Post by Alex on Aug 1, 2015 10:59:08 GMT -5
Gokai Taisan
During the Dan'atsu no Seiso, the lands currently known as Hokusei-do were spoken, or rather whispered, of only with dread and hatred and fear by the wretched Zaidanese who were belabouring and drying in droves under the accursed talons of the Akuna no Bokun. The area was known as the Nest of Pain (Itami no su) and the few men living there where either the Swords of Oppression (Yokuatsu no ken) who had forsaken their souls and bodies in the service of the Akuna no Bokun or the Treats for Fangs (Kiba no tame no chiryō) who were mercilessly preyed upon by the demons and their once-humans servants.
The gently rolling lands and moors of Hokusei-do were constantly shrouded in the Eternal Night (Eien no yoru) deemed to rest the demons and recreate the environment they were used to in the Shadow World. The legends have it that not only human slaves were marched into the Kagemon to please the Father of the Crimson Night (Shinku no yoru no chichi) but also the rivers were flowing backwards from the sea to the land as water itself was fed into the Kagenotochi to nurture new hordes of demons which were cruelly roaming the lands of Zaidan.
In this era, a fierce dragon, Son of the Burning Star (Nenshō sutā no musuko), who had settled in previous millennia in the Volcano of the Ash of Tears (Namida no hai no kazan), bleakly dominating the island of Kuraijima, was eventually awoken by the turbulences coming from the Kagemon. Soaring to the heaven and leaving trails of blazes and destruction on the ground, the Son of the Burning Star, wreaked havoc amongst the demons and their human followers and slaves. The records of Clan Sato held that this was the first time humans witnessed demons suffering and perishing on Zaidan. Not only did the surviving slaves witness the demise of hundreds of their reviled masters, but they also sensed their fear and disarray when the Son of the Burning Star vented his anger and inflicted his wrath upon demon and man alike.
From the desolation left behind by what would be called later on the First Coming (Saisho kuru), stood a miraculously surviving slave who survived destruction by having one Akuna no Bokun stumbling and falling on him during the soaring ascension of the Nenshō sutā no musuko. Shaken, bruised but nevertheless exultant, this sole survivor for miles around stood for hours on end gazing at the dead and mangled bodies of demons and their servants, taking in their mortality and their frailty. In the same fashion they used to humiliate and destroy their slaves had theses demons and auxiliaries been crushed and burnt and scared and defeated by the dragon. He was simply called Eita by his kinsmen although he was called Thing (Shinamono), like all other slaves by the Swords. The venerable scrolls of the Sato Clan call him The First to Stand (Tatte saisho no) and record the tales of boundless bravery and courage that Eita and his subsequent companions would dare to ambush and slowly defeat the Oppressors. The children of the Sato and Tanaka Clans have been delighted for countless generations by their elders’ stories of Tatte saisho no and the Ring of Courage (Yūkinoyubiwa), Tatte saisho no and the Woman Who Could Not Weep (Naku koto ga dekinakatta josei), Tatte saisho no and the Nenshō sutā no musuko or the most often narrated one: Tatte saisho no’s Last Stand, who glorifies the final showdown between the ancestor of the Sato and Tanaka Clans and the Demon with Unseeing Eyes (Kidzuiteinai-me de akuma) which had been born in the Shadow Lands out of the sorrow and anger of the Father of the Crimson Night who had lost one of the seven Princes of the Never Coming Dawn (Kuru koto wa arimasen akatsuki no ōji-tachi) to Eita’s hands.
The mere survival of Eita to the First Coming surrounded him with an aura of invincibility but also the rumours started to spread among the slaves that he had been chosen by the dragon Nenshō sutā no musuko. Swiftly nicknamed the Chosen (Eraba reta), the unfought victory of Eita over the demons and their minions spread like wildfire throughout the lands called the Nest of Pain. Isolated and spontaneous upheaval by slaves were swiftly put down by the Swords of Oppression, who nevertheless were suffering losses here and there and started to differently taste fear. Fear of their masters, the demons was well known and accepted, however the fear of the slaves was a new experience. Whilst the Akuna no Bokun did enjoy the smell of the fear they caused, the appearance of a new fragrance, the fear of the slaves, caused some of them to turn enraged and inflict hideous punishments with death being the least worse, on their subservient human guards.
Whilst these events, where Eita had little to no influence over, are described in the Sato and Tanaka legends as epic battles between on the one hand Eita and his followers and on the other hand demons and their armed servants. The Battle of the Silver Leaves (Gin'yō notatakai), the Charge of the Immortal Lances (Fumetsu no ransu o tantō), the Battle of the Silent Gorge (Sairento kyōkoku no tatakai) are but a few of the unprepared and mostly local events which have been embroidered by reijins over centuries. Certainly unknown to most, but maybe a handful of learned hermits of the Nakano Clan who have forsaken the company of their kin and who are rumoured to be so wise as to be immortal, the Son of the Burning Star’s wrath and cunning proved to be the first fatal blows to the demonic and human host of the Father of the Crimson Night. Eita with a cunning of his own grasped the need to follow soon in the wake of the Second, Third and Fifth Comings of the dragon. Increasingly his name became associated with the fiery destruction inflicted upon demon and man and thus grew his fame and ultimately his cohort of followers. It was in the wake of another rampage of the Sun of the Burning Star that Lord Heorla of Thousands Sorrow, one of the servants the Father of the Crimson Night, met his demise. When Eita scavenged among the charred remnants of demon and man, he uncovered the one relic of Price Heorla, a katana-like sword made of dark glass of a length nearly twice the one of the weapons used by the Swords of Oppression, but light like a feather and capable of shearing through the iron and flesh, man and demon alike like through water. Eita named it the Claw of Sorrow (“Kanashimi no tsume”) and the fame of master and weapon grew unbound among the slaves belabouring and dying throughout the Nest of Pain.
Reijins themselves are elusive and probably unclear as to what happened between the days of Prince Heorla and the fateful time of the duel between Eita and one of the Princes of the Never Coming Dawn, Arheka. Wise men of the Nakano sing to the stars, when recounting to long forgotten shrines, the story that for a hundred and nine days and nights the Father of the Crimson Night mourned his favourite son and for another hundred and nine days and nights he created out of his mind and corrupted flesh, the Demon with Unseeing Eyes who would ultimately hunt down Eita. Of the final confrontation between Eita and the Demon, centuries have blurred what had been a dramatic encounter at the current location of the Kagemon, without surviving witnesses. It is nevertheless recounted by reijins that Eita could not be killed by the Demon and in despair, the Demon seized Eita within his many arms and claws and hurled them both in the land of the Shadows where Eita still lives to be tortured eternally by the Father of the Crimson Night. Another often-heard tale recounts that the Son of the Burning Star attempted to rescue Eita and failing to do so, vowed to come and save his descendants when the need would be the most pressing. However, the legend which has always haunted the Lords of Sato is the one about the whereabouts of the Claw of Sorrow, which is believed to lay buried somewhere near the site of the Kagemon. Envy and fear have often fought in the minds of Sato Lords for it is prophesised that the recovery of the sword should bring again the wrath of the Father of the Crimson Night.
During the Dan'atsu no Seiso, the lands currently known as Hokusei-do were spoken, or rather whispered, of only with dread and hatred and fear by the wretched Zaidanese who were belabouring and drying in droves under the accursed talons of the Akuna no Bokun. The area was known as the Nest of Pain (Itami no su) and the few men living there where either the Swords of Oppression (Yokuatsu no ken) who had forsaken their souls and bodies in the service of the Akuna no Bokun or the Treats for Fangs (Kiba no tame no chiryō) who were mercilessly preyed upon by the demons and their once-humans servants.
The gently rolling lands and moors of Hokusei-do were constantly shrouded in the Eternal Night (Eien no yoru) deemed to rest the demons and recreate the environment they were used to in the Shadow World. The legends have it that not only human slaves were marched into the Kagemon to please the Father of the Crimson Night (Shinku no yoru no chichi) but also the rivers were flowing backwards from the sea to the land as water itself was fed into the Kagenotochi to nurture new hordes of demons which were cruelly roaming the lands of Zaidan.
In this era, a fierce dragon, Son of the Burning Star (Nenshō sutā no musuko), who had settled in previous millennia in the Volcano of the Ash of Tears (Namida no hai no kazan), bleakly dominating the island of Kuraijima, was eventually awoken by the turbulences coming from the Kagemon. Soaring to the heaven and leaving trails of blazes and destruction on the ground, the Son of the Burning Star, wreaked havoc amongst the demons and their human followers and slaves. The records of Clan Sato held that this was the first time humans witnessed demons suffering and perishing on Zaidan. Not only did the surviving slaves witness the demise of hundreds of their reviled masters, but they also sensed their fear and disarray when the Son of the Burning Star vented his anger and inflicted his wrath upon demon and man alike.
From the desolation left behind by what would be called later on the First Coming (Saisho kuru), stood a miraculously surviving slave who survived destruction by having one Akuna no Bokun stumbling and falling on him during the soaring ascension of the Nenshō sutā no musuko. Shaken, bruised but nevertheless exultant, this sole survivor for miles around stood for hours on end gazing at the dead and mangled bodies of demons and their servants, taking in their mortality and their frailty. In the same fashion they used to humiliate and destroy their slaves had theses demons and auxiliaries been crushed and burnt and scared and defeated by the dragon. He was simply called Eita by his kinsmen although he was called Thing (Shinamono), like all other slaves by the Swords. The venerable scrolls of the Sato Clan call him The First to Stand (Tatte saisho no) and record the tales of boundless bravery and courage that Eita and his subsequent companions would dare to ambush and slowly defeat the Oppressors. The children of the Sato and Tanaka Clans have been delighted for countless generations by their elders’ stories of Tatte saisho no and the Ring of Courage (Yūkinoyubiwa), Tatte saisho no and the Woman Who Could Not Weep (Naku koto ga dekinakatta josei), Tatte saisho no and the Nenshō sutā no musuko or the most often narrated one: Tatte saisho no’s Last Stand, who glorifies the final showdown between the ancestor of the Sato and Tanaka Clans and the Demon with Unseeing Eyes (Kidzuiteinai-me de akuma) which had been born in the Shadow Lands out of the sorrow and anger of the Father of the Crimson Night who had lost one of the seven Princes of the Never Coming Dawn (Kuru koto wa arimasen akatsuki no ōji-tachi) to Eita’s hands.
The mere survival of Eita to the First Coming surrounded him with an aura of invincibility but also the rumours started to spread among the slaves that he had been chosen by the dragon Nenshō sutā no musuko. Swiftly nicknamed the Chosen (Eraba reta), the unfought victory of Eita over the demons and their minions spread like wildfire throughout the lands called the Nest of Pain. Isolated and spontaneous upheaval by slaves were swiftly put down by the Swords of Oppression, who nevertheless were suffering losses here and there and started to differently taste fear. Fear of their masters, the demons was well known and accepted, however the fear of the slaves was a new experience. Whilst the Akuna no Bokun did enjoy the smell of the fear they caused, the appearance of a new fragrance, the fear of the slaves, caused some of them to turn enraged and inflict hideous punishments with death being the least worse, on their subservient human guards.
Whilst these events, where Eita had little to no influence over, are described in the Sato and Tanaka legends as epic battles between on the one hand Eita and his followers and on the other hand demons and their armed servants. The Battle of the Silver Leaves (Gin'yō notatakai), the Charge of the Immortal Lances (Fumetsu no ransu o tantō), the Battle of the Silent Gorge (Sairento kyōkoku no tatakai) are but a few of the unprepared and mostly local events which have been embroidered by reijins over centuries. Certainly unknown to most, but maybe a handful of learned hermits of the Nakano Clan who have forsaken the company of their kin and who are rumoured to be so wise as to be immortal, the Son of the Burning Star’s wrath and cunning proved to be the first fatal blows to the demonic and human host of the Father of the Crimson Night. Eita with a cunning of his own grasped the need to follow soon in the wake of the Second, Third and Fifth Comings of the dragon. Increasingly his name became associated with the fiery destruction inflicted upon demon and man and thus grew his fame and ultimately his cohort of followers. It was in the wake of another rampage of the Sun of the Burning Star that Lord Heorla of Thousands Sorrow, one of the servants the Father of the Crimson Night, met his demise. When Eita scavenged among the charred remnants of demon and man, he uncovered the one relic of Price Heorla, a katana-like sword made of dark glass of a length nearly twice the one of the weapons used by the Swords of Oppression, but light like a feather and capable of shearing through the iron and flesh, man and demon alike like through water. Eita named it the Claw of Sorrow (“Kanashimi no tsume”) and the fame of master and weapon grew unbound among the slaves belabouring and dying throughout the Nest of Pain.
Reijins themselves are elusive and probably unclear as to what happened between the days of Prince Heorla and the fateful time of the duel between Eita and one of the Princes of the Never Coming Dawn, Arheka. Wise men of the Nakano sing to the stars, when recounting to long forgotten shrines, the story that for a hundred and nine days and nights the Father of the Crimson Night mourned his favourite son and for another hundred and nine days and nights he created out of his mind and corrupted flesh, the Demon with Unseeing Eyes who would ultimately hunt down Eita. Of the final confrontation between Eita and the Demon, centuries have blurred what had been a dramatic encounter at the current location of the Kagemon, without surviving witnesses. It is nevertheless recounted by reijins that Eita could not be killed by the Demon and in despair, the Demon seized Eita within his many arms and claws and hurled them both in the land of the Shadows where Eita still lives to be tortured eternally by the Father of the Crimson Night. Another often-heard tale recounts that the Son of the Burning Star attempted to rescue Eita and failing to do so, vowed to come and save his descendants when the need would be the most pressing. However, the legend which has always haunted the Lords of Sato is the one about the whereabouts of the Claw of Sorrow, which is believed to lay buried somewhere near the site of the Kagemon. Envy and fear have often fought in the minds of Sato Lords for it is prophesised that the recovery of the sword should bring again the wrath of the Father of the Crimson Night.