The murky clouds across the vault of the sky were slowly dispersing.
The gray-white yōkai aura, having lost the Tsuchigumo as the core that sustained it, began to be torn apart by the natural currents of air, splitting piece by piece, letting the afternoon sunlight fall back onto the earth once more.
But the earth itself had not yet recovered.
For hundreds of paces in every direction, the ground had been petrified into a gray-white crust, and between the fractured strata the lingering resonance of the Tsuchigumo's yōkai aura still clung.
Craters everywhere.
Great pits smashed open where bodies had struck the ground, shallow ones blasted out by swinging fists, shattered hollows torn loose in the moment of a leaping retreat.
Kikyō stood off to one side, her bow already lowered. Her white hairband had been shaken loose at one end by the wind, and the stray strands hanging beside her ears were dusted with grit, lending that exquisite, delicate face a touch more weariness.
Her spiritual power was still full.
But her physical strength had run just as dry.
Kōbe Hikaru braced himself against the rock and rose. His body was still weak, the yōkai power after his mutation drained down to the very bottom—yet, mercifully, it was recovering at a pace visible to the eye.
That was the good thing about being a yōkai.
In sheer physical vitality, far beyond an ordinary human.
He stretched, joints cracking one after another.
Then he turned his head, looking toward Kaede Village.
The barrier was still glowing.
Far off, one could make out the silhouette of the torii, the rooftop of the Shrine.
Behind the pillars of the torii, two heads were peeking out.
Momiji in her red-and-white shrine maiden robes, Botan in her blue-and-white ones.
The two of them were huddled behind the pillars, only half their faces showing, big eyes round as saucers.
They had watched that whole earth-shattering battle from start to finish.
They could do nothing to help, but the bobbing of those two heads perfectly charted the flow of the fight—shrinking back when the Tsuchigumo had the upper hand, poking out when Kōbe Hikaru struck back, showing only half an eye when the two locked together in a tangle.
Now, seeing the great yōkai gone, the two heads finally emerged all the way.
"Is—is it over?"
Botan's voice carried across the hundreds of paces, trembling and unsteady.
"It's over."
Kikyō's voice was cool and clear as ever.
"Waah, thank goodness—"
Botan plopped down on the steps of the torii, sacred sutra scattering across the ground.
Momiji didn't sit, but she braced both hands on her knees, lowered her head, and gasped for breath.
They could feel that yōkai aura of the Gasification-level great yōkai—even through the barrier, that crushing pressure that had darkened the very sky had nearly frightened them into a faint.
And inside the main hall.
On the pillar.
Naoe Kanetsugu was still bound.
From beginning to end.
A great battle at the descent of the Tsuchigumo, an advance and retreat of the Uesugi army, the shattering of a divine statue—
And no one had remembered her.
Not a single person.
From start to finish, from beginning to end.
Not one of them had so much as thought of untying the ropes.
Naoe Kanetsugu leaned against the pillar. The expression on her face had passed from its initial resentment through struggle, helplessness, and numbness, until at last it settled into a complicated sort of calm.
She had heard the sound of her lord's nirvana.
She had heard the sounds of the fighting outside.
She had heard the roar of the Tsuchigumo, too.
Farther and farther away.
Fading into the wind.
No one had come to save her.
The cloth in her mouth had loosened enough now that she could spit it out herself.
But she didn't, because spitting it out would do no good either.
The ropes binding her were very strong.
She'd struggled against them all night and hadn't worked them loose.
Naoe Kanetsugu closed her eyes and drew a deep breath.
Her lord was gone.
The beloved blade had gone too, and the beloved lord was settled. And not so much as a single glance her way.
Though she knew her lord had, in truth, arranged her own means of escape well in advance…
But that did nothing to soften her mood just now.
Very bad.
Extremely bad.
"…"
Naoe Kanetsugu opened her eyes.
The cloth in her mouth was at last, bit by bit, worked out by her own tongue.
"Hey."
She called out toward the doorway of the main hall.
No answer. "…Hey!"
Still no answer.
Outside there was only the sound of Momiji and Botan talking, and—
"Big Sister Kikyō, Big Brother Hikaru, have some fruit!"
Kokaede.
The little girl with her twin ponytails came running out of the Shrine hugging a tray of fruit, grinning so wide her eyes vanished, utterly unaware of what had just happened outside.
Naoe Kanetsugu watched that small figure dash off, and the corner of her mouth twitched.
She was now beginning to seriously consider a certain question.
Just how long, exactly, was she going to be tied to this pillar.
Yet, for reasons she couldn't quite name, thinking of that fleeting glimpse she'd caught—the figure of her lord at the moment of nirvana—Naoe Kanetsugu suddenly felt that an outcome like this might, perhaps, not be so bad after all.
After all.
"The expression on my lord's face in that moment—I had never, ever seen it before."
Shame, vexation.
And, more inexplicably still—joy?
Mm… a little strange, isn't it?
…
"It seems it's over."
At that same moment.
In Musashi Province, to the southwest, at the border between Sagami Province and Kai Province, the rulers of the two lands—Takeda Shingen and Hōjō Ujiyasu—stood shoulder to shoulder.
A vigorous, athletic girl with a mane of crimson hair loose about her shoulders stood at a high point on the mountain, gazing at the distant shifting of the heavens, earth-shaking and world-splitting. With the perception she possessed as the incarnation of Fudō Myō-ō descended into the world, she could sense the sheer upheaval over there.
She was rather brimming with interest.
That Demon God, Hikaru… and that shrine maiden, Kikyō.
"To see through Uesugi Kenshin, to turn the tables and lay a trap for her, to shatter three thousand enemies in a single stroke, wounding but not killing, and even to slay Uesugi Kenshin once, forcing that incarnation of Bishamonten to be replaced—that is truly no small thing."
When it came to marching armies and arraying formations, meeting head-on in open battle, Takeda Shingen was confident she would never lose to Uesugi Kenshin.
But when it came to schemes and stratagems, Takeda Shingen knew she was no match for that Uesugi Kenshin fellow.
The God of War, Bishamonten—that was no idle boast!
But now, with Kōbe Hikaru in the picture…
"I hear this one has forged an alliance with Imagawa Yoshimoto?"
"First a Taigen Sessai, and now a Demon God Hikaru on top of that… it seems the rise of the Imagawa really has become unstoppable!"
Fudō Myō-ō, meeting all change with changelessness.
Faced with an unstoppable momentum, Takeda Shingen would not try to stop it.
In the meantime.
Beside her, Hōjō Ujiyasu said nothing, but throughout her gaze burned bright.
She too was stirred to action.
"That is, after all, within Musashi Province—under the banner of my Hōjō clan," she said.
"The Imagawa may not be able to hold onto it."
"Hahaha!"
Takeda Shingen threw back her head and laughed, her chest, bound tight beneath the cloth, swaying boldly in the wind, seeming to stir more waves than the distant mountains, setting Hōjō Ujiyasu grinding her teeth at the sight.
Both being incarnations of gods and buddhas.
Fudō Myō-ō, Takeda Shingen, was without doubt the more human, the more unrestrained and forthright, unbothered by trifles.
And she would not scheme against people's hearts.
Yet Takeda Shingen had a certain feeling.
The Uesugi Kenshin after the changing of the generations… might, perhaps, be somewhat different?
A god or buddha whose golden body had been broken ought to have something changed about it.
Just like… herself.
…
Echigo Province.
Kasugayama Castle.
On the inner side of the castle keep, the hidden chamber that enshrined the statue of Bishamonten.
The flame of the everlasting lamp flickered in the light breeze.
When the door was pushed open, what Uesugi Sentōin saw was a familiar back.
Blue robes, silver armor, dark long hair loose across the shoulders.
Seated on the cushion before the offering table, posture upright, as if she had been sitting there a very long time.
"My lord! When did you—"
Aya-Gozen strode over quickly, her voice carrying the urgency of one who had survived a calamity.
Uesugi Kenshin turned her head.
And smiled.
Aya-Gozen's steps halted.
Not because there was anything wrong with that smile.
But because—it was too right.
Everything was right.
The features, the voice, the seated posture, the bearing, even the curve of the smile—not the slightest bit off.
Yet Aya-Gozen couldn't say where the difference lay.
It was like the same melody, played by a different person.
The pitch unchanged, the tempo unchanged, the tune unchanged.
Only in the weight of the fingering, the intervals of the breath, that instant's hesitation or decisiveness at the fall of a key—there was the faintest, most minute deviation.
So minute that even she thought it must be an illusion.
"The Imagawa army to the south has already pushed to within twenty li north of the castle, my lord, you—"
"I know."
Kenshin rose to her feet, her tone level, the same as ever. "Don't worry, sister. I'll handle it."
She walked to the doorway of the hidden chamber, and as she passed Aya-Gozen, she reached out and patted her on the shoulder. Aya-Gozen went slightly still.
In the past, her lord… would never have made such a gesture.
But she didn't dwell on it.
The fighting was urgent; there was no room to dwell on it.
Kenshin walked out of the hidden chamber.
She took two steps, then stopped again.
She glanced back at a bronze mirror hanging on the wall of the chamber.
The mirror reflected her face.
Indigo-blue long hair, pupils of the same dark hue, gentle brows and eyes, a faint curve at the corner of her mouth.
But in the dim depths of the bronze mirror, another shadow lay layered over her face.
Silver-white long hair, golden eyes deep as an ancient well, a face aloof as a buddha's statue and yet carrying something more, something other.
She… was still there.
The two faces overlapped for an instant.
Then the silver-white shadow sank away.
Like the moon in the sky veiled by the clouds of the mortal world.
The new Kenshin looked at the mirror, where only her own face remained, and fell silent for a moment.
"The wrongs you committed, I will make right, predecessor."
She spoke softly. "I'll go and make amends to the benefactor who helped us reach that final enlightenment, and… repay the debt."
To whom she said it, no one could say.
But in that instant, thinking of that hazy figure lingering in the predecessor's residual impressions, thinking of the understanding the former generation had left behind, she felt her own heartbeat quicken—just slightly.
She turned and walked into the light of dawn.
Beyond the doors stretched a vast expanse. Outside Kasugayama Castle, the forces of the Imagawa clan had long since received Kōbe Hikaru's message, and carrying their spoils, they were withdrawing into the sea.
People, wealth, name, and trust—all lost.
This time the Uesugi clan had, without any doubt, suffered a grievous defeat.
But.
"An Echigo not held together by gods and spirits… might, perhaps, be a better realm."
…
And afterward, then.
In Kaede Village of Musashi Province, the faint glow of the barrier was softer than usual, wrapping the whole village.
Momiji and Botan had put Kokaede to bed early; the lamp in the side hall went dark very quickly.
The paper door of the main hall slid shut.
Outside, the stream in the back hills had risen, and the spring water trickled down along a narrow crevice in the rock, dripping between two pebbles that leaned against each other.
The stone faces worn smooth by the flowing water were glossy and warm; the stream slid along their curves, seeping into the place where the two stones pressed together, then slowly welling over, flowing back, soaking them again and again.
On the bank, the grasses nestled against one another in the night wind, stalks pressed close, leaves intertwined, flower-heads rising and falling with the same gust.
The sound of the stream grew quicker and more urgent.
The current came wave upon wave, each pressing harder than the last, the pebbles washed over and laid bare again and again, the glint of water on stone flickering on and off beneath the moonlight.
At last—
The water brimmed over the narrowest point between the two stones.
The wind stilled, the flowers went quiet.
All things fell briefly silent.
And then sank into stillness.
The stream returned to its thin trickle; the grass and leaves each drooped low.
The lamp in the main hall went out only a long while later.
Kōbe Hikaru and Kikyō had passed another day of the ordinary—stopping short at the threshold, but having already tried everything else besides.
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