The Divine Scales in the north shattered.
A dry crack rang through the hallway.
Black-and-gold fragments scattered into the air and fell to the floor.
Yoshitsune narrowed his eyes.
“It broke?”
“No way.”
Miroku looked down at the fragments scattered across the floor.
“This thing doesn’t break.”
“Right.”
The next moment—
Clink.
A tiny fragment moved.
Clink-clink.
The scattered pieces began to tremble, as if calling to one another.
One.
Two.
Three.
They slid across the floor, pulled toward each other.
They joined together.
The cracks closed.
—or rather, they didn’t.
In the instant Miroku blinked, a single set of Divine Scales was floating there, as if nothing had ever happened.
Yoshitsune stared at it.
“Still creepy as ever.”
“But useful, right?”
“That’s your takeaway?”
“If it doesn’t break, that’s good enough.”
The Divine Scales gave a tiny chime.
“Are they mad?”
“They don’t have a will.”
“They absolutely do.”
“They don’t.”
Miroku answered instantly.
The Divine Scales were an ancient ritual implement said to have existed since the Age of the Gods.
They had a physical form.
They could be touched.
But they could not be destroyed.
More precisely, the result known as “breaking” simply never stuck.
His father and grandfather could use them too.
However, each time, they required a price—blood, spiritual power, and so on.
Miroku alone could use them without paying a price.
He had found them in the storehouse at the family home when he was little and often played with them as a toy.
“Miroku.”
“What?”
“Are you thinking about something?”
“Not really.”
“It’s written all over your face.”
“What does it say?”
“‘I’m gonna get yelled at.’”
“That’s not it.”
More precisely—
He’d gotten yelled at like never before.
His grandfather had been rendered speechless.
His father had gone deathly pale.
And Miroku himself had split the Divine Scales into five pieces and rolled them around on the floor for fun.
Even now, remembering his father’s face was kind of funny.
“Do you think I’ll get yelled at again when I get home?”
“Why?”
“Because I broke them.”
“They’re not broken.”
“Right.”
“You’re pretty casual about this.”
Even as they spoke, the white woman was still being pulled along by the red thread.
“No.”
She slid across the floor.
“I don’t want to.”
“……Right.”
Miroku raised his head.
“She comes first.”
“You finally came back?”
“To reality?”
“Yeah.”
“I want to go home.”
“Still not back, I see.”
The red thread pulled taut.
The woman’s body was dragged north.
“Help me.”
He’d heard her.
Miroku made a face like he hated this from the bottom of his soul.
“Yoshitsune.”
“Yeah?”
“Ten seconds.”
“For what?”
“Keep it from moving.”
“Keep what from moving?”
“That.”
Miroku pointed at the red thread.
“Can I cut it?”
“No.”
“Exorcise it?”
“No.”
“Burn it?”
“No.”
“Then what am I allowed to do?”
“Just stop it.”
“You’re making a lot of demands.”
“You’re the next Emperor, right? Figure something out.”
“You really know how to make use of me.”
Yoshitsune stepped forward.
That was all.
No hand seal.
No incantation.
He didn’t even take a stance.
He simply faced the woman.
The instant he did, the air changed.
The red thread stopped moving.
Miroku had the sensation that something far away had looked this way.
Yoshitsune’s amber eyes slowly turned gold.
“Ten seconds enough?”
“Plenty.”
“Then hurry up.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
Miroku pulled three talismans from his sleeve.
One for the white woman.
One for the red thread.
He floated the last one in front of himself.
“You’re cutting it?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“Shifting it.”
“The bond?”
“Yeah.”
Miroku looked at the red thread.
Bonds.
Between people.
Between people and gods.
Between gods and the land.
Between soul and flesh.
Everything in this world was connected by one bond or another.
That didn’t mean you could cut them carelessly.
Depending on the result, the white woman herself might disappear.
That would be a problem.
She had asked him to help.
So—
He would help as much as he could.
That was the kind of person Miroku was.
Not that he wanted to admit it.
“What a pain……”
Miroku traced a finger across the talisman.
There was no ink.
Even so, black characters rose into view.
Bond.
Shift.
The talisman glowed faintly.
“You could do this?”
“Miroku?”
“I’m concentrating right now.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“You’re annoying.”
Right now, he had two years’ worth of experience.
His body was sixteen years old.
But that didn’t mean all his knowledge of techniques had returned.
If he could use something—
he would use it.
He’d worry about whether his current body could handle it afterward.
“Here goes.”
He sent the talisman flying.
The white paper touched the red thread.
—CRACK!
“Gah!”
The impact launched Miroku backward, and Yoshitsune caught him.
“Careful!”
“Let go.”
“You flew into me!”
“Exactly as planned.”
“Liar.”
“You’re annoying.”
The talisman remained stuck to the red thread. It hadn’t peeled off.
“Good.”
“What’s good?”
“First stage complete.”
“How many stages are left?”
“No idea.”
“You’re even more casual than before.”
Miroku fed spiritual power into the talisman.
Something on the other side of the red thread reacted to it.
Miroku’s expression changed.
“Yoshitsune.”
“Yeah?”
“It really is there.”
“What is?”
“A god.”
Yoshitsune’s smile vanished.
“Certain?”
“Probably.”
“Does ‘probably’ come up a little too often with you?”
“If you don’t like it, investigate it yourself.”
“I can’t see it even with the Dragon Eye.”
“Then keep quiet.”
A god.
That alone changed everything.
Gods could not be exorcised.
No matter how far they fell,
no matter how many people they harmed—
as long as they were gods,
they could not be erased.
All that could be done was pacify them, enshrine them, and seal them away.
“Could it be the tower?”
“It’s possible.”
The Calming Towers surrounding the Imperial Palace.
Inside them were sealed nameless gods,
fallen gods,
those who were no longer enshrined,
and gods that had begun harming people.
Normally, they could not get out.
“……I’ve got nothing but a bad feeling about this.”
“You’ve been saying that all day.”
“Yeah, well.”
Then—
“Miroku.”
A voice.
It wasn’t the white woman.
It was lower.
Distant.
A voice that could belong neither clearly to a man nor a woman.
“Miroku.”
“Who are you?”
There was no answer.
“I found you.”
“Am I getting found a little too often today?”
“You’re popular.”
“Not happy about it.”
“Give it back.”
Miroku’s brows drew together.
“You too?”
“Give it back.”
“I keep telling you, say what you want back!”
The red thread grew thicker.
It began to pulse.
Thump.
Thump.
“Miroku.”
“I know.”
The barrier creaked.
The three sets of Divine Scales tilted at once.
No.
That wasn’t right.
One was missing.
The instant he thought that, the Divine Scales that had just restored themselves moved on their own.
The fourth set.
Miroku hadn’t given it any orders.
And yet—
it moved north and took its own position.
“See? They do have a will.”
“They don’t.”
“They just moved on their own.”
“Coincidence.”
“That’s absolutely not it.”
“You’re annoying.”
Four sets.
East.
West.
South.
North.
The four directions were complete once more.
Miroku narrowed his eyes for an instant.
But he had no time to think about it now.
“Yoshitsune.”
“What?”
“A little longer.”
“How much longer?”
“No idea.”
“That’s even less helpful than before.”
“Do your best.”
“You’re leaving it all to me?”
“Right person for the job.”
“That’s a convenient phrase.”
Yoshitsune raised his right hand and snapped his fingers.
That alone pressed down on the space around them.
The white woman.
The red thread.
The windows.
The floor.
The air itself.
Everything stopped.
Behind Yoshitsune, for only an instant, the shadow of a gigantic dragon appeared, then vanished.
Miroku glanced at it.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
He turned his attention back to the talismans.
The white woman.
The red thread.
He could see it now.
The woman wasn’t a vessel.
Much less a god.
“……That’s not it.”
“What isn’t?”
“She wasn’t possessed.”
He looked at the woman.
Inside her chest—
there was a hollow.
Nothing at all.
“It’s the opposite.”
“The opposite?”
“Only her body was left behind.”
The white woman trembled faintly.
“Then,” Yoshitsune began, “what was taken?”
“I don’t know.”
Her face?
Her name?
Her soul?
Her very existence?
He still didn’t know what had been stolen from her.
“But…”
Miroku looked at the red thread.
“If it’s saying, ‘Give me back my body’…”
“Maybe it doesn’t know what was taken from it either?”
“Probably.”
Miroku took out two new talismans.
One for the woman.
One for the thread.
“I’m separating them.”
The woman looked at Miroku.
She had no face.
Even so, she seemed frightened.
“It’s okay.”
The words came naturally from his mouth.
Even he was a little surprised.
“Probably.”
“You could leave off that last word, you know.”
“Lying is bad.”
“This is when you’re supposed to reassure her.”
“What a pain.”
“Miroku.”
“Fine.”
Miroku looked at the woman.
“You’re not going to die.”
That much, he could say.
“Because I’m here.”
Yoshitsune glanced at Miroku.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Creepy.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
Miroku channeled spiritual power into the talismans.
They glowed.
“Bonds forged between heaven and earth.”
A breath.
“Let what belongs be where it belongs.”
The red thread trembled.
“Let what differs be where it differs.”
Miroku’s eyes turned,
just slightly,
gold.
“That bond—”
“Here, let it part.”
There was no sound.
The red thread connecting to the woman’s body simply separated.
Far away,
toward the north,
something’s presence trembled with rage.
The hallway shook violently, and all four sets of Divine Scales chimed at once.
Chime.
Chime.
Chime.
Chime.
The white woman’s body collapsed.
“Miroku!”
“I’m fine!”
Miroku caught the woman in his arms.
He touched her.
The body that had been barely physical until moments ago
was now
undeniably
there.
In the black hole where her face should have been,
a single streak of light appeared.
“Thank you.”
For an instant, he thought she looked like an ordinary young woman who could have been anywhere.
Then her white body transformed into light.
It became particles
and vanished from Miroku’s arms.
At the end,
something fell to the floor.
Clatter.
“What is this?”
“Don’t touch it.”
Miroku stopped Yoshitsune from reaching for it.
What had fallen on the floor was a small white bone, no bigger than a fingertip.
Characters were carved into its surface.
“Can you read it?”
“Wait.”
Ancient characters.
Not modern ones.
But they looked familiar.
“……God-era script?”
“The real thing?”
“Probably.”
“Yoshitsune, can you tell what it says?”
Miroku showed the bone to Yoshitsune.
“One character.”
“What?”
“—Body.”
Yoshitsune’s smile disappeared.
Then—
Gooooong.
A bell rang in the distance.
Gooooong.
Again.
It wasn’t the lunch-period chime.
This was older. Heavier.
From the direction of the Imperial Palace.
Gooooong.
A third time.
Miroku and Yoshitsune looked north at the same time.
“This…”
Yoshitsune muttered.
“Not good.”
“The worst.”
He knew this bell.
Anyone born in this country had to know it.
The Calming Towers surrounding the Imperial Palace.
The bell was sounded only when something went wrong at one of them.
An alarm.
Miroku pressed a hand to his forehead.
His second life.
As he’d suspected,
something was wrong.
In the spring of his first life, when he was sixteen,
he had never heard a bell like this.
“Miroku.”
“What?”
“Are you free after school?”
“I have work.”
“Come on, take the day off.”
“No.”
“I’m pretty sure the Imperial Palace is going to summon you.”
“I’m definitely not going.”
“And the Kannagi family will too.”
“Ugh.”
That—
he really didn’t want.
“I’m going to work.”
“That’s just escapism.”
“Labor is noble.”
“Don’t suddenly develop a work ethic now.”
Yoshitsune laughed.
Miroku let out a deep sigh.
At his shoulder, the four sets of Divine Scales began to overlap one by one without a sound.
In the end, they returned to a single set of scales, just as they had been at the beginning.
Then, as if it were the most natural thing in the world,
they slipped into the pocket of Miroku’s gym uniform.
“They just put themselves in your pocket, didn’t they?”
“They did not.”
“They did.”
“You saw wrong.”
“You said the same thing about that supernatural anomaly earlier.”
“Your imagination.”
“They absolutely have a will.”
“They don’t.”
“You’re stubborn.”
Miroku lightly tapped the Divine Scales through his pocket.
Chime.
They gave a small ring.
“They answered you.”
“They did not.”
“They did.”
“Let’s go home.”
“To the Imperial Palace.”
“Home.”
“The Imperial Palace.”
“Work.”
“The Imperial Palace.”
“Giving up?”
“On life?”
“No.”
Miroku let out another deep sigh.
The supernatural anomaly in the north building
had apparently
been nothing more than the entrance.