Kisai Yoshitaka
From Inga no Kusari wiki
| Yoshitaka, Kisai | |
|---|---|
 Unseated, 1st Division | |
| Date of Birth | 6th January, 1505 (507) |
| Place of Birth | Suo Province, Japan |
| Zanpakutō | Asauchi |
| Player | Lux |
| Shinigami | |
Contents |
Appearance
Kisai is woman of 6 and a half foot, appearing to be in her early forties. Her hair is black and her face is pointed and severe. Her hair is often held in a ponytail that flows down to her back, tied with leather string and held in place with three black pins. Her eyes are a deep honey colour and her skin is a tanned brown.
Being Japanese, Kisai’s eyes are not almond-shaped, surprisingly.
Kisai usually dresses in a black leather tank top with shoulder guards. Her body is lean and muscular, so her chest is not that busty. She has a rather flat chest, given the fact that leather tank tops are made for fighting, not for showing off your chest. She wears a normal shinigami robe over the top of this when she is required to.
Her stomach may be bare, but on her bottom she wears an ankle-length skirt with leg guard running down the side. On her feet she wears normal shinigami sandles.
Around her waist she wears several belts which hold on six swords, all of which are positioned behind her waist, ready to be used. They are all about a foot long, so there’s no trouble unsheathing them. They all have matt-black hilts and wrappings, so they don’t shine when she’s hunting a target.
On her hip, there rests a zanpakto with a black hilt and black scabbard. The hilt is decorated with two tassels, each hanging from the pommel of the blade. The hilt is also wrapped in red wire, covered by red cloth and finished with an eight-point star as a cross guard.
Personality
Kisai is a kindly person at heart. She might be a bit blunt and often very over-protective. She will protect her friends and show respect to anyone, no matter how ungainly and evil they may be to her. Until they challenge her to a fight that is. Kisai is on the whole concerned with the well-being of all people in her unit or group and so, will fight with everything she has to protect them. In a crisis, she’s very level-headed and calm. She takes quick and decisive moves to ensure the safety of her friends and colleges and defeat the enemy. This is the way of the Samurai, which she holds very dear to her heart. She herself was made a samurai, much to her happiness. However, even in the heat of battle, she will respect her enemies and never talk herself up. That’s her nature; humility in the face of adversity, severity in the face of cruelty. It’s her personal motto that she never fails to spout upon being asked why she fights for people. One can be sure that Kisai will always fight the right enemy and the right reasons. She will not be swayed by such silly reasons as patriotism or nationalism. She is an individual, through and through.
However, if one were to make her angry by calling her just another woman, she would unleash all of her power and skill to annihilate said enemy. This is the only time she will fight without reservation. She usually has an inward desire not to kill. As she’s said before, she’s seen more bloodshed than should really be healthy. Strangely, she never spares an enemy.
History
Kisai was born in the Suo Province of Japan in the early 16th century. Her father was a Daimyo, her mother was a stay at home mother, who cared deeply for the three siblings. As a child, Kisai would dress as demurely and as royally as any other noble woman. She would often spend time looking in the pond at her father’s home in the district. Her eldest sibling, a brother, was training to be a Samurai. He would often teach her what he learnt, fearing for her safety. They lived in troubled times, after all. Many people would seek to kill the Daimyo’s daughter to provoke the father.
However, it was not to be all roses and blossoms; Kisai discovered her brother had failed to fight and win against an enemy Samurai and as such, had to face the one fate for a defeated and disgraced samurai; Seppuku. Her father ordered her brother to perform seppuku, which would have been distressing enough for a woman of such years. However, it was not enough that her brother had to die; she would be the murderer. Her brother, having a strong bond with his sister, chose her to cut his head from his shoulders upon his performance of the cuts.
Kisai performed the cut dutifully, cutting her brother’s head off with a stony face. She dared not show emotions as her brother committed suicide right before her eyes; slashing his stomach no less than five times. He died with a smile set upon his features, knowing that Kisai had the strength to do what must be done.
However, her brother’s faith was misguided. A rage, an unadulterated rage brewed in her heart. The seppuku had brought honour to the family, showing that the samurai they’d produced could die with honour had proved this. But Kisai was not satisfied with merely honour; she’d lost her only friend and companion in life. She went to her brother’s room to cry herself to sleep. Instead, she found his armour in a cupboard. She donned this armour, forsaking the mask and helmet so that her father could see her now. She took his sword from the cradle near the window and tied it about her waist. Was she to run away, become the greatest samurai in the name of her brother? No, she was to make the final mistake of her life: She would murder her father.
She walked to his office in the dead of night, bashing open the door and drawing her sword. She levelled it at him, threatening to kill him if he moved. She asked that he make her a true Samurai, and that she would be allowed to die like her brother. The daimyo signed a decree, with tears standing in his eyes. As he passed it to her, his daughter mercilessly cut him down, sheathing her blade and seating herself at her father’s desk to write a note. She took a hairpin and pinned the note through the body of her father. It was a suicide note, designed to explain things to her now-widowed mother. The family would lose its honour if they’d discovered that she’d killed her father. So she’d given them an excuse; an unknown female assassin.
That was when she resolved herself to her fate. She carried a small cloth bag of food up to the family cemetery and knelt before her brother’s gave. She lit incense and made a prayer to him, hoping that he’d approve of what she was about to do. Carefully, she ate her meal in silence and settled down, writing a death poem. As she finished, she took up a blade and made her peace with the ancestors before running herself through.
After this, she became a spirit. At first, she was in danger of descending into a hollow because of her accumulated pain. But something kept her going; a voice that gave her strength. She wasn’t sure it was her strength or another’s, but all she knew was that she had to keep going, for the memory of her brother. Eventually, a shinigami found her and sent her to Rukongai. She lived there by herself for many years. She penned works and novels about grand adventure, dreaming of having such adventures. The Legend of the Female Samurai was her first book, and sold a few copies around her district. She did enjoy writing, but she felt that she had a much grander calling than simply penning more books for people to read. It was at this time that she heard of Shinigami and their duties from an older soul in the market. The old woman spoke in a wry voice to Kisai, telling her that she’d make a fine shinigami if she worked hard enough. Kisai went home that evening, enthralled by the idea of becoming a shinigami. But she was morose; she knew that she didn’t have the same strength as the other shinigami. Their spiritual pressure was much greater than her own; she knew she’d never get accepted. What she did not realise was that her spiritual pressure was unsuppressed and out of control, so it seemed lower than the others due to the petering out. However, that did result in an extremely untimely arrival.
On her way to the market one day, a hollow dropped from the sky and roared its mighty roar, looking for souls to devour. Kisai had never such a fearsome beast but she stood her ground, prepared to stave off the beast as her friends and neighbours ran from the beast. Luckily, the shinigami arrived before she got torn to shreds. They killed the hollow, one of them getting injured in the process. Kisai had often been taught to fear Shinigami, but today she was feeling brave; she asked if she could be a shinigami. They laughed, telling her mockingly that she needed to go to the academy before she joined their ranks. Kisai nodded with her cheeks flaming. She asked directions then headed there later that day.
At the entrance exams, she showed an impressive reiatsu level, but very little control over it. She also showed impressive swordsmanship, her footwork tight and clean. She also swung with a surety and confidence that the others lacked. She was accepted the next day. She packed up, left her home and moved into the academy and began her hard work at training. Her years as the shinigami academy were notable. She was not very good at Kidou, but she excelled in zanjutsu and other martial arts. Her reiatsu control slowly improved, but it was like wrestling a dragon! It took her over ten years to graduate, owing to the lacking Kidou. She did eventually succeed in becoming a shinigami, graduating with several of the older women she’d made friends with over the years. Of course, before graduation came the discovery of her zanpakto.
She woke up with dreams all through the first six years, having visions of a huge silhouette with glaring red eyes surrounded in purple mist. She was having this dream a lot, so she mentioned it to her sensei, to see if it meant anything. Her sensei lied and said that it meant nothing, knowing that she’d have to find her zanpakto on her own. And one night she did.
She felt the call of her zanpakto, from across the grounds. She ran towards it, feeling her chest burn as she ran into a cave that lead deep under the ground, far out in Rukongai. She saw green bioluminescence on the walls and avoided them like the plague. At the very end of the cave, sat on a rock, was a sword with a black hilt and black scabbard. It had red tassels and red wrapping on the handle, giving it a strange appearance for a regular zanpakto. As she approached it, purple mist spread from it and covered the water surrounding the island upon which it sat. Kisai coughed; the miasma was sickening. Suddenly, she found herself face to face with the dragon of her dreams, the dragon of her fears. “Are you my mistress?” The dragon asked. Kisai responded, saying that she was merely an equal. A samurai and her sword were equal parts of the same killing machine; the sword could not cut without the samurai, neither the samurai without the sword. The dragon was pleased with the answer, its red eyes becoming half-lidded. It next question was a strange one;
“If I were to be your sword, would you raise me against those you hold dear?” Kisai, surprisingly, said that she’d swing her sword with a passion for her duty. If she must, she would raise her sword to anyone who threatened the safety of those she protected...even if it was her brother himself, descended into a hollow by the pain of betrayal. The dragon rumbled, before disappearing into its cloud, its last whispers dying on Kisai’s ears; “I am not a tool, I am your partner. You will raise me, and I will cut. You will command my allegiance, but you will not control me. I am not tame, nor am I a pet. Remember this well.”
With that, she was permitted to cross the underground lake and take her sword. She could see its name etched into the scabbard; Ryukage, the Dragon Shadow. So that was what she’d been all this time. She was to eternally live in the shadow of her brother, the dragon. It was ironic that her zanpakto reflected this as she tied it to her belt and walked back to the academy. Ryukage...she knew the name of her zanpakto, but not how to release it. The sword didn’t tell her how to unlock its power.
When she awoke the next morning, she remembered the encounter. The burning letters on the scabbard and in her memory had now faded; Ryukage had removed all memory of himself from her. She simply assumed that she’d encountered and taken her zanpakto. She graduated a few years later, finally strapping on Ryukage as a shinigami. She moved to join the 1st division, wanting to gain more power by watching the head captain and studying their power. Even though she’d graduated, she still wanted to learn, and does to this day.
Combat
Strengths
-Samurai training: She has a good deal of fighting experience and so, can fight better than most grunts. Her martial talents and swordsmanship is that of a samurai, dulled slightly by passing years. She is talented when it comes to footwork, barely moving and wasting little energy. - Incredible Reiatsu: Her reiatsu is higher than normal shinigami. It sits, uncontrollable, at the centre of her being. She can sort of control it sometimes, but when it’s released with her rage, it comes to a flashy display and a lot of extra power in her attacks. However, see weaknesses for the drawbacks of this reiatsu. - Intense Endurance: She can endure hits well. She cannot be knocked out as easily as most shinigami, nor will her bones break as easily. She will shrug pain off quicker too. Performing seppuku enables to to stand great pain without uttering a murmur of grief...
Weaknesses
- Reiatsu: The reiatsu is awful on the rebound. When she uses too much too quickly, she can faint from exhaustion. Also, she cannot fight very well at all when she allows her reiastu off the leash.
- Older Woman: Because she died in her early 40s, she is older than the whipper-snappers that talk to her. Although she looks strong, she’s physically weaker than her younger counterparts.
- Hates her Zanpakto: She cannot use her zanpakto because she hates it. It’s gaudy and overly-beautiful. She likes a quick, easy, precise weapon. The full katana of her zanpakto is not like that at all. She uses her other blades first and foremost. When she unsheathes her zanpakto, you know she’s acknowledged you as a fighter stronger than herself without the aid of her zanpakto. Because of this, she is willing to sustain unnecessary damage.
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