Every generation, a shinobi thinks the Accord's Ghosts are a story elders tell to keep the young cautious. Every generation, one of them learns otherwise.
A mission begins with a contract and a map — a graph of nodes representing infiltration points, deception checkpoints, and potential confrontations, each connected by routes that carry different risk and different reward. Movement through the graph costs composure on a close call and builds Shadow Debt on exposure, two meters that run in opposite directions and demand constant arbitration. The game does not explain itself the way a manual would; it explains itself the way Hinomoto does — through consequence.
Review Key ThresholdsShinobi Briefing
Instructions
What resets between runs and what carries over?
Composure, shadow-thread, and your equipped loadout reset at the start of each new run, giving you a clean slate of nerve and resources. However, Reputation Bleed, conspiracy fragments, and faction hostility levels persist — the world remembers even when your inventory does not.
How is Composure restored during a run?
Composure can be partially recovered at safe-house nodes scattered across the mission graph — resting, spending shadow-thread on calming rituals, or completing a deception checkpoint without triggering any alerts all return a portion of your nerve. It is never fully refilled mid-run, so every recovery is a decision about where to spend precious time.
What changes when Composure breaks completely?
A broken Composure ends the run immediately — your shinobi's nerve shatters, and NPC contacts who witnessed the failure update their standing toward you negatively in the persistent reputation layer. Clan hunters spawned in that run also log your face, making future missions in that province marginally harder.
How does Shadow Debt escalate across a single run?
Shadow Debt accumulates in visible stages — at low debt you are merely watched, at mid-range patrols tighten and gate checks become harder, and at high debt the Hunter Pursuit Clock activates and clan hunters spawn on a visible countdown timer. Spending shadow-thread to bribe or disguise reduces accumulated debt before it crosses each threshold.
What triggers faction hostility and how persistent is it?
Insulting a clan's agents, stealing from their holdings, or killing their operatives all register as Reputation Bleed events that raise that faction's hostility permanently across future runs. Elevated hostility closes off certain contacts and node options within that clan's territory until a favor of equal weight is performed.
Can Shadow Debt carry over into the next run?
Shadow Debt itself resets between runs, but the consequences it generated — hunters who logged your face, contacts who saw you cornered — persist as reputation marks. In practice this means a high-debt run leaves scars on the world even after the clock resets.
Every generation, a shinobi thinks the Accord's Ghosts are a story elders tell to keep the young cautious. Every generation, one of them learns otherwise.
Recovered Hollow Crane Inscription
Found inside Ash Temple, lower sanctum
Mechanical Thresholds at a Glance
Escalating Pressure
Three Threats, One Tightening Noose
The Hollow Crane operates beneath every mission as an ambient force — its cultists move through Ash Temple and the Veil Market alike, and triggering their attention accelerates the conspiracy's erasure of clues you haven't yet found. Shadow Debt accumulates from exposure events across a run and crosses into the next, advancing the Hunter Pursuit Clock until clan hunters appear mid-mission, transforming your objective into a secondary concern. The Accord's Ghosts layer over both: enforcers of a dead treaty who appear when you learn too much, treating knowledge itself as the crime.
Instructions
Mastering Silk & Shadow means understanding that its rules are extensions of the world's logic — composure, exposure, and clan politics are mechanics because they are survival.
Rule interactions shown here represent the current design state. Edge cases and threshold values may be refined before final release.
Review Key Thresholds