Bushido Online: the Battle Begins: A LitRPG Saga Read online

  “I don’t even know what’s possible,” Seiki admitted.

  “Or come back later. Just come outside and yell ‘Amaya’. There’s one guy who rents this same room who always gets so mad when people do that, but don’t mind him.” She giggled.

  Seiki thought for a moment. “Actually, would you mind if I ask a question?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “How do you even fight an obake?” he asked her. He knew how to dodge physical weapons but, with magic, Suguru did not even have to touch him, and Seiki had no idea where to start.

  “If you’re talking about high-level people, just run far away. Life Drain is weaker the further you are. If you run out of sight, it breaks completely and eats up all the required energy.”

  “So you can’t really dodge it?”

  “No. Magic doesn’t work that way. Just like how a healer can’t miss with his heals, you can’t dodge magic. You can interrupt the user though. Right now, you can’t do anything about Soul Freeze yet, but if you have a ninja friend they can Shadow Strike out of it. We’re kinda hopeless against ninjas. Every time their poison dart ticks, it breaks our spells. You’ll get something later that does break out of it, but I don’t remember what it’s called, like a battle shout or something like that.”

  “Oh,” said Seiki, not sure he caught all that. “I see…” He had no idea it was this complicated, especially just about when he thought he was getting the hang of it all. Not only did he have to learn his own moves, he had to know every other move by all other classes as well in order to tell what he was up against.

  Amaya produced something from her pocket and handed it to him.

  You have received: Simple Paper Crane. Charm. +1% luck. Expires in 7 days.

  “It doesn’t do much,” admitted the girl. “But it helps with quests, especially now that you’ve got to get yourself two hundred gold for your third ability. That’s gonna take a while.”

  Apparently, she had been checking his abilities as well. Seiki thanked her for the charm, wondering what luck even was.

  Amaya walked him to the door and sighed as the night breeze blew in and rustled her hanging scrolls on the wall. “Stick around, Seiki. And you’ll see there’s a lot to be done.”

  She poked her head out and looked at the deserted alley with a smile. Seiki was not sure what she saw in it.

  “Take my advice, though, and try to get killed at least once soon,” she added, casually.

  You are no longer in a group with Amaya.

  She shut the door before Seiki could ask what her last sentence meant, and he was once again alone in the dark, empty alley. From behind the rows of buildings, he could start to see the white lights of dawn creeping up. He had not realized it had been a whole night.

  “No death yet? Interesting.”

  Seiki spun around. His eyes had not adjusted to the darkness outside and he could not discern anyone.

  “Personally, I don’t care about these things, but there’s a nut who managed to not die until Level 13. So now he’s out to kill people just so that they won’t break his record. Eh, but maybe that’s just a myth.”

  Seiki thought the voice sounded familiar. He slowly reached for his sword.

  “Oh, please don’t,” said the voice, chuckling. “I don’t want to be that guy. There is no need for bloodshed tonight.”

  Seiki remembered who it was, just as Gin [Level 11] revealed himself from within the shadows, with his bow drawn in the exact same manner as before.

  The self-proclaimed robber grinned. “You sure took your sweet time in there with the lady. But, hey, we all have our secrets. I won’t ask.”

  “It’s not—” Seiki cried before he understood that the man was just teasing him. “What do you want?”

  “Where’s your ryoushi friend?” asked Gin.

  “I don’t know.”

  Gin nodded toward the door. “Is he still in there?”

  Seiki could not help wondering whether Amaya would hear him if he shouted right now, or if someone else in the instanced room would come out. He also wondered if he would be fast enough to block an arrow with his bamboo sword.

  Gin sighed. “Why does everyone look so serious when you try to rob them?”

  Out of nowhere, someone materialized behind him with a particular effect that Seiki recognized now as ninja’s Camouflage. He guessed it was Gin’s ninja companion, Chika.

  “Don’t turn around,” Chika said. “Or it’s instant death with Assassin’s Stab.”

  “You’re Level 9. You don’t have it yet,” said Seiki.

  Chika grunted.

  “See?” Gin jeered. “I told you it won’t fool anybody. But she does have Poison Dart, and you probably know what that does.”

  The man was right. Poison Dart had a slow effect. With that, there was no hope in blocking arrows or getting out of here alive.

  “Look, I’ll put away my bow,” said Gin. He lowered his weapon and put it on his back. “We can talk like gentlemen. But don’t try anything stupid, because there’s more of us right over there.”

  He nodded to the right, and Seiki distinguished another person in the shadows: Hatsuo [Level 22], bearded, in a loose yukata, with a thin red and white headband, who was none other than the same good-natured Hatsuo from Ichikeya.

  Seiki stared in surprise. The man shook his head slightly as if telling Seiki not to let them know he recognized him.

  “That’s… one of you?” Seiki turned to Gin, wondering what exactly was going on.

  “Oh, Hatsuo is one of our founding members,” said Gin. “He’s a good shot. Don’t know why we always have a lot of ryoushi and ninjas. Must be the kind of profession we’re in. Anyway, see? Bare hands. I don’t even have my secondary equipped either, so let’s just talk. All right?”

  Chika backed away as Gin approached him. Seiki eyed the man warily, but Gin seemed to have switched his tone now and he walked closer with his empty hands still raised up.

  “So, your friend managed to loot after all,” Gin said. “That was good play by him. And I’m not complaining, because he did leave us a nice Ethereal Pearl and an Enchanted Thread, which is worth a bit of gold. That was very nice of him, so our little ones won’t have to go hungry. Robbers got families to feed too, you know.”

  Seiki was certain that last part was made up just to fit the man’s script.

  Gin walked closer with a mysterious smile, perhaps a bit too close even. “The question is: did he tell you? Did he share? You weren’t in a group, so you probably didn’t even know he looted.”

  That was something that had never crossed Seiki’s mind before, and even if he could tell there was something slightly suspicious about how Gin was putting it, he felt an urge to defend Yamura.

  “He did,” said Seiki. “But whatever we did with the loot is none of your business.”

  Gin seemed a bit surprised. “Oh, so he did manage to loot.” He looked over to Chika. “Hey, maybe we should recruit this guy, you think? I really didn’t see him do it.”

  The robber laughed as he saw Seiki’s expression when he figured it had been a trick question. “You, on the other hand, will make a good ronin. Straight-edged, you know. I suppose you’re not going to tell us what you got. And whatever it was, it’s obviously not on you.”

  In the man’s hand was a gold coin with several coppers, a health tonic and potion bottles, and an origami crane which the man was looking over with mild interest. They were the contents of Seiki’s cloth pouch.

  “Hey!” Seiki cried.

  Gin laughed and handed them back to him without any attempt to resist. “I’m not so heartless as to rob a man of all his belongings.” He whistled, and a shabby little dappled horse galloped in. “But gold is always welcome.” The man winked as he jumped onto his mount, juggling a gold coin between his fingers.

  Seiki looked down at the things in his hands and found that the man had indeed failed to return the gold coin with the pile.


  Gin shouted merrily as he rode away, “If you see your friend, tell him that he is welcome to audition!”

  Seiki turned to look and found that both Chika and Hatsuo had also silently slipped away, leaving him alone in an abandoned narrow alley. The sun was climbing up from the horizon, turning the maze-like East City from a shade of ghastly gray into golden and pale brown. He was not sure if he was upset, annoyed, fascinated, amused or all of the above.

  Chapter 10

  Gaining the approval of a master swordsman was a feat that required both time and dedication. Seiki did not know how Master Tsujihara managed to find fault with all his moves in a manner disturbingly similar to real martial arts masters, who were very seldom pleased with whatever you did. There was never an unkind word from the old man, but he obviously held back on the approval. Even when Seiki knew from experience this was all a tried-and-true strategy employed by many teachers, he was determined to get it.

  He learned a lot about the basics of the sword, and much more about his two abilities—especially the different variations on them depending on the angle of the strike. Starting stances also played a big role, and he soon realized what Master Tsujihara was teaching him was to maximize the effects of his moves, since an ill-formed one only did part of the damage at the same energy cost.

  “Your sword is a part of your body,” Master Tsujihara told him, as he accused Seiki of treating it as a foreign object that he was ready to discard when things got hairy. “You don’t just toss it away and grab your opponent like wrestling.”

  Seiki also became aware during that time that the dojo itself was instanced especially for him. He wondered at first how it worked, since the practice hall directly opened into the courtyard and there was no real boundary between what was public and what was instanced. But then, he remarked that when people stepped onto the practice hall floor, they immediately morphed into a replica of themselves that was labeled ‘Dojo Student.’ A student who would then quickly walk away into the inner chambers, while their real selves entered their own instances, making for a very smooth transition and giving Seiki and the old Master the privacy of having the whole practice hall to themselves.

  The only other people in the dojo were Sato and Maeda, the two students he had known from the Umezawa event. There were also other level-less Dojo Students who occasionally dropped by, who most of the time only gave him random pieces of information about Shinshioka and the world in general.

  “The Shogun is recruiting people for his campaign against the Demonic Clan,” one of the students told him. Seiki was slightly surprised to find that Shinshioka was actually at war. “But that’s for people who are skilled and past the vigorous military test,” the students added, as if to tell him that his level was too low to even be thinking about it.

  Seiki also spent more time exploring, as he had intended to, and he found out little things hidden everywhere in South City. The lady washing her clothes in the stream would fix torn clothes for a small fee, but explicitly told him that her skills were limited, and sophisticated clothes required a real Tailor to fix. There was an ever-ripe persimmon tree that he could eat from that had the same properties as Sumiko’s healing tonic, but the fruits could not be stored and would disappear after an hour. At one intersection, a different wanted sign was put up every night, and if Seiki wandered around after dark he would soon run into the wanted person. More often than not, a Thief [Level 5] who, once defeated, would be taken away by a South City Patrol [Level Unknown] who happened to be riding past and who would give Seiki thirty silver coins for his trouble.

  After being thrown into so many situations he was not ready for, Seiki thought it was time to have a plan. At first, he had only been mildly interested and was just letting the world take him wherever it would. But now that he had had a glimpse of what was possible, especially the elusive shared knowledge and language that everyone seemed to have, he could not help but feel intrigued, and perhaps a little overwhelmed. The dojo turned out to be something concrete he could work on. He decided he would try to get his third ability as soon as possible.

  It took him five days of diligent practice before Master Tsujihara was finally completely satisfied.

  Seiki had just performed three successful consecutive Sweeping Blades in a row when the progress bar filled.

  Quest progress: gain the approval of the master swordsman 100% complete.

  Quest completed: No Pain No Gain [Level 4]. 60 XP gained.

  He turned to look at Master Tsujihara.

  The Master was standing there with his usual slight smile. “Not bad, Seiki.”

  “Come on, Master Tsujihara. You can do better than that.”

  “You’ve still got much to learn,” said the Master.

  “Even Ito-sensei actually said he had always had faith in me when I won the junior judo purple belt,” said Seiki. A part of him was surprised he could talk about this.

  “Coddling does not build character, Seiki,” said the Master. “If it’s praise you’re looking for, I recommend buying a drink on the second floor of Momiji Inn and the geishas there will tell you what a great hero you are.”

  He said it as a matter of fact, but Seiki could see laughter in his eyes.

  “I didn’t expect this kind of advice from you, Master Tsujihara,” said Seiki, laughing.

  “Do you need directions?” asked the Master, again straight-faced.

  “Okay, now you’re really joking,” said Seiki in disbelief. “So are you coming with me tonight then, Master Tsujihara?” He grinned as he tested the old man.

  “I’m really disappointed in you, Seiki,” said the Master.

  Seiki laughed. “All right, all right.”

  He decided to get back to business. “I’m ready. When can you teach me the next ability?”

  Seiki had heard people whine about how much gold it took, but he could not believe the old Master would straight up ask for that, as it did not fit his character at all.

  Master Tsujihara did not answer the question. “Have you thought about working for the Shogun, Seiki? He is recruiting able soldiers.”

  “Do you think I’m one? I mean an able soldier?” Seiki asked, just to see what he could get the old man to acknowledge.

  Master Tsujihara just gave him a disapproving look.

  “Fine. I know. Humility is a warrior’s virtue,” Seiki said, quoting what Master Tsujihara had been saying for the past few days. Master Tsujihara was still waiting for an answer, though. “Oh, uh, not really. I haven’t thought about it.”

  Master Tsujihara sighed and looked out. “I used to work for the Shogun. It was a specific kind of life, Seiki, with a real purpose. Training soldiers, commanding troops, facing enemies on the battlefield.” The old man’s eyes seemed to be looking inward at past memories. “See the Shinshioka’s red flags lined up along our ranks as we prepared an attack, fluttering in the wind as the red day dawned on the assault at the enemy base, like wings on birds of prey… which reminds me that I had some rows of towels drying in the yard earlier. They should be done by now. Go get them in here, will you, Seiki?”

  Seiki blinked at the unexpected twist in the story.

  The old man did not seem to be joking. Seiki looked out to the courtyard and saw that there was indeed a rack full of white towels, which had not been there before—if he remembered correctly.

  “Well?” asked the Master.

  “Oh, yeah, sure,” said Seiki, a bit confused.

  Quest accepted: Towels in the Yard [Level 5].

  He was surprised it was actually a quest, which seemed completely unrelated. He got up, still eyeing the old man. But Master Tsujihara just waved and told him to hurry up. As Seiki went out to load his arm up with cleanly-washed towels, he noticed Ippei [Level 5], a young man in a loose white yukata sitting cross-legged on the raised platform. His wooden slippers were off on the ground, and his bamboo sword propped up vertically on the platform beside him.

  The man nod
ded to Seiki when he walked back with all the towels. “Focused Strike,” said Ippei with a little smile, doing a small move to mimic the ability. “Breaks walls.”

  Seiki was not sure what he meant by that but the young man said no more and seemed to have already turned his attention to something else beyond the back door across the courtyard.

  The old Master pointed to the corner when he saw Seiki. “Good. Put them over there. Fold them up, too.”

  Seiki chuckled as he knelt down on the corner and put down the pile of towels, unable to figure out what it was all about. “Is this some kind of punishment, Master Tsujihara? I was just joking about the geishas.”

  “Chores build character, Seiki,” said the Master without turning to look at him.

  It did not turn out to be such a chore, after all, as he got the notification as soon as he finished folding the first towel.

  Quest completed: Towels in the Yard [Level 5]. 15 XP gained.

  Before Seiki had time to wonder about the easiest quest he had ever accomplished, the world shattered in an ear-splitting thunderclap.

  The next thing he knew, he was lying on his side, his ears ringing, his back numb, and out of wind as if he had been hit by a Sweeping Blade. All around him, gray ashes were falling and the smell of smoke filled his lungs.

  Dazed, he pushed himself up, struggling to comprehend what had just happened. As he looked up, he noticed that the far end of the practice hall was black and red in live flames, producing a thick curtain of black smoke.

  Glancing to his right, he saw the old Master on the floor, among a pile of rubble that had collapsed from the ceiling. Seiki rushed to him. Master Tsujihara coughed as Seiki helped him to sit up.

  “Are you all right?” cried Seiki.

  The old man’s face was covered in ashes. Seiki noticed that a large piece of wood had also pierced through his left forearm, drenching his gray sleeve in blood.

  At that moment, hurried footsteps arrived and Sato ran in. “Master Tsujihara!”

  “Fire,” the Master managed, weakly. “Put out the fire first.”