Shou Takeo was born in the small village of Ecruteak, about 185 years ago, when the village was little more than dojos, houses, and maybe some other things that never seemed to interest Shou. After having been born, Shou was raised up and taught about culture and tradition of Ecruteak. Living in that small village, he was always fascinated about the large gleeming tower that loomed over the horizon. After asking his parents, he heard the stories about how the monks that are seen moving in and out of the tower served a great phoenix called Ho-Oh. However, the monks had been sworn to secrecy, and wouldn't discuss their work, or let anyone within the tower. Despite the monks being held in high regard in the village, this tales were often dismissed as myths, or lies. Shou however wanted desperately to find out, and often was shooed away from the tower by monks that would find him trying to peek passed the door. Soon it lead to even trying to sneak inside, quickly being caught by the monks and brought back to his parents for chastisement. At one time, he had sworn he heard the call of the great phoenix, but no one believed him, saying he was lying or simply heard another Pokémon. On the brink of frustration, one day he simply ran as far up the tower as he could get, reaching only the second floor of course. However, one of the monks quietly chuckled, as he had heard about the boy's determination and attempts to see the truth of the tower. So he offered to bring the boy into the ranks of the monks.
Soon Shou was a monk of the Brass Tower. Doing menial tasks and slowly being taught the meanings, and values of the monks. All the while, he learned in school, and started taking martial arts classes in a nearby dojo, the master being the very monk who had taken him in, Hotaka. Hotaka taught him a fighting style that would allow Shou, a small kid, to fight without being strong, or using force. The traditional style of Judo. Shou taken to the training quite well, and loved it because of it's alignment with the moral teachings of the monks. The gift of second chances, allowing you to not inflict damage or injury on your opponent, so they may rethink themselves, and if they don't it still allows you to deal damage. Shou found himself bursting through the teachings, and pleased at the praises that he was exceptional. Soon it was less praise, and more a belief that he had to keep improving himself, as well as an obligation to his cause.
Along with the training in Judo, soon Shou was being taught how to fight with a long pole. On one end of the pole, it was weight down with heavy cloths, which at first Shou didn't understand. Soon Hotaka smiled at the progress Shou made in his training, and admitted that he had knew Shou would take to this type of weapon. Presenting him with a naginata. A long wooden pole with a simple metal bladed end on one side, explaining that this was what Hotaka had been training him to use. A weapon that could be both deadly, and yet defensive and non-lethal depending on it's use.
Once he was about the age of 16 was the first time he had been granted the honor of seeing a living legend. During a ceremony to officially make Shou a sohei, a warrior of the monks (or at least an official apprentice of such a position), he was taken to the top of the tower, where the legendary boot roosted. The first thing Shou felt traveling up the steps was the warmth. Not an uncomfortable type, even in his heavy ceremonial robes, but a welcoming embracing warmth. Then he stopped in his tracks the moment his eyes laid upon the mythical creature. To the present day, he had never seen such a beautiful creature, the red of it's feathers were like warmth themselves, like if you touched them, your hand would pass through and be embraced in heat. Golden feathers beyond the man's conception of gold, only words could describe it as "the goldest of all gold". It's eyes seemed to see through Shou, yet take notice of everything that made him. It's presence alone seemed to push away the physical world, faded in his senses, only making room for the emenance of Ho-Oh, like it's presence was priority over such things like the ground beneath him, or the sounds in the air. Hotaka behind him chuckled as he lightly pushed Shou forward by his shoulders, to begin the ceremony. Despite that Hotaka seemed like he was a distant memory, and the world was only made up of the barest fragment of Shou himself, and all the rest of it was Ho-Oh. To this day, nothing gripped him more than that moment.
Since his ceremony, he trained even harder, soon topping the classes of Hotaka's dojo, and even developing a style all of his own, combining the practices of the naginata, and judo, creating a style that incorperated the flow and motions of judo into the strokes and guards of the naginata. In practice it worked to deflect weapons the same way Judo was used to deflect blows. Using the strikes against the user, embeding the weapon, pinning it, or simply moving it to another location all by simply directing it's force with his own naginata. Some say you could fight Shou for hours, and never scratch him, and he wouldn't be no-where near as tired as you were. The secret was that Shou barely had to exert force, only simply moving around, though he of course never indulged in these rumors, simply saying people were giving him too much praise. Hotaka however, was a master. Between them, they honestly could continue well beyond hours of motions, and flow never landing a single hit on each other, never a proper strike, at least when it came to Judo. With the naginata, Hotaka would eventually wind up with the upper hand, being a master of the weapon, as well as using it in a more traditional and offensive way than Shou. However, Shou could still last a long while without being properly struck.
Shou continued his training nearly every day, arms and limbs often sore from the constant efforts. Multiple times he's end up injured in some way or another, though he always seemed to bounce back just as good as always, and he began considering it as some kind of blessing, his body renews itself after injury thanks to Ho-Oh's power (wither or not that's true wasn't important). Eventually he ended up fracturing his leg. During the time he was off letting the injury heal, he mostly had to rest in bed and stay off of his leg. Until he took notice multiple shadows of figures pass by his window. Taking a look outside, he saw people running to and fro rather frantically. Although what really caught his eye was in the distance a small plume of smoke rising in the distance from the base of the Brass Tower.
Climbing up out of bed, holding his leg under him, bent so it wouldn't touch the ground, he grabbed his practice naginata for support, and began walking with it out of his house. Outside people were running inside, and locking up their doors. Many men had weapons out, and were directing groups of people.
Carefully Shou began hobbling over towards the path of the tower. His leg wasn't healed perfectly, but it could hold some weight. Though it was definitely not a favorable situation. Stumbling often, and falling plenty, Shou ended up approching the tower. He saw the flames before he could see the base of the tower. The smoke had easily spread along treetops, and up the wood and fabric tower. Smoke blocked out a lot of the sunlight, setting the whole scene in a gloom, mostly illuminated by the flicker of flames that light the treetops and tower alike. Shou held his arm over his face, slowly hobbling to the tower. Seeing the emenant destruction of something so sacred burned Shou from the inside, more ferociously than the flames themselves ever could do from the outside. Then his mind blanked out and he looked up the height of the tower as he heard a cry. A cry from Pokémon, cries from monks. A cry cut short as the top level of the tower collapsed a couple stories downwards, leaving the thick main-support beam naked and charred in the sky.
He couldn't leave anyone in there alive, he had to help. He had to help. He had to help. As he took a few ungraceful steps forward, someone came up from behind him, footsteps slapping against the ground. Holding himself on one leg, Shou looked over his shoulder, and saw the blade of a sword lunging forward. In a swift motion, the butt of his Naginata stretched outwards, jabbing into the shoulder of a black-clad man, stopping the length of the blade from reaching Shou, however only supporting himself on one foot, Shou fell backwards. The bandit looked down at him, holding the sword low, aimed for his chest. Shou swung his naginata, the blade crossing the man's chest... however it was mere dulled metal, only meant for practice. Shou never took a real one home, seeing no use to the lethal of a real blade. While it probably didn't feel good, the bandit knew it wasn't lethal, and with newfound confidence approched Shou, raising the blade. However the bandit found himself unable to move forward as a pole extended across his neck, and pinned him up against the chest of a man behind him. In a swift motion, the bandit's feet was swept out, his body flung to the side, and his face biting the ground.
Hotaka looked down at Shou, a firm, grim face. He didn't kill the bandit. Shou was thankful for that.
"Shou, you need to get away from here. Bandits are attacking Ecruteak. You need to take to the woods, you can't fight like this." Hotaka directed. He never saw Shou as a stupid man, never took him for a hero either, just a good boy grown into a good man. Hotaka wouldn't have ever expected that when he left to take the bandit somewhere secure, that Shou would have gotten up, and rushed into the slowly collapsing, burning tower.
Once Shou entered the tower, he began yelling out. He didn't hear a response at first, but soon there was a strong cough and sputter as a monk lifted himself up off of the ground. Under the monk was a few other men, nearly blending into the ground with the soot that coated them. It was evident that the monk had tackled them out of the way from falling debris. Shou immediately shouted for them to get outside. They quickly took the directions, and began moving passed Shou to get outside. As soon as they stepped passed, a horrible snapping sound above rang into the air directly above, and Shou without thinking about it, drove the end of the pactice naginata into the ground like a small wedge, which ended up catching the burning beams saving them by mere inches... at least until the naginata easily snapped and the weight and flames of the beams weighed Shou down from his back. Holding up the burning wood, and coughing from the smoke filling the air, he once again demanded the monks get outside. The pain in his bad leg stood as the reminder that escaping out from under the debris would most likely be impossible. The leg shouldn't even be capable of supporting this weight, it was simply the strength of his bones locking the weight up like a flesh covered wedge. The moment he moved, he'd collapse and be crushed.
Shou had no idea how long it was until another monk with a couple Pokémon drop down from one of the many holes above. Landing rather ungracefully, he quickly looked towards the exit, eyes stopping on Shou. "Get out." was all Shou could spare the monk. He looked down at the Pokémon in his arms. Maybe if he didn't have Pokémon to save, he would've helped, but he made his way under the debris Shou held up. The burns on his back had long made him dizzy with pain, his teeth being grind together as he took the pain of it... Until another round of debris fell, and everything went black.
He was furious. Not because he didn't get outside, but because he could hear screaming. Pokémon and humans alike, and if his face wasn't buried in soot and the burning wood around him, he might've been screaming too. Those screams only meant people he knew were burning away. They weren't given the luxery of suffocation like he was, though he could feel the flames across his back and his legs he couldn't feel at all. He had no idea if his eyes were open or closed, but soon light filled his world again, just briefly, as his body fell with blazing rubble to the floor below, his ears immediatly being filled with painful howls, and the scent of burnt fur and flesh. He had no idea what was happening around him, and soon his vision was black once more, though this time he was sure it's because his head had been cracked under the rubble. This time it was one of his arm's turn to lose all sense of feeling, which was a cruel blessing in the blaze of this fire.
Ears filled with the howls, and body slowly numbing after the searing pain, he lays there, furious at himself. He couldn't count the endless amount of time before all of his senses seemed to fade around him. Soon Shou would accept his death, his world reduced to merely a broken dying line of thoughts.
Ho-Oh. Your tower has burned down. I'm horribly sorry I couldn't have done something about that... but it's my honor to die here, having had served under your purpose and beauty. I only wish the sins dealt today could burn away with me, and that all could start anew... like some glorious phoenix.
Despite his senses that have burned into oblivion, he felt an every powerful presence. Like he knew just beyond a curtain something amazing could be seen. If he could smile, he would, because something like that shouldn't be in a blazing hell like this.
That last feeling was all he felt, before his eyes fluttered open. He layed in the ashes, sunlight shimmering from the gaping holes and cracks in the tower left scorched and charred from flames that had passed. He layed there because he shouldn't be able too in the first place. Just like everything around him, he should have been ash. What's more, is he could feel everything. Whatever he was laying on was damn uncomfortable. With a simple thought as that, he pushed himself up out of the ashes, stark naked in the burned ruins of his formerly beloved great Brass Tower.
He slowly made his way to the center of the room, turning his body to look around him in search of some way up to the ground-level floor. Though his eyes drifted downwards. Remnants of the tower were left behind, like old statues, charred and blackened from smoke and fire. Though something else grabbed his attention. Pawprints were left behind in the soot, though they were larger than anything he knew to leave a footprint like such. It wasn't the idea of what left them, more than the idea that something had survived... or most likely another case like him. A wonder. Though Shou had an idea of what happened, he questioned why.
Soon climbing up what remained of stairs, he approached the entrance of the tower. There he saw someone in monk's robes just outside, peering at the tower. Hotaka. Once he caught sight of Shou, his eyes widened. Obviously more than the suprise of seeing him naked, he was impossibly alive. Alive, and unharmed. Even the limp was gone, everything. Hotaka's eyes began to water, and that was probably the first and only time Shou would ever witness the aging man cry.
A brief explanation (or likely just a good guess based on myths and legends about Ho-Oh's powers) later, Shou was informed about the three unknown Pokémon witnessed to have left the tower earlier that morning. Everyone who had survived had left the tower, returning home to both fight back the attackers, and take care of their families. Though people beleive Ho-Oh was responisble for reviving the three Pokémon who had been lost in the fire, no one dared to enter the ruins. Thus no one knew Shou too had somehow survived. They believe that he too had been revived by Ho-Oh, though if it was intentional or by accedent that he was nearby the three other Pokémon, they couldn't say. Then probably the most troublesome knews, Ho-Oh had not returned, and instead vanished. The only signs of it's presence at all was a rainbow that seemed misplaced in the sky at this time of morning.
So Shou followed it. Taking this renewed life and fully pledging it to the one who had restored it, rather than returning to his home that he shouldn't have been able to reach altogether. He followed the rainbow that appeared in the sky, even if it was just dumb luck, or blind faith, he followed it.
