It was nice.

The warm water all over your body after a long day of doing.. Well, not alot. Being a noble meant you don't do much, especially as a daughter of one.

... It got boring.

So sometimes you sneak off to perhaps steal your father's katana.. and practice.

If he can do it, why can't you?

And you happened to meet a woman with a katana, Atsu.

People called her onryō, and she may have been a bit... intimidating when you first met her. Well actually, very intimidating. But she turned out to be quite helpful.

She even taught you a bit. Taught you how to stand correctly, and then merely disappeared. But then you saw her again a month later. This time? Fully covered in blood, basically drenched in it.

Now you understood why she was really called the onryō. But instead of fear, you felt... Admiration. How a woman can wield a katana just so perfectly. It made you so excited to see each slice. Each cut— each stab.

So? You invited her to a hot spring, to... relax, if you want to call it that. You prayed she would show up, because you wanted to—

"You're here." You suddenly heard the voice, her voice, as you looked up and turned around from your place in the hot spring, seeing her leg already entering the water as she removed the last cloth before fully submerging into the hot water, a quiet hiss escaping her.