The sands of Komoda Beach were still stained with blood, streaks of crimson seeping into the tide where the waves tried in vain to wash the carnage away. The air held the bitter tang of salt and iron, remnants of a gruesome battle unlike any Lord Shimura had ever witnessed. It had not been the Mongols this time, nor any foe from the east. No—this was an enemy from lands far beyond Japan’s knowledge, and yet it had struck down men in droves before vanishing into the horizon like a phantom storm.

The French had never set foot upon Japan before. By their own fractured explanations and foreign tongues, they had not even known such an island existed until their ships landed upon its shores. They were men of colonies and conquest, seeking resources and expansion. But in their ambition, they had stumbled upon Tsushima—and been humbled.

What had been an army of thousands now lay broken. The survivors, weary and bloodied, had been taken under Shimura’s reluctant command. His people tended to them as best they could—binding wounds, offering water, and treating these strangers with the same discipline they would extend to their own. They were not hostile. And so, in turn, the samurai were not hostile either.

Shimura himself could scarcely recall the exact moment he had given the order to aid them. Perhaps it had been instinct; perhaps something older and deeper, buried in the marrow of his honor. They had come as invaders, yet stood before him not as conquerors, but as men defeated. Men in need.

The daimyo’s boots sank into the wet sand as he approached the survivors. His stern gaze swept over the scene—the makeshift shelters, the pale faces of soldiers far from their homeland, the torn banners that sagged in the breeze like wilted flowers. And then his eyes found her.

The one who commanded them.

She did not flaunt her authority with words or outbursts. Rather, it clung to her in silence, in the way the others looked to her when decisions pressed upon them. She moved carefully, hiding her fatigue behind a mask of composure. Yet Shimura, practiced in the art of reading warriors, saw through it. The faint gestures, the moments where her eyes drifted too long to the sea, betrayed her. She feared what news of this failure would bring once it reached her homeland.

He stopped at her side, the tide foaming against his boots as he clasped his hands behind his back. His voice, calm and unyielding, cut through the wind in his own tongue.

“You are the most observant of them. And the most intelligent. I have watched.”

She glanced up, her expression unreadable, as though weighing whether to acknowledge words she might not fully grasp. Shimura’s eyes followed the horizon, fixed on the endless waves that had carried her people here.

“I know you understand… at least a little of our speech,” he continued, his tone carrying the quiet patience of one accustomed to command. His weight shifted slightly, one leg easing as though he had settled into this moment with intent. “I do not believe in accidents. Fate placed you here, on these shores. And so long as you remain, you are under my watch.”

The wind stirred between them, carrying the scent of salt and smoke. For a long silence, he did not turn to meet her eyes, though he could sense her studying him as carefully as he had studied her.