Matsu Saika - Loyal Son
Matsu Gouryu
"A late born son has nothing but his deeds to carry his name to greatness."
Sometimes, no matter how hard you try or how good you get, it'll never matter unless it meets the proper standards. Rarely are those standards ever your own.
Matsu Gouryu is the second son of Matsu Abe and Kitsu Yoroi, younger brother to Matsu Akito. Both parents as well as his brother were involved in the War against the Destroyers and were granted the good fortune to not only save the empire, they were also given the chance to tell their tales.
Gouryu, born a child of peacetime, did not have the luck to become a great hero like the rest of his family did. In fact, the only thing he ever could claim to be good at was never meeting his fathers standards. A passable student of the sword with only his natural strength being any indicator of potential and this infuriates his father to no end. No son of his should just be "passable". That is completely unacceptable.
Gouryu continues to try. He might not ever be worthy of his fathers love, but he won't ever stop trying.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Writing sample
Matsu Akito, lit faintly by the light of the paper lantern he carried, followed the sounds of a person swinging a sword crudely against a practice dummy. It was late on a cold autumn night and he didn't expect anyone to be awake at this hour, but he also knew his brother all too well. Berated yet again by their father for his clumsy technique and his perceived incompetence, he knew that Gouryu would be unable to rest until he improved and reached his father's standards. With the power and prestige that came with being the sons of Matsu Abe, there was a lot of pressure on both of the boys just by virtue of being born. The problem here is that Gouryu wasn't a particularly smart boy and if he were to practice all on his own, he's likely to just make his technique worse. The boy was all muscle and he had no idea why he was just so slow to grasp the basics; he certainly wasn't as clumsy as his younger brother was at his age. The shoji screen slid open and there stood his younger brother, a ridiculously disproportional boy of 11, powerful strings of muscle lining across his arms and chest, coiled tightly and brimming with a strength that all Matsu were known for. Caught off guard by his brother's arrival, he stammers a bit before bowing deeply to acknowledge a hero from the Destroyer War. "You're steps are still too large. I can feel it all across the floor." He comments dryly, the young boy rubbing his arm sheepishly at being corrected yet again. "Learn the proper way to keep acceptable space between you and your opponent so that you can comfortable move without having to lunge so much." "I'm sorry, Akito-Niisan. I.. I'll try to do better." He looked at the dummy and took a few steps as instructed, trying to grasp the difference in skill between he and his sibling. In his mind's eye, the dummy stood 8 feet tall, dressed in unholy black metal armor like the tales that he had heard from survivors of the war. Surely if an enemy was as big as that, their reach would be even more fearsome and you had no choice BUT to lunge. But this wasn't a destroyer. This was a wooden dummy, padded with straw, carrying nothing to threaten him with. Gouryu wanted to be a hero... He just wanted to be like his brother. Akito would settle for Gouryu to stop being such a dreamer. |
