A Town in Need

After the disappearance of Master Rowan, I had been traveling for a few years looking for him. Everywhere I went, I asked everyone I could if they had seen him but I haven't gotten any sort of leads. I passed many villages and no answers to be found. There were several times where I felt like giving up but I refuse to. Giving up now is not like for a samurai to do. There had to be someone out there who knew where or what happened to him.

There was a huge town that I came upon called Raju. It was way bigger than my home, Anje. Upon arriving, many people took interest in me. I stood out from the crowd and they couldn't help themselves by admiring how unique I looked. I'm not going to lie, it made me feel uncomfortable. Several people approached and made conversation with me. It wasn't long before I got to know the majority of the people here. I told them that I was an amateur samurai and they were suddenly flocking me with requests to deal with several problems they had. So, in exchange for helping them, I asked them to give me the info I needed. Once I fulfilled their requests, they praised me with gratitude and gifts. I didn't need the gifts but I felt it would be rude to not accept them. Even after giving me gifts, they thought it wasn't enough and gave me a home in the village too. Honestly, I was overwhelmed. I didn't want to stay here for too long but all of these people were being real nice to me. But I shortly realized that they wanted me to stay because I was skilled enough to deal with their simple problems and knew I couldn't refused. Meaning, they were using gifts as weapons to keep me prisoner and do chores for them. I made it sound like it was a horrible thing but not really. They were all nice people who liked talking to me. I didn't mind it one bit so I decided to stay here for a while.

Several months had passed and I was still living in Raju. I wanted to leave and continue my search for Rowan but I felt it wasn't time to leave the kind people here. I thoroughly enjoyed talking with everyone here like they were my family. The past few months made me really happy in a long time. But around this time, I had this strange feeling in my gut like something wasn't right. It didn't seem like anything strange was going on. Nothing except for the gossip about the mayor at least. Apparently, there was going to be an election soon for a new mayor but the current one is making campaigns to extend is term. And several people were complaining that he wasn't doing his job in supporting his people. I should've investigated that situation more.

Another several months passed and the mayoral election was on the horizon. Though the people were still hospitable to me, I noticed some strange coming into the village. These people looked strange. They passed themselves off as construction workers of sorts but I don't know. They just never rubbed me the right way. On top of these people suddenly showing, there were even more complaints about the mayor ignoring people to focus on his campaign. The other candidate trying to run for mayor were also making campaigns promising change for the better for the village. However, that was just another strange thing to me. Even though he was campaigning, he didn't seem like he was trying hard. At first, I thought it was because he was banking on the current mayor to basically push his supporters away. But that wasn't the case at all.

After the new mayor got elected, the town started changing for the worst. Increased taxes, increased prices, basically changes that drained the people of their money. It was just that though, several people suddenly started disappearing. These were just visitors, they were people who lived here for years only to suddenly just poof. People thought they left because of the changes but that didn't seem right to me. That's when I started investigating the matter. That's when I discovered an evil force lurking in the shadows...

Those strangers who passed themselves off as construction workers were more than just what they appeared. Apparently they've been working with the new mayor. They helped with getting him elected and he made all these changes to "repay" those guys for their help. It gets worse than that though. The mayor thought he was using the shady guys but it was the other way away. They were using him to gain control of the village to launder money and make facilities that would bag them more money. These guys called themselves the Joui and there were a bunch of them. How was I going to deal with them?

I investigated the people who had disappeared. I noticed one thing they had in common. They were all put in debt due to the law changes in the village. And they apparently refused to pay according to sources. It definitely had to do something with those Joui guys. So I dove deeper into the investigation. And I learned some disturbing info. When I learned of the connection, I thought those people were captured and sent to some remote prison. But no, it was far worse. Those Joui guys... "took care of them." Never to be seen again. It made me sick. I needed to stop these guys but I couldn't take on such a group by myself... Not only that, I became careless.

The Joui discovered me snooping. They caught me and took me to their boss, Daisuke. At first, they had plan to "take care of me" just like the others. But they noticed how I wasn't like the other people. They thought of using me for their dirty business. I refused wanting anything to do with that stuff but they threatened me into accepting the proposal. If I had not, they would've started slaughtering the innocent villagers even though they did nothing wrong. There were so many things I wanted to say out of anger but I didn't want to risk provoking them. Defeatedly, I accepted this fate. As long as the villagers were safe, I didn't mind risking myself to doing this business.

I had been working with the Joui for almost half a year now. Daisuke basically had me working all the time. He sent me on jobs outside of the village to "take care of certain businesses" and had me working at several facilities he had built. One of them was this stupid underground dancing house. I felt so disgraced. He noticed how "pretty" I was and thought he could take advantage of that aspect of me. So he had me dress up as a woman wearing mermaid attire to hide my other features and made me do those kimono dances in front of a bunch of pervy men. On top of having to use my blade for injustice, I felt so hopeless. What could I do? There was no way I could take these guys out by myself. I needed help. I need my master. He would know what to do. If only I knew where he was. If the gods are looking upon me, please. I beg them to bless me with help. Anything that would help me save this village from this corruption...