A Shadow's Will.

WORLD END

The Light Born at The End of The World

Akito runs down the mountain they live on, practicing his parkour skills. Vaulting over fallen trees, jumping across rocks, and slightly adjusting his trajectory using the low hanging branches of the trees. He doesn't go too fast, as he wants to conserve his energy for actually practicing the sword.

He arrives at the town where his friends live, it didn't take long as it is fairly close and he was still moving pretty fast through the mountain. He walks through the main street of the town, remembering the agreement he had with his friends to meet up at a specific location when he got firewood this morning.

He turns to the right, onto a smaller road that has an open plain of grass on the right at the end of it. It could be considered more of a playground, as kids mostly show up there to play together. He arrives there to see his friends, Miura Shiro, Nishima Unizaki, and Kanari Mishita. He had become good friends with the three over the years of him coming down to the town.

"Hey! Took you long enough!" Miura jokes, the first to spot Akito walking over to them.

"Haha, shut up man. You know I don't live here." Akito responds. He walks over to where the three are sitting.

"So, you ready to get to practicing?" Nishima asks, holding up 4 wooden swords. Even though they're all 10, Nishima holds a talent for carving wood. So he created these practice swords for them.

"Nishima, these are amazing! Thanks a lot for taking the time to make these." Akito takes one of the swords and inspects it. They're light, so they wouldn't truly match the weight and strength of a real sword, but it's still good to practice movements and techniques with them.

"No problem, man." He smiles happily and turns to look at Kanari. "Hey Kana-chan, you said you wanted to try this too, right?" He hands a wooden sword to her.

Kanari looks up, surprised. "Aa- yeah!" She pauses, awkwardly grabbing hold of the handle. "Thanks."

"So... What do we really know about sword-fighting here?" Akito looks around, hoping that perhaps someone amongst the group understood the way of the sword, even if slightly.

"Well, my dad is actually a former samurai." Miura says, getting up and grabbing his own wooden sword.

"Seriously!? Thats cool! Why didn't you tell us?" Nishima asks.

"It didn't really come to mind, I guess. But he told me stories! He said he mostly trained by getting familiar with swinging his sword and moving in a way that could defeat enemies swiftly." Miura explains proudly.

"Well, maybe we should just get used to holding these swords then? Just get used to the weight and length of them, we don't need to learn any moves yet. We can just swing and build our cores and balance." Akito suggests.

Kanari thinks for a moment. Her mother, too, was an elite assassin something-or-other. "Maybe we should hold the swords like this." She demonstrates, her voice a shy whisper.
Her sword stroke cuts the air impressively for a 10 year old child.

"Whoa! Kana-chan, that swing looked exactly like something my pops would do! How'd you learn to do that?" Miura exclaims. All three of the guys are surprised and impressed at the sudden action and her form when wielding a sword.

She blushes, gently pressing the sword into Miura's hand. "Mama showed me," she takes a deep breath. "When I was really little, I got to play with her."

"Oh... Your mother... Sorry for asking..." Miura says apologetically, knowing that it's a sensitive topic for Kanari. 

"It's... Alright." Kanari says softly, she smiles up at Miura, but it still obviously hurts her to think about. 

"Well, I guess we should get at it then." Akito says. He tries to hold the sword in his hands as Kanari did and tries to swing the way she did. Though his stance was off balance, and it doing the movement threw him forwards a little. He continues to try and swing the sword to get used to holding one. 

For the next few hours, the four of them swing their swords until their arms grow tired. Akito, Nishima, and Miura all receiving advice from Kana-chan. Akito improves his stance and his footing to create a strong core for himself and stay balanced. Nishima mostly just swings the same vertical slash the entire time, activating his shoulders, arms, and upper chest. Miura comes up with random cool-looking moves the entire time, but they aren't very efficient. But he enjoys doing so. 

"Well, I think it's about time I head home. I promised my mother to be back before sundown." Akito says. After the few hours they spent together, the sun was beginning to set and Akito believes he improved since the beginning of the afternoon. 

"Alright Akito, lets do this again, yeah?" Nishima says. "Also, keep the sword." He points at the wooden sword in Akito's hands. "I know you're gonna want to practice at your home too." 

"Seriously? Thanks a bunch man!" Akito says enthusiastically. He was worried that he'd have to come down to the town each time he wanted to practice. 

He shares a quick goodbye with Kana and Miura. Rushing out of town to make sure to get home before sundown. But the trek up the mountain is much harder than the way down. But again, Akito is familiar with the terrain as he runs back home. As he's running through the forest, he spots something out of the corner of his eye. He quickly stops and runs over to check on what it is. He kneels over to inspect it. It's a sheathed katana. 

"Whoa... I wonder if someone left this here on accident?" Akito reaches out to grab it and sees characters on the sheath of the katana. 

"Katana of The White Flame... Huh. Peculiar name." Akito picks it up and starts walking home with it. But quickly realizes that due to the distraction of the katana, night had quickly fallen. 

"Oh man, sorry mom. I gotta hurry." He tries to sprint as fast as possible to get back home, but he hears a rustle in the bushes next to him. 

"Oh? What was that?" He stops and walks over to the bush. 

"        ...       ...         OH SHI-!"