Bloodspeaker

Military: Skirmish

The investigators follow Shosuro Jūko and Yogo Kōichi from the Magistrate's Manor and into the forests surrounding Rindō. On the way, they spot Horiuchi Makena in the distance, striking at the ground with a hoe. The ground they're marring looks suspiciously like the same barrier line drawn around Tamura. This was suspicious, but Jūko argued against splitting the group, and so Kōichi was instead dispatched to investigate.   Upon arriving at a hidden clearing containing a gnarled, blood-leaved tree, the group found a samurai swathed in a thick cloak and wearing an antlered helm. Raehua challenged the villain, only to be told it was too late as they cut their own hand and began the ritual. This was enough for Aki and Togashi Daigo to identify the mysterious samurai as Meishozo Sasara. Fortunately, through some outside interference, the ritual failed. In fury, Sasara attempted to raise a trio of undead to fight the interlopers, but Raehua's mastery of cleansing jade preempted such a move.   A desparate battle ensued, with the skeletons finally bursting from the ground and nearly killing Daigo and Chūyō with their rusted armaments. Sasara was fortunately stymied from using her Maho by Raehua's abjurations, else events might have gone differently. In the chaos, Jūko was stolen into the trees and murdered by, as Chūyō magically determined, Kōichi himself. When Aki finally knocked Sasara out and the skeletons crumbled, kami of the earth urgently informed Raehua that the tainted must be killed. With a whip of her bladed fan, Raehua beheaded Sasara, just in time to stop her transformation into something mutated by the taint of Fu Leng.   At this point, unfittingly jolly, Horiuchi Makena joined them. The Unicorn gardener explained they'd found the magic circle outside town and had marred it with their hoe, thinking it bad news. They went on to explain, with startling expertise, that Sasara had almost transformed into a Bloodspeaker, warped by Fu Leng. It was likely that the artisan's obsession with perfecting abjurative makeup had given the Shadowlands taint a foothold, promoting ever greater atrocities in the name of developing spiritually powerful ingredients.   As for Kōichi, he was remorseless about his murder of Jūko. She had spilled a secret of the Scorpion, and thus his actions were an expression of honor and justice which would make him a true samurai. Raehua disagreed. She allowed Kōichi to sacrifice Jūko's spirit to the tree, but then took him into custody to face justice at the Imperial Court. Indeed, all of the Scorpion Clan deserved inquisition for this series of events, or so she claimed. In the meantime, Horiuchi Makena would take Jūko's place as steward of Rindō.