Hokage pleaded with the terror of a little child.
She appealed to Haruya, the tears streaming from her large black eyes ignored, “Now I always hear Onpachi-sama’s voice even when I’m sleeping. I wake up to myself talking. Except that it’s not me. Just now I was Asara speaking with Onpachi-sama.”
Tetsuya shivered. Lately Hokage was always receptive to Kihachi. Tetsuya couldn’t imagine what it was like to speak with the dead.
“When I talk with Onpachi-sama, more and more of Asara’s memories are revived from my blood. I was just talking about the old days. About the festival. About being in this cave. About being in Takachiho
. About war. They’re not my memories. They’re not coming from me!”
“You’ve regained Asara’s memories, Hokage?” Haruya asked, his expression grim. “Memories of the ancient past...?!”
Hokage nodded. Chiaki was taken aback.
(Her ancestor’s memories are being revived from her blood...)
Such things were not unknown. From time to time there appeared people who recalled their past lives, and in many cases such memories were passed down from their ancestors through their shared blood. In rare cases a trigger caused the recall. On such occasions, the nearer the ancestor, the clearer the memories.
Hokage was recalling more and more of her blood memories through her receptiveness to Kihachi’s spirit. But Asara had lived more than a thousand years ago. Given the dilution of her blood, recalling her memories should have been next to impossible.
(Is this also Kihachi’s power?)
“Asara blood is stirring more and more inside me.” Hokage was agitated. “Onpachi-sama said to destroy Takeiwatatsu-no-mikoto’s blood and that of the abominable Mikenu-no-mikoto as well. To take revenge. We’re to take revenge on the people of Yamato, the invaders!”
“!” Chiaki and Tetsuya gasped. Hokage covered her face with her hands, violently disturbed by the emotions surging up inside her.
“Please save me, Spirit-Protector, or Asara’s memories will devour me! I’ll become Asara and release the seal on Onpachi-sama! You have to stop me, or something terrible will happen!”
Hokage threw herself on Haruya as she wailed. Chiaki, looking at Hokage’s slender shoulders shaking beneath Haruya’s large hands, asked, “Just what is it Asara wants...? Miike-san...?”
“...”
“Revenge on Mikenu-no-mikoto?”
“...”
“Is the Miike family’s real aim revenge on Mikenu-no-mikoto?”
“The Kihachi of legend...” Haruya said slowly and heavily, “refers to a tribe of indigenous people who populated Hyuuga 1.”
Chiaki’s eyes quietly narrowed.
These, the Himuka, were the people who inhabited Hyuuga in ancient times and who were invaded and subjugated by the Kinai Yamato Kingdom. In other words, the legend of Kihachi was the tale of their subjugation at the hands of the Yamato people and the defeat of the resistance they had mounted against their forced subordination.
Mikenu-no-mikoto and Takeiwatatsu-no-mikoto were invaders from Yamato. The legend of the Sun Goddess‘ grandson descending to earth was the mythologizing of the first step in the Yamato Kingdom’s conquest of the various provinces of Kyuushuu. The people of Yamato set off by boat from the Seto Inland Sea, landed at Hyuuga, and started their invasion from there. Legend had it that Emperor Jimmu descended to Takachiho and cut a swathe eastward, finally reaching Yamato and establishing his capital there—but the story was really a retelling of his conquest of Kyuushuu, Haruya explained. In other words, the ’Records of Ancient Matters’, the Chronicles of Japan, and other legends of Japan were mostly written by the victors to justify and absolutize the Yamato Kingdom’s sovereignty and royal authority.
The Takachiho and Aso myths were further examples.
“Legend says that Mikenu-no-mikoto saved Asara from the evil Kihachi, but the truth is that Kihachi was a victim.” Haruya’s tone was heavy. “Asara was a woman of Himuka taken by force by the invader from Yamato, Mikenu-no-mikoto. Many of our myths and legends were created and disseminated to justify past deeds. Ultimately, the Kihachi legend was created by the central administration of Yamato to justify to later generations its invasion of another region. In other words, it cast the indigenous people as the villain.”
“Invaders... I see,” Chiaki said, finally seeing the full picture. Mikenu-no-mikoto and Takeiwatatsu-no-mikoto were related by blood to Emperor Jimmu. They symbolized those who had unified and subjugated Japan under the rule of the Yamato Kingdom.
“Asara was a real person—a shrine maiden of the Himuka. The Himuka worshiped the sun; to them, fire was greatly treasured because it was power given by the sun. Asara wielded fire magic. The fire shrine maidens were women of high standing, and one of them was said to govern the Himuka Kingdom as its ruler. Asara was a handmaiden of this queen. She and Kihachi were a love match. But the invaders snatched her away and forced her to marry among them.”
Perhaps she had been given as one of the spoils of war after the Himuka surrender.
“In his grief, Kihachi obstinately continued his resistance. He was a hero of the Himuka. But he was killed by the invaders’ overwhelming numbers. We Miike were conceived from Asara’s sorrow: the child she bore to an invader.”
That child’s name was Himuka-no-Takeru. 2
Kihachi became an onryou who terrorized Hyuuga and Aso, bringing such afflictions on the people as untimely frost. Takeiwatatsu-no-mikoto set out to exterminate him. He dug Kihachi’s head’s out of his burial mound, sealed his onryou within, then built Frost Shrine and held a memorial service for him there.
He offered the position of chief priest to Asara and Mikenu-no-mikoto’s future child, Himuka-no-Takeru.
He was given a mission by his mother. Though outwardly submissive to Mikenu-no-mikoto, Asara held a deep grudge within her heart for her long humiliation.
She died of illness while still pregnant with Takeru. But from the abyss of death she chanted a ‘certain wish’ with all her soul at her unborn child. To wit:
“Someday I will be reincarnated into your descendant, and I will resurrect Onpachi-sama. We will take this land back from the Yamato. Until then, take care to preserve my blood. Protect Onpachi-sama’s hallowed head. The day of my reincarnation will come.”
“So that is...‘Asara’s wish’?”
“Yes. Having received his mother’s wish, Himuka-no-Takeru broke out of her belly and was born. His heart was turned against his father. He left Takachiho and became the guardian of Frost Shrine.”
That was the origin of the Miike family.
The Miike did their best to hide the fact that they were following the last wishes of a conquered people. They served the Aso family, descendants of Takeiwatatsu-no-mikoto, as subordinates, and so continued for nearly 1,600 years.
“So all of it was to resurrect Kihachi’s spirit?” Tetsuya muttered incredulously. “To seize back what was lost to the Yamato?”
“...”
Tetsuya and the other Miike Celebrants were told that Kihachi was the chief of the Himuka people. But no one knew that Miike’s aim was to resurrect Kihachi’s onryou. Had Hokage learned of this from Asara’s blood-memories? She clung to Haruya, motionless.
“Am I supposed to...to believe this stupid story? We’re doing all this idiotic stuff because of a nonsense story?! This is why my dad died?!”
“Tetsuya.”
“I’m supposed to take this stupid story seriously?! Come on, Hokage, we going home!”
Yelling, Tetsuya yanked on Hokage’s hand.
“Te-chan...!”
“Come on! We’re going home, and we’re going back to our normal lives tomorrow! Let’s go!”
“You can go home, but what happens to Inaba Akemi?”
Tetsuya immediately wilted at Chiaki’s reminder.
Hokage was surprised. “Inaba Akemi? Did something happen to Akemi-chan? What happened...?!”
“They kidnapped her in order to get at you. They’re bad people who want Kihachi’s power.”
“...!”
“Sensei!” Haruya shouted, trying to stop him. Chiaki ignored him and took Hokage’s hand from Tetsuya.
“They’ll kill Inaba if you don’t go. That’s why we came to get you.”
“Don’t, Sensei! Don’t make Hokage go!”
“It’s to save your classmate’s life,” Chiaki said in a low voice, moving his face closer to Hokage’s. “Be brave. You’ll come, won’t you?”
Hokage’s face stiffened, but under pressure she nodded. Chiaki stopped Tetsuya’s angry outcry with a sharp look. “You want to save Inaba, don’t you?”
Tetsuya clenched his teeth with mortification. He finally jerked his face away, yanked on Hokage’s hand, and set off toward the cave’s entrance.
“Te-chan...!”
As he waited for the pair to leave the cave, Chiaki turned to Haruya.
“Should you have told us something so important?”
Haruya looked down and shook his head slightly. “It was not my intention to tell either the child or you.”
“Then why...”
“I had the feeling it was only a matter of time before I had to tell my dead brother’s son the truth.” Candle flames reflected within a mirror placed on the altar swayed wildly in a gust of wind. Haruya said, looking at it, “It is said the bandit Kihachi lived in this cave with Asara. Takachiho has many places associated with Kihachi, but in many the truth has been lost. This was not a bandit hideout, but a refuge for Kihachi and his anti-government guerrilla forces, so to speak, in their war against Mikenu-no-mikoto—that is the history told in the Miike family. People of today would probably find such stories of ethnic strife in Japan hard to believe.”
“...”
“But the reality is that blood flowed in such wars. The people of this country called Japan have almost completely forgotten the meaning of ethnic groups—which also means we’ve forgotten how to coexist with other ethnic groups. On such soil, baseless differentiation flowers into ignorance and lack of sympathy. I think that on this point, Japan is very much an immature country.”
“Miike-san...you—”
“Even though we carry within ourselves the key to understanding the pain of foreign countries. I believe it is because we’ve all forgotten that we fought that war of aggression half a century ago,” Haruya said, and closed his eyes. As if he could feel the pain of an ancient people indelibly ingrained inside this cave.
“What do you intend to do?” Chiaki asked seriously after a long silence, looking at Haruya’s profile illuminated by candlelight. “The Miike family has nourished the aim of resurrecting Kihachi for 1,600 years. Now that Asara has appeared, are you not bound to attempt it?”
“...”
“If Miike exists to fulfill Asara’s dying wish, I would not wonder at you taking action. To release Kihachi’s soul and dispel the Himuka people’s long hatred. To take your revenge on the Yamato race.”
He had inherited the position of Spirit-Protector. In other words, he carried on his back the dying wish of the Himuka people and responsibility for carrying out a mission 1,600 years in the making.
Asara had appeared. This was the moment of decision.
As he listened to Chiaki’s questions, Haruya stared fixedly up at the ceiling. “You’re right. That is the mission of the Miike Spirit-Protector. One he must carry out. Yet—”
“...”
“In actuality, Asara has appeared many times before.”
“What?!”
It was true. According to legend, Asara would be reborn. But the true ‘Asara’ herself had never been reborn. To be precise, they were girls ‘whose blood are exceedingly responsive to Kihachi.’ The bonfire ritual was a ceremony the Miike used to determine whether a girl born to the family was Asara.
Many such girls had appeared in the past.
“These girls would converse with Onpachi-sama like Hokage and recall their blood-memories. But none of the Spirit-Protectors have used them to release Kihachi.”
“Why not?”
“...I understood when I became one of them.” Haruya quietly turned his gaze from bare rock to Chiaki. “Do you think that I, as a single human being, have reason enough to do it?”
“Miike-san...”
Haruya looked down, his eyes somehow pained. He slipped past Chiaki out of the cave. His expression was of someone compelled to make a choice.
Chiaki gazed grimly at his back.
The four left the cave and returned to the car. Dawn was breaking. Chiaki found a shadow standing by his car.
“Spirit-Protector,” the shadow called. Someone Haruya knew: a young man who appeared to be related to the woman from earlier. He was holding a large, long, narrow box made of paulownia wood. “This is what you requested.”
“Thank you.”
Haruya took the box. It was said that in Takachiho was a burial mound where Kihachi’s hands and feet were buried. The ‘Tomb-Protector’ was the guardian of such ‘burial mounds’. They were the Celebrants of Takachiho.
Haruya placed the large paulownia box in the car’s trunk.
(What is it?)
From the shape, it looked as if there might be a sword or something like it inside. The young man offered a kagura bell to Hokage.
“Hokage-sama, please take care of yourself.”
It was called the spirit-summoning bell of Takachiho, used in night kagura dancing. Hokage took it carefully and pressed it against her chest. She nodded.
The four climbed into the car. They left Takachiho behind as dawn’s light shined down on the town.
The sun had climbed high into the sky.
The Aso morning was very cold, but at least now sunlight flowed through gaps between clouds. It made the cold more bearable, but coats were still necessary. Columns of frost still stood on shaded portions of the raised path between rice paddies.
Some of the snow at its base had melted, but the mountain was still covered in white.
The ‘Shakyamuni entering nirvana’ of the Five Peaks of Aso was very beautiful with its ornamentation of snow. The sky to the west was still heavily overcast, but the silhouette of the Five Peaks was clear, and even from here at the foot of the northern rim the smoke rising from the Middle Peak was distinct. The smoke was even higher than it had been three days ago.
“The mountain is responding...” the man said, sensing a presence coming to meet him halfway.
“It knows us. The Himuka people are crying out. It is said that Aso erupts in response to their cries—I can feel the truth of that here.”
Saeki Ryouko approached and followed his gaze toward the mountain. Enoki Masamichi’s eyes were far away.
“That’s right—in his later years, the Faith-Protector often spoke of this land of Aso. The springtime burning of the mountain, Aso Shrine’s fire-swinging ritual, the Onda Festival... Ash falling from the Middle Peak’s eruption. How in autumn these paddy fields would turn yellow, become waves across a golden ocean when the wind was blowing,” Enoki recalled, eyes closing.
This was the land on which Ikeda Katsuya had been born and raised. He would often reminiscence about his childhood. Enoki had never seen it except in photographs and videos. In his later years, Katsuya would recall this place with the eyes of a little boy.
“It’s strange. All of the Faith-Protector’s stories of Aso have made me nostalgic for it. I only ever knew the dirty air of the factory roof, and it felt as if the Faith-Protector’s Aso were a distant paradise. Isn’t that weird?” Enoki said, laughing at himself. “But you know, my image of the Himuka is how he described the lives of the Aso people.”
Ryouko’s heart ached in sympathy.
Enoki came from Kitakyuushuu City, a town distinguished for its steel industry. Yet its production of iron and steel had gradually fallen after the period of rapid economic growth after WWII, and was a shadow of its formerly prosperous self.
Though young, Enoki was exceptionally worldly-wise. His parents had owned a small factory in town which due to mismanagement was left with a large debt. They took flight by night and later died in an accident, though the truth was more likely a murder-suicide. Left behind, Enoki dropped out of high school and worked at a factory in order to make his living and repay his parents’ debt. Ryouko could understand his longing for the Aso of Ikeda’s stories.
Enoki abruptly laughed. What? she wondered, peering at his face. He was pointing at an odd building on the other side of the rice paddies. It looked like a brick-colored pyramid.
“It’s one of Aso’s strange pyramids. They say some people who made a killing off a Ponzi scheme built it. There’s probably a torii nearby. Apparently a religious group built it as a tax reduction strategy. I wonder what kind of deity they’ve got enshrined?”
It wasn’t in use, and had been left until it was little more than a ruin.
“I guess this is the kind of thing postwar Japan gave rise to?” Enoki sneered—and then, coming back to reality, he turned to Ryouko. “How are your wounds?”
“I’m sorry, our power was insufficient.”
In the battle with Katou Kiyomasa, half of the bird-people had sustained serious injuries. Kiyomasa had given them the slip at the end of the life-and-death struggle, and they were as yet unable to determine his course. Afterwards they had met up with Motoharu and were assembled at Kokuzou Shrine.
“We’re using the luminous flame stone to tend to our wounds, and everyone is on their way to recovery. The real issue is the psychological shock...”
It had been their first battle of such ferocity. In their dismay, three of the bird-people had applied to withdraw. I see, Enoki thought as he looked at Ryouko’s dark expression. The bird-people had vowed to fulfill Ikeda Katsuya’s dying wish, to ‘restore the Himuka Kingdom’, without regard for their own lives.
They were comprised the young people Enoki had initially gathered for a study group. After the death of his parents, Enoki had met Ikeda Katsuya and joined his religion, and eventually become the leader of the younger members due to his zealousness.
Katsuya had expected him to become the next Faith-Protector, and thus given him extra training.
He had spoken fervently of the version of Kihachi passed down by the Miike family and the history of the Himuka people.
Enoki had of his own initiative gone out to proselytize, to gather young adherents and do research about the Himuka people in a so-called study group. At last he had brought these young people together in a group and trained them to ardently worship Kihachi and the ancient Himuka people. The bird-people were what the upper-echelon warriors called themselves.
Ryouko was also one of their number.
“What should we do with them? Just let them go?”
“Well.”
“And after all the work we did to awaken our ability to fly using the Method of Bird-Flight. They’re high-level warriors of purer Himuka blood. It’s so disappointing,” Ryouko said.
The bird-people were the youngest sons and daughters of Miike Celebrants Ikeda Katsuya had brought out of Aso when he had established the Himuka cult. The Miike had always sought to protect the purity of their blood and apparently engaged in near-consanguineous marriage—thus it had been easy for them to awaken the ability of flight.
“... And they have such pure blood, too.”
Enoki himself had only a little flying ability. He was only able to do so with help from Ryouko.
“We have a limited number of warriors. They cannot be allowed to leave.”
“Shall I try to persuade them?”
“I’ll go. It’s only discouragement after their first battle. We’re the only ones who can fulfill Ikeda Faith-Protector’s dying wish.”
“Ikeda Faith-Protector’s dying wish...”
Ryouko was also reminded of Ikeda’s gentle visage. Her chest ached.
Though the young bird-people had a strong connection with Enoki, they had never really spoken with Ikeda himself. Only Ryouko had adored Ikeda like a grandfather since she was young.
Seeing the ardent activity of the young people of the Himuka cult, Ikeda had said: “I remember feeling what these children feel.” and laughed. The young Ikeda had experienced something like their excitement for the Himuka cult.
Ikeda Katsuya had been only been fourteen or fifteen when he rebelled against the Miike and left home for Tokyo. The friends he met there influenced him to get involved in the socialist movement. For a time he was as completely absorbed in their activities as one delirious with fever. But the Manchurian Incident whipped up Japanese nationalism and harshly suppressed other ideologies. His faith and conviction burning even stronger under oppression, Katsuya was wild with enthusiasm for a time; but when the imprisoned Communist Party leadership began proclaiming their about-face one after another, the young Katsuya began to steadily lose faith in his actions. At last he was arrested by the Special Higher Police, which triggered his renunciation and 180-degree reversal of belief.
“That was a momentous decision,” was what Ikeda said of his about-face as a young man. “I was so young, and I wanted a guiding ‘absolute good’.”
Then the war began.
Japan turned into a nation at war, and Katsuya volunteered for the navy to fight for his Japan, his land of the gods.
Invasion. Hard-fought battles. News of one surrender after another. Signs of Japan’s impending defeat. Air raids on the mainland.
In the midst of this Katsuya fought as a soldier for his country.
“I saw with my own eyes the sinking of the battleship ‘Yamato’ in the battle off the coast of Kagoshima.”
Katsuya often spoke of that time. Cast into the oily sea, Katsuya had seen the last moments of the mountain-like unsinkable battleship. Even so many years later he told of its dramatic form.
And then the end of the war.
Having survived, Katsuya returned to the burnt-out field of Tokyo.
All the believers had been defeated.
(What can I still believe in?)
The youth wandered, seeking a foundation he could stand on.
At last he arrived at the Himuka people, his ancestors.
“The Faith-Protector returned to his own blood,” Enoki said. “In the sinking of the Yamato, perhaps the Faith-Protector saw the sinking of the Yamato race and the defeat of those who held sway over the Himuka people.”
“...”
“In this apocalyptic Japan, the Faith-Protector wanted a revival of the country led by the Himuka people.”
Ikeda Katsuya returned to the Miike to tell his father, the then-Spirit-Protector, of his vision and to persuade him to make the Miike the standard-bearer of the Himuka. But his father refused to listen.
“Forget this foolish idea.”
A disappointed Katsuya decided to create his own ‘Miike’.
Making the youngest Celebrants his companions, Katsuya founded the Himuka cult.
But reality was not so indulgent. Faith was one thing; finding enough to eat took all their effort. Japan changed in the blink of an eye. Democratization and the transformation of the structures of society proceeded at speed. His friends threw themselves into the flexibility of a changing society. The campaign against the Japan-US Security Treaty, the postwar rapid economic growth. Katsuya carried the Himuka cult through the turbulent Shouwa era even as he brooded. If he didn’t preach to the adherents about the Himuka people, he could not pro-actively propagate the faith. Eventually the Himuka cult would become a harmless family religion, and he would be spoken of like one of those small-town cult-founders; even the fact that the religion had been founded with struggle as its aim would be forgotten.
(Until ten years ago, when the Faith-Protector came across Miike Hideya.)
Enoki heard that Katsuya made the acquaintance of Hideya, the newly-inaugurated Spirit-Protector, at his eldest brother’s funeral. For some reason they got along, and afterwards corresponded warmly.
A year after that, the young Hideya suddenly died.
That was also the year Ikeda Katsuya decided on Enoki as his successor, and the ‘undying sacred flame’ lit at the Oyashiro. Around the same time, they obtained the contents of the Miike Records, and Enoki gathered the young people and advocated ‘Onpachi-sama’s resurrection’.
For some reason, they were attracted to Enoki’s preaching regarding ‘reverence of the Himuka people’. They deciphered the Miike Records at their study meetings. These documents were negatives reproduced with a camera. Enoki and the others consolidated their unity at these secret meetings. As their deciphering proceeded, they learned the Method of Bird-Flight and the process for the crystallization of luminous flame stones, which they trained to implement. Finally it became clear that they needed Asara in order to resurrect Kihachi. They reached this point around a year ago. Surprisingly, Asara had already appeared five years ago.
Enoki and company schemed to get their hands on Asara—aka Miike Hokage—but the abduction attempt ended in failure. They were noticed by Miike Haruya, who succeeded Hideya. Afterwards, Hokage went missing. They searched in vain.
Not long after that, Ikeda Katsuya’s illness worsened. Plunged into despair at the difficulties involved in Kihachi’s resurrection, the young people were on the edge of giving up. Then they had a dramatic encounter.
—With Kikkawa Motoharu.
The place was Moji. Motoharu was in Kitakuyushuu spearheading a Mouri force against Ootomo as a guest general of Shimazu. The cultists became involved in an incident and rescued the Mouri general in a show of their power. That was the strange circumstances under which they met Motoharu. They were certainly startled by the «Yami-Sengoku», but also believed their power could be used in Kihachi’s resurrection.
A month later, Ikeda Faith-Protector died.
Enoki cared for Ikeda on his deathbed. He did not leave a will.
He only said, “I entrust it all to you.”
The bird-people roused to action.
“They want someone to tell them the right way to be,” Enoki said to Ryouko, thinking of the young bird-people. “They’re young.”
“Young...”
“So young they feel anxious unless they can be ‘something special’. They cling to the belief in the supremacy of their blood in order to assuage their own egos. That’s probably why they’re attracted to the Kihachi story. They want someone who can tell them exactly who they are.”
“...”
“After World War II the people of Japan obtained various freedoms. We can freely choose what we believe to be right. But that’s probably only the freedom to choose what to abide by.”
“Faith-Protector, what are you saying?”
“I think someone who is too free will die. That’s why in our anxiety we crave conviction and faith. We worship those who can provide us these things. In order to live in the wasteland of true freedom, one must have the strength to choose for oneself. A terrible strength. It’s a painful thing. To be controlled by a ‘righteous existence’ is to know complete ease and peace of mind. Thus whenever we become aware of it, we’re searching for a convenient mother. We’re probably seeking this mother so desperately that we neglect to put sufficient effort into developing ourselves.”
“Are you talking about me?” Ryouko felt like pointing out her high academic achievement. “Are you criticizing me?”
“Is that what you hear?”
Ryouko was silent.
Those of high academic achievement sometimes had hang-ups about that very thing. It was probably a ridiculous state of mind, but Ryouko sometimes felt those who were less highly educated had a toughness and vitality she didn’t—she conversely felt a inferiority complex toward those who had no academic credentials at all.
“My intention is not to criticize either you or others,” Enoki told her, and then asked in a businesslike tone, “What is the state of the Miike family? Will Miike Haruya deliver Asara?”
“They’re certainly agitated.”
(Miike Haruya...)
The fact that the Miike family was not carrying out its mission despite Asara’s appearance was proof that it was dead. But the Himuka cult lived on. They would answer Asara’s prayer in Haruya’s stead. Haruya should be happy to give Asara to the Himuka cult.
“This is the dying wish of my predecessor. I will find a way to accomplish it.”
Enoki thought of Katsuya.
The Shouwa era—
That old man who had continued seeking true freedom despite setback after setback.
He wanted him to hear Kihachi’s voice.
Uesugi Kenshin has entered the fray of the «Yami-Sengoku»...!
The Ikkou Sect learned that devastating news the morning of that same day. In Aso, Rairen at Kokuzou Shrine was the first to receive the news. By the time Akechi Mitsuhide returned, the grounds were already in an uproar.
“The New Uesugi recently entered into a formal alliance with Ootomo Sourin. But the real shock is that the supreme commander of the New Uesugi is said to be the deceased Naoe Nobutsuna.”
“Naoe Nobutsuna...!” Mitsuhide’s eyes widened. “But he was purified at Hagi...”
“He was not purified, Mitsuhide-dono.”
Another voice coming from behind cut into the conversation in the hall of worship. They turned to see Kikkawa Motoharu. After shooting Kotarou in the mountains of Eboushi Peak, he had joined up with Enoki and proceeded here. Both Mitsuhide and Rairen were surprised by Motoharu’s interjection.
“Did you already know that he was not purified, Kikkawa-dono...?!”
“I saw Naoe with my own eyes a short while ago.” Motoharu was calm. “Naoe Nobutsuna has come to Aso. He was saved by Kenshin. He was not purified. Naoe lives.”
“Unbelievable...” Rairen was speechless, while Mitsuhide looked grim.
“So the falsehood we used to entrap Uesugi-dono turned out to not be falsehood at all?”
“If Kenshin has appointed a new general, what does he intend to do with Kagetora-dono? Kagetora-dono appears not to have been told at all. I suppose Kenshin is going to discard him after all?” Rairen questioned.
Motoharu replied in a low voice, “Given that he acted without saying a word to Kagetora-dono, I wager it must be so.”
“Let us not be so quick to jump to conclusions,” Mitsuhide cautioned. “One who seeks to dominate the «Yami-Sengoku» surely would not be so quick to discard a power such as Kagetora-dono’s. If he has done, why? These are questions we cannot ignore. In any case, there is no sign he will leave his discarded piece alone. He will eliminate him—that is a certainty. That is what I would do.”
“You’re saying...he will kill Kagetora-dono?”
“As long as he can fight. Of course, it would be different if he no longer served a useful purpose on the battlefield. But Kenshin’s resolve must be considerable if he is willing to reorganize to the extent that he is throwing his general to the wolves.”
“Surely Kagetora-dono has not been rendered incapable of fighting in future battles?”
“No...at this stage, we can only speculate. For now, we must conclude that Kenshin’s resolution is extraordinary. We must be meticulous and vigilant.”
“The same with Ootomo’s movements,” Rairen urged tensely. “Based on Iehisa-dono’s report, we’ve learned that the suspicious ghost-phenomena at Kumamoto Castle are their work. They’ve brainwashed the students to turn them into a castle garrison. We increasingly suspect that the source of the spiritual magnetic field might be Kihachi’s head.”
“Kihachi’s—! It’s at Kumamoto Castle?! Have they found it?”
“We’re in the midst of verifying it now, but the stringent Ootomo guard is making it difficult. Shimazu are steadily gaining ground northward, and they are making preparations for storming the city.”
“Though Kiyomasa has escaped...” Motoharu scowled and lightly bit his finger. “He is seriously injured. While Oda’s command is thus disordered, Kumamoto can be taken with relative ease. If the barrier can be weakened, Shimazu will be able to disregard strategy and exterminate Ootomo by brute force. If Kihachi’s head is in the city, it behooves us to take action even faster.”
Though each nursed secret intentions, the three commanders nodded their agreement.
Take Kumamoto.
The start of battle was near at hand.
Mitsuhide was staying at a lodgings down the road from Kokuzou Shrine. It was one of many built for the Aso-based Kyuushuu conquest plan, and was ordinarily packed with subordinates.
In one of its rooms was Ougi Takaya.
The room was in the Japanese style and measured around ten tatami (~178 sq ft). A bed had been placed at its center, on which knelt Takaya in formal pose wearing sleeping clothes.
Takaya, after failing to escape, had been placed under house arrest here with Mitsuhide, who had anticipated his ‘betrayal’. He’d been at his extremity when Mitsuhide had found him, and physically near prostrate. Mitsuhide had had to beg the Ikkou Sect to perform a healing spell and then call in the Himuka cultists to implant another luminous flame stone. Thanks to these efforts Takaya was much better, but his psychological exhaustion was another thing altogether.
“You must rest,” Saeki Ryouko told Takaya at the end of her medical examination. “You shouldn’t think too much in your state. Wounds weaken you mentally as well as physically. For now, stop thinking and just rest.”
Although Kousaka had exploited that weakness...
“Even if you feel the need to ascertain the truth for yourself or whatever it is, for now you have to let your body heal. Do you hear me?”
Takaya had been silent since then.
Ryouko removed her stethoscope and refastened and straightened his kimono. She’d been told of his condition. Though she knew that “Don’t think” was by its nature impossible advice, for some reason this patient, though weak in mind and body, had no chinks in his armor for others to take advantage of. Her concerned words sounded vacuous to her own ears.
It wasn’t that he was trying to keep a cool head. But nor was he in some sort of daze. He wasn’t asleep; his eyes were open and fixed on a single point.
Ryouko bowed diffidently and left the room.
Motoharu was standing outside, watching Takaya attentively through a crack in the paper sliding door. Ryouko reported on Takaya’s condition before bowing slightly and beating a hasty exit, daunted by the gloomy atmosphere.
(An unfathomable person indeed...) Kikkawa Motoharu thought, looking at Takaya.
He’d come to see him after Mitsuhide had brought him back, but had not approached. Takaya, who had seemed to him crippled by shock, had now become, after his reckless flight, some sort of strange creature.
(Naoe is alive.)
Here before him was the one person who needed to hear that truth the most.
But there was more to it. The fact that Naoe was now on the side that should probably be regarded as Takaya’s enemy was neither careless conjecture nor outright falsehood.
(If that is the path you’ve chosen, I have not the right to object, Naoe.)
In Naoe’s heart there had long existed a thing that must be conquered; if after so much consideration he had decided that this was how he would achieve that conquest, then that was how it must be. Naoe was a man Motoharu recognized. If this was his conclusion, Motoharu could only accept it. But in his heart he wondered: was there no other way? To Naoe such talk would probably be a nuisance.
In no way should he intervene, and neither did he have any intention of doing so. His lack of clarity had to do with the prolonging of Kagetora’s ‘artificial reality’.
Even so, Kagetora was awakening. It would take just a little longer. Kagetora had detected his own sense of unease. He had seized on the impetus needed to end his eternal dream. The artificial Naoe was no longer in the world. But Kagetora was still looking at the world from his artificial awareness.
Someone needed to hold a ‘mirror’ up to him. Just as Don Quixote recognized his own true aged decrepitude and ugliness in the mirror-knight. Someone needed to show Kagetora the self that was living inside a delusion. Otherwise even if Naoe and Kagetora met on the battlefield there would be no fairness in their battle—and Naoe wouldn’t wish for that, either.
(Though that’s probably only my own position.)
Naoe was someone he regarded as a friend. As such, he thought that reality should be faced with truth. That was all.
(Am I wrong, Naoe?)
What was Kagetora thinking at this moment?
If Kagetora also believed this was the method Naoe had chosen for his conquest, the victor would chose to fight the opposition.
Presently Takaya sent out the Gohou Douji for autonomous intelligence-gathering. On Kenshin, Naoe, and Saga
’s Lady in White. But he received no satisfactory response. He also attempted an appeal to Kenshin, but naturally received no reply.
Mitsuhide returned after a short while. When he entered the room, Takaya was seated on the futon in sleeping robes gazing out the paper sliding window.
“How are you, Kagetora-dono?”
“... I’m not gonna die,” Takaya answered expressionlessly. “What are you gonna do with me?”
“Do...?”
“I was told I would be made into a vessel for an onryou. You brought me here to make me into a tool?”
“Someone told you you would be made into a vessel?” Mitsuhide shook his head. “That’s not going to happen. We are equals. You will not be treated as a mere tool. Even if a vessel is needed, we would never dehumanize you in that way. Trust me.”
“Sure,” Takaya muttered. “Not like you can do much with this beat-up body anyway.”
“...Kagetora-dono.”
Takaya’s face turned expressionless again. He became unreadable. Though he wasn’t trying to hide anything, Mitsuhide couldn’t read him.
He wasn’t stricken with grief. He wasn’t resentful or angry. It wasn’t quite stupor. ...It was in a category that exceeded understanding.
Observing him, Mitsuhide somehow felt that he understood.
(He is the only person who can face the one called the Demon King as his equal—...)
“... Kagetora-dono, there is someone who would like to see you.”
Only Takaya’s eyes lifted to look at Mitsuhide.
“An Uesugi officer who was in Saga. We captured him as a prisoner of war rather than killing him. You probably know him well. We have restrained his spirit so that he cannot commit suicide and seek purification.”
“...”
“The Uesugi leadership is magnificent. He has refused to say anything about Kenshin or the New Uesugi no matter how much torture we subjected him to. But I wonder what would happen if he were to come face-to-face with you.”
How would an Uesugi soldier who followed Kenshin react to Kagetora?
“I would like you to see him,” Mitsuhide said.
Takaya agreed.
His answer was quiet.
After a short time an angular-faced young man in his twenties was brought in by retainers. He wore spirit-shackles around his neck which bound him to his vessel.
He was made to sit in front of Takaya. The retainers left, leaving the two of them alone.
The man stared at the tatami and did not seem willing to meet Takaya’s eyes. Takaya gazed at him silently for a moment. ...There was no mistake. He knew this person very well.
“Lift your head,” Takaya told him quietly. “Look at me, Takemata Yoshitsuna.”
The man’s head jerked up at the sound of his name.
Takemata Yoshitsuna, one of the Uesugi commanders at Uozu Castle in Toyama. After dying in battle there, he had served the Uesugi and Kagetora as a valuable military asset for four hundred years. He had transferred from Uozu to Saga at Kagetora’s direction and had performed various jobs in Kyuushuu. They’d assumed he had been killed along with Saga’s Lady in White...
Takaya only gazed quietly at Takemata. As if drawn in by that gaze, Takemata didn’t look away.
“Kagetora...sama...”
“Did you kill Ryuuzouji?” Takaya asked. “Did Naoe order you to assist Ootomo?”
Takaya saw tears fill Takemata’s eyes. He seemed to crumble under Takaya’s gaze.
“I’m so sorry!” he cried like a dam bursting. He pressed his head against the tatami as he wailed. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I am so sorry—!!” he continued to repeat until his voice ran out, with such vehemence that one had to wonder if he had gone mad. Ougi Takaya now knew that Mitsuhide had spoken true.
He was no longer this man’s master.
Takemata’s tears spoke of his guilty feelings. Here in front of Takaya he probably felt as if the walls had closed in around him.
Takaya gazed quietly at him. For a long time Takemata’s sobbing was the only sound in the room. How long did it last? When his tears finally dried up, Takaya asked, “Can you tell me, Takemata...”
“...”
“What my father intends to do with me?”
“I do not know,” Takemata answered in-between sobs. “I was not told Lord Kenshin’s intentions... Only that I must obey.”
“When did you receive these instructions?”
“A long...a long time ago now... Ah... Around the end of the Itsuku Island affair...”
Takaya’s chin jerked up. “After...Itsuku Island...”
“Four hundred years have passed since Lord Kenshin last appeared before us...it was overwhelming. Lord Kenshin gave us a command: that he has raised a new general, and we are to obey his instructions above all.”
“...” Takaya half-closed his eyes in pain. “Why...”
Why did Father, he wanted to say, but choked up.
After a long moment of silence, Takaya finally asked, “Has Father really entered the «Yami-Sengoku» battlefield?”
“...”
“What does Naoe intend to do with me?”
Takemata’s shoulders jumped slightly.
“Does he intend to sacrifice me? Has he been preparing for conquest of the «Yami-Sengoku» for the past two years as Lord Kenshin’s servant while leaving me in the enemy commanders’ line of fire?”
“I...”
“What does Lord Kenshin intend to do with me now that he’s removed me from my position?”
Takemata bit his lips hard.
“Answer me, Takemata.”
Though quiet, it was not a command he could disobey. Takemata shook his head blindly. “I...I’m not sure. But I heard Hakkai-dono say...”
“Hakkai? The Hakkai is alive?”
Takemata nodded. Hakkai had been working for Kenshin since Itsuku Island. He was now at Naoe’s side as the New Uesugi’s «Nokizaru head». Takaya was stunned. But none of his feelings showed on his face.
He forced calm on himself and asked, “What...did...Hakkai say? Tell me precisely.”
“But—...”
“It’s fine. Just tell me, Takemata.”
Takemata teared up. There was a look of unbearable anguish on his face. But finally he resolved himself and repeated Hakkai’s words.
“He said...‘Naoe-sama intends to eventually «exorcise» Kagetora-sama...’”
Takaya caught his breath.
The words struck home like a dagger to the heart.
Naoe intended to kill him.
“...”
Takaya’s trembling fists turned white.
His muttered words were hoarse, wrung from his throat: “I see...”
Takemata fell prostrate.
Takaya closed his eyes and quietly tilted his face to the ceiling.
Comments
Oooooooooooooooouch! That
Oooooooooooooooouch! That last bit was brutal. There is a lot of 'he said, he said' going on in Kagetora's ears, a lot of L's he is taking along with that but to hear this same chatter straight from a trusted source is searing. So many emotions and so much self-control even though he is also physically hurt is astounding. Like always, I can't wait for the next chapter.
To be honest
I felt like it came from so far out in left field that I was sure Takemata was a plant. The sequence of events doesn't seem to support the claim that New Uesugi intends to kill Takaya--but then it was like suddenly everyone just accepted it as truth.
It seems like the people
It seems like the people working with the Himuka cult were surprised that the lies they told were confirmed as well. Kousaka disappeared conveniently so maybe he did have something to do with it? Just to seal the deal on his claims. Which could, unfortunately, work because neither 'Naoe' has shown themselves or come to Kagetora's aid and he himself set Naoe "free".
It gets worse
It's a question that's not even definitely answered in this arc (and I don't know when it will be). This is why I commented before that Mirage is like the ultimate anti-found-family story. Do these people ever talk to each other instead of coming to conclusions and leaping into fights?