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These works consisted mainly of restoring dilapidated castles or building new ones on a scale so colossal as to be exceeded by only the stronghold at Osaka. It is recorded that when Fukushima Masanori, lord of Kiyosu in Owari, complained of the crippling effects of these severe requisitions, Kato Kiyomasa told him that there was no alternative except to retire to his castle and defy Yedo.
This discord exercised a debilitating influence, and when Go-Murakami died , the Southerners found themselves in a parlous condition. For his son and successor, Chokei, failing to appreciate the situation, immediately planned an extensive campaign against Kyoto from the east and the south simultaneously. Then Kusunoki Masanori passed into the Northern camp.
At that time the nation was divided pretty evenly into two factors; one obedient to the Tokugawa, the other disposed to await Hideyori's coming of age, which event was expected to restore the authority of the Toyotomi family. Fukushima Masanori and Kato Kiyomasa were the most enthusiastic believers in the latter forecast.
He had succeeded to that office in 1367, at the age of nine, and his father, then within a year of death, had entrusted him to the care of Hosokawa Yoriyuki, one of the ablest men of his own or any generation. There are strong reasons for thinking that between this statesman and Masanori an understanding existed.
Neither did he hesitate to hand over the false insignia which had been given by Go-Daigo to the Northern Court. In February, 1352, Go-Murakami paid a visit to Otoko-yama on the southeast of Kyoto, and ordered a number of officials, under Kitabatake Chikafusa and Kusunoki Masanori, to enter the capital and conduct affairs. But his Majesty did not trust his own person into the city.
Few events have received wider historical comment in Japan. The Kusunoki family stood for everything loyal and devoted in the bushi's record, and Masanori was a worthy chief of the sept.
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