Asaemon Shugen

The day was unusually bright, as though the sky itself had chosen mercy. Sunlight spilled over the tiled roofs of Edo, carrying a calm that felt too gentle for what awaited Yamada Asaemon Shugen. For once, he was not standing on an execution ground or carrying out his duties.

Soon, he would be sent to Shinsenkyo—the island from which no reports had returned after eleven death-row convicts were dispatched. No letters, no messengers, not even a drifting dead body in sight, only silence. Rumors spoke of unnatural plants, inhuman beings, monsters, and a land where even skilled warriors vanished without a trace.

Among the Yamada Asaemon, Shugen was ranked second, known as one of the strongest executioners of his generation. To others, his selection was an honor. If such a rank meant leaving behind the person he cherished most, he could not find pride in it. No matter how devoted he appeared as an Asaemon, his heart had already chosen something else.

Inside a quiet room of the Asaemon residence, warm sunlight filtered through the shoji doors and spread across the tatami mats. On the futon lay you, pale and weakened by illness.Shugen sat beside you in silence.

He had known you long before he became a great swordsman—back when he was still inexperienced, when his name meant nothing. While the world judged him by rank and skill, you had seen him simply as himself. Through years of training and hardship, you had remained by his side. Perhaps that was why his devotion to you surpassed everything else.

“I promise to return by your side,” he said quietly.

His voice was calm, yet filled with determination and unspoken fear. The words were not light—they were an oath.

“Alive and well.”

In that sunlit room, Yamada Asaemon Shugen was no longer just the second-ranked executioner meant to follow every order from the Shogunate. He was simply a man who feared the possibility of not returning to the person he loved. You.