Location: The Inner Sanctum, Kiyosu Castle.
Current Date/Time: Morning. Late Summer, 1559.
The late-summer heat of Owari province pressed a suffocating, wet blanket over the flatland fortress. Outside the heavy timber walls, the shrill, unbroken scream of thousands of cicadas vibrated right through the humid air, rattling the teeth in Soma's skull. The stagnant moat water baked under the morning sun, sending up a thick, choking stench of rotting river reeds and warm, fermented mud.
"A stick and a river stone," Oda Nobunaga said.
The Warlord did not turn around. He walked ahead down the polished cypress corridor with long, sweeping strides. His dark gray silk kosode snapped and rustled, the sharp, violent friction of the fabric cutting straight through the deafening drone of the insects outside.
"You broke the earth's grip on my fortress with dead wood and a pebble," Nobunaga continued, his voice a low rumble that seemed to vibrate the floorboards.
Soma forced his stiff, bruised legs to keep pace. The deep muscles in his thighs and lower back burned with a hot, spreading fire. Hauling that massive cedar log in the freezing mud had pushed his soft, uncalloused body to its absolute breaking point.
"It wasn't just the wood, Lord Nobunaga," Soma rasped. He swallowed down a hard cramp seizing his calf. "It was the pivot. The fulcrum."
Nobunaga tested the foreign word on his tongue. "You speak in spells, Ghost."
"It is not magic," Soma said. He ground his teeth together as his frayed straw sandals slapped heavily against the wood. Beneath his weight, the hidden iron clamps of the nightingale floors chirped violently. "I took the crushing weight of the gate and used the length of the log to cheat it. I made your men's downward force travel further, so the short end would lift harder."
Nobunaga slowed his pace. He glanced over his broad shoulder. His gold-flecked eyes tracked the heavy sweat rolling down Soma's neck, stinging the deep purple bruise blooming along the engineer's jawline.
"You cheat the iron," Nobunaga mused, watching Soma wince as the coarse hemp of his borrowed robe dragged like sandpaper against his raw skin with every slight shift of his arms. "You find a clever, invisible line to slip beneath the crushing weight."
"The earth made the rules," Soma said, fighting to keep his breathing shallow and even. "I simply know how to read them."
Nobunaga turned his gaze forward again. His bare feet moved flawlessly over the acoustic floorboards. He made absolutely no sound, leaving the high-pitched, metallic squeaks entirely to Soma's stumbling, exhausted steps.
"Reading the dirt kept you alive this morning," Nobunaga said softly, a predatory amusement returning to his voice. "But cleverness only sharpens my curiosity. I wish to see what other invisible lines you hide."
An attendant knelt at the end of the hall. As Nobunaga approached, the servant bowed until his forehead pressed flat against the floorboards, his hands sliding blindly forward to grip the edges of the sliding cedar doors.
The doors parted.
The heavy cedar doors hissed shut behind them, instantly severing the scream of the cicadas. The silence left behind was so absolute it made Soma's ears ring. The stagnant air tasted of green, freshly harvested rush-grass pulled tight over the tatami mats, layered under the cloying, throat-coating sweetness of burning agarwood and the dry dust of ancient cedar beams. Amber sunlight bled through the thick paper screens, stretching long, bruised shadows across the floorboards.
Dead center on the woven grass sat the black Samsonite trunk.
It was exactly where they had left it the night before. The hard, matte-black plastic swallowed the amber light, refusing to reflect the glow. It sat on the ancient straw like a dark, fallen meteorite.
Nobunaga stepped onto the mats. He did not sit.
The Warlord began a slow, predatory circle around the luggage. He moved with a heavy, liquid grace, his gold-flecked eyes mapping every unnatural edge of the plastic.
"Last night, I dug into this belly and found your strange tools of black glass," Nobunaga murmured, tapping the lid with his iron war fan. "I weighed your cold star in my hands. But a man is not forged entirely by the tools he carries. Open the shell, Ghost. I wish to see what sort of skin you shed when you are not hiding behind your invisible lines."
Soma looked at the trunk. A heavy reluctance anchored his arms to his sides. He had managed to survive the revelation of the electronics, but the bottom half of the suitcase was a chaotic jumble of his personal life. Nobunaga was not asking a question; he was issuing an absolute command.
Soma reached forward. He popped the latches free. They released with a hard, snapping crack. He gripped the edge of the heavy lid and flipped it back.
The lingering scent of synthetic lavender laundry soap and aerosol deodorant mixed instantly with the heavy, ancient smell of the agarwood incense.
Nobunaga did not wait for an invitation. He reached directly into the open trunk.
His large hand completely bypassed the cold aluminum frame of the laptop. His thick fingers dove straight into the main compartment, plunging deep into the folded layers of Soma’s clothing. He pushed aside a folded pair of denim jeans. His rough skin caught audibly on the heavy blue twill.
At the very bottom of the trunk, Nobunaga’s fingers hooked onto a small, rectangular packing block. He hauled it out into the amber light.
It was a packing cube woven from fine, synthetic mesh. Through the translucent netting, a riot of neon color clashed violently against the muted, earthy browns and indigos of the feudal chamber. Acid green, electric blue, and blood crimson fabrics pressed hard against the unnatural mesh.
Nobunaga pinched the tiny metal tab of the zipper and yanked. The sharp, buzzing hiss of the metal teeth separating made the Warlord's eye twitch. He plunged his hand into the netting and dragged out a vibrant, sky-blue athletic garment.
Nobunaga held it high in the air by the thin, spandex waistband. The modern synthetic material was incredibly light, catching the amber light with an unnatural sheen. He grabbed the waistband in both fists and yanked his hands apart. The modern elastic fought back instantly. Nobunaga’s eyes narrowed, feeling the high-frequency, vibrating tension of the spandex resisting his raw strength.
He let go of one side. The elastic snapped back against his calloused palm with a sharp, stinging crack.
“This thread bites like a drawn bowstring, yet it carries absolutely no weight,” Nobunaga demanded, his golden eyes snapping up to Soma’s face. “It offers no defense against an iron blade or the winter wind. What purpose does this serve?”
Soma ground his back teeth together. His jaw locked tight. Sitting on the floor of a warlord's keep and defending the purpose of modern athletic wear stripped away every ounce of his professional armor.
“It is built for survival of a different kind,” Soma rasped. The humiliated flush finally reached his cheeks, burning like a brand against his bruised jaw. “It sheds water instantly and pulls heavy sweat away from the skin. It prevents the friction of movement from tearing a man's flesh so he can keep running.”
Nobunaga’s gold-flecked eyes dilated. He looked from the minimal scrap of sky-blue fabric down to Soma’s waist, where the coarse hemp robe tied over his hips. A slow, predatory amusement curved the Warlord's lips.
"My attendants scoured the river mud from your skin, Ghost," Nobunaga murmured, his voice dropping to a gravelly purr. "They speak of a man with no scars, pale as milk, who shivered like a wet hound in the bathhouse steam. I wonder..."
He hooked a thick finger through the thin waistband, stretching it until the synthetic thread hummed under the pressure.
"...does this screaming blue skin stretch tight over that pampered flesh? Or does it merely slide off those smooth hips? Perhaps I should have you strip away this coarse hemp and wear this instead. A master builder should look the part of the exotic bird he is. I wish to see if the display matches the pride."
A cold, sharp wave of discomfort washed over Soma, instantly hardening into a tight knot in his stomach. The suggestion that he was to be handled like a toy, a delicate plaything to be dressed up and paraded for the Warlord's whim, cut straight through his exhaustion.
A fierce, irritated heat flared in his chest. Soma did not lower his eyes. He leveled a sharp, icy glare directly at Nobunaga, his gaze completely rigid with offense.
"I am an engineer, Lord Nobunaga," Soma said, his voice dropping to a hard, cutting whisper. "I am here to build your gates, not to be paraded around your keep as a toy. I will not wear it."
For a tense, suffocating second, the silence in the room stretched so tight it threatened to snap. Then, a low chuckle started deep within the Warlord’s chest, vibrating out into the room before erupting into a full, booming laugh.
"A toy!" Nobunaga roared, throwing his head back. "You chirp like a trapped sparrow, Ghost, yet you bite like an Mamushi snake when cornered! You have more iron in your tongue than in your hands."
The amusement in the Warlord's eyes was bright and dangerous. He let his empty hands fall loose against his knees.
“You carry vibrant and loud fabrics for a man's flesh inside your box, and you try to call it private,” Nobunaga grinned, his teeth showing white against his dark beard. “You are a strange creature, Ghost. You build massive iron gates with the heavy order of the earth, yet you dress your manhood in brightly colored silk nets.”
Nobunaga tapped his closed fan against his thigh.
“I do not understand your strange threads, but I know when a prized bird is meant for display. That is a cage, Ghost. A cage that exists only to show off the bird.”
Soma kept his hands planted on the edge of the trunk. His face burned. He searched his mind for a dry, deflecting statement to shut the conversation down entirely.
“How we dress affects how we carry ourselves,” Soma said. His voice was stiff. “It is about keeping the mind focused. It has no tactical value in your world. Let us focus on the gates.”
Nobunaga’s smile faded, replaced by a look of intense, cold calculation.
“I do not forget a single thing that I have seen,” Nobunaga countered. His voice returned smoothly to its tone of absolute, unbroken authority.
He looked at Soma’s pale, unscarred hands gripping the black plastic. He looked at the soft skin of Soma’s neck, bruised but unbroken by the sun or the wind.
“I see that you value your own comfort just as much as you value your life,” Nobunaga said, his gaze hard. “Your skin is soft because you specifically choose to wrap it in bright nets and tight ropes. You do not wear iron, because you believe your mind is your armor.”
The Warlord stood up smoothly. His massive, heavily muscled thighs shifted beneath the dark gray silk. He towered over the kneeling engineer.
“Hide your bright armor away, Ghost,” Nobunaga commanded. The amusement was entirely gone from his voice. “If my generals were to see you carrying such strange strings, they would think I have brought a dancing boy into my house rather than a master builder. I will not have my prized asset mocked by brutal men who only understand the harsh friction of a spear hilt.”
Soma looked down at the open suitcase. He grabbed the heavy plastic lid and slammed it shut. He spun the metal dials, locking the latches in place. The sharp clicks finalized the closure.
He pushed himself up from the tatami. His knees screamed in protest, joints popping loudly in the quiet room, but he forced his legs straight.
“It will not show it to them,” Soma said. He looked up at the Warlord.
“This black box will remain in this room,” Nobunaga said. He dismissed the luggage with a sharp, echoing snap of his iron-ribbed fan.
He turned his broad back and walked toward the sliding doors leading to the veranda. The nightingale floors chirped softly under his heavy, deliberate tread.
“Follow me,” Nobunaga said over his shoulder. “A strong gate is entirely useless if there is nothing powerful behind it to strike the enemy. I wish to see if your physics can unmake a bloody problem that has plagued Owari since the dirt was fresh.”
Soma stepped away from the black trunk. He followed the Warlord out of the Inner Sanctum.
They stepped out onto the open wooden veranda. The heat of the late-summer morning hit Soma instantly, wrapping around him like a wet, suffocating blanket. The deafening scream of the cicadas crashed over the timber walls, vibrating in his teeth. He adjusted the coarse hemp sash at his waist, his bruised legs heavy, and stepped forward into the baking sun.