The Warrior Swordsmen of a New Era

The Warrior Swordsmen of a New Era

         On a warm spring morning I decide to go for a walk in the woods behind my families home.  Since the woods are so large and has many grown in areas I decide that I had better bring along my G.P.S. just in case.  As I leave the house, I can feel the warmth of the sun beating down on me.  With the whole day ahead of me, I go to the path that leads into the woods, but this simple walk in the woods may turn into more than I bargained for.
         With the opening to the yard slowly vanishing behind me as I walk deeper and deeper into the woods, I become overcome with aw of the scenery.  As I travel on I starts to feel a little dizzy, but I don’t think much of it.  The next thing I know I begin to black out.  When I finally regain consciousness, I look around but do not recognize any of my surroundings.  I realize that I am leaning against an old oak tree in the middle of a clearing with trees surrounding it. 
         As I look around, I try to figure out how I ended up in such a place.  I reach for my G.P.S. so I can find my way back home and when I turn it on it shows the path that I had been traveling before I blacked out which zigzag all over but then it just goes dew east.  After I figure up the distance that I had traveled which was easily more than two miles, I look at my watch and notices that it is almost five at night.  I decide that I need to get back home because my parents must be worrying about me and probably has a search party all lined up to look for me. As I start to head back home, I hear someone calling to me, but I look a round but there is no one there. 
         When I start to walk toward the old oak tree that I woke up near a bright white light begins to shine in front of me.  As the light begins to dim down, I can make out the figure of a young lady in the light.  She begins to talk to me but I am unable to understand what she is saying.  As I watch her, she begins to motion toward what appears to be a branch on the tree.  I slowly move closer to the tree and realize that it is not a branch but the handle to a sword sticking out of the tree.  As I grab holed of the handle, I feel a strange tingle traveling through my body.  I keep pulling with everything I have and with one great flash of light the sword comes free from the tree sheath and all.
         Now with the sword in hand I turn to the lady in the light.  Before I am able to say anything she begins to speak to me and I can now understand what she is saying. She tells me that I am the true owner of the sword and with it I will be able to do great things and also that there is a great threat that looms in the future. As she finishes speaking, she wishes me good luck and vanishes as quickly as she appeared.
         I stand there stunned at everything that has happened, but soon snap myself out of it and begin the long hike home.  As I travel back home, I am overcome by the same dizziness that I felt earlier and soon passes out again.  The next thing that I know is that someone is shacking me and calling my name.  As I slowly open my eye’s I notices that its dark out and my parents are kneeling over me.  They begin to ask me questions but I soon lose conscience again before I can tell them anything.  As my father begins to pick me up, he notices something clutched in my right hand.  He goes to grab it but is unable to remove it from my hand.  So he decides to add that to the rest of questions that they have me.
         When they reach the house they take me in and put me on my bed.  That night they take turns looking over me as I sleep.  As the sun start to come up over the horizon, my father comes in to see if there is any change in my status since the night before.  About ten minutes after he enters the room I begin to break out in a cold sweat and start to role back and forth.  They watch not knowing what to do.  Just as fast as it starts, it stops.  As I lay there another ten minutes, I slowly begin to wake up.  I slowly open my eyes and see my parents standing over me.  With the shock of seeing my parents in my room while I am sleeping, I sit up quickly.  I look at them with a puzzled look on my face.
         As I am sitting their my mom asks me what I was doing out in the woods for so long?  When I try to remember what had transpired the day before nothing comes.  I look at her and say I can’t remember much about the other day.  I tell them everything that I can remember, but I don’t remember anything after I passed out the first time.  We all sit there for a short time not knowing what to say next.  As I am sitting there, I notice that I have something clutched in my hand but it is covered by a blanket.  As I remove the blanket, it is like a flood of memories come rushing back to me.  I push the sword away from me and back myself up against the wall.  When my father sees my reaction to the sword he reaches down and takes it out of the room. My mother comes up to me and asks what’s wrong but all I can say is it wasn’t a dream over and over.  My mom puts her arms around me to help calm me down as my dad returns.  I calm down an begin to tell them the rest of the occurrences, but before I can finish a high pitch noise start to give me a major headache.  My parents just look at me not knowing what I am talking about.  They are unable to hear the noise. 
         I jump up and begin to fallow the noise to find out where it is coming from.  As I get closer and closer to my parents room, the noise seems to get louder and louder.  When I enter their room, I can tell the sound is coming from their closet.  When I open the door, the noise just stops, but inside the closet is the sword.  I look at the sword for a minute and decide that if it is the cause of the noise then I can’t be separated from it, so I pick it up and return to my room fallowed by my parents.  Now with my sword in hand I am able to tell them the rest of what happened.  My dad picks up the G.P.S. and turns it on to see if the story matched the data on the G.P.S. and sure enough it does.  As I am sitting there, I decide to take a look at the blade.  Just as I start to pull it out, I notice that the blade looks as new as the day it was made, but that’s not all.  There is some Japanese writing just above the handle.  As I look at it, I notice that I can actually read which doesn’t make sense because I could never understand Japanese before this took place.  The writing on the sword said “When the two great powers of east and west unites to battle a common enemy their victory is assured.”
         After reading the sword I put it back in the sheath and set it aside.  As the days move on, I begin to be able to venture off without having to have the sword right at my side, but I never quite felt right.  I begin trying to learn more about where the sword came from and what the inscription on it, is referring to.  Along with doing research on the sword I being to teach myself swordsmanship using different books that I come across.  After school lets out for summer, I decide that I would like to train at a true swordsmanship class.  I also want the teacher, also known as the Sensei, to look at the sword and see if he knows anything about it.  When we finally find a school close enough, we go to meet the Sensei and see about enrolling me in his classes.  When we walk in the Sensei, sees us and then notice that I am carrying a steel sword and thinks to himself “not another kid who thinks he is ready to use a real sword” but he just smiles and comes over to greet us.
         We talk to him about his classes and what I would have to do to get into the class.  He begins by explaining that only high level students are able to train using steel swords and I tell him that I understood that and I only brought it along so he could look at it and tell me if he knows anything about it.  He looks at me a little confused at my last statement but just dismisses it.  After all the papers are signed, Sensei asks me to fight one of his students in a match just to gage my natural talent.  One of his students had showed up a little early so he decides to have me face him.  Sensei has his student bring me a wooden sword.  Once his student is ready, we get into position but before the match begins I ask Sensei if there are any rules that I must fallow in this match and he says to treat this fight like a life or death match and put everything you got into it.  With that we each bow to Sensei and then to each other.  Sensei tells us to take are fighting positions and begin.  As I take a position that Sensei had never seen before he figures that the fight will be over very quick but it doesn’t turn out quite as he predicted.  In a split second I lunge toward my opponent and with one quick swing I catch him in the chest and drop him to his knees.  As I stand there with my opponet trying to regain his breath.  Sensei comes over to check on his student and once his student starts to breathe normally he turns to me and asks how I was able to take him down with a single attack.  I explain that I used my speed combined with a hip rotation to double the amount of power that my first attack had and also I was targeting a major area on the body.  I go to return the sword to Sensei but he tells me to keep it since I will need it for class.  I tell him that I am going to need a new sword since this one has a crack running the length of the blade.  Sensei takes the sword and looks at it in shock because none of his students had ever broken a sword before.  He takes the sword and tells me he would get me a new sword at the start of class.
         As we are leaving the dojo I notice a young boy play with a ball but don’t see any parents around.  As the boy bounces the ball, it heads toward the road and the boy runs after it.  Just as the boy enters the road a semi locks up its breaks and comes sliding toward the boy.  Without thinking I take off from the step I’m on and swoop in and snatch the boy up just before the semi slides through.  To anyone that seen me I was just a blear.  Just then the parents of the boy come running up to me thanking me for saving their son and mom comes up to me and hits me for doing something so foolish and also praises me for saving the boy, but then hits me again to get the point across that it was foolish.  I tell her that we should probably head home before someone begins asking too many questions and she agrees.  As we are getting in the car Sensei comes up to us and asks me if I want to start out in an intermediate level class instead of a beginner class.  He says that I would most likely get more out of it so I accept.
         After we leave the police show up to find out what had happened.  As the parents of the boy tell the police what happened the police ask if they got the name of the boy that rescued there son but they didn’t get any names.  One of the onlookers comes up to the police and tells them that I was caring a sword and they had seen me leaving the dojo across the street.  With the new piece of information they go talk to my Sensei who gives them the information that they seek.  An hour or so later there is a knock at the door.  Mom goes to the door and is greeted by the police.  The want to know if I am home and that they want to talk to me.  Since my room is not too far from the front door, I can hear their conversation for the most part.  Mom tells them that I am in my room meditating on the days advents.  She leads them to my room and before she can even say a word and without even opening my eyes I say hello officers how can I help you.  All three of them stand there surprised that I even new that they were there.  I tell them to come in and they enter.  First thing they do is compliment me on the rescue and then they ask me the five w’s.  After about a half hour they decide that they have enough information.  I tell them that if I wanted publicity for saving the boys life I would have given them my name and stayed for the news crews to show up.  With that they promise to keep my identity a secret and leave to finish up their paper work on the case.
         As things calm down I begin going to my classes on a regular basis and pick it up very quickly.  Some of them would say that I am a prodigy but I have a feeling that there is something giving me a little boost but I can’t quite put my figure on it.  As my classes continue I gradually advance through the different levels of mastery.  Even after regular boring school starts back up I continue to go to my swordsmanship classes.  As my training progresses I start to notice abilities that I had never had before like an overwhelming speed and a heightened sense of awareness which almost gives me three hundred and sixty degrees of sight.  I am able to sense an attack coming from any direction.  By the age of sixteen I have reached the level of a black belt. 
         Half way around the world at about the same time that I acquired my sword, there was a boy was receiving a package that he had never ordered.  When he opens it there is a set of two kodaichi’s.  As he is holding them, he begins to a strange feeling coercing through his body.  He feels that he is destined to get those swords for an unknown reason.  He decides to take a sword class.  As his class goes on he gradually advances but he doesn’t seem to have the drive to push himself beyond is natural level.
         One day in class my Sensei tells us that we will be having a special guest from Japan.  He is an old friend that trained with him.  He says that he will be coming in two days which is our Friday class.  We go to class on Friday but it seems that our guest has not arrived yet so we go about our class like another day.  As we are going through are swing practice before calling it a day there is a knock at the door.  Sensei tells us to continue are drills and he will be right back.  A few minutes later he returns and he introduces us to his friend Choji.  As they walk in a young man about sixteen years old fallows behind.  Sensei Choji introduces us to his student Shin Yagame.  As our eyes meet, it feels like I have known him all my life but I don’t know why.
         As he walks over to us, I step forward and introduce myself.  As we begin to talk, I don’t realize that I am speaking Japanese until my Sensei comes over an asks me how long I have been able to speak Japanese and I tell him that I didn’t even realize I was.  He looks at me with a confused look but just lets it pass.  Shin goes and talks to some of the other students, while I go over to a wall and sit.
         Sensei tells everyone that class is over for the day so they go change and head out.  I go up to Sensei and ask if he minds if I stay and talk with Shin for a while.  He says that is fine.  As we are talking our Sensei’s go into another room to catch up on past events.
         As Shin and I are sitting in the dojo I ask him if he had ever been to America before and he says no.  he ask’s me if I had ever been to Japan and I say no.  I tell him that when I saw him I could have sworn that I knew him from somewhere and with a surprise look on his face he says that he was thinking the same thing about me.  We continue talking while in the other room our Sensei’s are  discussing us.
         My Sensei tells Sensei Choji about my sword and the inscription on the blade.  He also tells him about the strange abilities that I seem to have like the extreme speed and my ability to sense an attack from anywhere.  When my Sensei is done talking, Choji tells how he has noticed a change in Shin and when in a good fight his reflexes increase and so does his speed but then he backs down before he does anything.  It appears that it almost scares him.  They decide that this would be a good opportunity to see which teacher is the better since they each have one student there, but they have an ulterior motive to.
         Our Sensei’s coming in while we are talking and they ask us if we would like to have a friendly match just to test our skills.  We look at each other and agree.  They sedgiest that we use a wooden sword instead of our steel ones to cut down on the injuries.  We take the wooden swords.  I have a katana and Shin has two kodaichi’s.  My Sensei tells us not to hold back.  They want to see what we can do.  We take our positions and bow to our Sensei’s and then to each other.  With the formalities out of the way the battle begins.  I decide to end the fight with a single strike, so I use my speed to launch a straightforward attack.  Just as I connect, I realize that he was able to block my attack with just a single kodaichi.  With that surprise I jump back and regroup.  It was the first time someone was able to block my first strike.
         I look at Shin for a moment and then ask him you’re not an ordinary fighter are you.  Shin just stands there and smiles.  With my first strike a bust I decide that I can’t hold anything back if I am planning on winning.  I launch another attack even faster than the last, but it is also blocked with ease.  I step back and I say so you’re good at defending yourself but the kodaichi isn’t a offensive weapon so how are you on the offence. 
         I take up a defensive position and wait for his attack.  He says so you want to see what I can do then I will give you both blades.  He comes in with both blades turned back as he runs toward me.  Just as he gets to me he slashes with both blades.  At first his attack seemed to be just as slow as any other person but as I am blocking each swing I notice that the time intervals between each swing are getting shorter and shorter.  As his attack comes to end, his speed is almost rivaling my own.  As he realizes that his attack is useless he backs off.  Now that we have tested each others strength we decide it is time to really start the fight.
         We both charge toward each other with great speed.  As we come together are, blades are swinging.  We are attacking, blocking, and countering each attack that comes at us.  We are moving so fast that neither Sensei is able to keep track of what’s happening.  We jump back for one final attack.  As we go full speed at each other are, blades collide and in an instant all three blades shatter to just splinters since they where only wood.  With are blades in pieces all we have left in are hands are the handles.  The match is called a draw.
         As we stand their our Sensei’s mumble something to each other, then they turn to us and my Sensei tells me to bring my sword over and show it to Shin.  I pick it up and bring it over.  Shin takes’ it and unsheathes it.  As he reads the inscription on it, Sensei asks if his swords have any writing on them.  Shin hands’ me my sword then goes and picks up his.  As he draws one of  the kodaichi’s he sees something that had never been there before.  It is an incomplete inscription, but when he draws the other the rest of the inscription is on that blade.  He looks at the blades in disbelief.  Shin says that there wasn’t any writing on them before we fought.
         Our Sensei’s look at each other then they begin to tell us a story of two great swordsmen in Japan hundred of years ago.  One came from the east and the other from the western most part of Japan.  About the same time a great evil was trying to destroy Japan.  Each swordsman was formidable on their own but neither one on their own could vanquish this great evil.  Each battle they fought in brought the two warriors closer together.  On one fateful day the two warriors ran into each other and a battle in sues to test their strength.  No matter how hard they fought there battle’s always ended in a draw.  Since they were so even they decide that they may have a chance to defeat the evil that had blanketed the land.  As they travel to the evil leaders head quarters, they end up fighting the minions, but the battle ends with minimal effort with their combined strength.  Eventually they reach the base and there final battle.  As they slash through the hordes of minions in the base until they reach the head demon.  As there battle begins they seem to have the upper hand but the tables soon turned.  The demon manages to get the upper hand and takes both warriors down.  As they get to there feet they summon up a power they had never had before. Using there new combined power they rip a portal to an other dimension and with one big attach send the demon through the portal never to be seen again.  Knowing that the demon may someday return the two warriors sealed there strength away in there swords so it could be used to fight the evil once again.
         As the story comes to an end I sit there for a moment and they tell us that the swords that we are currently in possession of are the same swords that the swordsmen sealed there power in.  Shin and I look at each other then down at are swords lying in front of us.  I say this must be some kind of joke, there’s no way that these swords are the some swords used over a hundred years ago.  We can tell by there expressions on there faces that it isn’t a joke.
         We all sit there in silence trying to take in everything that we had been told and also try to determine are role in this hole thing.  After what seemed like an eternity of silence we begin to discuss are thoughts.  Shin starts off the discussion by wondering if this means the evil is going to return after all this time.  My first thought is weather we would be able to defeat a evil that the past warriors were only able to banish to another dimension.  After much deliberation we decide that we would have to cross that bridge if it ever comes.
         As we sit talking I look at my watch and realize that it’s later than I thought.  I excuse myself and tell them that I had to get home.  They tell me that they are going to be in town for a couple more days and they would like to talk more when I had some more time.  I agree to meet them the next day and with that I take my leave and head home.