There are seven warriors, and they do what others refuse to do.
Master Hoshigumo was once an abandoned child.
His parents, overwhelmed by famine, left him at the gates of a snow-covered monastery.
But it was not the monks who found him, it was a soldier from the Nobutsune clan.
The child was brought back to the palace.
Nobutsune, then a young lord, saw something unyielding in those dark eyes:
no fear, no tears, no innocence.
He ordered that the child be raised in the shadows,
that he be made into a silent weapon,
a son of nothingness.
Thus was born the first of the Hoshigumo,
and from him sprang an entire clan.
They were his heirs not by blood,
but by pain.
Their loyalty was priceless,
for they knew nothing but the hand that had created them.
It is said that when they swore their oath to the patriarch,
the snow stopped falling for seven days.
Since that time, the Hoshigumo have sworn by one law:
to serve until they are reduced to ashes.
It was late at night when they finally arrived.
Seven warriors.
Seven assassins.
The children of nothingness, most loyal to the patriarch.
By torchlight, they knelt.
Their breath mingled with the mist, their shadows lengthening across the stone floor.
None of them looked up.
The silence hung heavy, heavier than iron.
Patriarch Nobutsune watched them for a long time.
Then he uttered a single word,
clear, cold, irrevocable:
"Begin."
They already knew.
No explanation was given, no prayer whispered.
At that word, their silhouettes faded away,
swallowed by the darkness of the palace.
The wind rose.
And once again, the world held its breath.
Soon, they would set out for the Temple of Asira.
But no one could read their future.
For even the gods look away
when men go forth to defy death.