Bakumatsu Rouman: The Last Blade: Shikyo

Shikyo is the official insane guy of the group. ^_^ Trust me. He's nuts. In his starting pose, he licks one of his nasty-looking blades, and anytime you don't do anything with him for awhile, he gets bored and does it again. He's always giggling, and he also spends plenty of time drooling. For his winning pose, he points his finger at his fallen opponent and laughs maniacally.. but if you kill him, he laughs as well. Completely bonkers. I love playing him.

Shikyo weilds a very nasty looking weapon.. two huge curved blades that he can use both seperately -- too slash you one-two across the chest -- or together -- to spin like a helicopter blade and rupture your vital organs. He has a move where he leaps into the air and dives at you with his blades, and he also has several moves that throw his weapon, spinning across the screen, and if you're not careful, it can hit you from behind, too. However, if you hit him while the weapon is out of his hands, it falls and he has to retrieve it manually. My favourite move of his is a wonderful thing called the Weasel's Slash, where he scuttles across the screen, grabs you by your collar, and proceeds to munch on your stomach. Very disgusting, and also fast and difficult to block. He's hard to predict, and a lot of fun to use.

Last Blade 1 Story: Shikyo was also once a member of the Shinsengumi, like Keiichiro, but it was not to preserve Japanese history; it was to go on gleeful killing sprees. It didn't take the Shinsengumi long to figure this out, but Shikyo escaped before they could do anything to him, in search of more killing. Rumours of the Gates of Hell made him want to kill even more, but killing mere commoners was not satisfying enough. (Hey, I know that feeling. ^_~) He sought prey to quench his bloodlust; and when a strange man came to him and told him it could be found, he was quite happy to go along.

Last Blade 2 Story: See Mukuro's page for more information.

Useless but fun facts: Shikyo's birthdate is February 24th, 1829, making him 34 years old at the time of the game. The kanji for his name means something like violet mirror.