Kaemon's Hunt

The small eta woman cringes and draws back from the man's hot breath. "I-I-I'm sorry, O-Crab-sama, but I don't know where he went. He l-l-left behind his belongings and made for the d-door not more than ten minutes ago."

An angry voice replies, "Show me his room," as his arm lazily points his massive, wicked spear to the guest rooms of the inn.

Kaemon followed the eta to the room, wary of each step he takes. When she opens the door for him he pushes her out of his way, none to gently, with the safer end of his spear. Stepping into the room, he takes it's measure while pacing calmly. Suddenly he puts his massive spear under the bed and flips it across the room and out of the couner. It would be hard for most to notice but his senses picked up the smell. With the bed out of the way his eyes confirmed the spots where the floorboards had been scrubbed clean of blood, proabably a week earlier. He brings his spear down hard on the wood, causing it to shatter and create a large hole in the floor. Peering in he sees a leg, barely visible in the shadows under the floorboards.

Stepping outside the room, slamming the door behind him, he looks at the eta woman. "Get a yoriki to clean up this room...NOW!" He is visibly upset at the womans incompetence and inability to act with anything resembling haste. His brow furrows as he walks to the front door of the inn, the woman having already taken off at a dead sprint.

Outside the building he kneels by the door and looks over the trails left by many people during the day. As he does so, another man approaches with a bow slung over his back. He looks to Kaemon incredulously, "I could hear you destroy the room from down the street. You know you don't have to be so rough with the heimin don't you?"

Rather than responding to the Hiruma's statement he just looks up at the man, no contempt, no anger... just duty. He points to the ground and traces some of the footsteps with an invisible line from his finger heading east. "That set has the limp you gave him. He won't escape a second time."

Kaemon stands and leads the way at a brisk pace, stopping every 20 yards or so to make sure he still had the tracks. He and the scout were more than a match for a man with a wounded leg, and in an hour they were right behind him. As they get closer Hiruma Daikemi fired a flaming arrow into the sky to indicate their position for the rest of the team. In only a few minutes they arrive, Kuni Josuke at their lead.

"He likely saw the arrow and has already summoned an oni if he has gotten to that point of desperation, and I assume he is. Be ready, this will be a rough fight," the imposing Kuni's words are chilling but true. The rest of the team merely nodded to Josuke's words.

After given the command, Kaemon leads the entire team on the last leg of the chase. They arrive at there location and find an oni slavering over a pile of heimin corpses near an overturned wagon. At the sound of the two kuni beginning their prayers, a large hida and Kaemon rush the beast. Kaemon repeatedly slashes and stabs the beast from around the Hida with his massive spear while Daekemi circles it, firing arrow after arrow into it's body. After a few seconds of it thrashing about, wailing in pain and agony, the two Kuni finish their prayer and the oni immediately falls to the ground in a gory mess.

Kaemon shakes the gore from his spear and waits in turn for one of the Kuni to purify him while the other takes care of burning the gore and heimin with a wave of fire. Daekemi stands next to the Toritaka and just says to nobody in particular, "A good hunt."

Kaemon replies his intense gaze scanning the horizon, "A good hunt. Where's the next one."