Since young I have always wanted to be someone. I would read stories of great men and women. Strong figures who accomplished great feats in their craft, or saved the world in a manner one would not expect. After the Prima Adventus most ignore the collected prior histories. They say it is too old. My father, a historian, a collector, a man of mystery. He would tell me of a group known as the Samurai. In retrospect they were no different to the Gnockt Empire's elite brigade in the way he spoke of them. One scripture, it was only one, spoke to me more than any other. Sasaki Kojiro, three pages, that was all. Torn and exhausted. A language I had never seen and one my father worked hard to translate. It was then as I learned a very oh so summarised version of what he was that I wanted to be like him. Rather I wanted to be him. I would become a…
"Samurai…"
"What?" asked Daevol (Miyamoto Musashi), vice-captain to District Twelve's Swallowtails.
"Musashi, you wish to be the greatest warrior of all time don't you? I wish to be the greatest…"
"What are you talking about? Berrilynn could we just stop with the whole swordsman stuff. We somehow got this far by just random luck. Now people are quoting you as the new Sword Saint. Yet we only have two members in this so-called gang. I don't want to be killed ya know."
"Kensei. Hahaha, Musashi, is it your time of the month?"
"I'm male…"
"Sure-sure. Who is the current Sword Saint?"
"Deep Regend is challenging you to a duel."
"Huh?"
"Will you accept?"
"What district?"
"Thirteen."
"Useless."
"The real Sword Saint doesn't even reside on this island. I think."
"All the more reason to reject. Who cares about some scrub below us."
"Haah… What are we gonna do?"
Hours before the northern invasion. Sasaki Kojiro prayed at a local shrine. He took to the steps of his nightly bout. A voice echoed in his ear…
"Do you believe in time travel?"
"Hah!" a haughty laugh was quenched by a stern look of icy logic. "What an absurd notion. Blowing up the moon with my bare hand is more believable."
"What if I told you that your reality is built on three layers connected by one entity. One of those layers is time, it is the second strongest force pulling on the weaves that build the fabric of our reality."
"Sad, another soul taken by the modern whims of mental illness. A lunatic speaks to me. How sad. Let me end your suffering."
The voice coined a smile, "who are you to end your own life." Berrilynn shuttered, he was looking at himself, but it somehow was not him at the same time. "Deja-vu, no?"
"Who…no, what are you? A demon I presume."
"Hahaha, the same as always. Claim my name for yourself, you will be the first sword. Take on the present, take on the past, and soon take on the future."
"A true samurai never wavers from a challenge. Name yourself, for I shall inform your family of your parting."
"Sasaki, Sasaki Kojirou."
Berrilynn's eyelids flickered before a blade was closing in on his neck hairs, he ducked and parried. Just as an insect flutters around a lamp, so too did sir Sasaki's blade. Berrilynn could only survive by his mild wits, his feet stumbling, his blade wobbling with clashes too heavy for him to handle. What even is a samurai, what even is a warrior, what am I even trying to do? Will I truly die? "Is my inspiration even real, if not, then I shall make it real. You wished to cut a bird out of mid flight. So too will I cut what is uncuttable."
A blade clattered, a sword split in half, a man resembling what Berrilynn thought Sasaki Kojiro to look like, slumped over; his head removed from his body. Within the clouding mist of night Kojiro saw brilliant chrome blinding him. A grim smile. Blood-lust began to bubble up into a rolling boil nearly overflowing. Once unleashed it shall crash the flame and quench but only his blade, never his ferocity. His stride soared to perfection, eyes holding onto the next advancement of skill. A blue aura made flowers wilt, the trees bent away. The man who could escape death, talked to himself at every moment of his life all at once, feared what he saw. What was about to be.
"When they ask, 'who is he?' 'Who are you?' A ronin, a ravaged warrior, a nerd, a crooked man with nowhere to go…nah, I'm a samurai."