Sen came back again. And again. “I am a descendant of the Gensei clan! Let me in!”
“That is why you cannot enter.”
He sat on the Godspath, hallowed ground that symbolized the barrier between the physical world and the spirit realm. The crow monks above called out to him, told him to go home.
“No!” Sen shouted. “I demand to be taken as a student of Jobo. I saw him fight. I’ve never seen anyone like that before!”
“Maybe you need to open your eyes,” they called, mocking.
“Let me in!”
Another day passed. Then another. Finally, one morning, the gate opened and again Jobo stood before him. “Why do you want to learn how to kill?”
“I… What?”
“You said you want to learn to fight like we do. To fight is to be willing to take a life. You must understand what you’re asking for. You’re not ready.”
“I have training.”
“I don’t care.” He turned from Sen, walking slowly back up to the temple building within. The other crow monks gave him one small bow each, and closed the gate.
So, he sat. He waited. The gates did not open for another day.
One night he woke to find the eldest monk, a husk of a man named Jikobo, watching him from the open gate, a small bowl of rice and pickled plum in his hands. With a nod, Old Jiko set it on the dirt at Sen’s feet, bowed once, and retreated back to the gate. He replaced the rope barring entry. It settled on its hook with a soft click, and Sen found himself starting to go after him, to call out, hand half raised, but the gate didn’t move, and the woods were silent. Above him, by the steps, he saw Jobo watching him, thin face set as stone, betraying nothing.
Does he ever sleep?he wondered.
Sen bowed to him, quickly. And went back to his mat. When he got to it, the rice was still warm.
The next morning, he went to the gate again. They still wouldn’t let him in. But he felt himself changing. He wasn’t so angry with them, wasn’t so upset.
“Please,” he asked, “won’t you teach me?”
The Shugenja considered him for a moment, and spoke as though soothing a child.
“Why,” he asked again, “do you want to learn the way of killing?”
“I’m a warrior.”
“I see no war,” the monk said. “I see only a human, and some trees. Tell me, lord, where is your war that you want so much?”
He left Sen with that, pondering his question.
Sen went back to his mat again. The day stretched on, wet and wilting. At some point, he must have fallen asleep, for when he startled, jolting up, Jobo was on the path before him.
“Tell me, why have you come? For the teaching, or the clothes?”
“What?”
“How we adorn ourselves.”
Sen blinked, confused. “The teaching,” he said. “I don’t care about your clothes…”
The crow monk shook his head. “When I say, ‘clothes’, I am not speaking of our clothes. Perhaps one day, you’ll be able to understand your own thoughts, and avoid thinking in binary ways. Your mind is caught in the illusion of good and evil.”
With that, the crow monk walked off into the woods.
After a moment of indecision, Sen followed him again. Followed for an hour, high into the peaks of the Blue Woods and the mountain. Blazing sun and cool shade, dappled shadows, insects buzzing in the air. Another hour passed; Jobo kept walking.
