(AN: Hello again. I just need to say that it has been a LONG ass time since I stopped writing this story. It just lost interest for me and I don't know why. Maybe because both Tekken VI and Soul Calibur V tanked or because my Soul Calibur fics started getting better and better and this still looks like a newbie's crappy MS-filled ramblings [which will be a jar for you readers when you see this chapter that is better written, more descriptive and much LONGER]. Maybe I just lost a sense of direction for this story, because there isn't much that I feel I can do for Yoshimitsu without going too far.)

(Also this chapter is going to be different than it originally was going to be because some a-hole stole my flash-drive with EVERYTHING on it...TWICE! So I lost everything, including my laptop and internet access. So updates will not be frequent but I will try to figure out what to do with this story.)

(Like with my Soul Calibur fics, they all occur in the same universe and are, more or less, tied together. So I just want to reiterate that the events of Soul Calibur II through IV happen roughly in the year 1591. This is mostly for me to keep my thoughts together.)


The Subordinate

The good doctor had been rescued and the cyborg ninja was now resting in a forest. He usually came to this place for peace, when his mind was overcrowded. This seemed to be happening quite frequently of late, which bothered him. Even with years of discipline in the arts of ninjitsu and the use of a katana, a clear head was always needed whenever he went on a raid on some corrupt CEO like the Mishima Zaibatsu, or even when he got into a fight. The sword, the emblem of the Manji-tou, had also begun to play a role in the clouding of his thoughts.

More than a mental issue, it had also become a physical one as well. His cybernetic arm was still functioning properly, all pistons and hydraulics cleaned and responding as quickly as they should be. But there was something more to this as well. He felt it when he broke through the chopper to rescue Dr. Boskovitch: he was dying. How long exactly it would be until he succumbed he did not know. He didn't even know how old he was now, or if he was still healthy: his age had long since been forgotten. But each year since he received his prosthetic arm, he knew that things were not as they should be. More and more fatigues, more and more weakness, more and more cybernetic parts being added to replace parts of him that were slowly dying off.

He needed the meditation to leave it all behind and center himself once again.

In the glade he sat, cross-legged, with the sword lying upon his knees. It had been a long week since the daring rescue during the Second King of Iron Fist Tournament. His mind wandered and, over and over, something began to appear in his thoughts. Not an image as before, but a name, a name which he had known and yet he didn't truly know. It was something so important and yet he knew almost nothing about it.

Shinzo...


It had been a long time since the encounter in Istanbul. While the Greek Holy Warrior had gone her way, he had had to wait in this city, the Queen of Cities it seemed, stretching from one end of the Bosporus to the other by way of a great chain, for the others. Though he had left Japan alone, when he arrived in Samarkand, roughly two thirds of the way to this place, he was not alone. The destruction he had seen along the Great Silk Road and the rumor of the lives taken by this Sword of Heroes had left him dumb-founded. Here he was, off to kill a great evil by using a great evil.

Heaven's judgment, he thought to himself. Shall come to the one who uses evil to end his own suffering.

To that end, by the time he had reached the city once known as Constantinople, he had gathered a few people to his side in a small band of sorts. They were outcasts, warriors, some of them expert thieves or outlaws, but wherever they went, suffering ended. For, while on his journey, Yoshimitsu realized that even if he had the Sword and slew Nobunaga, the suffering he had caused would not be ended merely by his death. There would always be some shogun with lofty ambitions and a disregard for the meek and lowly. And he, Yoshimitsu, would be there, with his band, named in honor after the clan he had lost: Manji-tou. These thieves and bandits were his retinue, men and women from across the great deserts of the east: Japanese, Mandarin, Mongols, Khazars, Arabs, Europeans. All of them had been helped in some way by him and now they would help him. But it would not have been possible without his friend, someone from the islands of Japan like him, whom he had named as his lieutenant.

Shinzo.

And so Yoshimitsu waited and waited until Shinzo brought the rest of the clan to Istanbul secretively. They were the support that he had promised the kunoichi that day on the roof-tops. If, as the rumors said, the Sword of Heroes could leave whole armies slain in its devastation, it would be folly to go up alone against it. They met late at night in the courtyard of one of the local hans, as they called a tavern here. Yoshimitsu was not wearing his battle gear, but his mask was upon his face and a hood and cloak concealing his form. He waited exactly where he said he would be, wondering why Shinzo was taking his time.

At last the young man appeared. He was clad in heavily worn and sand-beaten clothes that showed he had crossed the same world as his master had. He was young and bore no facial hair, but his long black hair was tied behind his head like a horse's tail beneath his hood. He approached the hooded figure calmly and confidently, approached at least two paces space between them and then bowed.

"Sensei," Shinzo greeted. "I have come as you requested."

"Thou hast done well," Yoshimitsu replied. "Are the others gathered together?"

"Yes, sensei," Shinzo nodded.

"Well and good, Shinzo," Yoshimitsu nodded. "Gird thy loins about thy waist and make ready the others. Ere this night ends, we shall march on the East Rhine fortress."

"A moment, sensei," Shinzo spoke up. "I have but one question to ask."

"Name it."

"The Manji are thieves, not soldiers," Shinzo said. "Why are we then attacking this castle in the west?"

"There lurketh much evil in yonder castle," replied the master. "I perceive that this be the hiding place of the Sword of Heroes, the blade of the curse: Souru Ejji."

Shinzo blanched for a moment, but did not falter. A stout heart this one hath, thought Yoshimitsu.

"Will it indeed be a help to the people if we confront this great evil, sensei?" Shinzo asked.

"Hai," came the answer in one word.

"But how?" Shinzo asked. "We have both trod the same road from Osaka to this place, we both know the legends about Souru Ejji. How can we, a mere band of forty, hope to challenge such an evil all by ourselves?"

Yoshimitsu chuckled grimly. "Thy fears are well-intended but needless. Ours is not to take the castle by strength of arms, but to assist should the ones who shall do the attacking require our aid. Take heart, Shinzo, for we are on the path of the virtue."


(AN: I would say "can you guess who x person is?" but since Soul Calibur V has already come out, much of the mystery behind Yoshimitsu is killed [another reason I lost interest in the story, maybe?]. Apart from spoiling what will happen - both in this and in a potential Soul Calibur VI fic - I haven't got a name for it, but my brother and I have been creating characters with back-stories for it [that's something we do agree on: SCV sucked], yeah, SCV sucks and it's just really bad. I don't know what they did gameplay-wise but it feels really unbalanced. Like even if you had a giant character who was slow, you could still take out the opposition if you knew that character well enough in previous Soul Calibur games. But in Soul Calibur V, the douche-bag Patroklos [he is NOT a protagonist since he takes delight in killing the innocent] trumps everyone, even when he is playing as Setsuka rip-off. Also the story sucks and half of the good characters were cut out and the music is kind of bland and forgettable. In short, Daishi Odashima and the other game designers at NAMCO-Bandai pulled a Steven Moffat.)

(This chapter also clocks in as one of my shortest to date, but don't worry, the next chapter will continue the past "flash-back" a bit more.)