Kōbe Hikaru had not simply happened to rush back in time. From beginning to end, he had been keeping watch over every movement in Kaede Village.
It was not intuition, nor was it any power of foresight.
It was blood.
His blood.
Long before he left Kaede Village, Kōbe Hikaru had used his [Blood Mutation] to leave the faintest traces of blood mist in every corner of the village—seeped into the cracks in the earth, clinging to the wooden planks of the eaves, even mingled into the grain of that stone slab beneath the Shrine's corridor where he so often sat.
The concentration of that blood mist was extremely low—low enough that not even Kikyō's barrier would regard it as a foreign presence.
But they were his eyes.
Anywhere else, at such a distance, Kōbe Hikaru's Blood Mutation would have struggled to take effect.
But Kaede Village was different.
Here, in every single thing, he had left behind favourability.
Those things, though without consciousness, would by their very spirituality actively help him sustain the existence of his Blood Mutation.
In other words.
So long as he willed it, even across hundreds of li, he could perceive any disturbance within the village through those fragments of blood mist scattered throughout Kaede Village.
He could not see clearly, but he could faintly sense.
And so, the instant the barrier was triggered—the instant those twisted figures, evil demons that did not belong among the yōkai, came surging into the village—
Kōbe Hikaru knew.
He abandoned the Imagawa clan retainers with whom he was still handing over affairs in Suruga, abandoned the little yōkai still being settled into place, threw open his [Thunder-Sinew Razor-Body] at full power, and tore off in a mad sprint to the north.
Thunder wrapped his body, blood mist opened his path.
The distance of several hundred li, he compressed into less than a single hour.
And when he arrived, the scene that met him made him arch an eyebrow beneath his oni mask.
Seven heaps of ash had long since scattered into nothing. Kikyō stood upon the open ground, longbow in hand, her expression serene.
Before her, Kokaede stood with arms flung wide; behind her, the villagers had gathered of their own accord. Ten paces off, two girls in shrine maiden garb stood frozen in place, their faces blank with bewilderment.
Farther still, upon the slope of broken stone, a figure in white robe and red hakama knelt on one knee, covered in mud, hair in disarray, that beautiful, alluring face written all over with disgrace and terror.
And what troubled him most—that woman's spiritual power had been sealed.
Sealed by Kikyō.
Across thirty zhang, without sound or sign, sealed before anyone even noticed.
Kōbe Hikaru watched this scene, and beneath the crimson oni mask, the corner of his mouth curled faintly upward.
He had always known Kikyō was strong.
The power of the Sacred Arrow, the exquisite artistry of her barrier techniques, the depth of her spiritual power—even if her human constitution held her back a little, she was still, without shame, the strongest among shrine maidens. All of this he had witnessed long ago.
But what he saw today was not only strength.
It was heart.
This girl, from beginning to end, had not offered a single word of explanation.
No rebuttal, no defense, no argument. In the face of the accusations of two brainwashed young shrine maidens, in the face of the frame-up of a schemer skilled in silver-tongued rhetoric—
She simply stood there.
Loosed a single arrow, and forced the rat out from the shadows.
Sealed the spiritual power, and in turn, shattered the other's state of mind.
Clean and decisive.
Just as ever.
This clarity that refused to fall into the trap of self-justification, this composure that could not even be bothered to give a reply—it was absolutely not something that could be gained through cultivation.
It was the affirmation of the self, and it was, too, confidence in one's own existence.
She did not need others to believe she was innocent.
Because she knew she was innocent.
That was enough.
How incredible.
If this weren't a battlefield, right now he would very much like to walk over, and in front of everyone, sweep her up and spin her around three times.
Of course, he wouldn't do that.
Because Kikyō would hit him.
"Big brother!"
Kokaede's voice broke into his thoughts.
The little girl with her twin ponytails looked up at Kōbe Hikaru. "You're back! That bad woman got scared off by big sister!"
"I saw."
Kōbe Hikaru gave her head a little pat, then turned his gaze toward Tsubaki upon the slope of broken stone.
Truly worthy of being the schemer from the original work.
Luring demon blood, summoning evil demons, timing it all so her junior sisters would witness the evidence with their own eyes—running through this entire procedure, had it been anyone other than Kikyō, she really might have succeeded. She really might have swayed their state of mind.
A shrine maiden's state of mind was of the utmost importance. Once she fell into self-doubt, even her control over her spiritual power would weaken.
But she had run into Kikyō.
Run into a powerful shrine maiden who did not even deign to explain herself.
And so she lost—lost utterly and completely.
At least—on the level of rhetoric and scheming.
The thing Kōbe Hikaru had prepared in advance seemed, too, to have no place to be used.
[Nekomata's Claw: Favourability 72]
[All talents unlocked]
[First Talent: Spirit Affinity—all lowly spirits without self-awareness will show goodwill toward you.]
[Second Talent: Soul Summoning—within a brief span of time after a spirit has dissipated, you may temporarily gather together the lingering fragments of its consciousness, causing it to briefly "return."]
This talent had been unlocked by the favourability that surged past fifty on the battlefield of Yadaihara.
The battlefield strewn with departed souls and the breath of death had stirred this originally utterly mindless dead thing one step further into awakening.
If needed, at any moment he could use it to summon forth the souls of the dead "witnesses."
This, too, was the necessary means he had prepared, to be deployed the moment Kikyō's state of mind was affected.
But as things stood now, it seemed there was no need.
And yet, Kōbe Hikaru looked into Tsubaki's eyes.
In those eyes, grown somewhat unfocused after her spiritual power was sealed—there was no look of defeat.
There was only fury, and, hidden deeper beneath that fury, madness.
"She still has a trump card in reserve."
Kōbe Hikaru said in a low voice.
Kikyō glanced at him, without a trace of doubt.
Even though Tsubaki now knelt upon the slope of broken stone, her spiritual power sealed, disheveled from head to toe, her schemes exposed, her rhetoric rendered useless, her two junior sisters wavering.
Even the drama of the fallen shrine maiden she had so meticulously arranged had been smashed to powder by Kikyō with a single arrow and a single sentence.
She had lost.
In everyone's eyes, she had already lost completely.
But the corner of Tsubaki's mouth—at an angle no one noticed—twitched.
She lowered her head.
Her long black hair fell down, covering the greater part of her face.
Seen from without, she looked like a defeated loser who had admitted her defeat.
And then, she smiled.
Not the meticulously polished, elegant smile from before.
But rather, at the very end, a twisted smile that simply tore everything away.
Clearly, Tsubaki did still have strength to spare, still had a trump card in reserve.
Still had...
Rumble!
Thunder rose again, lightning burst apart, and in the very instant she smiled, the Muramasa at Kōbe Hikaru's waist had already flashed forth, wreathed in blood mist, wreathed all the more in surging lightning!
Tsubaki was simply, dumbfoundedly, drowned by the surging, arriving majesty—
"—!?"
The crowd started slightly, and the two young shrine maidens of the Tahōtō were frightened as well.
Only Kikyō: "..."
The shrine maiden cast a glance at Kōbe Hikaru, who had abruptly drawn his blade at her side, and saw that ashen-haired oni warrior whose expression seemed cold and severe, yet was in truth written all over with smugness, as if to say: See, this is what they mean by "a married couple grows to resemble each other."
Of course Kikyō knew that Kōbe Hikaru had learned this from her.
She, too, silently lowered the bow in her hand. They both understood perfectly well—she had no habit of standing by and watching while an enemy unleashed their power.
Only, a pity...
"Heh."
"Heh heh."
"In that case——"
Tsubaki's laughter rang out once more, and her figure, too, appeared upon a small hill even farther off, dozens of paces away.
Disheveled and in tatters from head to toe, her whole body bearing the broken marks of being grazed by lightning and blade light, her face pale—yet still there, still alive.
Had this one prepared in advance the means to flee?
Kōbe Hikaru clicked his tongue, thinking that she was indeed worthy of being a BOSS in the original work. With full preparations made, she was, as expected, not so easy to deal with.
Then he saw the hand of that Tahōtō shrine maiden draw out from her sleeve, a single sacred sutra pinched in her palm.
The patterns upon that sacred sutra were of no orthodox shrine maiden technique... At the sight of this talisman, both Momiji and Botan blanched in unison.
It was a seal-breaking incantation.
The key to what the Tahōtō sealed.
In this world, the Tahōtō was an ancient spirit-tower that suppressed evil and calamity, its seal sustained by the lifetime of spiritual power of Tsubaki's master, and, further back still, of every generation of guardian sorcerers.
Beneath the tower was suppressed a demonic fiend, an evil demon, sealed away centuries ago.
Momiji and Botan, as their master's final disciples, had inherited the duty of guarding the Tahōtō.
And Tsubaki was their senior sister.
That sacred sutra in her hand was precisely the seal-breaking decree their master had crafted while alive, in case of dire need—stolen away by Tsubaki without their knowing.
And this, glaringly, was the true trump card Tsubaki had prepared against Kikyō... If she could not shake Kikyō's state of mind, then this move would be her final killing stroke.
"Tsubaki! Have you gone mad——!" Momiji cried out in shock, even with a trace of horror.
"The thing sealed beneath the Tahōtō—if you let it out, no one will be able to stop it——"
Tsubaki paid her no mind.
As she crushed the sacred sutra, her other hand formed a hand seal.
It was not an attack. The spiritual power within her body was sealed, and she could not release it outward to attack—but she could still activate a technique prepared in advance.
Especially... a technique not meant to face demons.
But rather, to face people.
It was the so-called... black witchcraft!
"Senior sister, you actually learned the black witchcraft that Master forbade——?!" Botan, too, was no longer in mere terror—she was seized by a horror beyond all measure.
In response, Tsubaki curled her lips into a smile, her long hair streaming.
What she used was the very forbidden black witchcraft of the Tahōtō—that which linked herself to the evil demon imprisoned beneath the Tahōtō, a drawing-close to the demon that none could stop.
For ordinary people, drawing near that imprisoned demon was of course a most terrifying curse.
But for Tsubaki, it was not so.
Such a means, to her here and now, was more like an instantaneous transference.
And none could stop it!
What Tsubaki had always been most skilled at had never been the exorcism of demons, but black witchcraft against people... She had originally intended to shake Kikyō's state of mind, and once her spiritual power ran out of control, to work black witchcraft upon her.
Only a pity she had not succeeded.
"Tsubaki——!"
Momiji rushed forward, and the sacred sutra in her hand transformed into countless paper dolls, bursting out all at once!
But in the instant the white light burst apart, the dozens of paper dolls passed through only the lingering ripples of empty space.
Tsubaki had vanished.
In the air remained only her final voice, drifting and floating, carrying a cold and sinister mirth.
"Kikyō, Kōbe Hikaru, come chase me."
"We'll... meet at the Tahōtō."
...
Momiji stood rooted in place, her face ashen.
Botan's sacred sutras scattered across the ground, her big eyes stretched wide and round, her lips trembling, unable to make a sound.
They finally realized.
What their senior sister meant to do.
They confirmed, all the more completely, that they and their companions had been deceived.
"The Tahōtō..."
Botan's voice quavered. "Senior sister—she's going to break the seal——"
"That demon."
Momiji picked up her words, her voice as though squeezed out from between clenched teeth.
She turned around, looking toward Kikyō and Kōbe Hikaru. In those eyes that had just moments ago been brimming with hostility toward Kikyō, there was now only a single emotion.
Fear.
What was sealed beneath that tower was no ordinary demon.
Momiji's voice came rushed and urgent:
"Master said that it was a terrifying yōkai, an evil demon, sealed centuries ago—it once devoured the entire population of a whole town before it was subdued. Master spent a lifetime of spiritual power sustaining the seal, and her final dying charge was this—that it must never, ever be let out."
"If senior sister... Tsubaki... undoes the seal——"
She swallowed hard.
"That demon will absorb all the life around it. It will swiftly recover the power it had before..."
Kōbe Hikaru's gaze shifted away from Momiji, turning toward the west.
The Tahōtō lay to the west.
From Kaede Village, some hundred-odd li away.
It could only be said that she was indeed worthy of being the Tahōtō shrine maiden versed in black witchcraft from the original work. Tsubaki's sudden transference, this move, they could not stop.
But even black witchcraft of that caliber could not be accomplished in a single step.
They still had time. They could catch up.
"Kikyō."
He spoke.
"Mm."
Kikyō had already slung the longbow onto her back, the white ribbon binding her hair tight once more. "Kaede, watch over the village."
Kokaede was startled for a moment, then nodded hard.
"Big brother, big sister Kikyō, please be careful."
Kikyō gave her little sister a glance, and said nothing more.
She turned to Momiji and Botan.
"Rest assured."
Only two words.
Momiji opened and closed her mouth, wanting to say something—perhaps an apology, perhaps an explanation, or perhaps only wanting to ask a single question.
But Kikyō gave her no chance to speak.
"Let's go."
Kōbe Hikaru's hand was already resting on the hilt of Muramasa.
The [Thunder-Sinew Razor-Body] was set in motion.
Purple arcs of electricity burst apart beneath his feet, and the ground cracked open.
In the next instant, his figure became a bolt of purple lightning, charging into the night.
Kikyō followed close behind.
White spiritual power surged up all around her, and the instant her feet left the ground, two birds formed from shikigami flew out from her sleeves, bearing her body westward.
The speed was not slow, yet neither was it at the utmost extreme—she could only follow from afar.
Momiji gritted her teeth, grabbed Botan's hand, and gave chase.
Four figures vanished into the veil of night.
Kaede Village returned once more to silence.
Only the moonlight, shining down upon those last few heaps of ash scattering upon the ground.
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