Night Blade: Dawn of Discovery

  ***

  BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

  The scheduled klaxon of the alarm clock abruptly wakes Niko as he rolls over to hit the alarm clock, hoping to turn it off. "Fivemoreminutes" he says with a slur while his arm goes limp and hits the side of the bed.

  "Wake up, young one." Tora's voice says.

  Not expecting to hear Tora's voice, Niko interprets the call as a dream. Rolling over, he musters "No, no more boulders. I never want to see a desert again."

  "Young one. It is time to begin the training."

  "Just five more minutes! It's Sunday!" Niko rolls over to see where Tora's voice is coming from. He opens his eyes slowly, trying to get adjusted to the daybreak light. A blurry gold figure is in the middle of his room. Trying to get a better idea of who, or what, the figure was, Niko blinks a few more times, then rubs his eyes.

  Tora is standing in the middle of Niko's room.

  The shock of seeing the actual Tora, and not just a dream-produced image, Niko frantically pushes himself to the back of the bed. "HOLY CRAP! WHAT THE HELL?" As a defense reflex, he grabs the nearest pillow and throws it at Tora.

  The pillow flies towards Tora and hits his chest. From the middle of his chest outward, the image of Tora gradually dissipates into thin wisps. The pillow continues flying past where the Tora image stood.

  Walking into Nikos' room from the hallway with a tray holding a glass of orange juice, two cinnamon buns, scrambled eggs, and a chocolate muffin, Misaki starts to say, "Good morning, Niko! I made your fav-"

  The pillow hits the bottom edge of the tray and upturns the whole meal on Misaki's chest and apron. As the cinnamon buns and parts of the muffin fall from her chest to the floor, her face is covered in eggs and orange juice.

  "Mom!" Niko quickly jumps away from the bed towards his mother, standing in the doorway.

  Misaki slowly removes the tray from her chest. "What. Was. That?" She says each word with increasing volume and intensity.

  Grabbing the tray from her and trying to collect the bits of scattered food, Niko tries to explain. "Mom, I'm so sorry. I thought I saw Lord Tora in my room, so I threw a pillow at him and....." he trails off, expecting his mother to know the rest of that situation. He looks up at her face and is greeted by strong glare. Grabbing a towel from the back of his door, he hands it to his mother. "Sorry about that...." he says with growing embarrassment.

  Never breaking her glare, she jerks the towel out of his hand and holds it up to her face. As she starts to wipe her face off of the orange juice and eggs, she muffles through the towel, "It's a good thing I made extra."

  Sitting at the kitchen table in his comfortable khaki cargo pants, a gray t-shirt with "Sword Titan" written in white, block letters, and a short sleeve black button up shirt loosely over that, a new plate of breakfast items is placed in front of Niko.

  "Now don't make this end up on me this time!" Misaki says as she sits down to enjoy a plate of her own.

  Curious about her comment, Himuro takes a break from his daily headlines and lowers his tablet. He glances over at Misaki and Niko. "Say what?"

  Niko grabs cinnamon bun and takes a bite out of it. "It was nothing - don't worry about it, Dad." He takes another bite from his bun.

  "As I was saying, before I was interrupted," Misaki says as she momentarily glances over at Niko, "I made your favorite breakfast, in celebration of you winning the tournament yesterday!"

  Already finished with his first cinnamon bun, Niko reaches over for his glass of orange juice. "Thanks, Mom!"

  Himuro places the tablet on the table. "Yes, the latter half of the tournament was broadcast on the internet, and wow, was it a nail-biter!"

  Thinking back to the last match of the tournament, when he fought Tsuyoki and his demon abilities surfaced, Niko stops drinking orange juice and takes a big gulp, preparing to hear statements like "You used your demon abilities and cheated", "You should have been disqualified", and "I thought we raised you better than that!" Random thoughts are speeding though his head.

  The breakfast was a setup! They want me to hand over the Banish Blade to Tsuyoki as the 'real' winner of the tournament!

  His eyes quickly move from side to side, looking all around the room, hoping to find something in which to change the subject when the situation becomes negative.

  "It's been a while since we've seen Tsuyoki around, hasn't it?" Misaki asks as she scoops up some eggs to eat.

  "Yeah, it's been, what....at least five years or so? Where has he gotten to?" Himuro says as he drinks some juice.

  This is it! I'm going to be grounded until the end of time! But how do I explain that I didn't call upon my abilities – they activated on their own? They'll never believe the truth. I gotta think of something, and fast!

  Slightly leaning into the table to get a better look at Niko, Misaki asks, "Is everything okay, Niko?"

  Realizing that he had been holding the orange juice glass to his mouth for the past few minutes, he recognizes the awkwardness of the situation. Spewing some air into the glass and making the orange juice explode a bit, he places the glass on the table and wipes his mouth. "Yeah, nothing's wrong here. Why do you ask?" he asks nervously, like he is trying to hide something.

  "You would think that the winner of the tournament would be proud of himself!"

  "Yeah, especially when he won an awesome prize!" Himuro says as he picks up a cinnamon bun. "That last fight with Tsuyoki really was a close one, wasn't it?"

  Niko gets some eggs on his fork. "Uh, yeah. It sure was," he says lightly

  "What about the Grand Master? He sure put on a great show, huh?" Misaki says with excitement.

  "Mmm-mph" Niko muffles as he shoves some eggs in his mouth, then nods in agreement.

  "How about that 'grand prize'? The rumors around the network had a lot of guesses, but I know one person who actually has it!" Himuro stands up a bit and extends his arm over the table, getting within reaching distance of Niko.

  Still suspicious of his parents intentions of the breakfast, Niko braces himself, preparing for his father to slap him across the face.

  Instead, Himuro's hand reaches the top of Niko's head and ruffles his red hair. "Our son, right here, won the tournament and is now in the possession of the greatest grand prize of all." He then retracts his hand and sits back down in his chair.

  Keeping his guard up, Niko thinks to himself Here it comes! Goodbye brief glory!

  "Do you have it with you? Can I see it?" Himuro asks with the excitement of a kid on Christmas morning.

  As if coming out of a trance, Niko asks to clarify. "What?" The fact that his parents completely avoided the fact that he accidentally used his demon abilities to win the tournament left him speechless.

  "The video sources online didn't get a good quality shot of it." Misaki says as she finishes up her breakfast. "Some odd blurry thing was blocking the grand prize, even when you were holding it over your head in front of everyone."

  "Uh....yeah, it's in my car." Niko says as he slightly points to the driveway. He stands up, placing his napkin on the table. Believing that he just dodged a metaphorical bullet, he stutters "I'll....go...get it" as he walks to the front door.

  As he walks through the front door and closes it behind him, Niko turns towards his car, and is confronted by Tora again. Not expecting to see him on the front porch, Niko stumbles backward in shock, grabbing the door handle for support. "Damn! You scared me." he reaches for his chest, hoping his heart is still in it.

  "It is time. You must go to Chisai and comfort her, then we will begin our training." Tora says.

  "But, I was eating breakfast with my parents. Can't I finish that first?" Niko begs.

  "You must go to Chisai's aid."

  "What's wrong with her?" Niko asks, trying to understand what Tora is asking.

  A gust of wind blows from the east, causing particles of Tora's robe to separate from him and fly with the wind. Rapidly, Tora's image is disappearing again.

  Feeling cheated of h
is second chance to talk to Tora, he raises his voice as he starts chasing after the particles in the wind. "Hey! Don't leave again! What's wrong with her?"

  The door opens to reveal Misaki. "Niko, who were you talking to?"

  Niko, standing in the middle of the yard, looking confused, turns to his mother. "Mom! Lord Tora was just right here! He was right here!" he says as he points to the ground.

  "Lord Tora again? You must be seeing things. He hasn't been around here for at least a week."

  The reference to Tora's recent visitation time frame struck Niko as odd. What was he doing here a week ago?

  "Aren't you going to get your 'grand prize'? We can't wait to see it!" She says as she leans on the door frame.

  Recalling that he was outside for one specific task, Niko jumps back on it. "Oh, right!" He runs over to his car, opens the back door, and reaches in to grab his okatana.

  The moment he grabbed the sheath, a shock went through his soul again – only this time, Niko felt comforted.

  He turned around to face his mother, closing the door with his hand. "Here it is!" He says as he sprints over to her position, holding it up for her to see.

  "Does he have it? Can we see it?" Himuro calls from behind the door frame. He steps around his wife to gets a good look at Niko's okatana. As if an automatic response, he feels as if a wealth of information had been suddenly blessed upon him. "Is that....no, it can't be. But it has the.....nah, how could it. It's undeniable. How did it....." the partial questions continue as he slowly walks backwards into the wall of the front porch.

  Niko slows his sprint to the front door as he approaches his father. Noticing the strange motions, he tries to get closer for support. "Dad? Are you alright?"

  Focusing all of his attention on his son, he looks Niko right in the eyes. "Is that the......" Yet, another partial question.

  Niko holds the sword up towards his father. Seeing the red handle, the scaled sheath, and the unique trident hilt shape, it was unquestionable; this is the sword that he had been told about in legend.

  Needing to get something important, he pushes his son aside to rush inside. Niko, regaining his balance from the sudden push, asks his mother. "What happened to him?"

  Misaki is looking in the direction that her husband traveled. Confused, she responds with the only answer she knows, "I don't know."

  Moments later, Himuro returns to the front door with an old, old book. The dark brown leather cover has the scratches and imprints of being handed down through the generations. The pages have slight tears and rips all around their edges. The cover itself had an ancient writing on it, but out of the parts that were still legible, Niko could only make out a few letters in the quick glance that he could get. "Niko, do you remember the story I used to tell at halloween, the one about the village being swallowed up?"

  Niko tries to think back to any halloween that his father told the story about the "village swallowing curse."

  Traveling back in his memories, he recalls the story about a warrior who had a powerful weapon. Being the strongest one, he protected the village he lived in. However, the longer he possessed the weapon, the stranger his antics became, including killing livestock for the fun of it. After a while, the village started turning on him, trying to run him out before he killed anyone for the excitement.

  Feeling betrayed by the village he protected, he stood on a tall hill overseeing the village, pointed the weapon in the air, and moved it in a circle above his head. A dark sphere started to grow from the middle of the circle, and sparks started flying from it.

  Soon, the dark sphere grew so fast that it swallowed up the warrior, the village below, and the weapon itself, and none of them were heard from again.

  It always used to give Niko nightmares when he was told around a campfire, thinking that he was next for this "village swallowing curse." However, a more pressing matter to Niko was trying to figure out what the connection was between his sword and the story.

  Himuro opens the book to a page somewhere in the back. The pages let off a thin layer of dust as they move, meaning that this book had been in storage for a long time. "Look at this!" Himuro points to an image.

  Bending over the book to get a better look, Niko focuses in on where his father is pointing. Suddenly, everything becomes clear. A long, curved sheath with scaly details, the trident-shaped hilt, and to top it off, the braided red handle.

  Speaking the only words he could find, he says "What the.....?"

  The image in the old book was the sword Niko held in his hands.

  Pointing at the image again, Himuro inflects importance on his message. "Niko: you hold the weapon that destroyed the village."

  Overwhelmed by the thought of holding something so powerful, yet so evil, made Niko's hand lose their strength. The sword he held in his hands slipped from his loose grip and started falling to the ground.

  Noticing that a weapon so powerful was falling to the ground, Himuro acts fast. He tosses the book in the air to Misaki and dives for the sword. He grabs the sheath moments before it hits the ground. Electric sparks fly from the sheath and around Himuro's hands, causing him to open his hands and the sword to hit the ground. "OWWW! That hurt!" He stands up, holding his charred hands close to his chest for protection.

  "Dad, I had no idea it would do that. I'm sorry." Niko says as he bends down to grab the handle and sheath.

  "So, it is true: that sword is the 'Blade of Demise'. Legend has it that it will only choose a true owner and reject everyone else." Himuro says.

  Niko looks down at the sword in its sheath. "'Blade of Demise'? It told me to call it the 'Banish Blade.'"

  "The 'Banish Blade'? I've been told that it had different names, but I never believed it." Going over what Niko said again, Himuro catches something he overlooked. "You said 'it told you'? How did it talk?" He says as he leans in, hoping to at least get a closer look.

  "You know the moment when I received the sword as the grand prize at the tournament?"

  Misaki and Himuro nod.

  "That's when it happened. I was so nervous to be in front of so many people, and the Grand Master alone. When I touched the sword, I went through, well, a test with it – the sword. When I passed the test, it told me to call it the Banish Blade. Afterwards, when I lifted it above me to show everyone, I wasn't nervous anymore."

  Softly, Himuro speaks up. "'So it has been said, so it will happen.' The legend is true."

  Niko looks up at his father.

  Himuro puts his charred hands on his son's shoulders. "Niko! Whatever you do, do NOT lose that sword, and most importantly, do NOT let your anger take control of you. Your demonic abilities allow you certain privileges that others don't have. With this sword, you will most likely surpass any demonic ability. Even those of the Grand Council."

  Curious to what his father just said, Niko reiterates. "The Grand Council?"

  Realizing what he had just said, Himuro quickly covers his mouth with one of his hands. He removes his hand to say "Forget what I just said." then covers his mouth again.

  Niko looks down at the sword, then remembers that he has to go help Chisai with....whatever is wrong with her. "Look, I have to head over to Chisai's for a while. How about you get some medicine on your hands, dad?"

  "Chisai? Is she a new friend of yours?" Misaki asks as she holds her husbands hands, trying to comfort him.

  "You could say that." Niko says as he runs back to his car.

  "Niko! Don't forget: make sure you control your anger. That's how the warrior was lost: his anger got the better of him, and made the weapon more powerful."

  Opening the driver door, Niko nods at his father, sits in the car, and takes off.

  As his car disappears in the distance, Misaki tells her husband, "I'm sure he will be fine. We raised him well enough."

  Taking slow steps into the house, Himuro looks over his shoulder in the direction that Niko drove. "I hope so."