Shusui and Tomoe practiced duelling in the spacious dojo behind the mansion. Shusui wore a grey ninja outfit with armour plates attached to it. The outfit did not cover his square face, showing his age through wrinkles and the grey in his short hair and beard. His regular work attire of a three-piece suit had been tailored to allow him nearly the same freedom of movement that he had now, something a master ninja required. Tomoe wore a hybrid armour with crimson highlights on burgundy that looked like a cross between traditional samurai armour and modern armour with Kevlar and chest plate carriers. She also wore a kabuto-style samurai helmet adorned with the golden crest of the imperial chrysanthemum on the front. The helmet’s neck guard flared out at the bottom, letting her shoulder-length ponytail peek out from it.

  The sword blades flashed and swirled between Shusui and Tomoe, their blades clashing together. Tomoe’s determination showed on her face as she concentrated on trying to break her mentor’s guard. She had an average build, and even though Shusui was not a large man, he was still far stronger and more skilled than her. This always forced her to use her agility and all of her skill in the fights against him. He always said that she would be fighting powerful opponents, so he had always pushed her, sometimes to the breaking point.

  Tomoe and Shusui broke apart after she blocked a cut from her mentor. They both assumed a sword raised above the shoulder stance. Both breathed heavily from the intense sparring, and they took a moment to study their opponent for a weakness. Tomoe wielded Kusanagi no Tsurugi, the mystical Grasscutter Sword, named after its legendary use in cutting huge firebreaks during a battle. In its raw form, the sword looked like a roughly forged, leaf-shaped blade of reddish iron that appeared like it was flaked from stone. Her imperial blood allowed her to shape it into the form of an exquisitely crafted, long-bladed katana, which she wielded with both hands. When Tomoe used the sword, it felt like a completely natural extension of her body, an advantageous benefit for her.

  Seeing no weakness in each other’s stances, the two both charged forward with a shout, trying to land a single killing blow. The blades flashed downwards, looking to edge by each other’s guard as they pivoted their bodies in the attack. Shusui did something different. He subtly shifted his elbow and stance and knocked her blade aside. Before she recovered, he swiped to the side, hitting her sword guard to knock the sword from her grasp.

  Tomoe gasped briefly in surprise and dodged sideways to avoid another killing blow from her mentor. She reached her hand out and summoned Grasscutter back to her. The sword blinked out of existence on the floor and materialized with the hilt perfectly placed into her gauntleted hand. She then charged forward to meet Shusui’s next downward strike. Tomoe’s blade was faster, and Shusui’s blade just grazed her armour while her blade struck his shoulder armour with a thump. She immediately backed up to swing another blow when Shusui raised his arm.

  “Well done!” he chuckled. “Your skills are more than deadly enough now. I’m glad you blunted the edge of your blade. I would have lost the use of my sword arm otherwise. You timed the blow perfectly to brush by my sword.”

  “Thank you, sensei.” Tomoe bowed. Inside, she hid a smile, knowing she had broken through her master’s guard.

  “I think that is enough sparring for tonight. You called your sword back so smoothly. It is said that the wielder of Grasscutter is never without their sword. Have you been able to summon the sword further than last time?”

  Tomoe shook her head harder than she should have in frustration. “No. I can still only do about half a kilometre. It is so taxing to force the sword to come even at that distance. I can reach out and sense it even when I’m in town, but I can’t seem to grasp it, no matter how hard I try.”

  “That is one of the more difficult abilities of the sword. Distance shouldn’t matter – the sword exists inside and outside our world.”

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  “I know that, but it doesn’t make it easier.”

  “Keep working at it.” Shusui then grinned. “Now that you’re tired, I want you to practice through the eight forms once more.”

  “Yes, sensei,” Tomoe respectfully replied in a flat, resigned voice. She was tired and sweaty and wanted to be done for the day. Shusei pushed her hard with his training. Her life would depend on her abilities one day, so she would do each of the eight forms again, even if she were exhausted.

  Tomoe moved to face the back of the dojo, which had a concrete-walled extension and a row of five human-form steel silhouettes in front of it. To an extent, it resembled a target range.

  Before she began the eight forms, she performed the traditional invocation. It wasn’t necessary, but she believed it helped to keep her pure and focused. Holding the sword horizontally in front of her, one hand on the hilt and the other supporting the blade with the palm face up, she began.

  “I thank Amaterasu Omikami for the gift of the imperial treasures to protect Japan. I pray to Amaterasu to grant me the just and divine power to use Kusanagi. I, her humble servant and descendant, will lay down my life to prevent the darkness from rising. Elements of fire and wind lend me your strength. With my soul, let me rend the fabric of existence to drive off the dark god.”

  Tomoe then assumed a ready stance and held Grasscutter in front and at an angle out to the side from her shoulder. She breathed carefully, focusing her mind on forming the simplest form of magical attack with the form.

  “First form – Windblade!” Her sword swung downwards in a short slash at a target in front of her. A blast of dense air that was only visible by how it distorted light emanated along the edge of her blade. It travelled the ten metres between her and the target to knock the silhouette over.

  The silhouette popped back up as Tomoe held her sword up in her ready stance again, this time with the blade at a shallower angle.

  “Second form – Grasscutter!” Her sword swung downwards in a long horizontal arc in front of her. She wasn’t trying for maximum power and put enough focus and energy into the spell to create a thin blade of air that knocked over all of the human silhouettes with a simultaneous tinging noise from each target as if something hard had struck them all at the same time. The silhouettes popped back up after a few moments again. With enough power, the attack could slice down a huge swath of tall grass and cut people and small trees. This attack used up more of her power, but not nearly as much as her flame wind attacks or even the heavy scything and cutting attacks like Stonecutter that could pierce the armour of a tank or cut a boulder in half.

  Her magical attacks reached the pinnacle with the eighth form, something that she would only use with a hint of her strength. The eighth form was named Godstrike, and she felt it had the power to cut the fabric of existence. Even when she practiced the attack, she felt her sword wanting to draw vast amounts of her power, consuming even her life energy, to perform an attack that could harm a god. It was an attack of last resort as it could cripple or even kill her if enough energy were used.

  By the time Tomoe finished the eight, she was panting and drenched in more sweat. The steel targets had new scorch marks on them from the flame attacks, and several were dented or cut in two from the more advanced attacks. She sheathed her sword and looked at her master.

  Shusui acknowledged her with a nod. “Good work.” He then looked at her thoughtfully. “I can still see that tapping into Godstrike still makes you nervous. You need to flow with the power, to swim with the current, even as you control and divert it. This is the essence of the imperial family’s magic.”

  Tomoe sighed. “I know, sensei. Godstrike tries to pull all of my energy from me to just start it. It always feels like I’m squeezing it to prevent it from taking too much.”

  “I know we’ve been through this before,” Shusui calmly said. “Try to twist it, to use its demand against it. Fighting it is the wrong way. This might be why the summoning isn’t working as well, either. You believe it is hard, so you fight it. Persevere. You can master Grasscutter. Others might use regular magic, but they can never use the sword.”

  Tomoe was always amazed that Shusui never lost patience with her or anyone else, and she loved him for it. “I will keep trying.”

  “I know you will do your best.” Her mentor gave her an encouraging grin. “I see that Nagisa has arrived as if by magic.”

  “Your bath is ready, princess. I have laid out your homework for tonight, and a snack will be ready for you.”

  “Thank you, Nagisa. The bath would be wonderful, and I’m always hungry after training. At least homework will be easy tonight.”

  “Of course,” Nagisa replied with a slight bow.