Shinobi Joe, Mordheim Champion proxy. Warhammer Fantasy Ninja 074139/17

Eric started awake to see two baleful eyes staring down at him. 

The eyes seemed to belong to the night itself as the rest of the figure blended seamlessly with the surrounding darkness. A black gloved hand encasing a steel like grip, clamped down on his mouth, stiffling any cry for help.

Looking shifty

"You are not Crashhart!" the night demon stated. "Where is Crashhart?" A razor sharp sword blade appeared like magic from the shadows, its glint confirming its reality. "I have been sent to kill Crashhart, I have travelled half the world to find him! The Princessess honour will be restored, tell me his location and I will make your death painless!".

Eric rolled his eyes. Really! Another one!

All he had done since taking on the persona of Crashhart was fight duels with cuckolded husbands, dodge unpaid whores and kill off loan shark heavies.

Now he was about to have his throat slit by an assassin with strangly shaped eyes and an accent he had never heard before. Was there not a single person on earth Crashhart had not offended or tried to mate with?

Real Ninjas wear blue!

Suddenly the door exploded inwards in a shower of splintered wood, the forms of Red and Crazy Bob enclosed within! Quicker then thought itself the black clad assassin had lashed out with his leg. The kick connected with Bob's temple and sent him sprawling to the ground unconscious.

Within a heartbeat the mystery figure had regained his fighting stance and parried a sword blow from Red. The two combatants engaged in a swirling melee of flashing steel. Eric grabbed his sword and joined the melee, the stranger easily taking stock of this and repositioned himself to counter the new arrival.

It's not the size of the dog in the fight that counts but the size of the fight in the dog!

Suddenly an Ogre shaped hole appeared in the tavern wall as Arnold crashed through the flimsy partition wall to appear behind the warrior in black. This sudden appearance of the behemoth form of Arnold stunned even the mystery assassin! In a blink of an eye Arnold had crashed a ham sized fist into the strangers head, dropping him like a sack of spuds.

The assassin regained conscienseness to find himself tightly bound, and staring at a dozen bewildered faces.

"Its awake" a voice said.

"Great but what is 'it'?"

"Maybe a Hobgoblin? Look at its sallow skin and those eyes, its definately a Hobgoblin".

"It's short" another voice ventured "Is it one of your kin, Grim?"

"Look at its jet black hair. Could it be some kind of Dark Elf?"

The baritone voice of the Ogre interjected "Its none of those things. It smells human. Its a Shinobi assassin from the Nippon kingdoms!" "My old mucker Gorebull Maneater returned from Nippon a while back dressed like this fella. He told us tales of a clan of 'shadow warriors' who would appear like demons from the darkness and disappear again in the blink of an eye, the only evidence of the 'visit' being the bodies of the slain. I'd never seen one before but this fella certainly matches Gorebulls description. What we going to do with this bloke? As Gorebull said they make good eating if you can catch one?"

"What are we going to do with this fella?" Eric repeated stepping forward "He appeared out of nowhere, nearly KICKED Bobs head off his shoulders and then fought me and Red to a standstill. What are we going to do with this fella? We are going to recruit him!"

Shinobi Joe is a champion (35 gc's) with only a Halbard (10 gc's) at the moment but I have plans for this little fella.

So above is Shinobi Joe my new Champion. It's an old WHF ninja I bought as a kid back in the day.

First impression when I pulled him out of the lead pile was "blimey thats a little one!". They definately made the figures smaller back in my day. Thankfully being a japanese ninja its fitted in ok.

One of the reasons "The Last Samurai" is one of my favourate films is because they actually got Ninjas right (well as right as Hollywood can get anything right), by dressing them in blue and blacking up the faces. The black ninja is one of those old misconcentions that was perpetuated by the movies.

Also tried to paint the eyes to make them look like he was looking round a corner or he is sneaking up on the corner of a building.

Going to have him as a champion so he can gain loads of ninja goodness in the way of skill ungrades (he has to get throwing stars).

Also finished up 'Full skin Willy" (the result of a rather bizare conversation we had last week).

This fella was literally the result of 45 minutes of throwing paint at the figure at work as I had got distracted by the ninja and needed Willy finished for the game that night.

This fella is a youngblood (15gc), with a Halbard (10gc) so he has half a chance of wounding a knocked down enemy.

The way my band are lasting I figure I will be replacing him soon anyway!

Two more down. 378 to go!

The good news is I am  mostly finished on several minis so I just need the Forsaken to stop dying so I can finish the others off.