War priest 3 a summers s.., p.1
War Priest 3: A Summer's Snow, page 1
War Priest
A Summer’s Snow
(Book Three)
By Harmon Cooper
Copyright © 2022 Harmon Cooper
Copyright © 2022 Boycott Books
Edited by Celestian Rince
Proofed by Andi Marlowe
Art by Daniel Kamarudin
Font by Shawn King
Audiobook narrated by Travis Baldree and produced by Podium Audio
www.harmoncooper.com
writer.harmoncooper@gmail.com
Twitter: @_HarmonCooper
Harmon Cooper’s Patreon
All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
War Priest: The Story Thus Far
Part One
.Chapter One.
.Chapter Two.
.Chapter Three.
.Chapter Four.
.Chapter Five.
.Chapter Six.
.Chapter Seven.
.Chapter Eight.
Part Two
.Chapter One.
.Chapter Two.
.Chapter Three.
.Chapter Four.
.Chapter Five.
.Chapter Six.
.Chapter Seven.
.Chapter Eight.
Part Three
.Chapter One.
.Chapter Two.
.Chapter Three.
.Chapter Four.
.Chapter Five.
.Chapter Seven.
.Chapter Eight.
.Back of the Book.
Other notable works by Harmon Cooper
War Priest: The Story Thus Far
(Contains spoilers!)
Arik Dacre is just graduating from the Sacred Branch of Wound Transfer at the Academy of Healing Arts when his school is attacked. His instructor, Master Guri Yarna, helps him escape, but not before the disciple is certain his parents and his sister are killed. Still with a will to survive, Arik is taken as a slave by a group of bandits where he meets the academy’s groundkeeper, Jinmo. Realizing he has to do something, Arik escapes and meets a water kami named Meosa in a cave, a kami that has been sealed away for five hundred years.
Vowing to save Jinmo, Arik heads to the border city of Omoto where he finds that Jinmo has been forced to take part in combat. Arik intervenes, but isn’t able to heal Jinmo in time. To hide from authorities and to get his bearings, he works in an infirmary alongside a tanuki named Master Kojiro and a nursemaid named Indra. Reuniting with Meosa, Arik decides to head south to Mogra, to the land of his enemies, hoping that he’ll be able to find a visiting lecturer named Master Nankai who once taught Arik how to use a sword.
Crossing the desert between the Jadean city of Omoto and Mogra proves to be difficult. Arik encounters a mysterious kitsune-masked woman along the way who disappears the next day. After reaching the Double Blade School of Combat, Arik is confronted by Combat Master Altai, who tells him what has become of Nankai. He gives Arik a biography about Coro Pache and sends him on his way, back north to Iga, where he can train and then return to Mogra in a few weeks to compete in a tournament that will put him in direct contact with the warlord Nobunaga. It is in this biography that Arik learns of the Mask of the Fallen.
On his way to Iga, he meets a man named Hojo, who turns out to be a master illusionist technically classified as a Hidden Warrior, whose school has been disbanded. Hojo is looking for something as well in the Jade Realm, but he isn’t clear about this at first. He does, however, offer to help train Arik and to help him find the Mask of the Fallen. Arik studies some of the basics of the School of Illusion, including disguises and deception. Hojo doesn’t instruct him on Chimaura, but Arik does learn several moves from the master illusionist, techniques like the Autumn Leaves Strike, which allows him to easily disarm an opponent.
Alongside Hojo, Arik journeys to Iga where he faces off against several opponents—Istvan, a man from the north with a flaming hammer; Nyoko, a Jadean woman from the mountains with an axe; Tatum, a Crimson blade on a warrior pilgrimage; and Akamatsu, a retired Crimsonian blade. His training is cut short when Hojo announces that a Jadean businessman known as Kogu is in Iga, and he happens to have the Mask of the Fallen, which turns out to be a lie.
What Kogu actually has are documents that relate to the movement of Crimsonian weapons through the Jade Realm, documents that Arik uses his newfound infiltration techniques to procure. This puts him into direct conflict with the kitsune-masked woman he met in the desert, who easily bests him in a fight before disappearing. Angry that Hojo has lied to him, Arik returns to their place to get his things where he notices, for the first time, the effects of Chimaura on his own form. Hojo apologizes, and promises to take Arik to a female shaman known as an itako who can get help them get the Mask of the Fallen. Arik is also interested in obtaining Coro Pache’s Whispering Sword, but because the text he has about the object is unclear about its location, this quest can wait.
They reach the itako, who has them perform a ritual in a space said to be the barrier between the living and the dead. Arik is able to obtain the Mask of the Fallen, but he also witnesses something strange in the process as he sees Hojo with his face melting away, only to return back to normal.
Wearing the Mask of the Fallen allows Arik to see a red line connecting from his weapon to the most fatal point on his opponent. He also notices a sense of bloodlust when the mask is on, and that the mask seems to be communicating with him in some way.
Arik, Hojo, and Meosa head to Omoto, where Arik and Hojo part so the disciple can take part in the tournament in the Crimson Realm, Arik arriving just in time to join it. Now wearing the mask, and with his newfound combat knowledge courtesy of Hojo, Arik looks to win the tournament which will put him directly in touch with the warlord Nobunaga.
Even worse, Arik sees the head priest Master Guri Yarna with the warlord, his main instructor back at the Academy of Healing Arts. To rub salt in the wound, Master Guri Yarna is joined by Mori Ehara, Arik’s young sister, the only other person seemingly spared in the slaughter at his academy. Vowing to get even, Arik works his way through his tournament opponents, including a woman with dual blades who is later spared by Nobunaga. Even though he could beat him, Arik forfeits his match against Domen, the herder that once helped him in Mogra, which sends him straight to the chopping block. Anyone that survives their match and isn’t crowned winner of the tournament is executed.
Arik and the others who have lost their matches are led to a hole in the desert that is said to be bottomless. Before Nobunaga begins executing people, he turns his focus to Master Altai, the combat master at the Double Blade School of Combat Arts who helped Arik a few weeks back. Nobunaga claims that Master Altai has been working against him and subsequently has the man thrown into the pit. As he’s being led to his death, Altai shouts to Arik that Master Nankai, his former combat instructor who is rumored to be dead, is indeed alive.
After being discovered by Nobunaga, Arik is thrown into the pit, where he is saved by Meosa. The two float along the side of the bottomless hole until the executions are over, and once Nobunaga and his entourage have left, Arik and Meosa safely leave the area, the disciple vowing to meet up with Hojo and continue his campaign to not only kill Nobunaga, but rescue his sister in the process.
Book Two
The second installment, War Priest: The Whispering Sword, begins with Arik Dacre fending off false shinobi on the beaches of Katano. He has led them away from Kogu’s fortresses, allowing Hojo to gather more information while Arik distracts Kogu’s men. Hojo and Arik meet later, and Hojo reveals that his daughter has already discovered the information he was looking for, which is related to a supply chain near the city of Iga that Kogu is running for Nobunaga. She has also taken some of the key papers, which means she’s on the same trail as her father, only ahead.
Hojo has promised Arik that he will help him get the Whispering Sword based on the limited information they have, which is written in Coro Pache’s biography. To do so, Hojo leads Arik to Moonagwa, a western Jadean city known for its tight security. Along the way, they encounter false shinobi disguised as Jadean soldiers. Hojo also demonstrates Chimaura to Arik by wiping the minds of the family after Arik heals their daughter.
Arik and Hojo take shelter at a Hidden Warrior safe house outside Moonagwa. They infiltrate the city and meet with an itako, who uses a ritual to reveal the rest of the information regarding the Whispering Sword’s location. The itako tells them that the sword is at the Moonagwa graveyard, in one of the crypts. The only way to discover which crypt it is in will be to use a crystal cylinder to interpret an image left in the Coro Pache book. Luckily, Meosa knows a crystal kami that lives nearby named Sukitoma who can make the crystal they need.
Arik and Hojo return to the safe house, where they are ambushed by Sengum Minamoto, the Hidden Warrior who betrayed Hojo and led to the disbandment of the School of Illusion. Sengum triggers explosives. Arik and Hojo barely escape with their lives. After regrouping, they head to the west, toward Sukitoma’s Crystal Castle. They learn that a giant skeleton known as a gashadokuro is guarding the castle, and upon confronting the yokai, they are challenged to a fight. Hojo and Arik beat the giant skeleton yokai, who reveals that his name is Basha. He’s guarding the lake at Sukitoma’s request. Basha tells Arik and Hojo he’ll help them take out Nobunaga’s supply chain outs
After meeting with Sukitoma, who makes the crystal cylinder they need to decipher the message in Coro Pache’s autobiography, Arik, Hojo, and Meosa return to Moonagwa. They gain access to the crypt and battle the Whispering Sword, Arik only able to get control of it after he holds the grip of the weapon while wearing the Mask of the Fallen. They leave that night to a safe house outside of Iga, where Hojo encounters his daughter Tayaura. Arik learns that he has met Tayaura already, once as a barmaid and also in the southern desert, where they traveled together while she was masked.
After a brief fight, Tayaura agrees to join them in bringing down Nobunaga’s supply chain. She corroborates the information she has stolen from Kogu with what Arik and Hojo know, and a plan is hatched. The only problem for Arik is that he still doesn’t know how to use the Whispering Sword to its full extent. Much to his disappointment, Hojo sends Arik to Iga, where he will need to train to use his new weapon. He agrees to meet with Arik in a week.
Penniless, Arik is able to quickly gain money by first begging and later by gambling through Meosa’s aid. They take up residence in a nice hotel, and discover that the warrior Istvan is rooming across from them. Also from the Onyx Realm, Istvan tells Arik he’d like to have a meal with him sometime.
For the next several days, Arik trains with a Crimson warrior named Akamatsu, the two forced to train with the Whispering Sword overnight and to work on Arik’s various techniques, like the One-Count Strike, during the day. Each morning, Arik is greeted by Istvan, who confesses that he used to be a disciple himself before returning to the border city of Austere to work for his father. This is how Istvan is able to use his flaming hammer.
After one night of training, Arik finds Istvan waiting for him. The northern man reveals that Nobunaga has come through town and that he would like to do something about it. Arik admits that he is a disciple, and it is agreed that they both are working toward a similar cause. Istvan says he’ll meet him the following morning alongside a Jadean woman named Nyoko, and the three will head to the Valleys of the Unknown together.
Arik tries to recruit Akamatsu to join them, but the Crimsonian’s loyalty to his country forces him to challenge the disciple instead. Arik kills Akamatsu, only to find that the older man used the money Arik had paid him for training to buy a grave for himself in a warrior’s cemetery. Arik feels remorse for what has happened, but Meosa assures him that Akamatsu has died honorably and they return to the hotel to meet Istvan and Nyoko.
Istvan, Arik, and Nyoko head to the Valleys of the Unknown and set up camp near the first camp of Nobunaga’s military build-up and supply chain. Basha later joins them. Because they’ve yet to have contact with Hojo or Tayaura, Arik and Meosa disguise themselves and head to the market that has sprung up outside the walls of the camp. They encounter Tayaura working as a barmaid, who explains that her father is inside the walls and hasn’t had any contact with her yet.
Tayaura and Arik return to the others to wait for Hojo. The next morning, the female illusionist admits that she was at Arik’s Academy when it was attacked, that the two actually fought. She feels terrible about this and tells him the only reason she was there was to root out Sengum Minamoto.
Hojo appears soon after, the master illusionist wearing a wooden bird beak over his face and carrying ten bird cages across his shoulders. He explains that they’re going to use flammable wax to attach wood shavings to the legs of sparrows, light them on fire, and the sparrows will return to their nests, under the thatched roofs sheltering Nobunaga’s siege weapons. He also tells them that Nobunaga will give a speech that afternoon.
After dealing with some skepticism from Istvan, Hojo, Tayaura, and Arik leave for the first camp. They separate at that point, Hojo maintaining his disguise as a bird monger and Arik and Tayaura dressed as Crimsonian blades. They join the crowd waiting to hear Nobunaga speak. Before Nobunaga appears on the stage, several others step out that Arik recognizes—Sengum Minamoto; Master Guri Yarna, his healing instructor; Tatum and the female Crimsonian blade Arik once fought; and Sonjin, who was Master Altai’s student and murderer.
Nobunaga sacrifices a Jadean man and then delivers a speech to rouse his troops, telling them that the North is theirs for the taking, and that his government gets the riches while the soldiers can do whatever they want with the men, women, and children. He also tells the troops that he’s holding a northern girl captive, who will later marry his son, which Arik assumes is in reference to his sister, Mori Ehara. A sparrow flies overhead, its body on fire, signaling that Hojo’s attack has begun.
Arik strikes Nobunaga with the Whispering Sword and the fight kicks off. While Enenra, the air kami, and Meosa fight overhead, Arik takes on Sonjin, Tatum, and the Crimsonian woman. Tayaura fights the false shinobi, and is struck down by Sengum Minamoto. Before he can deliver a deathblow, Hojo appears directly behind Sengum and using either Chimaura or Thunderaura, or likely both, he switches places with his daughter just as Sengum cuts her head off.
Hojo is decapitated, leaving Tayaura to avenge his death, which she does quickly, killing Sengum with the crystal kunai. Unfortunately, Hojo’s wound isn’t something Arik can heal. Tayaura approaches him, now wearing Sengum’s hat which belonged to her father’s teacher, Hirokuni. She tells Arik that Hojo wanted him to have his conical hat and his sword. Arik reluctantly takes these items and they work to escape, Meosa carrying Hojo’s body and head.
They rendezvous with Istvan, Nyoko, and Basha outside of the first camp, where merchants have also started fighting against Crimsonians and sellswords. The group escapes together, all aside from Basha, who will leave on his own terms. After they’ve reached a clearing, it is decided that they will first go to Moonagwa to place Hojo’s body in the Whispering Sword’s crypt. They will also visit an itako, who can perhaps help them locate the double that Hojo may have left behind. After they’ve done that, Arik, Istvan, Meosa, Nyoko, and Tayaura will head to the Crimson Realm, where they will finish what Hojo has started, and rescue Arik’s sister.
The World of Taomoni
The world of Taomoni is divided into three distinct realms. The northernmost realm is known as the Onyx Realm; the central realm is known as the Jade Realm; and the southernmost realm is known as the Crimson Realm. The realms have been at odds in various ways over the last 1500 years of recorded history. Because it is between the two, the Jade Realm has often served as the primary place of conflict for the Onyx and Crimson Realm. While the aggressor in Arik Dacre’s story is the Crimson Realm, this hasn’t always been the case. Five hundred years before Arik was born, Coro Pache, a man from the Crimson Realm famously known as the War Priest, helped repel an invasion from the Onyx Realm.
Chi cultivation
There are three main branches of chi cultivation in Taomoni—Revivaura, Thunderaura, and Chimaura—as well as a lesser-known fourth branch, Yokaura.
Revivaura is what disciples in the Onyx Realm study. It has water-like properties, and advanced levels of it allow a disciple to do everything from growing new bones and organs to transferring wounds they’ve stored up.
Thunderaura is an electric, combat aspect of chi studied by people known as blades in the Crimson Realm. This usage of chi allows Crimsonians to amplify their strength and stamina, as well as their speed in combat.
Chimaura is studied by illusionists and shinobi in the Jade Realm’s School of Illusion. Little is known about this smoky aspect of chi, and Hidden Warriors rarely speak about it. From what Arik has seen, Chimaura allows someone to do things on a more psychological level, but there are physiological aspects to it as well, including the power to change one’s appearance. The shamans of the Jade Realm, known as itakos, also utilize an aspect of Chimaura to deliver their readings.
Yokaura is an ancient aspect of chi said to have been practiced by yokai and kami. Knowledge of its existence is mostly forgotten, and it is no longer practiced or studied in Taomoni.
Part One
.Chapter One.
“Before you deceive others, you need to understand how to deceive yourself.”
