Chapter Six: Head of the Kannagi Family
A crack ran across the barrier covering the tower.
There was no sound.
And yet, everyone present held their breath.
Like a crack spreading through transparent glass, a thin fissure raced across the surface of the pale membrane of light.
The barrier covering the Calming Tower was counted among the highest-grade seals in this country. Maintained for hundreds of years through repeated repairs and sacred rites, it was not something that would waver from a little spiritual interference.
Considering what was sealed inside, it really couldn't afford to waver.
Miroku unconsciously tightened his grip on the Divine Scales.
A chilly sensation traveled through his palm.
The small scales were still pointing north, as always.
However, they weren't indicating the cracked tower.
They were pointing even farther below.
Underground beneath the Imperial Palace.
I have a bad feeling about this.
Why was this happening right after his second life had begun?
At this point in his first life, things had been much more peaceful.
He went to school, slept, and worked his part-time job.
Every so often, he got dragged out as a ritual exorcist and harassed by Yoshitsune and the others.
It had been a hassle in its own way, but at least he had no memory of a crack appearing in a tower that sealed a god.
Miroku was thinking about that when he heard the rustle of clothing from the far end of the corridor.
Several ritual exorcists were approaching.
When Miroku saw the man walking at the front, his brows drew together slightly.
His father.
The current head of the Kannagi family.
The head of the family that oversaw sacred rites and ceremonial observances, and a man who stood near the very top among this country's ritual exorcists.
He wore a white kariginu robe with deep-purple hakama.
His long black hair was loosely tied back.
Judging by his appearance alone, he looked less like a religious official and more like a court noble from a story.
His finely formed features gave no hint of his age, and his eyes always held a gentle warmth.
He never let the soft smile leave his face, and he rarely raised his voice.
His features.
The air around him.
He looked a lot like Yoshitsune.
Miroku had thought so for years.
And the two of them got along astonishingly badly.
Miroku secretly suspected it was because they were so alike, but saying that to either of them would only create more trouble, so he kept quiet.
When his father spotted Miroku, his usual gentle smile deepened just a little.
“Miroku. You made it out safely.”
“You can tell that just by looking.”
“Now, now. Don't say things like that.”
Even his voice was gentle.
Miroku didn't notice that his father's steps were slightly faster than usual.
The first thing the man checked wasn't the tower or the scales.
It was Miroku.
From head to toe.
Was he injured?
His father checked every inch of him in an instant, all behind that smile.
“Are you hurt? Does anything ache?”
“Nope. Perfectly normal. Bursting with energy.”
“Nausea or dizziness? Does your body feel heavy? Are you hearing any strange voices?”
“Dad.”
Miroku narrowed his eyes.
“I didn't come here for a physical.”
“Right. But just in case.”
“I'm fine.”
“I see.”
The short reply ended the conversation. To Miroku, his father looked exactly as he always did.
Yoshitsune, however, noticed that the man's right hand, hidden inside his sleeve, was clenched so tightly his nails were digging into his palm.
Perhaps sensing Yoshitsune's gaze, Miroku's father looked his way, and their eyes met.
“I'm relieved to see you're safe as well, Yoshitsune.”
“Thank you.”
“I hear you took Miroku to a dangerous place.”
“It's the other way around. I went with him.”
“I'd prefer it if you stopped him next time.”
“Yes... I'll keep that in mind.”
Shigure looked back and forth between them and quietly asked Yozuru,
“Why are those two scary when they're both smiling?”
Yozuru didn't answer.
Apparently, he had decided it would be wiser not to get involved.
After finishing his exchange with Yoshitsune, Miroku's father turned his gaze to the tower. The atmosphere changed with that single motion.
The ritual exorcists waiting nearby straightened slightly under the suddenly taut air.
“Separate the North Tower from the third barrier. Close the spirit veins to the other towers for now. Seal off the northern corridor until we've confirmed the state of the seal.”
“But if we isolate the North Tower, the strain on the seal—”
“I know.”
Miroku's father cut him off gently.
“So hurry. What about the ritual priests inside?”
“They've all completed their evacuation.”
“Then there's no problem. Begin.”
“Yes, sir.”
The ritual exorcists scattered all at once.
Those gathered in the garden unfurled talismans, while others carved new spell formulas into the corridor pillars.
The voices of a purification litany began to echo from somewhere in the distance.
In response, the buildings of the Imperial Palace themselves began to glow with a pale light.
The land.
The buildings.
The waterways.
The trees.
The stone paving.
The entire Imperial Palace, designed as one enormous altar, began to move to suppress the abnormality in the seal.
Miroku watched in silence.
A seal managed by the state.
Naturally, it wasn't something a single exorcist could deal with.
That was normal.
The abnormal thing was that he and Yoshitsune had been handling things alone at the north building.
Even so.
The Divine Scales in Miroku's palm paid no attention whatsoever to the ritual exorcists' movements.
They still pointed underground.
“Dad.”
“Hmm?”
“This.”
Miroku lifted the Divine Scales slightly.
“They aren't pointing at the tower.”
His father's gaze dropped to the Divine Scales.
“Then what are they pointing at?”
“Underground.”
For the briefest instant, the smile vanished from his father's face.
It truly was only an instant.
Not even as long as a blink.
But Miroku didn't miss it.
He knows something.
He sensed it instinctively.
“What is underground?”
“This isn't the place to discuss that.”
“So there is something.”
“It's not nice to twist people's words like that.”
“You raised me.”
“I don't remember raising you that way.”
“That's what they call the results of a hands-off education.”
His father smiled as if at a loss.
But he didn't answer Miroku's question.
That alone was enough.
There was something beneath the Imperial Palace.
And it was something his father had no intention of telling even Miroku, who was regarded as the next head of the Kannagi family.
Not that Miroku had any intention of inheriting the position.
The signs of trouble were getting stronger.
Miroku tried to put away the Divine Scales.
That was when—
Clink.
The scales chimed.
His fingers stopped.
Again.
Clink.
The Divine Scales trembled.
They rose from his palm.
The single set of scales split apart against Miroku's will.
One became two.
Two became four.
Four Divine Scales scattered around Miroku.
This time, his father's expression clearly changed.
“Miroku.”
“It wasn't me,” Miroku said first.
“They're moving on their own.”
East.
West.
South.
North.
The four sets surrounded Miroku.
Everyone nearby sensed that something abnormal was happening.
No one spoke.
The Divine Scales slowly changed direction.
All four pans.
At the same time.
They turned toward Miroku.
“...Huh?”
A dazed sound escaped Miroku.
The Divine Scales were pointing at him.
That alone made no sense.
But his father's reaction was even more inexplicable.
“Don't move.”
His voice was as gentle as ever.
Even so, his father took one step toward Miroku.
“Stay right there.”
“I haven't moved.”
“Good. That's my boy.”
“Don't treat me like a child.”
There was no answer.
His father was looking only at the Divine Scales.
He wasn't smiling.
That was unusual.
The pans of the Divine Scales wobbled.
Once.
Twice.
To the right.
To the left.
And then.
All four sets came to a stop, perfectly level.
Clink.
A single clear note rang out.
The next moment, the Divine Scales overlapped as if nothing had happened and returned to a single set.
They dropped straight into Miroku's palm.
“...What the hell was that?”
Naturally, there was no answer.
At least, that's what it seemed like to Miroku.
His father wasn't looking at the Divine Scales anymore. This time, he was looking at Miroku.
The color had drained from his gentle features.
“Dad?”
“...It's nothing.”
“You have the face of a man who's definitely hiding something.”
“It's your imagination.”
“No way.”
His usual smile returned.
That only made it more suspicious.
“More importantly, will you tell me what happened at the north building?”
He was changing the subject.
Obvious.
But even if Miroku pressed him here, he probably wouldn't answer.
Miroku gave up.
The white woman.
The faceless supernatural anomaly.
The red thread.
The divine presence he had sensed at its far end.
The voice demanding that he return my body.
The bones left behind after the white woman vanished.
He explained everything in order, one point at a time.
His father never interrupted once.
However.
The moment Miroku mentioned the bones engraved with divine-era script, his father's eyes narrowed slightly.
“Are you carrying them now?”
“Yes.”
Miroku reached into his clothes.
At that instant, his father's hand shot out.
“Don't touch them anymore.”
He took the bundle of cloth from Miroku.
He cradled the bones through the cloth as though they were fragile.
“You touched them with your bare hands?”
“I did. I only picked them up, so maybe a few seconds.”
“Did you hear a voice?”
“It said, ‘Give it back.’”
His father fell silent.
“...Dad. You do know something, don't you?”
He didn't deny it.
He didn't confirm it, either.
He simply stared at the bones.
That silence was answer enough.
Yep. Trouble confirmed.
Miroku slumped inwardly.
“Go home for today.”
“I have work later.”
“Take the day off.”
“If I miss this shift, they'll cut my hours. I don't want that.”
“Then I'll cover—”
“That isn't the point.”
His father looked troubled for a moment.
The expression somehow resembled Yoshitsune's, which irritated Miroku for some reason.
“...I see.”
His father didn't push any further.
Miroku looked away.
That was why he failed to notice his father tightening his fingers slightly around the bones wrapped in cloth.
Or the thing that surfaced in the depths of his eyes.
With the area around the tower sealed off, Miroku and the others were moved to a room in the Imperial Palace.
Regardless of whether they were successors to the Five Great Elder Houses or the next Emperor, they were still high school students.
And now that the thing being sealed might be a god, there was no way they could be allowed into the scene.
Miroku had no objection.
He had no desire to throw himself into dangerous places.
The problem was—
He was bored.
From far away, he could hear the movements of ritual exorcists coming and going, along with the occasional voice reciting a purification litany.
The quiet should have been calming, as it usually was.
Today, though, it felt strangely heavy.
Miroku lay on the tatami, using his arm as a pillow while he stared at the ceiling.
Returning to the past.
The white woman.
The bones.
The underground of the Imperial Palace.
The Divine Scales.
And.
The Divine Scales pointing at him.
He lined them up in his head.
None of those things had happened in his first life.
Or had they?
Miroku furrowed his brow.
Had they not happened in his first life? Or had he simply forgotten them?
The more he thought about it, the worse he felt.
So he stopped thinking and closed his eyes. Time to sleep. Sleep was important.
That was when footsteps approached from the corridor.
“Lord Miroku Kannagi.”
A man's voice came from beyond the sliding door.
Miroku opened one eye, looking annoyed.
“Come in.”
He couldn't be bothered to get up himself, so he glanced at Shigure, who was sitting near the door.
Shigure's face seemed to say, Why me? But in the end, he opened the door.
The person who entered was one of the ritual toolmakers employed by the Imperial Palace.
The man wore a white kariginu robe and carried an old paulownia box in his hands.
Nothing seemed strange about that.
The problem was.
The man was wearing a ko-omote mask over his face.
The air in the room stopped.
Miroku, too.
For one moment.
He couldn't move.
His sleepiness.
Vanished completely.
That was not a mask a human being was supposed to wear.
At least.
No human other than Miroku.
“The mask you left in our care has been repaired, so I've come to return it.”
The man knelt in front of Miroku as though nothing were wrong and held out the paulownia box.
Miroku looked at the man's face.
Then.
At the paulownia box.
And then.
Back at the man.
“...Thanks.”
“Not at all.”
Miroku accepted the box.
Something was off.
The weight in his hands.
It was far too light.
A nasty sensation ran down Miroku's spine.
He opened the lid.
It was empty.
Slowly.
He raised his eyes.
The ko-omote mask covering the man's face.
Warped.
A single wrinkle appeared in its white cheek.
Then.
Another.
The smooth forehead crumpled, and the thin brows drooped.
The mouth.
Spread into.
A wide, ugly grin.
A wooden mask shouldn't have been able to move.
And yet.
In the time it took to blink.
The ko-omote mask modeled after a young woman.
Had transformed into an old-man mask covered in deep wrinkles.
Miroku's body tensed slightly.
What came from the man's mouth next was a voice completely different from the one he'd heard moments before.
“Heh heh... It's been a long time, little girl.”
Dry.
A raspy voice like an old man's.
The mask.
There was no mistake.
When Miroku had returned from being spirited away at the age of six, this was the mask he had supposedly been holding.
What it was.
Who had made it.
How long it had existed.
No one knew the details.
The only thing they did know.
Was that it seemed to be an unbelievably troublesome object.
If anyone other than Miroku put it on carelessly.
There was a very high chance.
That it would devour their mind.
Even after it was torn from their face.
Only a very few people.
Had ever returned to a normal state.
“Hey.”
Miroku stood.
He started toward the man.
The mask.
Laughed, “Ha ha ha!”
“Don't worry so much. You needn't concern yourself with this human.”
“Of course I need to.”
“I merely borrowed his body for a little while. I won't break it.”
“How am I supposed to trust you?”
“You're as suspicious as ever.”
The mask laughed merrily.
At least.
There was no obvious abnormality in the man's body.
His breathing.
His spirit veins.
Neither was disturbed.
Miroku didn't completely lower his guard, but he took one step back.
“More importantly, little girl.”
The old-man mask.
Grinned.
Even wider.
Another bad feeling.
How many times had that been today?
“How do you feel about using us, after more than a thousand years of existence—”
A pause.
“To crack peanuts?”
Shigure's expression froze.
Miyabi slowly turned to look at Miroku.
Himeuo wore an indescribable expression.
Only Yoshitsune was struggling not to laugh.
“...It wasn't on purpose.”
“You struck us three times.”
“Twice.”
“Three times.”
“Don't get hung up on the details.”
“And it wasn't the peanut that cracked. It was us.”
“That's why I apologized.”
“I haven't heard you apologize yet.”
Miroku looked at the mask.
For several seconds.
Silence.
“...Sorry.”
“You don't mean it.”
“I'm sorry.”
“Don't look away.”
“You're awfully demanding.”
“Whose fault is that?”
Miroku surrendered.
He faced the old-man mask head-on.
“My apologies. From now on, I'll try not to use you to crack peanuts.”
“Try?”
“I won't use you.”
“Good.”
Apparently, that satisfied it.
Simple.
No.
Miroku wasn't sure what its standards were.
Something this troublesome.
Cheering up from an apology like that.
Was that normal?
Or wasn't it?
Miroku had never really understood it.
The old man.
Once again.
Laughed, “Ha ha ha!”
“You must be exceedingly careful with how you handle us.”
“I'll do my best.”
“You will.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
At that moment.
The mask.
Peeled away from the man's face.
As if whatever had been holding it there had suddenly lost its strength.
Plop.
It fell onto the tatami.
At the same time.
The man's body tilted.
“Whoa.”
Miroku caught him instinctively.
He was unconscious.
But.
His breathing was normal.
His spirit veins showed no obvious disturbance, either.
For now.
He seemed all right.
“...You really only borrowed his body?”
Miroku looked at the mask on the tatami.
Now.
It was an ordinary white ko-omote mask.
It was hard to believe it had been the old man just moments ago.
Miroku let out a deep sigh.
“Ugh... What a pain.”
The supernatural anomaly at the north building.
The Calming Tower.
The mysterious bones.
The underground of the Imperial Palace.
His second life.
It seemed.
Was going to be.
Far more troublesome than the first.