Tomoe Gozen was Japan’s most fearsome female samurai. Tomoe’s significance wasn’t that she was a female samurai, which was not unheard of at the time, but that she was an exceptionally skilled warrior. She was as beautiful as she was deadly, and her stories became so legendary that the line between truth and myth has become blurred. Many ballads and tales were written about her exploits, one of the main sources of information being the Heike Monogatari. These stories and ballads describe how she defeated renowned enemy generals and charged into battle against all odds only to arise victorious. Truthfully, we don’t even know if Tomoe Gozen is her real name. “Tomoe” could have been used to describe the pattern of her armor, and “Gozen” was a generic title given to women of honor. Whether some of her stories are myth or historically accurate, no one can argue against the legacy of her courage and brutality.

Tomoe Gozen is included in Unmatched: Sun’s Origin, where she battles against Japan’s “Great Unifier” Oda Nobunaga.