Hikaru looked at his empty hand, and the inside of his head was frightening in its quiet. The Wakizashi lay a few paces away, the lightning that had coiled around it almost entirely extinguished, only a handful of faint blood-red sparks still flickering against the cold ground.For an Onmyoji, a few paces was not a great distance. Under ordinary circumstances he would simply lunge forward, roll, reach out, and have it back in his grip.But right now, Hashira's hand still had his wrist, her five fingers locked around it like iron, and behind her back the warped shadow of Nakamoto was pressed against her like something black that had crawled out of a nightmare.Nakamoto's torn mouth curved upward. Not a smile. More like a wound being pulled wider by fingernails. From inside that black gap, thick coils of Resentful Energy seeped outward, wrapping around Hashira's neck, her shoulders, her nape, turning a face already drained of color into something that could have been a wax sculpture sto

The moment the white silk strips made contact with the Wraiths on the slope below, the scene before Hikaru transformed into a purging rite that was cold to the point of cruelty.A faceless Wraith had just raised its head, had not yet managed a single shriek, when a white hand closed around it. Five fingers tightened slightly. The black mass of its head crumbled like dry mud, and the rest of the body was wrapped in silk and torn apart into dissipating smoke. Another that had been moving on all fours, neck twisted backward, tried to scramble into a crack between rocks and escape, but two white strips came from separate directions and coiled around its limbs. They pulled in opposite directions. The spiritual body split in silence: no blood, no flesh, only Yin Energy detonating outward in a wave of foul black smoke.The Wraiths descended into chaos.But chaos was useless.Moments ago they had resembled a tidal wave. The white silk of Urakami Shime resembled hundreds of arms belonging to a

A villa this large, having just experienced something this horrifying, should have been filled with screaming, the sound of guards running, vehicles, radios, alarms. But right now, the entire estate was as silent as an abandoned house left behind after a funeral. Lights still burned in a few corridors, pale yellow glow spilling through shattered windows, but they offered no warmth. Instead they resembled weak candles lit beside corpses.Hikaru carried Hashira through the broken window on the ground floor and entered the main hall.The scene inside was exactly what he had expected.Guards lying scattered everywhere.Some collapsed beside the staircase, still gripping their weapons but with eyes shut tight, faces white as bone. Some sprawled in hallways, radios dropped nearby, mouths still flecked with white foam. Some leaned back against walls, heads tilted to one side, breathing so faint it was nearly undetectable. And some had stopped breathing entirely.The dead were easy to identif

The white silk strips withdrew slowly into Shime's sleeves.Urakami Shime remained suspended behind him. The white funeral veil covering her face stayed turned toward Hikaru for a moment longer. No sound. No parting words. No "don't crush the next one." But Hikaru had the vague sense that she was looking at the new jade in his hand, and then at him.Like confirming he had received it.Then her form began to fade.The white kimono dissolved into the shadows first. The Wataboshi covered in gold and black talismanic script followed after. The funeral veil over her face was the last thing to disappear. In that moment, Hikaru caught the scent of Verdant Jade Incense again.Very faint.Very clean.Then all sound returned.The curtain resumed its faint rustling. The talisman at the head of Hashira's bed stopped trembling. The bedside lamp returned to its ordinary pale yellow. Hashira's weak breathing came back to his ears.Urakami Shime was gone.Shiratori continued to hover before Hikaru fo

Hikaru said nothing.He was not truly a twenty-year-old. In his previous life he had lived past thirty, had loved, had been on the verge of marriage, then been killed by the person he trusted most. He was not naive enough to misread what Hashira's eyes were saying right now.She liked him.Not the simple gratitude of someone who had been saved. There was gratitude, there was the emotional reliance that came after surviving danger together, there was the influence of the Romance Fate, there was the turbulence of a woman who had just been pulled across the boundary between life and death. But beneath all of that, Hashira Maruhi had arrived at her own decision.She was an adult.She knew what she wanted.And she had no intention of pretending otherwise.Hikaru said, slowly: "Madam, you nearly died last night. Your mind may not be fully clear this morning."Hashira looked at him, her smile not fading. "I'm clearer than you think.""You were just possessed by a Wraith, eroded by Yin Energy