Ninja Attack!. Hiroko Yoda

battle. It should have been a clear rout. But as dawn broke, something strange happened. The Moriya men began panicking, loosing arrows wildly, swinging swords blindly, running around like chickens with their heads cut off. Legend ascribes the once-mighty army’s subsequent defeat at the prince’s hands to divine intervention. But reading between the lines, it is highly likely that the prince’s clandestine friend Otomo played a role in the affair, for throwing terror into the hearts of a superior-sized force is one of the founding principles of ninjutsu. And in an era before ninja were widely known or employed, his feat could well have looked like the hand of god intervening to smite the enemy troops.

      It isn’t known exactly how he pulled this off, but history offers a tantalizing clue: in the fourteenth century, a warrior named Kusunoki Masashige pulled off a similar trick by preparing dozens of extra battle-pennants and hiring hundreds of civilians to pose as warriors, fooling his overconfident enemy into thinking that they had sorely underestimated the size of the forces they were facing.

      The End

      The victory sealed Prince Shotoku’s clan’s claim to the throne, and one of his first official acts was recognizing Japan’s clandestine operatives with the title of “Shinobi.” A millenium later in the sixteenth century, the Ninjutsu-Ogiden, annals of the Koga ninja, would explicitly describe Otomo-no-sabito as an honored ancestor—of themselves, and of all ninja.

      Somewhat strangely for someone otherwise quite well documented, there is absolutely no record of what caused Prince Shotoku’s death at the age of 48, some three decades after he assumed power. Given the lack of any reports to the contrary, not to mention the limited medical technology available at the time, it is entirely likely that natural causes were to blame.

      Trivia

      THE FIRST NINJA

      The prince used the characters 志能便 to write Shinobi—“will,” “ability,” and “usefulness.” Today it is written with the homonym 忍び, “clandestine.”

      WHAT’S IN A NAME?

      There is some controversy over Prince Shotoku’s name. During his lifetime, he was known as Prince Umayato (stable door), for he happened to have been born outside of a horse stable. In recent years, the political baggage of the posthumous title Shotoku, which means “imperial virtue,” has led Japanese scholars (and textbooks) to prefer the use of “Umayato” instead. The change remains politically charged in some quarters.

      _____________________

* This is undoubtedly a metaphor for just how well informed he was kept by his spies.

      EN NO OZUNU

       He who commands Oni: Gyoja

      NINJA MAGIC

      701 A.D.

      Name: EN NO OZUNU

      役小角

      Birth–Death: 634?-701?

      Literal Translation: “En of the Horn”

      Occupation: Shaman/Mystic

      Cause of Death: Unknown

      A.K.A.: En no Gyoja (En the Pilgrim) Kamo-no-e-no-kimi (Birth name) Ubasoku (The Unordained Devout) Jinben Daibosatsu (After death: “Great Bodhisattva of Heavenly Change”)

      Known Associates: Zenki (red, male oni) Goki (green, female oni)

      Hobbies: Collecting medicinal herbs Housebreaking ogres

      Preferred Technique: The Kujaku-o (Peakock King) mantra

      Clan Affiliation: His own bad-ass self

      Existence: Confirmed

      The Man

      A mountain man who was more of a mystic than a fighter, En no Ozunu would have scratched his head in confusion if asked if he was a ninja. (Not least of all because it would be many centuries before the word was actually used.) Yet a deep connection exists nonetheless. He is the legendary founder of the religion of Shugendo—a fusion of native Japanese mountain worship and Buddhism, inflected with Taoist and cosmological teachings from China. The yamabushi, as its practitioners are known, were a tough crew of self-reliant alpine survivalists and martial artists. They treated mountains as sacred ground, and first taught the ninja many of their tricks. In turn the ninja venerated En no Ozunu as an honored ancestor, akin to their patron saint.

      He was born with a horn growing from his skull, a flower clutched in his hand, and the ability to hold conversations even as a newborn. Long years spent meditating deep in the mountains earned him the nickname En no Gyoja, or “En the Ascetic.”

       Schooling ogres is all in a day’s work for this holy man

      The charismatic holy man eschewed formal ordination, choosing instead to practice and espouse his new brand of religion on Mount Katsuragi in Nara. His iconoclastic example and growing number of followers represented a direct threat to the emperor’s authority. Before long, he was falsely accused of treason and exiled to a distant island for three years.

      In exile, En no Ozunu took to climbing and meditating atop Mt. Fuji, a trek considered so arduous that it is often said “he who climbs Mount Fuji once is a wise man; he who climbs it twice is a fool.” Apparently climbing it more than a thousand times grants one supernatural powers, for his perfection of a magical mantra called “The Peacock King” on its slopes turned the already talented En no Ozunu into something more than human. (Did we mention that he accomplished this feat while officially confined to the remote island of Oshima, many miles removed from the foot of the mountain?)

      Packed with peacock power and blessed with the ability to flit about the skies on clouds, Ozunu now began splitting his time between heaven and Earth. Not a bad gig if you can swing it, but man, what a commute!

      The Moment of Glory

      It’s hard to pick a single shining moment from the life of a super-shaman. Was it the first time he walked on water? When he realized he could subsist on nothing but mist and air? The time he transformed himself into a tiger? Certainly his most famous triumph involves a pair of oni, or ogres, known as Zenki and Goki.

      Like a monster Bonnie and Clyde, Zenki and Goki were a couple that terrorized the residents of a mountain range near Nara. Until En no Ozunu showed up, that is, invoking the power of a Buddhist deity to stun them into submission. He then captured their five infant offspring and hid them in a large cauldron to convince the demon couple their children were dead. Recognizing their sense of loss as the exact same sort of distress felt by their victims, Zenki and Goki pledged to renounce their evil ways and assist En no Ozunu in his future endeavors. He took them up on their offer, reunited the family, and the oni couple remained loyal associates for many years.

      The End

      When you’re talking about a man with connections to some literal “higher-ups,” life’s end is just another beginning. Some say En no Ozunu achieved enlightenment and walked across the ocean to China in 701. Others say he took to the skies, accompanied by his mother, in a Buddhist alms bowl. Whatever the case, he is now considered a Sennin, or Great Immortal, who is still out there, somewhere, watching over the yamabushi for as long as they walk the earth.

      Trivia

      DOJO OF THE GODS

      In the centuries after his death, the yamabushi established an elaborate training facility on a Koga mountain called Hando-san, where En no Ozunu is believed to have once dwelled. Ninja visited the area to learn the use of herbs and minerals, weather patterns, and camouflage strategies from the warrior monks.

      HARD-HEADED IMMORTAL

      Legend