Kage, Shogun

Section 1: Basic Information

Last Name, First Name: Kage, Shogun
Gender: Male
Age: 36
Birthday: June 14
Height: 6'6"
Weight: 312 lbs

Specializations: Kenjutsu, Taijutsu, Fuuinjutsu, Kyujutsu
Starting Weapon(s):

Type of Equipment: Weapon -> Polearm -> Naginata
Description: This naginata is seven feet long, two feet of blade and five feet of hilt. The blade itself shines in the light right down to its perfectly crafted cutting edge. The hilt is wrapped in silk which allows the user to keep a firm grip on the blade even while it is wet. Some samurai choose to wrap the blade of their naginata in either a cloth or leather wrap that can easily be removed if needed.
Ability (or Abilities): n/a
Durability: This weapon is crafted out of __________ and is thus as durable as that element
History of Item:
Appearance:

Spoiler:

Kenko: Steel
Kenshi: Titanium
Kengo: Corundum
Kensei: Tungsten
Kenjin: Diamond

All Swords are still made of some type of metal, the hardness chart is just how durable the sword is compared to other materials

Rank: Kensei
Loyalties: Ronin

Section 2: Personality

Personality: Shogun personifies the term "lone-wolf." As a child, he was spoiled with the best trainers and mentors money could buy, and after growing up into the real world as a samurai, he has grown the attitude of not needing help from anyone but himself, because he is the best. He envelopes sarcasm as being a virtue, and uses it as his primary means of speech. Despite all of these characteristics that closely resemble that of a jackass, Shogun is an honourable man. Even with his ingrained personality, the values of the samurai remain ever present. Honour in battle above all else, and victory falls second.
Likes: He likes primarily three things above most things, and those things are simplicities that have fallen into the life of a man that grew up like Shohun had. Those three things would be alcohol, women, and weapons. It is rare to find Shogun anywhere without some form of alcohol or an attractive woman on his arm, usually though it's both. With weapons, he treats them like women treat shoes. He collects them and cares for them, keeping them sharpened and polished until the day he must taint them, after which he starts all over again.
Dislikes/Fears: Dislikes? That's an easy category to fill with Shogun onto pages upon pages. You see, after going through several stages in his life, from pamperment to disappointment to suffering and back, Shogun has acquired quite a dislike for the world and the people that fill it. He has only become close with one other person, and that person is the only other samurai that he has grown to respect as a sentient being, and that would only be because that very man cares almost less for the world than he does. That, however, does not mean that he trusts him. Shogun has one philosophy in life, despite his yearning to be the most honorable opponent this world has seen, he does not expect that of his opponents. This is because of his one true belief in the world as we know it:

Everybody lies.

Motivation: Shogun's motivation used to be one that yearned to fight for the Empire, but after several years of doing so, his dreams changed drastically. He now hates the war after seeing what it has brought to the world, and he pities all who were affected by it. Now, his only two purposes for living are to become stronger with every passing day, and to end the war. And when both of those are finally obtained, he can start the walk towards his one goal that has been hiding from him through his entire life. More than anything, Shogun Kenko wishes to be made immortal. To live forever.

Section 3: Background

Character History:


Shogun Kage, the Fist of the West and Bane of Demons, was born amongst a common samurai village known to those that do not inhabit it as the 14th Territory of the Dai Shukun Empire. During the middle of the First Era, the territory was conquered by soldiers of the Empire, and it was quickly turned into the birthplace of many of the Empire's finest warriors, which Shogun would eventually be a part of. Shortly after the Empire settled themselves down in the 14th territory, known by the highly superstitious and mythic natives as the Land of Fallen Stars, a caste system had been implanted into the village. It separated the nobles and warriors from the commonfolk, which would later be what sealed the fate of Shogun's family, the family of Shadow.

The Kage family was fortunate enough to be on the upper hand of the castes, as Shogun's father that carried the name of Senso happened to be part of the magistrate of the village, and remained in his position even when the Empire took over the village. Being a part of the village magistrate brought the family much honour, even in the disheartening game of politics, but unfortunately that left Shogun with much less of a present father figure as he would have liked. Senso made his family rich, trying to make up for the fact that after his wife had died in childbirth and he could not bring himself to chase after another woman in any way. Shogun was in fact Senso's miracle child in many senses of the word, and so he felt that it was necessary to treat him as such. Firstly, Shogun was born to a woman that was declared infertile by the local herbalist and medicine man. His mother did pay the price for defying the laws of her body, and suffered a painful death as Shogun passed from her womb. Secondly, and perhaps the most prominent of all, Shogun was born with a strange mark covering his entire right arm, like that of a tattoo. All of the etchings marked into his skin resembled holy things. One of the markings says, "Demon bane," and another says, "Angel Incarnate." These markings meant a great deal to the people of the highly superstitious village, and because of these more than lucky blessings, Shogun was praised as a miracle by more than just his father. It was thought that one day, Shogun would become the savior of the village, and eventually after that, he would become the savior of the Empire.


For the first ten years of Shogun's life, he was held almost in captivity by the samurai village that had given birth to him. They kept him in the courtyard of the Great Monks, the village's religious gathering place where the townsfolk often met with the monks to make sacrifices or pay homage to the gods. There is where the monks trained him. The monks were considered the strongest Samurai of the Northwest, and were also said to be trained by the gods themselves, but that was just a myth. He was trained as a regular samurai, focusing extensively on training him in the arts of Kenjutsu, the handling of weapons, but moreso than that, he was trained as a monk. This means that he was trained in more exotic arts than the regular young samurai of the village were trained. His focus of training was around the art of Taijutsu and body control. After perfecting numerous styles of martial arts, and numerous ways to angle his body in fights so that he was untouchable, the secret of the 14th territory was finally set free into the world to live in the village at his father's manor. He worked, starting then, as an instructor at a peewee samurai training house. He felt it below his talent, but he had to do it as his father instructed that it would be best to learn how to work for yourself at a young age.

Every day after we worked, he returned to the monks to further his training and honed his skill. He was taught lessons of history, and of the local folklore, mathematics, tactics, and for reasons that the monks would not yet reveal to him, they taught him extensively about the planes of heaven and hell.


At the turning point of Shogun's life is when things began to reveal themselves to him. He was twelve years old, and the village had finally decided they needed to formally make him public to the rest of the Empire, what they didn't expect is what happened at his coronation into being officially proclaimed a Samurai. At the ceremony, when the head monk presented the blade in which for Shogun to cut his hair off, as was tradition, a beam of blinding light shot through the window of the cathedral and shown itself directly on Shogun. When the light hit Shogun, his eyes lit up bright white, and beams of light emitted from his fingers and mouth as well. He turned to the audience, and in a voice that sounded as if it came from a million spirits, he said, "This is my servant. He will be known as the Slayer of Hell, the Bane of Demons, and the Prophet of the West. For confining him here in the village has been a crime punishable by the worst, and I demand that you set him free. He is the monk of the modern world, and only he can do my work."

After that day, Shogun's life changed dramatically. The ceremony was finished with haste, and Shogun was proclaimed a Kensei, a Saint of the Sword, a rank only given to hardened Samurai. Shogun expected even more praise from the entire village than he had received before, but his arrogance was met with disappointment. The village was afraid of him. His father was afraid of him, and he was branded as a traitor to the village because no god of theirs would talk to them in such fashion, automatically making him a blasphemer on top of all things. Shogun went into a rage, not only at the village for casting him out as being a demon, but for not finishing his training. He knew he was holy, and honestly all he cared about was meeting that title one day. He decided that he couldn't do that without first figuring out more about the markings on his arm.


Shogun infiltrated the courtyard of the monks in the late of the night, and broke into the library. It took him about an hour to throw all of the books he found involving anything about heaven or hell into his bag. One in particular caught his eye, one labeled "The Heavens Consealed." It seemed a fitting title, and the fact that the word 'concealed' was spelled incorrectly on a book that made it onto the shelves of the Great Monks peaked his curiosity. He placed that one inside the line of his pants with his belt just so he wouldn't misplace it, and it seemed he did so just in time, as the police from the village found him and escorted him into the nearby prison. He was in scorn about the village that he had thought treated him like royally, but then they turned the backs the minute he wanted answers. Not only did they turn his back on him, but they went the extra mile to ruin him as well. In Shogun's mind, it was their faults for him being in here. It was their faults he wasn't considered the village's hidden saint, he was the village's smudge. Their black mark.


A year had gone by, a year in the confines of a cold, stone prison cell for the outcast once called "holy." A year dedicated to a plot of breaking free from those very stone walls, and a year of atonement. Shogun spent that year in prison completely silent, which was a first in his lifetime. He did not speak to the guards, nor to the cellmate that was separated onto the other side of the room. He woke up each morning and performed various workout techniques, followed by reading his smuggles book, followed by more exercise. All the while, he waited for his opportunity to break loose. One day, it came. A guard came back to Shogun's cell and began to slide the food in through the slot in the door. Usually, they threw the food through, but Shogun's silence had given them a false sense of security, so the guard stuck his hand through with the tray before dropping it. Shogun grabbed the man's forearm, and pulled, forcing the man to be pressed up against the other side of the iron door. "Scream, cough, say anything.. and your arm is mine. Now unlock the door and you'll live." From the other side of the door, the man unlocked it in a hurry. Shogun devised a plan to make it look like the man was escorting him somewhere by having the man closely follow him with his hands 'tied' behind his back. After he made it to the gate, he ran for it.

For several days he ran away from the prison, trying to throw anyone that was chasing him off his trail. Eventually, he felt as though he were far enough away, which is when he ran into the man that would become his lifetime friend, Shinobu. He stumbled into a tavern. Not the tavern that you'd think of though, bustling with people and drinks and women, no this tavern was quite different. It was solemnly quiet, with a bartender slowly scrubbing the bar, seemingly in a trance. No lights were on, and no patrons were present. Shogun stumbled up to the bar after several days of running with no food or water. He explained to the barkeep that he needed a bed, but the barkeep didn't say a word, he just pointed to a hatch on the floor. Shogun assumed this meant that his room was down there, so he opened it and climbed the ladder down to the basement. The basement had a fireplace and several tables topped with mugs of ale. Shogun looked around to realize that this wasn't a bedroom, it was filled with boys a bit older than he was, who were laughing and drinking and being merry. When he walked in, all of them looked at him and stopped what they were doing. Eventually, after the awkward greeting, Shogun became acquainted with this band of outcast boys like himself, that were led by a boy named Shinobu, who had long been referred to as the demon-boy of the village. This gang, throughout the years, lasted as a means for survival for Shogun and his new friends, but soon after, it became something worse. The gang began to steal for power and wealth and quarrel amongst themselves. Shinobu, who had always been an honorable man, left the gang, and almost a month later, Shogun left too to find him.


No matter how hard he tried, Shogun was never able to find Shinobu amidst the world they lived in. War had consumed the continent, and hope was looking slim for Shogun. After about a decade of searching for his lost friend, he decided it was time to call it quits. He remembered the dreams of his pompous childhood, and realized that he had a job option lined up for him. He was going to join the army, and fight as a a Samurai in the Imperial Army. Throughout his time in the army, he was taught several things, mainly that the Empire he fought for was the only and supreme ruler of the land, and that nothing existed outside. The other thing he learned from the officers in the army was that he was a demon, the opposite of heaven-sent, but that he was an asset to the military. He fought as a common footsoldier, slaying thousands with naught but his hands and polearm. It was a bloody war, a war that he would never finish, because he finally found out the truth about his arm. He was told that he was a demon, a spawn of the trickster, and that the Empire was all that he needed to worry about, but those things couldn't have been more wrong.

The morning after a raid on a local city, Shogun woke up at his military camp, but he didn't actually wake up in the tent he had fallen asleep in. He woke up in a lush, grassy valley. A waterfall fell in the distance, and a stream ran past his feet. A gentle breeze accompanied the warm sun that touched his skin. "Surely, this is heaven." He thought to himself, immediately assuming that he had died in the attack the day before. "Indeed." replied a spectral being, "You are Shogun Kage, the Shadow of War and the Saint of the West. You were bred for a special purpose," the voice continued, "You were meant to rid the world of the demons that plague it, even if that must mean journeying to the immortal planes. Shogun, your training and battle experience have reached an adequate potential, and although you will continue to grow stronger, your talents are needed elsewhere. When you wake up, you will be in the world of the tainted shinobi, and your Blessed Seal will be unlocked. The power of the heavens is at your disposal. Now go, and do vengeance on the wicked." And with that a writhing pain shot up through Shogun's arm, and he crippled over in pain. When he woke up, he was in a tavern. The tavern was lively, and the people inhabiting it seemed to be just like he was, sporting similar accents and weapons. But when he walked outside, he was standing on a cloud. He had been taken to the Village of the Sky, Aerogakure.

RP Sample: Tubes were sprouting from my chest, or what was left of my chest, carrying various fluids and nutrients into my body to the areas that the dismantled ribs and snapped diaphragm were blocking the blood from flowing. A hoarse wheeze escaped me as I tried to take a breath, only to remember that I had a machine to do that for me now too. I was in so much pain, so much more pain that I had ever felt before. It was what I deserved though. I threw the fight to not hurt my friend, and in doing so, my friend hurt me. It was a sacrifice that I accepted with grace even before it happened.

And so now, I laid in the bed of the hospital of Aerogakure as a wounded man. It would be a long time before my wounds were healed, and I was extremely grateful that I had finished my appearance at the Summit before I received the blow to my chest. Yeah, Aeran Uchiha would be taking it easy for awhile. While in the hospital for several days, I knew that I had already reached my decision for what to do after I got out of this treatment center.

The nurse walked in, and after giving me a pitied expression, she said with a sadness, "Just here to increase your dose, Aeran." She knew my first name because of an.. encounter.. I had had with her in the time I spent here prior for me setting off to the desert. I meant to laugh and say, "Oh, take your time," but all that came out through the medical tape that wrapped my entire face and body except for my left eye was a cough and a cringe and grimace of pain. She left a few moments later, and I returned to thinking to myself once more. There was no point in trying to participate in the oncoming war in this state, and no point in trying to rebuild a village, so there was only one thing left to do. I had more than proven myself in the Exams, and after the results would be announced in the coming week, hopefully I would be in tact enough to go out on my own. And then I would meet with Ventus to tell him to find Ayame and return to New Uchiha. There he would instruct the people and help them rebuild, and in one year's time, I would return. I needed to take this year of rest to train my body and get it up to its maximum potential.

Bump