Work Text:
Rekka is a girl.
Anubisu might the first and only one to realize it from the get-go, aside of the Troopers themselves (something he’ll later learn is wrong; Suiko, Kourin and Kongo realized almost right away, but Tenku had to wait until the dust settled before he realized the truth. But, to be fair, the boy never had a sister of his own, so he wasn’t looking for the signs or able to put his finger on anything out of place, especially during a fight).
Even at a distance, it is obvious to him.
But, then again, Anubisu is a hunter; looking for the smallest details so he can better identify and track his prey is what he does.
Rekka, on that front, is a prey like any other.
Oh, he’ll give it to the girl, she makes a very convincing boy at first glance. Her haircut isn’t particularly girly, and her voice is deeper than the average female. The subarmor hides away all traces of womanly curves under its protective layers and, as Anubisu understands, Rekka is still at that age where womanhood is only ‘blossoming’ in young ladies. She probably doesn’t have much in terms of hips and chest yet, and boys are only shedding the high pitches of childhood for the deeper tones of adulthood around that time too.
In itself, lost among the other Troopers, she looks very much like any other young warrior.
It’s the little thing that betray her true sex.
The way she moves, for one. Her gait is anything but manly, if one takes the time to observe it. Her knees aren’t shifting like a man’s would and it takes him but a minute to realize her gravity center is lower than the other Troopers when she fights against the Youja in the street.
Even the way she fights is revealing; she more easily keeps her arms close to her body when putting herself in a fighting position – something Anubisu has often observed in women trained in martial arts. Their smaller range compared to a man make them more wary, more aware of their own moves least they’re caught unaware by a blow.
Her cries of rage and defiance are higher pitched than the other Troopers, too. And her eyes, the Yami Masho decides as he observes her closer, narrowing his own eyes, are much too large for a boy, even a young one.
Rekka is definitely a woman, even if she’s one in hiding.
… she reminds him of his sisters, a long time ago. Two of them had cut off their braids and donned armor to accompany the men on the battlefield, to fight and die like any other samurai, their resolve never wavering in the face of adversity.
One of them had gotten the end she had sought back then, and Anubisu had had to carry her broken body home, tears of rage in his eyes, furious at her for dying and at himself and his brothers for failing to protect her…
It makes him grimaces. This is not a good memory, nor one into which he has delved for a very long time.
It is probably for the best that there is no further resemblance between the sisters he lost and the Trooper, Anubisu decides here and there. His sisters had been pale-skinned, blue-haired beauty, with refined manners outside of battle; Rekka is hale and slight, and there was just something wild around her.
The fire, he thinks with amusement, is not an element easily tamed.
And still… Part of him is tempted to yank Rekka away from the fight and slap her for her folly. Does she truly think a mere girl can oppose him, oppose the Masho, oppose their Master? Such presumption!
Were he someone else, Anubisu would be tempted to call her out and tell her that her place isn’t on a battlefield, but he’s not such a hypocrite. He knows intimately how women can be warriors as much as men can, and many have proved it, even if they usually did so defending castles and villages rather than in charging along the men in the thick of the fighting.
If Rekka wishes to ‘be a man’ and die like one, facing the might of the Youjakai, then he won’t insult her by treating her like a weak ‘flower’.
And… he won’t betray what he knows, he decides. It’s not like it can remain a secret forever, anyway. He has no idea how seriously the young girl intends to hide herself, but he’d be surprised if her allies do not pick on the truth of her sex sooner rather than later.
As for the other Masho…
Well. Anubisu has never been in the business of saying more than he needed, not with the way they all jeer and scoff at each other, nor with Rajura able to use one’s word against them with just a play of the tongue. Anubisu is usually the ‘quiet one’, unless the group as a whole needs to know something only he can tell them, and the truth about Rekka isn’t something they absolutely need to in order to face her in battle.
Besides, they are sufficiently intelligent to work it out by themselves, he reasons.
He’s surprised they haven’t yet, to be honest. He knows they haven’t; if they had, neither Shuten nor Naaza would have managed to hold their tongue. Both have poor opinions of women warriors. Rajura is generally more nuanced, though he seems to think women’s wits and schemes are more dangerous than their blows.
Maybe he’s right about it, who knows?
Anubisu has never faced a scheming woman, but he knows the roles they have in the tales.
He doubts Rekka is one of them, though.
No, this one would be more like Mulan, he muses as he watches a civilian call to the Troopers to clear up their act.
How can the others have not seen the truth yet, Anubisu wonders as he glances at his fellow Masho and sees them look indifferently to the five youths having trouble taking down the one Youja. Anubisu goes back to observe the battle, shaking his head slightly at the poor display.
Such inexperience is painful to witness.
But something tells him those whelps will be quick study and that they may surprise them in short order. Kourin, notably, looks like a potentially promising adversary.
And Rekka…
Well. A woman who wishes to fight like a man should be watched closely. If she has the courage to come and fight, and to somehow lead the battle – which she definitely is, the first to summon her armor, and the first to release the full might of the armor’s power – then she might surprise them all in the future.
And part of the Yami Masho cannot wait to see how she will.
It takes him until he’s back in his quarters, feeling humiliated, the mocking smiles of his fellow Masho following him as well as their chuckles at his defeat for Shuten to process that he has been beaten by a girl.
Because Rekka no Ryo is definitely a girl.
She has not boldly proclaimed so, of course. Indeed, she has stayed very discreet on her true sex herself.
But the boy child Shuten had caught in his chains had called her ‘Ryo-neechan’ in distress, much to Shuten’s dim surprise, and the Trooper hadn’t corrected him.
Not that Shuten had truly paid it much attention, too busy cornering the Trooper and forcing her in his trap, making her get rid of her armor as she jumped after the scholar and the child in the volcano, and then he had been so high on his upcoming victory, the doubt he had felt had seemed inexistant.
A girl, Rekka no Ryo? The one who had opposed him so boldly in the deserted city?
Ridiculous!
But then Rekka had caught him, and jumped with him into the volcano, where Shuten was sure to burn if he reached the lava. His armor may have protected him from noxious fumes and may have mitigated the effects of the heat, but Shuten had known with utmost certainty that he was going to die if he touched the magma, bursting in flames like a torch.
The Rekka armor offered complete protection from the fire, the fumes, the heat and was straightened by them. Shuten did not have that advantage.
“Ryo-neechan, help!”
The cry of the boy had still been ringing in his ears as Shuten struggled to disengage and free himself from Rekka’s surprisingly strong hold, and then his eye had caught one small detail he hadn’t bothered to pay attention to before.
It makes him feel vaguely ashamed it has taken so long, but to be honest, Shuten has excuses. First, he had been rather busy fending off the five Troopers’ attacks in the city to pay true attention, then when he had faced Rekka again after the Trooper had managed to climb out of the volcan on their lonesome (a fact that Shuten did find impressive, though he wouldn’t admit it aloud), the blue-eyed youth had been in full armor, which covered much of his neck. And, finally, once his trap had worked and Rekka had banished the armor away before he could burn the two humans he wanted to save so badly, Shuten had been too high with delight and pride, playing with his catch like a cat would with a mouse, to really look as he ought to have.
But here, freefalling toward certain doom, so close to the Trooper?
Shuten had noticed.
Rekka didn’t have a nodo-botoke. Not even the trace of a node on his… her throat.
What more normal, since Rekka was a girl, and only males developed such a feature?
The child’s tongue hadn’t slipped, after all – unless Rekka had intended to keep it secret. Shuten’s adversary, the one who was about to kill him, was a young girl!
He… didn’t know what to think about it, the Oni Masho thinks as he rises from his bath, wincing as he wipes away the water from tender, dark pink patches of skin where he got burned despite the protection of his armor. At least he was cleaned from the grim and sooth, and his hair hadn’t suffered too much from the experience, he reasons as he passes on a yukata and rejoins his innermost chambers, fusuma closing behind him.
He cannot stop thinking about Rekka no Ryo.
How could the truth of her sex escape him so thoroughly? Was it because her armor was troubling his senses? Was it just because he had too arrogant and hadn’t wanted to imagine that a mere girl could oppose him and his Master?
That one could beat HIM, the Oni Masho, Arago-sama’s favored, the leader of his Generals?
But one did, and Shuten can only punch his futon in frustration. Bad enough to have lost a fight, the first in hundreds of years outside of the odd sparring session with Anubisu, Rajura and Naaza. Bad enough to have lost against what amounted to an inexperienced youth who hadn’t even fully mastered their armor. But to have his ultimate defeat inflicted by a girl?!
Women aren’t made for the battlefield.
It’s not their place.
Yes, Shuten understands that sometimes, there is no choice, and women are now and then the only line of defense left to avoid your castle being captured or your village being razed to the ground, and he doesn’t have a problem with a girl of samurai blood learning the bow and the naginata and, occasionally, the katana, because this is normal, this is expected. Them running around during a siege to bring archers new arrows to rain death on the assailants, water to those who need it, or busying himself helping the injured is another form in which Shuten can reasonably conceive women participating in a battle.
But they have no business being on the offensive!
If a clan is so weak that they have to send their own women to charge instead of letting it to the men, then they deserve to be crushed. This is how Shuten’s own Father raised him, and he has never doubted his wisdom.
What sort of family does Rekka belong to, that they would entrust her with the role of a frontline fighter?
And does it really matter in the end?
She has still beaten Shuten despite her sex.
When the others will learn it…
But, he reasons with a frown, they have missed the obvious just as much as Shuten has, didn’t they? If they had known… surely, one of them would have talked by now, if only to rub salt in the wound dealt to Shuten’s pride?
… he’s not forced to say anything, he decides. If the others do not know, then Shuten has no intention of sharing this one knowledge. Whoever tracks down Rekka no Ryo, her tiger and her two companions next can find out on their own. Then… then he will advise on what to do.
A girl…
He lies on his back and closes his eyes. Rekka’s face flashes in his mind. He cannot stop thinking of her, thinking of his defeat, thinking of all the little things that are becoming obvious in retrospect. The wide, ice-blue eyes, wider than they ought on a male; he should have noticed. And what a strange, striking color on one whose element is fire. The hale, tan skin, so at odds with a proper lady’s white, creamy tone. The voice, not deep enough for a boy of this age, but not high enough to make it obvious right away.
He hadn’t been able to feel any obvious curve even as she held him against him, but the armor is a flat surface, and perhaps she binds her breasts…?
… a girl has held him in a closer embrace than a lover, he realizes belatedly, a light flush spreading over his cheeks. Even if it was to try and kill him, the only ones who had ever held him like that were his bed partners. How could that girl have done that and not felt troubled? Was she accustomed to hold men so close?
If so, it didn’t argue much in favor of her virtue…
Though… No. He didn’t think Rekka was much of a seductress. Not with the manners she had shown or rather, her lack thereof.
She hadn’t acted like a woman at all, Shuten realizes, his eyes snapping open again. Perhaps that was what bothered him the most. Rekka might have been in ‘disguise’ (and he’s starting to have doubts that the girl has ever intended to fool her enemies), but the way she had moved, spoken… it had felt natural.
As if she hadn’t changed anything to her usual way of being.
Did that meant that no-one had ever taught her traditional feminine attitudes? If so, why? Had her parents decided to raise her as a boy? Had she lost any feminine will by hanging too much around warriors?
Or…?
Oh, but why did he fucking care, the redhead mentally snarled, turning and tossing, a fist clenched over his sheets?
Rekka wasn’t that special!
Aside of the fact she was a woman, a woman who had beaten him.
… no woman Shuten had ever met had ever glared at him like that, either, or threatened him, launching themselves into impassionate speeches.
“Brat,” he murmurs aloud. “Insolent brat.”
But try as he might to insult her and push her away from his mind, her eyes keep haunting him as he desperately tries to fall asleep.
Next time he meets her, Shuten decides, he won’t show any pity. He’ll reclaim his honor.
And he’ll teach her what a woman’s place ought to be.
(But it’d be pity if such a fire was to be quenched… Rekka is far more fascinating when she’s herself, wild and untamed, and when she glares at you and is readying herself to attack…)
(Fuck, the Oni Masho realizes a moment later. He’s having a hard on…)
It takes Rekka starting to scream in a high-pitch tone that no male of that age can hope to achieve for Naaza to finally add two and two and realize that Rekka is a girl.
Not that he hadn’t had his suspicion before, when he ambushed the Trooper, the scholar and the child following them at the ‘university’.
There had just been something a little ‘off’ with Rekka no Ryo, although Naaza hadn’t been able to pinpoint what was bothering him exactly.
That hadn’t been Rekka’s youth, though a close-up look at the fiery youth’s face had revealed him… her, as he now knew… to be much younger than he had first anticipated. Not that his adversary being young truly bothered Naaza; at Rekka’s age, he had already seen his first battles and was acting like an adult, with the responsibilities that came with it. If Rekka felt ready to face the might of the Youjakai and oppose Arago-sama, then Naaza wasn’t about to treat the whelp like a child.
Still… even as they traded blows and Naaza simulated his own ‘death’, he hadn’t been able to shake off the feeling that he was missing something.
And now he knew.
It was Rekka’s scent that had thrown him off a loop – a scent he hadn’t felt to be adequate for a young boy, but that hadn’t felt normal for a young girl either.
See, the thing is, Naaza has an excellent nose and sense of scent. It is but one of the many abilities he had gained from a life spent among dried flowers and plants and distillated liquids he uses to make poisons and remedies alike. He knows how to identify all the components of a perfume by their odor, and he knows how to smell the smallest drop of drug in his own food if a fool tries his luck at poisoning him.
Ah! As if him, the Doku Masho, could ever succumb to his own tools!
It was pathetic that even now, courtiers with a grudge would try it – though the number of attempted poisonings had drastically dropped after he had hung one to attempt this foolishness off his balcony by the bowels after force-feeding them their own poison and making sure it killed them after hours of agony. It had been a very pathetic one, in his opinion, and the blood had been a pain to clean up, but Naaza still felt he had made his point.
But nevermind.
The thing was, from the moment he had faced Rekka on that roof after his fight with the tiger had alerted the Trooper to his presence (and damn the beast for that), Naaza had been hit by a perfume far too… floral to belong to a man.
Oh, he knew men who loved to use lotions – Rajura used many to take care of that mane of his, and Anubisu often used oils to tend to his muscles after intense training sessions – but the musk of them was different. Products for men were different from products for women; they tended to be stronger, their effects longer lasting, whereas a woman’s perfumes tended to be lighter, softer, evocating the delicateness of the feminine body.
Simply put, at first sniff, Rekka hadn’t smelled like a man at all.
But, Naaza had reasoned then, puzzled, the boy had just spent a long time cooped in close quarters with the scholar girl that had made the Troopers pull together to vanquish the first Youja in Shinjuku and who was the key to find the scattered warriors. Whatever she was wearing on her skin and clothes must have rubbed on Rekka no Ryo, masking his own scent behind her own. That had to be that. The lingering feminine scent would soon disappear. Or so he had thought as he faked his defeat and let the Trooper flee, knowing he would lead him straight to one of his companions in short order.
Now, though, Naaza knows he was mistaken.
It’s not the scholar’s scent his nose picked on that rooftop (though a touch of it had likely hung on Rekka regardless).
It was Rekka no Ryo’s own. A perfume made of pine sap and wildflowers, the hint of peach (a soap of sort, maybe?), and smoked wood mixed with the musk of the tiger.
A woman.
The Trooper who’s covering her face, crying in pain after his poison just slipped into her eyes, is a woman.
Slowly, Naaza starts to chuckle. Oh, the irony of knowing that Shuten got beaten and almost burned to death by a ‘wet-behind the ears’ girl is just delicious; the Oni Masho is always so prideful, it’s going to sting his ego for years!
… did he know Rekka’s true sex?
Eh. Why should Naaza care?
Slowly, his chuckle changes tone as he observes Rekka and something dark grows in his chest.
A girl. His opponent is a girl. A fucking girl.
She has no business being here. None.
Women aren’t made to fight, unless one considers childbirth a battle (and it definitely is; he has seen enough deliveries as a lad helping his Mother to know how arduous it can be, to bring a new life in the world).
It’s the role of the men to protect them, not the reverse.
(He steadily ignores the whisper at the back of his mind that keeps pointing out that if his sisters had been half as stubborn and skilled with a sword as Rekka is, instead of having been refused more than basic training by their Uncle and oldest brothers, then no pirate would have carried them off while Naaza was away. This has no bearing on the current situation. None.)
How the fuck did a girl even get ‘chosen’ by a mystical armor, uh? Aren’t there enough young, promising, male warriors out there lusting for that honor?
And of all the Troopers he could find himself opposed to, why did it have the be the only female one? (Assuming none of the others were also girls in disguise; Naaza shouldn’t dismiss the possibility.)
Urgh.
Well. Regardless of her sex, Rekka is an opponent like any other, he steadily reminds himself. She’s opposing Arago-sama, she’s an enemy, and there is only one way to deal with an enemy.
But to hell if he’s not going to rub Rekka’s own weakness in her face!
“My, that is unexpected,” he drawls, letting the flat of his blade hit his palm as the girl whimpers, an arm desperately wiping at her eyes. “You hide well, girl,” he stresses out with a sneer, making Rekka twitch as she turns toward him, eyes closed, her expression twisted in pain. It doesn’t bring Naaza as much joy as he had hoped. “But I see you for what you are, now. Does it hurt?” he asks in fake sympathy, watching her grimace.
He takes care in explaining to her what his venom has done, how she’ll never see light ever again – and especially not THE Light, once he’s done with her and he takes care of the still resting Kourin, even as Rekka goes back to her feet and assume a vaguely combative stance, a hand still clutched to her face.
Pathetic. (Courageous.)
“You’re going to be useless as a warrior now,” Naaza chuckles darkly. “But I’m sure there can still be something useful made out of you. Yes,” he grins nastily, “perhaps you can find a new calling laying on your back, taking care of a different kind of sword! That’s what your kind is made for, isn’t it?”
The taunt hangs heavily in the air. Is he… Is it really him who has threatened a woman with rape, he wonders faintly? If she was still alive to see him, his Mother would be horrified – and would be having his testicles on a block with herself holding the knife to make sure her son would never stray.
The way Rekka’s face twists and colors briefly has nothing to do with pain; it is shock, shock slowly replaced by rage and disgust and, even if she hides it well, fear.
“Bastard!” she snaps, voice shaky. And still, she looks more defiant than terrified. She has a brave soul. “As if I’d ever let you put a hand on me!”
“You think you can stop me, girl?” the Doku Masho replies, his earlier mirth abating. “That you can really defend yourself in your position?”
“I don’t need my eyes to kick your sorry ass!” Rekka snaps, a fierce scowl on her face.
Naaza could almost believe her… if he wasn’t hearing her heart beats loudly from here, or if he wasn’t catching the very scent of fear on her, even if the black-haired girl does a praiseworthy job in trying to hide it.
Rekka can pretend all she wants and offer bravado, in truth, she is terrified. Terrified of Naaza – or rather, of his earlier words, since even upon getting blinded, she hadn’t sounded THAT off.
Despite himself, Naaza’s guts twist. He shouldn’t have said that. That was not… He has never liked to see a woman scared of him, at least not scared THAT way. Naaza has made many disputable things, but he has never forced himself on…! But Rekka is making him so angry just by being there, by daring to try and fight again, he has his orders, he has always followed them, he’s Obedient, and Naaza can’t…
He’s not going to say ‘sorry’ for what he has said, for what he has done, but he’s going to give her a quick death, he decides, trying to drown his unease under a new resolution. At least this way, she won’t have to fear the fate Naaza has hinted at (a fate he knows could become all too real, if the wrong people grab her.)
(His sisters would likely have preferred death themselves over being made slaves, servants, concubines, parting their legs for men unworthy of them…)
He raises his swords and he rushes to attack. Quick and deadly, just like a snake bite; Rekka will not suffer needlessly if he strikes true.
And of course, that’s the moment the tiger picks to come back and steps in to save his Mistress…
Rajura prides himself on being the smartest Masho and the most well-informed one. He’d like to boast he’s the most observant one as well, but this is a title that Anubisu easily challenges him for, because the Yami Masho has an eye for detail that tends to catch things Rajura himself may have overlooked. It’s infuriating, but it’s something Rajura has come to accept.
A pity the two of them aren’t able to collaborate more often; between the two of them, the Gen Masho is sure they would be a force to be reckoned with and able to easily crush Shuten and grab his position for themselves…
Ah, but this is a fancy, nothing more.
The point is, Rajura is smart, observant and rarely if ever caught unaware.
Which is why realizing he’s likely the last of the Masho to catch on that Rekka is a girl stings his pride more than his defeat at Kongo’s hands do.
And he has to be the last, the white-haired man thinks darkly as he watches Rekka no Ryo fight in his web, unable to free herself, gasping and groaning as the sticky substance tightens around her in answer to her struggles, her pained noises joining the other Troopers’ own cries.
There is no way Anubisu hasn’t noticed; the man is too well-versed in body-language to let something as important escape him, even if he never directly confronted Rekka and crossed blade with him… her…
Rajura has seen the Yami Masho out spies just by noticing a headwear out of place or a limp on someone who had been caught by one of the many traps the Masho use to secure their own quarters. He likely knew Rekka was a girl from the very first day, and he told no one!
Rajura can’t believe Shuten wouldn’t have noticed either; Rekka held onto him as he tried to project them both in the lava of Mt Fuji! From this close, Shuten can’t have missed the fact his adversary was female!
Aaaaand it’s starting to explain a lot of things about the Oni Masho’s obsession with taking his revenge on Rekka, come to think. Rajura had thought it had just been the idea he had lost to a green boy which had incensed Shuten so, but to find he had lost to a young girl… No wonder he had been so snappy, or so interested in following reports and images of Rekka’s fights and mumbling so much about a ‘rematch’.
Of course, Shuten would have had a raging hard-on regardless of the Trooper’s sex, since as far as Rajura knows, the Oni Masho has never been picky in the sex of his lovers so long they stroked his desire and inflamed his sense (ah!), but Rekka being female is only compounding the effect further.
It was no wonder either that he hadn’t screamed the truth aloud; the other Masho would have riled him endlessly for it. Rajura still might, actually, once he was back to the palace in victory, captives or trophies in tow.
And then there is Naaza… who had been strangely close-lipped about Rekka… reserving most of his ire for Suiko. Suiko, who belonged to the Mouri clan, with whom Naaza had personal history and made a good focus for his hatred. But Rekka had been the first one to defeat him and twice at that, thrice if one counted his role in awakening Suiko no Shin from slumber; yes, the first defeat has been orchestrated so Naaza could resume following the Trooper so Rekka would lead him to the rest, but that had still been a defeat in form, if not in truth.
Given how petty Naaza tended to be, one would have expected the Doku Masho to get as easily riled as Shuten over Rekka no Ryo.
But he hadn’t. And it made a twisted amount of sense if Naaza knew Rekka was a girl, Rajura muses as he watches his captives head down, refraining from tapping his facemask in thought – a nervous habit he dislikes showing.
Naaza doesn’t have a high opinion of women acting as warriors – and neither does Shuten in general, but their reasons are different. For Shuten, it’s a question of education. For Naaza, Rajura suspects there is a form of mental trauma and denial fulling a massive guilt complex over losing someone because they either were untrained when they should have been, or because they WERE trained and got too cocky.
Either way, Naaza tends to be dismissive of women taking a proactive role in their own defense or in attacking an enemy.
Of course he would have disdain (real or fake, it was hard to say) for Rekka and would instead focus on the nearest male warrior he could find. The fact Suiko was a Mouri by blood was either a boon or a twisted irony that only made it easier for Naaza to rage about.
Rajura does not hold on such misogynistic feelings. A woman, he knows from experience, is just as dangerous as a man if not more, though their weapons are not often the same. His own Mother had been a good example, able to kill a man in a handful of days by just using the right words to start a rumor and stroke the fires of jealousy in her husband or the courtiers seeking her favors.
She had been glorious to behold, Rajura thinks with a smirk, and an excellent teacher.
Rekka is not his Mother, though.
She couldn’t be more different. It’s like comparing the moon and the sun, he muses as he lets himself slide down a thread to observe her from closer.
If he couldn’t see the lack of nodo-botoke and the tiny signs of womanhood, the Gen Masho would really think the Trooper a boy. She has little to no feminine wile he has been able to witness, either at Amanohashidate or here. She doesn’t exactly move like a woman, though now he thinks about it, there are some tells…
She doesn’t speak like a woman ought to either. The pronouns she uses are ambiguous, and she doesn’t try to inflex to make herself look ‘cute’. Maybe it’s for disguise’s sake, but the way she speaks feels completely natural to her and isn’t worse than Tenku no Touma’s speech (southerner, this one; Rajura can hear it in his accent as well as his choice of expressions, not that it truly matters).
In his days, such an attempt at passing herself for a man would have seen the girl harshly punished, perhaps even put to death for the offense, he muses before pausing in sudden thought.
Has Rekka ever claimed to be a man?
Rajura cannot remember the Trooper doing so. She has long hair, though they are shorter than his own or Shuten’s, so it’s not like she made a big effort to ‘disguise’ herself. No, the more he thinks about it, remembering his exchanges with the girl as she fought him before he tricked her and Suiko into attacking each other, even in that deserted street the day the Invasion started, Rekka hadn’t boldly proclaimed to be a man. Just that she was Rekka no Ryo.
Yes, her way of speaking isn’t feminine, her body language has none of the grace expected of a woman of quality, but she never made the claim to be anything but her true sex. Even the other Troopers haven’t outright called Rekka a boy either. In that case then, she hasn’t been hiding. Just… lying low. Letting people assume what they wanted, and since none of the Masho had expected one of their opponents to belong to the fairer sex, well, they hadn’t looked further than that.
My, perhaps the girl is smarter than Rajura had first thought, he thinks with a touch of dark amusement.
Not that it will save her, of course.
But, Rajura ponders as he lowers himself further, hanging just above her as he watches her fruitlessly struggle to free herself, maybe he can expend some mercy to her. If she bows to him, accepts his victory and his superiority, agrees to serve him, he could spare her.
Part of it is because he has never been fond of spilling a woman’s blood. Part of it is because he knows it would enrage Shuten, to see the one who beat him bow to another and be unable to ever touch her, because Rajura would never allow so.
Part of it is because the Troopers are… awfully young. Oh, they are of age, yes, but they aren’t acting like proper adults yet from the little he has seen, and even if he won’t voice it aloud, it bothers Rajura. He hates… wasted potential, and those boys… and one girl… they could become such useful tools, under his command.
If one of them caves, then chances are good the others will follow, he reasons. And wouldn’t that be an even greater victory than killing them all, if he could make them join Arago-sama of their own free will, bringing in new soldiers, lesser Generals to serve the Masho and the glory of the Youjakai?
Chances are good they will refuse, of course but… Rajura doesn’t risk much by trying, does he?
And, he smirks as Rekka opens an eye to glare at him, teeth bared like the tiger she’s so fond of, a conversation with a lady is something he has missed, so why not indulge for a bit, even if it’s not going to be fun one?