Voice of Daigoro Quotes in Shogun Assassin (1980)

Voice of Daigoro: When I was little, my father was famous. He was the greatest Samurai in the empire, and he was the Shogun's decapitator. He cut off the heads of 131 lords for the Shogun. It was a bad time for the empire. The Shogun just stayed inside his castle and he never came out. People said his brain was infected by devils, and that he was rotting with evil. The Shogun said the people were not loyal. He said he had a lot of enemies, but he killed more people than that. It was a bad time. Everybody living in fear, but still we were happy. My father would come home to mother, and when he had seen her, he would forget about the killings. He wasn't scared of the Shogun, but the Shogun was scared of him. Maybe that was the problem. At night, mother would sing for us, while father would go into his temple and pray for peace. He'd pray for things to get better. Then, one night the Shogun sent his ninja spies to our house. They were supposed to kill my father, but they didn't. That was the night everything changed, forever. That was when my father left his samurai life and became a demon. He became an assassin who walks the road of vengeance. And he took me with him. I don't remember most of this myself. I only remember the Shogun's ninja hunting us wherever we go. And the bodies falling. And the blood.

Voice of Daigoro: When we're on a mission, I keep count of how many ninja my father kills. He says not to keep count, only to pray for their souls. But if I don't keep count, I don't know how many souls to pray for. So I keep count. So far it's three hundred and forty-two.

[three ninja women ambush Lone Wolf. He swiftly kills them]

Voice of Daigoro: Three hundred and forty... five.

[last lines]

Voice of Daigoro: I guess I wish it was different. But a wish is only a wish.

Voice of Daigoro: At night, we make a fire, and have our tea, and we listen for the ninja, who never make a sound.

Voice of Daigoro: My father hardly ever talks anymore.