Kuni Harike

Kuni Harike was a shugenja of the Crab Clan who defeated the Kusatte Iru sacrificing his own honor and soul.
== Kusatte Iru ==
Harike set out in 634 to destroy the Kusatte Iru, perhaps the most powerful oni spawned by the Shadowlands. Harike was armed only with a dark and sinister artefact (a powerful Obsidian Sphere) and accompanied only by his yojimbo Kuni Ryute. In the combat that followed Ryute was slain and Harike's soul irrevocably corrupted through his artefact and his use of Maho. Even so Harike managed to place the foul beast in a deep sleep beneath what would become Kyuden Toketsu in the Plains of Foul Tears, never to awaken. Harike also preserved Ryute's soul in a crystal with his breath, preventing his yojimbo from entering the afterlife. Eventually some monks retrieved Harike's remains and established a temple in the shugenja's memory, Legend of the Five Rings; Third Edition, p. 14, 288 Lesser of Two Evils, p. 5 Kuni Harike Temple. Lesser of Two Evils, p. 21
== The Lesser of Two Evils ==
Harike had sacrificed his honor to save the Empire. The Sphere had been crafted binding kami to the stone permanently, enslaving them in a mad and diabolical ritual. The magic he used was the maho spell 1000 Years of Terrible Slumber, and alongside with the other spells he stored was activated coating the Sphere in fresh blood, which made the stone to appear as as a heavy lung, wet with blood and mucus. All of its powers became evident, as if the stone were speaking and breathing. Lesser of Two Evils, p. 32
== The Bog Hag ==
Unfortunately for Harike, following his demise his body was taken and worn by a Bog Hag named Higashato. Using her foul magic, she appeared many times to the monks that prayed at Harike's shrine dressed in his skin and convinced them that the only way to battle the Shadowlands was to understand it. By 1050 she had them reciting blasphemous texts and carving stone oni statues. 
Category:Crab Clan Members