I am
Kinji-Bato, I have earned my second name, the Iron Typhoon, but that comes
nearly last, and I must begin at the beginning.
Upon
Earthfall the elves and many sylvan folk left Golarion, but some of these
peoples chose instead to cross the Darklands of the world and found themselves
in Tian Xia, a land little touched by the star fall and the ensuring
chaos.
Many
strange creatures and races already called Tian Xia home, and even the humans
the refugee elves and sylvan peoples met were different, smaller and yellow
skinned. The story of how elves and
other sylvan creatures came to Tian Xia is a compelling one, but I shall speak
of it no more, as it is not my story.
My
people’s origin in the lands of Dragon Empires follows the elves story, but
diverges after the discovery of the mithral tree and the exit from the
Darklands. We centaurs did not wish to
mine, nor were the Tia humans welcoming of us.
The best of them considered us some sort of kami; the worst of them saw
draft animals that talked.
Over
long years, my people did find places to fit in among the Tians, but they were
not places of honor or distinction which are so coveted by the native
peoples. Centaurs toiled well and for
longer at a time than nearly any other people, could work farms alone that
would have taken a dozen Tians to work.
But no centaur bore the honored title of Samurai or Shogun.
So this
was the world my father and mother had bore me into, one that offered only
menial labor or nomadic roving as an existence.
However, when I was but a foal my father through but one act of honor
changed the course that my life would take forever.
My
father answered the call of the khan when battle came to our part of
Hongal. He left our simple hut to fight
with nothing but hooves and fists. When
he returned, he bore barding of lacquered steel scales and a fearsome masked
helm. His hands were no longer empty a
mighty bamboo daikyu and razor sharp steel naginata now filled them.
Upon my
father’s return and for every moment from that one on, I yearned to learn the
arts of my father’s bow and naginata.
His armor however seemed stifling and cumbersome to me. A few years after his victorious return he
bid me to try on his helm one day and I found the feeling of steel and silk
padding covering my head most unpleasant.
From that day forth, I vowed I would not wear barding again, my body
already knew I did not need such things.
My
father did teach me the noble arts of his naginata and daikyu as I grew
older. At first stringing and drawing
his bow taxed me almost to my young limits.
He told me the bow had been made for him by the Khan’s finest bowyer
from a bamboo stalk that had resisted seven strikes from the Khan’s own sword
before yielding.
On the
day I turned 10 years and now a young stallion and not a foal, I asked my
father if I might begin searching for a wise master to teach me to be what I
knew my blood was singing to be, a monk.
I had seen many of them over my years, and had even seen one deal with a
drunken lout in a seedy tea house once.
Even before the unfortunate idiot smashed through the paper window of
the place I knew I wanted to be able to move like a wave as that monk did. I wanted to know such prefect balance as he
did that I could not be moved less I wished it.
My father must have seen the truth of my wish in my eyes, for he agreed
without hesitation, and spoke to mother on my behalf in his calm and matter of fact
way she could not in the end resist.
One
week later my honored father and mother were seeing me off on my first journey
from home, to seek out my teacher, my master, the one who would teach me the
way of the open hand. My mother cried as
she handed me the list of places and the persons I should speak to about
training. It seems she and loyal
Rabbitbane her bonded hawk had run and flown themselves ragged to compile
it. Being the son of the clan’s druid
also brings its perks along with its lectures.
Father
simply placed his large hand on my shoulder and said “Kinji, you are my son,
and all the honor and courage I have gained for our family now resides with you
as well, for you are a stallion now. Go
now and bring yet more honor to our name when you find your master and become
our people’s first master of the open hand.”
He handed me his naginata at the end of his words, and then bowed to
me. That act was an honor that I shall
never forget, nor defame or disgrace so long as I live.
I ran
from one end of Hongal to the other following the names and places on my
mother’s list. After many weeks and
months I had in my hands at last the names of three masters that would possibly
accept me as a student.
The
first name was Master Huan Mi of Muliwan.
When I found him before I could even speak he said to me, “The answer to
your question young centaur is no, I cannot train you.” I opened my mouth to ask why but again the
shaved headed monk interrupted me. “You want to know why I cannot train you, a
fair question; the answer is I cannot train you because I cannot make you into
something you cannot be. Ah’ before you
would object again, please let me say that I do not mean you CANNOT be a master
of the open hand, I mean that you cannot be a master as I would know one. Before you can master any teachings you must
first be able to truly understand the teacher.”
So I
left Master Huan confused and more than a bit stung by his words. I vowed however to continue my search and
followed the path to the next name on my list.
Master Shu Bi Lee. Master Shu
lived in a tiny hut on the wind and snow swept steppes of Hongal near the
shadows of the Wall of Heaven. With
Master Shu I sat quite for a night and a day before the tiny wizened man even
spoke to me. “You show patience, so
perhaps master Huan’s words have had an effect.
However I shall spare you any wasted time and tell you simply, I will
not teach you. However, before you storm
off young man, I would tell you something.
I cannot train you because I cannot force action, I cannot force a spear
shaft to bend like a bow, the thing must have the WILL to bend or not. Once we understand a thing’s will, then we truly
know the thing.”
I left
Master Shu and pondered his words for the long weeks it took me to find the
last name on my list. I confess that the
fear of utter failure in my quest to find a teacher made my heart thud faster
when I approached the overgrown and moss covered pagoda that was the home of
Master Quam. Master Quam was a man of middle
years with a long and bright green dyed fu manchu beard and mustache. “You must be honored Master Quam of the
Forest of Spirits, I, Kinji-Bato have come far to find you.” The monk simply thumbed his prayer beads and
looked at me for a moment then spoke.
“Master Huan and Master Shu were wise to send you to me student who
would be Iron Typhoon. Your name as
known to those of the open hand is known to me, and I can train you. But first you must pass a test, and while it
may seem a simple one, you will find it is not so.”
Master
Quam pointed to the hundred stairs that led from the bottom of the pagoda to
the top. “If you wish to learn from me,
all I require of you is that you bring me my firewood from the pile near the
splitting log to the fire pit at the pagoda’s top.”
I
wanted to say that such was impossible; that there was no way that a centaur
could climb the steep side of the pagoda especially loaded with a cord of
firewood. I closed my eyes against the
fear that I was about to fail in my quest.
I tried to breath slower and center my thoughts, there had to be a way
to accomplish the simple task that Master asked. Humans carried things up stairs with ease,
then should not I, a centaur strong and agile be able to do such a thing as
well.
A calmness
I had never known before stole over me, and as if he answers had been there the
entire time. I simply started placing
the split pieces of firewood in the back corner of each stair so that the wood
filled its width. I repeated this on
every stair all the way unto the hundredth.
When I looked up from my work the pile was gone and I was looking at
Master Quam. He then said “That was very
clever, but it is only an hour from dark and my firewood is busy being lazy in
the form of a ramp, and not in my fire pit to make me evening feast or banish
the dark.”
I
simply smiled and said “yes Master, I can see how that is a problem, but let
your humble student fix it for you.” I
moved carefully back to the bottom of my makeshift ramp and began taking it
apart from the bottom up. Ten minutes
later the wood was stacked neatly beside Master Quam’s fire. He then looked at me and said “You have
passed my test, and are now my student, but then student, how exactly are you
going to get back down?”
I
climbed those stairs for the first time when I was 11 years old, and descended
them for the last time ten years later.
In those ten years Master Quam taught me the art of crafting bows and
arrows, and every last one of the thousand katas of the open hand. He taught me to speak with the wind when
shooting my bow, and how to become the arrow.
He taught me to weave a shield of sharp steel with my father’s naginata,
and how to clip but a single leaf from a tree with its edge. He taught me to be as powerful as a crashing wave,
or still as a forest pond. He taught me
to be the Iron Typhoon, and gave me my second name the day I left his pagoda.
I had
read in Master Quam’s scrolls accounts of a far flung place called Iboria where
centaurs were said to dwell. I decided
that I would see if these tales were true and traveled the path of Aganhie,
never sleeping in the same place twice for two years and two days. I now look upon the place the westerner’s
call the Stolen Lands, and I am close to my goal.
I am
Kinji-Bato the Iron Typhoon and I have told you my story, what path it takes
from this point only fate can say.
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