Editing The Mountain That Burned (section)

== Setting ==

''Never seen a blue sky''
''Yeah, I can feel it reaching out''
''And moving closer''
''There's something about blue''

''Asked myself what it's all for''
''You know the funny thing about it''
''I couldn't answer''
''No, I couldn't answer''

''Yoko Kanno and the Seatbelts – Blue''

[[File:Village1.png]]

Tenra is defined by war, by chaos, and yet, there is balance. One warlord rises, expands his borders, falls, and his territory is taken by another. So it goes. Such is the flow of life, a cycle of hatred and bloodshed which has fed these lands for four hundred years and seems set to do so for four hundred more. Tou-shu has followed this pattern relentlessly.

Or, it did. But now there is one, dangerous, warlord who has risen above the others and has conquered enemy after enemy like few before him. Never once faltering, never once failing, this man's tactical genius has grasped the recent developments in warfare like no other. Grinding all opposition to dust underneath legions of men, war machine and harnessed magic, he has become known as the Bloody Tide. To stand in his way is death, one can only flee, and hope that they are not swept away in his wake.

This man is Takahashi Masaru. He has already conquered Kagari, Kyousen and half of Migusa. His forces wage war on countless fronts. The main limitation that he faces are the mountain ranges, and the valuable resources needed to continue to perpetuate such a fearsome conflict. Now, he turns his attention to the Mountain of A Thousand Stories. Located in one of the Yaosu mountain ranges, the mine in the mountain has inadvertently become far more important than 'merely' for the reserves of scarlet steel and soulgems which it produces... but because the miners have dug straight through, and created a passage through which it is possible to move men. A staging post, perhaps, for a greater invasion to come.

The village supporting the mine has few soldiers, and nobody who can stand up to the massing army. Takahashi has given them three days to surrender, but if they do, they'll be thrust into the centre of a brutal and unrelenting conflict. If they resist, they'll be destroyed. What choice is left? Is there anyone who can step forward to try and dissuade this man and his boundless ambition?