Half of the men pass by their captain, hurtling toward the boy.

Surprised and stumbling, Haru decides to flee into the woods, but the samurai follow him.

"Where do you think you're going?! I didn't give that order!"

But they don't listen and continue chasing their chance to get rich.

The other half who loyally stands by, watches their captain turn red with anger, put away his spear, and curse his men.

"Miserable... Insolent!"

Silently he climbs on his horse and the rest of his men understand: They will no longer camp here today.

The mountain road gradually changes as it gets close to Toyama city and castle.

A massive black wooden gate and brave men guard the only entrance to the manicured gardens that surround Maeda Teruko's home.

The name alone causes spontaneous reactions to the most disciplined of monks. Some respect and admire him, after all, he owns many estates and has great influence over the other noble families in the city.

Others are grateful for his jobs, whether as a samurai, painter, sculptor, craftsman, blacksmith, or any other function passed down from generation to generation, the Daimyo Maeda is happy to employ, provided his talent is good enough for his exacting standards.

Those who have seen his true nature, however, have only one reaction: Fear.

Chapter 2 - The Daimyo

The captain nods to a servant who opens the large gate. Twenty men carry, in addition to their belongings and mounts, the horses of those who abandoned their post to go after wealth. His men are welcomed by his companions while he alone goes straight to the main house, just after giving water to his horse.

Entering the halls of the Toyama castle, servants and geishas bow and open fusuma doors for him. Beautiful paintings and armor decorate the walls. Woods painted black and red give rise to furniture pieces that are true masterpieces of famous carpenters. Swords forged by great blacksmiths rest on wooden stands. Entire rooms are filled with scrolls and books. The cloying smell of incense sticks with opposing fragrances permeates the entire upper floor. The captain swears that it is possible to find the Daimyo's quarters by smell alone.

Two large samurai guard the door to the quarters, they recognize one of the captains approaching and open the door for him. The doors slide open quietly and one of the guards makes a silent sign with his forefinger in front of his lips. A large room is revealed and the Daimyo is in the center, with his back to the door, writing a letter with a brush.

The captain takes soft steps like a cat and kneels, waiting his turn to have the nobleman's attention. When he finishes writing the letter, he rings a tiny bell, and a man with his face covered by a black cloak enters, kneels, and takes the letter. With the same speed and grace, he withdraws. Daymio turns to his captain:

"I was pleased to hear that we were successful in battle and had very few casualties."

"Sir, I am honored."

"Forty-six of the fifty men returned, correct? Now that is a victory!"

"No Sir, I failed, I returned with only twenty men."

The Daimyo opens his mouth for a second, but pauses, reflecting.

"Even if there were mountain robbers, there wouldn't be so many casualties. I am curious. Tell me, what happened to the other half of the men I put under your command?"

"One of them was killed by his weakness, and the others got greedy when they saw a chance to get rich..."

The look on the Daimyo's face indicated a serious mistake on the captain's part, yet he never saw the nobleman caring that much for losing men. After a few moments he realizes that the mistake was actually in his speech, or rather, what was missing in it:

"...Sir."

The anger vanishes from Daimyo's face.

"A chance you say?"

"The Arata boy, he's back, Sir."

"Ah!"

The Daimyo stands up, excited, and signals with his hand for the captain to follow him. As he leaves his quarters, the two samurai begin to follow, but their lord makes another motion indicating for them to stay where they are.

They find themselves in a corridor that leads nowhere, and some doubts arise in the captain's mind.

'Could he have gotten lost? Besides, why build such an empty corridor?'

The Daimyo gives small knocks on a wall until a false section stands out. The captain thinks he knows what is hidden there, he has heard rumors but never considered them to be true: The secret collection of Maeda Teruko.

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"Welcome!"

A servant closes the secret door with them inside. The captain can't help but feel that this is a trap of some kind.

He always felt that this house looked bigger from the outside, and this hidden room could very well be the reason for this. It stretches several meters, being at least twice as large as the samurai dojo or the Daimyo's quarters.

All the wood on the walls is covered with thick black paint, very different from any the captain had ever seen. You can see that it has been overused, as its dried drops bounce on the relief of the walls, like tar. Sometimes they give the impression that they are still drying, while the more superstitious would say that they are moving like something alive, thus also being part of this bizarre collection.

Rare scrolls of forgotten art make simple pendulum movements on chains full of papers. These are glued not only to the chains but everywhere and on various objects. Small seals prevent any curses that are supposed to live on these objects from breaking free.

Human body parts, like giant deformed arms, bones arranged in little piles, hands with tones too strange to be natural skin colors, with interlaced fingers and tattooed ideograms. Circles of transmutation on small altars, books of all sizes, locked vertically on golden shelves that display them like trophies. Candles whose blue fire wavers proudly like flags of the demonic arts. Tubes that take tears from a statue are turned into a ceiling drip intended to fall into a box full of embers, creating the thickest smoke the captain has ever seen on the floor.

The Daimyo faces a space between bones on a table.

"This is it..."

"Sir?"

"The special place where I will place the skull of the last Arata."

........

If he didn't know the area well Haru would never be able to run from this group of crazed warriors. The mountain forest cannot be underestimated. Large roots form natural walls and divide the boundaries between large century-old trees. The soil mixes with the accumulated rain, forming treacherous little mudflats. Wild animals and poisonous insects are everywhere. Rock formations give rise to small precipices and waterfalls.

The men, tired from the battle from which he was still recovering, made small superficial cuts on their target when they reached him, but it seemed impossible to kill him. They gave up pursuing the boy and cursed themselves for having left their duty, knowing the captain would not take them back.

The remaining group stops for a second:

"Where did he go?!"

"That way!!!"

They come to a clearing. You can hear dry thrashing sounds, like a boar hitting a tree.

"What is that sound?"

"Who cares? Where did the boy go?!

The sound of pounding gets louder.

"What now? Have we lost him?!"

Haru's foot finally gives one last knock on the wood.

"I believe he was..."

Before another samurai could respond, a branch from a large tree falls in front of him, landing on four of his companions, killing one.

Haru lands on top of the bodies. A blow is landed on him by a samurai almost as young as he is, but Haru leaps backward, avoiding the blade. This one, unbridled from an avoided attack, dives into the air for a few moments more, accidentally cutting deep into the back of the head of a companion who was unconscious on the ground from the branch. Blood spurts out of his neck, and even without making any kind of movement that would indicate his death, it is clear that he is dead, no one survives a cut like that.

The samurai falls to his knees. Tears stream down his face. Between sobs, he whispers words that no one hears.

"That's enough..."

Haru walks away being followed by the few remaining samurai, while this one, still on his knees, begins to draw his wakizashi from his waist. By the time he commits seppuku, Haru is long gone.

The boy's breathing is heavy; he is tired after an hour of running from these men. The cuts on his body were not fatal or deep, but they were many and he has lost quite a bit of blood.

'Of the twenty-some who were hunting me, there are only five left. I can't stop now! If I die here... Who will avenge my parents?! That spearman... He must die!'

Visualizing the face of his enemy gives him new strength. He needs something to escape this situation and thinking about it, he looks at his pursuers.

Among them, three stood out for their resilience. The first was a young samurai, dark, with clumsy hair and narrow eyes, wearing leather armor. The second had long hair, was older, but his physical condition was second to none. He has a kamon of a circle with flowers on his back and two more on the front, probably descended from an important clan. The third was large and clumsy, but he compensated for his lack of skill with brute strength. He had little armor and carried a sword as long as his companion, but with a different appearance, like a cleaver.

Haru looks back from time to time and sees that he cannot escape these three. The blood hasn't stopped running down his face yet, the cut was deeper than he thought.

........

Far away from there, the captain asks his Daimyo in that dark room:

"Sir, why do you want the bones of the Arata clan so badly?"

"When you press your bones, Captain, do they break?"

"No sir, unless they are crushed."

"Exactly! What if they are twisted?"

The captain reflects, visualizing the rigidity of the bones.

"I believe they would crack, sir, like a piece of dry wood."

"Perfect. That's why Arata clan bones are so rare."

The Daimyo goes to a small altar of bones and picks up a small one, probably belonging to a finger.

"Our bones resist pressure, as the bones of other species, like birds, resist twisting, but something makes Arata bones extremely rare."

He twists the bone and it doesn't break.

"Something obscure makes them have both properties: strength and flexibility. If our bones are dry wood, it's as if theirs were... bamboo."

......

When Haru realizes it the long-haired man is gone. He takes a deep relieved breath:

'One down.'

As he turns forward a blade is about to split his head in half.

With no time to stop running, he picks his feet up off the ground and manages to somersault backward in mid-air, avoiding the blade while his body is still moving forward. He lands on his feet and resumes his run.

The long-haired samurai thinks:

'Impossible! There was no way to avoid that blow!"

The samurai in leather armor and the big fort appear between trees running side by side with Haru.

They begin to approach without stopping running, making a sort of tactical pincer on him, drawing their swords from their sheaths slowly.

When they get close enough, they strike at the same time, but at different heights. The one in armor aims at his legs and the big one tries to cut his head off.

The Arata boy dives into the air, spinning horizontally, twisting his spine in a way impossible for most people, finally avoiding both blades and landing on the ground with a somersault.

When he runs again, the samurai stop chasing him, still shaken by his exploits.

The big one tries to catch his breath but begins to shake with anger and frustration. The older long-haired samurai rests his hand on his shoulder, saying:

"Forget it, it was impossible from the beginning."

Haru continues to run until he realizes that there is no one chasing him. His knees almost give out, he becomes dizzy, as his body cools he realizes the pain taking over. He staggers down a dirt road while watching the sunset over the distant mountains.

A girl with yellowish-brown eyes, short shoulder-length black hair, wearing a blue yukata, watches the same beautiful sunset through a window. She sighs.

"I wonder what's beyond...those mountains?"