Sengoku [Chapter 10] (Patreon)

Chapter 10 - The Bell

"never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee" 

- John Donne, 1624.

In daylight, Kuroha behaved as though nothing had happened. She ate her rice, complained that it was too soft, and rebuked her attendant for letting the tea cool. When Shimon entered the council chamber, the old woman regarded him with vague disinterest. Only the smile betrayed her. It appeared as he bowed, thin and hungry, then vanished.

Shimon told no one about the divination. Tarō would ask questions he could not answer. Nagai would ask better ones, with dire consequences attached. The priests might prescribe purification, confinement, or execution, depending on how alarmed they became. The System, as usual, offered nothing useful.

By the following morning, Kuroha and her attendant had left the castle. Training for the new yōma-hunting unit began at once.

Abe Chikanori presented the scholars’ first conclusions in the yard below the inner wall. Illustrated sheets had been fixed to boards behind him: warped limbs, divided jaws, and bodies drawn from the testimony of those who had survived seeing them.

The ten hunters selected for the unit stood in light practice armor. Nagai Morichika watched from the shade of a storehouse veranda with two clerks beside him. Chief Priest Noritsuna, Abbot Ryōzen, and the elder scholar Kuze Sōtei sat nearby.

Abe tapped one drawing with a bamboo pointer. “Arrows wound them. They may even slow them. That is not the same as stopping them.”

The page showed a long-limbed yōma with five arrows buried in its chest and belly. Beside it, the same creature had reached the archer.

“Of the eighteen accounts we judged reliable, eleven involved bows. In seven, the creature continued attacking after wounds that should have killed a man. In one account, a yōma pulled an arrow from its own eye and stabbed the archer with it,” he added grimly.

Tarō muttered under his breath.

Abe looked at him. “Would Kume Tarō care to share his conclusion?”

“No.”

“Then keep it until requested,” Chikanori chided.

Abe indicated another sheet. Arms, legs, and heads had been drawn apart from their bodies.

“We do not know whether every yōma possesses a heart. If they do, it may not be where a man’s heart should be. Blood loss weakens some of them, but seldom quickly enough. Complete severing is more reliable. A yōma without a leg cannot run well. None of the surviving accounts describes a decapitated creature fighting for more than a few breaths.”

The scholar Kuze Sōtei cleared his throat. “Distance and a cutting edge. Those are the common factors.”

Abe nodded. “Yari hold or redirect. Naginata and long swords remove limbs and heads. Archers may slow the creature before contact, but no one is to trust an arrow to finish the work.”

Kagawa Hachirō, assigned to support the cells from the saddle, stood with the instructors. “Any competent warrior could have reached that conclusion.”

Abe bowed with such care that the gesture became an insult. “A competent warrior reached it by losing an eye. We hope the written account will let others learn more cheaply.”

Several men lowered their faces to hide smiles. Kagawa’s remaining eye narrowed.

Nagai spoke before pride became a duel. “The scholars have given you the answer. Matsuda and Ishikawa will teach you to use it.”

The grizzled instructor Ishikawa divided the hunters into two cells of five. Each received three yari, one naginata, and one long sword that Ishikawa called an ōdachi and Kagawa insisted was a nodachi. The distinction mattered greatly to both men and not at all to Shimon.

When Ishikawa called the names for Shimon’s cell, Tarō stepped to his right and Matsunaga Heita to his left. The next man answered with a curt “Here” and tested the flex of his yari shaft before taking his place. Seki Jūzō was broad through the shoulders, perhaps thirty-five, with a square face and the top of his left ear missing. During the interviews he had spoken only when questioned, and even then as if words cost money. The fifth man, Fujita Kenzaburō, was a younger castle retainer whose spear drill was cleaner than his confidence.

Seki glanced along the line. “At least three of us know which end of the yari goes forward.”

Fujita stiffened. Tarō looked pleased to have found another man who insulted people conversationally.

Ishikawa placed the weighted practice ōdachi in Shimon’s hands. It was made from dense oak with iron set into the core, far longer than his katana and considerably heavier. It was, without a weighted pommel, also poorly balanced.

“You are the tallest,” Ishikawa said. “You are quick, stronger than you look, and complain less after being struck than most.”

Shimon looked away. “I am not sure the last part is true.”

Ishikawa studied him like a carpenter judging timber. “It will become true.”

A live blade waited in the rack nearby. Its lacquered scabbard was too long to wear through a belt, and the hilt reached nearly to Shimon’s shoulder. He would have to carry it in one hand, over a shoulder, or across his back.

The scabbard opened partway along its length. A locking catch secured the hilt and blade during travel, while the hinged section allowed the weapon to be drawn from behind the shoulder. The design belonged to this world rather than any history Shimon remembered.

Despite the modification, it still looked inconvenient. The weapon also looked capable of dividing a man from shoulder to hip, which was probably the stronger consideration.

Their first target was built from wicker and rice straw around a flexible frame of split bamboo. Its arms hung almost to its knees, and a carved jaw divided its face nearly to the throat, based upon Shimon and Tarō’s descriptions.

The target stood on a timber sledge. Behind it waited an aetosaur, low and broad beneath a padded harness. Mud had dried between the ridges of its armored back. A handler stood near its head with a bucket of sliced turnips and spoke to it with the patience normally reserved for stubborn children.

At his whistle, the animal leaned into the traces. The target lurched forward.

“Points!” Ishikawa shouted.

Tarō, Seki, and Fujita advanced together. Their yari struck the straw body at chest, shoulder, and hip height. The sledge kept coming, driven by the aetosaur’s weight, and forced all three men backward.

“Set!” their instructor cried.

They lowered their rear hands and drove the butts of the spears into shallow sockets prepared in the ground. The shafts bowed. Sandals tore grooves through the dirt.

Seki’s spear held straight. Tarō’s point twisted as the shaft flexed. Fujita lost half a step, recovered, and leaned back into the pressure, but the target slowed.

Matsunaga moved first. His naginata cut across one arm, but the weighted wooden blade failed to carry through. Shimon entered from the other side and struck the neck. The practice blade buried itself deep enough to leave the straw head hanging by a strip of rope.

“Dead,” Ishikawa confirmed.

The handler stopped the aetosaur with a turnip. The sledge settled crookedly, one wicker arm bent beneath it.

“The yari held it. Seki’s point remained useful. Kume allowed his to turn. Fujita watched the target instead of the men beside him. Matsunaga cut with his arms and left his hips behind.”

Tarō frowned. “The target is heavier than a yōma.”

“Then the yōma will be easier. Congratulate yourself after it is dead.”

They reset the frame and the drills continued until sweat soaked the clothing beneath Shimon’s practice armor. Sometimes the target came straight. Sometimes the handler pulled a guide rope and made the sledge veer. Later, six laborers drove a second target along a separate track from another angle.

Three yari could not hold both equally. Tarō and Seki each took a target while Fujita moved between them, reinforcing whichever line began to give. Matsunaga and Ayanokouji had to finish one creature quickly, then cross to the other before the spearmen lost their footing or strength.

At first, every man watched only his own weapon. By the third day, they had begun to watch one another.

The practice weapons were painted along their edges so that each strike left a record. The spearmen stopped thrusting blindly at the center of mass. They attacked shoulders, hips, and mouths, turning or slowing the target long enough for the cutting weapons to work. Heita learned to reach around the yari shafts without fouling them. Shimon learned to wait until a neck, knee, or elbow opened.

The ōdachi could not be corrected easily halfway through a cut. Its weight had to begin in the feet, pass through the hips, and arrive through the hands. When Shimon tried to force it with his arms, the blade dragged him out of position and left him slower to recover. He did, however, notice that the blade was growing lighter, more nimble, as he practiced with it.

The chip in his brain still recorded every attempt.

[HEAVY BLADE MOTION DATASET]Completed cuts: 684Average recovery delay: ImprovingFriendly-strike probability: 11.4%

Eleven percent remained far too risky a proposition, he thought.

“Again,” Ishikawa ordered.

The aetosaur leaned into its harness to start the whole training session all over again.

By the fourth morning, Shimon could remove the straw head cleanly more often than not. His palms had blistered and hardened. His shoulders still ached at night, but each morning the pain faded with unnatural speed.

***

The one-eyed Kagawa Hachirō joined the drills on the fourth morning as a mounted auxiliary.

He rode into the yard on a black-feathered fukuiraptor larger than any Shimon had seen in the castle pens. The animal stood high at the hip, its long body balanced over powerful hind legs. A leather-and-lacquer saddle sat above the pelvis, secured by broad straps around the breast and belly. Reinforced guards protected the flanks where a spear might glance, and the bridle kept well clear of the teeth. Kagawa held the reins in his left hand; a long tachi hung at his right side.

Black feathers covered the neck and back, fading to rust-red along the arms and tail. Yellow eyes moved over the waiting men with steady predatory interest.

“This is Kurobane,” Kagawa announced. “Do not strike him.”

Seki looked at the painted wooden weapons. “We had not planned to kill him.”

Kagawa gave him a flat stare. “A poorly aimed practice blade can still break a leg, and I might be forced to return the favor.”

“Then the warning was useful and had weight after all,” smirked the other warrior.

Tarō looked away before his amusement became visible.

The mounted drills used a heavier target packed with straw, animal bones, and damp clay. Goat meat and offal had been tied across its shoulders so Kurobane would seize the same area each time. A handler kept a long control line attached to the rear of the harness until the animal settled into the exercise.

The carnivorous dinosaur smelled the blood at once. Its body lowered, hind legs folding beneath it while the sickle claws pressed into the dirt.

Kagawa raised one hand. “Hold until he takes it.”

Tarō glanced at the animal. “And if he takes one of us?”

“He has been fed,” the one-eyed samurai responded with a chuckle.

“That was not the question.”

Kagawa smiled. “Then wash and do not smell like goat.”

The control line went slack, and the vicious predator crossed the yard in a rush. The target had barely begun moving when one clawed foot struck the sledge, and the jaws closed around its meat-wrapped shoulder. Straw, clay, and bone collapsed with a wet crack. The fukuiraptor twisted its neck and hauled the entire frame sideways.

“Now!” the one-eyed man ordered.

Tarō, Seki, and Fujita advanced with their spears. Their task was to pin the target from the opposite side without crossing the animal’s body or striking its legs. Heita and Shimon then had to cut whatever remained exposed while accounting for Kurobane’s head, tail, rider, and sudden changes of direction.

The first attempt left a red streak across the leather protecting Kurobane’s flank.

The animal pointedly ignored it; its rider did not.

He dismounted before the target stopped moving and inspected the mark. “Who?” the warrior demanded.

No one volunteered, but Kagawa followed the angle back to Tarō’s spear. “Kume,” he accused.

Tarō examined the streak and shrugged. “It might have been Seki.”

Kagawa stepped close enough that their armor touched. “This beast is worth more than the roof over your head.”

“Then perhaps it should learn to avoid spears,” the other man replied, not moving an inch and puffing up his chest.

Kurobane lifted its blood-wet muzzle and looked directly at Tarō. Stubbornly, Tarō did not apologize, but his next step took him farther from the jaws.

The second run marked the animal’s shoulder guard. The third left paint on Kagawa’s saddle. The fourth caught the reins. Kagawa’s temper worsened with each mistake.

“Watch the tail.”

“If you cut my leg, I will take both of yours in payment.”

Kagawa decried with increasing exasperation.

Ishikawa allowed the shouting because the instruction beneath it was sound. A mounted predator changed the shape of the formation. The spearmen had to leave room for its turn, read when it would pull rather than hold, and keep their points away from its hind legs. The cutters had to trust that the animal would remain fixed upon the bait while at the same time, some primal part of them never trusted the beast completely.

Shimon found Kurobane easier to read than a skilled swordsman. The animal did not feint. Its shoulders dropped before a lunge. Its tail swung wide before a turn. The hind legs gathered beneath the body before each burst of speed.

The chip, his only true ally, assembled a model.

[ALLIED ORGANISM MOVEMENT PROFILE]Designation: KurobaneType: Fukuiraptor variantPrimary attack: Bite-and-holdSecondary attacks: Hind-claw rake / lateral body impactPredicted movement reliability: 84%Safe attack zones updating

A translucent boundary shifted around the animal in Shimon’s vision as the chip formed an augmented reality for his vision. When Kurobane pulled left, the danger zone widened around the tail. When it braced, a narrow opening appeared beside the neck and shoulder.

Shimon waited for that opening, stepped into it, and brought the wooden ōdachi down through the target’s neck, and the blade stopped a hand’s breadth from Kurobane’s jaw. Only paint marked the straw.

Kagawa examined the cut. “Acceptable,” he grunted.

Things went well enough that Shimon gained a point in his Mind attribute, and the constant swinging of the oversized sword improved his Swords skill. All very useful, and by the sixth day, the five-man cell could work around Kurobane without marking beast or rider. The fukuiraptor seized and unbalanced the target. Tarō, Seki, and Fujita fixed it from the far side. Heita removed a limb, and Shimon “finished” it by taking its neck.

Things went well enough that Shimon gained a point in his Mind attribute, and the constant swinging about of the oversized sword improved his Swords skill. All very useful. 

Kagawa took personal credit with an arrogant smile. “You have finally learned to stay out of a mounted warrior’s way.”

“We learned to stay out of Kurobane’s,” Seki shrugged.

Kagawa turned toward him, but heavy footfalls sounded beyond the yard before he could answer.

Nagai entered on a pale-brown, short-feathered predator and dismounted with the composure of a man stepping down from an ordinary horse. A handler took the reins. Training stopped.

He surveyed the targets and painted weapons. “Matsuda says your foundations are no longer insulting. Ishikawa says you can sometimes distinguish comrades from enemies. Kagawa claims everything useful accomplished here was his idea.”

Kagawa bowed as though this were an accurate summary.

“That will have to suffice,” Nagai continued. “Men have disappeared east of the boundary village. Woodcutters found fresh human bones near a cave. Two travelers reported strange shapes moving after dark, and someone tore down a blessed shrine rope three nights ago.”

The yard quieted with the news.

“We believe yōma are feeding there. You leave tomorrow morning. You hunt,” the powerful man declared.

Tarō’s expression sharpened with anticipation. Several others looked equally pleased. Training offered bruises and correction; a successful hunt offered greater reward, standing, and a chance to prove themselves. However, Shimon felt no excitement, for he only wanted the drills to just be a little less taxing. He was deciding that inaction, no matter how strenuous, was much preferred to excitement.

“Three condemned criminals will accompany us,” the commanding man remarked offhandedly. “Blood and recent death draw yōma. We will provide both.”

Heita looked up, Kagawa gave a thin-slipped smile, and no one challenged the order.

The senior retainer looked them all in the eye. “Prepare your armor. The shrine will receive the unit before sunset. No one departs without purification.”

Chief Priest Imbe Noritsuna’s shrine stood on a wooded rise beyond the northern edge of town. The path to it climbed through cedar and evergreen oak. Weathered stone lanterns marked the final approach. A shimenawa stretched between two old trees near the entrance, the braided rope thick as Shimon’s wrist, white paper streamers stirring beneath it.

The warriors rinsed their hands and mouths at a stone basin before entering the worship hall.

Aya waited inside with several assistants. Her dark hair was bound neatly behind her, and the white sleeves of her kosode framed her hands as she arranged paper, brushes, ink, salt, hemp cord, and narrow wooden slips on low tables.

Shimon tried not to stare, but somehow Tarō annoyingly noticed anyway.

“She has looked at you twice,” he jibed. “You should speak to her.”

“We are preparing to hunt demons,” Shimon hissed back.

“That gives you a subject. Common ground.”

Chief Priest Noritsuna entered before Shimon could strike the other man. Today, the priest wore white beneath pale-blue outer robes. He bowed toward the sanctuary, clapped, and began the rite.

Noritsuna recited the norito in a formal cadence older than ordinary speech. Thanks to the chip’s growing translation function, he understood much of the vocabulary but not what the true meaning of the words carried. The priest named pollution, misfortune, crooked acts, unseen offenses, and the powers asked to bear them away.

An assistant passed among the kneeling warriors with salt. Each man received a pinch in his hands and let it fall.

Noritsuna took up the ōnusa and swept the paper-and-hemp streamers left, right, and left over the line. But as they passed above Shimon, the air changed.

[UNKNOWN CARRIER SIGNAL DETECTED]Signal Strength: Low-ModeratePattern: Structured / AmbientMultiple sources suspected

His hands tightened into a fist, even as he saw Heita shudder across the row. The movement was small, but Shimon still saw it.

After the purification, Aya distributed writing materials. The warriors had already practiced the nine syllables under Noritsuna and Abbot Ryōzen: the hand seals, the spoken formula, and the nine cuts traced through the air with two extended fingers.

Rin. Pyō. Tō. Sha. Kai. Jin. Retsu. Zai. Zen.

Noritsuna had warned them that the gestures meant little without correct breath, concentration, and transmission. 

Ryōzen had put it more simply. “A monkey may wear prayer beads. It remains a monkey.”

They were now to combine the kuji with written jūji: crossed signs and characters copied onto paper charms. The slips would be folded into armor, tied to spear shafts, or fastened inside helmets.

Aya knelt before them and demonstrated. “Do not paint the character. Write it with purpose. Each movement must lead into the next.”

Her brush descended, crossed, and closed the smaller marks around the center.

Shimon watched her wrist while the chip recorded the movement.

[CALLIGRAPHIC COMPARISON ACTIVE]

The character itself was simple. His other teacher Ueda Sōan had made him copy worse. What troubled him was the carrier signal. It strengthened whenever Noritsuna spoke a syllable or one of the warriors completed a seal.

Yet, something now about the process felt different. It felt like a connection opening through his bones. Shimon dipped his brush.

Rin.

He formed the first seal.

Pyō.

His fingers shifted.

Tō.

Pressure gathered behind his eyes, and he looked toward the corner of the hall. Yet, nothing stood there. Only sunlight lay across the floor, cedar branches moving beyond the open doors.

Something had nevertheless found the line.

[UNKNOWN CARRIER WAVE]Signal Strength: HIGHConnection state: ACTIVEForeign pattern detected

The supernaturally attuned Heita inhaled sharply, causing the brush to tremble in Shimon’s hand. Then, words entered his skull without sound.

You should know better than to call to others when you are mine.

Shimon stopped breathing.

Around him, brushes continued to move. Noritsuna corrected another warrior’s fingers.

I do not like to share.

[HOSTILE PRESENCE DETECTED][COGNITIVE INTRUSION][UNKNOWN CARRIER WAVE: CRITICAL]

Shimon tried to release the brush. His hand would not obey.

“I didn’t know,” the young man whispered in English.

Aya looked up quizzically, and Tarō turned toward him with a look that spoke volumes.

Shimon gave a nervous smile. “I wasn’t calling you. I was practicing.”

These little signs are bells.

Amusement pressed against the stranger in a strange world’s thoughts.

The priests ring them and wonder what listens. The mountain men ring them. The monks ring them. Old women scratch at doors with bones and smoke.

Against his will, the brush rose.

They call to us. They welcome us.

“I didn’t know,” Shimon whispered.

You know now.

His wrist moved and the brush drew a line beside Aya’s careful jūji. It crossed the center, curved where it should have remained straight, and doubled back into a shape his eyes could not hold.

[UNAUTHORIZED MOTOR ACTIVITY DETECTED]Motor control conflict: SevereUser override: Unsuccessful

Shimon pulled against his own arm. The brush continued with smooth certainty. The pattern resembled kuji-kiri until it did not. Nine cuts became ten. The final stroke opened the design instead of closing it, something terribly wrong painted in black.

Near him, Matsunaga made a strangled sound, but not one paid him any heed.

Shimon’s fingers folded into a seal Noritsuna had never taught.

I will teach you mine instead.

Orange light spread across his vision.

YOU HAVE LEARNED A NEW SPELL.Occult Art Acquired: THE CLOSED GATEOccult [1] learned.

Spirit attribute reduced by 1.                                                                                                          Body attribute reduced by 5.

34 experience gained.

The biochip covered the notification with fresh warnings.

[HOSTILE PRESENCE DETECTED][UNKNOWN CARRIER WAVE: CRITICAL][AUTONOMIC STRESS RESPONSE: EXTREME]

The brush stopped as the young man felt a weakness possess him.

Shimon stared at the black pattern of his creation. Aya had gone pale, and Noritsuna stood rigid beside the sanctuary. Tarō gripped Shimon’s shoulder and spoke to him, but the words reached him only as noise.

There was only one question that mattered. “Can you get me home?” he asked in English. 

Yes.

His eyes watered. He hated that a single word could do that.

“How?”

Do as I say.

He felt something vast moved beyond the connection.

Follow your destiny, and I will open the road.

Shimon tried to ask what that meant, then the weakness took him and the floor rose up to meet him.

***

He awoke on his back beneath the beams of the shrine hall. Tarō knelt on one side of him, while Aya sat on the other with a damp cloth folded across her hands. Chief Priest Noritsuna stood near Shimon’s feet, still clutching the ōnusa, and Heita watched from behind them with his face drained to an ashen gray.

The young man pushed himself upright, but the room tilted around him, and Tarō caught him by the shoulder before he could fall.

“What happened?” Shimon asked, blinking until the faces above him stopped moving.

“You spoke,” Tarō replied.

“I know that much,” Shimon muttered groggily.

“You spoke in a tongue no one understood.”

The paper remained where Shimon had fallen, with the black seal spread across its surface exactly as he remembered it.

Aya followed his gaze and asked, “What did you write?”

Shimon looked around blearily before answering, “I do not know.”

Noritsuna approached with measured steps. “The wind moved through the sanctuary when you completed the sign, and the bell rang without being struck.”

Shimon had neither felt the wind nor heard the bell.

The priest lifted the paper carefully with both hands, and awe competed with caution across his expression. “A power answered,” he declared, and no one present disputed him.

Kagawa shifted forward, a rueful grin on his face. “Was the answer favorable?” 

Noritsuna regarded the one-eyed warrior for a moment before replying, “A bell does not choose what answers it.”

Something changed in Kagawa’s posture. His confidence did not disappear, but it became less certain.

“We will complete the rite,” Noritsuna continued. “The sign will remain here, and none of you will copy it, speak over it, or touch it without my permission.”

The warriors bowed in acknowledgment of the priest’s authority. Although Shimon’s thoughts remained sluggish, he could see that Seki’s usual indifference had vanished, while Tarō kept one hand close to his shoulder in case he collapsed again.

Heita alone failed to bow immediately. Instead, he stared over Shimon’s shoulder at something no one else appeared able to see. His eyes widened, and then he lowered his head so abruptly that his forehead struck the floorboards.

Despite the ominous conclusion to the rite, the hunting party departed shortly after sunrise.

Nagai rode at the head of the column on his pale-feathered war-beast, while Kagawa followed on Kurobane with the relaxed balance of a man who had traveled many leagues in the saddle.

Abbot Ryōzen and Abe Chikanori walked behind them. The monk carried prayer beads, a short staff, and a bundle of ritual implements wrapped in oilcloth. Abe had protected his writing box beneath waxed cloth and brought enough paper to document a minor campaign. Ishikawa walked between the two files of hunters, correcting the position of a spear or the fastening of an armor cord whenever he found fault.

The ten hunters marched in two loose columns. Shimon carried the sheathed ōdachi across his left shoulder, while his katana and short sword remained at his waist. The long scabbard caught a branch, and brushed a porter’s pack. He felt like a walking armory.

“Watch yourself,” Tarō complained.

Shimon responded with nothing, a card he was getting better at playing.

Six porters followed with spare weapons, stakes, rope, oil, water, firewood, salt, food, and the supplies Abe apparently considered indispensable. Behind them came three condemned men linked by iron collars. Their wrists were bound in front, and two castle guards walked beside them with spears ready.

The first prisoner was broad, broken-nosed, and marked by bruises from confinement. The second was older and walked with a limp, while the third kept his head bowed beneath a tangle of greasy hair. No one had told them precisely what awaited them, although their expressions suggested that they had guessed enough.

The road descended through the castle town and crossed the eastern fields. Farmers paused in their work to watch the procession. A large aetosaur pulling a plow raised its blunt head, chewed twice, and then returned its attention to the furrow. Far above the river, two pterosaurs circled on broad wings, and their shadows passed briefly over the paddies.

Once the castle disappeared behind the hills, Kagawa guided Kurobane back along the column until he rode beside Shimon.

“What language did you speak in the shrine?” the mounted warrior asked.

“A family tongue,” Shimon answered.

Tarō glanced across from the other file, and Kagawa noticed the reaction immediately.

“Kume does not believe you,” he observed.

Shimon just shrugged. Silence would serve when words could be damning.

The one-eyed warrior gave him a discerning look. “The priest did not call it, whatever it was, an ill omen.”

“The priest also ordered us not to touch it.”

Kagawa considered that argument before remarking, “Priests prefer caution. It keeps them employed.”

The abbot looked back from farther up the column. “Priests are often wrong.”

Kagawa’s smile faded a smidgeon. “The monk is joking.”

“No,” Ryōzen corrected, and then he faced forward again.

Near the boundary village, familiar storehouses appeared beyond the fields. Shimon recognized the small shrine where charms had once hung in crowded rows during his first journey, although several of them had since been replaced.

The villagers kept their distance as the column passed. They bowed to Nagai, stared at the chained prisoners, and avoided looking directly at the hunters, as though too much attention might invite whatever followed them.

Beyond the village, the road narrowed into broken woodland.

Heita had avoided Shimon throughout the morning, but when the path curved around a washout, Shimon slowed, moved alongside him, and caught the man by the sleeve.

“We need to speak,” Shimon told him.

Heita pulled free. “We do not.”

“You saw something in the shrine.”

The samurai’s face tightened, although he continued walking.

“You reacted before I did,” the young man continued, lowering his voice. “You also stared at me in the council chamber.”

“I was not staring at you,” the tight-faced man protested.

“What were you staring at?”

Heita quickened his pace, but Shimon’s longer stride matched him without difficulty.

“I will continue asking until you answer,” the young man stated testily.

Heita muttered and pointedly ignored him.

Ahead of them, Tarō and Seki were quietly disputing something. Kagawa had returned to Nagai’s side, and no one nearby appeared to be listening.

After several more paces, Heita finally relented. “There was something above you,” he whispered.

Shimon ground his teeth, gathered himself, then asked, “At the shrine?”

“I saw it in the council chamber first.”

“What did it look like?”

“Black.”

“That is not especially useful.”

Heita glanced at him before elaborating. “It was black, like ink spreading through wet cloth, and shaped almost as some animal crouched. It came from behind you, though there was no true space there, and thin arms unfolded over your shoulders, each ending in something curved and sharp. Whenever I tried to count them, the limbs blurred, divided, and multiplied.” 

Shimon suppressed a shudder. “And at the shrine?”

“It covered you,” Heita answered, his voice falling until Shimon could barely hear him. “When you wrote the seals, it bent down, and its face passed through yours.”

Heat remained trapped beneath Shimon’s armor, but his skin turned cold. “Did anyone else see it?”

“I do not know,” the other man said with a shake of his head.

“You looked around.”

“I hoped someone had.”

A chain rattled behind them when one of the prisoners stumbled, and a guard struck the ground beside his feet with a spear butt before ordering him upright.

“Do you see such things often?” Shimon asked.

Heita hesitated, which answered the question before he finally admitted, “Yes.”

The young man gave him a weak smile. “Where do you see them?”

“At shrines, temples, and old places,” Heita explained. “They gather where the spirit is strong. Sometimes I see them in forests.”

“What are they?” asked Shimon, genuinely intrigued.

“The people call them kami.”

“That is a name, not a true answer.”

“It is the only answer I have to give you,” Heita answered somberly, touching the scar beneath his chin before continuing.

“Some sit beside offerings, while others follow priests. Some crawl through the rafters during funerals. When I was a child, I saw one inside a sacred tree. It looked through a split in the bark and spoke my name.”

“What did you do?”

“I stopped telling people what I saw.”

Ahead of them, Abe nearly walked into a low branch while writing. Ryōzen caught the scholar by the sleeve and guided him aside without interrupting his stride.

“Was the thing at the shrine hostile?” Shimon asked.

Heita looked at him with naked unease. “It noticed that I could see it. That is all I know.”

Shimon decided that he did not want to pursue this avenue of inquiry any further.

***

They reached the cave in the late afternoon.

Shimon recognized the ridge before the entrance came into view. The angle of the slope, the split cedar beside the path, and the gray stone among the roots all matched the map stored by his chip. A pale route line appeared across his vision, accompanied by the old designation:

Temporary Domicile.

The cave mouth opened behind a screen of brush, and bones lay scattered among the dead leaves. Most were animal remains: a deer skull with one antler chewed down, scattered ribs, and small vertebrae carried apart by scavengers. The human remains lay nearer the entrance.

The man Shimon had left there was no longer whole. His skull rested on its side without a jaw, fragments of cloth clung beneath the ribs, and one arm had been dragged several paces toward the trees.

Tarō stopped beside him. “You know this place.”

“I spent a night here,” Shimon confirmed.

Tarō looked from the bones to the swords at Shimon’s waist. “Was he their former owner?”

“Yes.”

“Did he try to kill you?”

“He did.”

Tarō nodded before spitting on the forest floor, because in this world that amounted to sufficient explanation.

Nagai dismounted and immediately put the camp to work. The hunters checked spear points, tightened armor cords, and cleared loose branches from the fighting ground. Kurobane was watered while Kagawa inspected the saddle and harness, and the porters unloaded three stakes with crosspieces near their tops.

The stakes were driven into the ground before the cave. Ropes were passed over the crosspieces so that the prisoners’ wrists could be held above their heads while their bodies remained a short distance in front of the upright timber, leaving their necks and limbs clear of the wood.

The prisoners understood what the preparations meant.

The broad man shouted that he had been promised a beheading, while the older prisoner collapsed to his knees and had to be hauled upright. The third man finally raised his face.

Shimon recognized the pickpocket from the market. Confinement had thinned him, sparse whiskers had grown around his mouth, and a faded yellow stain remained upon the cheek Shimon had struck into the mud. Recognition crossed the man’s face almost immediately.

“You,” the prisoner breathed.

Tarō looked between them and asked, “Another friend?”

“He tried to steal from me,” Shimon explained, his brow furrowing.

The pickpocket pulled against the chain. “Mercy, master samurai. You spared me in the market.”

Shimon looked away, offering no answer.

The guards separated the prisoners and bound them to the stakes. Abe paced between the bodies and the cave mouth, considered the distance, and then ordered the stakes moved two paces closer. The broad prisoner cursed him until one of the guards replaced the gag.

Shimon turned toward Nagai. “They are to die here?”

“They were sentenced to die at the castle,” the senior retainer answered evenly. “Here, their deaths will also serve as bait. Perhaps they will be more useful in death than they were in life.”

The oilcloth was removed from the live weapons, and steel caught the late sunlight. A retainer assisted Shimon, holding the ōdachi’s scabbard while Shimon drew the long blade.

Nagai faced the assembled hunters. “Straw does not panic, twist, beg, or seize a weapon,” he instructed. “Each condemned man will receive one disabling cut and one killing cut. No more. This is an examination rather than entertainment, and a damaged edge or careless stroke may kill the man beside you after dark.”

Kagawa’s expression suggested mild disappointment.

“You will go first,” Nagai ordered him. “Take the arm, and then the neck.”

The broad prisoner’s ankles were freed so that he could move against the restraint above his wrists. Kagawa measured the distance, waited for the man to recoil, and then cut through the left arm above the elbow. Blood struck the leaves as the severed limb dropped.

The prisoner screamed and sagged against the rope, but Kagawa adjusted his stance and removed the head with his second stroke.

Nagai examined the edge of the tachi before permitting it to be cleaned. “Acceptable,” he judged.

The older prisoner came next. Heita stepped forward with his naginata, and although his face had gone pale, the blade remained steady.

“Leg, then neck,” Ishikawa instructed from beside him. “Drive from the hips, and do not reach with the arms.”

Heita cut through the thigh above the knee. The ropes kept the prisoner upright, but the man twisted before the second stroke, and the naginata entered the neck without passing through the spine.

The prisoner convulsed against the bindings.

Seki moved immediately. He drew the katana from his waist, set his feet, and looked toward Nagai for permission.

“Finish it,” the powerful retainer commanded.

The broad man completed the cut with one controlled stroke, and the prisoner’s head dropped beside the stake.

Heita stared at the blood coating his naginata blade.

“Your first stroke was clean,” Ishikawa told him. “On the second, you shortened your step when he moved, and the blade lost its strength. Remember that.”

Only the pickpocket remained.

When the gag was removed, he looked directly at Shimon. “Please,” he pleaded.

The young man possessed neither the authority to release him nor anywhere safe to take him. The only choice available was whether the man’s death would be immediate or prolonged.

He stepped into range with the ōdachi. The weapon’s length required more distance than the others, so he placed his feet, found the line through the neck, the chip marking it for him. Then he drew a slow breath.

The pickpocket did not look away. Shimon exhaled and cut, and the blade passed cleanly through the neck and continued into open air. The head fell forward, while the body jerked once against the ropes and became still.

You have slain a Condemned Thief.13 experience gained.

The System, it seemed, gave out experience points without distinguishing execution from murder or combat, the once innocent young man thought as he cleaned the blade letting it sleep in its scabbard.

The three heads were fixed above the bodies, and blood darkened the ground beneath the stakes. Abe arranged knotted cords around the bait, placed scraps of meat in shallow dishes, and tied written charms to the corpses.

Shimon watched him complete the pattern. “What is that intended to do?”

“In theory, it carries the spiritual scent farther,” Abe explained offhandedly.

“And in practice?”

The scholar just gave him a grin.

The party withdrew several hundred paces to a shallow hollow screened by bamboo and fallen timber. Food was distributed before sunset. The rice had been cooked with adzuki beans, staining parts of it a muted red. Kagawa raised his bowl toward Shimon.

“Blood rice,” he remarked sardonically. “Appropriate.”

Abe shook his head. “Red beans repel harmful influence and are served on auspicious occasions.”

“We tied three heads to stakes. I do not count that as a cause for celebration.”

“Tell that to their victims,” the scholar answered nonchalantly. 

Shimon took a bite and found the rice earthy and faintly sweet. He paused for a moment and saw Heita sat beside him, staring into his bowl as though the food was cursed.

“You should eat,” Shimon advised.

“I know,” the odd man murmured, although he obeyed without appetite.

Across the hollow, Kagawa began recounting how he had lost his eye. The story had expanded considerably since the interviews. In this version, he had fought the mouthless woman alone for nearly an hour, saved an entire village, and ridden twelve leagues afterward without treatment.

Kurobane slept nearby with its head tucked beneath one feathered arm.

Tarō leaned closer to Shimon and whispered, “They found him beneath a cart.”

“How do you know?” Shimon hissed.

“One of the men who pulled him out told me.”

“Did he save the village?”

“The village was already empty.”

Kagawa reached the portion of the tale where he continued fighting after losing the eye, and no one dared interrupt him.

Darkness settled early beneath the trees, while the full moon rose above the forest and silvered the world. No fires were lit, and the hunters wrapped themselves in cloaks before settling down to wait.

Shimon sat with the ōdachi across his knees. His katana remained at his waist in case the longer weapon became useless at close range, while the chip borrowed his senses and measured the temperature, his pulse, and the slow passage of time.

[PASSIVE MONITORING ACTIVE]Ambient temperature: FallingStress response: ElevatedUnknown Carrier Signal: Low / IntermittentHostile presence: None detected

The hours passed slowly. Owls called from deeper within the trees, and small animals moved beneath the leaves. These were the movements, the cycles of a natural place.

Gradually, the forest quieted to an unnatural stillness.

Kurobane raised its head as the feathers along its neck lifted, while Nagai’s mount produced a low rumble in its throat.

Heita touched Shimon’s sleeve. “Can you see them?”

Shimon looked toward the cave, where moonlight reached the stakes through breaks in the canopy. “I can see the bait.”

“The shadows,” Heita clarified.

“What shadows?”

Heita’s eyes moved between places that appeared empty. “They move as they should not.”

The chip pulsed with fresh information.

[ENVIRONMENTAL AUDIO SHIFT]Natural ambient activity: SuppressedLarge-organism movement suspected

[HOSTILE PRESENCE DETECTED]

Pressure gathered along the edge of Shimon’s perception, bringing with it the same unnatural awareness he had experienced during his first night in this world.

He saw something crouched beside the stakes. At first, it resembled a man bent over one of the corpses, although its arms were too long and worked too close to the body. Wet tearing carried across the clearing, followed by the sound of chewing. One of the severed heads slipped from its stake, but the creature caught it before it struck the ground and bit into the cheek.

A second shape unfolded from behind the stones near the cave, and then a third moved through a place where Shimon had seen nothing.

Nagai crouched beside him. “How many?”

“Count hostile presences,” Shimon ordered silently to his hidden companion.

[ACTIVE SCAN]Detected structured hostile signatures: 3Visual confirmation: PartialClassification: Unknown

“Match the signatures to the gray feeders from the forest.”

[CLASSIFICATION REQUEST]Confidence: 71%Threat label added: YŌMA — GREY FEEDERDetected count: 3

“Three,” Shimon whispered.

“I can see only two,” Nagai replied, only the smallest bit of uncertainty in his voice.

“I am certain there are three,” the young man assured.

“How?”

“I can feel them.”

“There are three,” Heita confirmed from behind them.

Nagai looked toward him, and Heita pointed into the clearing.

“One is beside the first body, another is behind the cave stones, and the third is beneath the fallen cedar.”

The indicated place appeared empty until a long gray hand curled over the trunk.

Nagai drew his sword. “Ready.”

Weapons rose throughout the hollow as the hunters moved into position.

Heita managed three steps before bending aside and vomiting into the leaves. Tarō glanced back while the man wiped his mouth with one sleeve.

“Finished?” Tarō asked.

Heita nodded. “For now.”

“Then let us do this.”

Three heads rose near the cave. Moonlight showed gray skin stretched across bodies that were a poor imitation of men. Their arms were too long, and their joints swelled in the wrong places. One possessed a jaw divided almost to the throat, opening sideways around several rows of teeth, while another still held part of a human face between its fingers.

Nagai raised his blade. “Advance.”

The two cells separated. The left formation moved with three yari in front and two cutting weapons behind, while Nagai rode beyond the spear points, prepared to drive the creature back toward the line.

On the right, Tarō, Seki, and Fujita leveled their yari. Heita waited behind them with his long naginata, while Shimon raised the ōdachi. Kagawa remained mounted on Kurobane beside the formation as its auxiliary.

The yōma separated. One moved toward Nagai’s cell, while the remaining two advanced toward Kagawa’s side.

“Hold the formation,” Tarō ordered.

Kagawa ignored him and drove his heels against Kurobane’s flanks, and the primal predator launched across the clearing.

“Kagawa!” Tarō shouted.

Kurobane struck the first yōma before the spear line could advance. Its jaws closed around the creature’s shoulder, while the yōma twisted with impossible flexibility and raked its claws across the harness. Kagawa cut downward from the saddle.

Tarō swore and called, “Spears forward. Support the beast!”

He, Seki, and Fujita ran after Kurobane, and the charge drew all three yari away from the cutting weapons.

The remaining yōma climbed over the fallen cedar toward Shimon and Heita. They had trained as five men against two targets, but they had never practiced holding a creature with only two cutters and no spear line. Heita extended the naginata, and although his face remained pale, his hands had steadied.

Then the yōma began to move.

“Right,” Heita warned.

The creature had not yet turned, but Shimon trusted him and his own lightning reflexes. He shifted just as a gray arm swept through the space where his head had been, while dark nails cut through the air.

Shimon struck the forearm, and the ōdachi severed two fingers before the creature tore itself out of range. Black fluid scattered across the leaves.

Heita thrust for the throat, but the yōma bent backward until its head nearly touched its spine. The point passed above it, and the creature snapped upright again. In defense, Shimon brought the flat of the ōdachi across his body. Claws struck the blade and drove it hard against his armor.

Health: 21/24

His brain stupidly realized at this most inopportune time that his Health had dropped because he had lost points in the Body attribute.

The creature opened its mouth, releasing the smell of old meat, damp soil, and sweet rot.

Heita hooked the naginata behind one knee and pulled. The joint folded sideways, and the creature fell against Shimon, driving him backward over a root. He kept the ōdachi between them while its teeth snapped close to his face, his strength surprising even him

[HOSTILE CONTACT][RECOMMENDED ACTION: DISENGAGE]

Shimon hissed at the advice, even as the yōma seized the ōdachi with both hands. Its fingers closed over the edge, cutting down to the bone without loosening their grip. The former professional e-sports gamer released the hilt, and the sudden loss of resistance pulled the creature off balance. He swiftly drew his katana and cut cleanly through its elbow.

You have learned Iai (lvl.5)

The severed arm dropped with the ōdachi still clutched between its fingers. A beat later, Heita drove the naginata point through the creature’s chest, but the yōma seized the shaft and began pulling itself toward him.

Shimon remembered Jirō’s killer doing the same.

“Heita, release it!” he warned.

However, instead of retreating, Matsunaga stepped forward. He turned the shaft, withdrew half a pace, and caught the naginata’s curved blade behind the creature’s neck.

“Take the head!” Heita cried out.

Shimon recovered his weapon, and raised it high as the other man dragged the creature’s head downward and away from the naginata shaft. Shimon planted his feet and cut with his entire body behind the stroke.

The neck parted cleanly, smooth as foul silk. The corpse collapsed and continued clawing at the leaves for several seconds before it finally stopped moving.

You have assisted in slaying Yōma: Grey Feeder.9 experience gained.

Heita pulled his blade free and stared, a look of shock on his face.

Suddenly, across the clearing, Kurobane roared. The second yōma had wrapped both arms around the fukuiraptor’s neck, while Kagawa struck repeatedly at its back and the three spearmen worked from below.

Kume drove his yari into the hip, Fujita fixed the shoulder, and Seki thrust through the ribs before dropping the butt of his weapon into the earth and bracing his full weight behind the shaft. The creature stopped advancing.

The raptor rider cut through the neck from above as Kurobane bit down, and the head disappeared between the animal’s jaws with a heavy crack.

“Dead!” the one-eyed man called triumphantly.

The fighting on Nagai’s side had already ended. Their yōma lay pinned beneath three yari, with one arm several paces from its body. The naginata bearer removed the head while the second cutter severed both legs.

They had killed it exactly as they had been taught.

Nagai crossed the clearing and surveyed Kagawa’s scattered formation. “Kagawa,” the senior retainer called, his voice controlled.

“The creature is dead,” Kagawa replied succinctly.

The senior retainer kept his expression neutral. “That was not as it should have been.”

“My charge prevented it from reaching the formation.”

“Your charge destroyed the formation and destroyed order,” chided the older man.

Kagawa glanced toward the corpse. “Still, the result speaks for itself.”

“It does,” Nagai agreed coldly, “and it speaks poorly.”

Kurobane worried at the severed head until Kagawa ordered it to release the remains. Tarō recovered his yari, while Fujita inspected the damaged harness. Seki sat upon a stone and examined a shallow claw cut across his forearm.

Heita walked several paces away and vomited again, although this time no one remarked much upon it.

They collected teeth and claws, took measurements, and made drawings before burning the remains at the scholar’s direction. Abe moved quickly between the corpses while dictating observations to a porter who had been unwillingly promoted to clerk.

“The third creature continued moving for approximately six heartbeats after decapitation,” Abe recorded.

“Four,” Shimon corrected.

Abe looked up from the body. “You counted? While fighting?”

The chip displayed an exact duration.

“Approximately six,” Ayanokouji conceded.

Ryōzen prepared the dead. The prisoners were cut down and laid together with their heads beside them, while the yōma corpses were kept separate, salted, and surrounded by strips of written paper.

The monk chanted while the pyres were built. His voice remained low and steady, and prayer beads moved beneath his thumb as the oil-soaked kindling caught.

Shimon remained until the rites were complete.

Kagawa used the time to improve his account of the battle. “The creature seized Kurobane,” he recounted, “but I held the saddle with one hand and cut through its neck with the other.”

Seki tightened the cloth around his forearm before remarking, “Kurobane should receive your stipend.”

Kagawa pretended not to hear him.

Nagai ordered them back before the pyres had fully collapsed. “No lingering,” he warned. “Blood has called once, and it may call more of their foul kind again.”

The hunters formed around the porters and wounded. The yōma teeth were sealed in separate pouches, while Abe carried his notes beneath his robe as though the pages were more valuable than the men who had produced them.

Spirits buoyed by success, they marched through the remainder of the night.

Dawn found them on the road below the castle. No one had slept, armor rubbed against bruises, and Shimon’s shoulders ached beneath the weight of the ōdachi. His clothing smelled of blood, sweat, smoke, and yōma viscera.

Even the boastful Kagawa had stopped talking.

Nagai did not dismiss them to their houses when they reached the castle. “The scholars will question each cell after you have rested,” he informed them. “Food will be brought, and you will remain within the castle until the inquiry is complete. Sleep while you can.”

Bedding was arranged in a barracks room near the concealed council chamber. A small household altar occupied one corner, where two wooden tablets stood behind a dish of salt and a cup of water. Someone had placed a fresh evergreen sprig beside them.

Shimon lowered himself onto a sleeping mat, but before he could close his eyes, the familiar sensation returned: something was paying attention to him.

He looked toward the altar, but nothing sat there. The tablets, salt, water, and evergreen branch remained undisturbed.

[UNKNOWN CARRIER SIGNAL DETECTED]Signal Strength: LowPattern: Multiple interference points suspected

Heita lay two mats away, still awake.

“Do you see anything?” Shimon whispered to him.

Heita kept his gaze fixed upon the altar. “Yes.”

“What do you see?”

“Two kami are sitting there.”

Shimon stared into the empty space. “What are they doing?”

“They are looking at you,” the odd man answered quietly.

Ayanokouji considered waking Tarō or finding Ryōzen, but exhaustion overcame him before he could choose between them. Sleep took him almost at once, and he dreamed that the room was full.