Young Kage Tatsuya stands confidently at 5’10” with flexibility matching the feline and a piercing glare equal to a snake measuring its prey. Kage has long black hair reaching his shoulders with brown eyes seen from behind a kitsune or oni mask. These masks reflect the Roku-Dai teachings of Shin Takiyo and the Wu Xing Shin School. The oni represents the death harbored behind his presence as a mortal being possessed to practice evil acts for a purpose personal to him. The kitsune represents the deceit and trickery in using the darkness as an ally for good. Otherwise Kage wears a traditional Gi with a straw hat and his hair tied in a bun underneath.

Personality:

Kage is “silently fierce”, he is not one to entertain or draw much attention. He rather listen and observe his surroundings instead of adding to it in noise. Kage once a young boy bound to honor under the Nang Dynasty following the path of Feng Huo, has now cast himself into the unbound territory of shadows. The very art he practices is the Roku-Dai, an extension from the teaching of Shin Takiyo and his school Wu Xing Shin. Shin Takiyo only brought this extension or private school of thought to light due to the extraordinary circumstances that have occurred in the Nang Dynasty. Kage was presented with Shin’s teachings of Roku-Dai after the sacrifice of his father and Hiroshi, Shin now 89 years of age leaves the Roku-Dai in the hands of Kage Tatsuya at age 28.

Sacred Weapon: Dansu Raito or “Dancing Light”, The sword is a mixture of steel melted down from his father’s blade that was given to Kage before ordering him to retreat with the refugees, and Hiroshi before the sacrificial ritual. The two metals were fused together to create the double edged sword that Kage now wields with Hiroshi’s soul.



Mundane weapons:

+ Chang Dao
+ Zhanmadoa

Equipment:

+ Rope
+ Opium pipe
+ Herbal Medicines
+ Kunai

Background Story:

Kage Tatsuya is a member of the Tatsuya clan originating in one of the hill tribes of Naijin. He is also an outstanding member of the Shin Wu Xing School founded by a former Waito General by the name of Feng Huo and a Monk, Shin Takiyo. The two had fled from their respective province in the Waito lands after it’s collapse. During the summer season, a revolution sparked caused by the pressure of the current King. The dowry of the King was low due to poor spending leaving the security force half abandoned. Feng Huo during the last battle to protect the palace, decided instead to turn his attention on the monastery, which was also under attack, the revolution accused them for training “lost children” making soldiers out of them to supply the King with fighters. The accusations were incorrect, but it did not stop the revolution from attempting to raze it or take the children. Feng Huo would successfully defeat the small force but at the cost of losing the palace. Feng Huo speaks to Shin Takiyo the Monk of the Monastery to gather the children and make the move toward Naijin.

Feng Huo and Shin Takiyo would trek to the shores of Waito with 27 children, 17 trained men, 12 women, and 9 monks. During the journey they would lose 6 children, 5 men, 3 women, and a monk to illness on the road. When they reached Naijin, they found a similar scenario playing out as in Waito, but this time there were no ties to position or rank with responsibility and so the two decided to head North toward the hill tribes of Naijin. Once in the mountains, Feng Huo and Shin Takiyo secured a plot of land to begin building the school they conceptualized during their journey to Naijin. The plans of the school did not alter but the way they would sell it did. Considering the social predicament the Naijinese people faced, Feng Huo used the school as a way to teach self-defense to the rural hill tribes from the constant battles around them. They also marketed the school as a monastery for troubled or orphaned youth. Over time Feng Huo and Shin Takiyo would do small civil work in the villages, eventually putting the children to work as well. This created a reciprocal relationship between the school and the villages it pulled from.

The school was both a monastery for Shin Takiyo to continue his work, but also a recruiting center for Feng Huo. His loyalities did not leave him when he left Waito, they simply reorganized priorities. Feng Huo believed in unification of Waito, that one day Waito would no longer fight amongst itself, but would turn inward to prepare for its mature evolution into one entity. Feng Huo felt time was necessary for this growth, and he would re-enter to arena with strong men who could carry out his vision when other leaders with similar visions did the same. He knew them to be working as he was, for he was not the only one with the same vision during his time serving.

The school marked its name to be Wu Xing Shin or Truth of the Five Elements. It was an integration of both battle tactics and spiritual philosophy. The assimilation of mind, body, and spirit were emphasized greatly in the works of the Wu Xing Shin. Only 6 months after it broke ground, the school housed the original 21 children who moved from Waito to Naijin, but it added 7 more children from the neighboring hill tribes. Two of these children went by the names of Kaori Tatsuya and Hiroshi Yoshinori, appearing more like brothers than friends.

Both trained and worshipped closely together studying their way through the Wu Xing Shin School. The two would be tested on all levels of the human condition, but their loyalty to the land they grew up in was not truly measured until Feng Huo heard of Lau Nang’s plan for unifying Waito. Feng Huo seizing the opportunity he had been waiting for sent a correspondent to Lau Nang, promising a private military to fight for Lau Nang in the East, with the agreement that Feng Huo would be awarded his own land and position within the Nang Dynasty to help maintain the security of a unified empire.

Lau Nang agreed to these terms leaving Feng with negotiating the approach. Feng first had to speak with Shin, once they came to an agreement Feng took 70 master students including Kaori and Hiroshi to the Eastern provinces of Waito. Feng knew these lands well successfully liberating several villages from former warlords with the element of surprise. The villagers were then recruited by Feng Huo to continue their emancipation of needless warring states. This idea snowballed into a 200 man fighting force led by Feng Huo, Kairo, Hiroshi, and a handful of other master students.

Feng Huo’s momentum would not cave and his campaign resulted in success. It would not be but a few months later when news crossed the land of Lau Nang’s achievement too. The Nang Dynasty establishing itself as a secured power that did what was thought impossible. When the fighting settled, Feng Huo was invited to the capitol to receive his decorations in the ranks of the Nang Dynasty. His authority opened up a favorable pipe line from the Wu Xing Shin School to his army.

The brief time peace existed, Kaori would find a young Waito woman who he settled with, the two conceived five children; 3 boys and girls, the youngest was Kage Tatsuya. Hiroshi would not settle in having his own family, but treated Kaori’s as if they were his own. The five were trained by Feng Huo’s school established in the capitol of his province directly descending from the Wu Xing Shin School teachings. They also received lessons from Kaori, Hiroshi, and personally from the 57 year old Feng Huo at the palace.

Peace however does not last forever. The Dynasty was shook by the death of Lau Nang’s loved ones. Quickly the emotional toll of losing those closest to Lau Nang could be felt across the empire as his reign shifted to more cynical and tyrannical. A search for immortality was the new talk of the land, it was a chatter that propagated two camps; one opposing, one for. Lau Nang the only voice that mattered occupied the “for” camp in an attempt to reconnect his loved ones back with the world of the living. When Lau Nang announced the findings of the scrolls, he invited his Nobles to the capitol for a ceremony of Eternal Life, to give them the gift he was giving to his loved ones for their service to his cause. Feng Huo was one of them as he grew sick with old age, he had just started the dream he had always envisioned only to be sapped of his energy because of age and natural illness. Feng Huo agreed to the invitation of furthering his life asking Kaori to accompany him and two sons for protection on the road. He required those most loyal to him since many throughout the land disagreed with the use of these scrolls.

The arrival was a spectacle in its own right, but what followed was the illness never forgotten. All of the nobles who participated in the ceremony including Lau Nang became sick with a fever. Feng Huo even went as far to submit himself to it allowing for Kaori and his sons to return to the province. He believed the empire was about to be in danger from its own ruler. Reluctant Kairo takes his sons leaving the General at his bed side. Unfortunately, during the journey back both sons become ill, showing similar signs of the fever. They make it to the edges of their land greeted by one of the master students who takes responsibility in bringing the boys by cart. Kaori rides to Hiroshi and Kage who were left behind to maintain the daily operations of fielding a security force. When Kairo arrives he is able to fill in the details of what has transpired, but one day after arriving news of Feng Huo and a strange military of possessed looking Nang warriors are reported to razing a village a few hundred miles from the capitol of the province.

Kairo concerned about his boys who never returned order several messengers to ride out and have all the villages retreat to the palace. No one knew what the threat was, but Kairo after listening to Feng Huo’s warning after the ceremony while laying on his “death” bed, knew it could not have been of this world. Feng Huo should be dead, but he wasn’t, he was with an army killing his own people.

Some of the messengers were too late in getting to the villages before Feng Huo did, but those who could made it only to be asked that they either fight if able, or retreat to the shores to cross the waters toward Naijin if not. The fighters were instructed that the odds of surviving were slim and that their only objective was stand for as long as they could to give the others a starting chance. It would be 6 days after the initial invasion of Feng Huo before the Terror emerged over hill’s crest with an army of undead.

Kaori and Hiroshi with several other master students of the Wu Xing Shin School led the defense in opposing Feng Huo. Kage would be ordered by his father to retreat as the last known Tatsuya. There also needed to be a leader among the refugees who knew how to get to the monastery in Naijin. The battle for the capitol began with the archers volleying across the field while the undead scourge covered immense ground with supernatural speed. The final hours were closed once the undead reached the top of the walls where they began cutting down untrained men while trained men attempted to stand their ground only to be overwhelmed.

In the palace Kaori and Hiroshi along with staged kegs of black powder awaited Feng Huo. Feng Huo reached the palace doors only to be invited in by Kaori and Hiroshi lest he hide behind his pawns because he was too weak to fight them. The challenge was accepted, Feng Huo battled the two without mercy severely injuring Kaori and wounding Hiroshi. In a final attempt to kill Feng Huo, the master students of Wu Xing Shin emerged from various places to ambush Feng Huo and the undead who were inside the palace witnessing the fight. During the chaos Kaori ordered Hiroshi to escape just before Feng Huo lifted Kaori up in the air taking a large bit into the neck of now limp body.

Hiroshi retreated into a tunnel beneath the palace where the black powder kegs were stationed. These kegs were set next to the supports resulting in the fortress to crumble beneath its own weight. Hiroshi with 5 master students escaped leaving several others behind to continue the fight. Ignited the kegs charged an explosion shaking the tunnel and the fortress, the structure began collapsing until dust and rubble remained. It was not confirmed whether Feng Huo survived but anything inside the palace would have been crushed or trapped.

Hiroshi does make it to Naijin reunited with Kage. Kage is informed of his father’s death by the hands of Feng Huo who also was a father-figure to Kage. The story brought with it a unfathomable amount of pain and questions only to be answered by the stories following the events, the ceremony brought with it a fever creating undead. This realization brought the news of Naito in Naijin not long after. Shin Takiyo, Hiroshi, Kage and several other members decide on their options with how they were to respond to the events of their once beloved land. Hiroshi offers himself to Kage to free the curse holding Feng Huo and revenge the death of his father and all the fathers who lost their lives and sons defending a dream now drowning in evil.