Arashin - The Main Character of our story

 

The Kokutan clan was once the most powerful of the demon clans and one of the most powerful and strongest of the monster clans (Bakemono). During the Bakemono no Ran they paid for their support of the Fue clan with defeat. Only the easternmost possessions of the house were saved, but even these were conquered by the Yatai Empire about a century later. After millennia in which they had been masters of their own destiny, the Kokuden were eventually forced to surrender and become vassals of the Daikura clan.

This act of surrender led to serious consequences in the demon clan.

On the one hand there were those who accepted the surrender, believing that it was not dishonourable to serve those who wandered stronger, others killed themselves by performing seppuku so as not to be ashamed of their defeat, and finally there were those who went into hiding together with the ninja clan of the Demon Flower.

Again humiliated during the era of slaughter, the clan meditated revenge.

For centuries, the Demonic Gods, the atavistic gods of the Oni had remained dormant.

Suijin and the elder sorcerers of the clan, led by the evil and devious Kuroten plan to awaken their powers, so that they can use them to once again throw Yatai and perhaps the whole of Shin-Rin into chaos, take revenge and, why not, finally assume power over all the islands by establishing a Demon Empire.

But while Suijin, the eldest of the Kokutan brothers and head of the clan, dreams only of revenge and power, the second son Arashin wants nothing to do with the demonic empire and revenge.

After a duel with his brother, a duel which Arashin lost badly, he abandoned the clan's ancestral home, Kagearashi Castle, and wanders the country as Ronin

During his travels he befriends several people, the young nekomata priest Ryo and the tanuki priestess Hisame, for whom Arashin has more than just friendship.

Under his protection he also took in young Tatsuki, a mysterious child whom Arashin rescued from bandits. The boy does not speak, but plays the transverse flute with incredible mastery.

Arashin wanders around Yatai as the political situation degenerates and the country approaches civil war once again. At the same time he is spied on by his brother's agents, who fear he may get in the way of the plan to awaken the Demon Gods.

Arashin is a fencing master, second only to his brother in the style of the Dark Haeart Blade, the traditional school of the Kokuden clan.

Apparently Arashin is a ruthless warrior who knows no mercy, but this is but a suit of armour he has built for himself to defend himself against the hate-filled environment where he has always lived. He plays himself as stoic bully, In reality he cares deeply for his friends and is prepared to die

for them.