Okisuke turned to the last page of the battle report, set it down, and pressed his fingers against the bridge of his nose.
Three documents lay on the table. The first was a casualty count from the eastern border. The second was a list of towns that had fallen. The third was an investigation report on internal infiltration. All three were saying the same thing.
One month.
The war had been going for exactly one month, and the Land of Iron had already lost two towns inside its own border.
"The eastern gate garrison was wiped out entirely," his adjutant Tanaka read quietly beside him. "The third squad on the northern line was ambushed during withdrawal. Eleven survivors..."
"That's enough." Okisuke raised a hand. Tanaka stopped.
Okisuke stared at the map on the table. The Kamizuru advance routes were marked in red, spreading inward from the border like cracks running through stone. But what was really keeping him up at night wasn't those red lines. It was the positions circled in black at several points across the map.
Those were where things had gone wrong from the inside.
Grain stores burned. City gates that failed at critical moments. Garrison deployment information that leaked before it could be acted on. Each incident looked like an accident when examined alone. Together they had only one explanation.
"The infiltrators," Okisuke said. "How many did we actually let in?"
Tanaka was quiet for a moment. "Seventeen confirmed so far. But the actual number is probably higher."
Okisuke said nothing more. He stacked the battle reports and pressed them flat under the corner of the map.
'Only if Shinji hadn't allowed them inside in the first place...'
He had seen plenty of disasters in his career, but this one had gone rotten in a way that was unusually thorough. The Kamizuru's ability to breach this deep into Land of Iron territory within a single month wasn't purely a matter of military strength. They had known the inside of this country too well. Everyone understood where that knowledge had come from. Nobody was willing to say it out loud.
Two knocks at the door. Another soldier leaned in. "Sir, there are new developments on the civilian gathering situation in the south district. Do you want to see the report?"
Okisuke rubbed his eyes. "Bring it in."
---
The streets of the south district were much quieter than they had been a month ago.
Many of the shops had closed. Some had official seals pasted across their doors. Others had simply been boarded up with planks. The occasional pedestrian moved through quickly, head down, making eye contact with nobody.
But Kanzaki Trading was open.
A line of modest length stood at the entrance — women carrying children, elderly people leaning on walking sticks, a few young men who looked like craftsmen. They stood without noise or pushing.
The curly-haired man stood behind a table near the doorway. On the table were sacks of rice and several bundles of dried vegetables.
"How many in your household, ma'am?"
"Four. My husband and me, and two children."
"Then take two jin of rice, and this as well." He pushed a small packet of dried vegetables across the table. "Easier on children's stomachs."
The woman took it with slightly trembling hands. "Kanzaki-sama... thank you."
"No need for that." He waved it off. "Next."
Beside the line, an old man knocked the ash from his pipe against the bottom of his shoe and lowered his voice to the person next to him. "Look at this. Every other merchant has run off or gone into hiding. Only Kanzaki-sama is still here."
"That's right," the other person said. "When the grain prices spiked last time, his prices didn't move a single mon. My wife bought our rice right here."
"Now that's someone who actually cares about our Land of Iron." The old man exhaled slowly. "Kanzaki-sama..."
Someone further back in the line said it, not loudly, but everyone nearby heard it clearly.
"Kanzaki-sama is a good man."
Nobody disagreed.
The curly-haired man kept his head down and continued distributing rice, taking in every word with perfect clarity. His expression didn't change.
'That's enough for today.'
About half an hour later, everything on the table was gone. He had his assistant clear it away, explained to the few remaining people that today's share was used up and they should come back tomorrow, then pulled the door shut.
The street went quiet.
He stood behind the closed door and listened to the sound of footsteps gradually dispersing outside. After a moment, he turned and walked deeper into the building.
---
The second floor was not open to the public.
The room at the end of the corridor was kept locked at all times, and he was the only one with the key.
He pushed the door open. Five people were inside, all bound at the hands and feet, sitting in a row against the wall. Two had their heads down. One appeared to be resting with his eyes closed. The remaining two looked up when he entered.
These five were Kamizuru spies. He had found them one by one across the city over the course of the month.
Finding them had not been difficult. He was better suited to working at night than anyone else in this city, and spies did their work at night. After that it was only a matter of time.
He crouched in front of one of them. The man had already closed his eyes, pretending not to notice.
He raised his hand and gave the man's face a firm, unhurried pat.
"You're awake."
The man opened his eyes, saw his face clearly, and immediately pressed himself back against the wall.
"You..."
"Relax." He sat down beside him, his tone no different from when he had been handing out rice downstairs. "I just want to ask a few questions."
The man's breathing quickened. Of the five, this one had seen him directly — last month in the north city district, when he had dealt with three Kamizuru shinobi and this man was the only one left standing afterward. Things seen with your own eyes were difficult to forget.
Muzan remembered too, which was why he had kept this one until now.
"Kamizuru clan techniques," he said. "Your bee-style jutsu, transformation techniques, earth release. I want to understand how they work."
The man said nothing, staring at him.
"The bee-style doesn't interest me," Muzan continued, his voice still level. "I just want to understand the principles. Actually, forget it for now — start with transformation technique. How do your people use it?"
The man steadied himself slowly and opened his mouth. "Transformation technique... you wrap chakra around your whole body and replicate another person's appearance."
"Replicate," Muzan repeated the word. "Does it alter the body itself, or does it work from the outside?"
"From the outside," the man said. "Transformation technique doesn't change the actual physical structure. It creates a visual illusion using chakra. That's why maintaining it requires continuous chakra consumption."
Muzan nodded slowly, his expression thoughtful.
'I see. Transformation technique is an illusion, not a genuine change of form. But I can achieve genuine change of form... the problem is that full-body transformation costs too much chakra and the fine detail is difficult to control.'
He thought of the attempts he had made over the past months. Either he couldn't maintain the form long enough, or the details were off — something that looked wrong the moment you got within a certain distance.
"Earth release," he said, shifting topics. "Which types does your clan use?"
The man hesitated briefly, then spoke. "Most shinobi know the basic earth release techniques. Earth Flow Wall, Earth Spear, Rock Jutsu... the Kamizuru specialize in bee-style, so earth release isn't something we've developed particularly far."
"What can you do personally?"
"Earth Flow Wall, and Earth Spear Jutsu."
"Show me the hand seals for Earth Spear Jutsu."
The man's expression flickered, but he met Muzan's gaze and slowly raised his bound hands, pressing them together as best he could and awkwardly tracing the positions of several seals.
Muzan watched once and committed them to memory.
'I've used something similar in combat before, but the seals were wrong. I was brute-forcing it with raw chakra. With the correct seals the efficiency will be much higher.'
He stood up and brushed off his clothes, then walked toward the door.
"Wait," the man said behind him, his voice dropping low. "You got your answers... what happens to us now?"
Muzan stopped at the doorway without turning around.
"Don't worry," he said. "I still have questions. I need you to keep answering them."
He pulled the door shut, locked it, and went back downstairs.
The corridor was quiet. From below came the occasional sound of his assistant tidying up.
Muzan leaned against the corridor wall, closed his eyes, and ran through what he had just learned.
He understood the principle of transformation technique well enough now. Chakra deployed externally to produce an illusion for the eyes, requiring continuous maintenance, fundamentally a method of deceiving vision. For an ordinary shinobi, it was sufficient.
For him, it was not.
What he needed was a disguise he could maintain for extended periods without burning through large amounts of chakra constantly. Transformation technique couldn't give him that.
But it had given him something else. A direction.
'If I can push genuine body alteration to a fine enough level — fine enough that every inch of skin matches the target exactly — then no chakra maintenance is needed. Because at that point it's a real form, not an illusion.'
He opened his eyes.
That path was far harder than transformation technique. But once achieved, it would have no weaknesses.
He walked back to his room, sat down by the window, and began to practice.