1554 Muraki Castle Campaign

For Momocon 2026, Samurai vs Monsters, World of Darkness LARP

By After the Sun Sets Games In the year 1554 AD, as war spread across the hidden supernatural courts of the world, the lands of Owari in distant Japan became the site of a growing darkness. There, Oda Nobunaga rose swiftly among both mortal and supernatural warriors alike. To common men he was a brilliant and dangerous daimyo of the Oda Clan, but among the Changing Breeds he was known as something far older in spirit — a White Khan Bastet born of an ancient bloodline tied by kinship and oath to the Shadow Lords Garou of Japan.

The conflict began with the struggle for Muraki Castle. Forces loyal to the Imagawa had seized the fortress and much of eastern Owari, building fortifications upon lands long whispered to be cursed by spirits and abandoned temple gods. Shadow Lord mystics warned that the hills beneath Muraki had once been sealed generations earlier by Hakken hunters and spirit speakers. Whatever slept below had been bound there for a reason.

Yet war could not be delayed.

Nobunaga gathered nearly thirteen hundred warriors beneath the banners of the Oda Clan. Ashigaru bearing long yari spears marched beside ranks armed with imported fire-tubes whose thunder echoed through the valleys. Hidden among the mortal soldiers traveled Bastet scouts, kinfolk craftsmen, and Shadow Lord warriors wearing the guise of samurai retainers. Spirit-talkers walking with the army warned of growing unrest in the Umbra. Ancestor spirits refused to answer prayers near Muraki Hill, while fox spirits and mountain Kami fled the region entirely.

To secure Nagoya against rival Oda forces, Nobunaga left trusted allies and Garou defenders behind before sailing from Atsuta Bay toward the embattled lands near Ogawa Castle. Strange omens followed the fleet across the waters — pale fog moving against the wind, white crows circling overhead, and lantern lights seen beneath the surface of the sea after nightfall.

The assault upon Muraki Castle became one of the first great victories of the young Khan. Oda samurai stormed breached gates while arquebusiers unleashed smoke and fire upon the defenders. Bastet warriors in war-form climbed walls like hunting cats while Shadow Lord Garou struck from nearby forests beneath the cover of darkness. By dawn, the Imagawa banners had fallen, and Muraki Castle stood once more beneath Oda control.

Then the mountain beneath the castle awoke.

In the nights that followed the battle, strange sounds echoed from beneath the fortress foundations — iron scraping against stone, chanting in dead tongues, and the distant beat of war drums where no living soldiers marched. Entire patrols vanished within the lower tunnels. The dead from the battlefield began to disappear from funeral pyres. Survivors spoke of armored figures moving through the mist beyond torchlight.

Within days, ancient wards hidden beneath Muraki shattered.

The lower catacombs beneath the castle erupted with horrors from forgotten ages. Undead samurai clad in rotting armor emerged from sealed passageways carrying cursed blades stained black with grave soil. Behind them came Oni bound long ago beneath the mountain by ancient mystics — massive horned creatures of rage and corruption, wielding foul magics that poisoned both flesh and spirit alike.

The war for Muraki became something far worse.

For months the Oda forces fought desperately against the undead legions and the sorceries of the Oni. Villages surrounding Muraki were abandoned or burned to deny the dead fresh bodies. Shadow Lord packs hunted through forests choked with spiritual corruption while Bastet warriors battled horrors in the castle tunnels beneath the earth. Firearms and steel slowed the undead, but many enemies rose again unless properly burned or spiritually cleansed. Worse still, the Oni twisted the Umbra around Muraki into a realm of fear and madness.

Even Oda Nobunaga understood that this was no longer a war his people could win alone.

At last, after terrible losses and months of endless battle, the Khan ordered a withdrawal from the deepest tunnels beneath Muraki. The fortress above remained under Oda control, but the darkness below could not yet be destroyed. Ancient seals were hastily remade while surviving mystics bought time with blood and spirit rites.

Then Nobunaga turned to the oldest alliance his people possessed.

Deep beneath the mountains of Owari, hidden within sacred caverns watched over by Bastet and Shadow Lord guardians, stood an ancient Torii Gate untouched by mortal history. Through this gate flowed one of the oldest spirit roads connecting the East to distant Avalon and the hidden paths of the Moody Badger Tavern and the Myrddin Taverns beyond.

Through rites of moonlight, blood, and spirit fire, the Khan sent forth his call.

The message traveled across the trods and hidden roads of the world, reaching Garou septs, Bastet courts, Changeling freeholds, and wandering hunters of the supernatural throughout Avalon.

The Oni had risen once more beneath the mountains of Owari.

The restless dead walked again.

And the White Khan called upon the warriors of Avalon to cross the spirit roads to Japan — to hunt monsters beneath the earth, to cast down the Oni, and to send the damned souls of Muraki at last into the peace of the afterlife.