Katsuyori no Shigehira was born the second son of a minor branch of the Takeda clan, famed horsemen of Kai Province. Unlike his elder brother, destined to inherit the family’s estates, Shigehira was raised with the freedom of a “spare” son. He found solace in the bow more than the sword, training tirelessly until he could strike a hawk in mid-flight. His skill with the yumi earned him the nickname “Taka no Me” (“The Hawk’s Eye”) among his peers.

But Shigehira’s life wasn’t all glory. During the Takeda clan’s decline after Nagashino, when Oda Nobunaga’s guns tore apart their cavalry, Shigehira refused to surrender to despair. While many Takeda samurai abandoned their banners, he swore a personal oath on his leopard-skin sash—that his clan’s spirit would never vanish from the battlefield so long as he lived.

He became a wandering warrior, moving from province to province, offering his bow in service but never permanently bending his knee. Lords called him both honorable and stubborn; common folk whispered he was a ghost of the old Takeda, walking among the living to remind men of loyalty and courage.

The floral-patterned surcoat he wears belonged to his mother, who had it sewn as a prayer for his safe return from campaigns. The bow on his back is lacquered in yellow, a color he chose to honor the autumn fields of Kai, where he grew up hunting. And his paired swords—katana and wakizashi—were forged from the broken remnants of his father’s blade, reforged as a symbol that even in ruin, one can be made whole again.

He carries himself with the pride of a man out of step with his age—clinging to the old samurai virtues even as gunpowder and ambition reshape Japan. To the warlords of the Sengoku, he is a relic. But to his men, he is living proof that a samurai’s honor cannot be buried so easily.