Chapter 80: The Clarity of Heaven and Earth
The night wind had changed.
Standing atop the lookout tower of Kaede Village, Kikyo let the longbow at her side hang loose. She closed her eyes.
For a priestess of her spiritual magnitude, sight was often a redundancy. The wind carried whispers from afar, and the earth transmitted the faintest vibrations through the soles of her feet. Among humans, monks and miko were inherently more attuned to perception than they were to brute physical strength.
And in this moment, Kikyo felt it all with stunning clarity.
Even before this night, she had sensed the state of Suruga Province, far to the west of the village. The malevolent, seething Yao Qi that had once coiled over the region like a thunderhead poised to burst had completely vanished.
In its place was a new presence.
It was Hikaru's demonic aura—untainted, turbid, yet utterly devoid of resentment. Not only had he won, but a lingering resonance of thunder now clung to his own energy. She could feel that the very nature of that power had shifted. The wild, untamed lightning she had sensed before was now… leashed. It coiled submissively around the frigid aura of the Oni Samurai, a ferocious beast turned into a hunter's loyal hound.
He had claimed the Thunder Beast's power as his own.
Though she couldn't fathom the means he had employed, that crackling lightning was undeniably bound to Hikaru's presence, moving with him.
And that was only the beginning.
Next, her senses turned south, toward the lands of the Hojo clan's main branch. There, a demonic aura belonging to insects had loomed, so pervasive that its foulness could induce a tightness in one's chest even from dozens of miles away.
But now, that stench was dissipating. In its place, she felt the echo of an explosive, deafening roar.
Was that… heavenly judgment?
It was him. It was Hikaru.
Wielding the lightning he had just conquered, he must have rushed a hundred miles south to bring its divine punishment down upon the head of that insect demon. Insects feared fire, but they feared thunder even more. Under that cataclysmic strike, all the cold, dampness, and corrosion would have been evaporated by the pure, masculine power of the storm.
It was as if that part of the world had been washed clean, rendered pristine and clear.
"The second one," Kikyo counted softly.
Then she felt westward again, where a toxic Yao Qi had festered. It, too, was gone.
Finally, she turned her senses to the east. That demonic aura was eerie and strange, carrying the cloying smell of decay and the unquiet dead. But this scent, perhaps, was the most familiar of all to Hikaru. He was an Oni Samurai, after all—a dead man who played with bone and blood.
Kikyo could almost picture the scene: Hikaru standing before that necromantic demon, watching its corpse puppets sway and twitch. She imagined that beneath his crimson ghost mask, a stiff, mocking smile might have formed on his lips.
Then, in the next instant, a crimson mist of blood would have erupted, turning the tables completely.
The Yao Qi in the east vanished as well.
In a single night, the demonic miasma choking the four cardinal directions had been utterly purged. This was that man's way. No defense. Only offense. Extinguishing every threat at its source.
Though she had not been there to witness it, Kikyo felt as if she had seen every one of Hikaru's battles. She could sense the demon in the form of a young man, the Oni Samurai, unleashing his terrible prowess.
He really is…
'Quite remarkable, isn't he?'
A clear, pleasant voice suddenly echoed in Kikyo's mind. The priestess's eyelashes trembled as she slowly opened her beautiful eyes, her gaze falling to the Shikon Jewel on her chest, which was emitting a faint, pure glow.
It was Naohi speaking.
Though she lacked a system like Hikaru's, as the guardian chosen by the jewel, Kikyo could commune with the will of the Naohi dwelling within it.
She gave a slight, almost imperceptible nod. She agreed wholeheartedly with Naohi's sentiment.
That Oni Samurai… that incredible demon who fought alongside her…
In truth, once Hikaru had successfully subjugated the Thunder Beast, his subsequent victories were all but inevitable. By holding the Thunder Beast's Horn, he could use his strange connection with it to wield the lightning sealed within. The demons that followed—Gakimaru, the Venomous Flood Dragon, and the Nekomata—had to face not just Hikaru, but the overwhelming power of the storm as well. He could even draw strength from the corpses of other demons, so long as their bodies remained.
Of course, Kikyo did not know this last part. But that ignorance did nothing to hinder her rising spirits.
For a fleeting moment, a faint curve graced the corner of Kikyo's lips.
But in the next second, that nascent smile froze solid.
She snapped her head around, her gaze piercing the night beyond the village, past the sacred barrier she had erected. Moments ago, dense crowds of low-level demons had been gathered there—wolf demons, ghosts, and a chaotic mix of chimi-moryo. Though they couldn't breach her barrier, their constant howling and scratching created an irritating, grating noise. Kikyo had intended to let them gather in greater numbers before dealing with them all at once; while it wouldn't save her spiritual power, it would conserve her more limited physical stamina.
But now…
It was quiet.
Deathly quiet.
The howls, the scratching, the thudding footsteps—all of it had vanished in an instant.
But it was only the sound that had disappeared.
Kikyo's pupils constricted. She saw it.
Outside the barrier, hundreds of demons were still frozen in their attacking postures. A wolf demon's maw was stretched wide, its fangs a mere inch from the shimmering barrier, a string of saliva hanging impossibly in mid-air, no longer dripping. A hulking ghost held a bone club aloft, its muscles tensed for a strike, yet it was locked in place above its head, utterly motionless.
They weren't dead. It wasn't just their bodies that were frozen.
The very fabric of time and space in that area felt as if it had been forcibly stopped by some terrifying, beyond understanding power.
The wind stopped. The leaves on the trees ceased their swaying. Even the dust motes hung suspended in the air.
This was absolutely not something those lesser demons could accomplish. It wasn't even within the power of the four so-called vanguards she had sensed earlier.
This oppressive presence…
Kikyo's grip tightened on her longbow, her knuckles turning white.
Then, a mist began to rise. Black mist, seeping up from the ground, silently swallowing the motionless demons. Amidst the churning black fog, the sound of footsteps rang out.
They were very slow. And very heavy.
An aged figure slowly emerged from the depths of the mist. It was an old man. He wore an old, grey kimono, with a haori embroidered with dull, faded patterns draped over his shoulders. His hair was a stark, greyish-white, combed back with careful care. He leaned on a long sword, its scabbard as pitch-black as charred wood.
He had the air of an aged noble who had stepped out of a deep palace courtyard, a man accustomed to wielding great power. But in this era, even the most powerful nobles were still just mortals.
This man was different.
Because before him, all things seemed to freeze. Because wherever he walked, the static forms of the demons he passed crumbled into fine powder.
"I have heard of your great name for a long time," the old man said, stopping just before the barrier. He looked up, and on his wrinkled face, a smile appeared—kind, yet utterly bone-chilling.
"The priestess of Musashi Province, known by the people of this age as the strongest of all her kind."
"Kikyo."
Kikyo did not speak. She had already recognized this person. Or rather, this demon.
He was the one whose name Hikaru had spoken before he left.
The Great Yokai who had followed Shuten-doji to ravage Kyoto from Mount Oe hundreds of years ago—an existence that had once proven troublesome even for Minamoto no Yorimitsu, the legendary guardian of Heian-kyo.
He was the mastermind behind this entire incident.
Kidomaru.
He had arrived. Not at the very end, as she might have expected. But at the precise moment Hikaru had finished clearing the surroundings, when Kaede Village's defenses were at their most vulnerable.
He had come in person.
Kikyo raised the bow and arrow in her hand, the movement fluid and deliberate.
She saw him pause outside her barrier, his ancient eyes locking onto her. She heard him speak again, his voice slow and measured. "The thing in your hand, the Shikon Jewel…"
His gaze was heavy, his voice aged and rasping, as if squeezed from the very depths of his throat.
"This old man shall take it."
The words were weathered and cold, carrying a finality that sent a tremor through the frozen night.
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