Chapter 678

My ambition ends here!

When Date Nagamune realized that if Uesugi Muneyuki came to harm here, his own career would be over too, he knew he had to perform.

Otherwise he's done for!

Never mind anything else, just the fact that he's fine while Uesugi Muneyuki's fate is unknown means the entire Metropolitan Police Department, the peerage, and even Fuji Media behind Fuji TV won't let him off! And the newlywed Uesugi Minami Management Officer! They've only been married a month and the groom's already wood?

Date Nagamune felt each second stretched like a century at this moment.

He stared fixedly at the direction where the black bear disappeared into the bushes, his mind filled with terrifying images of what might have befallen Uesugi Muneyuki.

Uesugi-san!!

The wilderness tracking instinct drilled into him during his Self-Defense Official days, combined with his extreme worry for Uesugi Muneyuki, overrode his rationality to "wait for support." "No, I can't just stand here waiting...... Maybe he's injured and hiding somewhere...... Maybe he's just...... lost."

This thought was like a spell.

Date Nagamune glanced at the scattered forensic examination kit, gritted his teeth, grabbed the bamboo stick, turned on his mobile phone flashlight, and actually dove headfirst into the thicket where the black bear vanished!

The forest light was dim, fallen leaves thick on the ground.

Date Nagamune tracked by faint traces and intuition, his heart in his throat, hoping to find signs of Uesugi Muneyuki alive while dreading the sight of a mother bear with her cubs feasting, leaving only Uesugi Muneyuki's head uneaten. Woo-woo, Mai Xuejie, Uesugi underclassman—this relationship known worldwide is about to reverse!

Date Nagamune lowered his voice and shouted, his voice distorted in the wind: "Uesugi-san! Can you hear me? Ou system Nagamune! Kyu system Date mouth tooth! Quick fatty answer me mouth tooth!"

Only the wind rustling through the treetops answered him, along with his own increasingly loud heartbeat.

After who knows how far he'd chased, the terrain began to grow steep.

Suddenly, a louder rustling and low grunt came from ahead. Date Nagamune's heart tightened, thinking it was the black bear, and he immediately crouched low, gripping a tree branch tightly.

But what came charging out from the side slope was not a black bear, but a stout wild boar with upturned tusks!

Its small eyes flashed with feral light, clearly enraged by the human intrusion into its territory; it scraped its hooves and charged straight over!

Holy shit! Not only bears? But wild boars too?!

No humans left!

TMD, is Japan just the lair of a zoo?

Then what about my falcon green dragon honeybee black panther rat One-Eyed Dragon of Oshu Dragon of Echigo Tiger of Kai Wolf of Yunzhou Lion of Sagami?

"West Mata!" Date Nagamune's soul flew and spirit scattered, he hastily dodged to the side.

I did a sliding tackle!

The wild boar brushed past his pant leg as it charged by, kicking up a stench.

Misfortunes never come singly.

The earlier black bear seemed also drawn by the commotion here, emerging from deeper behind the trees, still holding that Snickers in its mouth, but its gaze had locked onto this two-legged beast that kept disturbing its "meal" and "stroll."

So arrogant and rude, it's time to give you a lesson!

Before him, the wild boar turned and charged again; behind him, the black bear stared fixedly.

Date Nagamune instantly found himself in a textbook-level "worst wilderness encounter" scenario.

He leaned back against a large tree, cold sweat dripping, his mind a blank slate.

What tactical flashlight intimidation, what slow retreat, what don't turn your back on fierce beasts...... all the training points seemed to have become scrap paper under the pincer attack of the two beasts.

Now, absolute desperation!

I can compose my death poem now!!

"Want to die, want to die, want to die...... Sinai Sinai Sinai Sinai!" he wailed inwardly, the hand gripping the bamboo stick trembling.

The black bear let out a warning growl, the wild boar's charge was imminent!

Don't panic!

Date Nagamune frantically signaled himself!

Think how Caesar did it! Think how he dealt with Vercingetorix!

Think how Masamune did it at the Man Taken Bridge! Think how he dealt with Satake Yoshishige and the Various Daimyo Alliance!

As a descendant of Masamune, that's just how stalwart I am!

At this critical moment, Date Nagamune's hand moved subconsciously to his coat pocket—there he had the half-eaten plum rice ball from this morning, wrapped in plastic wrap, prepared as a snack.

"Auntie big!"

Almost without thought, pure desperation-born instinct, Date Nagamune pulled out that half rice ball and threw it with all his might into the open space between the black bear and wild boar!

The plastic-wrapped rice ball traced an arc in the air, "slap" landing on the leaf-covered ground.

The rice ball rolled a few times and came to rest in the snow and mud, the plastic bag tore open,

Time seemed to solidify for a second.

The wild boar's charge momentum stalled abruptly, its nose twitching as it turned toward where the rice ball fell.

The adult Japanese black bear's attention also shifted from Date Nagamune, it sniffed the air, and grew interested in that small thing carrying the scent of rice and plum.

Yo sa! Just now!

Victorious advance, Tiger Crouch Shrine!

Date Nagamune seized this fleeting opportunity, disregarding form, he rolled and crawled madly back along the way he came!

He could hear behind him the two beasts growling and grunting as they fought over the rice ball, but thank heaven, they seemed temporarily more interested in that unexpected "tribute."

However, before that large wild boar decided to go for the rice ball, it seemed to feel that this human who startled it couldn't just get away so cheaply, it gave a fierce shake of its head, and its hard tusks viciously "gouged" Date Nagamune's flailing escape attempt where he hadn't had time to fully dodge.

"Huff~huff~huff~ah ah ah!" Date Nagamune sucked in a cold breath from the pain, feeling his buttocks burn with fiery pain, the fabric instantly torn, likely seeing red.

He staggered, but the will to survive kept him upright, and instead he used this momentum to flee even more embarrassingly, limping desperately outward.

When he finally tumbled out of the forest's edge, soul shaken, buttocks bleeding, covered head to toe in leaves and dirt, image utterly gone, seeing the stone wall of Uesugi Kenshin's grave again, Date Nagamune nearly collapsed from exhaustion.

He slumped by the stone steps, then winced in pain as he clutched his buttocks and sprang up, panting heavily, checking the wound behind him—thank goodness, the wild boar's tusks had only struck, likely not broken bone, but his buttocks burned fiercely, and he couldn't even see how bad it was.

Did I get speared? Did the wild boar spear me?!

Date Nagamune considered a most horrifying possibility, he tried to reach out and touch, but the moment he made contact he jerked in pain.

Just as he was grimacing in pain, feeling both dread and relief at having scraped back a life, while simultaneously realizing with even greater despair that Muneyuki was likely in dire straits if he was in the forest

"Date? What's wrong with you?"

A familiar, calm voice, even carrying a trace of hoarseness as if just coming back to his senses, rang out before him.

Date Nagamune's whole body stiffened, and he raised his head with extreme slowness, in utter disbelief.

He saw Uesugi Muneyuki standing perfectly fine before Lord Kenshin's tombstone, that suit jacket of his without a single wrinkle, his hair even looking like it had just been tidied. He was frowning slightly, looking at Date Nagamune's bedraggled, blood-streaked state, then glancing at the investigation kit still scattered on the ground and the remaining food packaging, his gaze finally settling back on Date's ashen face.

"You......" Uesugi Muneyuki paused, as if taking half a second to comprehend the situation before him, especially Date Nagamune's shell-shocked expression and the way he was clutching his buttocks: "I seemed to hear a miserable scream just now...... what did you run into? Also, my investigation kit how......" His tone was full of confusion, and a kind of "what happened here while I was gone for just a bit?" bewilderment.

You're asking me?

You motherfucker asking me?

Date Nagamune gaped, looking at the unscathed Uesugi Muneyuki who looked like he'd just gone for a stroll, then at his own buttocks twitching in pain, then thought of the heart-pounding ordeal in the forest dancing with bears and fighting for his life with a boar, and that half a life-saving rice ball he'd sacrificed...... an extremely complex mix of emotions — ecstasy, shock, absurdity, grievance, dread — surged to the top of his head one by one.

He pointed at Uesugi Muneyuki, fingers trembling, voice hoarse and cracking from excitement and the mad dash just now: "You...... you you you...... where the hell did you run off to?! I thought you'd been eaten by a wild bear!! And a boar! I almost got sandwiched between a wild boar and a bear trying to find you!! My rice ball! My oh sharp!! You...... how are you here? Uesugi-san!! You'd better tell me this isn't a joke! Or I'll get angry!" His roar reverberated in the silent Uesugi cemetery, filled with the sense of collapse after surviving a calamity and a giant question mark at this "missing person" suddenly appearing unharmed.

Uesugi Muneyuki looked at this guy's expression so worked up his chrysanthemum was about to split, then lowered his head to look at himself, as if finally realizing that during the "moment" his consciousness roamed the High Plain of Heaven conversing with the divine ancestor, more time might have passed in the real world, and some...... rather dramatic things had occurred.

Rarely, he revealed a trace of near-innocent puzzlement.

"If I said I received Lord Kenshin's call while paying respects here, ascended to the High Plain of Heaven and conversed with Ancestor Lord Kenshin for a while, he told me not to forget my original aspiration, remember my mission, struggle for the great revival of the Uesugi Residence, roll up my sleeves and work hard, would you believe it?" Uesugi Muneyuki said. "You're shitting me!" Date Nagamune roared in anger: "I'd rather believe the Second Young Lady is still a virgin, just in case? I mean just in case??" "Alright, actually I saw a deer, thought it was the ancestor's revelation, so I chased it, ended up losing it." Uesugi Muneyuki spread his hands, wild, shaking the universe!

"Really...... don't run around everywhere! Everyone's looking for you! I even notified Headquarters!" Date Nagamune was so angry smoke was coming out of his head, he yelled, but soon his whole body arched up from the pain in his buttocks, just like the legendary rifleman Niko, like a giant shrimp. "Wait wait wait, let me look!" Uesugi Muneyuki realized Date might have more than flesh wounds, hurried over to examine him, then his expression turned a bit meaningful, a bit wanting to laugh and a bit sighing.

"Date."

"Hm?"

"You...... seem to have...... an anal fissure."

"Nani?????????"