The sky was like a canopy, the earth like a board; columns of war-smoke rose like pillars, and blood flowed like rivers.
Whooo —
The north wind howled.
The young man carrying the enormous sword — Bankotsu, the leader of the Band of Seven — broke into a grin. He drove Banryū point-down into the ground and let out a long breath.
"Finally finished."
"Big brother, this job was a breeze."
Jakotsu, with his feminine features, sheathed his flexible long blade and licked his lips.
"This many men — wasn't even enough to warm me up."
"Gah!"
Ginkotsu, his body forged of steel, gave a mechanical sound that seemed to agree.
"Heh heh… what was it that big shot told us again?"
The short Mukotsu stepped out of the green miasma, an oddly chilling smile on his face. "Wasn't it something like — kill every last person on this side?"
In the distance, Kōbe Hikaru — who had heard those words thanks to a yōkai's keen ears — narrowed his eyes.
Kill everyone?
"That's right."
Bankotsu nodded, casually wiping the blood off Banryū. "That's what our 'noble client' ordered."
"Not just this army — even the domain of that fellow Suda Shigenobu, who hired us in the first place, is to be wiped out along with them."
Suda Shigenobu.
Kōbe Hikaru recognized the name.
That was the lord he had killed several days ago.
This bunch, from the sound of it, had first been hired by that man — but in the middle of the job, someone else had hired them as well?
"What a shame."
Renkotsu spoke up from the side, a hint of regret on that monk-styled face of his. "We arrived a step too late."
"That Suda Shigenobu was already killed by someone else."
"They say it was some fellow called 'Kōbe Hikaru' who did it."
"Who?"
Jakotsu asked, curious.
"Don't know."
Renkotsu shook his head.
"Only that it's a yōkai, following around a shrine maiden — sounds like he's some miko's shikigami."
"Lopped off Suda Shigenobu's head with a single stroke, then strung the head up over the castle gate for all to see."
"Folks in the castle town are out of their minds with rumors — calling it 'an Oni-God descended into the world.'"
Bankotsu snorted. "An Oni-God?"
"Interesting."
"If the chance comes up, I wouldn't mind meeting this fellow."
Kōbe Hikaru said nothing.
He merely listened in silence.
Relying on a yōkai's hearing, he listened from afar as those seven traded jokes among heaps of corpses.
"By the way, big brother."
Jakotsu suddenly remembered something. "There's a village nearby that worships a toad — pretty interesting actually. It's not in our contract, but since we've got nothing else to do, want to make a special trip and finish that one off too?"
Kōbe Hikaru's expression tightened slightly.
A village that worships a toad.
That was —
"Oh?"
Bankotsu arched a brow. "An interesting village? How so?"
"Well."
Jakotsu smiled — a smile that looked oddly pure and innocent, utterly out of place on a battlefield reeking of blood, and made all the more grotesque by that bloody smell. "Those villagers really are something."
"It seems they worship a yōkai."
"What yōkai?"
"Apparently… an Oni-God, named Kōbe Hikaru? Probably the same so-called Oni-God who killed Suda Shigenobu."
Silence.
On the slope, two figures both froze at the same instant.
Kōbe Hikaru's hand was already on the hilt of his blade.
Kikyō's bowstring had begun to give off a faint hum.
That village.
It was — without the slightest doubt — Ishimura, the village they had just rescued; those villagers they had once sworn to shelter.
"Oni-God?"
Bankotsu laughed aloud. "That's quite a ringing title."
"Then let's go take a look. See whether this so-called Oni-God will come and save them."
Kōbe Hikaru glanced at Kikyō beside him.
His expression was calm, but a killing intent was rising in it.
"Let's go."
He said in a low voice.
Of course he had to go — had to act.
True, even if that village were slaughtered, it had no real connection to him. He had never been a saint, and he couldn't possibly foresee every twist of the future — if he failed to make it in time, well, all he could do was offer a word of regret.
He had already done his utmost in righteousness, granting that village a brief reprieve from the oppression of the powerful. The wars that came after were not something a single yōkai could control. But since he had caught wind of this in time… Kōbe Hikaru had no choice but to move.
And his instincts told him: the arrival of this bunch had something to do with 'him.'
Something to do with Kikyō.
And more likely still — something to do with the Shikon Jewel!
Kikyō did not stop him.
She simply followed silently at his back.
Two figures descended from the slope.
One step, two steps.
Their pace was unhurried, but firm.
"Hm?"
Jakotsu was the first to sense something amiss.
He turned his head and looked toward the slope.
"Big brother, someone's coming."
Bankotsu turned as well.
His gaze caught two figures — one grey, one white-and-red.
The grey one carried a long blade on his back, his pale long hair drifting in the wind.
The white-and-red one held a longbow, her black hair cascading like a waterfall over her shoulders.
"A miko?"
Bankotsu's eyes narrowed. "And a… yōkai?"
"That combination — familiar!"
He saw it.
The grey-clad one was giving off a thick, heavy yōkai aura.
Not human.
"Whatever."
The corner of Bankotsu's mouth curled up. "They've come to die anyway, haven't they?"
He pulled Banryū free and shouldered it.
The other six likewise slid into combat stances.
Jakotsu's blade began to writhe; Ginkotsu's mechanisms began to whir.
A poisonous mist began to roil around Mukotsu; sparks flickered at the corner of Renkotsu's mouth.
Suikotsu fitted on his claws.
Kyōkotsu swung up his meteor hammer.
The Band of Seven, complete in number.
Facing two people.
"Who are you?"
Bankotsu asked.
No one answered.
But Kikyō halted her steps, and only Kōbe Hikaru kept advancing.
One step, two steps, three steps.
Until — he stopped a hundred paces from Bankotsu.
"Just now."
He spoke.
His voice was calm — calm in a way that was almost terrifying. "You said you were going to slaughter a village?"
"Oh?"
Bankotsu arched a brow. "What do you want with that?"
"You connected to that village?"
Kōbe Hikaru did not answer.
He simply drew his blade.
The light of the steel was like a stretched ribbon.
The instant Muramasa cleared the sheath, that bloodthirsty killing intent surged outward.
"I've said it before."
Kōbe Hikaru's voice was soft. "That village is under my protection."
"Anyone who wants to harm them —"
He raised his head, his crimson oni eyes piercing under the sunlight: "— I kill."
Bankotsu was taken aback for a moment.
Then he laughed — laughed loudly.
"Hahahaha!"
"So it really is you — the pair of miko and yōkai. You really are that 'Oni-God Kōbe Hikaru'? No wonder you looked a bit familiar!"
"What a coincidence!"
He lifted Banryū from his shoulder and leveled it at Kōbe Hikaru.
"I was just thinking of looking for a chance to meet you — didn't expect you to come delivering yourself to my door."
"Then —"
His grin twisted into something feral.
"Let me see exactly how much you're worth, 'Oni-God!'"
The words barely fell before Bankotsu moved.
Banryū came sweeping out, bringing with it a foul, blood-stinking wind.
That two-zhang colossus of a blade weighed nothing in his hand.
It drove straight for Kōbe Hikaru's vitals.
Kōbe Hikaru did not dodge.
He simply — met it head-on.
Blade clashed against blade.
Clang —!
Metal rang against metal; sparks scattered in every direction.
Kōbe Hikaru's body did not move; it only tilted slightly.
Bankotsu's strength was enormous. He was human, yet possessed a strength surpassing that of ordinary yōkai. He had no fancy transformations — what he had was nothing but this raw, brute power.
Strength enough to rival a six-stage yōkai.
But that was all.
In raw strength, Kōbe Hikaru did not entirely surpass him. But strength was not the only thing Kōbe Hikaru had.
"Hm?"
Bankotsu's expression shifted.
"You can take a blow from me?"
"Now that's interesting."
He swung again.
This time, faster, harder.
Banryū carved a black arc through the air, like a streak of black lightning.
This time Kōbe Hikaru did not block head-on but sidestepped to evade.
The blade's edge grazed his shoulder as it passed — and at the same moment, Muramasa was already lashing out at blistering speed toward Bankotsu's flank.
"Clang!"
Bankotsu blocked the cut with Banryū's hilt.
The clang echoed; force met force, evenly matched.
Their faces were a hand's breadth apart.
"Not bad."
Bankotsu grinned. "A lot better than those fodder soldiers."
Kōbe Hikaru said nothing.
His left hand rose, and from his palm —
A white bone spike burst out.
"!"
Bankotsu's pupils contracted sharply.
He instinctively jerked backward, but he was a step too slow.
The bone spike grazed his face, slicing a bloody line across his cheek.
Bankotsu wiped at it with the back of his hand, looked at the smear of blood, then raised his head. A new seriousness had entered his eyes.
"So you're a tough one after all."
"Brothers —"
He shouted.
"All of you, together!"
The Band of Seven's encirclement unfolded in an instant.
Jakotsu's long blade twisted toward him like a living snake; Ginkotsu's body fired off hidden projectiles from every joint at once; Mukotsu's poison mist began to spread; flames spewed from Renkotsu's mouth.
From every direction, only killing intent.
"Kikyō."
Kōbe Hikaru's voice was calm. "Stand back."
He did not turn his head, only gripped Muramasa tighter.
"I'm enough on my own."
Kikyō paused, but did not argue. She simply retreated ten paces, longbow in hand, ready to support him at any moment.
She knew Kōbe Hikaru's strength, and she knew his state of mind right now.
These fellows before them were vicious to the extreme, but they were all human — not the sort of opponents she was best suited to deal with — though she could manage them too, if it came to it.
"Ha! On your own?"
Bankotsu laughed loudly. "What do you take our Band of Seven for?"
"Scraps?"
The corner of Kōbe Hikaru's mouth lifted.
In the next second, bone spikes burst from his back — a dozen or more — like white flowers suddenly bursting into bloom.
All those hidden projectiles were caught on the bone spikes, ringing out in a chorus of clinks and clatters.
"What!?"
Astonishment leaked through Ginkotsu's mechanical voice.
But Kōbe Hikaru had already moved.
[Spectral Step] activated — his figure flickered like a wraith, and in an instant he was standing right in front of Mukotsu.
"You —"
Mukotsu's words went unfinished. Muramasa was already cleaving down.
The blade's light streamed across him, from left shoulder to right hip — cut in two with a single stroke.
"Hm?"
Kōbe Hikaru frowned.
There was no blood on the blade. Green venom was leaking from Mukotsu's body, corroding the edge.
"Heh heh… trying to kill me?"
Even Mukotsu's upper half could still speak. "My body's all poison — touch me and you —"
The words went no further.
Kōbe Hikaru had seen through this fellow's trick in an instant. He looked short and pudgy, but it was all a sham — what filled out his clothes was nothing but bulging sacks of poison.
Truly strange, hard to guard against.
But before Mukotsu could finish gloating, Kōbe Hikaru's left hand had already seized his head.
Five bone spikes burst from his palm, driving straight through Mukotsu's skull — no matter how many poison sacks were stuffed into his clothes, that one blow killed him as dead as anything could be.
One down.
"Too noisy."
He flicked the corpse aside.
[Bloodthirst Eternal] activated.
For all that Mukotsu's body was poisonous, he still had blood.
That blood flowed along the bone spikes and into Kōbe Hikaru's body, swiftly converted into nourishment that healed his wounds.
The poison came in too, of course, but with an oni-warrior's constitution, this much venom was nothing.
"Mukotsu —!"
Bankotsu roared. Banryū came sweeping out, dragging a dark wind in its wake.
Kōbe Hikaru still did not dodge — he met it head-on.
Muramasa and Banryū collided; sparks flew.
They held each other in deadlock, neither giving way.
But —
"That all?"
Five bone spikes burst from his right arm, like blades of bone.
Before Bankotsu could react, those spikes had raked across his chest, leaving five gashes — deep enough to show bone!
"Damn it!"
Bankotsu retreated. At the same moment, Kyōkotsu was already swinging his meteor hammer in from behind.
The two coordinated seamlessly, pinning Kōbe Hikaru between them.
But Kōbe Hikaru smiled.
Bone spikes burst from his back, slamming directly against Kyōkotsu's meteor hammer.
"Even his back —"
Kyōkotsu was stunned.
Kōbe Hikaru gave him no time to react — he simply turned, sweeping Muramasa around in the same motion.
A flash of blade-light.
Kyōkotsu's massive head went flying.
Blood gushed forth like a fountain.
Another one dead.
[Bloodthirst Eternal] activated again.
That blood seemed to come alive on its own, seeping through Kōbe Hikaru's skin and into his body. What little stamina he had spent was restored in full.
"Damn it!"
On the other side, Renkotsu suddenly belched out flames — a sea of fire blanketing the sky, swallowing Kōbe Hikaru.
But when the flames dispersed —
Kōbe Hikaru still stood in place, his whole body now sheathed in a layer of white bone armor, with wisps of fire still curling around the bone. Inside it, however, he was clearly unscathed.
[Bone Soul Mutation] fully unleashed.
"Your turn."
He looked at Renkotsu.
Bone spikes burst from his feet, launching him forward.
Twice as fast as before.
Renkotsu tried to dodge, but couldn't. Fortunately, the next instant, Jakotsu's writhing blade interposed itself before him.
"You won't —"
But Jakotsu's words went unfinished.
Kōbe Hikaru's left hand caught hold of that serpent-blade.
Five bone spikes burst from his palm, pinning the blade — and with it, Jakotsu, who still gripped the hilt — flat against the ground.
"Let go!"
Jakotsu tried to pull his blade free, only to find the bone spikes seemed to have grown into the steel — there was no yanking them out.
Kōbe Hikaru's right hand — Muramasa was already swinging toward Renkotsu.
"Ginkotsu, save me!"
Renkotsu shouted.
Ginkotsu's iron-clad body lunged forward, taking the blow with his body.
Clang!
Muramasa struck against Ginkotsu, leaving only a shallow mark.
"Hmph, my body is —"
Ginkotsu's mechanical voice did not finish.
Kōbe Hikaru's knee had already driven into his chest, and a thick bone spike burst from that knee, plunging straight through Ginkotsu's torso.
"Gah!"
Ginkotsu uttered his last sound; the mechanisms in his chest began to smoke.
"This is bad!"
Bankotsu's face changed. "Ginkotsu's about to blow!"
Kōbe Hikaru sensed it too. He released Ginkotsu and fell back.
The next instant.
Boom!
An immense explosion burst at the center of the battlefield.
Ginkotsu's hulking iron-cast body suddenly disintegrated from within. Amid showering shrapnel, a swath of crimson bloomed open like a flower.
Firelight surged skyward, and the shockwave hurled the surrounding corpses through the air.
Kōbe Hikaru was driven back a dozen paces, and the bone armor on his body developed a number of cracks. But [Bloodthirst Eternal] was still in effect.
Those cracks were rapidly mending.
Soon, the smoke and dust dissipated, and only four figures remained on the battlefield.
Bankotsu, Jakotsu, Suikotsu, and Renkotsu sprawled on the ground.
Most of Renkotsu's left shoulder had been blown off; blood streamed out in torrents.
"Retreat —"
Bankotsu gritted out.
He knew he could not win.
Mukotsu was dead, Kyōkotsu was dead, Ginkotsu had exploded.
The rest of them were simply no match for this oni-warrior.
This yōkai was not much stronger than himself, his speed not an absolute advantage either — yet he seemed to have no weakness at all, and those bones of his shifted in endless ways, leaving no possible guard.
"Trying to run?"
Kōbe Hikaru, Muramasa in hand, instinctively made to pursue… but at that very moment, the fragments of Ginkotsu scattered across the ground began to split a second time — a second explosion!
"!?"
The blasts were smaller in scale than the first, but more numerous. Sparks bloomed in wave after wave, black smoke rising thick enough that Kōbe Hikaru had no choice but to halt his step and fall back, barely able to evade in time —
By the time the explosions ceased and the smoke spread, Bankotsu and the other two had vanished without a trace.
All he had managed in those last moments was to send a fine blood-mist drifting after them.
But he could no longer catch up.
Kōbe Hikaru halted and looked around.
The black smoke settled. The air on the spot was still thick with concentrated resentment.
All those who had died at the Band of Seven's hands — their grudges were ceaselessly gathering.
"Forget it."
He gave up the pursuit.
Ginkotsu's secondary explosion had caught him off guard; the three surviving members of the Band of Seven had run off with quite some speed. With their minds bent on escape, he would certainly fail to catch them now, and might even lose his one chance to question them… And besides, Kōbe Hikaru understood, and could sense, that Bankotsu's Banryū had considerable talent — the kind of talent to grow into a true yōkai weapon, given that it was fed.
Let him keep his life. Let him grow. Later on, perhaps there would be a 'harvest.'
In any case, he had already left a trace of 'blood' on that fellow — with blood as his eye, sharing in his sensations, he could to some degree monitor and even control the man's actions, keep him from doing evil — even set limitations, forcing the man to only kill villains in order to feed his blade. On that foundation, he had no need to fear any sudden surprises.
Kōbe Hikaru walked over to Renkotsu.
The man wasn't dead yet; gravely wounded though he was, he was still breathing.
"Now."
Kōbe Hikaru crouched, the tip of Muramasa pressed to Renkotsu's throat as he began his interrogation: "Speak. What did you come here to do, and who sent you?"
Renkotsu looked into those crimson eyes and shook from head to foot.
"I… I'll talk… I'll say anything…"
His will to live was strong.
"Don't kill me… please don't kill me…"
Kōbe Hikaru said nothing. He simply drew a shallow line across his neck with the point of the blade.
Blood seeped out.
"Talk. Quickly."
"It… it was Kyoto…"
Renkotsu's voice trembled. "There was a noble… who hired us…"
"Told us to use the war between the Hōjō and the Imagawa to brew slaughter all through this region…"
"To brew resentment…"
"It… it was Kyoto…"
"Why?"
Kōbe Hikaru's voice was cold.
"We… we don't know either… that noble didn't say…"
Renkotsu swallowed. "But our boss said — that fellow might not be human. He's a yōkai. A very, very powerful great yōkai!"
Kōbe Hikaru's eyes narrowed.
A demon of Kyoto.
Resentment cultivated in advance.
It was hard not to draw a connection to himself — or rather, to what was now in Kikyō's keeping.
"The Shikon Jewel."
He spoke those words.
That thing had been exposed, and would indeed draw the covetous eyes of demons from all directions.
At least until they had shown enough strength to safeguard its existence!
Renkotsu's body shook harder still.
They didn't know for certain, but they had guessed as much themselves — the Band of Seven had its own intelligence network.
Kōbe Hikaru rose to his feet.
He had learned what he wanted to know.
"Anything else to say?"
He asked.
Renkotsu opened his mouth, wanting to say something.
But Kōbe Hikaru had no more interest in listening.
Muramasa came down — clean and decisive.
[Bloodthirst Eternal] activated one last time.
Renkotsu's blood was drawn in, and every wound on Kōbe Hikaru's body was healed.
Kōbe Hikaru sheathed his blade, turned, and walked toward Kikyō.
The shrine maiden stood not far off, expression composed as she watched it all.
"Let's go," Kōbe Hikaru said. "Back to Kaede Village."
If the demon out of Kyoto was after the Shikon Jewel —
Then there was no way they would leave the village that Kikyō had once guarded untouched.
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