The clock rounded midnight.
Upon rushing to the hospital, Narita Yuzuru and Chiaki Shuuhei asked for the room number at the reception desk, then began running down the corridor without pausing for breath.
“...”
They stopped, panting.
A young man sat with his arms wrapped around his knees in front of a hospital room door.
He raised his head towards them.
Yuzuru’s eyes widened.
“...Taka...ya...”
“...”
Takaya stared at them dazedly, voicelessly. Yuzuru hugged him instinctively.
“Takaya! Takaya, are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere?”
He shook Takaya’s shoulders, but Takaya made no response. There was gauze covering his cheek, his clothes were torn and stained in spots with blood, but he did not appear to have sustained any major external injuries.
“...Thank goodness...” Yuzuru murmured with effort, and sighed deeply. Chiaki’s gaze went to the hospital room door.
A ‘no visitors’ sign hung from it.
“Kagetora...” he said, but Takaya didn’t respond. Chiaki softly opened the door.
The small room held a single bed. A pulse meter emitted monotonous light traces, and drops from an intravenous drip silently fell at measured intervals.
Upon the bed lay the unconscious form of Kokuryou. A large oxygen mask covered his mouth, and there was a bandage wrapped around his head.
His body was in critical condition, and his life hung suspended. Yuzuru looked at him over Chiaki’s shoulder.
“His wife...died...”
“!”
Yuzuru and Chiaki turned.
Takaya mumbled in a choked voice, “She had burns over her entire body, and her internal organs ruptured, and...she passed away earlier. Gramps, too...to protect me... If he doesn’t regain consciousness tonight...they’re saying that his life will be in danger. Even though I was only scratched...even though nothing happened to me...”
“Takaya.”
“Why—” Takaya muttered, his voice a guttural groan, “why wasn’t it me?”
“...”
“Why was it them...? Why did it have to be them? Even though they didn’t do anything...they never did anything...so why did this happen?...why did this happen to them?...why...?!” Takaya moaned in anguish. And he said nothing more as he crouched there by the door, arms around his head, shoulders shaking.
It had been something akin to a miracle that he’d been unharmed in that explosion—in the pillar of fire Jikou Temple
had become in the strike of an unknown attacker. Or perhaps Takaya’s «power» had quickly manifested itself, though it managed to protect only him.
It had taken everything he had to take Kokuryou and escape from that terrible blaze, which nothing could even approach. When the fire trucks arrived (evidently they could move here), the firefighters had entered the raging flames and somehow emerged with Kokuryou’s wife—but they’d been too late.
There had been no way to save her.
He could only stand and watch as the rescue workers rushed about the scene.
He could do nothing but stand there, overwhelmed by a deep sense of helplessness.
“...”
Yuzuru’s gaze moved away from Takaya’s agonized expression back to Kokuryou.
His bloodless face seemed to belong to a wax doll rather than to any living person, and without the aid of the respirator and the pulse meter, his breathing would almost certainly have failed by now.
Yuzuru approached the pillow.
“Narita...” Chiaki called to him. “Don’t. Come out.”
Yuzuru made no reply. He stood at Kokuryou’s pillow and looked down at his face.
“...”
But—then.
Kokuryou’s eyelids, stiff as wax, moved feebly, almost indiscernibly.
Chiaki went to join Yuzuru, his eyes widening. Kokuryou’s eyelids opened then, just the slightest bit.
“Has he regained consciousness?”
“!”
At Chiaki’s words, Takaya sprung to his feet and rushed to the pillow.
“Gramps! Hey, Gramps!” he shouted desperately, but Kokuryou made no reaction. The blind slivers of his eyes were fixed on the ceiling.
“Gramps! Gramps!”
He gave no sign that he had heard, but his head turned towards them weakly as if something had gradually entered his consciousness.
His gaze was fixed not on Takaya, but on Yuzuru.
“Aaah...” Kokuryou whispered almost inaudibly, and his white arm with its tube attached appeared to be reaching for Yuzuru.
“...”
A weak light flickered in his hazy eyes, and then—
“...Are you...the...Buddha...?”
Chiaki and Takaya were stunned.
His whispered faded, and he sank once more into sleep.
Frozen in place, Chiaki looked at Kokuryou, then Yuzuru.
Yuzuru looked down with quiet protectiveness at Kokuryou, then gently returned the arm reaching out for him to its place.
The Buddha—?
(What was...)
As they left the room, Chiaki said to Takaya, “I’m heading back to meet up with Haruie. You guys stay here. Once we’re finished over there, we’ll come and get you.”
“—”
Takaya didn’t reply.
“Kagetora,” Chiaki admonished him in a muted voice, “get ahold of yourself.”
Takaya lifted his eyes a little.
“...Yeah.”
Hearing Takaya’s listless response, Chiaki glanced at Yuzuru, then walked quickly back down the corridor.
Takaya turned to Yuzuru as the sound of Chiaki’s footsteps faded.
“Did Chiaki bring you...?”
“...”
“Have you already...been to see that lady—Haruie?”
“Yeah. Before we came here.”
Chiaki Shuuhei—or Yasuda Nagahide, who had sensed disaster immediately upon entering Sendai, had gone with Yuzuru to meet up with Ayako at the site of the University Hospital collapse. Chiaki had promptly dispersed the suggestion on the necessary people so that rescue work could begin. It‘d been one blessing in the midst of tragedy that many of in-patients’ wards had been spared, but key medical facilities had been destroyed, and many of the staff and patients had been affected.
Once he’d finished general treatment, he had headed for Kokuryou’s Jikou Temple without stopping for rest...
“I see...”
Once he’d heard the whole story, Takaya sank again into haggard silence. He slumped down to the floor against the wall.
“Takaya,” Yuzuru said worriedly.
“...”
“Oh, I know. How about I go get coffee or something? You’ll probably feel better after you have something to drink. I’ll be right back... ?”
Yuzuru turned at a tug on his clothes as he was about to head down the corridor. Takaya, with his head against his knees, had grasped hold of Yuzuru’s shirt.
“... Takaya?”
“...Stay with me...” he said—and then pleadingly, “...I’m scared...”
Those few words seemed to take all of his effort. Yuzuru looked at Takaya, then sat down next to him.
“Takaya.”
“...”
After a moment of silence, Takaya opened his mouth.
“There’s a morgue...on the floor below us...”
“...”
“Kokuryou’s wife’s remains...are there...” Takaya told him, his voice a moan. “She died crushed under the building...there’s still...so much pain on her face... Her remains...from her chest down, her body is all torn and horribly burned—she was such a kind person, but her face...is full of such terrible agony, and there’s yellow fluid coming out of her mouth...”
His voice cut off, and Takaya bit his lips hard.
“...I...”
“Takaya.”
What was he afraid of? Even Takaya himself didn’t know. Only that it didn’t have anything to do with danger to himself.
The image of her body, scorched into his mind, flashed relentlessly before his eyes.
It had not been a peaceful death. That kind woman had died in hideous agony, her voice raised in an inhuman scream, her life torn brutally from her.
It was too horrific.
He had not thought that a person’s last moments could be this terrible.
The terror paralyzed even grief.
That cold darkness was preparing even now to swallow up yet another kind person.
He gripped Yuzuru’s hands as they encircled him. Right now he needed Yuzuru’s warmth—the warmth of another living being.
“...Don’t go anywhere...”
Takaya closed his eyes tightly.
The strength of Yuzuru’s arms. The steady beating of his heart.
Warm hands.
Like two small birds afraid of the dark, they huddled together in a corner of the corridor.
They could do nothing now but endure.
They could do nothing but await the morning.
“All right. It looks like accommodations have been found for all of the injured,” Chiaki, who had rendezvoused with Ayako at the hospital collapse site, said while surveying the surrounding area. The rescue workers who had rushed in after him in patrol cars and fire engines were busily running around taking care of the rest.
Kadowaki Ayako—Kakizaki Haruie—nodded in response, relief on her face.
“It looks like they’re able to carry out the rescue work now that you’ve removed the suggestion. Thank you for that.”
“You don’t need to thank me. And I can’t hold this for long in any case.”
“Eh?”
Chiaki grumbled, frowning, “The suggestion will remain as long as this Dakiniten curse is in place. Though I’ve removed it for now, we’ll end up right back where we started if the curse isn’t eliminated. If this happens somewhere else, you’ll get the same non-reaction all over again.”
Ayako’s face was also grim. “Then we have to eliminate the curse.”
“Yeah. ...But...”
One of the police officers working on the cleanup came over to them.
“Thank you very much for notifying us. How are your injuries?”
“Eh...ah, they’re fine...” Ayako lightly lifted her right arm, which was suspended by a white cloth. “It doesn’t seem that serious.”
“But I wonder what happened. Nobody reported an accident of this magnitude for four hours. It’s almost as if nobody noticed...” The police officer tilted his head at them eagerly, and Ayako and Chiaki looked back at him sourly. “There are some things I would like to ask you; if possible, I would like you to come down with me to the station...”
“That’s fine, but there’s not much sense in you investigating us, is there?”
“Wha?” The police officer looked puzzled.
“At this rate, you‘ll suddenly return to yourself in the midst of your investigations saying: ’Huh? What am I doing here?’ Go home before the story gets complicated. Once we’ve removed the curse, we’ll let you know the circumstances in full.”
“Huh? Um...wait.”
“There’s something we need to do first. Haruie.”
“Right.”
The two of them glanced at the police officer, then walked towards the large cave-in created by the destruction of the building.
The cave-in formed a gigantic crater.
Chiaki peered in and snorted. “Humph. So they’re making this crater the ‘platform’ of the spell. Pretty damn tasteless, if you ask me.”
“The ‘platform’ is a ‘spell platform’ created with spiritual powers. One that doesn’t use tools.”
“It’d be too noticeable if they were to bury some temple’s incense altar here, though, wouldn’t it?”
“What do you think? Should we ambush them here?”
“I don’t fancy waiting for them in the night wind, so let’s leave a proxy,” Chiaki said, extracting a small kokeshi-like doll from his jacket pocket that fit on the palm of his hand.
“They would’ve already noticed that we’re on the move. They’ll probably come armed to the teeth this time. I don’t think this’ll hold ’em off, but it should at least buy us some time.”
Ayako’s eyes widened.
“That’s...”
“It’s a koppashin made from the sacred tree that stands on Mount Kouya’s holy ground. I didn’t want to come empty-handed, so I came prepared with a few of these. ...Those Mogami guys will have to deal with this for a while, and we’ll work Kagetora over for the battle ahead. We have to get rid of that curse on Sendai ASAP.”
“Neutralize the curse?”
“Yeah. But we have to make sure they won’t cast any more curses. The quickest way would be to kill the caster, but it’s a spirit in possession of a body this time around, which is bothersome. The spirit won’t disappear even if the host is killed. So...”
“«Choubuku», then?”
Chiaki stooped to place the koppashin on the ground.
“We’re the only ones who can do it. Fitting, isn’t it.”
“I wonder if that’s why they wanted to get rid of Kagetora?”
“We’re the natural enemies of the onryou.”
“But the problem is how to neutralize the curse after that. How do we get rid of it if it’s already completed?”
“That’s true.” Chiaki folded his arms. “If we’re not mistaken about it being ‘kinrin no hou’...I’ve never handled a curse of this magnitude before. And we still don’t know what they’re planning to do with it either. But for now...” Chiaki dropped to one knee and joined his hands in a ritual gesture.
“On deibayakisha mandamanda kakakaka sowaka.”
The koppashin, an object representation of a divine spirit, could house the descent of various deities. Chiaki had apparently planned to call Shoumen Kongou to this particular koppashin.
“O Great Shoumen Kongou. I pray thee thrash all those who would step within this ground. Let all thy sworn enemies be destroyed. —On deibayakisha mandamanda kakakaka sowaka.”
Then Chiaki drew a large ‘ (Un)’ symbol, the seed syllable of Exalted Shoumen Kongou, in midair with his finger.
He turned to Ayako.
“Let’s leave it to him and go meet Kagetora.”
“Shoumen Kongou is the deity associated with the Koushin beliefs, right? Can we hold back Mogami with this?”
“Shoumen Kongou is by nature a fierce god who is a protector of Buddhism. He drives away the calamities of evil beasts, diseases, and thunder. Since we’re up against foxes here, he’s perfect.”
“So we’re fighting foxes with the monkey? What if he does a ‘see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil’?”
“Sheesh, y’know...”
The two walked towards the car. Around the terrible cave-in swirled a chaotic mass of personnel dealing with incident control. No one even noticed the tiny koppashin they had left behind.
As the long night brightened, Takaya and Yuzuru, along with Chiaki and Ayako (who had gone to pick them up), got a room in a hotel near town, which would thereafter act as their base of operations.
Though Kokuryou had not regained consciousness, he was out of danger for the time being.
Ayako, who had placed the call, replaced the receiver and said, “I’ve given the hospital my contact information, so they’ll call me immediately if anything happens. I know you’re worried, but let’s leave it to the doctors.”
“Yeah.”
Takaya didn’t even look at her. Ayako was anxious about the shock he had certainly received, but he was surprisingly calm. His responses and behavior were collected, and there was neither agitation nor carelessness in his speech or conduct. On the contrary.
He didn’t seem particularly concerned about Kokuryou.
“Kagetora...?”
Ayako had to think it odd.
Takaya ignored her, instead fixing his gaze on the map spread out in the middle of the Japanese-style room.
“So you’re saying that the fifth barrier point was completed in the middle of all the confusion last night, Chiaki?”
“Yeah,” Chiaki responded, paying no attention to Takaya’s unnatural calm. “The one at the Toukoku University Department of Agriculture. They’ve spelled shut the gap you guys pulled open over there. Kagetora, it looks like ‘kinrin no hou’ is almost certainly what they’re planning.”
“‘Kinrin no hou’?”
“It was a spell performed in the old days at the emperor’s enthronement, a powerful spell that used Dakiniten to strengthen the emperor’s controlling power and destroy those who rebel against him. I’ve also heard that it induces mass hypnosis, so I’m pretty sure that’s what this is.”
“But the barrier in question isn’t completed yet?”
“You’re talking about the barrier at the city center? It’s more of a gigantic platform than a barrier. The ‘kinrin no hou’ is completed by linking platforms positioned in eight directions. The completion of the fifth means that the power of the curse is at 70%. But we can still cancel out the suggestion for about an hour or so. If the eighth barrier is set, the eight-degree ‘kinrin no hou’—in other words, a completed ritual—will mean that the power of the hypnotic suggestion also becomes perfect. If that happens, I probably won’t be able to cancel out the suggestion.”
“Then what should we...”
“Geez, and we don’t even know what they’re plotting to do with the barrier. Anyhow, it wouldn’t be wise to leave the curse lying about. If nothing else, we should at least completely dissolve the barrier first.”
“I think we can manage the invocation of the dead with jichinhou,” Ayako entered the conversation.
“But the problem is the ‘kinrin no hou’ and Dakiniten-hou. We don’t know how to neutralize them even if the invocations are canceled...”
“Neutralize?”
“A way to break the curse—actually, using a curse to break a curse. Ordinarily we break them by performing an exorcism or purification, but sometimes for strong, difficult curses for which those don’t work, we’ll also use neutralization,” Ayako said, making a face. “Based on the effects and nature of a curse, you can find something that is naturally its opposite, though the neutralizing spell is different from either curse.”
“So what’s the curse that’ll neutralize the ‘kinrin no hou’?”
“I was thinking maybe something from one of the Exalted Five Great Kings of Wisdom, but we don’t have enough data,” Ayako shrugged. Chiaki crossed his arms.
“Naoe or Irobe would know a lot more, but—damn.”
“Naoe...”
Takaya’s expression changed the slightest bit. It was Yuzuru who followed up with, “Have we still not heard from Naoe-san? You said that he’s in Yamagata...”
Both Ayako and Chiaki suddenly scowled.
“We...haven’t heard from him.”
“Oh no. But then...”
“Even if something’s happened, we haven’t got the time to go rescue him. We can only do what we can here,” Chiaki said, pointing at the map. “Thankfully, this barrier has a weak point. Look here.”
“?”
“The Date family’s burial place at Kyougamine is within the barrier. It’s sacred ground of considerable power. They were probably thinking of barricading it with spells, but contrary to what they anticipated, the power produced by the sacred ground was too strong. If we want to destroy the barrier, this is definitely the place to do it from.”
“But that certainly would not pass under Mogami’s notice. He’ll be bringing an army to lay waste to Kyougamine.”
Date Masamune’s face came to Takaya’s mind. —If Mogami were to attack Kyougamine, Masamune would probably not stand quietly by. Its peace would be destroyed. If that happened, it could become an excuse for all-out war.
“Ugh. I really don’t want to rouse Date.”
“...”
Takaya was silent for a moment with his own thoughts, then lifted his eyes. “In any case, we should perform «choubuku» on the caster first. I’ll do something about neutralizing the curse. Haruie.”
Ayako raised her head abruptly, startled. “Ri-right...”
“I‘ll leave him to you. The ’koko’ of Dakiniten should disappear at least, if we deal with the person controlling them. We’ll exorcise Mogami’s onshou.”
“I-I got it.”
“I‘ll come with you,” Chiaki volunteered. “Keep an eye out for the people trying to kill you. Mogami’s onshou are out to get you with ’koko’ or whatever else. Otherwise, there’d be no point in that flashy explosion earlier.”
Takaya’s eyes sharpened. “You’re saying that they involved Kokuryou-san and his wife on purpose?”
“Who knows? Anyway, you haven’t eaten anything since last night, right? You’ve gotta be hungry. Narita, can you get some takeout from somewhere?”
“Huh? Aaah...yeah.” Yuzuru stood obediently. “You guys rest. I’ll go find something.”
“I’ll go with you.” Ayako followed.
Yuzuru and Ayako left the room and walked down the hall side by side, where the carpet was being cleaned.
“It’s weird, don’t you think...?”
“?”
Yuzuru turned to see a dubious look on Ayako’s face and tilted his head at her.
“What is?”
“Mmm. The way he’s behaving,” Ayako replied doubtfully, a hand under her chin. “His expression is odd. Or maybe not odd, but I thought that he’d be in despair or moping in a corner by himself after going through so much...”
Yuzuru regarded Ayako silently.
“I heard...from Nagahide earlier—that Kokuryou-san’s wife died.”
“...”
“But that’s not how he looks. I don’t see any sadness or fear in him. No child can be so calm after seeing someone murdered. Especially someone like him, whose emotions are so unstable—he shouldn’t be able to stay that calm. What’s happened? What’s happened inside of him?” Ayako pressed Yuzuru. “He called me Haruie. That’s right—that expression of his, it’s almost as if—”
“Ayako-san,” Yuzuru interrupted, then shut his mouth. The elevator arrived, and they got on and pressed the button for the lobby. Yuzuru sighed as he waited for the door to close.
“I can’t read what Takaya’s thinking either.”
“You can’t?”
“No. He’s not a lively or cheerful person, but he experiences emotions strongly and wears his heart on his sleeve, so you can usually immediately tell what he’s thinking... But I couldn’t this time, for the first time.”
“What...does that mean?”
“I don’t know. But this is the first time I’ve seen that expression in Takaya’s eyes,” Yuzuru said dejectedly. “Even when he’s pretending to be good and follow the rules after getting slapped down for going up against the teachers at school, there’s still this glint of humiliation or resentment in his eyes. His emotions are expressed only in his eyes, like he’s a wild beast baring his teeth, ready to go for his enemy’s throat...”
“...”
“But nothing of Takaya’s feelings is reflected in his eyes right now. It’s not that he’s calm or collected. It’s something else...something scarier...” Weary with the effort of putting what he could not express into words, Yuzuru bit his lip. “I guess I feel like he’s throwing himself away.”
“Yuzuru-kun.”
“Yes, that’s what it is! As if...he feels like he could have prevented Kokuryou-san’s wife from dying if he could have used that «power». If he were Kagetora...so he wants to stop being Ougi Takaya. That must be it!”
Takaya stood alone by the window, gazing out at the sky covered with broken clouds.
He had come to understand how very powerless he was this night.
He could think of nothing but—
If only I’d been stronger—
He wanted that from the bottom of his heart. Just that.
He’d let someone he should have protected die. As night transformed into dawn, regret over what could not be redone transformed into a desire that overrode everything else.
Only power. Only strength.
A longing with the intensity of prayer.
To have an absolute strength.
What could he give in exchange? If it could not be obtained without a price.
Kagetora’s power.
In order to obtain that power—
What could he give in compensation for the granting of his wish?
Takaya gazed outside.
“Kagetora...” Chiaki said to his back. “You should prepare yourself regarding Naoe.”
“...!”
“The next time you see him, he probably won’t be ‘Tachibana Yoshiaki’ anymore.”
“What are you talking about?”
“We don’t know if anything has happened to Naoe’s body, but if by any chance something has, he’ll abandon his current host and possess some other body. Which means that he’ll no longer be the ‘Tachibana Yoshiaki’ Naoe that you know.”
“But...”
“There’s also the chance that his soul will be bound and manipulated using hypnotic suggestion. In the worst case, you have to be prepared to kill him and perform «choubuku» on his soul, Kagetora.”
The corners of Takaya’s mouth stiffened slightly.
So this was the cruelty of the mission imposed on them?
This cold-heartedness capable of using those of lesser rank as sword fodder.
Did one take that cold-heartedness upon oneself in order to grow stronger? Had Kagetora carried it within him? Was that the meaning of strength?
(Naoe—...)
He suddenly longed for Naoe’s smile. Even while his words had been stern, there had been an endless gentleness in the depths of his eyes.
Was it strength to be able to lose that without losing his composure?
And yet—
If becoming that person meant that he would no longer protect those he should protect.
(I...)
Takaya’s brows creased against those thoughts.
Chiaki stared at Takaya silently. Just as he seemed about to speak again—
“!”
A sharp sensation grazed Chiaki’s sixth sense.
He grinned with a hand pressed against his forehead.
“So you’ve shown yourself...”
“What?”
“Looks like our guests have been spotted at the site, Kagetora. We should go give them a proper welcome.”
Takaya’s hard gaze was focused in midair.
A black rain began to fall.