Time flew by; three days passed in the blink of an eye.
The night sky was vast and high, a full moon hanging overhead, as large as a white plate.
The pale moonlight cast shadows on the ground that looked like freshly splashed ink, sickeningly black.
Kōbe Hikaru sat on the wooden bed in the guest room, leaving the lamp unlit.
There was no need to light it.
The light outside the window was almost blindingly bright, yet it carried a bone-chilling cold.
But that was not moonlight at all; it was an almost tangible energy overflowing from the direction of the shrine.
Purple to the point of black, black to the point of shining.
That was the light of the Jewel of Four Souls.
It was the evil energy of the Crooked Spirit, turbid and freezing—the Demonic Aura emitted by the hundreds of high-level yōkai lurking within it.
According to what the Straight Spirit had later revealed.
From the moment the Jewel of Four Souls was formed, the soul of the strongest Shrine Maiden, Midoriko, had been constantly battling against hundreds, even thousands, of vengeful spirits of high-level yōkai and even Great Yōkai within it.
Normally, Midoriko’s soul held the upper hand.
Therefore, most of the time, the Straight Spirit was active, and the Jewel of Four Souls appeared as a clear, translucent white jewel.
Only when the Jewel of Four Souls fell into the hands of demons with impure intentions, or during celestial events like the night of the full moon when Yin Energy was at its peak.
Would the Crooked Spirit gain the upper hand.
The evil energy within it would then pour out recklessly.
That was exactly what was happening right now.
On this very night.
Hikaru reached out and pressed his hand against Muramasa at his waist.
The blade buzzed in its sheath, like a starving wild dog catching the scent of blood.
“Don’t rush,” Hikaru patted the hilt of the sword.
“You’ll eat your fill tonight.”
He pushed the door open and stepped outside.
The village before his eyes was terrifyingly quiet.
There was no chirping of insects, no barking of dogs, not even the rustling of wind blowing through the leaves.
The air felt like solidified glue.
Hikaru looked up.
Three feet above his head was a thin, transparent membrane of light, like an overturned bowl, isolating the entire village—or more accurately, the hilltop where the shrine was located—from the outside world.
Another Barrier.
Hikaru was naturally no stranger to it.
But he could also tell the difference between this Barrier and the ones Kikyō had used before.
It did not cover the entire village; it only covered the villagers’ homes, deliberately excluding the shrine at the core.
Rather than defense, it provided more in the way of soundproofing.
She had made the village and the area around the villagers’ houses extremely quiet.
She made it so the people inside could not hear the commotion outside, nor sense the auras from beyond.
That young woman wanted the villagers to get a peaceful night’s sleep.
Meanwhile, she stood alone inside the shrine, unprotected by the Barrier.
To face all the danger by herself.
“What a stubborn fool,” Hikaru muttered.
In that moment, his Demonic Aura surged, transforming into dense Ghost Qi.
Then, using the Ghost Qi, he manifested his armor.
And donned the Oni Mask!
…
The shrine terrace.
The wind was fierce.
The wind here was different from the foot of the mountain; it carried a metallic stench, the scent of highly concentrated Demonic Aura.
Kikyō stood in front of the Shrine Hall.
She did not hold her Sacred Bell, nor did she offer prayers.
Gripping her longbow, with a quiver hanging at her waist, her white top and red hakama fluttered wildly in the gale, looking like a paper kite that could snap at any moment.
Suspended in mid-air before her was that jewel.
Pitch black.
Ink-like black energy spewed from the jewel.
That was the Crooked Spirit, the collective resentment of hundreds of powerful demons after their deaths.
They were roaring, struggling, trying to break through the net of Spiritual Power binding them.
“Hiss—”
“Roar—”
In the darkness, countless pairs of eyes lit up.
From all directions.
On the treetops, atop the Torii Gate, behind the stone lanterns, and even from within the dirt.
The diners drawn by the riotous Demonic Aura had arrived.
This time, it wasn’t hundreds of low-level yōkai.
Though the numbers were few, only about a hundred or so.
The quality was astonishingly high.
Directly ahead was an Earth Spider, thirty feet tall, its eight long legs planted into the ground like steel spears, the carapace on its back gleaming with a cold metallic light.
To the left were Conjoined Giant-Head Demons, dragging rusty iron chains in their hands, plowing a deep trench into the ground with every step.
To the right was a Human-Face Moth, dropping large swaths of phosphorescent powder with every flap of its wings, causing the stones it touched to smoke.
They were all high-level yōkai that had completed the Six Stages of Body Transformation and had even touched the threshold of Quality Transformation.
Kikyō remained expressionless.
She drew an arrow and nocked it on the bowstring.
The arrowhead pointed at the Earth Spider’s compound eyes.
Spiritual Power gathered, and a white light flared.
But just then, a soft sound came from behind her.
It was the sound of straw sandals stepping on the stone slabs.
It was very faint, but in this tense atmosphere, it was more piercing than thunder.
Kikyō did not turn around.
She knew who it was.
That scent, a mixture of human rationality and yōkai death aura, was unique in the entire world.
“Go back,” she said.
Her voice was not loud, somewhat scattered by the wind.
“Go back where?” Hikaru walked up to her side, stopping half a step away.
A position that neither blocked her line of fire nor prevented him from blocking an attack for her at a moment’s notice.
His armor rippled, bringing with it a surging Demonic Aura, yet it was not foul; instead, it made Kikyō feel an inexplicable sense of solid reassurance.
“The soundproofing in that room down there is too good.
It’s suffocating.” He pushed the Oni Mask on his face halfway up, revealing half of his clean, pale face.
His red eyes locked onto the horde of demons and monsters ahead, yet it looked as if he were staring at a grand feast.
“Besides, not inviting me to a party like this is just too mean,” he said.
Kikyō’s fingers remained hooked around the bowstring.
“This is my duty.”
“The impurity of the Jewel of Four Souls must be purified by its guardian Shrine Maiden.”
“I know.” Hikaru drew his sword.
*Clang—*
Muramasa left its sheath, the bright blade gleaming with a demonic light under the moon, its hamon pulsing wildly like living blood vessels.
Hikaru ignored the system notifications flooding his vision, simply pointing the tip of the blade diagonally at the ground.
“You have to purify the jewel and fend off these guys at the same time.
You’ll be overwhelmed.”
“These guys have thick skin and tough flesh.
Your arrows are fierce, but they aren’t area-of-effect damage…
I mean, you can’t target a whole cluster at once, and your number of arrows isn’t infinite.”
He turned his head and glanced at Kikyō.
Her aloof profile was breathtakingly beautiful under the radiance of her Spiritual Power, yet so lonely that it made one’s heart ache.
“Just like before,” Hikaru said.
“You take long-range, I’ll take close combat.”
“I’ll handle chopping off heads, you handle the finishing blows.”
“Any that slip through the net are yours, the head-on clashes are mine.”
Simple.
Direct.
He didn’t even ask too many questions about the cause of tonight’s events, nor did he ask Kikyō why.
He just made it seem natural, a matter of course.
He also felt that Kikyō probably needed his help.
Although this Shrine Maiden was very powerful, through their previous battle and their interactions over the past three days, Hikaru could actually sense that, compared to the original work he was familiar with, the girl before him hadn’t yet reached her peak stage.
People all need to grow.
When a fictional work turned into reality, this was only natural.
At the very least, in his memory, Kikyō during her strongest period might not have had much more Spiritual Power—that was innate potential, after all, and she had already reached her limit.
However, her application of her abilities was far stronger than it was right now.
Furthermore, it was impossible for him to pass up this opportunity to fight.
A battle with Kikyō’s cooperation…
was equivalent to having a safety net.
He could increase his Affinity with Muramasa and also increase his Affinity with the Jewel of Four Souls.
This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
It benefited others, but it benefited himself even more.
Why not do it?
Thus.
Kikyō fell silent.
She wanted to say something, but didn’t know where to begin.
At this moment.
The young Shrine Maiden’s fingers hooked around the bowstring loosened for a fraction of a second, then tightened once more.
The presence behind her was very steady.
She could feel the existence of this youth-like yōkai, this Ghost Samurai, by her side.
He was like a wall.
A wall she could entrust her back to.
This was an experience she had never had before.
As a Shrine Maiden, she was always the one standing at the very front; behind her were the villagers, the weak.
No one had ever stood by her side.
And no one had ever been able to fight alongside her.
This was the very first time.
“…”
The wind blew her long hair, the tips brushing against Hikaru’s arm.
“Alright.”
A single word.
Light and airy, yet carrying the weight of a thousand pounds.
The corners of Hikaru’s mouth curled up.
That was enough.
“Let’s go!”
The blue bricks beneath his feet shattered.
A gray shadow shot forward like lightning, lunging straight at the largest Earth Spider.
That was the toughest bone in the entire dish.
The Earth Spider roared, its two front legs smashing down like battering rams.
Hikaru didn’t dodge.
He swung his blade upward, a black arc of sword energy drawing a semicircle in the air.
*Clang!*
Sparks flew in all directions.
He blocked it.
At the same time, the sound of something piercing the air rang out.
*Twang!*
A streak of white light flew past Hikaru’s temple, pinning itself precisely into the Earth Spider’s open maw.
An Exorcism Arrow.
The Earth Spider shrieked and reeled backward.
Hikaru used the momentum to leap into the air, the tip of his sword thrusting straight toward its compound eyes.
“Thanks!” he shouted in mid-air.
There was no need to look back.
He knew that the figure in the white top and red hakama was right there.
He was in front of her, and she was behind him.
That was enough.