R watched the young girl Yora push open the door to his room and enter, carrying a tray with a sake bottle and two cups. He sniffed the air coming in with her, and nods to himself as the smell of drugs is certain. The girl was using sake to mask the scent of sleeping powder in a packet hidden in her kimono dress, it was this drug that sent many good men to their death, but R has learned to tell the difference in his training as a ninja. Yora was the one mentioned by the samurai Kappei in his last diary entry, the one who told him they should run away together, but nowhere to be seen when Kappei was found dead under the nearby mountain cliff with only his clothing and that diary. R must bring Kappei's swords and samurai passport back to his feudal masters and family.
Yora was also the youngest of the girls and women of this inn. R did not know how much innocence she still has left, but he decided to start his work with her and spare her the terror of finding another girl dead. Let Kappei judge her in the afterlife early. Today no other customers were at the inn, and the murderers had decided to bring out the poison for him, so she was the first to present him the opportunity.
"Put it there, Yora, please bathe with me."
R said to Yora, pointing to the wooden tub he filled with hot water earlier. His identity for the mission was a merchant on his way home with a lot of money to spend, so the girls were very open to his requests no matter how rude or horny they are. The villagers nearby know they do sell their bodies, and Yora was no virgin since long ago.
The girl blushed then replied to him with a smile. She put the tray down and reached into her collar, pretending to loosen the dress but R saw she was trying to get the drug packet out before it gets wet. The girl knew what was inside.
"Master R, Yora, is pleasures..."
The girl walked towards him and the tub slowly opening her dress, teasing him every step. R took her by her right hand then pressed her entire body into the tub face first, still in her dress. Yora tried to break free, but could not make any big splashes under R's pressure and weighed down by the dress.
R flipped the struggling girl over, pinched onto her throat with his left hand and lifted her up. Her hands held onto him tight, but he wanted her to see him.
"Be still and think of your crimes. The Buddhas will take your pain away if you repent, Yora. I will give you and your mother peace."
Yora's eyes widened. Her mother Yasako gave birth to her at a young age as an inn maid herself, and they were both trapped in the life of prostitution and murder. What R said means he was going to kill all of the gang and the only thing she could ask for was a quick death.
"No more pains, Yora. I pray for you both."
The girl made a nod at him and let go of his arm. R pressed her back down, started praying and watched her pretty young face relax, finally becoming still and expressionless. He was a devout Buddhist, even though the ninja line of work demanded his devotion be expressed by cold ruthlessness. Still, he was able to sense the girl's acceptance of her guilt. She was silent praying together with him in her last moments.
He lifted the slender corpse out of the wooden bathtub and laid her in a spread eagle shape. There was no breath or pulse, Yora's eyes point straight towards the sky with diluted pupils. R gently pulled her drenched wet dress back up to cover her modest but shapely chest, and tied her kimono belt back on. Next, he sat the dead girl up on her knees, and dragged her to the center of the room. He gave her the most reserved, ladylike sitting pose he could, then went to change into a set of new clothing for himself.
"Miss Yasako, Yora said she wants to show you something in my room."
R went to Yasako's room and told her. He wanted to spare her the pain of losing her only child as much as possible. The woman was younger than Yora's age when the girl was born, and still looked young enough to be her sister. Their life of crime came from necessity, not choice, so R genuinely wanted to help them leave their pain.
"Yora? What are you doing?"
Yasako entered R's room and saw Yora, sitting upright but wet from top to bottom and lifeless. Her head bowed low like she was apologizing in shame, eyes staring downward. Water dripped from her nose and mouth, the smell of incontinence coming from below her.
The terrible shock made Yasako speechless. She slowly walked towards her daughter, knelt down and held her arms around the dead girl.
"Forgive me, Miss Yasako."
R immediately chopped hard on the back of her neck with the side of his hand, mercifully knocking her out cold. Then, he pulled her neck back and wrapped a thin silk string around it. He kept pulling until Yasako lost her hold on Yora, and fell to the floor limp.
Praying quietly, R pulled the two corpses to his bedsheets, closed their eyes and covered them together. The unfortunate women can finally rest, but he still has work to do. There was another girl he wanted to give a little mercy to, among the seven left in the inn. She was Hina, the girl whose services he used every day to keep his cover. R had his desires so he was soft on her, but he was surprised that Hina was a Buddhist who severely doubted her actions. There was no way for her to leave and she has already killed people.
R looked around for her quietly and found Hina very soon, carrying a basket of food and sake heading for Michiko the inn mistress. She was a plain looking girl with short hair, only older than Yora. It was fortunate for both of them, as Hina has grown attached to his looks and his bed skills. Without saying anything, they went to his room together holding each other.
"The Buddhas have mercy on you. I came to avenge Kappei."
Once they are inside, R put a hand on her mouth and made her sit down. She was shocked at first, but gave him a sad and relaxed look when she heard the name. She pointed to his string of Buddhist prayer beads hanging on the wall.
"Your pain will be gone soon."
R gave her the beads and moved behind her. She sat straight after receiving them. He knelt down, held her head between his arms, then made a very powerful twist. There was a sharp crack, and the girl fell onto the ground face first, her legs kicked and twitched feebly then became still.
He carried Hina's corpse in his arms and let her lie beside the two bodies. There was a genuine smile on her face.
R dropped all the contents in Yora's drug packet into the sake bottle in the basket for Michiko, and added in some drugs he brought with him. His plan was to let the woman behind all the murders experience what her victims felt. He left the basket and the bottle meant for himself at her door.
"We finally got you, Master R!"
He was pulled into a room by two girls right away after leaving Michiko's door. They are Yuki and Nori, twin sisters known for being loud and naughty, sharing men together as a treat. He knows the town would miss them after today, but they must be punished. R let himself enjoy the girls pressing their perky breasts on him for a short moment, then reached into his pockets for two handfuls of aphrodisiac powder as they all undress. He watched with full attention, not for weapons they may hide, but for their thighs he see as their main attraction.
"Let me serve you, girls."
R laid down on the twins' bedsheets and let them settle down on his sides. He reached between their shapely legs before the girls can stop him, tickling them good, while rubbing as much powder as possible into their moist womanhoods. Yuki and Nori return his favor by massaging him, but they lost their strength fast. Soon, all they could do was panting and touching themselves.
He pulled his hands back and flipped the girls onto their stomachs. Next, R held one girl's neck in each of his arms, sat up, and applied pressure. The panting became gurgling, though Yuki and Nori did not even try to scratch at him. The last orgasm in their lives were their best. Their bare feet tapped a soft but intense rhythm, adding a strange beat to R's prayer for the girls' peace. The tapping ended with the sound of water flowing freely, as Yuki and Nori's habit of drinking gave them very full bladders on the moment of their death.
Giving the girls' dreamy expression on their choked red faces a last look, R wrapped their sweaty messy corpses in the bedsheets and kicked them to rest at the edge of a wall. He gave their room a quick search, and found Kappei's official documents hidden in their closet.
When R dressed up again and left the room he heard the sound of sex coming from not far away. He pulled back and listened carefully, in case it was some hired killer who Michiko or Yasako knew, or an innocent villager who came to visit a girl. Then, he realized it was two young bisexual women working under Michiko, Kinue and Omachi.
Omachi was the more boyish one, with the shortest hair and flattest breasts among the nine. Michiko has been making her do all the cleaning since not many men would pay for her, but sometimes the customers pay to watch her and another girl finger each other in front of them. Kinue was the youngest daughter of a disgraced samurai and the most beautiful one at the inn, as she still carefully keeps up her long hair and noble makeup.
R peeked into Kinue's room and saw a shocking picture: Kinue was on top of Omachi, pushing the sheath of Kappei's katana sword into her womanhood while touching herself. The sword itself was thrown aside like their clothing. Kinue's face was red and steamy from the excitement in sex, it looked even more beautiful than under makeup, He calmed himself down quickly, then slid open the door silently and walked in.
"Forgive me!"
Speaking to the girls, the Buddhas and Kappei, he flipped a heavy spare blanket onto the girls, covering them, and stabbed Kappei's katana right into its center. Pained coughing came from under the blanket immediately, and red color spread all across. R waited till all movements and noise ended to remove both sword and sheath. It was a disgrace for the sheath of a katana to be used by Omachi and Kinue like this, and the girls paid for their crimes with the most painful death of them all, but he also felt he should respect their intimacy in a way.
As he wiped the katana clean on the blanket, a slash came from behind his back. R turned around to see Oharu, an athletic girl with ponytail hair, holding Kappei's wakizashi short sword. She wasn't scared or angry, she was eager to fight him.
"Are you a ninja like me?"
R asked, but Oharu kept attacking, cutting a thin piece off his right sleeve, making him drop the katana. She was blocking the way between him and the door. He backed away, then dived at her lower body. Oharu dodged away, and R ran out of the room.
"You die fighting, the next man your masters send won't find anything! Hand over the samurai passport, and I can let you go."
Kappei's death is an assassination. The feudal masters must learn about this, and they must tell the shogunate. The people behind Oharu must have planned for a war between their lords and R's, and the blame may be pinned onto them if the passport went to wrong hands.
R ran into Yuki and Nori's room, and hid behind the dead girls' still warm bodies, wrapped up together with them in the bedsheets. His clothing was already stained by the lovers' blood and cut open by Oharu, being stained by urine is no longer a problem. The ninja girl would easily smell the blood on him and follow.
Oharu entered the room as he expected, still holding the wakizashi short sword. R pulled onto the silk string hard.
Before he left the room to find out about Kinue and Omachi, he has left a trap in the doorway in this room, a loop made of silk string tied to a roof beam. It caught Oharu right by the neck, making her drop her weapon too. R climbed out from his hiding place, then tied the other end of the string around the left thigh of Nori's lifeless naked body.
Oharu blushed seeing the twins dead and naked side by side, but she could not even gasp under the tight silk string. R flipped Nori's body over, letting the string wrap around her thighs, and lifted the struggling Oharu off the ground. The hanging girl was tall and athletic, so she tried her hardest to touch the floor again. Seeing this, R lifted her higher by turning Nori over once more.
The ninja girl's eyes turned to him and kicked at him. However, R was safely out of range, Oharu knew she was only going to feel more pain and shame in her last moments.
R walked towards her and she did not kick him anymore. Her expression pleaded him, the thin silk string gave her so much pain only death can end. He held onto her waist to slightly comfort her, then pulled down. With a loud pop, the girl's eyes and mouth opened wide as if in surprise, then closed halfway very slowly to give a look of hard earned rest after exhaustion. He let go of the dead girl but let her hung there freely, since he needed to finally take care of Michiko.
Michiko was lying in her room, unconscious but still alive. She was in her mid 20s, not much older than the girls and younger than Yasako, but her ruthlessness made her the mistress. Her luxurious hair and breasts were beautiful but also very imposing when fully on display. Now, in front of R, she was half dressed while drugged asleep, so the defenseless weakness gave her a new form of beauty. She drank the bottle of drugged sake in the basket, along with half of R's bottle. The air in her room smelled like alcohol and sex, two businesses of this inn. All it missed was hot spring water.
R thought to himself how life and beauty can change or end in any way, and how he must become the instrument of it. Michiko was humbled like the girls she controlled, now she must die like them. R wondered if she would fully gain the weak, innocent beauty in death.
He had planned a way to kill the scheming inn mistress she deserved on the day he gathered all the evidence on this inn. He poured all the remaining aphrodisiac into the half full sake bottle, then put in another packet of sleeping drugs he found in the room. Saying a prayer, he opened Michiko's tightly crossed legs and pushed the sake bottle neck into her vagina. It fitted perfectly.
R carried the unconscious woman to the main hot spring pool of the inn then lowered her in, still in her half open kimono. He pushed her to its center and waited.
After a while, the hot water and steam inside the bottle made Michiko open her eyes. She looked around in confusion, but the drugs made her impossible to say a word. The kimono weighed her arms down, just like with Yora, but R was not by her side to give her any comfort. Michiko starts to wave her arms around and kick at the water feebly, but she could not stand up straight. She gasped for air, but each time only more water entered her mouth and made her gulp.
R stepped in front of the pool and sat down looking at her. Michiko realized what has happened and stopped struggling. Soon, sake in the bottle had all mercifully became steam and brought all the drugs into her body, sending her into sleep. Combined with the hot water and tight kimono, her breathing was choked to a stop not long afterwards.
In the next morning, the villagers were surprised to find their mysterious merchant visitor gone and the staff of a hot springs inn slaughtered to the last woman. Six bodies and a letter from the feudal lord were on display at the entrance: Yuki, Nori, Kinue and Omachi were laid on the floor covered by bedsheets they died in, while Michiko and Oharu were stripped naked and hung upside down. The corpses of the young girl Yora, her mother Yasako, and Hina were already sent to the nearby Buddhist temple for a simple funeral. The three were dressed in pure white bridal kimonos.
In the end, the temple monks put the graves of the other six by their side, and all were known as the brides of the ninja.
