Hasetsukabe no Koharumaru was drenched in sweat, suffering from acute dehydration and sheer exhaustion.
He kept running, hiding endlessly without a single moment to rest, desperately chewing on wild grass and swallowing muddy water just to stay alive.
To be honest, it was a brutal way to live, but he was already used to hardships like this—though facing a squad of elite shinobi was an entirely different nightmare.
Wielding a blade gripped tightly in his right hand, Koharumaru swung it like a whip.
His movements were fluid yet lethal, keeping the three Oni-masked assassins on high alert.
Every single kunai carried by the Oni-masked men was coated in a deadly neurotoxin; a single graze meant paralysis, followed by death within minutes.
Koharumaru knew he couldn’t afford a single mistake, desperately searching for any blind spot to break away, but their relentless pressure was simply too overwhelming.
“I’m sorry, but Hasetsukabe no Koharumaru must die by our hands,” one of them stated flatly.
“Then come and try if you dare!”
Koharumaru parried a strike, trapping one of the Oni-masked assassins while the others moved to flank him from behind.
Just as they closed in for the kill, Koharumaru stomped hard on the ground, pivoted, and drove his blade straight through the throat of the nearest assassin.
The man collapsed instantly into a pool of his own blood.
The remaining two Oni-masked agents immediately detonated a smoke bomb to cover their tracks.
Unfortunately for them, Koharumaru’s instincts were too fast; instead of retreating blindly, he looped around to flank their position.
Spotting the movement, the surviving assassin prepared a counter-ambush, drawing a hidden mechanism from behind his back.
Koharumaru furrowed his brow, trying to read the attack in a split second, but it was already too late.
“Too slow,” the assassin mocked with absolute confidence.
Two life-sized wooden puppets suddenly emerged from the left and right, their chest compartments snapping wide open to reveal hollow interiors.
As the assassin flicked his fingers through the control threads, the puppets lunged, instantly binding Koharumaru’s arms, legs, and torso in a tight mechanical lock that rendered him completely immobile.
“Let me g—” His voice was cut short as the puppet’s cage slammed shut with a heavy click, sealing him securely inside.
Muffled pounding echoed from within the wooden prison as Koharumaru battered furiously against the walls.
Ignoring the trapped youth, the primary assassin hoisted the container onto the ground, leaving a secondary guard behind to watch over the captive while he hurried off to deliver the report directly to Taira no Masakado.
Upon arriving at the front lines, the battlefield was already a chaotic warzone as Masakado’s rebel forces clashed relentlessly with the Kyoto government troops.
Two primary leaders, Fujiwara Hidesato and Taira no Sadamori, sat conferring inside a command tent, anxiously awaiting updates from their scouts.
Believing that the returning messenger was supposedly Koharumaru himself, the cunning Oni-masked operative decided to hijack the opportunity, feeding them false intelligence.
Shedding his standard gear, he hastily donned the disguise of a brick merchant—the exact cover Koharumaru had used earlier—while stashing his shinobi clothes away.
Hiding beneath the thick canopy of a large tree to catch his breath, the agent prepped himself for the performance, running in place dozens of times until his heart hammered wildly against his ribs.
Once he looked suitably exhausted, he sprinted desperately toward Sadamori no Taira and Fujiwara Hidesato, dropping heavily to his knees to deliver his fabricated report.
“Halt!
Who goes there?!” shouted a nearby soldier, leveling a spear at his chest.
“I am Hasetsukabe no Koharumaru!
Urgent report!
Masakado’s main army is marching south!
Furthermore, the local farmers are begging for immediate military reinforcements in the region!” the disguised assassin gasped, putting on a masterclass of frantic acting.
Both Fujiwara Hidesato and Taira no Sadamori shot to their feet, their faces contorting in shock.
“Just as I suspected!
That means the intelligence we received earlier was completely false!” Sadamori exclaimed.
“Even so, isn’t this rather strange?
A heavy silence fell over the camp, the howling wind doing nothing to ease the tension.
The disguised assassin clenched his fists tightly behind his back.
“Tell me, Koharumaru… did the Suzaku Shogun personally order you to spy on Masakado?” Fujiwara Hidesato asked sharply.
“Yes, Hidesato-sama!” the agent replied with feigned confidence.
After a tense few moments of deliberation, Sadamori no Taira finally made up his mind, barking orders for the troops to mobilize.
“Move out!
Order the main vanguard to advance south immediately!”
“Wait a moment, Sadamori-dono.
I still don’t trust this messenger a hundred percent,” Hidesato warned.
“If we don’t move right now, Masakado will overthrow the government!
Are you willing to sit back and let that happen?!”
“Even so, we must have a contingency plan.
If anything happens to you on the front lines, Sadamori-dono, my head and the heads of our commanders will roll!” Fujiwara Hidesato argued back with rising heat.
Sadamori’s expression curdled with displeasure.
Seeing the argument peak, the disguised assassin realized he needed to push his luck even further.
“If you harbor any doubts about my report, then execute me right here.
I gladly surrender my life to Hidesato-sama and Sadamori-sama,” he declared, bowing his head low.
It was a calculated gamble designed to completely disarm their suspicions; after all, military leaders rarely executed a friendly scout on a whim, but he kept his senses sharp just in case.
“Is something the matter, Koharumaru?
Is there anything else you wish to add?” Sadamori asked, eyeing him suspiciously.
“No, Sadamori-sama!
With your permission, I take my leave,” the agent replied crisply, backing away slowly.
Without waiting for their response, he slipped out of the camp, ducked behind a thicket, and shed the merchant disguise in the blink of an eye, slipping back into his dark shinobi gear.
Rejoining his partner, the two operatives hoisted the heavy wooden prison box containing Koharumaru between them and hurried back toward Masakado’s camp.
Though the burden was punishingly heavy, they took turns carrying it, sweat pouring down their faces as their pace steadily slowed from exhaustion.
Back at the rebel base, Taira no Masakado was eagerly awaiting news when the two shinobi finally arrived, dropping the container onto the dirt.
Releasing the latch, the heavy cage door swung open, spilling Koharumaru out onto the ground where he groaned in agony.
Masakado gazed down at the captive with a cold glare.
“What is the meaning of this?”
“We captured the spy who has been monitoring your movements, Masakado-sama!”
“A spy, you say?”
Drawing a poisoned kunai, the leading assassin pressed the blade directly against Koharumaru’s neck, drawing a thin line of crimson.
Masakado immediately understood and signaled for an executioner, intending to force Koharumaru into committing ritual seppuku right then and there.
“Good work.
Here is your promised scroll.
Now leave!”
“At once!”
The two agents vanished into the shadows.
However, the moment they stepped away, the leading assassin unrolled the reward scroll—only for a hidden blade to plunge deep into his chest from behind. This chapter is updated first at g.com.
He snapped his head around in sheer disbelief.
It was his own comrade.
“You…” he choked out, blood spilling from his lips.
“Too bad.
That scroll belongs to me now,” the betrayer sneered, twisting the blade deeper.
Suddenly, the scene shattered—it was nothing more than a trick of the mind.
Realizing his ambush had failed, the leading assassin immediately flared his chakra strings, commanding his puppets into action.
His treacherous partner whistled sharply, summoning a half-dozen hidden assassins from the surrounding trees.
Outnumbered nearly nine to one, the betrayed agent knew it was a fight to the death over the stolen intelligence.
“Since when did you turn on me?!”
His question was met with dead silence.
Flicking his fingers at lightning speed, he directed his twin puppets to unleash a flurry of concealed blades at the incoming attackers.
While the enemy easily sidestepped the initial volley, the puppet-master spread his arms wide, causing the wooden constructs to release hundreds of flying needles.
Several rebel shinobi shrieked as they were pinned to the trees, dropping lifelessly to the forest floor.
“Tch!
You’re dead!” one of the remaining assassins roared, ripping off his mask and charging forward with a drawn kunai.
Blades clashed in a violent flurry of sparks.
The puppet-master continuously shifted his defense, throwing up another dense smoke bomb to obscure their vision.
Familiar with his tactics, the veteran shinobi closed in swiftly while shielding his face.
As the smoke thinned, six shuriken came hurtling through the haze.
The puppet-master leaped backward, pulling his puppets in front of him to act as meat shields.
Scrambling up the trunk of a towering oak, a surviving assassin launched a plunging attack.
Though the puppet-master managed to dodge the worst of it, a stray blade sliced deeply across his left forearm.
He hissed, clutching the bleeding gash.
“Poison?”
“Naturally,” the enemy grinned mockingly.
His vision began to blur, and a bitter taste of blood rose in his throat as he vomited violently.
Tearing off his own mask to catch his breath, he barely managed to duck as another shuriken grazed his cheek, leaving two raw, bloody gashes across his face.
Within moments, his legs began to go numb from the fast-acting toxin.
Refusing to surrender, he channeled every ounce of his remaining willpower into his fingertips, forcing his puppets to move despite his failing body.
He spun around, only to gasp as an enemy shinobi managed to bypass his guards, driving a dagger straight into his vital organs.
Coughing up a thick wave of blood, the puppet-master slashed his own blade forward in a final act of defiance, slicing the attacker’s throat before they both crashed heavily onto the blood-soaked soil.
Dragging his paralyzed body forward, the puppet-master reached out with a trembling right hand toward the moonlight filtering through the canopy.
Grasping a fallen dagger with his left hand, he pressed the cold steel against his abdomen and executed ritual seppuku.
Choking on his own blood, he collapsed into the dirt.
Far away from the bloodshed, the Oni Mask slowly fluttered his eyelids open, whispering a faint name that neither Emperor Erwin nor his guards could hear.
“Hasetsukabe no Koharumaru… you’ve finally shown your face in this world, haven’t you?”