Cargo Vanishes on the Pass
Every foggy night, one more load of cargo vanishes from the pass. If the cargo cannot get through before the spring market, the village lord will close the pass. 📓 Night Watch Log of the Checkpoint Day four : Fog from the west. At the third cedar in the row, the insects fall silent. Two packhorses at the cargo station, with only their saddles left behind. Day seven : Three bales of silk bolts gone. The tracks disappear halfway up the slope. The ground is hard, with no sign of digging. Day eleven : A notice from the village lord posted at the foot of the trail. If cargo does not get through before the spring market, the pass will be closed. Day thirteen : Four arrived at the checkpoint. A samurai family's daughter, a samurai in the village's service, a hired kunoichi, and a fist fighter with oni blood. Day fifteen : (blank) You are the barrier keeper, newly arrived at the checkpoint on the pass. You handle a sword as well as anyone, but you have no arts of exorcism. Your duty is to catch whoever is taking the cargo and get the goods for the spring market through. The days until the spring market are numbered. ⛰ The Pass and the Village There is only one road out of Yahiro, and it crosses the eastern pass. In winter, snow closes it for two months, and when the thaw comes, the cargo for the spring market goes over this pass and down to the post town. Halfway up is a cargo station, where the packhorses are changed and travelers spend the night. On foggy nights the cedar row swallows sound, and around the third tree the insects all fall silent at once. It is not only cargo that vanishes. The saddle straps are cut in three places, all in the same direction, and the tracks disappear halfway up. If it were the work of a yokai, a report would have gone to the shrine. If it is the work of a person, someone has slipped past the checkpoint's inspection. The spring market comes once a year, and the paper, charcoal, and herbs the village sells, along with the salt, iron, and silk it brings in, all pass over this road. 🏔 The Four Who Gathered at the Checkpoint Tsukumo Shizuka / Age 24, Daughter of a Samurai Family, Naginata She has come out to the pass as the village's envoy. Her eye runs fast over a ledger, and the moment she saw the cut in the saddle straps, she declared it was no horse's doing. She never gives an inch in sparring, yet brushes the sand off her beaten opponent's hakama with her own hands. Asahina Tsubame / Age 26, Samurai in the Village's Service, Uchigatana She stopped by the pass on her rounds along the border. She has the skill to finish a fight the moment she draws, yet she always gives her name before drawing. Anyone who has stopped her in that opening, she never forgets, and on her next round she calls their name first. Kirigakure Chitose / Age 22, Hired Kunoichi, Kunai and Kusarigama The village hires her on a yearly contract. Erasing her presence is her trade, yet only in front of you does she pick the creaking boards on purpose and let her footsteps sound. Her rule is half the fee up front. Hozuki Momiji / Age 25, Fist Fighter with Oni Blood She has come from the village to work on the pass's construction. So bad at judging her own strength that sliding a door open pops it off its rail, and every time she breaks something, she goes and fixes it herself. Only when tending a wound does she become so careful that her fingertips tremble. 🌫 How to Play There are no chapters. Each day is divided into five parts, morning, midday, evening, night, and the dead of night, and you move between the checkpoint, the cedar row, the cargo station halfway up, the teahouse on the pass, and the inn and dojo down in the village. Where you go decides whom you meet. Some places will be empty. Inspecting cargo, tailing someone, and stepping into the fog at night all call for skill checks. Fail, and cargo is lost, and someone gets hurt. The days until the spring market keep running out. There are no affection numbers. When the way they address you changes, that is your answer.