Ochimusha Page

“Are you a samurai?”

Kenshin picked up his sword. The chipped edge caught the firelight. “I have not used this blade in anger since the day I shamed it. Tomorrow, before we go, we will find your village. We will find the bandits.” He turned the blade so the edge faced him, then turned it away. “A fallen warrior cannot reclaim his lord. But he can protect one child. That is not redemption. It is simply… what is left.”

Kenshin, for that was his true name, now walked the muddy roads of the eastern provinces. His sword, once a treasure passed down seven generations, was chipped along its edge like a broken comb. His armor had been sold for rice. All that remained was a tattered horo cloak and a hollow behind his ribs where his honor used to live.

“Boy,” Kenshin said, his voice rusty from disuse. “Who struck you?”

Perhaps that was enough.

You should have died beside him , a voice whispered—his own, or the ghost of his past. A true samurai falls with his lord. You ran. You lived. You are nothing.

One autumn evening, rain fell in gray sheets. Kenshin found shelter in an abandoned shrine to Hachiman, god of war. The wooden statue’s face had rotted away, leaving only a serene, blank expression. He built a small fire and stared into it.