Читать книгу Ninjutsu. Facts, Legends, and Techniques онлайн

12 страница из 32

You walk along the rampart to a new position, hoping to lose the strange emotion that accompanies you in the lonely night. Then suddenly it tells you the most shameful thing a warrior can learn about himself. You are afraid! Your tenseness, your uneasiness, they are but manifestations of fear— pure and simple fear. For the first time in your life you are afraid!

Your mind flashes back to the many times in the past when you faced an enemy. Why were those times so different from now? Facing an enemy who can be seen, his next action anticipated, and your trained reflexes triggered into an appropriate response by his slightest suki (opening), is one thing. But here tonight there is no visible enemy, and that is an entirely different matter.

Now it is suddenly clear to you—the reason for your fear— your shameful fear. Tonight the fierce commandant of the guard, whom it is said will someday be replaced by you, a brave and loyal warrior, had warned all sentries about the increased activities of the dreaded masters of the art of invisibility—the ninja, as these spies and assassins were called—who were operating in the hire of your lord's most hated enemy.