Miyoshi Seikai "The Iceman"

"The World Still Turns"

Part Ten

Miyoshi Seikai may have effectively disappeared from the human realm, but that didn't mean the world stopped to wait for him. Dawns came, sunsets still filled the horizon with their daily unique colour show, and events already in motion, all continued without him.

Although Taro knew where Seikai had gone, his general absence was hardly unusual. Quite often it would be months between his visits to the smithy, so he wasn't at all perturbed, and with several requests for tanning, along with a nice little sword contract he'd negotiated, all in all, his days were happy and productive, with barely a thought of his chilly friend.

Ah, but that would be too easy...

A nice little status quo which happily maintained Sengoku village life, the day to day of the mundane, with nothing untoward happening until our focus of this tale returned.

That is for more quaint stories and picture postcards. Life, as we all know, isn't like that. There are many more strands to its tapestry.

And there was one other who had noticed The Iceman's disappearance.

The antithesis of 'friend', and well beyond 'enemy'. He, (yes, apologies, I should have mentioned that), he was, from the very beginning, Miyoshi Seikai's nemesis.

Of course, it would be rather naive to write of a shinobi such as The Iceman, who through the course of his life as a child of the shadows, hadn't created his fair share of enemies, those who would gladly see his demise, (more than a handful regularly paid to see if it was possible. Paid very well, in fact).

But the one, who was currently looking for part of a missing purse one of his renegades had stolen, and had subsequently gone and got himself killed, (which was irritating), had made Miyoshi Seikai something of a life long mission.

His name?

Keiro.

Just as whispered about in hushed tones as The Iceman, this was one Iga turned a blind eye to. Known as 'Kurayama' - The Darkness.

Before his history is explained, we return to Taro, who was heading towards his home made pool, and since the weather had turned from soaking to baking, it had  been a very happy blacksmith who finally downed tools for the day, and headed to its cool, mountain waters, picking up a flask of sake along the way.

He brushed aside the feeling that his private bathing utopia felt odd. He was weary, and filthy, and even though he paused to squint through the dancing, dappled sunlight to its waters, he soon shrugged off the notion, peeling off layers of clothing at some speed, before plunging into the bracing chill with a grubby grin on his features.

"Hello Taro."

The disembodied voice which suddenly appeared in the clearing made his blood drop in temperature to way below the crisp waters he bathed in, and he twisted this way and that, trying to find the owner, but with the glare and glint refracting into his eyes as the sunlight happily played, he couldn't find the source.

"Time we had a little chat, hmm?"

Taro knew the voice well enough, even after years, it still occasionally gave him nightmares of the past.

"Keiro..."

He half whispered, "...Seven Hells..."

A chuckle came from directly behind the blacksmith, closer this time, and he spun in the water, expecting to see a blade as much as the wielder.

But, no, only the rockface, which, come to think of it, had no purchase for even a shinobi, unless they were looking for a dunking...

"You really are incredibly gullible."