Hibiki had long since discovered that Kyoko was present.
This woman was simply not someone those two female police officers could easily keep an eye on.
Just now, when he was in the guise of Ibaraki Doji slaughtering those corrupt cops, this daring young reporter had been hiding behind a half-destroyed patch of lawn not far away, holding her camera and peeking at the whole thing.
He originally thought she would hide until the very end, but he hadn’t expected her to actually dare to step out on her own.
“Foolish woman!”
Hibiki cursed under his breath.
It was precisely because of this fool’s reckless, life-risking, truth-seeking personality that the Tachibana Family had been forced to cut ties with her.
If she were allowed to continue causing such trouble everywhere, even the Tachibana Family, which had been rooted in Japan for centuries, would sooner or later find itself in massive trouble.
“Ibaraki Doji… In myths and legends, the leader of the Mount Ooe Oni Clan.”
Kyoko forced herself to calm down.
She clutched her wildly pounding chest tightly with her left hand, while her right hand kept the lens of her portable camera firmly aimed at the legendary evil oni before her.
The muscles on her face were trembling uncontrollably, and the force with which she spoke was so great that she was practically gritting her teeth.
Questioning an evil oni that had just slaughtered over a dozen people without batting an eye made her feel like a sheep voluntarily offering itself up to a hungry wolf—no, rather like a rabbit delusional enough to try and fall in love with a tiger!
It was simply insane!
“Eh? You are clearly terrified, so why did you come out?”
Ibaraki Doji seemed to have finally had a modicum of her attention drawn by this reckless mortal.
She shifted her gaze away from Police Inspector Sakata, who was still rolling around on the ground, and turned her head to look directly at the female reporter behind her.
“Wouldn’t it have been better to just hide where you were? I wouldn’t go out of my way to bully the weak.”
Hibiki said this on purpose, half as a probe, and half as a warning.
However, Kyoko took a deep breath, seemingly finding some kind of support in those words.
She straightened her back; though her voice was still trembling, her logic was exceptionally clear.
“I am Kyoko, a reporter.”
“Seeking the truth is my responsibility, and warning the public is my duty.”
She paused, as if organizing her thoughts, or perhaps trying to steel herself.
“Lord Ibaraki Doji, I only learned today that you legendary oni gods actually exist. Evil oni that once only existed in myths are now running rampant in the world today. Does this mean… that the eight million gods are all about to reappear in the human world?” You are reading on g.com, the official source.
“What exactly are you trying to do? Are you planning to recreate the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons and wreak havoc on Kyoto again?”
This was the question she cared about the most.
If the Mount Ooe Oni Clan from mythology were truly to reappear in the world, this era had no Minamoto no Yorimitsu and his Four Heavenly Kings to subdue them.
If large numbers of these invulnerable evil oni, who regarded human life as nothing but grass, were to rush onto the streets…
The first thing that flashed through her mind was the face of Hibiki, still bearing a hint of childishness.
That child Kyo has to take the train to and from school by himself every day!
This is too dangerous!
She had to figure out what all of this meant!
Listening to Kyoko’s gradually steadying voice, Hibiki, who was playing the role of Ibaraki Doji, sighed helplessly in his heart.
This aunt of his really was…
always putting others before herself.
“Reporter? That’s a job I’ve never heard of.”
Ibaraki Doji stroked her smooth chin and, with those golden slit pupils, curiously looked Kyoko up and down, before nodding as if she had suddenly realized something.
“Oh, I remember now. Is it like those night watchmen from ancient times who patrolled at night, beating gongs and drums to remind everyone to prevent fires and theft? Or perhaps a spy collecting intelligence for the daimyos?”
Her naive and ignorant acting was the spitting image of an ancient oni god who had stepped out of ancient mythology and knew nothing about modern society.
Hearing Ibaraki Doji compare her profession, which she took such pride in, to a gong-beating night watchman or a spy, Kyoko’s mouth twitched, but she held back the urge to retort.
Now was not the time to worry about that.
“…You could understand it that way,” she said with difficulty.
“Ara la, since that’s the case, I’ll let you off the hook.”
Ibaraki Doji acted magnanimously, waving her hand casually.
“Even an evil oni wouldn’t lay a hand on a night watchman. After all, if I ate you all, who would be left to sing the stories of us oni gods for a thousand years?”
This seemed to be some kind of unwritten, ancient rule passed down among oni gods.
It was just like when monsters attacked a village, they would always spare the bard responsible for telling stories.
Hibiki naturally followed this logic, finding a perfect excuse for himself not to harm his own aunt. The source of this chapter is g.com.
Hearing that she had been “spared,” the string in Kyoko’s heart, which had been stretched to the limit, finally loosened just a little.
She could feel that her professional attire on her back had been completely soaked through with cold sweat.
“Then… I really should thank you for your magnanimity, Lord Ibaraki Doji.”
With lingering fear, she glanced at the carnage not far away, and at Police Inspector Sakata, who could no longer make a sound and could only writhe on the ground like a maggot.
She gathered her courage once more, puffed out her chest, and pressed on.
“Then now, can you answer my previous question? This concerns the survival of Tokyo… no, the entire world!”
“That sort of thing… it’s not really a secret, so it wouldn’t hurt to tell you humans.”
Ibaraki Doji seemed to find this “night watchman” interesting and actually answered her question.
She snapped her fingers, and a mass of blazing karmic fire gathered out of thin air beneath her, forming an eerie cloud.
She sat suspended on the cloud of karmic fire, resting her smooth, rounded chin on her hand, and draped one of her fair left calves loosely over her right leg, her posture lazy yet filled with the arrogance of a superior being.
After striking such a comfortable pose, she spoke in a tone that made it sound like no big deal, uttering words that were enough to cause one’s entire worldview to completely collapse.
“A grand transformation has already begun.”
“A god originating from the Alien God has already descended upon this world. Its existence has stimulated the spiritual veins on this planet that had long since dried up, allowing them to regain their vitality.”
Kyoko’s brain buzzed, and she was almost unable to process this information.
“Alien God? Spiritual vein revival?”
These terms combined sounded like the setting of some fantasy novel, but coming from the mouth of the genuine evil oni before her, they carried an unquestionable sense of reality.
Ibaraki Doji ignored her shock and continued on her own:
“The revival of spiritual veins means the return of the mystical. We oni gods and demons, forgotten by the world and forced to linger in the corners of legends, are finally permitted to step out from the shadows of the ethereal realm once again.”
She extended her undamaged, fair, and cute left hand toward Kyoko, and toward this world, spreading her five fingers as if to grasp everything in her hand.
“So, you ask what I want to do?”
She scoffed, her golden eyes filled with mockery and arrogance.
“I don’t want to do anything. I am just following the tide of the era and coming out to get some fresh air.”
“The only thing that truly needs to be declared is one thing—”
“The era belonging solely to you humans ends here; it is about to come to a close.”