Arata Haru executes a blow from above Ouchi Jiro.

He brings his blade down as fast as he can, taking advantage of his body's spinning in the air to the fullest, along with the elasticity of his bones, executing the fiercest attack he is capable of.

It would still take Haru a long time to understand what happens next. A crash can be heard and he watches his blade shatter into several pieces. Did it hit the captain's helmet? Had the quality of the blade prevented him from killing his enemy? Was it too much force? Something is wrong.

In the milliseconds that the young Arata finds himself perplexed hovering above his opponent, a feeling of injustice grows in his chest. Frustration locks his body, a cry of rage rises in his chest but never reaches his mouth as his hand drops the handle of the katana which in turn completes the mosaic of fragments flying in front of him.

Ouchi Jiro is as surprised as Haru himself, but then the outcome seems obvious, after all, he is strong and is facing a poorly trained teenager.

"Like I said... You are weak!"

The captain delivers an incredibly agile kick to the boy's chest while he is still falling, causing him to pirouette several times and collide with a tree, falling unconscious.

Deep down he knows he survived by luck, but he could never admit to himself that he was almost defeated by the boy. The spearman needs to bury this in his past, to prove to himself that he is the strongest, so he decides that it is time to strike the last blow and end this once and for all.

He starts walking toward Haru, but Hideo calmly steps into his path.

"No, no, no...Now it's my turn, buddy."

Chapter 13 - Worst Moments

Jinme and Izumi can feel the ground shaking beneath their feet during the advance of the crazed samurai. It was obvious to the two that they needed to advance to check Tobi's condition, and that Naoki was having trouble getting up and was in trouble. The sight of what Gojo has become is frightening.

To their luck, the samurai are so out of their minds that many simply walk past them as if they were chasing something unseen. The two take advantage of the madness of their enemies and move forward killing only those who present a danger to them.

Izumi never considered Jinme as someone strong, and in fact, she would easily beat him in combat, but the thief's desperation to see if his colleague was okay made him faster and fiercer.

He cuts off the heads of three samurai before reaching Tobi, then kneels beside his leaning body and places two fingers on his neck so as to feel his heartbeat.

"Whew... He's alive."

Izumi sighs, relieved at the news. When she looks forward, she lets out another sigh, of weariness, as she sees Gojo walking over to her colleague.

"It never seems to end!"

Jinme gathers his courage:

"Yeah... but I'm not letting that monster get to her!"

The thief runs up to his target and with great dexterity leaps and gives a spin, causing his blade to spin in the air, and downing a ferocious blow to the back of Gojo's head.

The hard skin of the newly transformed warrior cannot be pierced by the sword.

A gigantic hand quickly rises over the enemy's shoulder, holding Jinme's face and muffling his screams.

Izumi screams and goes to the rescue of her allies, but the deformed warrior looks over her shoulder and that sinister look makes her slow down her attack unconsciously.

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Only when Gojo whistles she notices that she was holding back. The same sound has the opposite effect on the samurai who have passed them and, like trained dogs, they turn around and advance on the thief.

Izumi gets caught in the middle of a group of angry warriors while Gojo takes Jinme hanging by the head like a toy as he struggles and screams.

The green-eyed girl is usually elegant, restrained, so she would be praised for having the manners of a lady of that era if she were not a thief with a dirty kimono. She has been well educated, so, like all those who are trained to behave well in society, she has a block that prevents her from giving in to her more violent impulses.

An ordinary, well-educated person needs to be pushed to the extreme to leave all this behind, and at this moment Izumi is going through the worst moment of her life and yet refuses to scream and show her desperation.

Dozens of hands surround her, groping her body, violating her private parts, holding her arms, and also scratching her skin. The taste of dirt invades her mouth, then of blood. She is sure that if this continues, she will be killed by these mad men.

She enters a state of denial, a defense of her mind that takes her away from this horrific experience she is going through as if she were watching someone else being hurt instead of her.

At that moment, Izumi undergoes a curious phenomenon that many would call astral projection. Even though she is not asleep, this ability allows her to leave her body, visualizing an astral form of herself that cannot be harmed. She finds herself standing next to the huddle of men raping her as she watches everything, yet she doesn't quite understand what is happening. She feels... so light.

In fact, her feet don't touch the ground and she notices, when she looks at her hands, that a thin golden aura surrounds her skin. Sometimes when she moves she can see through her arm. She observes this for a few seconds, raising her hands against the sun. She finds it beautiful to look at, but when she tries to speak the words don't come out.

For Izumi, everything happens more slowly since time on the astral plane passes seven times slower than on the earthly plane. However, looking at her body being assaulted, she knows she is racing against time.

She looks to the left and sees a long-haired samurai leaping over Minamori as she tries to reach him. Further away she sees Tsukasa without strength and Bou on the ground. An arrow from Gori glides slowly toward the enemy, but it is clear to Izumi that it will miss its target. She floats up to the arrow and places her fingers on the tip, changing its trajectory slightly.

Some enemies are dead, but there are still other samurai and archers impeding passage on that side.

The astral thief looks across the road and sees Naoki struggling to get up, while Jinme dies at the giant hands of Gojo, who walks calmly. Tobi's body is gone from the ground, but she doesn't know how and sees no trace.

She floats over to Naoki and tries to help her up, but to her surprise, her hands go through her friend's muscular arm.

She tries to push Gojo away, to keep him away but simply runs him through. Forced to watch the large enemy slowly approach her friend, Izumi begins to look around and try to think of a solution.

A few feet behind them she sees Haru slowly whirling in the air and her enemy with his leg extended, so they assume he has received a powerful blow. Hideo seems to be watching as well.

'I don't have time to worry about them, I have to save Naoki!'

Gojo is only five steps away from Naoki.

'There's no way... there's nothing! Nothing I can do in this form?!'

She sees herself again, bloodied on the ground.

'Damn it!'

She quickly flies to her body and dives into it. Then pain. It is all she can feel, all the pain that made her go out of herself is now back. She can't hold on any longer and screams.

Gojo is only four steps away.

The sound seems to echo through her body, making it vibrate. The hands stop scratching her for a second. She is thinking of nothing at this moment so she doesn't understand why they stopped but takes the chance to escape, rolling between their legs.

He is only three steps away.

Bloody, with no time to rest and clear of what she must do, Izumi runs to Gojo and while the group that was raping her runs after her. The giant finally blows Jinme's head off in his hand.

Just two steps away.

Quick as a cat, Izumi slides under Gojo's legs, cutting the tendons in his heels, preventing him from continuing to walk. Gojo doesn't seem to have felt any pain and seems surprised that he can't walk. His arms, even though they are giant and deformed are not long enough to reach Naoki, who finishes getting up.

She watches Izumi crawl up Gojo's body like a serpent, swirling around the monster with her blades. Unfortunately, the warrior's skin proves too tough and she can't do much damage. The thief stands on the target's gigantic left shoulder and fires a shower of stabs as she thinks:

'Cut! Cut! Let's go! That's it! Cut! Die!'

One of Naoki's knives breaks. The enemy feels no pain at all. Frustrated she screams:

"'WHY... YOU... DON'T DIE?!"

Izumi's shrill voice makes Gojo shudder and react by punching the back of his hand into the thief's torso. The hand is too gigantic and is raised too hard, causing a fatal strike. The wrist crushes Izumi's intestines, the back of the hand breaks her ribs, and the calluses of the fingers crush her collarbone and throat.

The blow is so strong that it causes the young woman to be thrown upwards and vomit blood, but in the final moments, Izumi understood: The crazed samurai stopped attacking her by her scream and Gojo felt pain just the same. Those who are exposed to this purple smoke become sensitive to sound.

When she reaches the maximum height of the arc she makes in the air, the thief gathers all her strength and throws her remaining knife upwards in a gesture that Gojo would call to surrender.

Falling, she realizes that her fate is far worse than simply falling to the ground and dying, for below her were those men out of their minds.

As she falls to certain death already without strength, her eyes meet Naoki's, and she moves her lips to send a message:

"Lo-ud-no-i-ses."

The samurai's hands hold her down and cause her to vanish into their midst. Splashes of blood fly as an artery is punctured, and blood trickles down everyone's feet. They dismember her, tear her apart, and eat her flesh. Swallowing the girl's pieces seems to give almost sexual pleasure to these men, who gasp and moan until they are satisfied.