With the grave news that lily had been kidnapped it was up to Manzo and Manzo alone to go and investigate the hideout of the kenpachi school. He had to go alone or they would kill Lily, something had to be done. There wasn't a whole lot of time to waste even if he needed time to prepare, he couldn't have it. "Alright Nyancelot, you stay with the camp, I'll take care of this myself." Manzo said with the sound of determination in his voice. He knew he had to do this alone, no matter what. This was going to be a test of his strength as much as anything else.

But he had to ask himself if he had it within him to take out an entire school of swordsman as well as Ninja. Regardless of if he felt it in his capability, he had to try. It was do or die, and he could not tolerate another death on his hands. Losing Esperia was bad enough, losing Kerri, it was all too much for him to handle. So adding Lily to that list was out of the equation, it was not going happen, not now not ever.

As he made his way back to the camp, he began to gather his things it dawned on him that he felt he had heard that name before. "Kenpachi." Manzo said to himself as he stroked his chin for a moment, trying to place where exactly he had heard that name before. The name alone brought back memories of what smelled like gun powder, and the sound of steel clashing. Could it be someone from his past, he wasn't one hundred percent on it. But he could not be lost in thought now, he had to think very carefully about what it is he was going to take with him to make sure this job went off without a hitch.

"I wish I had someway to contact Alisa." He said to himself as he began to rummage through his belongings and gather his things. He started with his attire. He needed to know what kind of place this was going to be. Without that knowledge he could not properly prepare. It was clear that these men were professions who stood by tradition. So he had a bit of time to try and rescue Lily, at least until sunrise, though he hoped it wouldn't take him that long to get to his destination.

He quickly grabbed a black Katchu. A tradition samurai garb that was split between multiple parts. The kabuto, or the helmet in the fioran tongue. As well as the o-yoroi, the armor portion of the garb. While in modern times, it was not imperative for him to wear the last part, a bit of protection couldn't hurt, and it was better to be safe than sorry to say the least. Especially if these ruffians were employing things like explosive paper. That kind of thing would be hard to come by for inexperienced fighters, which these clearly were not.


As tactics and strategy on the battlefield evolved as well as the incorperation of magic, so did the armor of the swordsmen who wore it. At first, it was designed to protect a swordsman during combat, inspire his allies, and incite fear in his enemies. Eventually, during the more peaceful times of Joya, Joyan swordsman armor became more ornate and purely ornamental.

Scholars have dated the oldest surviving swordsman armor to the early 10th century, but modern joyan artisans strive to recreate and replicate authentic o-yoroi to bring history to life for display in museums and private collections. Which he believed to be a waste of good material, but he was trained in the old way, and clung to it's traditions without a wavering thought.

With the choice of his clothing he would begin to put it on, wondering if any of his kinsman were near tonight, specifically his mothers. Wondering if they would have any words of encouragement for him on this night. He could only hope that they were somewhere close and thinking of him. He thought of them often, more often the older he got. He wondered and hoped he could reunite with them soon, just so have those moments of mothers and son he had missed throughout the years.

"I wonder if there's a chance." He said to himself as he reached down for totsuka and fastened it to his hip as he became lost in thought for a moment. Of course the thought he was lost in, was if their village was close enough to the destination where he could make a pitstop in order to get some additional followers for his mission. It wasn't completely out of question but he had to work fast if he was going to do this and stage this rescue without any undue harm coming to Lily.

Now with all of his clothes situated and his gear thoroughly on his body he exited the cave, about to set out on his journey. He realized that an approach from the ground would leave him open to assault. He would need to do something else entirely. He placed his fingers in his mouth and let out a loud whistle. He waited a few moments for it to travel far enough to reach the ears of his trusty pet.

After a few moments, a large white dragon would swoop down from the sky and land before him with a loud thud. Ghost hadn't seen Manzo in so long he was over joyed to be called on by his master that he proceeded to bum rush him as if he were just a big lizard puppy. Which for all intents and purposes he was. As Manzo fell to the ground with a bit of laughter, he rubbed the snout of his lizard companion and kissed him on the forehead.

"Oh that's a good boy." He said cheerily as Ghost rolled over onto his back and exposed his belly for Manzo to rub, knocking down several trees along the way of course. Manzo crawled onto his belly and began to rub it as Ghosts' tongue hung out of his mouth in quite the silly display. "I missed you too buddy." Manzo said as he crawled off the belly of his dragon and waited for him to calm down and come to his feet so he could explain the situation to him as carefully as he could.

"Alright boy, we have a lot of work to do. We need to get to the Mattori clan compound and get some support for the coming batttle. Hopefully my mothers are in tonight, if not we deal with my sister, and who exactly wants that." Manzo said with a laugh. He was being joking of course but at the end of the day he didn't have time for a teary reunion with his family at this time. There was much work to be done. Much work indeed. With Manzo's words ghost rolled over onto his feet and let out a chuff that told Manzo he understood exactly what they had to do here today.

With that Manzo jumped on the back of ghost and they were off into the night sky, headed for the Mattori compound to gather the support needed for the initial assault of the school. "I still can't get over that name, there's something there. I know there is." He said as he stroked his chin trying to think very hard about why it is that name stuck out to him. Though no matter how hard he thought, nothing came to his mind, it was as if there was nothing there because his brain did not want him to remember.

That was a concern, what could be so terrible that he couldn't remember, or that his mind did not want him to remember. All he could do was remember the smells of a battle field, meaning it had to be due to the civil war he took part in. It had to be that, but the name was just something he could not get to stick in his mind to trace any memories back to it. "I have to figure this out." Manzo said to himself as the mattori compound came into view.

Ghost landed in the courtyard where the guards would surround them. But as soon as Manzo jumped down and revealed his face to them, they stood attention and apologized for their actions of turning their blades on the son of the heavenly mothers. "It's alright, it's been sometime since we last saw one another." He said as he attempted to put their minds at ease. He truly didn't want them to take it to heart they were just doing their jobs at the end of the day. "Please take me to my mothers." He asked

They did just that, through the halls of the compound they arrived at the throne room where his mothers resided over the clan. As soon as he entered the door, the two women looked up in shock to see their long lost son returning home to them. Both very statuesque women, his birth mother, wore long pink hair tied into a bun, an eye patch on her right eye, and missing one arm. His donor mother, with short black hair and crimson lips. They rushed over to him for a tearful embrace.

The three exchanged an intimate hug with between mothers and son. "I'm very sorry I have been gone so long, and that I have not come under better circumstances, but my student Lily, she has been taken by one of the schools." He explained the whole situation to his mothers who responded with giving him the support of several of the clan swordsman, just the help he needed. With that the small group of Mattori clan swordsman were off, coming up on the school after a short hike. He wondered why they chose it to be so close to the home of a prominent clan.

The group fought their way through several cave systems until they found themselves inside the main training hall covered by the mountains. As they fought, he heard a voice call out to him. "Hitokiri!" This caused Manzo to turn his head in the direction of the voice, to find that it was the man who gave him that name. The man who started the bloodiest civil war amongst the clans. "Kenpachi." Manzo said in response to him. The two staring each other down for a moment. Before Kenpachi jumped down with blade drawn.

Manzo met his blade with Totsuka the two clashing. "Still as sharp as ever." Kenpachi said with drawing his blade for a moment, before the two would clash again. Their blades creating sparks that ignited the hay near by causing them to create a ring of fire with their exchanges of swords. Manzo called out to the other swords man to go search for Lily as he handled this situation. "Another duel at dawn Hitokiri, except this time, you won't be so lucky to get away with your life." Kenpachi said as he began to assault Manzo's blade with his own, driving him back.

Manzo was in a defensive stance looking for an opening to counter, and he found it. He let out a quick strike, driving kenpachi back. The two exchanged blows for a while, neither proving that they were going to back down this time. Or any other time for that matter. He heard one of the swordsman call out that they had rescued his student Lily. "Saved your brat huh, she was only bait for me to get you here. Doesn't mean we didn't have fun with her." Manzo quickly turned his attention back to him and let out several swings of flame in kenpachi's direction. This was not over yet.

2000/2000

20% discount from armor