Chapter 174: Totosai, What Do You Mean You Heard the Voice of the Earth?
The third day.
It had been exactly three days since the expeditionary group departed from the Imagawa Main Castle.
They had come up empty at the first two locations. While it wasn't a complete waste of time and resources, they indeed had not found their target.
The first location had been a geothermal vent nestled deep within the western mountains of Suruga. The sweltering cave held distinct traces of recent smelting: scorched slag piled in the corners, shattered crucible fragments dusted with ash, and a discarded iron tong left near the vent's edge. But the occupant was long gone. Based on the residual soot and the coldness of the tools, the traces were judged to be at least half a month old.
The second location was situated beside an abandoned, echoing mine in the eastern reaches of Totomi Province. At the bottom of a steep pit sat a simple forging furnace that had been hastily, yet methodically, dismantled. The residual heat within the stone bricks had long since dissipated into the damp air. Heavy ox hoof prints were stamped deeply into the mud, extending steadily toward the southwest before vanishing completely into a rushing stream.
Two empty attempts.
Kobe Hikaru was not in a hurry. His undead nature afforded him a vast reservoir of patience.
Imagawa Yoshimoto, however, was growing anxious. Her fretfulness had nothing to do with Totosai, but rather the fact that she had been away from the main castle for three full days. If she didn't return soon, the bureaucratic government affairs of Suruga would pile up high enough to bury her desk.
In the sweltering afternoon of the third day, the group finally crossed the last jagged mountain ridge along the winding path in the southwestern direction of Totomi Province.
Then, they stopped.
The entire procession ground to a halt.
Ahead of them lay their final destination: a small, solitary volcano.
Calling it a proper volcano was almost generous; it looked more like a massive earthen mound that had its peak cleanly sliced off by a giant's blade. It stood no more than a hundred zhang high. The mountain's body was a violent, bright red, and the exposed, jagged rock layers were covered with thick, solidified lava patterns that spider-webbed across the surface like dried-up blood vessels. Thin, acrid white smoke rose lazily from the crater at the summit, with occasional flashes of angry orange-red light peeking through the suffocating haze.
The air itself felt heavy, thick with the choking stench of sulfur and molten rock.
The ground beneath their sandals was uncomfortably hot. The closer they drew to the base, the higher the temperature spiked. There were no living trees for miles around—every piece of vegetation had been scorched to death by the intense geothermal heat, leaving only grayish-white, withered stumps standing haphazardly like tombstones in a dead land.
Yoshimoto lifted the heavy fabric curtain of her palanquin and poked half her head out, her brows knitting together as she stared at the smoking mound.
"Is this the place?"
"The last marked point on the map," Hikaru replied.
The Oni Samurai stood at the very front of the procession, his Crimson Demon Eyes fixed unblinkingly on the churning crater.
If Totosai wasn't here—if all three painstakingly gathered clues resulted in failure—they would have no choice but to return to Suruga. Afterward, Hikaru would have to rely on the Tanuki Spirit and the Yokai of Tono to drastically expand their search network, and there was no telling how many months that would take.
Though he possessed endless patience, he preferred to save time and avoid unnecessary trouble.
Doing things right the first time was always the most efficient path.
The Oni Samurai kept his thoughts to himself as he took a few deliberate steps forward.
Thick blood mist bled from beneath his straw sandals, rolling rapidly along the cracked, heated ground toward the volcano, acting as a massive, hyper-sensitive sensory net.
Fifty steps. A hundred steps.
Two hundred paces.
The moment the leading edge of his blood mist brushed against the jagged rock layers at the base of the volcano—
He sensed it. Yao Qi.
Thick, heavy Turbid Qi seeped sluggishly from the deep crevices in the rock. It was a Yao Qi that was neither fiercely aggressive nor tyrannical. Instead, it carried the distinct, metallic scent of iron and stone, the blistering temperature of a roaring furnace fire, and seemed to possess the rhythmic, beating cadence of a heavy hammer striking an anvil.
This was Yao Qi that had been entirely devoted to the art of forging.
Only a demon who had spent centuries accompanied by nothing but a blazing furnace would emit such a uniquely tempered aura.
The corners of Hikaru's mouth curled upward slightly.
He knew it. He had found his target.
He was just about to step closer to initiate contact. As for how to properly greet the legendary blacksmith, Hikaru had already formulated a plan and made full preparations.
However, in the very next second, chaos erupted.
Just as his foot lifted to step forward, the entity inside the crater seemed to have sensed his probing blood mist in advance.
The volcano violently erupted.
A thick, blinding pillar of liquid fire suddenly blasted from the crater, accompanied by a deafening roar. The flames soared dozens of zhang into the sky, instantly incinerating and dispersing all the surrounding white smoke.
Surging out alongside the inferno was a hidden, skyrocketing Yao Qi that washed over the landscape like a physical wave.
According to Hikaru's internal grading criteria, this aura had reached at least the Seventh Transformation or higher, achieving a complete qualitative change in density., its concentration was staggeringly high, and its foundational roots were incredibly deep.
It far surpassed the pressure of any ordinary high-level demon.
This was a 'senior' entity, one that had existed and refined its craft for at least several hundred years.
Beneath this terrifying lava eruption, the Ashigaru at the rear of the group broke into a panic, their formations wavering. The spearmen in the front row subconsciously raised their polearms, hands trembling, while the archers in the back row frantically drew their bowstrings and notched arrows. The leading samurai immediately drew his katana, stepping firmly in front of the daimyo's palanquin to shield it.
Motoyasu jolted awake from her nap on the straw mat. She hurriedly fumbled to shove her glasses onto her face, her breath hitching as she shrank back and hid behind the heavy wooden wheels of the palanquin.
Yoshimoto leaned further out from behind the curtain, her knuckles turning white as she gripped her folding fan tightly. Her expression was grave, but she maintained her composure, refusing to show fear in front of her retainers.
She kept her eyes fixed solely on Hikaru's back at the very front.
Everyone's attention was drawn to the center of the roaring fire pillar erupting from the low crater.
A figure came charging out of the flames.
He was incredibly small.
Barely over four feet tall, the figure possessed a hunched, frail-looking frame and a massive head that took up a full third of his body weight. He was balding, his face heavily mapped with deep wrinkles, and a pair of massive, bulging eyeballs darted rapidly in the harsh firelight.
He wore a coarse cloth short coat that was heavily scorched black at the edges, and straw sandals on his feet that were nearly burnt straight through at the soles. Tucked securely into his waist sash was a massive iron hammer, its head easily larger than the old man's entire torso.
He was riding a bull.
It wasn't an ordinary beast of burden, but a bizarre, massive black bull with three glowing eyes, a pitch-black muscular body, and four heavy hooves that stepped directly on swirling flames. It came wobbling out of the crater, literally flying through the boiling air.
The bull was flying in the sky.
The old man clung desperately to the bull's back.
And the exact moment he burst out of the smoke—
A sharp, panicked shriek erupted from the old man's mouth. The roaring flames drowned out the sound for the ordinary soldiers, but Hikaru, relying on the sensory expansion of his blood mist and the acute vision of his Spirit-Tracking Archer Transformation, 'saw' and perfectly deciphered the frantic movements of his lips.
"Oh no! I've been found!"
Looking at the old man's wildly shifting eyes and trembling hands, he appeared to be in a state of absolute, unadulterated terror.
Amidst these frantic words and panicked looks, the old man suddenly yanked violently on the bull's horns. The Three-Eyed Fire Ox let out a low bellow and made a sharp, physics-defying turn in mid-air. The flames on its four hooves jetted outward, accelerating the beast as it tried to flee desperately toward the southwest.
He wanted to run.
Without even launching a probe, without even squinting to see clearly who the other party was, he simply turned his mount and fled for his life.
A bird startled by the mere twang of a bowstring.
Nothing could be more appropriate to describe the legendary blacksmith's current state.
Hikaru watched the black dot receding at extreme speed, his Crimson Demon Eyes narrowing slightly in calculation.
That was Totosai.
There was absolutely no mistake.
A small, eccentric old demon, riding a flying bull, living inside an active volcano—it matched all the known intelligence perfectly.
But what the Oni Samurai hadn't expected was that this cowardly fellow would run so incredibly fast. The sheer acceleration of that Three-Eyed Fire Ox didn't seem to be a single fraction below Hikaru's normal sprinting speed when his Thunder Muscle was fully active.
What surprised him even more was the aura.
The Yao Qi.
The sheer concentration of Yao Qi emitted by that small, hunched old man was truly extraordinarily high. It was suffocatingly dense.
If measured by the number of transformations—
Ninth Transformation.
Exactly the same tier as Hikaru himself.
Was this truly the Swordsmith who once served the Great General of the Dog Clan, Toga? Just a craftsman, not even a dedicated combatant, yet he possessed this terrifying level of transformation and this bottomless well of Yao Qi.
The Lord of the Western Lands, Toga, was indeed one of the few terrifying existences capable of establishing a true demon kingdom in a world heavily dominated by humans.
But regardless of his pedigree, now that Hikaru had finally found him, he naturally couldn't allow the old man to simply fly away.
Hikaru raised his hand. His bone-white demon mask condensed from thin air and he slotted it firmly over his face.
The Crimson Demon Eyes flared to life, glowing dangerously from within the narrow slits of the mask.
Heavy, dark demon armor covered his body in an instant, and jagged Bone Spikes erupted to surround his shoulders and forearms.
He didn't turn back as he shouted to the group behind him.
"Wait here."
Violent purple electrical arcs exploded from beneath his feet, instantly shattering the volcanic rock ground as he kicked off with explosive force.
His grey figure turned into a blinding streak of purple light, giving chase into the sky.
Purple lightning subsequently tore through the thick white smoke lingering above the volcano.
Hikaru's speed reached its absolute limit the moment he burst out with full force. His base speed, after the Thunder Muscle had deeply seeped into his marrow, already exceeded his previous full-power level. Now, fully unleashed, purple electrical arcs continuously detonated from the soles of his feet, each step leaving a brief, crackling lightning afterimage suspended in the air.
But that Three-Eyed Fire Ox was no slow beast.
The flames on its four hooves jetted outward, transforming into four concentrated orange-red exhaust trails as it accelerated. Like four ignited rockets, the beast dragged long, sweeping smoke trails across the sky as it bolted frantically toward the southwest.
The small old man on the bull's back huddled tightly between the massive horns, his bald head reflecting the harsh orange light of the crater below. His heavily wrinkled face was squeezed into a tight bunch, and his bulging eyeballs stared so hard against the wind pressure they looked ready to pop straight out of their sockets.
He was literally breathing fire.
And it wasn't just coming from his mouth; his entire body was emitting intense heat. Beneath that scorched coarse cloth coat, dark red Yao Qi seeped from his aged skin like flowing lava, condensing into a thin, protective shell of fire that enveloped his entire person in a barrier of flowing flames.
The fire ox was also emitting its own blaze.
Its three eyes simultaneously shot out thick, orange-red pillars of light. It wasn't an offensive attack, but rather a simple, brute-force method of illumination—it was violently clearing its own path through the air. Wherever the light pillars swept, the atmosphere was scorched into visible, rippling distortions.
The escape posture of this demon and his bull was full-force and entirely resolute, without even a single hint of hesitation.
Hikaru, however, used an even greater burst of speed to flank them directly. A jagged purple lightning arc curved sharply through the air, intercepting and blocking the fire ox's path to the southwest.
He spoke, his tone calm but carrying immense weight.
"Totosai!"
His voice, heavily wrapped in dense Yao Qi, was sent out and exploded like thunder in the air.
However, the old man's reaction was even faster than anticipated.
The Three-Eyed Fire Ox suddenly jerked violently to the left, the direction of its hoof flame jets shifting instantly. The entire massive bull drew a near-right-angle turn in mid-air, defying all momentum, and bolted wildly toward the south.
He didn't even dare to look back.
"I'm not here to fight—"
Hikaru chased after him, thick blood mist spreading rapidly from his body's surface in an attempt to lash out and entangle the fire ox's hind hooves.
But as soon as the blood mist touched the outer edge of the beast's flames, it was instantly evaporated into useless white steam by the sheer high temperature.
The old man's voice drifted back from ahead, sharp, panicked, and punctuated with heavy coughing.
"Don't try to fool this old man! The last one who said he wasn't here to fight smashed my forge to pieces! The one before that who said he just wanted to talk nearly twisted my head clean off my neck!"
He was highly likely talking about Sesshomaru or some other terrifyingly powerful Great Yokai.
Hikaru could actually understand this extreme stress response. Totosai was Toga's personal, legendary Swordsmith. Since Toga's death, countless ambitious demons and even Great Yokais had violently coveted his peerless craftsmanship.
Those who possessed the strength and resources to actually find him would certainly not be weak.
He had been chased, threatened, and beaten into a permanent state of paranoia.
Fleeing had simply become his base instinct.
"I have something I want to ask you to help reforge—" Hikaru tried again, his voice cutting through the wind.
"No forging! This old man has sealed his furnace! I won't forge for anyone!"
"I can pay a substantial reward—"
"I don't want it! This old man doesn't lack for anything!"
"Listen to me finish—"
"Not listening!"
The fire ox violently changed direction once again, this time charging recklessly toward the east. Its speed increased rather than decreased. The old man suddenly pulled out that massive iron hammer from his waist, its head larger than his own torso, and swung it violently behind him without looking.
The demonic power condensed on the heavy hammer head turned into a dense, fist-sized fireball, blasting directly toward Hikaru's face.
The fireball's temperature was extremely high, but its actual kinetic power was limited—it was purely a distraction tactic.
Like a panicked octopus squirting ink to escape a predator.
Hikaru simply sidestepped in mid-air to avoid the fireball, and purple electrical arcs exploded beneath his feet once more, propelling him forward.
Just like that, the bizarre chase continued for nearly half a quarter-hour, the two of them essentially circling in place above the volcanic wasteland.
The top speed of the fire ox this old man was riding was not inferior to his own, and its mid-air direction changes were extremely flexible. Its maneuverability in the sky far exceeded that of any ordinary flying demon Hikaru had ever encountered.
Every single time its path was blocked, it would immediately pivot, never traveling in a straight, predictable line.
Hikaru could easily keep up, but he couldn't securely catch them without escalating the situation.
, the Oni Samurai knew that even if he physically caught the blacksmith, it would be incredibly difficult to keep him under control without causing harm. The opponent also possessed Ninth Transformation level Yao Qi.
Although as a dedicated Swordsmith he certainly wouldn't be skilled in actual life-or-death combat, the sheer concentration and deep foundation of his Yao Qi were undeniably present. Simply using his own Yao Qi to suppress the old man would be quite a grueling struggle if the opponent decided to violently resist.
In that case... he wouldn't bother being polite anymore.
Hikaru stopped dead in mid-air.
The crackling purple electrical arcs retracted into his body.
A dense forest of white bones rapidly rose from both sides of his spine. Thick White Bone Spikes wove together into a massive, heavily armored frame, and violent purple thunder burst forth from the gaps in the bones, filling in the empty spaces as crackling muscle.
Thick blood mist condensed rapidly over the structure, forming a tough, translucent skin.
The terrifying, six-meter-tall Bone-Thunder Giant Body took full shape above the smoking volcano.
Asura Transformation.
A massive, imposing humanoid figure hovered in the sky against the backdrop of the orange-red volcano, its intense purple radiance illuminating the barren wasteland for hundreds of paces in every direction.
From Yoshimoto's group in the far distance came the shocked exclamations of the Ashigaru, followed immediately by Motoyasu's sharp shout of alarm—it was her very first time seeing Hikaru unleash such a monstrous form.
Totosai also finally turned back.
He couldn't ignore the massive spike in pressure.
Upon seeing that towering, six-meter-tall Bone-Thunder Giant Body crackling with purple lightning, his bulging eyes instantly widened to the size of brass copper bells.
"A-Asura——!?"
His tone had completely pitched into sheer terror, but he did not stop his frantic movements.
In fact, he pushed his mount even harder.
The flames jetting from the four hooves of the Three-Eyed Fire Ox seemed to finally reach their absolute limit, shifting rapidly from orange-red to a blinding, scorching blue-white, and its speed surged exponentially—
The massive right arm of the Asura Transformation swept across the sky.
The gigantic bone arm traced a heavy, inescapable arc through the air, trailing violent purple lightning, and completely blocked the Three-Eyed Fire Ox's only path of escape.
Spirit-Tracking Archer. Strike, and it will hit.
Interception.
It was exactly like swatting a particularly fast, buzzing fly.
The Three-Eyed Fire Ox slammed violently into the side of the dense bone arm.
The kinetic impact was immense, sending shockwaves rippling through the air—but the reinforced skeleton of the Asura Transformation did not budge in the slightest.
Ninth Transformation against Ninth Transformation; the foundational structure was the same, but the actual content was completely different.
Hikaru's Ninth Transformation was a volatile chain of qualitative changes that occurred when three heavily overloaded transformations burst simultaneously; it was the combined, terrifying product of the Spirit-Tracking Archer Transformation, Thunder Muscle, and Bone Soul Transformation, further amplified by the massive projection of the Asura Transformation. The actual combat output was equivalent to twice that of normal, equivalent transformations.
As for Totosai's Ninth Transformation, it was clearly just the raw foundation of Yao Qi accumulated over centuries of endless forging—heavy, steady, and incredibly dense, but entirely focused on the art of smithing. While his raw physical strength, relying on centuries of accumulation, would not be inferior to a Yokai of the same level, that was absolutely all there was to it.
It was exactly like a mortal blacksmith who had trained his arm strength by hammering iron for hundreds of years; his raw strength was indeed great, but if he were sent to the battlefield to fight, encountering a seasoned warrior with pure killing technique and not-insignificant strength—he would certainly not meet a good end.
He was completely blocked.
The Three-Eyed Fire Ox bounced hard off the side of the unyielding bone arm and tumbled helplessly twice in the air, its blue-white flames flickering.
The old man was nearly thrown completely from the ox's back. His massive hammer flew from his weakened grip, spinning wildly dozens of times in mid-air before embedding itself deeply into the lava-covered ground far below with a heavy thud.
But Totosai was truly a veteran Yokai who had survived in a brutal world for hundreds of years.
The exact moment he was knocked back, his reaction was not to angrily counterattack, nor to raise a barrier to defend—
It was to perfectly use this kinetic impact.
As it was violently knocked back, the Three-Eyed Fire Ox rapidly changed direction, its four hooves reigniting with desperate flames, and it darted wildly toward the north, borrowing the heavy momentum of being repelled by the giant arm.
It was the exact opposite direction from where the Asura Transformation had originally come.
The old man lay completely flat against the ox's muscular back, hugging its neck, and shouted at the absolute top of his lungs.
"The wind is strong, time to bolt——!"
Hikaru stood calmly inside the chest cavity of the Asura Transformation, his Crimson Demon Eyes fixed coldly on the rapidly shrinking black dot in the northern sky.
The corner of his mouth twitched in dry amusement.
The Asura Transformation consumed a truly massive amount of energy and was entirely unsuitable for long-distance, high-speed pursuit.
He had been perfectly clear on this specific limitation ever since his brutal battle with the Tsuchigumo.
The duration of the massive exoskeleton was strictly limited; it was more than sufficient for sudden interception and overwhelming suppression, but it was absolutely not worth the energy expenditure for chasing a fleeing coward across the province.
But he had no intention of using the Asura Transformation to chase him anyway.
In fact, he had accurately guessed from the very beginning exactly how Totosai might react when encountering a powerful unknown entity.
And from the very beginning, he had never intended to rely solely on his own speed to catch him.
Up to this point, it was enough.
He had already successfully... driven Totosai directly toward the path he had traveled along, the exact direction from which the expeditionary group had come.
Yes, this was actually his true goal all along. Herding the target.
The Asura Transformation rapidly retracted, the massive bone skeleton disintegrating into ash, and the violent purple lightning dissipated into the wind.
Naturally.
Hikaru dropped smoothly from the six-meter height back to the ground, the soles of his straw shoes stepping lightly onto the scorching, cracked lava rock.
He lifted his gaze.
He looked calmly into the distance—toward the exact direction where Yoshimoto's group was currently located.
Forty Ashigaru, six mounted samurai, eight palanquin bearers, and one luxurious palanquin.
Along this three-day journey, the random stones he had quietly spoken to, the hollows of old cedar trees he had gently touched, the maps he had folded and unfolded repeatedly—
That was naturally not madness, nor was it some strange undead illness.
It was him methodically farming favorability.
Every single stone, every withered tree, every mundane object along the path—during these three days of slow travel, while everyone else was not paying attention, he had touched, infused his energy into, and communicated with them one by one.
The favorability wasn't particularly high.
Most were only hovering between 1 and 5.
Some that he had repeatedly attended to and praised had barely reached 10.
But it was enough.
It didn't need to be very high for this specific task.
It only needed them—to be willing to listen to his request.
"Come, lend me a hand, gentlemen!"
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