“I’m fine, so. ...Yeah. I’m going to stay here for a bit, so thanks for taking care of things over there. ...It’s okay, stop worrying about me,” Takaya told Ayako back at Jikou Temple, and put down the handset. He had recovered, but knowing now that this was Date’s mansion, felt inclined to stay for a little while longer to check out the situation.
When he turned, Masamune was standing behind him.
“If thou canst bear some exercise, wilt thou take a walk with me? ’Tis not far.”
“?”
“I would fain visit Kyougamine
,” he said, and looked at Katakura Kagetsuna nearby. “Accompany us, Kojuurou.”
“Aye.”
Takaya looked at Masamune, his wariness undiminished.
This One-Eyed Dragon who had been resurrected into the modern age—.
He should not yet know of Takaya’s true identity as Uesugi Kagetora. If he did learn that Takaya was one of Kenshin’s Yasha-shuu, whose aim was the destruction of the «Yami-Sengoku», Takaya’s safety might yet be in doubt.
(What the hell are they planning?)
Masamune leisurely strolled away as Takaya stared at his back.
Not far from Aoba Castle, residences pressed up against the place which had once been called Kyougamine, the site of the Zuihouden, Date Masamune’s mausoleum. The Zuihouden had been a luxurious and glorious piece of architecture built in the Momoyama style, and in the pre-war days had been designated a national treasure. Unfortunately, it had been destroyed in the air-raid against Sendai in the twentieth year of Showa (1945).
Afterwards, there had been many petitions for reconstruction, and by means of excavation and detailed scientific investigation, and at the enormous cost of eight hundred million yen and five years of labor, the remodeled Zuihouden had been completed in the fifty-fourth year of Showa (1979).
The master of this magnificent mausoleum walked up the shallow flight of stone steps beneath the line of cedar trees.
Masamune looked up at the tall luxuriant trees with deep emotion.
Following behind him, Takaya carefully noted Masamune’s every action.
“Truly, this neighborhood is much changed...”
Takaya stiffened, startled. Giving no mind to Takaya’s reaction, Masamune continued, looking out into the distance: “In this spot alone have traces of that era been preserved, Kojuurou.”
“My lord hath the right of it,” Kojuurou, also known as Katakura Kagetsuna, agreed, looking up at the cedar trees in turn. “Dono, of a certainty dost thou live on within the hearts of succeeding generations.”
“Stay, what desirest thou to say?”
“Nay, naught in particular.” Kojuurou smiled slightly. “That I could meet my lord thus once more in this world fills my heart with wonder.”
“... I, too.” Masamune’s single eye narrowed. “Never did I imagine that I might gaze upon my mausoleum with this single eye.”
Beside them, Takaya listened to the conversation of lord and retainer. Their manner somehow gave him a sense of déjà vu.
“Thou art Ougi-dono, thou hast said?”
“Eh? Yeah...”
“Is this thy first visit to Sendai?”
“Uh...well...”
“Ah. ’Tis a fair city, this Sendai, is it not? A flourishing and prosperous city of the Northeast. Though people created this city, this city now mobilizes its people. Its prosperity was once Edo and Osaka’s—no, ’twas their superior.” Masamune smiled boyishly. “Dost thou not think that this city alone can make a kingdom?”
“!”
“It could be made the capital of a kingdom. Though the dream of the Oushuu ended long ago, dost thou not think that the power of the city as it is now is more than enough to stand as a kingdom’s—as Japan’s—capital?”
“—”
“My wish was to make this land of Sendai a capital like it is now.”
Masamune ascended the stairs, satisfaction plain on his face.
Takaya was just a bit disappointed. He couldn’t detect any particular ambition behind Masamune’s words.
(What in the world is he...)
“What? Give money?” Masamune exclaimed at the entrance, scowling in shock. “One must pay to enter a mausoleum? I did not die so foolishly.”
Kojuurou smiled ironically. “Mayhap ’tis for thy journey upon the Roku Dou.”
“’Tis become a strange world,” Masamune said with a sigh. “Await me here, Kojuurou.”
“Soft: but I have brought enough for my share.”
“’Twas not my meaning. The two of us shall go in.”
Kojuurou smiled wryly and said only, “Take care, my lord” as he watched them step inside.
The Zuihouden stood before them immediately upon entering. Masamune invited Takaya inside and stood looking up at his own mausoleum.
“’Tis a handsome mausoleum, is it not, Ougi-dono? Even Toyotomi Hideyoshi hath not one so fine,” Masamune said proudly. “Dost thou not think the way one is interred after death tells easily of one’s entire life?”
“—”
Takaya finally opened his mouth to ask bluntly, “Was it you who saved me...who took out that woman?”
Masamune turned. Takaya looked at him with direct eyes.
“We cared for thee, but ’twas our guest who saved thee.”
“Guest? That’s—”
“What—” Masamune inquired quietly, “wert thou doing in that place? Didst thou predict that one of the Mogami would come?”
Though he was silent, the answer was written plainly on his face. Masamune, on the other hand, was a closed book.
“Thou knowest aught, dost thou not? Wilt thou not say? What Mogami was doing there.”
“I...” Takaya averted his eyes. “I thought it was the Date who were destroying the buildings and calling the spirits.”
“Calling... Dost thou know of the invocation of the dead?”
“A bit, I guess, but I don’t know what it’s for. But I’m not just gonna let them keep killing and hurting innocent people.” Takaya glared sharply at Masamune. “I will absolutely not let fighting between ghosts kill the living.”
“Verily, thou hast the right of it.”
“Then why did you come back at all? All of you are already dead, aren’t you?! But because you’ve returned, a lot of people are gonna get sucked in and get killed! That’s just...totally wrong!” Takaya shouted, angrier by the minute. “Your life is already done! You can’t do it over!”
“...”
Masamune looked at him quietly. Takaya panted with the force of his outburst. Masamune opened his mouth. “We are not here to redo our lives.”
“?”
“The destiny of our former lives was the will of Heaven. There was naught that we could do but lament it. None can redo their lives. But if I could...” Masamune’s single eye laughed. “’Twould be a fresh start.”
“...!”
Masamune looked over his shoulder at Takaya’s stiffening face as he walked out.
“Be at ease. We desire only to protect this territory of Sendai.”
Takaya stared at Masamune’s broad shoulders, which had once borne the weight of a country. He had walked seventy years with the people of an entire nation on those shoulders.
(Are those his true feelings...?)
He followed.
“Ougi-dono. Art thy parents in good health?”
Takaya looked blank at the sudden change in topic.
Parents—
Takaya’s brows creased lightly. “... Yeah.”
“I see.” Masamune gazed up at the tall, thick line of cedar trees. “Even those without children have parents. Whether alive or separated by death...the fact that they are one’s parents changes not.”
“...”
“We begin our existence in our mothers’ wombs. Our mothers are our home. One could say that they are our origin. That changes not though our flesh be destroyed. I have but one mother who gave birth to me. Yet—” His eye narrowed slightly. “Though a child hath but one mother, it doth not always follow that a mother hath but one child.”
Takaya, not grasping Masamune’s point, looked dubious. Masamune appeared to be speaking about himself.
“Although I did not wish to despise it my whole life... ’twas this single eye which denied me my mother’s love, and my child’s heart cursed this ugly visage.”
Takaya took another look at Masamune’s eye patch.
“I accepted over and over again that ’twas anxiety over the future of the Date Clan, but... ’Tis never bearable to be neglected and hated by one’s mother.”
“—”
The image of Sawako in her moss rose garden surfaced in Takaya’s mind. The mother who, smiling, gazed after her child—a child that was not himself.
“That’s....not true.”
“?”
“It doesn’t have anything to do with your parents. I’m me. I made myself, I raised myself, so what’s so special about it? Everyone’s the same. The origin or whatever doesn’t matter anymore, does it?”
“... Doesn’t matter anymore, hmm?”
“If you look at faults, in the end they’re just the same as people everywhere. But children don’t complain, no matter what kind of good-for-nothings they live with. ‘Cause even if they think ’why do I have parents like that?’, they can’t do anything about it. So even if they just have to accept it, even if they can’t do anything but bear the mistakes of their parents, are they still supposed to go and say ‘thank you for giving me birth?!’”
Masamune was silent.
“Mother or child, in the end they were all so you could be cute. If you’re protected, if you’re happy, then to hell with the children. If you can run away on your own and leave us behind, then you must not even have cared about our feelings at all...!”
Takaya abruptly returned to himself. He shut his mouth, disconcerted. Masamune’s eye lowered quietly.
“... Thou must treasure thy mother greatly.”
Takaya’s head lifted.
“I know not the circumstances, but I believe thou dost. Last night in thy delirium thou didst call out for thy mother.”
(Wh...!)
Takaya reddened. But before he could rush into an explanation, Masamune added, “My mind is disturbed.”
“...?”
“Yet, though she is important to me, I cannot help but tire of her as mine enemy.”
Takaya looked curiously at Masamune, who had a lost expression in his upward gaze.
“You—”
“My mother... was once the Demon Princess of the Ouu, she who attempted to end my life with poison. She and my younger brother, Kojirou, desire to invade Sendai.”
“!”
“She has sided with mine old enemy Mogami.”
With those words, Masamune began walking towards the Kansenden. Takaya was somewhat startled, but looking at Masamune’s lonely figure, unthinkingly ran to catch up.
“Wait! Stop leaving me behind!”
Masamune stopped and turned.
“I’ll probably...”
“?”
“I’ll probably wipe you out of this world. Are you really okay with that? If I end up forcing you to go.”
Masamune’s single eye smiled.
“That, too, shall be fine.”
Kojuurou was waiting for them on the stone stairs. He greeted them with a slight smile.
“Welcome back, my lord.”
“Mmm. Hast thou sensed any suspicious presences?”
“Nay. This is truly the sacred precincts of the Date; few spirits are allowed to approach. My lord has enjoyed a long conversation, it seems.”
“Aye. I was proud simply to speak of my mausoleum.” Masamune gave a great booming laugh.
A line appeared between Takaya’s brows. —Evidently, an inexperienced youngster like himself could not converse on an equal level; Masamune was too large a handful to get a grip on.
(So, this is the One-Eyed Dragon Masamune...)
The tiger was still too young to challenge the dragon soaring across the sky, it seemed.
Kojuurou followed protectively behind his master as he walked off. Looking at them, Takaya suddenly noticed: (That’s...)
Kojuurou unexpectedly blurred in his mind.
(He reminds me of someone—)
Master and retainer walked ahead, exchanging jests. Kojuurou’s affection and respect for Masamune were plain in every word of his soft, deadpan replies. And he had seen the love and sternness in those eyes somewhere before...
Takaya suddenly remembered as they descended the hill.
(Of course—...)
His face appeared in Sendai’s sky.
(Naoe— He reminds me of you...)
The wind rippled through the treetops.
A flight of birds took wing from Kyougamine.
When the three of them returned to the mansion—
“?”
In front of the door stood a man in a white coat who looked as if he were waiting for someone. One look at his face and Takaya reacted with startled recognition.
(! He’s the guy from yesterday!)
It was the suspicious young man he’d seen in front of Sawako’s house yesterday.
Not noticing Takaya’s agitation, Masamune hailed the young man.
“How now, couldst thou not have waited within for our return?”
Takaya started a second time.
(Do they know each other?)
Leaning against the plaster wall, the beautiful young man smiled at Takaya.
“Well, well. We met yesterday, I believe.”
“... Hi,” Takaya greeted him dubiously. He appeared to have remembered as well.
The young man said to Masamune, “’Tis about time for me depart. But first I wished to take my leave of you, Dono.”
“Wilt thou be returning home?”
“I do not believe I have yet heard your reply. And there is also this.”
Kousaka extracted a golden rod wrapped in cloth from his pocket. It was without a doubt the tokko belonging to the woman from last night.
(Th...!) Takaya’s eyes widened. (Why does he have that!)
“This is the tokko left by the Mogami last night. She appeared to be using this ritual implement to perform an invocation of the dead.”
“...!”
Takaya looked at the young man in amazement. So he knew of the invocation of the dead too? Then could it have been this man who had saved him last night?
(Then he was also the one who took out that woman and carried me here...?)
“Was that you?”
Kousaka gave him a quick sideways glance, but continued speaking to Masamune without answering him.
"The destruction of the building was the earth-purification (cleansing and removal of various things, such as impurities, from the earth) required for an invocation. It was apparently for the establishment of a ‘platform’ for the invocation. Of course, this vajra tokko was for the creation of a barrier around the ‘platform’.
“A spell for an invocation of the dead, hmm? Yet why such obsession over the choice of location? Why that spot and no other? Some grand design must lie behind these invocations to require such monstrous acts simply for the creation of these ‘platforms’—thus do I believe”.
“That is something I still do not know. On this tokko, the «feel» of the user still remains. It should be possible to track the movement of aural disturbances with this scent. Although—” Kousaka chuckled. “I know not whether the Date has someone of those abilities.”
“!”
Kousaka handed the tokko to Masamune.
“I shall seek your reply another day.”
Kousaka left with those parting words. Masamune and the others watched him go off with indignation.
“Who is that guy?”
“—”
Masamune muttered disgustedly, “One whom I cannot see into.”
“?”
“[[Kousaka Danjou Masanobu]]. He is the one I spoke of as our guest.”
“! Kousaka Danjou!” Takaya exclaimed sharply and turned back, but Kousaka’s shadow had already disappeared around the corner. But—
(Kousaka Danjou—the guy who resurrected Takeda Shingen...?!)
In the incident that had happened previously in Matsumoto.
Which meant that he was the one who had caused Yuzuru to be possessed by Shingen!
(He couldn’t have...!)
“Do not let down thy guard. There is slyness in his eyes. He will certainly act as Shigezane predicted,” Masamune muttered, and Takaya turned sharply back to him.
Reawakened wariness.
(Is he connected to Takeda?)
Misgivings blossomed in his heart.
(Is Takeda behind Date?)
Takaya’s eyes began to burn with hostility.
In deep thought, Masamune was still gazing fixedly at the spot where Kousaka had moved out of sight.
The ominous shadow of a woman observing them blended into the shadows of the wall.
He left Masamune’s mansion that evening. Since he wasn’t familiar with the place, he had no choice but to go as far as the city and call Ayako to come pick him up.
He’d thought that Masamune might try to detain him, but surprisingly, he’d been allowed to leave with no objections at all. If they were connected with Takeda, there was a great possibility that they knew he was Kagetora. He had no clue what Masamune was thinking for letting such a dangerous person slip out from under his nose; maybe he was being left to sink or swim on his own, or did Masamune simply not fear Kagetora’s «power» at all?
(But if they really have no ambition other than to protect Sendai—)
For the time being, their aims were the same.
(But is he really letting me go?) Takaya wondered, and quickly looked around him.
No, he couldn’t dismiss it so lightly. Not when he was dealing with the famous One-Eyed Dragon Masamune. He had probably said those things to take advantage of Takaya’s naiveté and use him to expand Date’s power in the «Yami-Sengoku».
(I can’t trust the onryou.)
Takaya began walking towards the twilight city of Sendai.
“Ka-Kagetora!”
Ayako had driven to the designated rendezvous, the front entrance of an arcade facing a main street in the center of town. It was a little past 6:30. Ayako got off Kokuryou’s white Laurel, stomped towards Takaya straddling the guardrail, and suddenly—
Whack!
—slapped Takaya’s face hard.
"Oo...
He stared dumbfounded at Ayako. They were abruptly drawing the attention of pedestrians waiting for a walk signal.
“...ooow. What the hell was that for, dammit!”
“Argh, geez! What the heck do you think you were doing?! Giving me one call and not even telling me where you were? Where have you been maraudering around, anyway?!”
“Well, you didn’t have to hit me, sheesh!”
“Naoe would’ve blown a gasket if anything had happened to you, and then I would’ve been hearing it!”
Abbot Kokuryou alighted from the passenger side and rushed over to mediate.
“All right, all right. Let us not brawl in the middle of the street. It’s indecent.”
“Bu-but this child—geez!”
“But he came back safe and sound, so everything is all right, yes?”
Ayako sulked, disgruntled. Abashed, Takaya pressed a hand against his injured cheek. Kokuryou looked him over and commented, “You don’t seem to have received any major injuries. No, Ayako-san was truly worried about you. I have heard that a young woman was found lying at the university site this morning and was taken to the hospital... I thought that it might have had something to do with you...”
“A woman? Has she regained consciousness yet?”
Ayako and Kokuryou looked at each other as if to say, “So it is true.”
“She woke up at the hospital, but claimed that she does not remember anything of why she was there or what she was doing.”
Takaya’s expression turned cold. “—Was she possessed?”
“So you really did see that woman last night, right? Which means some onshou made her their spiritual vessel and came to perform the invocation of the dead?”
“Yeah.”
“Then it is the Date who’re doing it...”
“Actually, it’s not,” Takaya flatly cut her off, and Ayako gave him a strange look. “Ah, er... I mean, I don’t think it is. Most likely.”
“It’s not Date? Then who—” Ayako was taken aback. “Mogami? You’re saying that Mogami’s onshou is the one responsible for the invocations?”
“Probably. I think we can believe that much.”
“Believe? Kagetora...?” Ayako peered at Takaya. “What does that mean?”
“Um. Well...”
It was Kokuryou who guessed the truth and asked the question. “Where did you go after the university? What were you doing? You met someone, did you not?”
“—”
“Something has given you a lead, yes?”
Takaya mumbled inarticulately, “...well, you know, um, Sendai is, er, Date’s base, right? So, yeah, they wouldn’t go around destroying their own city—”
“I don’t know about that. They’re probably trying to gain control of society like Shingen was.”
“That’s totally not it,” Takaya was about to say, and stopped as he suddenly thought, (Wait a minute...)
There was contact between Date and Takeda. Didn’t that mean that even if such was not Date’s intent, Takeda would probably be aiming for Sendai?
(But still, that guy called Kousaka rescued me—)
“Argh, geez! What the heck happened, Kagetora! Who did you meet? Just tell me!”
“Ah...woah...”
Takaya squirmed against Ayako’s grip on his collar. Kokuryou cut him off.
“Could it be, young monk... Did you meet someone from the Date?”
Ayako whipped around to looked at Kokuryou, and immediately whipped back to Takaya.
“Is that true, Kagetora?”
“Ah. Well...”
“Wh-why didn’t you say anything about something this important earlier!”
“S-stop shaking me!”
“However, Ayako-san...”
Ayako abruptly let go of Takaya and turned to Kokuryou.
“This means that the barrier now being erected around Sendai was not created for Date, but Mogami?”
“Barrier?”
Takaya pushed past Ayako to ask Kokuryou. “What’re you talking about?! This city is in the middle of some kinda barrier?”
“Those incidents of structure collapses were expressly for the foundation of a barrier that would be constructed around Sendai,” Ayako replied behind him. “We finally figured it out after the fifth incident occurred. If you plot the destroyed structures on a map, they all land on the parameter of a circle with a radius that’s just about 1.5 kilometers from the center of the city. So it looks like they want to build a barrier within this circle.”
“A barrier to do what?”
“Well. Even if they’re all called barriers, various kinds have different properties. Some block outside influences from contaminating a ritual, some make it easier for the makers to use their powers, some bring out the special effects of a particular spell... There’re lots of ways to make them too; the simplest is to encircle an area with small pebbles—even a line drawn on the ground can become a ‘barrier’.”
Using spell ‘platforms’, a large-scale barrier encircling the city could be built. In other words, the destruction of structures established a ‘platform’ to perform the spell known as the invocation of the dead, each of which created one barrier point.
“So the invocations of the dead are summoning spirits to the barrier points. Their power provides energy to strengthen those points. When performed in a circular pattern, a circular barrier can be raised.”
“Then what would the barrier be for? Would Mogami be using it to amplify their powers so that they can take over Sendai or something...?”
“An amplification barrier, hmm? That’s not out of the question, but it looks like this barrier isn’t as simple as that.”
“Huh—?”
Ayako scowled. She had taken two days to perform a very detailed spiritual sensing, but the properties of the encircling barrier had not been so simply divined.
“And it looks like the maker has a considerable amount of power. Frankly, it’s pretty much impossible to figure out what effects this barrier will have before it’s completed.”
“But wouldn’t it be too late if we wait until the barrier is complete to see its effects?”
“That’s true. I’ve said that the «mood» of the earth has changed, right? I thought that it was the distribution balance of spirits in the land crumbling because of the invocations of the dead, but it looks like I was wrong.”
“Wrong...? So...”
“So I wonder if the «mood» of Sendai is changing because of some other spell being performed. The spiritual sensing I performed told me that the ‘platforms’ at the building collapse sites were being used to conduct spells other than the invocations.”
“Spells that are manipulating the «mood» of the city?”
“Yeah,” Ayako said seriously. “What’s bad is that mixed up in all of this is a spell that appears to use spirit foxes called ‘koko’.”
“Spirit foxes?”
“Yeah. Sendai’s «mood» is entwined with the ‘kodoku’ of the foxes. I’m not totally sure about this, but. I think that the other spell that’s being performed here involves ‘the Way of Dakiniten’.”
(The Way of Dakiniten?)
Just as Takaya was about to inquire further.
Another voice from the hustle and bustle of the city suddenly called his name.
“Takaya...?”
“Ah”—Takaya’s shoulders trembled.
“Oh?” Kokuryou thought, turning, and the surprised Ayako looked in the same direction.
“Takaya. It’s you, isn’t it? Takaya...?”
A woman’s voice. A full, familiar voice.
Kokuryou and Ayako’s eyes widened at the small woman who had called out Takaya’s name. She said again, “You’re Takaya, aren’t you? You are, aren’t you? Takaya.”
He turned as if bespelled.
A sweet-looking woman stood there with her shopping bags.
There was a energetic-looking elementary school-age boy with her.
The two from the moss rose garden...
Takaya stood transfixed.
(Mom—)