Chapter 129: Situation in Kyoto
Kyoto.
In only a few days, this ancient city, a place that carried a thousand years of Japanese history, had become almost unrecognizable.
Six enormous tornadoes condensed from Yin energy rose from different points around the city. They stretched from earth to sky like black pillars, twisting violently as they devoured streets, houses, and shrines. Anything drawn into those storms, whether stone, steel, flesh, or spirit, seemed to decay and erode in an instant.
Under the contamination of that dense Yin energy, the sky above Kyoto had turned a heavy gray.
No sunlight could break through.
It was impossible to tell whether it was noon or dusk. The city had fallen into a dim, lifeless gloom, and the temperature had dropped below freezing.
And in such an environment, Yokai that normally hid by day and hunted by night crawled freely into the streets.
They began hunting humans.
The only fortune amid misfortune was that within a few hours of the supernatural incident breaking out, the highest levels of the government had made a swift decision. A large number of personnel had been dispatched to evacuate Kyoto's residents.
Airplanes, subways, high-speed rail, buses, private transport, and every method of movement that could be mobilized had been urgently directed toward the city. The sudden redirection caused traffic paralysis in other regions, but it succeeded in moving the majority of Kyoto's population out before the situation collapsed completely.
Even so, some residents remained.
They were not abandoned.
They chose to stay.
Some could not bear to part with the wealth their families had accumulated over generations in Kyoto. No one knew when they would be able to return after leaving this time. Once they fled, everything they owned, all their glory and fortune, might turn to ash.
Others clung to wishful thinking.
They believed the authorities had exaggerated the danger. They did not think a supernatural incident could truly become horrific enough to slaughter an entire city. Perhaps hiding at home would be enough to survive. Some even mocked the cowardice of those who had "fled" Kyoto.
But after the fifth seal node of the Spiral Seal, Kinkaku-ji, was destroyed, and the dense Yin energy covered the sun, those who had stayed behind finally regretted it.
They panicked.
Yokai appeared in groups on the streets, no longer hiding, no longer cautious.
It was like the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons recorded in old supernatural tales.
By then, escaping Kyoto was impossible.
The cruel and bloodthirsty Yokai used their keen senses to track the scent of living flesh. Those residents who had once laughed at others could only scream in despair as they became food in the mouths of Yokai.
For a time, blood and death seeped into the already dense Yin energy.
As time passed, the surviving residents of Kyoto trembled in their hiding places and tried to seek help from the outside world through the internet.
But at this moment, neither the Onmyōdō world nor the authorities had the ability to rescue them.
Those desperate pleas were destined to sink like stones into the sea.
Yet through those messages, videos, and photos, the outside world finally learned what had happened in Kyoto.
All of Japan boiled over.
Everyone knew that a supernatural incident had erupted in Kyoto. The government had sealed off the city, evacuated residents, and raised the Onmyōdō world to a Level One alert.
But no one had imagined it would be this terrifying.
Past supernatural incidents, in the minds of most ordinary people, still resembled serial murder cases.
What made them frightening was the unknown.
The fear of non-human Yokai lurking in the dark.
Even when entire remote towns of thousands were slaughtered, many people believed it happened only because those places were isolated, because the strength of the Onmyōdō world could not reach them in time.
That was why the Yokai succeeded.
But this was Kyoto.
The ancient capital.
A major city known throughout the country.
The scenes that appeared in videos and photos were full of rivers of blood, ruined streets, and Yokai dragging people through the darkness. It looked less like Kyoto and more like Ashura Hell.
Only now did ordinary people truly understand.
Supernatural incidents were far more terrifying than they had ever imagined.
And at this very moment, at Shōkoku-ji, one of Kyoto's famous historic temples, a great battle was already underway.
Rumble!
Onmyō Arts bloomed across the sky like surging clouds and falling celestial flowers. Explosions shook heaven and earth. Talismans burned, barriers shattered, and spell formulas lit up the gray darkness like stars trying to force back the night.
The Keikain Clan.
The Omnyo Agency.
The Onmyo Alliance.
The Onmyō Academy.
The Tsuchimikado Clan.
Onmyoji units formed from all these forces had gathered at Shōkoku-ji and were now locked in a fierce battle against the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons led by Hagoromo Gitsune.
Shōkoku-ji was the second seal node of the Spiral Seal.
If this place was destroyed by Yokai as well, the Spiral Seal would become completely useless. Only the final node at Nijō Castle would remain, and by then, that last node alone would no longer have any meaning.
"Not bad, Onmyoji."
Kidōji, a Great Yokai skilled in swordsmanship, unfolded his Spirit.
The blade in his hand swelled into an enormous sword, carrying the weight of his Spirit as it slashed down toward Kūgū Tenma, one of the Twelve Heavenly Generals of the Onmyo Alliance.
[Noble.]
Kūgū Tenma, with wine-red hair and heterochromatic eyes, controlled the giant magical sword behind him without panic.
"Release."
Clang!
The two massive blades collided.
Sparks scattered through the air, and sword light erupted across the temple grounds.
Within Kidōji's Spirit, the world seemed to transform into a battlefield of blades. Countless swords surged like a tide, tearing through the space around Kūgū Tenma before raining down toward him from every direction.
For a moment, Kūgū Tenma could only dodge and block.
Inevitably, he fell into a disadvantage.
"What a nuisance," he muttered with a grim expression. "If my strength had recovered, I would have already shown this fellow something worth remembering."
After performing the Rites of the Six Relations, his strength had suffered a severe decline.
At his peak, killing the Great Yokai before him would not have been impossible.
He would never have been reduced to this wretched state, forced to evade again and again while waiting for an opening that refused to come.
And yet, the battle between Kūgū Tenma and Kidōji was only one corner of this great war.
Above Shōkoku-ji, including Kidōji's Spirit, five layers of Spirits shook heaven and earth.
That meant the Yokai side had five Great Yokai-level existences participating in the battle.
And that did not even include Hagoromo Gitsune.
At this moment, she was being temporarily held back by the combined secret arts of Tsuchimikado Yasuzumi, head of the Tsuchimikado Clan, Keikain Hidemoto, head of the Keikain Clan, and Kurahashi Genji, Director of the Omnyo Agency.
Hagoromo Gitsune, like Zenki and Goki, did not walk the path of training a Spirit.
Her path was the strengthening of her own limits.
.....
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