The early morning sun was beginning to rise in the sky, sitting cross legged on a large grassy hill overlooking a large stone fortress meditating with his eyes closed was now a 16-year-old Ryuzen Kuroda in his black samurai armor with two samurai bodyguards behind him keeping watch for any threat that might appear as their lord meditates. His face no longer resembles the young boy he was when Jinsai first found him. Now he had a fully trimmed mustache but no other facial hair as he prefers a clean-shaven look and he now has the partial shaved head with samurai topknot, his body shape is lean, muscular, small waist and well-defined shoulders. The year is 1568 and two years have passed since his adopted father died and Ryuzen power since inheriting his father's lands has grown exponentially. He lands are now worth a yearly income of 5,000 koku of rice; he even acquired the lands around his dead parent's village and rehabilitated the rice fields around it. He has been married to Isabell for a year now and she has just given birth to their first child a son who Ryuzen named Arinaga Kuroda who is now barely a month old. Ryuzen now has small army of 500 samurai and at the suggestion of Enkai and hired a group of 20 Iga ninja who were from the Iga province who owed no allegiance to any daimyo as the entire province was just ninja warriors who successfully overthrew their daimyo and remained independent ever since which made them the perfect warriors to counter Melanios ninjas. After Ryuzen had finally established his base and army he then went to the Shingen to request the invasion of Imagawa lands. Shingen approved of the invasion as the Imagawa were no longer a powerful clan since the death of Yoshimoto Imagawa in 1560 who was defeated by Nobunaga Oda and their power had been declining to the point after 8 years the Tokugawa clan former servants of the Imagawa had pushed them out of there Mikawa province and already taken half of Totomi province and now poised to start pushing into the Imagawa home province of Suruga, Ryuzen seeing the eventual fall of the Imagawa was foregone conclusion he wanted to add power to the Takeda domain and his own, plus stop the Tokugawa from being able to expand further east, and finally cut the Hojo off from any access the coastal roads into central Japan. Ryuzen was playing the long game and wanted to surround the Hojo, and this would be his first step in a long process of taking on the Hojo clan. Ryuzen army was no match for the Hojo at present and he was keeping them happy and distracted with all the trade and business his clan was giving them and were blind to Ryuzen real plans of trying to acquire the orb of fate on Mt.Fuji. Finally crossing the Imagawa border and had surprised this fortress by surrounding it at night and cutting it off from any reinforcements. Now Ryuzen was deciding now how to best take the fortress without losing too many men. The fortress was situated on a small mountain surrounded by earthen baileys, with wooden palisades, four wooden watch towers each in a corner of the fortress, and large wooden gate with gate house on top. The main building was large two-story building made of stone in the center of the fortress. It was formidable fortress with an experienced commander who had repelled bandits and samurai armies many times in the past. Ryuzen finally opened his eyes and looked at the fortress and noticed there was one strange flaw in the fortress toward the bottom of the mountain near the fortress there was old open sewer with covered with large bars hidden in the vegetation. It was discovered by one of his Iga ninjas scouting the area at night. Ryuzen then realized he would have his men feint an attack long enough for the Iga to get next to the sewer and cut the iron bars and enter the fortress at night while the attack would distract everyone in the fortress. Ryuzen stood up and walked back to his army's camp and would then tell his men and ninja to begin preparations for tonight's attack and infiltration.

  It was around 10 pm at night when his samurai were into position for an attack and the ninja were hidden close enough away from the sewer to begin moving toward it once the firing of guns started. Ryuzen through his connection with Joam his father-in-law had acquired for him three small pieces of artillery called swivel guns. They could not do any serious damage to the enemy fortress, but they would be loud enough to distract the enemy while his ninjas infiltrated the fortress. Ryuzen had set aside enough ammunition for each swivel to fire 30 shots which would take them two minutes to load and fire each shot and give the Iga ninja one hour to get into the sewer. Once inside the sewer they would make their way into the fortress and infiltrate the gate house to open the fortress and another group of ninjas would find and kill the commander of the fortress before the sun rose in the morning.

  Ryuzen standing behind his swivel guns then looked at the fortress which looked asleep and peaceful, he then raised his war fan moved it down to commence the firing of his swivel guns. Like a loud thunder from a storm the gunfire echoed loudly though out the mountains and hills of this area and immediately the fortress walls with great noise and causing the earthworks to create plums of dust into the air from the impacts. The enemy soldiers in the fortress begin to beat drums to rouse everyone to the wall in expectation of an attack. The swivel guns are not really causing any damage they are at least distracting the enemy soldiers from Iga ninjas movements. The ninja is moving at a rapid pace to the sewer, and the group arrive in about 15 minutes to the entrance of the sewer. They then begin cutting the iron bars with tools designed to cut iron bars and finally after about 30 minutes they finally cut the bars open and begin to enter the sewer. The sewer is designed to take the wastewater out of the castle through an underground spring. The ninja make wade their way through stinky wastewater and rats and finally make their way to the sewer entrance which is covered by a simple wooden grate next to the main stone building. They can still hear the gunfire from the swivel guns and know at any point they will stop soon. The ninja now successfully in the fortress will wait for the enemy to stand down and go back to sleep. The ninjas are all dressed in black from head to toe and armed with short swords and daggers. There twenty in total and if they are caught and discovered by the enemy they will quickly be killed the much larger force in the fortress. The swivel guns stop firing at about 11 pm and the fortress then begins to stir to repair any damage and inspect the fortifications and finally after 1 am the fortress fell silent except for a few guards on night watch stationed at guard towers and the walls looking outside and not inside the fortress. The ninjas emerge quietly and quickly from the sewer and open the sewer grate carefully and once all the ninjas emerge from the sewer they split into two teams one to infiltrate the gatehouse and the other to find and kill the commander. The leader of the gate team is Hanbei and he quickly moves with his men toward the gate house and between them is a courtyard that leads from the main building to the gate, and it is all clear except for a couple of torches placed near the wall and main building but not one guard is stationed in this area. As the finally reach the gate Hanbei moves toward the door that leads into the gate house. He pulls a dagger from his belt and then places his head and right ear on the door to hear any movement or noise inside the gatehouse. To his surprise all hears is the sound of men snoring loudly, he then carefully and quietly as possible he moves the handle of the door to swing it open carefully. As he enters with his men he realizes there is only four guards in the gatehouse and each of them is sitting and leaning against the gatehouse walls with their heads faced down asleep. Hanbei creeps up to one of the sleeping guards and waits for another three ninjas to do the same next to the other sleeping guards as well with their daggers also drawn. Then following Hanbei lead he stabs the soldier in the throat and places his hand on his mouth to prevent noise; the other ninjas did the same and all four guards were quickly killed. Hanbei then moves quickly to the gate bar, and he and five other ninjas quickly remove it and wait for the signal from the other team that their mission was successful.

  Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

  At the same time Hanbei makes his way toward the gate house, the other team makes its way into the main building, and the leader of this team is named Hanzo, and he quickly moves to open the door leading into the main building and again to their surprise like the other team the guards are asleep by the door. Instead of killing the guards his team quietly moves their way through the winding dark hallways to the stairs leading to the second floor. As they reach the second floor and peer into the darkness of the hallway, they see a guard actually alert and standing in front of a door with a candlelight shimmering from inside of the room. The ninjas silently creep up the stairs and once all of them have moved up the stairs and at the hallway entrance near where the guard is standing. Hanzo pulls out a small throwing knife and takes aim for the neck of the guard, and two other ninjas stand ready to catch the guard when he falls to prevent any sudden noise. Hanzo takes aim and then throws it, and it connects into the esophagus and guard instantly reaches for his throat and makes a quiet gurgling noise and starts to fall and the two ninjas instantly catch him and carefully place him on the floor. Then Hanzo moves to the sliding door with the candlelight shimmering from inside and carefully slides it open and sees and instantly recognizes the commander in his dark blue samurai armor sitting on a seat with his head resting on his arms on the desk sound asleep. There is a small window facing the guard gate and a bed near it also, Hanzo thinks this is perfect as he can signal the gate team with the candle in the room once the mission is complete once he kills the commander. Silently and carefully, he approaches the commander from behind and then stands near him and pulls his short sword and stabs his neck at the base of the spinal cord and instantly kills the commander. Then carefully and quickly decapitates the enemy commander's head places it in a sack Hanzo brought with him. Then picks up the candle in the room and stands near the small window in the room and uses his hand to cover and uncover the candle three times and waits for a response and the gate team waves a torch to let them know they received his message.

  Hanbei sees the signal and motions one of his men to wave the torch toward lord Ryuzen lines to signal the mission is accomplished and to start their march to the gate. Hanbei and the rest of his men then open the gate which makes a loud creaking noise that opens the gate but also begins to stir the fortress. Some soldiers begin to rush out of the main building and rush toward the gate and Hanbei's men begin to cut them down as they approach and it is really a race against time to hold the enemy soldiers off long enough to allow Ryuzen army to rush in through the gate. As Hanbei is guarding the gate the Hanzo team is killing anyone who comes up the stairs to the second floor and so far, have killed three samurai who were no doubt coming to get the samurai commander about the noise from the gate. More soldiers are rushing out of the main building but are starting to swell in numbers and two of Hanbei's men have now been killed and he only has seven men left to hold the gate against thirty soldiers approaching. Then like a rushing flood Ryuzen samurai came rushing through the open gate and quickly overrun the enemy samurai in the courtyard. The fighting is now all along the walls surrounding the main building and inside the main building itself. The enemy is being quickly overcome as with no leader to rally them they are quickly being cut down, and chaos and panic is spreading among them and with nowhere to run they are trapped on all sides and finally after twenty minutes of fighting the battle is over. The entire enemy force of three hundred are dead including the commander.

  Enkai approaches Ryuzen in the courtyard of the fortress who is inspecting the enemy heads of the dead samurai as per tradition, "Congratulations on your victory my lord, the first fortress in Suruga province of the Imagawa clan has fallen. This will no doubt please Lord Shingen when he hears of your victory and you have secured the way for his army to follow. This is but a first triumph in what I hope will be long line of victories in the future" Ryuzen responds, "I thank you for your praise, but I feel this just a small steppingstone to our next step in our grand plan" "You are always thinking several moves ahead and I am glad my strategy training is finally starting to rub off on you" Then Enkai bowed and left Ryuzen alone to his thoughts. Ryuzen in his mind said, "If you only knew Enkai, I had to rewind fate 10 times to secure this victory, and this is barely my first siege I have ever fought. That enemy commander was truly a ferocious opponent. He thwarted my plans on several occasions, and I had to resort to the dishonorable night attack to win but this is for the greater good of eventually stopping Melanios no matter how disagreeable the victory was in attaining it" Then Ryuzen walked to wear the enemy commander head was displayed and he bowed out of respect to his enemy and was truly impressed with this unknown commander and he had learned a great deal from this man in such a short time. Ryuzen resolved the next fortress would fall much more quickly.