heard addressed as Tomoe seemed to want to remain nameless. But at heart Genji was of the earth. The sumo's ring, or dohyo, was pounded clay, that gave him unshakeable fortitude. And it was this stability that brought him swiftly off his stool, out of the teahouse and down the steps to the bank of the river, right in front of the road, ready to meet the reanimated threats that appeared ready to annihilate all living things that surrounded them.

Genji bore no weapons; sumo did not wear armour. But all he needed was his fists. They were enough. Strangely, his talisman gleamed in anticipation of his readiness to fight.

The one-armed warrior, seeing the violence on the street...a samurai, dead or no, cutting down an unarmed civilian... this dishonor awoke in him his code.

He stepped out of the teahouse and into the path of the undead samurai. For they would have to cut through him, Kenji, to cause further dishonor. And that would not be easy for them, no it would not.

He drew his odachi with his one good arm...

The yurei were indiscriminate, but also senseless, from what Hakusa continued to observe. They continued down the middle of the street attacking whomever was immediately in their path, and the innocents did not need any further prompting to get out of their way. Up ahead of them was the bridge crossing; those stuck there would have no means to avoid their killing blades, short of diving into the water. But perhaps, as Hakusa inferred, these undead were not headed towards the bridge, but would veer off towards the steps leading up to the teahouse.

If they did, they would find their way blocked, for Hakusa saw a mountain of a man, a sumotori, descend with quick grace to emplace himself at the foot of the steps. Genji had left the bickering samurai to their ineffective devices, to deal with the invasion. He had noted that right at the back with another strange figure, but this one was a cripple in worn robes, not a trio of stalking warriors in armor.

Hakusa, trusting his instinct that redirecting the dead was the best course of action. He looked for something he could topple into the dead, finding a decaying merchants tent. He waited, drew, rehearsed the shot in his head and released. Intent on knocking the tent into the yurei.

"Peace, dono. I am Kenji Kamukara of House Tanaka. I am no yurei, and you will do nothing of the kind. It is our part to defend these folk. Draw your blade, samurai, but until we have vanquished those, I have no quarrel with you." Kenji bowed, but kept his eyes on the unfamiliar samurai.

And with that, Kenji exposed his mostly unprotected back to the samurai, a sign of vulnerability, and moved swiftly toward the violent horde of zombie-samurai, ready to defend the peaceful village and earn his honor...or his valiant death.

That Kenji spoke honourably with the proper demeanour of a samurai, as he truly was, gave Saito pause in his overreaction, lest he was judging the disheveled one-armed warrior too harshly. The real threat remained, and the unyielding Saito was as ready to defend the innocent from the inexplicable undead who had arisen. Turning one's back might be construed as an insult, but the swiftness at which Kenji charged down and what he had declared he would do would prove his genuine desire to fight the yurei.

Hakusa stood his ground from afar, knowing better than to attempt to engage the three vicious undead directly. One of them had veered towards the tentage of a refreshment stall, katana ready to cut down the vendor, but the yamabushi made the near impossible shot, one that cut the rigging hemp tying down the roof. The woven straw structure collapsed, burying the zombie samurai beneath. It wouldn't be enough to destroy the undead, but hopefully it would entrap it sufficiently for a while. Now to make sure the vendor could escape from underneath unscathed!

The crashing topple of the straw structure buried one of the zombies. Genji looked toward the leper with a raised eye brow admiring the skillful shot. But there was no more time to honor the mastery of bowmanship for in front of him heading towards the Teahouse stairs was another of the monsters.

Genji slides forward with poise compressing his form before releasing his full strength forward toward the creature with open palms and a thunderous momentum.

The sumo eschewed weaponry; only the samurai class carried swords, others made good with all manner of other implements, and the secretive shinobi, had their own set of deadly equipment. Only the sumo no toride relied on the power of their own bodies: their incredible mass, their unshakeable stance, their implacable hands. From Genji came a charging blow with the full momentum of his palm strike, which blew past the undead's slashing katana and landed squarely on its chest.

The yurei staggered, its dilapidated oyoroi armour absorbing most of the blow, enough to prevent immediate destruction. But Genji could hear decayed ribs crack and shatter as its chest caved it. What he didn't expect was a slight warmth from his pendant as it gleamed for a moment, followed by a strange phenomenon. The undead warrior before him froze from its initial damage, and continued to remain motionless, its sword sagging until the wrist holding it up appeared to split. There was much Genji did not know about the talisman he owned; did it even play a part here?

Saito was taken aback that Kenji had turned to leap into battle. Perhaps he had misjudged the odd-looking samurai, despite his appearance that matched the yurei attacking the bridge junction. If he were indeed an honourable champion, Saito would fight alongside such a warrior, and leapt forward with him.