The Sword of Kaigen

by M.L. Wang

Misaki had always pictured herself having daughters. She had enjoyed the vague fantasy of raising powerful, forward-thinking young women with the courage to amount to more than their mother,

After Misaki had lived in the Matsuda compound almost a decade, it was Setsuko who made its cold halls feel like a home.

‘there are a million ways to tell the same story. Our job as jaseliwu is to find the one the listener needs to hear. Not necessarily the one that makes them the happiest or the one that gives them the most information, but the one they need to hear to do what they need to do.’

it was easy to believe the fantasy of a stable world.

Kaigen didn’t use propaganda. Everyone knew that.

“You’re patriotic and loyal. You’re exactly what everyone’s told you to be.”

It was a slight weapon, barely bigger than a traditional wakizashi, but it had seen more combat than any katana in the Matsuda dojo. Of course, Mamoru had no way of knowing any of that. His mother, after all, did not talk about her past.

“Most strong things are rigid. If you are water, you can shift to fit any mold and freeze yourself strong. You can be strong in any shape. You can be anything.”

She did not fear physical intimacy, but she liked to melt into the sweet sting of heat, not grate and buckle under ice colder than her own.

Eventually, she resigned herself to the idea that she was nothing more to him than a vessel, a womb to carry his sons—but that was all right. It would all be worth it when she held her child.

She tilted her head. “You have dimples.” “I got them from you.”

WAIT THIS IS HEARTBREAKING

This is it, Misaki realized. This was the joy they had all promised, in a single, simple hope: Mamoru might grow up to be different from his father.

For fifteen years Misaki had lamented being fated to raise her husband’s sons. All that time, she hadn’t considered that these boys might have something of her in them too.

Wait im so sad for her

It was the marked difference between a carefree man and a thinking one.

We are the Sword of Kaigen.” “You say that—everyone says that—but in the end, a sword is just a tool.”

She had to wonder, that all these years, this boy had been growing up right in front of her—and she had missed it.

“Don’t want to attack a little old lady?” Misaki smiled. “Fine. Then defend!”

My queen

Then again, it was very possible that the sexism inherent to their upbringing had created a blind spot so opaque that they weren’t capable of recognizing those abilities in a woman.

How had a soulless block of ice like Takeru and a selfish thing like her created something so bright?

he had become a new creature—liquid lightning.

For all her strange and mannish habits, she was still a woman, and it still wounded her pride to think that her husband did not find her desirable—that

Maybe she would have felt that same rush now if she were the only one in danger. But that was her son. That was her son, who was bright, and growing, and a better koro than she had ever been.

that rectangle may be the fastest way for us to let the Emperor know that this is happening.”

Yeah lets just call the government up

“Kaa-chan.” Mamoru held her shoulders in a firm grip—and when had his hands gotten so big and strong?

Tou-sama’s murmur was so quiet that Mamoru almost didn’t hear it over the wind. “Needles.”

YEAH FUCK YOU

Yukino Sensei repeated the order, “Brace!” that Mamoru realized he had just been standing there.

God bless yukino sensei

In spite of everything, Misaki found a smile on her lips. “This is Shadow’s Daughter.”

You might look like a decorative flower, but you’re more sword than anything else.”

Misaki tied the obsidian sword at her hip and realized how much she had ached for its weight there. A baby just wasn’t the same.

Thank the Gods she was a monster.

opposites exist to balance and complement one another.

Misaki scowled down at the fonyaka. “You try fighting fair after pushing out four babies,”

He was a Matsuda. His sword wasn’t made of ice or metal. It was his soul.

It was Hiroshi.

WHAT THE FUG

The monster crumbled, and she was just a woman, just a mother who had failed her son.

What the world would never know, was that he was the second youngest.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN

I did it, he thought, and the blood spreading from his body seemed unimportant. Tou-sama, Kaa-chan, I did it! He couldn’t wait to tell them!

wait no

Robin sank into it, drinking the cold like a parched man at a half-frozen river. Misaki melted.

“Are you planning to?”

SCARY

“A life of dangerous adventures might seem worth it now, when you are young and seemingly invincible, but one day, you will have children, and you will not want that life for them.”

How dare you claim to respect my autonomy and then deny it because it means you don’t get to keep me.”

“I’m going to go find your brother.”

Yeah unless this is a happy reunion im good off that

She wished she could feel something… anything other than the inevitability of each step down, down toward the end of her world.

“It was like Nami was so happy to see them that she cleared the coast of waves and sharks and sharp rocks just for them. I barely caught any fish that day, but the Goddess filled my girls’ hands with pearls.”

her boy had fought through the injury that ended his life.

HER BOY

She would let a fonyaka pull her life from her mouth, she would give her soul a thousand times over, if she could just bring Mamoru’s back.

But look at you… You fought so well.”

“I never loved you the way I should have.” Tears rolled down Misaki’s cheeks. For the first time since coming to Takayubi—perhaps the first time in her life—she knew she was human.

“I know I have no right to ask anything of you, but please… if your poor, stupid mother can ask one last thing of you. Let me hold you one more time. Just one more time,

Yeah what the hell

never see that boyish smile, with those dimples, deepen into the smile of a man.