Saburo (Polesia)

The third, and eldest living son of the Ichimitsu family, Saburo is seen as something of a golden child by both is father (Hisoka) and his mother (Miyuki). That being said, of the Ichimitsu children, Saburo is the least inclined toward subterfuge and deception. While he is quite adapt at stealth and getting himself out of restraints and even imprisonment if necessary, he loathes having to do so as well as his clan's entire warped view on bushido and honor. As the heir of the Ichimitsu famil, however, he is trapped by the very code of honor that he wishes to embrace and that has caused a great deal of inner conflict over the years.

Character Abilities

For many years Saburo was trained by his father to be the elder Ichimitsu's replacement when he died. Because of this, he is a master with the longbow, though he never achieved the same mastery of distance as his father, due to his failing eyesight. However, with training and some instruction from his mother, Saburo discovered that her mushin philosophy, that she applied to sword fighting, could also be applied to the bow. He then discovered the teachings of Zen archery and is currently almost a master of its techniques. As long as he could see his opponent, Saburo never missed, and in fact could fill his opponent full of arrows in seconds, something that even his father could never accomplish.

With the decline of his eyesight and the unexpected emergence of his psionic powers, Saburo has learned to augment his archery and make up for the fact that he can no longer see. He uses his gifts subtly, claiming that it is his enhanced sense of hearing and touch that allow him to find his targets, while in truth he uses abilities to perceive his surroundings and his enemies aura as well as to subtly guide his arrow toward that aura if he's ever off the mark.

The Children of Ichimitsu (Saburo)

Clan Ichimitsu is a prominent family under the patronage of the Sasori daimyo, often referred to as others as his Black Left Hands, a moniker that they have actually taken to calling themselves with pride. While mostly shinobi/samurai, there are many in the Ichimitsu, as their family name suggests (Ichi=one; Mitsu=bright, reflective, expressive; meaning essentially one who delights in expressing themselves in bright or brilliant ways) they also tend to boast agents that are trained in other forms of combat that while able to blend well with the shinobi arts, are not those of traditional shinobi, making them often unexpected threats for those who might have experience or training dealing with common shinobi.

The current patron of Clan Ichimitsu is Hisoka Ichimitsu, who has earned his reputation as an aesthetic, as well as one of the deadliest shots with a longbow, able to take down targets at a distance unthinkable to most. With his wife Miyuki (a notable onna-bugeisha from another clan), he has fathered five children, though the first two boys did not survive past two weeks.

The first time it happened Hisoka was distraught, thinking that somehow he was unfit to father living children. He spent time fasting and meditating, trying to purify whatever taint existed in his heart, but when his second son died of the same causes, he started to become suspicious and called several of his most trusted retainers. To these men, some of whom he loved as brothers, and several that were actually his close kin he confided his thoughts, that someone was poisoning his children to prevent him from fathering an heir.

To see if there was truth to this, Hisoka had his retainers shadow all those who had any contact with his sons, including Miyuki, whom he fully intended to kill if he found guilty. In time, it was found that a kitchen worker was being bribed by a rival clan to feed Miyuki a slow acting poison, that while virtually harmless to her, caused the babies to sicken as they fed from her breast. While this was a somewhat happy end to this horrific event, Miyuki had become aware of her husband’s suspicions, and mortified that he would ever assume her capable of murdering her own child, she closed herself to him and their relationship lacked any true affection thereafter, simply becoming a duty to both. Despite this, the supposed curse of Clan Ichimitsu was broken and Hisoka and Miyuki had two more sons and daughter in between.

The death of two children and Miyuki’s emotional rejection frosted Hisoka’s heart more than any amount of battle or murder ever could. He gave his sons practical names (Saburo and Shiro, meaning third and fourth son) and didn’t even bother to name his daughter, whom Miyuki named Naomi.

Some time passed, and the three surviving Ichimitsu children grew and pursued their trades as their father saw fit. Shiro and Naomi were for the most part ignored by their father and trained mostly by others to use their unique talents to better their clan, while Hisoka put his full attention on his older son. They were the lucky ones.

Saburo's training was brutal to say the least. His father would drill him in the use of the bow until his fingers bled and his arms cramped. All this was made even worse by the fact that Shiro from a young age displayed weak eyesight, something that his father believed could be overcome by intensifying the training, and while this did give Saburo the ability to fire his bow and hit his target based on instinct, he was never able to master the distance that his father had. In time Hisoka realized that his dream of training his son to be his replica was never going to be realized. He continued to drill him in the use of the bow, but the training became more mundane and focused on increasing Saburo's speed instead of his distance.

Without Hisoka's knowledge, Miyuki also trained Saburo, introducing the concept of Mushin (no mind) and teaching him some of the more basic precepts of Zen archery, which allowed him to fire his arrows with astonishing speed and accuracy, even surpassing his father in this regard. Saburo, during this time, also began to resent the Sasori methods of subterfuge and their "flawed" version of bushido, preferring the ways of his mother's people. For years doubt gnawed at him, as his dedication to honor made his responsibilities to the Sasori almost intollerable while simultaneously trapping him in his role as the eldest son and heir who was obligated to perform those duties.

Things worsened for Saburo as time went on. During his early twenties, he caught a horrible fever the wracked his body and seemed to sear his very being. Little to nothing could be done conventionally to heal the sickness, and by the time a shugenja of sufficient power could be brought to him, significant damage was done. After that Saburo was never quite the same, his constitution was weakened and he was given to fits of coughing every winter. But worst of all, the fever had damaged Saburo's already weak eyes so that he was nearly blind, unable to even see shapes more than a couple of feet in front of him. Hisoka was crushed by this and ceased most contact with his son, ending their training and his hopes of the boy becoming his heir.

For a time it looked like Shiro would become the new head of the family, a prospect that no one (Shiro especially) was particularly keen on. However, remarkably, within six months of losing his sight, several servants witnessed Saburo out in the archery range firing his arrows and managing to hit his targets at a fairly distant range. Hisoka came immediately, upon hearing the news, thinking that Saburo had somehow regained his sight. However, Saburo showed his father that he had set small bells on the the targets that would jungle in the slow breeze and allow him to fire his arrows at his mark, based on his hearing.

This remarkable story was of course a lie. Saburo had in a sense truly regained his sight, he simply no longer saw with his eyes. Either during the his fever, or the stress afterword, Saburo had awakened some latent psionic power that now allowed him to sense his surroundings in a way similar to his brother. Unlike Shiro, however, Saburo made certain never to pursue the "curse" further than simple perception to help him perform his duties. He kept a tight reign on his powers and never overtly manifested them, and came up with other explanations for his ability to walk about as though he still could see. There are some who doubt this miraculous ability, and some that even suspect it for what it truely is, but for the most part its simply accepted that Saburo is extremely skilled at his craft and many lament the possibility of what he might have become had he not lost his sight. The only one who truly knows Saburo's secret is Shiro, and the young Himitsu has kept his mouth shut on the matter, knowing that no good would come of the truth.

In recent years Saburo has taken his monastic leanings more to heart, knowing that he still has a long time before he can retire from this life that he loathes, but still doing what he can to purify his soul from the distasteful actions that his clansmen call honor. He will do his duty to his family and to himself, but he despises every moment of it.