[Fiction] Wataru, pt. 1

Kagemitsu Wataru sat in his four chambered cell, breathing slowly, pacing each inhalation methodically. He allowed his eyes to slowly scan the walls of his prison, with its lack of windows or airways. He knew not how long he had been imprisoned here, but what was time to a man whose life had already spanned millennia?

Wataru’s family line extended their military services to the Shogunate as far back as the eighth dynasty, and one of his great-grandfathers had even served as an officer in the Shogun’s army. Wataru’s more immediate family, however, did not have the luxury of assignment to more lucrative assignments that befit his father’s warrior class. Always with his father, Hamonuke, there were peasant lands that needed defending, even the lands that no other warlord in his right mind would ever want to conquer. But, Hamonuke did what he was told, without question, like any stoic samurai would.

Following years of avid training, days spent watching his father train in the fine art of swordsmanship, Wataru decided that it was time to serve in the Shogun’s army. Late at night, he packed one of his father’s finest swords, enough clothes for a three day journey, and some food from the family stockade, and he set out for Edu. Upon arrival there, tired and disheveled, he pledged his allegiance to Oda Nobunaga and vied for membership in the shogun’s army. All it took was lying about his age, claiming a worldly seventeen years - he was fourteen at the time - and he was made a foot soldier in the warrior caste.

At the battle of Okehazama, he slaughtered thirty-two of the enemy’s forces. He was advanced in the ranks very quickly, based on his ruthlessness in the field. His performance at the battle of Nagashino, too, was impressive, and he personally took a spear in the shoulder protecting Lord Nobunaga. After cleaving the head from the shoulders of his lord’s attackers, Wataru was medically treated and, while he rehabilitated, he was advanced to the role of retainer to the Shogun. In fact, so impressed was Nobunaga with Wataru that he bestowed on Wataru the role of head executioner.

But Wataru, as he worked closer to the shogun, became increasingly uncomfortable at his observations of Nobunaga’s madness. Nobunaga made more and more irrational demands as the path to conquer Japan headed toward Kyoto, the capital of Japan. Following the battle of Anegawa, for example, Nobunaga demanded Wataru assassinate not only the enemies that faced him on the battle field, but Nobunaga also demanded the deaths of his enemies’ wives, children, parents, and all blood relatives. Wataru, bound by his sworn oath to the Shogun, could only abide.

It was the incident at Hannoji that turned Nobunaga’s fortune to ruin. In what was supposed to be a simple invasion, Nobunaga’s forces fought to take Takamatsu Castle. So routine did Nobunaga view this campaign, that he opted to not join his forces on the field, remaining instead at the Hannoji temple in Kyoto. Wataru was among a slight contingent of officers that remained with the shogun during the taking of Takamatsu.

However, while assigned to the field, one of Nobunaga’s generals, Akechi Mitsuhide, conspired with a small regiment of Nobunaga’s forces and the Takamatsu defenders to return to Hannoji. They surrounded Hannoji temple and surrounded Nobunaga, forcing him into submission. Akechi ordered Wataru, the chief executioner, to murder Nobunaga. Sworn to his oath to the shogun, Wataru refused. Akechi advanced to kill Wataru, but Nobunaga, in a bout of defiance, unsheathed his own blade and committed seppuku.

Akechi’s issue with Nobunaga finished, he slaughtered all of Nobunaga’s remaining officers, save for Wataru. He marched Wataru to the burial grounds of Hannoji Temple, forcing Wataru to open a grave. Then, Wataru was mercilessly beaten, as a torrential rain began to fall. Wataru was thrown into the makeshift grave and was buried alive.

Wataru had no idea how long he was buried when he was visited by the demon, who offered him immortality.