章節 5: Swordsmanship
"Come on dad! <munch> you can do it! <munch>"
It's been 2 years since we went to the theater and I met Kiyomi, things haven't changed that much in this 2 years, I continued training my weird sense, since the theater I can sort of feel other's emotions, don't ask me why, don't ask me how, also sometimes I sneak out to meet Kiyomi and play the shamisen, not much has happened outside of that, I'm enjoying life as a kid, life as a kid good.
Right now we're in our little backyard behind the house, it's not really big, but for only two people is comfortable, my father is practising with a bamboo sword doing some swings while I just watch 'Damn, this watermelon is good'.
" 98...99...100 ufff, that's it for today" leaving the sword aside he approaches me and I hand him a towel and a cup of water which he starts to drink.
"Hey dad?"
"Hmm?"
"I want to learn swordsmanship"
"pfuuuuuuuuuuuhh"<cough><cough> and he spit out all the water, maybe I shouldn't have told him while he was drinking water, not my best idea.
"There there" I start patting him gently on the back.
"Uff thanks I almost chok-, no wait!, why do want to learn swordsmanship?!" that is better that what I expected, it's understandable, if your 7 year old blind child told you he wants to lear how to use a sword, the most common thing would be to say no instead of asking why.
"<munch>The situation here in the country is becoming tense with this Orochi guy as the shogun, so I though it wouldn't be bad if I knew how to defend myself with a sword, don't you think, also, you're a samurai so you can teach me here at home <munch> and though I'm blind I can handle myself pretty well"
"..." I guess he really is thinking about it, the things I said are true, it's been some weeks since a guy with a face almost as large as his body became the ruler of wano a.k.a the shogun, it's all been downwards with him, the change is slow, but anyone a little observant can see it.
As I train my sense I can feel it, people are not happy with this guy taking the role of shogun, fewer and fewer people smile, it's almost not noticeable but to me it is.
"It wouldn't kill you to try I guess..." I don't even need to look at him to feel he's hesitant.
He hands me the bambu sword "Do you remember what I was doing?" I nod, he is already aware that I can somehow see so it's not strange of him to say something like that to his blind child.
I stand in the middle of the backyard, placing the sword right in front of me, I raise it over my head and bring it down with force, I can feel the wind being pushed away as the sword goes down.
I try it a few more times trying to make myself comfortable with the sword, when I feel I'm comfortable with it I try adding some more moves of mine.
This... is actually pretty fun, it's like playing the shamisen, every swing with the sword is like playing a note on the instrument while reading a sheet, some notes are longer making a heavier sound and some are shorter but very light, it all creates a flow of music where you just let yourself drift in the rhythm.
I just closed my eyes and danced along with the music.
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'What the hell' Those were the only words Shimazu could say regarding his son and the sword, at first he was unsure about his son training, but the moment he gripped the hilt of the sword everything turned into a nonsense.
Yasu started out pretty normal with his first couple of swings, but from there he started adding other movements he hadn't seen in his entire life, those movements were flawed at best, something just downright stupid to use in a fight, but against what he told Yasu his son didn't stop, he continued doing those same moves over and over again, each time he would fix minute details, maybe his footwork, maybe the grip on the hilt, maybe the force of the swing.
Not always it would work for Yasu, sometimes when he tried to fix his footwork he would trip and fall or he wouldn't make much progress, but that's not the problem, with every single move he would fix something, with every single move he would improve, with every step back he would take 10 forwards and he stayed practising for hours, when he stopped it was already night time.
In a week's time he took unusable movements and turned them into a swordsmanship style of his own, it had a million flaws, but one just can't create their own style out of nowhere in only some weeks.
Curiosity got the better of Shimazu and he decided to ask Yasu one day about how he was doing all of that, he came out more confused than before, Yasu saw using the sword the same as playing music, how?.
Shimazu knew that sometimes his son would go out to meet a geisha and play the shamisen, but how do you even relate those two things?.
When his son turned nine, he already couldn't hold back in a spar and it didn't take much for Yasu to beat him, maybe it's because he's growing, but with every year his strength increased alongside his sword mastery.
It didn't take long for Shimazu to realize he didn't have anything more to teach his kid.
Maybe some would feel bitter or jealous in this situation, but Shimazu felt relief, at least his son would know how to handle himself when the time came, and if he had to guess, it wouldn't be long until things started to get from bad to horrible.
He was wondering if he should introduce his son to Ryou, he himself could use it relatively well, most of the samurai could use Ryou to some degree, but to teach it to a child might be placing too much burden on his shoulder and hopefully he wouldn't have to use it anytime soon.
He suspected Yasu used some kind of energy related to Ryou to see, but he wasn't sure of it, for now he could only hope Yasu didn't end in a bad situation and get himself hurt.
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