Episode One: The Kaleidoscope

It is early May, in the year 1478. Nine men are sitting, waitng in the midst of wet marsh. The surrounding water begins to bubble, and a white form emerges. As the creature walks forward, more of the white creatures begin to approach. A step forward, and a black shadow approaches the horde of beings. The water erupts into flames, and the men stand up. These men are the Dog Warriors.
In the year of 1458, the province of Awa, located on the southernmost part of the Bousa pennisula, is ruled by two families, the Satomi, and the Anzai. They are at war with each other, but the Satomi become starved, and their supplies are diminishing. Their leader, Satomi Yoshizane, asked the Anzai family for help. But Anzai Kagetsura attacked the Satomi instead, aided by supernatural forces, the Satomi are severly beaten, and they are forced to take refuge in Takita castle.
Satomi Yoshizane is determined to win. He orders his son Yoshinari, and his daughter Fuse's fiance, Kanamari Daisuke, to assasinate lord Kagetsura. The two leave for the Anzai camp with a handful of retainers. Anzai Kagetsura proves to be more than a mere man, as strange demonic forces rip through the small army. Daisuke, realizing what the monster is, gives Yoshinari's horse a slap, sending him back to Takita, and challenges the monster himself. The demonic powers attcak, Kanamari Daisuke falls to the ground. He dies in hopes for Fuse's dream of a utopia in Awa.
At Takita, Satomi Yoshinari is begging for the forgivness of his father. But Yoshizane, who's last desperate struggle to win failed, said it didn't matter. He asked the family dog, Yatsufusa, if he wanted to help save the house of Satomi. In jest he told Yatsufusa that if he brought the head of Anzai to him, he would give the dog the hand of Fuse in marriage. The dog agreed, and that night Satomi Yoshizane recieved the head of Anzai Kagetsura.
With their leader gone, Anzai's army was in shambles, and this led way for the victory of the Satomi army. They celebrated, and Yoshinari was declared Tateyama's new lord. The hero, Yatsufusa, was given land and his own tenant.
But the dog remembered the words of Yoshizane: "Bring me the head of Anzai Kagetsura, and you may have my daughter Fuse's hand in marriage". Fuse learned of her father's pleading pledge. Despite the objections of both her parents, the princess Fuse married the dog, and the strange union went off into the sacred Tomi mountains.
Fuse carried with her a rosary of one-hundred eight prayer beads, one-hundred small beads and eight large crystal beads. The roary, given to her as a child, began to glow, and strange characters began to appear on them.
They lived there for almost a year. Fuse was haunted by strange dreams, and in one of them a woman told her that she had concieved the dog Yatsufusa's offspring. She was destined to give birth to a litter of eight. She learned that there was a curse placed on the Satomi house, and she had to find a way to destroy it.
Kanamari Daisuke survived his battle with the demonic forces, but because of his failure, saw no reason to return to his position in the Satmoi clan. After he learned of the marriage of Fuse and Yatsufusa, he set off after them, into the mountains. He found them, and shot the dog. But the bullet had hit Fuse as well, and she was fated to die.
Daisuke went to comfort his finace, and Fuse told him of the curse upon the Satomi, and told him not to die in vain for her, but to find a way to break the curse. Fuse's rosary began to glow once more, and the charactres changed from their originals to the spell of Confucisism. Fuse than drew her knife, and slit ther belly, and the beads flew into the sky. As the one-hundred small ones fell to the earth, the eight larger ones were scattered across the four winds into the night. Daisuke decided to obey Fuse, and became a monk, named Chudai, and began a quest to break the curse upon the Satomi. But the nature of the beads that flew into the skies was still a mystery.
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