Shinta

History
Shinta (no surname known) was one of the primary leaders of the Rising Moon Clan as well as the sensei of the Brothers Kurokawa and one of the most powerful figures of the series until his death. To be written...

Abilities
As the man who taught both Ruzan and Blackriver everything they know, it can be assumed that Shinta possesses expertise in every area that they do. Though he only uses swords in his fights, it has been recounted in a flashback that Shinta is proficient with every single type of one-handed weapon in common use and has thus taught Blackriver his knife techniques and Ruzan his fist techniques.

Furthermore, Shinta possesses a mastery of psychology even beyond Blackriver's, in that he can often tell what people will choose to do before they even decide to do so themselves. Shinta's knowledge of thought processes nearly parallels the ability to read minds.

Author's Note
"Shinta's models are really kind of obvious and he's one of those stereotypical characters that has to be in this kind of story. I mean, he's the type of guy like Hiko Seijuro of Rurouni Kenshin or Hatake Kakashi from Naruto, but he's obviously more serious than those two (especially Kakashi). You're kind of left wondering through the story whether Shinta is a good guy or a bad guy, much like his student in the later part of the series. At first, like in the beginning of the story, you only hear tell of Shinta and you never actually see him. He's this kind of legendary figure that is out in the distance, out of reach of even the heroes of the series. Eventually you get to the Caverns of Time arc and you get to see him in action, where he totally kicks ass all over the place. So I think I did pretty well setting him up as this sort of ineffable character who is relatively invincible compared to the others. I also kind of had to kill him off in the Nexus War arc for two reasons. One, I needed to make Malygos seem really powerful to really set the stage for how strong the Dragon Aspects really are. Two, I didn't want to have him available as an unused deus ex machina later on..."

Trivia
Shinta is named after both Himura Kenshin of Rurouni Kenshin and the traditional Japanese culture known as Shinto.

Furthermore, Shinta's personality is based heavily off of Hiko Seijuro of Rurouni Kenshin and the traditional depiction of stern and skilled sensei in Japanese martial arts.