The tea in the elegant woman's cup had gone cold.

She hadn't touched it, not since she'd started speaking. The ragtag group before her sat in silence, their eyes fixed on her, listening intently as she unravelled a story that felt like it was straight out of a fictional novel. But her words came straight from the heart and were clearly the truth.

By the time she was finished, she left her listeners with a completely different view of Takeshi...

-

Sayuri, the graceful woman, let out a slow breath, staring at the steam still rising from the fresh cups they had poured. Then she began:

"I remember the night everything fell apart."

Her fingers tightened slightly around the ceramic, her gaze distant, as though she were staring through time itself.

"The rain was merciless, coming down in sheets so thick it was hard to see more than a few feet ahead. Lightning split the sky. Thunder roared. But nothing, nothing was louder than the clash of their blades."

She paused, running a thumb absently along the rim of her cup, as if grounding herself in the present before diving deeper into the past.

"Takeshi and Ryuunosuke..." she said their names with a quiet reverence, like they were ghosts lingering in the room with them.

"We grew up together. Three orphans, taken in by Master Jiro, a man far too stubborn to let his way of life die out. He was an eccentric, but no one was more masterful with a blade. However, he had one problem with the world..."

" Swordsmanship had become nothing more than a sport in most places in the times of peace. But he was adamant about teaching us, and made sure we knew: He wasn't teaching us how to perform, he was teaching us how to kill."

A short, mirthless laugh escaped her lips.

"I don't think we understood what that meant until it was too late."

Her expression hardened, the distant sorrow bleeding into something sharper.

"Takeshi was always the best. He had this grace, this effortless fluidity to his movements, like water flowing downstream. Ryuunosuke was different - he was raw, explosive, like thunder crashing through the heavens. They were rivals, always pushing each other, but it was never meant to be anything more than that."

Her grip on the teacup tightened.

"Until Master Jiro asked Takeshi to kill him."

The group stirred slightly, but she didn't acknowledge their reactions. Her eyes remained unfocused, lost in the memory.

"He was sick. Dying. He refused to end his own life - that would have been a disgrace. So he asked Takeshi for mercy. To grant him an honourable death at the hands of his finest pupil. Takeshi didn't want to do it. Even as strong as he was, as disciplined as he was... he was still young and innocent. Still a kind soul. But in the end, he agreed. Because what else could he do?"

She exhaled slowly, shoulders sagging ever so slightly.

"And the moment Takeshi's blade took Master Jiro's life..." she looked down at the untouched tea, fingers trembling slightly, "Ryuunosuke walked in."

A bitter smile played on her lips, though there was no humour in it.

"You can imagine how that went."

She finally lifted her cup, taking a single sip before placing it back down, as if the action itself steadied her.

"I ran through the storm, screaming for them to stop - but Ryuunosuke wasn't listening. He was seeing red. Takeshi was holding back; he didn't want this fight. But real swords don't allow much room for restraint."

Her jaw tightened, voice dropping slightly.

"Ryuunosuke didn't seem to care about the death of the old man, but more so the fact that he had chosen Takeshi to be the one to end it. It was always Takeshi, and he was blinded by jealousy and emotion, that he even turned and struck me."

She glanced at the group, noticing how they shifted, how their expressions darkened at the revelation.

"It wasn't meant to be a deep cut. It wasn't meant to be anything serious. But that was the moment something inside Takeshi snapped."

She shook her head, fingers curling slightly against the wooden surface of the table.

"He fought differently after that. Before, he was dodging, defending, trying to keep Ryuunosuke from losing himself completely. But after that moment? He fought with intent. And like always, he won."

She breathed in deeply before continuing, her voice quieter now.

"Takeshi disarmed him, knocking away his sword. But he refused to land the final blow. He still saw him as his little brother."

Her throat tightened slightly, but she kept going.

"That was his mistake."

Her fingers brushed across the table, tracing absent patterns against the worn wood.

"Ryuunosuke took advantage of that hesitation. He threw wet dirt into Takeshi's face. And in that split second, he pulled out his second blade."

Her eyes darkened, the weight of the moment pressing down on her.

"Master Jiro always shamed him for keeping a second blade. Called it dishonourable. But Ryuunosuke didn't care about honour. He had always been more cold-hearted of the two, willing to do whatever it took."

She swallowed hard.

"And with a single slash, he blinded Takeshi."

Silence.

The fire crackled.

She stared at the steam rising from the tea, barely realising how her hands trembled against the table.

"Takeshi swung wildly, trying to hear where he was - but the rain drowned everything out. And then..." her voice barely above a whisper now, "It was finished."

She let out a slow breath, unclenching her fingers.

"Ryuunosuke left, laughing. Saying Takeshi's fate was worse than death."

She finally looked up, meeting the eyes of the ones who had found their way to her doorstep.

"That was years ago. Before the virus. Before the world changed."

She picked up the tea, taking a long sip this time.

"And now here you are, listening to a story about ghosts."

Kai leaned back slightly, folding his arms as he tried to process what he'd just heard. "So you guys were living the samurai lifestyle in the 2010s?" The disbelief in his voice was plain, though to be fair, Japan was vast, and they were in the middle of nowhere. If there was ever a place for relics of a bygone era to linger, it was here.

She nodded, her expression unreadable, but there was a quiet acceptance in the gesture.

"It wasn't as strange as you think. It was just... our life," she said simply, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

And the truth was, compared to everything else they had encountered, it wasn't the strangest thing they'd heard. So, they went along with it.

She exhaled, staring into her cup for a moment before continuing.

"I've been taking care of him ever since."

Her voice dipped slightly, a tremor of sorrow barely masked by her composed demeanour.

"After that night, Takeshi fell into something deeper than grief. He lost his sight, lost his ability to wield the blade, lost everything he had spent his entire life mastering. And worst of all..."

She paused, fingers tightening against the cup.

"It was done by the only person he had ever called brother."

The silence stretched between them, weighted and suffocating. They could almost see it - Takeshi, blinded and broken, left in the ruins of everything he had once known.

"For a long time, he was lost."

Her voice was steady, but her fingers trembled slightly against the ceramic.

"He couldn't bring himself to pick up a sword. Couldn't move past it. He told himself that his hands would always be stained with his master's blood - that he had no right to wield the blade after what he'd done."

The light piercing through the window cast a golden glow over her face, but it couldn't chase away the shadows in her eyes.

"I tried to help him, but nothing worked. And then..."

She let out a slow breath.

"Then, his master's words echoed back to him."

Her voice was quiet but firm, carrying the weight of something long etched into memory.

"Hardship begets success. Fate takes with one hand and gives with the other."

The words settled over them like an omen, tinged with something almost prophetic.

"When Takeshi awakened as a mutant, everything changed."

The group leaned in slightly, waiting for her to explain.

"His ability... it allowed him to manipulate the very air around him. The winds themselves became an extension of his senses. And slowly, he learned how to use them."

A faint smile touched her lips, distant but tinged with genuine pride.

"For the first time in years, he could feel the world around him again - not with his eyes, but with something deeper. He became a swordsman anew, more refined, more fluid, more elegant than ever before. His blade was no longer just an extension of his body - it was part of the wind itself."

They let the words hang in the air for a moment, the weight of his story settling in.

An orphan raised by an old swordsman. A warrior shattered. A mutant reborn.

That was Takeshi's story, and they gathered that Ryuunosuke was Thundercutter, or at least that was what they assumed.

But there was one pressing question on all of their minds.

Kai leaned forward, eyes narrowed slightly.

"Okay... but how the hell did Takeshi get here?"

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