NationStates Jolt Archive

The Xanthalian ministries of the Armada and Military, Intelligence, and Research and Science have formed a team of the nation's best swordsmen and women, pulled mostly from the Ministry of Intelligence, to study the ancient lost sword art known as Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu. This incredibly powerful sword school has become little more than legend over the past thousand years, but if it can be rediscovered it would give fighters using it incredible power. Unfortunately, it requires incredible speed and agility of both the mind and body to master. Nonetheless, the one known historical figure to master Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu, Rurouni Kenshin, was able to take down dozens of regular swordfighters at once, defeat the greatest blademasters of his time, and even block bullets with his blade. While the chances of success of ever rediscovering this technique are close to zero, the Minister of Research and Science probably best described the effort's motivation in his statement that "it can't hurt to try, and even in the modern day the sword can be a powerful melee weapon."
This will be the first government-funded blade training outside the Ministry of Intelligence in Xanthalian history.

((OOC: Ur... Kenshin never actually blocks bullets using Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu- he gets really lucky once or twice, but he never actually deflects bullets. And as of the end of the manga, only two people know the style- Himura Kenshin (aka the hitokiri Battousai), and Hiko Seijuro the 13th. And neither one ever passed the style on again- it presumably dies with them. Just some notes from a die-hard Kenshin fanatic ^_~))

Reploid Productions: He did so block a bullet! In the first manga! Look it up! As for not passing the technique on, I know that. That's why we need to rediscover it.

After nearly three decades of research, the effort to rediscover the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu is finally showing progress. The Minister of Research and Science: "We've discovered the basis, now it's just a matter of building techniques from there. Most of our people couldn't make the cut, but we have seven still in training that are showing strong promise. We can now safely expect to have the technique fully documented and an Armada/Military/Intelligence training school set up within the next five years. Of course, security will be paramount. If too many are allowed to learn the technique, we could be put in grave danger. Still, abandoning the effort now would be pointless. This will do a great deal to enhance our special operations ability."

The Ministry of Research and Science has issued a statement that the sword school of Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu has been successfully revived, but the Ministry of Intelligence has classified all specific information on the grounds that "the power of the sword techniques in Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu is too great to risk its use spreading."