After six train changes from Tokyo followed by a steep cable car ride, I stepped out into a cloud of mist. I could see nothing; thick pearly moisture filled the tree-fragrant-air. And it was silent. Silent, silent. 

In old Japan, warriors, priests, and the blind made their entire lives a pilgrimage, walking and begging from one end of the islands to the other. The man who inspired me sojourned alone for forty years, up and down the country, seeking opponents, his passage marked only by the defeated he left behind.