Shinobi’s Quest – fragment #1

Hey people! Okay, so I wrote this as the beginning of a ninja’s short tale. Read on and tell me if you think it’s worth continuing, trashing, etc. Just tell me what’s on your mind 🙂 

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“You say you have seen him?”

“As I have every single traveller who passes through here.”

“But you do not even know whom I’m talking about.”

The old man sputtered, laughing a dry, wheezing laugh, “Your name is Kiyoshi.” It was not a question and the black garbed individual before him was mystified.

“How do you know my name?”

“He said you would come.”

Kiyoshi took a deep breath. Now was not the time for rash action. He had journeyed far and wide and suffered too much to be foiled by a sage who talked in endless riddles.

“My father mentioned me?”

“Not him, no.”

“Then who…”, barely had he begun, when there was a flash of light and something sharp flew past his ear. Instinctively, Kiyoshi spun, drawing a shuriken with one hand and flicking it at the old man while dropping down into a low crouch. The action barely took half a second, and before the old assassin could retaliate, he had become a permanent part of the tree he’d been sitting against.

Kiyoshi examined the old man’s filthy robes. It was either part of the deception, or the old assassin had indeed been lying in wait for days, if not months. He knew he would find nothing. No letter, no mark, no sign of any affiliation with anything, except two silver daggers.

A ghost, albeit a senile one.

Kiyoshi reached up, and placing two fingers on the corpse’s forehead, wrenched the shuriken free. He closed the old man’s eyes, the only witness to another nameless death.

Wiping the metal star with a leaf, he slid it into his robes, running a thumb over the hilt of the dagger concealed at his side. Always remember what you fight for.

It was a long journey and the going would be perilous. His feet began moving.

He did not look back.

 

 

 

– sketch by artofjokinen, check out their amazing work on deviantart