The Floating World

by Elijah Stephens

  “I wanted his honor to die with mine.”

  “You failed. You only delivered him to his wife and the warmth of her waiting arms in Heaven. You also tried to kill Rumiko, but she survived. You kidnapped Yukio to regain the family you never deserved, and I took her back. The eastern province will not crumble, your brother’s spirit will spread freedom to the peasants here.”

  “Then kill me if I’m so wicked. Why do you hesitate? Why do you want me to remember my failures?”

  “It is only what you have earned. You could kill yourself, or are you bereft of dignity as well?”

  Yoshimizu was torn apart with guilt. “What motivates your honor?”

  “The attempt to avoid becoming you at this moment,” said Shinji. “When you paid those ninja to steal the key, would you have stopped the war if you had already opened the golden case?”

  The Daimyo clasped his hands over his stomach. “All of this treachery has been for nothing.”

  Onozawa picked up the case and saw that it contained an origami dragon folded out of green paper. The structure was dynamic, made from exquisite skill and detail, and it was eating its own tail in an infinite loop. “This is what you were missing.”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s a display of the eternal cycle of disconnection,” said the ninja. “The dragon has dominion over land, sea, and air, but it chooses to eat itself away. Do you have any idea how many people died for you to see this?”

  Yoshimizu shivered at his words. “Stop torturing me and finish this!” He walked forward with his hands open, begging to be killed. Shinji was filled with disgust and decked him in the jaw hard enough to knock him to the ground.

  “There are orphans who must live their entire lives with the emptiness you have brought to them. What makes you think that death will be the end of your suffering?”

  The Shogun wiped the blood from his mouth as a conch shell was blown by the watchmen, alerting everyone to danger. Onozawa ran to the door to see if the guards were coming for him, but instead he saw the black panther strolling through the open. It stepped gracefully into the room and sniffed around before settling its gaze upon Yoshimizu, who was stumbling over himself as if trapped in a nightmare.

  “What kind of magic is this?” he said as the beast approached him, stalking him with lips curled above large fangs.

  The Daimyo took off running through the back door and jumped into the jungle. The cat followed, slicing the back of his legs with razor claws. Yoshimizu yelped like a lamb as he was taken down, and the sound of his body being shredded was audible from where Shinji stood. While listening to the Shogun’s breaking bones, he took the origami dragon from the case and put it in his pocket.

  The bearded ronin Satoshi was the first to come to the door to see if his paycheck was still intact. He froze when he saw the ninja who had killed his friends. As he let out a scream to alert the others, Onozawa drew his sword and hacked through him with enough strength to chop him in half. His sword was dripping red on the walkway as he scanned the courtyard, in full view of numerous armed guards as well as the other ronin.

  He almost slipped in the puddle of Satoshi’s blood when he rushed into the Daimyo’s quarters and through the back, heading east into the deep foliage towards the front gate. Two archers stepped between the buildings of the inner-compound and saw him splashing through the water of the bamboo grove. When they pulled their bowstrings and took aim, Shinji threw a handful of shurikens into their wrists and their arrows were let loose in random directions.

  They yelled to alert the rest of the watchmen and spread their advance on the ninja. He tossed a hollow eggshell in their faces and a fine white powder of crushed seashells blinded them. They were choking and scratching at their eyes when the assassin shoved his katana into the nearest guard with an arterial squirt of blood. The other archer blocked an attack, but his inferior blade broke and Onozawa split his skull.

  Shinji continued east, through the bamboo stalks and into the gravel beside a thin river. He heard the snap of a bowstring before an arrow grazed his shoulder. The stocky ronin who fired it placed two arrows on his string as he reloaded. When he launched them, Onozawa let the arrowheads ricochet off the flat side of his sword. The samurai realized the extent of his opponent’s skill and picked up a spear.

  “Did you kill the Daimyo Yoshimizu?” Sanjo asked through stained teeth.

  “Did you kill the Daimyo Hideyoshi?” the ninja responded.

  “So you’re here to return the insult. I didn’t know that the eastern province hired assassins in their court.”

  “And I didn’t know the west hired animals in place of warriors. Did you get paid well for damning yourself to the wandering infinite?”

  Sanjo suddenly recognized him. “You were the ninja who rescued that girl. You killed Arata and Hashimoto.”

  “You’ll see them again very soon,” he promised.

  The ronin attacked with his spear and Shinji dodged from side to side, waiting for the right moment. As the broken bamboo stalks came drifting, he saw his opening and took off one of Sanjo’s hands at the wrist. The ronin backed away, cradling his injury while doing little more than soaking himself in blood.

  Onozawa flicked the red off his blade. “Which limb do you wish to lose next?”

  Sanjo tried to bite back the pain, but his strength was wasted. When he slipped in the loose gravel and fell on his face, Shinji drove his sword through the man’s spine. Four watchmen blocked his escape at the water’s edge, so he sheathed his weapon and picked up the dead ronin’s spear.

  “Your Daimyo is dead,” he told them, “If you knew what he was doing to your people, you would thank me.”

  “Surrender and your death will be swift,” a guard replied.

  Onozawa stepped forward and cracked his spear against the man’s leg, then he swung through the bamboo stalks, leaving them as pointed spikes. When the others attacked, he knocked the leader off his feet with a hard kick to the temple, tripping them back and impaling them. Another group of archers came through the grove like hunters and forced Shinji towards a narrow alleyway between buildings.

  He climbed the wall and onto the roof, where he looked east to see soldiers gathering in the courtyard near the front gate. Everything he had done to depose the Daimyo who was going to kill them by slow starvation had worked as much in their favor as his own, but none of them knew what had occurred. When the watchmen split ranks and covered both sides of the building to flush him out, he ran along the apex of the rooftop and jumped to the next awning with a wave of arrows flying past him.

  One caught in his lower leg and he slipped down the slanted tiles. He fell through the thick branches of the marshland and landed in the bushes. The archers came to search, but they found no sign of the assassin. “Damn ninja tricks, he didn’t just disappear!”

  They separated to find him, poking their weapons into compact greenery and moving vines around possible hiding places. After one of the guards shoved his blade into a shrub and struck metal, a sword shot out from the leaves and stabbed him. The others hurried to the dead man and waited for the slightest noise, but the assassin sliced two of them open in a red mist that blinded the others.

  Onozawa found the same path he had taken to get in and followed the southern wall of the compound, where there were plenty of shadows. As dawn approached in the cool morning, he climbed the overgrown vines to escape from the inner-sanctum. Nearby, he could hear nobles conversing about the death of Yoshimizu, until a messenger arrived to inform them that the eastern province was mobilizing their cavalry.

  They disregarded the notion that Hideyoshi, whom they believed was still alive, would order the annihilation of the west after winning such a decisive battle, but they were disgusted by the idea of begging for mercy and their pride overcame a simple desire for peace. They didn’t know that their warehouses were emptied by Yoshimizu to pay for the battle he had already lost, so they a
sserted their sovereignty and sent out word to prepare for war.

  While Shinji looked for the stables and found them near the fresh-water river, the darkness was pierced by blue light arriving from the east. After he cut the ropes that tethered the cavalry’s horses, he reacted to the sound of quickly approaching footsteps and ducked under a huge blade that cut the air. He backed away from the ronin who held a broadsword that was almost too heavy for him to carry.

  “I saw you from my lookout post and I’ve sent for the others,” said Takemura, a grizzled man with shaggy hair.

  “You can’t handle this yourself?”

  “Are you goading me to impatience?” asked the ronin.

  “Are you stalling because you’re afraid of me? The Shogun you were supposed to protect is dead. Since you have no loyalty except to yourself, you don’t have to die today. It can be a golden morning.”

  Takemura swung and missed, and the violence frightened the horses into a sprint towards the grasslands. A riot of voices echoed from the front gate, where the nobles and servants scurried to collect their animals.

  The middle-aged ronin closed the distance to Onozawa in the loose soil near the water’s edge. “You hold your blade like a samurai,” he noticed.

  “So do you,” replied the assassin.

  Takemura heaved his broadsword in a wide arc and it spit out woodchips as it sunk into the bark of a tree. After Shinji shattered the metal into jagged pieces, he kicked the samurai back and fatally pierced him. With the Sun rising behind thin clouds and a glowing silver tint, by the time Onozawa reached his horse and spurred it into a run, the last two ronin caught up and were following him along the shore.

  He turned onto the grasslands and let his enemies gain on him. As they cleared the dirtmound, they saw his horse running alone in the waist-high grass and reacted too late to avoid the ambush. Shinji cut the saddle strap of the ronin Takeshi and he grunted as he hit the ground. He fumbled for the two katanas attached to his waist while the other samurai Masamune circled back. Onozawa threw his sword like a spear and impaled the man before he could dismount.

  Takeshi tightened his grip on his weapons and wiped the blood from his forehead. “You’re the one who took the little girl.”

  Shinji staggered among the flowers with the bleeding arrow-wound in his leg, accidentally disturbing white butterflies that fluttered into the air. “We’ll be even after I take your head.”

  Takeshi came forward with both blades swinging and sliced the ninja’s shoulder. Onozawa retaliated, breaking the ronin’s nose with an open palm strike that sent him reeling over the dirtmound to the sandy beach. While remembering the carnage at Hideyoshi’s compound, he disarmed Takeshi and drowned him in the ocean. The ground quaked as the cavalry from the east began their march to war, but Shinji was overtaken by blood loss and passed out on the coastline. His last thought was that he would be able to tell Yukio that her father’s death had been avenged.

  * * * * *

  He woke up in the warm sand. With the Sun burning his eyes, he looked into the ubiquitous haze while the hum of the waves pulled back. The noise of battle could be heard in the screams of dying men and the sound of split flesh. He crawled onto the grasslands and ripped his sword loose from the dead ronin Masamune. Along the crops and roads of the provincial city of the marshlands to the west, the war scattered onto the sloping hills. Most of the nobles were forced to fight on foot, a severe disadvantage after they failed to recover the horses that Shinji set loose.

  On the edge of the flatlands lining the road to the north, peasant families were observing the fate of their province playing out in the streets. If anyone knew that both Shoguns had been killed, their faith in the social hierarchy would vanish, even if Hideyoshi’s kindness had dissolved the power structure and the new form it took would grant them relative freedom. Onozawa found Katsushiro and his cavalry eviscerating the enemy nobles.

  The General regarded him curiously. “Where did you come from?”

  He ignored his nagging headache. “Yoshimizu is dead.”

  “Then this battle is unnecessary,” Satsuma replied. “The nobles think we’re here to steal their land.”

  “He didn’t tell them about the assassination of his brother. There is no way to stop this war if no one will listen. He was going to starve them, he sold their crops to pay for his mercenaries, just as we assumed.”

  Since the heaviest defense was near the inner-sanctum, Katsushiro left his warhorse and ran with Shinji to find the nobles. Once in the Governor’s compound, samurai were fighting on the shrines of their ancestors, and enemy archers along the walls were firing upon the invading cavalry. When Onozawa threw open the empty warehouses, the enemy Generals watched in dismay.

  As the noblemen stood in shock, no longer intent on battle without a purpose, one of them said, “Scores of wagons were brought in here day and night leading up to the war. Yoshimizu assured us that he would leave enough food for winter. When the season ends, the harvest will be over and we will have nothing left.”

  “Even if you won the war, there isn’t enough food in the east to support your people,” Satsuma told him. “We only came to assure that no madness would consume your lord and threaten our homeland.”

  “I’ll kill him myself,” the General replied.

  “It’s already done,” Shinji revealed. “We only wish to grant your people ownership of the land they tend and unite the provinces under equal rule.”

  “This is decreed by Hideyoshi?”

  Katsushiro nodded. “Yes, it was Hideyoshi’s decree. You will be protected under the rule of a man who cherishes his subjects more than his own power. Everything your Daimyo left in his failed war will be sold to buy food to fill these warehouses. That should hold you until the next harvest. Yoshimizu has failed you, so who would you trust with your protection but a united Southland?”

  The General considered the truce. With quick resolution, he took off running towards a shack near the main road that contained the implements of the watchmen’s duty. As he retrieved a large conch shell, a little girl broke from the peasant families and chased her cat into the path of charging horses. The frightened mother screamed when she saw her daughter close to being trampled, and her terror pulled the warriors from their adrenaline long enough for everyone to hear the low rumbling of the alarm.

  The notification spread and the Generals yelled orders to their armies, letting the truth be known about the death of Yoshimizu. Katsushiro then announced that Hideyoshi was the sole ruler of the Southland. As the war came to an end, ownership of the land was immediately granted, settling the minds of the nobles who preferred the long process of politics over complete annihilation. After the armies began talks for unification, Shinji headed home.

  * * * * *

  He rode across the grasslands and entered the path to the Governor’s compound. When he finally got to the edge of town, the wind carried the scent of the flowers in Hideyoshi’s garden. Peasants roaming the streets looked to him like a General in their army, questioning him extensively about the war. His service in battle and his consistent loyalty to the Shogun’s family brought him respect from commoners, who looked to him for words of victory.

  They wanted to be reminded that their sacrifice had provided them with the constancy of peace. Although he could not promise them a future without conflict, he told them that the arduous process to unite with the opposing army had begun. When he relayed the death of Yoshimizu, they knew what it meant. Even if their comfort was based on a lie about Hideyoshi, their future resided in the belief that stability was absolute.

  After giving them the good news, Shinji walked his horse to the bronze gates and the guards let him in without question. Once inside, he crossed the courtyard and saw Yukio standing by the pond. “I didn’t know if you would come back,” she said, staring at the large goldfish. “What did you bring me this time?”

  He could tell that s
he had been crying. He reached into his pocket and handed her the origami dragon from the golden case. “Your grandfather made this.”

  “I wasn’t being serious,” she said, and he saw an adult woman staring through the child’s face.

  “It’s a piece of him that you can still hold onto. He united the Southland and we achieved the same thing today. Your kingdom is returned.”

  “A kingdom instead of a family? You’re the only one I have left.” When Yukio hugged him, he realized that she had been crying about him and not her parents. He had never been regarded as important as she considered him to be. “I don’t want it,” she told him. “It’s not my kingdom anyway.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m going to build a shrine for my father. But not here, I want everybody to see it.”

  “We can’t do that, Lotus. People need to believe that your father is still alive, it’s the only way that they can be confident in their freedom. The peasants will feel responsible for their work, but they are still beholden to the nobles.”

  “So it’s a lie, I have to act the same as before.” Yukio frowned, fighting back her tears. “There’s no honor in deception. Look at those samurai, they would die before letting anything happen to me. Now you say that we have to lie to keep this land united?”

  “Civilization is a lie,” said Shinji. “And many adults are not as mature as you are. Everyone has lost someone close to them in this war, what keeps them hopeful is the knowledge that they are justified in their survival. The nobles own the land because peasants don’t work for themselves, but they cannot know that social status doesn’t make you happy. Only feeling as if you are a part of something can. Your father’s decree showed them that they own the land in this region, that all the tasks that are considered low class and disdainful are essential to their province. Isn’t your father still half of what you are?”

  “I guess so...”

  “Then if he’s in Heaven, so are you. Just stay with him and that will be your connection to what is greater than humanity.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Honor and innocence.”