The Vengeful Ghost
The Katana Of Destiny (Flash Fiction)
The stench of smoke and blood clung to the night, a sour, metallic scent that burned Akira Yakutia’s nostrils. He staggered through the ruins of his village, each step a crunch of ash and splintered bone. The last embers hissed in the wind, a sound like a dying whisper.
There was no laughter now. No warmth from his daughter’s hand tugging at his sleeve. No gentle voice of his wife, Ayame, welcoming him home. Only silence, broken by the caw of crows circling for their feast.
He fell to his knees in the ash, his once-white kimono stained a grotesque red. He pressed his hands into the broken earth as if he could hold his world together.
“Akira…”
The voice was soft, carried on the smoke. He looked up, his eyes raw with grief. For a moment, he saw her—Ayame—her form translucent against the glowing ruins, her face as kind as ever.
“You must live,” she whispered. “Live until his blood wets your blade.”
His gaze dropped to the sword lying in the rubble before him. The Kanata. It pulsed faintly, as though breathing. He reached for it, and fire lanced through his veins, searing but not consuming. His wounds sealed. His limbs grew light, faster than thought itself. Yet his chest ached with a hollow weight heavier than grief—it was the emptiness of a man remade by vengeance.
The curse had chosen him.
Tashi Omiashi, once his lord, now his betrayer, had ordered this slaughter. Akira had bled for him, fought for his dream of power, but Omiashi’s ambition to become Daimyo had no place for loyalty. Akira’s family had been butchered by the very man he served.
The Kanata throbbed in his grip, alive with a terrible hunger. Not words, but a single command pressed into his bones: vengeance. Only vengeance.
Years bled into one another. Akira became a shadow on the battlefield, a name whispered in terror: The Vengeful Ghost. Soldiers swore he could not be killed, that his blade moved swifter than the eye. He carved through Omiashi’s armies like a storm through reeds, each death another step closer to the warlord himself.
At night, he heard Ayame’s voice—a lullaby threaded with iron. “You are close, my love. End this. End him, and you will be free.”
Yet freedom was an illusion. Sleep was shallow, food tasteless, the warmth of a fire no longer reached him. His body lived, but his soul was ash. The curse was a cage of blood.
At last, the day came. Omiashi’s castle loomed against the dawn, its walls black against the rising sun. The gates fell like paper before him. Akira strode through the carnage, unstoppable, until he reached the inner court.
There, Tashi Omiashi awaited. His armor gleamed obsidian, his face carved with arrogance.
“Akira Yakutia,” he said, drawing his blade. “The dog I once fed. You should have died with the rest of your pitiful village.”
“I did,” Akira answered, his voice an echo of the grave. “Now I am vengeance.”
Steel rang. Sparks burst into the air. Omiashi was powerful, his strikes deliberate and cruel, but Akira moved like lightning, the Kanata’s hunger guiding his every motion. The courtyard shook with their fury, walls splintering, servants scattering.
Omiashi laughed even as his blood slicked the stones. “So the whispers were true. The blade keeps you alive. But will it save you when I cut your soul apart?”
With a roar, he struck down. Akira met him, the Kanata shrieking as steel clashed. For a heartbeat, silence.
Then Akira’s blade slid through Omiashi’s chest.
The warlord staggered, crimson spilling from his lips. “Then… die with me, Yakutia,” he rasped, before collapsing in ruin.
The Kanata glowed, then flickered. The curse’s grip released.
Akira dropped to his knees. The weight of years crashed onto him—immortality crumbling, his flesh failing. At last, death claimed him.
Ayame stood above him, hand outstretched, smiling.
“You have come home,” she whispered.
Akira reached for her, his body dissolving into ash. The Kanata clattered to the stones, its edge slick with Omiashi’s blood.
The curse was sated.
For now.
It lay there—patiently—until another would use it for vengeance.
The Vengeful Ghost: The Katana Of Destiny ©️ 2025 Jeff Walker
