Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Ewwdo — Ao and Suisen’s Home — Seventeen Human Years After Mugai's Death

When Ao and Suisen offered to host him so their parents could focus on a diplomatic mission for the United Netherworlds, Raiji had nearly bounced out of his shoes at the thought.

“I didn’t even get to spar with Big Sis! Why did the United Netherworlds have to summon her?” he muttered.

Now, having finished his daily sword training—Master Benikage had threatened extra drills if he slacked—Raiji wandered into the library, scanning the shelves.

“No comic books whatsoever… This house is a wasteland,” Raiji sighed, flopping dramatically.

Then, an old book about the Zesshosais caught his eye. “Oooh! I bet there’s something about Dad and Aunt Higan in here!”

But the last name listed—along with an illustration—was someone called Mugai. Raiji didn’t know why, but something about his aura reminded him of his father.

As he turned the pages, a photo slipped out. He picked it up. In the photo there stood a much younger Ao, and beside her… a cyborg.

“Big brooooooooooother!” Raiji shouted, dashing from the room. “Look! Look! This cyborg is sooo cool!”

Suisen looked up from his paperwork just in time to see Raiji’s eyes sparkling. He chuckled, taking the photo. “Thank you. You know... that cyborg is standing right in front of you.”

Raiji frowned, his brows knitting tight. “Huh? You’re a demon! Are you trying to mess with me?”

“It’s a long story,” Suisen replied gently. “I’ll tell you when you’re older, Raiji.”

Raiji groaned. “Again with the ‘when you’re older’... Being a kid is so hard.”

After a pause, he tilted his head. “So… if I say I believe you, were you really a cyborg? For real?”

Suisen nodded.

Raiji squinted at him. “No offense, big brother… but you were way cooler back then.”

Suisen sighed and facepalmed. “Do you know that your cousin Rekka said the exact same thing?”

Just then, the front door burst open.

“I’m baaack!” Ao called joyfully.

Raiji lit up and sprinted to her, throwing his arms around her in a hug.

“Welcome back, Ao,” Suisen said warmly. “I’m glad you returned earlier than expected.”

“Let’s just say… I persuaded everyone to resolve a diplomatic crisis quickly,” she smiled, flexing the arm where the Demonic Fist was on her hand.

“My sister is the bestest warrior ever!” Raiji cheered.

Suisen hid a smile. Ao always said the same thing about Fuji, in the same breathless tone.

“Raiji, why don’t you come with me?” he offered. “I just remembered that I have two more photos you might like. That way, your sister can get changed and rest a little.”

Raiji eagerly followed him.

The first photo was one Yeyasu had taken from a clever angle, capturing himself, Higan, and a little Rekka. In it, Rekka had just whacked a Moboo square on the rear with her spellcasting staff, with a perfect imitation of her mother’s signature ambush move.

Raiji doubled over, clutching his stomach as laughter spilled out of him. Then Suisen pulled out a second photo, but he covered the left half with his hand.

“Now… don’t ever tell your dad about this photo,” he said with mock seriousness.

On the right, baby Raiji was sleeping soundly on a rug. Suisen lifted his hand from the left side, revealing Fuji passed out in the exact same position.

Raiji gasped… then burst into another fit of laughter.

Later in the Evening

“Big Sis…” Raiji hesitated, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “It’s not that I don’t want to believe it, but… was Big Brother Suisen really a cyborg?”

Ao arched a brow, intrigued. “He was. But how did you find out?”

Raiji launched into the story of how he’d found the photo, how the cyborg version looked way cooler, and how Suisen told him he’d have to wait until he was older to hear the rest.

Ao chuckled, shaking her head. “Well… at least he’s consistent.”

Raiji scratched at his hair, his face tightening into determination. “Then I’ll wait. But while I wait, I’ll keep training! One day I’ll be as amazing as Dad, Mom, and you!”

He stretched, letting out a long yawn. “I’m going to bed now. Good night, Big Sis! Love you!”

“Raiji, wait.” Ao’s voice softened, tugging him to a pause. “Do you love your big brother Suisen too?”

“Of course I do!” Raiji grinned, all teeth. “Even if he’s not as fun as Uncle Yeyasu!”

“Then…” Ao’s tone grew calm but firm. “Promise me you won’t bring up the cyborg thing again until he’s ready to talk about it, okay? He might not show it, but there are things in his past that still hurt. And when he’s ready, you’ll understand why.”

Raiji straightened, lips pressed together in seriousness. “I promise. Good night.”

As he padded off to bed, Ao sat in the quiet, her thoughts drifting back to the day that had changed everything for her and for Suisen.

Eight Human Years After Mugai’s Death

Opener, Cannonline, Sea Again (returned to his original body after Ao and Cannonline performed one of their first rituals, which restored living Infernal Treasures into real demons), Benikage, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe were sleeping near the campfire.

Ao lay on her side, staring into the fire. Every few moments, her gaze drifted toward Suisen.

His body, damaged in the last battle, sparked faintly. Not even Cannonline could repair it this time, because, as she had explained, Suisen’s frame was an experimental model built many turns of the Dark Sun past, (1) which now it had simply reached its limit.

And yet, he’d refused the ritual that would restore him to his true demonic form. No one understood why, and he refused to explain.

So, Ao stood up and approached him. He was sitting on a rock, breath ragged.

“Why?” she simply asked.

“Ao, please… leave me alone. I don’t want to talk,” Suisen replied.

“Then I will,” she said, unwavering. “Why keep choosing that body? Why keep hearing all those voices from the multiple souls bound inside? I was a living Infernal Treasure too. I know the difference. A real demon body is something else.”

And for the first time since she had known him, Suisen snapped.

“No, Ao. You don’t understand!” he shouted, his voice cracking with a rare frustration.

Ao was sure the others had been woken by his angry voice, but no one moved.

“When Celestia turned you into a real demon, (2) you kept your memories. But I won’t. There are pieces of my past I’ll never get back. You don’t know what it’s like to look at your brother… and not recognize him. (3) What if it happens again or I lose my identity? What if… I forget you?”

Ao’s hand drifted to her chest, breath catching. She didn’t catch every word, but the way his voice cracked—sharp, desperate—left her throat dry.

Still, she decided to be strong.

“If it happens…” she said, smiling and puffing out her cheeks in a show of mock defiance, “I’ll tell Dad you made me cry! I’m sure he’ll beat you up until you remember me.”

Suisen blinked. Then let out a soft, broken chuckle.

“…Let’s go wake up Cannonline and Opener. I think… I’m ready to become a real demon now.”

“Huh? Why Opener?”

“Well… I died as a kid, more or less. I’ll need something to wear unless I want to appear completely undignified.”

Ao shook them gently. Both stirred at once, as if they’d been listening all along. Opener didn’t speak, but the faint curve of his lips was answer enough.

As they left to prepare the ritual, Ao took a steadying breath. Then, she moved forward with Cannonline, preparing herself for what would have come next.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The ritual—made possible by combining the binding power of Ao’s Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai with Cannonline’s restoration tools—came to its end.

Ao’s hands fidgeted at her sides, Cannonline’s gaze was fixed on the cloth covering Suisen. Both were waiting for Opener’s signal.

Scattered across the floor were the many demonic weapons that had once been embedded within Suisen’s cyborg frame.

One item in particular drew Ao’s gaze.

Though she had never seen it in person, she was certain the small axe resting on the ground was none other than the Demonic Axe Zenchi Kintoki.

Its blade was asymmetrical—one half a translucent crystalline white-gold edge, the other a matte blackened steel, cracked like ancient veins of glass.

Glowing script-runes shimmered faintly on the white-gold side, while the shaft was wrapped in braided leather and wire that spiraled tightly together. Where the handle met the blade, a glass orb was inset, likely designed to hold Suisen’s final recorded vision.

“All done,” Opener said, breaking the silence. “You’re taller now, huh?” he added with a faint smile as he lifted the cloth.

Standing before Ao and Cannonline was a young demon, a little taller than Ao was. He had short brown hair streaked with green, one soft brown eye, and one vivid green one. His brow furrowed slightly, lips parting as though words might come but didn’t.

The reborn Suisen looked around slowly. First at Opener, then at Cannonline, and finally at Ao. Meanwhile, Sea Again, Benikage, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer approached from the outskirts of the ritual space.

Everyone remained silent until Suisen finally spoke, his words measured, the pause between each syllable betraying hesitation.

“Why are we not at Ewwdo Castle, Demmodore Opener?”

No one answered immediately.

Finally, Cannonline cleared her throat. Her voice was calm and clinical. “Before we explain that, do you know who you are looking at?”

Suisen nodded. “Of course. Cannonline, the Demonic Weapons Magistrate. And those three,” he said, gesturing to Sea Again, Benikage, and Tenbuyer, “are the Ocean Magistrate, the Total Victory Magistrate, and the Resale Magistrate, respectively.”

“And the other two?” Cannonline pressed.

Suisen studied Ao for a long moment. “From the stories, I expected someone younger… but her physical appearance accords perfectly with the description of the Ice Fang Princess.”

Ao’s heart skipped a beat. Who Suisen spoke about was a past version of her.

Then Suisen looked toward Joe Doe.

“I don’t recognize him… Why does he share a body like mine? I was designed by the Shogunate to execute orders, yet here stands another in the same form. Is he one of their projects as well?” His words faltered, unease breaking through the flatness of his tone.

Joe Doe responded calmly. “I am Joe Doe, leader of the Thirteen Magistrates. Magistrate Cannonline placed me in this body after my original one was severely damaged in an explosion caused accidentally by Shogun Yeyasu. That’s also why we’re not at Ewwdo.”

Ao caught the deliberate pause before Joe Doe spoke, and the way his eyes flicked toward Cannonline. Too smooth, too careful—a lie, probably meant only to test the extent of Suisen’s memory. When Suisen showed no reaction to the name Yeyasu, everyone knew that it meant nothing to him anymore.

Suisen turned back to Cannonline.

“My circuits are failing to respond. Why?”

Cannonline gave a steady reply. “The explosion destroyed your mechanical body, and an organic vessel was the only available replacement. You will have to adapt to its… sensory input. And you will no longer require oil for sustenance.”

Suisen frowned. “A necessary choice, perhaps. But I do not approve, Magistrate Cannonline. Restoration to a cyborg body must be arranged at once.”

Ao’s breath caught, shoulders tightening as if something had punched the air from her chest.

Seeing her face fall, Opener, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer gently led Suisen away to rest. Only Ao, Cannonline, Sea Again, and Benikage remained behind.

Sea Again crossed his arms. “His stance, his tone, and the blankness in his eyes... That’s not the Suisen we knew. My own restoration was not like this. Perhaps the duration as a living Infernal Treasure is a factor? My time was far shorter than his.”

“Unfortunately,” Cannonline said, “we can only wait and hope it is a temporary dissociation.”

“In the meantime,” she added, “Benikage, help me gather the weapons so we can send them back to Ewwdo Castle. Except for the Demonic Axe. Maybe holding it will help him remember something.”

Benikage gave a small nod, and Sea Again began helping him.

Ao said nothing at first. When her words finally came, they drifted out soft and unfocused.

“I am going on patrol.”

Cannonline watched her for a moment, then nodded silently. Sea Again and Benikage didn’t stop her, though their gazes lingered as she disappeared into the mist.

Ao slipped into the highland fog curling around the camp. Only when the firelight was far behind her did she break into a sprint. Her breathing came in sharp gasps, her heartbeat a frantic drum against her ribs, louder than the wind.

When she reached a ridge—where wind-twisted trees creaked gently in the night—her legs finally gave out.

She collapsed to the ground.

She didn’t scream. But the tears came anyway—silent, persistent, and utterly devastating.

“He forgot everything since we became the Seven Infernal Treasures Wielders… (1) all those battles—everything,” she whispered to the empty air.

She drew a sharp breath, trying to steady herself.

“Now, to him… I am just a title from an old story.”

She lifted her gaze to the pale glow of the Nethermoon above. Its cold light offered no comfort, only the reminder that the Netherworld kept turning.

Even when a heart broke in silence.

“I will bring him back,” she vowed. Her voice was low but steady, even as tears still streaked her face. “Not the old cyborg. Not this new demon. Him.”

She stood. The Nethermoon's light felt colder, but she kept walking. The Grand Journey, after all, was far from over.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

That night, Suisen dreamed.

A small demon with brown eyes and neatly tied brown hair stood in a training garden, dressed in a child-sized kimono bearing the Edogawa crest.

His hair was gathered into a tidy side ponytail with a ribbon, and his wide eyes shone with admiration as he spoke to someone taller—slightly older—whose face remained a dark blur, though a distinctive, sharp-toothed grin was visible.

"That last spell you cast was phenomenal, Brother! Father once said Mother was a spellcaster like you," the younger demon said, his voice brimming with admiration.

The blurred figure laughed proudly.

"Hyahyahya… just wait and see what I’ll be capable of in time!" Then, after a pause, his voice softened.

"But enough about me. Have you thought about what you want to do? Father may not say it, but I know he’s worried. You’ve been so focused on your studies lately…"

The dream flickered, and Suisen jolted awake, a sharp gasp tearing from his throat.

Around him stood Magistrates Sea Again, Crimson Dark, and Cannonline.

"How are you feeling, Suisen?" Magistrate Cannonline asked gently.

“Strange,” he admitted after a pause. “It feels like my body wants to recharge… but also like it needs to expel something.”

Magistrates Sea Again and Crimson Dark exchanged a glance.

“Come with us,” Crimson Dark said. “We need to explain a few things about your new body, and what that means now.”

Suisen followed in silence, but every step felt alien, every movement a negotiation with unfamiliar limbs.

His legs no longer moved with the clean, hydraulic rhythm he knew. There was no hiss of pressurized joints, no auto-recalibration—only flesh, muscles, and instinct.

He was taller now, and lighter. Distances skewed. The guiding chorus that had always whispered in his mind was gone, perhaps forever.

Even breathing betrayed him. Once an unconscious subroutine, it was now a burden. His chest rose and fell without command, every rhythm sharp, intrusive.

At the riverbank, Crimson Dark tossed him a damp cloth.

"You're sweating," he said.

Suisen frowned. “Sweat? That’s… inefficient.”

Sea Again chuckled. “Welcome to living flesh, kid.”

Suisen leaned toward the water.

Gone was the polished alloy and sensor plates he had known. The reflection showed a young demon with brown hair streaked with green, one soft brown eye, one bright green. Both very real. Both very alive.

He didn’t recognize the face staring back. He felt alien in his own skin.

"Do I… have to sleep now?" he asked quietly.

"Eventually," Sea Again replied. "You’ll hate it at first. Then you’ll be too tired to care."

“And food?”

“You’ll be starving soon,” Crimson Dark said. “Not oil, but real food. And yeah, bits get stuck in your teeth. It’s the worst.”

“I… don’t know how to eat,” Suisen admitted, the words barely a whisper.

There was a beat of silence, then Crimson Dark nodded. “Then we’ll teach you. That’s why we’re here.”

Suisen flexed his fingers, watching the tiny tremor ripple across his skin. The hands were warm, alive—but clumsy, untested, unsteady.

A simple movement of them made him overshoot. Muscles he didn't known they existed resisted his command. Movements that were once instantaneous now lagged behind his intent, forcing him to pause, adjust, and try again.

No hum of computations, no automatic corrections, no split-second calculations. Only raw, unpredictable flesh, and the weight of every nerve firing in real time.

Worst of all, his Foresight had vanished. The familiar hum of predictions—once a constant guide—was gone.

Uncertainty gnawed at him. Not knowing was intolerable. But what hollowed him most was that mortality pressed against him like a weight he couldn’t compute or ignore.

Eight Human Years After That Afternoon in Ewwdo — Present Day

The sky above the Dojo was streaked with soft twilight. Clouds drifted slowly across the horizon, their edges touched with gold.

Raiji sat on the edge of the old rooftop veranda, one of the few places where you could see the entire Gero Haunt Spring below and still remain hidden from view. Most of the students didn’t even know it existed. A quiet perch above the training halls, open to the wind, open to the stars.

Suisen folded his legs beside him, hands resting loosely on his knees.

When he had arrived that morning—unannounced—and asked Fuji and Pirilika if he could speak with Raiji alone, they hadn’t questioned it. They simply pointed him toward the roof and made sure the evening drills ended early.

Now, Raiji watched Suisen in silence.

He had expected advice. Maybe even encouragement or something to carry with him into his first real mission for the dojo.

Instead, Suisen spoke of his past.

Raiji had taken Ao’s advice seriously all those turns of the Dark Sun ago—to never push his brother-in-law about his time as a cyborg. Back then, he wouldn’t have understood how deeply that past had scarred him.

But now, hearing Suisen talk about it—his voice shifting between awe, regret, and quiet detachment—Raiji began to understand. A little, at least.

He noticed Suisen was still staring at his own hands, as if they didn’t quite belong to him.

Raiji lifted his own hand beside Suisen’s. “See, big brother Suisen? Yours look like mine now.”

Suisen glanced at them, his fingers small, warm, and undeniably alive. For a brief moment, he let himself feel the pulse of flesh, and the weight of a hand that could be held.

“I suppose they do,” he murmured.

Raiji grinned. “So if I mess up a swing during sword practice and get a blister… well, welcome to the club!”

Suisen chuckled quietly. Then, after a beat, he looked out at the stars, letting the silence stretch between them.

“I’ll try not to let blisters stop me either,” he added softly, more to himself than to Raiji.

Raiji’s grin widened, satisfied. Together, they watched the twilight settle over Gero Haunt Spring, the quiet companionship more reassuring than words could capture.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

That same morning, Ao set out with Opener, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe toward the nearest settlement.

The plan was twofold: gather intelligence about the next likely location where demons were still trapped in Infernal Treasures… and find proper clothing for Suisen.

As they walked, a firm and familiar hand settled on her shoulder.

“I’m sure he’ll remember everything in time, Ao,” Opener said gently. “We just need to give him a little elbow room and let the memories simmer.”

Ao’s hands clenched briefly at her sides, then fell limply. Her gaze drifted to the ground, to the leaves shivering in the wind, as if trying to hide the weight pressing against her chest.

“Thanks, Opener… It’s just—” Her voice faltered, lost to the rustle of leaves.

Tenbuyer, flapping a few steps ahead, glanced back. “What’ll you do if his memories don’t return soon, Ao?”

Ao paused. “…Honestly? I haven’t let myself think that far. Part of me still hopes he’ll start remembering any day now. At least he sent a letter to Uncle Yey-yey recently. That buys us some time… before we have to break the news that his brother doesn’t recognize him again.”

“Only Cannonline could invent a technology that delivers letters no matter where you are,” Joe Doe said, and then silence fell.

Tenbuyer turned to him. “Your possession powers… they work on inanimate Infernal Treasures too, right? What if you tried with the Demonic Axe? Maybe it could stir something in him while he’s using it.”

Opener flinched and his shoulders tensed.

"Is there something wrong, Opener?" Ao asked, concern in her voice.

Opener blinked, shook his head and turned to Joe Doe. “We three can hold down the fort. Why don’t you head back and test Tenbuyer’s idea?”

Joe Doe gave a quiet nod and left without a word.

Ao’s gaze dropped to her hands. The Demonic Fist glowed faintly, as if sensing her thoughts, and a hollow ache settled behind her ribs. Her fingers fidgeted with the edge of her kimono. Each step felt heavier, as though she bore a weight she could neither set down nor carry fully.

She had been the one who urged Suisen to return to his demon body. She’d thought it would heal him. Help him find peace. But now his soul felt lost, adrift in a form he couldn’t yet claim as his own.

How long until he found his way back?

They finally reached a village. While Tenbuyer bartered with a reluctant shopkeeper over supplies for Suisen, her eyes caught a flicker of color in a nearby stall.

Sunlight danced across the dusty boards, catching the rainbow-colored wings of a small, butterfly-shaped crystal. Ao’s breath caught. She reached out instinctively, fingertips brushing the smooth, glimmering surface as tiny prisms scattered like fireflies in the morning light.

She bought it without hesitation, trading a handful of HL and tucking it into her kimono. Her mind wandered to one of the first real conversations she’d had with Suisen, not long after Celestia had made her a full demon. (1)

“Yesterday I watched a holo-film with Pirilly about a samurai cyborg who used rainbow light to power his final attacks!” she had said, eyes sparkling. “Suisen, can you do that too?”

Suisen had blinked at her, clearly puzzled.

“That would be an inefficient use of energy,” he replied kindly, but firmly.

She remembered feeling disappointed… and trying hard not to show it.

But then, a few days later, Suisen had pulled her aside with a rare glint in his eye.

“Cannonline modified my body for a little surprise,” he’d whispered. “But I can only do it once. This stays between us, okay?”

Ao had nodded excitedly.

And from his hand, dozens of tiny rainbow-colored holographic butterflies had emerged—exact replicas of the ones on her kimono.

They fluttered around her, each beat of their wings shifting from one color to the next like stained glass come to life.

Even now, she still remembered the fluttering wings, each shift of color making her eyes widen. For the first time, someone had mirrored her wonder—and understood it without words.

Her chest swelled with a quiet warmth, a joy she hadn’t realized she’d been missing.

Later, when Ao and Opener were alone, she asked again if something was troubling him.

“It’s nothing, Ao,” Opener said softly. His voice carried a weight that betrayed the words. “It’s just… the memory of my body being a puppet for Mugai’s will through the Demonic Fist isn’t something I like revisiting.”

His gaze fell to Ao’s hand, where the Demonic Fist rested with silent gravity.

“I still remember the first time I wore it,” he went on. “Back when Shogun Gachiyasu gave it to me as a gift. I shouted like a fool:

Well received, Gachiyasu! Domo arigato for this awesome Infernal Treasure! Sasooga how it fits in my hand just right! Thank you billions, once again! Oray will definitely pay you back for this!” (2)

A faint, rueful smile touched his lips. “But when you wore it for the first time… the Zessho Mugai shifted, reshaping itself to fit your hand perfectly. It was as if Mugai himself reached across time to bless you. To choose you.”

His expression sobered. “A silent sign, I think—that you are the one meant to complete your grandfather Mugai’s last wish. To free the demons inside the living Infernal Treasures. The same wish you voiced at Ewwdo Castle, three turns of the Dark Sun ago.”

He glanced at her, recalling every word.

“I know Grandpa Mugai will lend me his power if I ask for his help. Before he died, he told me about that Netherworld—not just to push me to become a real demon, but to entrust me with the mission of freeing all the other living Infernal Treasures in his name. But I don’t know the art of fist fighting.” (3)

And then, you asked me:

“Opener… please, teach me. I’ll do whatever it takes.”

Opener’s voice faded into the stillness, heavy yet steady, carrying both burden and blessing.

Ao didn’t answer. Her eyes lingered on him, softened by a vow unspoken.

Slowly, she reached out and set her hand on his shoulder. No words followed—only the warmth of her touch, quiet and firm, anchoring him in the present.

They walked on in silence. The kind that said more than words ever could.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

When Suisen woke that morning, he had briefly hoped Magistrate Cannonline might have found a way to restore his cyborg body.

Instead, she told him there was no way back—and that they needed to stay away from Ewwdo for a while, due to the “damage caused by the explosion.”

So now, not only was he permanently trapped in a biological body, but he’d also been instructed to train with that strange axe named Zenchi Kintoki.

Suisen didn’t know why, but just touching the weapon made his new skin crawl. What unsettled him even more was the way Cannonline, along with Magistrates Sea Again and Crimson Dark, had watched him—as if they expected something to happen the moment he connected with it.

Something unpredictable. He missed his foresight—deeply and desperately.

After hours of failed attempts to synchronize with the Demonic Axe, Suisen finally asked to be left alone.

He sat on a large rock, trying to breathe through his growing frustration. Without realizing it, he drifted into a fitful sleep.

The same small demon child appeared once more. But this time, the boy was locked alone in a cell.

From somewhere beyond the bars, a male voice drifted closer. It carried a strange familiarity that Suisen couldn’t place, speaking to someone unseen.

“…and so I assure you, no harm will come to the Edogawa family. The hostage is only a precaution…”

The demon child’s stomach growled. Dust clung to his cheeks, and a single tear carved a clean track down the grime.

His lips trembled.

“How long have I been here...? What if no one finds me...? Brother… Father… where are you...? I’m scared.”

Even knowing it was only a dream, Suisen instinctively reached out to comfort the child. But the little boy faded as the perspective shifted violently.

Now, Suisen stood looking at his own former body, with cold metal limbs, glowing sensors, and synthetic skin.

Two figures loomed before him, their faces lost in shadow, and one of them spoke in the same male voice of before.

“It seems the soul has been successfully bound to the core. Now we have—”

Suisen jolted awake, a gasp tearing from his throat, his heart hammering against his ribs like a bird trapped in a cage. A faint shift in the air made him realize he was no longer alone.

His gaze drifted and he saw the Head of the Thirteen Magistrates, Joe Doe, stood a short distance away, silent as a shadow. He was watching him, head tilted slightly, as if studying something invisible in the air around Suisen.

“You were dreaming,” Joe Doe finally said, his voice low and unreadable.

Suisen hesitated. “…I don’t normally dream.”

“No. You didn’t,” Joe Doe replied. “But you do now.”

He stepped closer. Suisen fought the instinct to pull back.

Joe Doe’s gaze shifted to the Zenchi Kintoki, still lying beside the rock. Its glowing runes pulsed faintly, like a memory trying to surface.

“You hate that axe, don’t you?” Joe Doe asked.

“…Yes. And I don’t understand why,” Suisen admitted.

“Are you certain you’re not lying?” Joe Doe asked, his voice dropping even quieter.

Suisen’s fingers twitched.

He looked away. “That axe doesn’t speak to me. It doesn’t calculate. When I touch it, I just feel like something is missing.”

Joe Doe gave a crooked smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “That’s how I felt when I saw you in your old body. And trust me, after possessing more than one shell, I know what it means to be shaped instead of being born.”

Suisen’s voice turned sharper. “I was designed to follow orders, nothing more. You can choose your path. We aren’t the same.”

Joe Doe’s smile disappeared.

“Indeed. A delusion of function is still a delusion,” he said, his tone flat and pointed.

Then he paused. “Tell me. Have you looked into your own eyes yet?”

Suisen frowned. “What does that mean?”

“Not at your reflection,” Joe Doe replied. “I mean truly looked inward to see yourself. The demon you are now.”

Suisen had no answer.

Joe Doe turned to leave. “Until you do, the Zenchi Kintoki won’t answer you. It was never just a weapon. It’s a key.”

Suisen blinked. “A key to what?”

Joe Doe paused at the edge of the trees. “To the part of you that chose to live.”

Then he was gone.

Suisen sat in silence for a long time. The wind stirred the grass. The runes on the Demonic Axe continued their slow pulse, like a heartbeat waiting to sync.

At last, he looked at the Zenchi Kintoki. He reached toward it, then stopped.

“A key...?”

He looked down at his hands, no longer metallic and manufactured. Now just trembling flesh.

Slowly, he curled them into fists, but didn’t touch the Demonic Axe. For a long moment, he listened to his own breathing, uncertain and ragged.

And in that quiet, while his hands still trembled, he wondered: what was the key, and what was the lock… and which one was he?

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

“Here we go, Ao,” Opener said, tying the last turn of bandages.

“Thank you, Opener,” Ao whispered.

Cannonline’s gaze lingered on her arm. “If I may advise you, for a couple of days don’t go on patrol alone.”

Tenbuyer said nothing, but the tension in his face betrayed what words didn’t.

Ao nodded. She slipped out of the tent and into the night air, lowering herself onto the grass. Legs folded beneath her, she stared at the Nethermoon as it carved its slow arc through the clouds.

Behind her, Cannonline’s voice carried low and clipped as she gave Tenbuyer instructions about rations—measured, exact, like suturing a wound.

Ao barely heard it. Her thoughts still reeled from that moment—Suisen flinching from her as if she were poison.

She hadn’t expected the blow. It hadn’t been hard, just a panic strike, but the ache it left was more than a bruise. With every small movement, it tugged. Deeper still, something had cracked.

For that heartbeat of shock she had frozen, long enough for Cannonline to shove her back. She could have raised her guard. She could have fought. She hadn’t. Because what she’d seen in Suisen’s eyes hurt far worse: he saw her as a threat.

Since then, the camp had grown uneasy. No one admitted it aloud, but each night someone stayed awake, shadow watching his tent—waiting for the wrong movement.

Ao hugged her knees to her chest. His name had stopped him. There had to be something left inside him. She had urged him to embrace his demon self, believing it would free him. But now her stomach twisted with doubt—what if she had only broken what little peace he had?

Her jaw clenched and her hand with the Demonic Fist glowed faintly. The Zessho Mugai had never judged her. Tonight, she wasn’t sure she could claim the same for herself.

A rustle behind her made her tense. Then a familiar silhouette.

Joe Doe.

He settled beside her without a word and set a warm steamed bun in her lap.

“I’m not in the mood for sweets,” Ao murmured.

“It’s not sweet,” he said. “It’s a pork bun. Tenbuyer told me to give it to ‘Lord Mugai’s granddaughter who looks like she’s two seconds from crying.’ His words, not mine.”

A weak laugh escaped her. The sound felt strange in her own throat.

Joe Doe didn’t smile. His eyes stayed on the horizon. His voice was calm, edged. “I can forgive panic. But I can’t forgive seeing Lord Mugai’s granddaughter hurt.”

Ao lowered her gaze. “He wasn’t himself.”

Silence stretched between them. Finally, Joe Doe asked, quiet: “But he’ll come back, won’t he?”

Her breath caught. “I don’t know.”

He studied her face. “Do you still believe in him?”

The question lingered like a blade. She tilted her head back, staring up at the stars—just as she had when she was a child, small and afraid, before her Dad nearly gave his life to save her. (1)

“Yes,” she said at last. “I do.”

Joe Doe rose and brushed dust from his Deathfune frame. “Then I’ll try to speak with him again.”

He left her with the pork bun and the endless sky.

The wind curled around her shoulders like a blanket. And she didn’t cry. For the first time in a long while, the weight on her chest eased—because she let herself hope.

Then, with a soft smile, Ao took the pork bun and started eating it.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

That evening, the day after the incident, the camp lay hushed beneath the mist. Suisen sat by the fire, a bowl of cooling rice in his hands, watching the others move through their quiet routines.

Magistrates Tenbuyer and Cannonline sorted supplies with clipped precision. Demmodore Opener hunched over his misterious journal, scratching notes in a restless hand. Magistrate Sea Again meditated, still as stone. Magistrate Crimson Dark drew his whetstone down the edge of his blade—slow, deliberate, unbroken.

Suisen hadn’t spoken to the Ice Fang Princess since yesterday.

She lay in the grass, patrol finished, turning something glimmering in her palm. It caught the Nethermoon’s light, shifting colors across her face. Her lips curved faintly, but her eyes… empty.

He was still watching when the silence shifted. Joe Doe, Head of the Thirteen Magistrates, had settled beside him.

“I need to speak with you. Alone,” Joe Doe said, voice low, steady.

Suisen set the bowl aside. “Just me?”

“Yes. What I have to say is a confession.”

“…About the Demonic Axe?”

Joe Doe shook his head. “No. About your past. The part no one else has dared to tell you.”

Suisen’s grip tightened. “Why now?”

Joe Doe’s gaze never wavered. “Because if I wait, someone else might tell it wrong. And you deserve to hear it from someone who believed it was necessary at the time.”

Suisen’s pulse ticked faster. “What are you talking about?”

“Walk with me.”

They followed the highland trail until only wind and footsteps remained.

Joe Doe stopped. His words came slow, deliberate, weighted.

“You were born a demon. A real one. Your name was Ikki Edogawa.”

Suisen froze.

“You were the younger brother of Shogun Yeyasu,” Joe Doe continued. “Quiet. Brilliant. Curious. Until the day your cousin, Partyasu, handed you over as a hostage.” (1)

Suisen’s stomach turned.

Joe Doe’s voice dropped lower. “You weren’t rescued. You were executed.”

The word hit like iron. Final. Cold.

“But your soul wasn’t lost,” Joe Doe went on. “Lord Mugai used the Demonic Fist to extract it before it faded. He judged you too valuable to let go. So he bound your soul to a prototype cyborg shell—Experimental Model GS-00.” (2)

He turned to face him. “That’s when Ikki Edogawa ended. And Suisen began.”

The dreams. The child’s fear. The cold voice…

The soul has been correctly bound…

Suisen’s breath hitched. He saw it—again—the child’s neck snapping beneath the Demonic Fist. And the hand that wore it.

Demmodore Opener’s. Magistrate Cannonline standing beside him.

He clutched his head. “You said Swordmaster Mugai was behind it. But in my vision—it was Demmodore Opener. He was the one who killed me.”

Joe Doe’s tone softened, precise. “You’re not wrong. But in that moment, Lord Mugai had possessed Opener’s body through the Demonic Fist. That’s how he acted without being physically present.”

Suisen’s voice shook. “Why tell me now?”

“Because Ao is his granddaughter,” Joe Doe said. “And even after everything, she still believes he could have been better. That he didn’t have to become what he did. Maybe… if you outlast his shadow—if you become something else—that belief won’t die with him.”

Suisen looked away. He hadn’t chosen any of it.

Not being a cyborg.

Not the orders he carried.

Not the pain.

Not even the name.

“…I was never meant to be anything but a tool,” he whispered.

Joe Doe shook his head. “No. You were meant to break. But you didn’t.”

He stepped back into the shadows, pausing once more. “You survived Lord Mugai’s design. The question now is: what will you become?”

Suisen’s voice cracked. “Wait. Are you saying the Ice Fang Princess is Swordmaster Mugai’s granddaughter? That doesn’t make sense. Their ages… how is that even possible?”

Joe Doe offered the faintest smile. “That is her story to tell. Not mine.”

A flicker in the Zenchi Kintoki’s reflection caught Suisen's eyes—a pulse of light he didn’t understand.

Then Head Joe Doe was gone, leaving Suisen alone with the fire, the wind, and a name from the past: Ikki Edogawa.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

In the days that followed, their work kept them busy—freeing demons trapped in Infernal Treasures scattered through a nearby village.

Ao didn’t speak to Suisen. He didn’t speak to her.

When he wasn’t training with the Zenchi Kintoki—still unresponsive, still silent—he worked beside Cannonline and Tenbuyer, tallying rations with mechanical precision. He moved through the days like a ghost in borrowed skin.

And yet… she felt it. The weight of words unspoken. His eyes lingering too long. His posture stiffening whenever she drifted near.

So that afternoon, after they left town, she proposed a solo training session in the wastelands. The excuse was thin, and they both knew it.

The wind scraped across the dry plain, carrying sand and silence.

“Is there something you want to tell me?” Ao asked at last.

Suisen hesitated. Then: “Are you really the granddaughter of Swordmaster Mugai?”

She didn’t flinch. “Yes. I am.”

He scratched at his head, eyes narrowing. “That’s… surprising. I didn’t know Mugai ever adopted anyone before he died.”

Ao blinked slowly.

“I wasn’t adopted,” she said. “My Dad is his son.”

Suisen frowned. “And how old was he when he had you?”

“Ten turns of the Dark Sun,” Ao replied evenly.

His face darkened. “You’re mocking me. You expect me to believe your father was a child when you were born? And your mother—what, even younger?”

“I don’t have a mother,” Ao said, her voice sharpening. “Just my Dad.”

Suisen’s jaw tightened. “How is that even possible?”

She drew in a slow breath. “He created me as a living Infernal Treasure. He trained me to fight. Then he left, telling me to find my own path. Later… we reconciled. And after certain events, I became a real demon.”

Suisen’s hands curled into fists. “Then he isn’t your father. He’s your creator. That changes everything.”

The words hit like a sharpened blade.

Ao stepped forward. “He created me, yes. But that doesn’t make him less of a father.”

“You were forged to love him,” Suisen said, voice low and cutting. “That bond you cling to? It isn’t love. It’s refined obedience. And I thought you were stronger than that, Ice Fang Princess.”

Her pulse hammered, but her voice held steady. “Obedience can be broken. Love can’t. Not real love. It stays. Even when it scars you. Even when the one you love walks away.”

She met his eyes, unwavering. “I wasn’t created to feel this. I chose to.”

Her tone sharpened. “At least I know who I am. Can you say the same?”

Suisen’s reply was cold as steel. “I was built to obey. And unlike you, I know the difference between obedience and love. You think you’ve got a family? What you have is an origin story. I know what real family is—blood ties.”

Ao’s chest burned. “You think blood makes a family? Then why do I love someone who abandoned me?”

Suisen’s voice broke through her words like a scalpel. “Because you were made to.”

The silence that followed was brutal. The wasteland itself seemed to hold its breath. They stood locked in fury, confusion… and something neither dared to name.

A third voice cut in.

“You two need some HL-free pork buns and a chill-down minute.”

They turned.

Tenbuyer stood a few meters off, balancing a basket of root vegetables and a half-carved beet. His wings drooped in exasperation.

“I mean, great emotional revelations and all,” he muttered, “but you’re gonna wake Sea Again. And trust me, you don’t want him cranky after meditation.”

Neither Ao nor Suisen spoke.

Tenbuyer glanced between them, then shrugged. “For what it’s worth? Blood’s just chemistry. Bonds are choices. Sticky ones.”

He fluttered off, grumbling to himself. “Better get dinner cooking before Opener starts quoting war poetry again in that messy Hinomoto language…”

The silence returned—thicker, heavier.

This time, Ao didn’t try to fill it.

She turned and walked away without a word.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The wasteland wind had long since carried her anger away.

What remained now was quieter.

Ao sat on a stone ledge overlooking the plains, just beyond the latest village they’d helped. Every demon trapped inside an Infernal Treasure had been freed.

But she wasn’t.

Not from Suisen’s words. Not from the way he’d looked at her—not with hatred, but with something worse: doubt.

She pulled the small butterfly-shaped crystal from her kimono and turned it between her fingers. Under the light of the Nethermoon, it shimmered with every color it had captured since the day she first held it.

She’d meant to give it to him someday—as a reminder of a time when they laughed. Of a moment when he leaned close and whispered:

Cannonline modified my body for a little surprise, but I can only do it once. This stays between us, okay?

And then he had summoned dozens of tiny rainbow-colored holographic butterflies from his hand.

She clenched the crystal tightly.

You were forged to love him.

Suisen’s voice haunted her.

She could handle pain. She could endure loss. But hearing her love for her Dad reduced to design?

If only Suisen could remember the day her father—despite the Empathy Killer curse—sacrificed himself to heal her, whispering through blood and grief:

“It's fine... As long as I feel anything, the curse will eat away at me. It's just proof that I love you to death, Ao." (1)

She and her Dad had chosen love despite everything. Just like she’d chosen to believe Suisen could choose his way back.

Wasn’t that worth something?

She stood, brushed off her knees, and started her patrol—a routine sweep of the western ridge before nightfall.

An hour out, the fog rolled in. Unnaturally fast. Unnaturally thick. Cold in a way that felt intentional. It swallowed the ridgeline and smothered every sound beneath it.

She stopped when a low growl—then two more behind it—echoed ahead.

Three Sea Angels emerged from the mist. And since they weren’t underwater, there could only be one explanation: she had been marked as prey.

Ao dropped into a defensive stance. The Demonic Fist pulsed to life around her.

The first lunged—claws serrated with frost. She pivoted in time, its horns grazing her sleeve instead of skin. Her counter was sharp and deliberate, a focused strike to its ribs. Bone cracked.

The second Sea Angel was faster. As she moved to block, a cold lance of magic struck her arm—the same one Suisen had hit days ago. Pain exploded through her. Her muscles screamed. She bit it back.

The third circled, studying her like a strategist, waiting for a slip. Ao backed away slowly, shifting her weight to her good arm.

She flicked her wrist to summon the Demonic Axe, but her fingers trembled, refusing to stay steady. The weapon dragged against her arm, heavier than it had ever been, its weight pulling at her like a chain. Ice spells would do nothing. Backup would never arrive in time.

The Demonic Fist pulsed again, flickering erratically as if agitated by both the threat and her own turbulent emotions, but it was still syncing with her.

“Come on,” she whispered. “Just a little more…”

The second Sea Angel charged, buccal tentacles slashing wide.

Ao ducked, rolled, and used its momentum to drive a sweeping kick into its side, sending it stumbling. Her ribs throbbed, but adrenaline kept her moving.

The second Sea Angel crumpled and didn’t rise again. The first, still clutching its shattered ribs, let out a final hiss—then collapsed, unconscious.

She turned to track the third, but too late. It slammed into her from behind, and she went sprawling across the stone.

Her vision sparked. She tasted blood.

Gasping, she forced herself upright, one arm hanging limp. She braced with the other.

The third Sea Angel charged again.

Ao realized she wasn’t walking away from this clean.

Still, if she was going down, it wouldn’t be here. And not without swinging first.

Her knees buckled, vision blurred, but she forced herself upright, fists clenched. Pain screamed through every cut and bruise, yet she lifted her guard again, not for the words lodged like blades in her chest, but because her stance itself was proof—she knew who she was, even if Suisen refused to see it.

She ran forward to meet the Sea Angel.

A flurry of blows followed—some blocked, some not. One cracked across her temple. Another scraped her jaw. But she landed one clean punch to its chest, the Demonic Fist flaring with ghostfire.

The Sea Angel staggered—then crashed back into her from the side. She dropped to one knee, breath ragged.

The Demonic Fist flickered. And something slipped from her sleeve.

The crystal struck the ground with a delicate tink, far too fragile for the violence surrounding it.

It rolled away, scattering tiny rainbows across the stone beneath the light of the Nethermoon—a reminder of a promise she hadn’t given up on, even if it cut her palms to hold onto it.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

The Sea Angel lunged, tentacles carving the dirt, its jagged maw splitting the dark with a snarl. But Suisen didn’t retreat. Not this time.

The Demonic Katana pulsed faintly in his hands, golden runes threading along its length with a quiet, steady glow. The blade had answered his call—not as a weapon awaiting orders, but as something awake. Something alive.

This wasn’t a practiced form drawn from manuals or archived sequences. It came from somewhere deeper—not from memory or code, but from instinct, from breath.

The Zenchi Kintoki settled naturally into his grip. The wind brushed past his shoulder. Then he moved.

The Sea Angel struck first, claws sweeping in brutal arcs. Suisen stepped forward, letting his blade draw a clean diagonal across its charge.

Steel met flesh. The impact wasn’t data—it was pressure through his arms, raw and real. His joints protested, but his stance held.

The Sea Angel screeched and staggered, but he pressed the advance. Dropping low, he let the blade carry his weight through a smooth pivot and sliced again—sharp and clean across its flank.

A memory surfaced: Yeyasu and himself as children, watching their father Shogun Gachiyasu train. His blade had moved like wind. And now Suisen understood.

It wasn’t about prediction. It wasn’t about precision. It was about stillness without fear.

Choosing the strike—not chasing it.

The Sea Angel roared, charging again—faster, more desperate. Suisen waited. Then turned with it, sidestepping just enough to catch the angle—and drove the Demonic Katana straight into its chest.

The creature convulsed once. Then dropped.

The basin fell silent, broken only by the whisper of mist curling back into the hills.

Suisen lowered the Zenchi Kintoki. The runes faded, but didn’t vanish. They remained lit—not with power, but with presence.

That’s when he saw her.

Ao lay slumped against the rocks, body curled in on itself, one arm twisted beneath her. The Demonic Fist flickered faintly. Her kimono was torn, soaked red—but her chest still rose and fell.

Suisen crossed the clearing without thought. He dropped to his knees, one trembling hand hovering near her cheek, the other still clutching the katana. Her skin was too pale. Her breathing, too shallow.

“Ao,” he said, voice rougher than he expected—like it had been dragged through too many wrong choices.

She didn’t stir. But her fingers shifted—just barely—a twitch against the dust.

That fragile, deliberate movement landed harder than any strike he had ever taken. It had never been about duty. Or power. It had always been about her

About the way she stood—furious and flawed, unyielding even when bleeding. About how she gave without asking permission. About how she never stopped seeing him as more than what he was made to be.

He hadn’t fought to win. He had fought because he couldn’t bear to let her fall.

Something glinted in the dust beside her: the butterfly-shaped crystal. Its wings shimmered with fractured rainbow light beneath the Nethermoon.

He lifted it gently, turning it once in his palm. For a moment, the memory of those holographic butterflies shimmered in his mind. Then, with deliberate care, he tucked the crystal into his kimono—just above his heart. Not as a keepsake, but as a promise.

He sheathed the Zenchi Kintoki into the scabbard that had appeared with it, then gathered Ao carefully in both arms. She was light, but in that moment, she felt like the weight of everything he’d nearly lost.

Behind them, the Demonic Katana’s glow softened—less like fire, more like breath. Not demanding his will, but echoing it.

And as he carried her from the battlefield, the last of the fog peeled away, revealing a sky scattered with stars—clear, unbroken, waiting.

Arc One — Identity & Rebirth — End

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

The path back to camp was silent beneath his steps. The wind had died, the mist thinned to ghosts. Only the crunch of dirt and Ao’s shallow breathing against his chest filled the air.

She was still unconscious.

Every muscle in his arms ached, but his grip didn’t falter. She was light—yet heavier than any burden he’d carried. Not by weight, but by what she’d endured. And by what he’d said before it all.

No words could fix that now. So he stayed silent. Step by step, forward. Hoping movement might lead somewhere better.

The Demonic Katana on his back held a faint warmth—steady, patient. Waiting for him to understand not just what it had become, but what he had. Something had shifted. Not just the Zenchi Kintoki. Not just the battle.

But something quieter and deeper.

Ahead, firelight flickered through the trees. Voices stirred, and shadows moved.

Sea Again was first to reach him, Benikage, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer close behind.

Benikage opened his mouth, but Suisen cut him off.

“She’s alive,” Suisen said, voice flat. “She needs rest. And treatment.”

Sea Again stepped forward, then stopped under Suisen’s unwavering gaze.

“I’ll take her,” Suisen said again.

No one argued.

They parted. Suisen walked between them, steady, Ao resting against him. Her kimono was torn across the ribs, stained dark where the Demonic Fist flickered faintly.

Inside the tent, Opener and Cannonline waited with bandages and salves. No questions asked. They didn’t need to.

Suisen lowered Ao onto the futon and drew the blanket over her. For a long moment, he stood there, watching her breathe. His lips parted, then closed again. Nothing he could say was enough.

So he slipped back into the night.

He walked until the firelight faded, settling beneath a tree at the clearing’s edge. The Demonic Katana rested silently half-sheathed across his knees. But it was present, as if it remembered more than he did, and chose to wait.

From his sleeve, he drew the butterfly-shaped crystal. He turned it in his palm, fractured light shifting with the last flickers of fire. Above his heart, it was a promise—to her, and to himself.

Footsteps approached—slow, deliberate.

“This katana… it’s the Zenchi Kintoki?” Sea Again’s voice broke the quiet.

Benikage crouched nearby, arms crossed. “I didn’t think you knew how to hold a sword, let alone unlock a named one.”

Suisen unsheathed the blade partway. The runes shimmered faint gold across the steel.

Benikage tilted his head. “Instinct or training?”

Suisen slid the blade back. “Maybe both. I wasn’t thinking. I just moved.”

Sea Again settled beside him. “That sounds like instinct.”

“It was like remembering something I was never taught,” Suisen murmured.

Benikage gave a slow nod. “Then we’ll start there. Tomorrow, you train. No desperate swinging. You’ll fight with intention.”

“I’m not ready,” Suisen said.

Sea Again’s smile was faint. “That’s why it’ll work. You’ll listen.”

Benikage clapped his shoulder once, firm. “At dawn. Bring the blade—and your doubts.”

They vanished into the trees, leaving him with the fireflies and the fog.

Suisen looked at the crystal once more, then tucked it close. The Zenchi Kintoki remained across his knees, not a tool waiting for commands nor a weapon driven by will.

But a question—quiet, patient, sharper than any strike: what would he choose to cut for?

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View

Dawn crept across the plateau, thin light spilling over the mist. For the first time since being reborn as a true demon, Suisen had slept—brief, dreamless. But once awake, he couldn’t fall back again.

Now he sat at the cliff’s edge beyond camp, the Zenchi Kintoki resting across his knees. The sky churned, and the wind bent the grass like whispering doubts.

The Demonic Katana was silent. The form it had taken to save Ao had vanished, leaving cold steel.

He hadn’t seen her since carrying her back from the Sea Angels ambush. His arms still remembered her weight: the sag of her shoulders, the faint heat of her blood against his sleeve. That absence lingered now, heavy and raw, more ache than memory.

Footsteps approached. Opener.

The Demmodore sat beside him without a word. For a while, they only watched the grass bow under the wind. Then Opener spoke.

“You insisted on going after her alone. I figured something had gone down. What was it?”

Suisen hesitated… then told him. The argument. The words. The guilt.

When he finished, Opener punched him. Clean, fast, no hesitation.

“That’s for Fuji,” he said, without heat. “As for the rest… Ao will decide.”

Suisen’s cheek stung, but he didn’t move. He’d expected a storm of rage, a lecture that would strip him bare. Instead there was only one strike, and then silence. That silence spread through him deeper than any wound.

He swallowed. “You’re not angrier?”

Opener’s tone softened. “What you said was cruel. But I’ve said worse to people I loved—usually when I was scared.”

He tossed a pebble into the gorge. The sound vanished into the wind before it reached the bottom. “Sometimes a clean strike lands softer than a desperate one. It doesn’t mean it hurts less. But it’s a start.”

Then, quieter: “You know she might not forgive you.”

Suisen’s grip closed tight on the Demonic Katana, metal biting into his palm.

At dawn proper, other footsteps broke the quiet. Benikage, Tenbuyer, Joe Doe. The training was about to begin.

Benikage grinned. “You trained under the Shogunate’s elite back when you were the Foreseen Magistrate, right? Then you’re gonna hate this.”

Training began without warning.

A smoke bomb hissed at his feet. The terrain warped; stones bent like breath, shadows slanted sideways. Benikage vanished into illusion, presence flickering like a trick of the eye.

Then the assault came.

Joe Doe struck first—surgical blows aimed at joints. Tenbuyer’s stun spores arced overhead, hissing down like burning rain. Suisen shifted too late, and Benikage’s blade whispered past his shoulder.

His reflexes tried to map the sequence—and failed. Every time his mind locked on a pattern, Benikage broke it. His predictive modules kicked in, forcing his body into pre-scripted counters, blades carving empty air where no enemy stood.

Steel grazed his ribs. Spores stung his lungs. He stumbled, hit the ground. Dust rose, palms raw against stone.

Joe Doe offered a hand. “Try fighting in the moment. Your instincts are louder than you think.”

Suisen didn’t take the hand. The Zenchi Kintoki sat beside him like dead weight, heavier than any chain.

On the second day, they pressed him harder.

Tenbuyer swept past on his glider, tossing spores like confetti. “Pretend it’s a dance! Or don’t—you’ll still trip!”

Benikage’s voice echoed from five places at once. “Thinking’s a trap! Think slower!”

By the third day, something shifted. His body began to move before his thoughts caught up.

A block intercepted a strike he hadn’t seen until his arm was already raised. A pivot threw Joe Doe off balance. When Tenbuyer spun in, Suisen dropped, the wind of the glide brushing his hair. Imperfect, messy, but alive.

By the fifth day, they didn’t hold back.

Benikage warped the terrain into sudden cliffs. Joe Doe dove from above, blade sparking. Tenbuyer’s net spun across the perimeter.

Suisen stepped forward. Let the net scrape past his shoulder. Pivoted beneath Joe Doe’s strike. Met Benikage head-on.

Steel rang. Their blades locked for the first time.

Suisen didn’t yield.

“There it is,” Benikage said, grinning. “That was your gut, not your brain. That was you.”

Suisen’s breath came harsh, steady. The Demonic Katana didn’t hum or glow. It simply rested in his hands, waiting—not a command to follow, but a question he would have to answer.

And for the first time, the question didn’t frighten him.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

That late morning, the first after the Sea Angel attack, Ao woke to the sting of antiseptic in the air.

Every part of her body ached—her ribs throbbed with dull weight, her arm burned beneath the bandages—but she was alive.

Fragments of memory flickered: the Sea Angel’s claws, her balance slipping, the final impact.

She tried to sit up. A firm hand pressed her shoulder back down.

“Not a chance, Ao,” Opener said, voice calm but steady.

She turned her head. He knelt beside her—one hand holding her down, the other balancing a tray of medicine and gauze.

Behind him stood Cannonline, arms crossed, jaw set. Her posture was rigid, but her eyes told the truth.

“When Gatty mended your arm,” she said sharply, “I told you not to patrol alone for a while. (1) And you did it anyway. Do you realize you could’ve broken your father Fuji’s heart?”

Ao winced. “It all happened so fast. I didn’t think—”

“That’s exactly when you’re supposed to think,” Cannonline cut in.

Her voice softened, but her stare held. “You’ve been trained better than that.”

Opener set the tray down and let out a quiet chuckle. “You’re not alone, Ao. You know that, right? We’ve got your back. Always.”

Her throat tightened. “But… you trained me.”

“To fight smart,” he said, settling cross-legged beside her. “Not to fight alone. So you wouldn’t repeat the mistakes I made with your grandfather, Mugai.”

A faint smile tugged at him. “Remember when you punched me during that spar back in Wahei?”

Ao blinked. “You said I broke form.”

“You did. And I dropped you two seconds later. But the hit landed. And you remember the lesson.”

She gave a small nod.

Cannonline’s stance eased, just enough to let the room breathe again. “The tears in your kimono can be repaired without showing. If I remember right, Pirilika gave it to you before we left, didn’t she?”

Ao nodded slowly.

“You’ve cared for it well,” Cannonline said. “I’ll find an excuse to bring it back to her. Perk of being reborn a Celestian angel—I can still open a portal now and then.”

Ao’s gaze drifted up to the tent ceiling. “Was there… a crystal sewn into the lining?”

Opener shook his head. “No. Nothing like that.”

Her breath left slow. “Then… who brought me back?”

Opener hesitated. His voice dropped, gentler. “Ikki—no. Suisen.”

Ao blinked. “Suisen?”

Cannonline nodded. “He carried you the whole way. And he didn’t let anyone else take you.”

The words landed quietly. Ao stared at the ceiling, lips parted but heart still. If it hadn’t been duty, then it had been choice. And she wasn’t sure whether that was better—or worse.

Some time later, after a soft knock at the tent post, Joe Doe stepped inside with Tenbuyer fluttering just behind his shoulder.

“Can we come in, Ao?” Joe Doe asked.

Ao nodded. “Yeah.”

They sat across from her, silent for a moment—their faces unreadable, but kind.

“It’s about Suisen,” Joe Doe said at last.

A knot tightened behind her ribs. “Okay.”

“He’s been quiet since he brought you back,” Joe Doe said. “But something’s changed in him.”

Ao’s voice barely carried. “He said… I was made to love my Dad. Like it wasn’t my choice at all.”

Joe Doe’s jaw tensed. “He said that?”

She nodded.

Tenbuyer floated closer. “He was hurting. And when people hurt, they lash out. Words they don’t mean—or maybe half-mean. Sometimes both.”

Ao stayed quiet, eyes fixed on the blanket draped over her knees. Her hands tightened beneath it.

“I don’t know if I can forgive him,” she whispered. Part of her wanted to stay angry—because letting go would mean admitting she still cared.

Tenbuyer didn’t press. “Then don’t. Not unless you want to.”

The tent held its breath.

Joe Doe offered a quiet smile. “That’s okay, Ao. You don’t have to decide tonight.”

He rose, brushing his hands. “You’ve already been through more than most. If you stay, stay because it’s your choice—not because someone made you feel like you should.”

Ao looked up slowly. “How do I know the difference?”

Joe Doe pointed gently at her chest. “Because you’re still asking.”

At the flap, he added, “When the time comes… tell him. Not for him. For you.”

They left, and the tent was quiet once again.

Ao lay back. The bandages pressed warm against her ribs.

Beneath them, the Demonic Fist shimmered faintly—quiet, steady, and hers again.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View

The sixth morning of training dawned colder than the rest.

Suisen stood at the edge of the plateau with the Zenchi Kintoki sheathed at his side. He hadn’t asked for today's session, but Sea Again had—without agenda or explanation.

“Come when the wind is quiet,” he had said. “Bring the sword and leave everything else.”

Now the wind had stilled.

Across the stone bridge, Sea Again waited with his back to the sunrise, the light glinting faintly on the blade at his hip. He said nothing when Suisen approached, only offered a single nod as he stepped onto the bridge.

“You’ve begun to move like someone alive, Suisen,” Sea Again said at last. “But your sword still reacts. It doesn’t act. That’s the difference.”

Suisen’s fingers hovered near the hilt. “What do you mean?”

Sea Again didn’t answer. His gaze drifted toward the mist-draped horizon. “Do you remember when the Zenchi Kintoki first answered you?”

Suisen nodded. “During the fight with the Sea Angel. When I protected Ao.” (1)

“Instinct. Survival. Fear,” Sea Again said. “Powerful emotions, but unstable. You can’t burn that hot forever—not without losing yourself.”

He stepped off the bridge and gestured toward the stone clearing beyond.

“Today, you won’t spar with me,” he continued. “You’ll spar with what you’ve hidden from yourself.”

A flick of his sword, and spiritual energy rippled outward. Six shadowed figures stepped into being, each bearing a mirror of the Demonic Katana. Their edges blurred, but their faces were his own.

“These are your burdens,” Sea Again said. “Regret. Fear. Shame. Guilt. Hesitation. Grief. They’ve walked with you since the day you woke again as a demon.”

The illusions closed in.

“There’s only one way through them,” Sea Again added. “Not with rage. Not with desperation. With clarity.”

Suisen drew the Zenchi Kintoki. Silent. Heavy. Waiting.

The first shadow—Regret—lunged. Its strike faltered mid-swing, burdened by hesitation. He saw it for what it was: the echo of words once spoken when shielding Yeyasu.

I’m really... really... sorry... I’ve been... so much... trouble. (2)

He blocked—but the shadow twisted unnaturally and slipped past his guard. Its blade grazed his side before dissolving into smoke.

“You’re still asking the sword for permission,” Sea Again called. “A blade doesn’t lead. It follows.”

Another illusion came. Fear.

Suisen saw himself as Ikki—in the final seconds before death. Cornered. Powerless. Already erased in the minds of those who would have made him a cyborg. His parry came too late. The blade passed through him, the shadow reforming in silence.

Suisen staggered, chest tight. His mind raced, tried to calculate—but failed.

He closed his eyes. And in the stillness between breaths, a voice cut through—wounded and fierce—under the shape of Shame.

At least I know who I am. Can you say the same?

The words stung because they were true. His throat locked. But the blade waited steady in his hands, and with it, so did he. He opened his eyes, stepped forward, and cut.

One stroke, and Shame broke.

Two more closed in—Guilt and Hesitation. Guilt for the subordinates he’d treated as expendable. For the words he couldn’t unsay to Ao. Hesitation for not yet having the courage to face her.

He pivoted, shoulders loose, feet sure. The Zenchi Kintoki flashed in an arc, cutting through them both with focus.

This time, the Demonic Katana didn’t resist. It moved with him.

Only one shadow remained. Grief. Its shape flickered, then solidified into something cold and familiar. Metal limbs. Dead eyes. Perfect stance.

The version of himself built by the Shogunate. Efficient. Silent. Obedient. It raised its blade and waited.

Suisen stepped forward. He didn’t lift his Demonic Katana. “I see you,” he said. “But you were never all of me.”

And then—gently—he cut. The final shadow dissolved.

Silence settled over the clearing.

Then the Zenchi Kintoki stirred. A quiet, steady thrum moved through his grip and into his chest.

A pale silver-blue light traced the runes along the blade—cool and balanced. No ragged edges of instinct. No heaviness of reaction. The steel had smoothed. The glow refined.

This was no longer the improvised form born on the day of the fight against the Sea Angel. This was control shaped in stillness. Precision drawn from choice.

This was clarity.

Sea Again stepped beside him.

“That’s the name of this form now,” he said. “Shingetsu. The True Moon.”

Suisen looked at the blade in his hand.

It no longer felt like a tool crafted for someone else’s command. No longer a symbol of guilt or redemption. It was his sword now. A reflection not of what he had been made to be, but of who he chose to become.

The wind shifted again and, for the first time, it didn’t push or pull. It listened—and carried him forward.

As he turned to sheath the blade, Suisen caught a faint shimmer at his feet. A wisp of thread—fine as silk, gold as flame—curled at the edge of the stone where the last illusion had vanished.

Curious, Suisen bent down and picked it up. The strand pulsed faintly in his fingers, warm to the touch.

“Strange,” he murmured.

Sea Again looked over, and a flicker of recognition crossed his expression.

“That’s a soul thread,” he said, “left when a blade is wielded with intention. An extremely rare condition.”

Suisen held the thread between thumb and forefinger. It glowed with a quiet gold, fragile as dawn mist, and with it came shards of memory rising and breaking: a voice he knew, a smile half-forgotten, the weight of a promise.

“What do I do with it?” he asked.

“What you do with it,” Sea Again said softly, “is for you to decide, Suisen. In your own time.”

They left the plateau together. And the thread, wrapped carefully in a cloth, went with him.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The sixth dawn since the Sea Angel attack found Ao stepping out of her tent, the air still heavy with night’s chill. She followed the ridge path as she always did, letting the grass whisper against her legs, her breath a small cloud in the dim light.

The night before, Cannonline had returned her kimono—restored, mended, every thread laid with care. She hadn’t teased, hadn’t quipped. Instead, her hands lingered on the stitches like she was reading them for meaning.

“Did something happen to Dad or Pirilly?” Ao had asked, her chest tight.

Cannonline’s answer had been quiet. “No. It’s just… there was something in Pirilika’s eyes. A lightness I’ve never seen. But I didn’t ask.”

The words had stayed with her through the night.

Now, on the ridge, she felt two presences draw near—one measured, one faint as a shadow. She didn’t turn until they settled beside her.

Opener folded his arms behind his head, gaze fixed on the horizon as if nothing mattered more. Joe Doe crouched nearby, silent, watchful.

“Did I wake you?” Ao asked.

“Hope we’re not interrupting a sulking ritual,” Opener said gently. “We’ve been through too many battles to let you brood alone without backup, Ao.”

Joe Doe tilted his head. “Technically, I was just passing through.”

“Sure you were,” Opener muttered. “And I’m a ballerina.”

Ao let a breath slip out, half laugh, half sigh. Joe Doe settled fully at her other side.

“I’ve seen you watching Suisen train,” Opener said after a stretch of quiet.

She didn’t answer.

“He’s changing,” Joe Doe added.

Her fingers curled against her lap. “He’s quiet. But not sorry.”

“He’s both,” Joe Doe replied. “You just haven’t seen it.”

Opener’s tone grew weightier. “He told me what he said to you. I hit him for it.”

Ao turned, startled. “You… did?”

“One strike,” Opener said, matter-of-fact. “For Fuji’s sake. The rest is yours to decide.”

The silence lengthened.

“I’m not angry,” Ao whispered. “Not anymore.”

“Then what is it?” Opener asked.

She didn’t meet their eyes. “I just needed him to be the one person who didn’t see me as broken. Or written for someone else’s story.”

Joe Doe’s voice was steady, low. “When someone breaks you, it isn’t always the words. It’s the fact that they could say them at all.”

Her breath caught, the truth sharp in her chest.

“You didn’t walk away,” Opener said. “That means something.”

“Or maybe it means I’m not strong enough to,” she murmured.

Joe Doe shook his head. “It means you’re still deciding if the bond is worth the pain.”

Her hands rested in her lap, trembling slightly.

“Forgiveness doesn’t erase what happened,” Joe Doe continued. “It only means the person weighs more than the wound.”

Opener nodded. “And if you forgive him, let it be because you choose to. Not because it’s expected. Not even because he regrets it. Only because you want to.”

They left her there, with the wind and the sound of her heartbeat.

She hadn’t spoken to Suisen since the Sea Angel attack. Yet each morning she had felt him—hovering at the edge of camp, close enough to matter, never close enough to intrude. Distance as message.

Now, below her, six illusions surrounded Suisen—Regret, Fear, Shame, Guilt, Hesitation, and Grief, as Sea Again had named them.

And one by one, Suisen cut them down. Not with rage. Not with desperation. With a stillness she had never seen in him before.

The Demonic Katana didn’t blaze. It didn’t sing. It breathed.

Gone was the rigid precision of his cyborg days. Gone the strain that once tethered every movement.

Ao’s fingers twitched. “His stance… it’s different.” And something inside her shifted too.

Strength had always been loud to her—eruption, impact, noise that broke mountains. But this… this was something else.

She remembered her own awakening. The first time the Demonic Fist had answered her.

Cannonline had asked once if she knew where Opener drew his strength from. She’d tapped his chest, above the heart. And Ao’s mind had flashed back to Celestia, to a vow whispered with a child’s fierce certainty:

“Ao’s gonna become a brave warrior that puts my heart into helping everyone! Just like Dad and Pirilly!” (1)

That vow had become power. The Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai had awakened.

How could she have forgotten that? Maybe strength wasn’t about how loud it rang. Maybe it was about where it began.

On the field below, the illusions vanished. Suisen stood with the Zenchi Kintoki glowing faintly in his grip. Sea Again watched from a step away.

Ao stayed where she was, her pulse steady. She still didn’t know what she would say if Suisen spoke first.

But for the first time, she didn’t need him to. Not because she had forgotten. But because she was ready to hear the part of her that had never been broken.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

The path forked where the mountain split in two. One trail dropped toward the ridge below; the other climbed into bare stone and high wind.

They chose to divide into two groups. Cannonline, Ao, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe took the lower ridge. Suisen, Opener, Sea Again, and Benikage continued upward along the steeper trail.

“Signal if you find anything strange,” Sea Again said.

The ascent wound them past cliffs sharp as broken glass, their steps echoing against the wind. When they crested the ridge, the world narrowed into a valley locked between two sheer walls of stone. The quiet inside pressed against the ears—too neat, too clean, like the air was holding its breath.

Opener dropped onto a boulder with a grunt. “Break time. I’m too old to climb without reward.”

Benikage stretched out in the grass, pointing skyward. “That cloud looks like a threat that got lazy halfway.”

Sea Again ignored them. He was walking in a slow circle to study the perimeter, every line of him alert.

Then Suisen felt a prickle at the base of the spine, as if the air had just grown teeth. He turned.

From the far end of the valley, four massive figures emerged—scaled and snarling.

Dragons. Not the sentient kind who debated ethics over tea. These were wild ones—feral, territorial, and deadly.

Their eyes lit with a feral gleam. The largest reared back, its roar splitting the stone underfoot.

Benikage bounced to his feet. “So much for lazy clouds.”

The Zenchi Kintoki slid free, silver-blue runes breathing awake in Suisen’s grip. The Shingetsu's steady glow matched his breath.

“Spread out,” Sea Again ordered, his voice calm. “They flank when they can.”

The valley erupted.

One dragon barreled straight for Suisen. He stepped forward, meeting the strike rather than retreating. His blade angled, catching claws and sliding along scale, his body rolling with the momentum past its flank. 

The beast twisted back, tail lashing. Suisen dropped low, set his back foot, and drove an upward slash across its belly. Not deep enough to kill—but enough to stagger.

Opener’s laughter boomed nearby as his fists hammered against another dragon’s chest. Sparks flew as knuckles met scale. “You’ll have to do better than a boulder with claws!”

Benikage clung to a horn, blade flashing as he rode a third dragon’s neck. “Slice later, style first!”

Sea Again wove calmly with the fourth. His blade whispered in arcs so exact that even the dragon’s fury seemed to hesitate.

The valley became claws and currents, impact and breath. Suisen let the Zenchi Kintoki move without command, his body answering instead of thinking. Every block carried him into the next stance, every pivot cleared space for his allies.

“Benikage—now!” he called.

Illusions rippled across the valley. Two dragons crashed into each other, roaring confusion. Opener seized the moment, his strike ringing like thunder. Sea Again swept the last beast off its footing with a single precise cut of his blade.

The ground quaked, then stilled.

They stood among the dust, bruised and gasping, but upright. Victors.

Benikage pointed through the trees. “Is that… water?”

A lake waited at the far end of the valley, glass-clear, catching the sun like a jewel hidden in stone.

“Reward delivered,” Opener said, already unlacing his gloves.

“Time to cool off,” Benikage added, tossing his sword into the grass.

Suisen didn’t move. His hand hovered near his side as the others stripped down without hesitation.

Sea Again studied him. “Something wrong?”

Suisen hesitated. “This body… I don’t know if it can swim.”

The silence that followed was far too casual.

Opener stepped forward with a mock-wise tone. “Do you know the best way to learn how to swim?”

Suisen tilted his head. “No. What is it?”

“You gotta drown first.”

Suisen turned, reflex tugging him toward correction. “That’s not the phrasing. The proper saying—”

He didn’t finish. Sea Again and Benikage blurred into motion. In one heartbeat Suisen was stripped, in the next—

SPLASH.

He surfaced sputtering, hair plastered to his face, and glaring to the three traitors.

Benikage grinned. “Victory by involuntary swimming!”

Sea Again folded his arms. “Lesson one: don’t fight the water. Let it carry you.”

With a shout, all three launched in after him.

The cold bit his skin, but not unkindly. Suisen flailed at first, then found the rhythm. The water didn’t demand control; it offered balance.

And when the splashing turned to laughter, he let himself floating and smiling, because he was alive.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The wind shifted as they crested the ridge, scattering dark pine needles across the uneven path.

Ao adjusted the strap of her pack. Ahead, nestled against the mountainside, a village revealed itself—stone dwellings with walls cracked open, roofs sagging, and doorways gaping like mouths too tired to speak.

No smoke rose. No voices stirred. Only the still air pressing down.

“Strange,” Cannonline muttered, slowing her steps. “This settlement wasn’t on the map Tenbuyer and I studied.”

“That’s because it’s not supposed to be here,” Joe Doe said, his tone edged with certainty. “And if it is… someone wanted it forgotten.”

They lingered at the ridge’s edge, silence draped heavy across their shoulders.

Ao narrowed her eyes. The place didn’t feel hostile—not yet—but wrong. Time itself seemed stalled here, as though the village had been abandoned not just by people, but by memory.

Tenbuyer dipped lower, wings twitching in the unsettled air. “I’ll scout the perimeter. If anything jumps out at me, I’ll scream artistically.”

Cannonline snorted, her reply dry. “That would be a first.”

Ao exhaled through her nose and followed Joe Doe as he approached the outermost house.

Inside, the air was stale, powdered with dust. A table stood set as though waiting for a meal that never came. Plates slumped beneath gray film. Ash clung cold and unburned to the hearth. Children’s sandals sat neatly by the threshold, one strap snapped.

Ao bent, fingertips brushing the edge of the ruined sandal. The brittle leather crumbled at her touch.

“There was life here,” she whispered. “Not ended in fire or steel. Just… unraveled.”

And she almost heard it—laughter echoing faint behind walls, a child skipping barefoot across the threshold. The echoes clung like shadows of a day that never ended properly. Her hand hovered, reluctant to let go of the fragile memory.

Cannonline moved beside her, voice low. “Places don’t go quiet like this unless something decided they should.”

Ao’s gut twisted tighter. That silence wasn’t emptiness. It was purpose.

“Joe Doe,” Cannonline asked suddenly, sharper now, “do you sense movement?”

He crouched by the hearth, running fingers through the powder. “Whoever lived here… was pulled away too cleanly.”

Ao drifted further into the room, palm brushing the doorframe. Scratched into the wood in faint, uneven lines were children’s markings—scores, names, games. She froze, throat tight.

“I don’t like this,” she murmured.

“Neither do I,” Cannonline said.

Joe Doe straightened, frown cutting deep. “We’ve never seen a place this empty and unguarded.”

“And without traps,” Ao added.

They stepped back into the waning light. From outside, the village looked almost peaceful. Golden dusk stretched long shadows across the dirt paths like grasping hands.

But Ao’s instincts screamed otherwise.

Tenbuyer swooped in, landing hard enough to scatter dust. His flippant air was gone.

“I found something,” he said grimly. “We should regroup with the others. This isn’t the kind of place to linger.”

Cannonline’s gaze sharpened. “Define ‘something.’”

Tenbuyer hesitated. His wings twitched once. “A trace of Carnage Energy in a cave nearby.

Ao’s breath caught.

“How strong is the trace?” she pressed.

“Faint, but focused,” Tenbuyer answered.

Joe Doe’s expression shadowed. “Decisely something not natural.”

Ao turned back to the hollow village, a chill sliding down her spine.

“Signal the others,” she ordered. “We’ll face this together. I don’t think we have much time.”

Tenbuyer launched skyward, flare hissing through the darkening air.

The rest stood at the village’s edge, the weight of silence pressing harder with every heartbeat.

Ao cast one last look at the ruined homes. The village hadn’t been destroyed. It had been peeled away, deliberately, layer by layer, until nothing remained but absence.

She shivered.

Absence was worse than destruction. Absence meant something had learned how to erase without leaving a trace. And now they were walking straight into it.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

A flare split the sky, followed by Tenbuyer’s coded flash of urgent regroup.

Within the hour, both groups converged just outside an abandoned settlement. The wind carried mineral dust across the rocks, dry and metallic, that clung to Suisen’s throat.

Ao stood near Joe Doe, arms folded and unreadable. She didn’t greet Suisen. She didn’t look away either.

“We found a place laced with Carnage Energy,” Tenbuyer reported, wings twitching with unease. “East of this village, in a cave. Faint, but concentrated.”

Benikage gave a low whistle. “Perfect. I always dreamed of cursed spelunking.”

“No one’s getting cursed, Benikage,” Sea Again said flatly.

Opener cracked his knuckles. “Cannon, Joe Doe, Tenbuyer, and I will set a perimeter and hold outside. If anything tries to crawl out from the cave, we'll crash it.”

Cannonline nodded briskly. “Signal if things go wrong. I’ll open a portal before you finish screaming.”

“Understood,” Ao said, voice tight.

Suisen’s gaze brushed hers. No words passed between them, but when the strike team advanced toward the cave, she didn’t drift from his side.

From Ao's and Suisen’s Points of View 

The cave swallowed them whole.

The air dropped—not the natural cool of stone, but a stale cold that pressed against skin like a warning. Veins of blackened rock crawled across the walls, threaded with glassy streaks and dim crimson light. The ground pulsed faintly, echoing like breath drawn by something that had no lungs.

“The Carnage Energy trace is becoming stronger,” Sea Again murmured.

No one answered.

The tremor came instead. The earth growled. Pebbles rattled loose. And from the cavern’s dark throat, a roar ripped out, torn straight from the rock.

The thing that appeared only faintly resembled a Shirofune. Shadow clung to its frame like molten tar, hardening into jagged plates that pulsed in rhythm with the hollow scar in its chest.

Where a soul core should have been, only shards remained—burning faintly, fused with Carnage Energy itself. Heat bled from the cracks, carrying with it a fevered hum. Its body glowed like a furnace on the verge of collapse, every twitch scraping against the air with a sound that wasn’t meant to exist. A faint red and black marking was on the remains of its shoulder.

Benikage’s eyes narrowed. “That’s no common spawn… looks more like a guardian.”

“No time for guesses,” Ao snapped. “Flank it.”

Suisen drew the Zenchi Kintoki. The blade answered with calm light, silver-blue runes steady, unflinching. He stepped in first. His cut met claw. Sparks tore loose. The force knocked him back, but he pivoted, rebalancing, only to find Ao already at his side and her Demonic Axe carving in low and clean.

They didn’t speak. They didn’t need to.

Sea Again locked the front line, his blade parrying molten strikes with precision.

Benikage scattered illusions, fracturing the creature’s focus, breaking rhythm.

Ao’s Demonic Axe bit deep into its shoulder, steam hissing from the wound. Her movements struck Suisen—gone was the fighter who relied on sheer force. Every swing now carried restraint, discipline, lethal economy. And so, he matched her. 

Still, the corrupted shell held. His Demonic Katana sang, but the fused shards refused to scatter.

Then the Zenchi Kintoki pulsed differently with a silver-blue light—and beneath it, a golden thread shimmered faintly at Suisen’s feet, glowing just long enough to root him.

The creature shrieked. Its armor slid, molten plates reshaping, adapting.

“It’s learning,” Sea Again warned.

“Then we end it first,” Ao barked, lunging again.

Their tempo sharpened. Suisen found it—her cue setting his, Sea Again anchoring the rhythm, Benikage weaving chaos into clarity.

Four strikes, from four angles. The blades converged in a single collision of will.

The creature pulsed once, twice—then shattered, its body collapsing inward, molten light snuffed out.

Silence returned.

Suisen crouched, fingers brushing the faint golden thread the Zenchi Kintoki had left behind. It pulsed weakly before fading into his palm. He looked to the broken cavity in the creature’s chest. Shards of its former core smoldered still, smoke curling upward against the stone ceiling like a memory refusing to fade.

“After Fuji, Pirilika, Ceefore, Yeyasu, Higan, Ao and I fought the Carnage Dimension, (1) we thought it was finished. But power like this… it doesn’t vanish. It seeps, slow and quiet. We missed it. And now,” his voice sank, “there may be more.”

Ao’s voice cut the hush. “Then we don’t miss it again.”

Those were the first words she had given him in days. Then, she crouched toward a faint glow nearby, fingers skimming the ground.

Her gaze sharpened.

Sea Again leaned closer. “What is it, Ao?”

“A sigil. Red and black. Cracked in the fight… but still bleeding Carnage Energy.” She pressed her palm flat, steady. “I’ll seal it.”

Benikage blinked. “You can?”

Her lips curved. “Watch.”

She pressed her palm to the earth. The faint shimmer collapsed, folding into her hand before winking out. When it was almost gone, the edges warped in stylized red and black lines.

Ao’s brow furrowed.

“Is there something wrong?” Sea Again asked.

She shook her head.

No one spoke after that.

But they all felt that this wasn’t just about freeing demons bound in living Infernal Treasures anymore. This was Carnage Dimension seeping back into their Netherworld.

The fight ahead wasn’t survival.

It was warning.

And as Suisen stood in that cave, the Zenchi Kintoki dimmed faintly in his hand, its faint golden shimmer reflecting the steadiness he was losing grain by grain.

Ao noticed his calm was forced, but didn’t voice it.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The morning after the battle, the wind along the mountain ridge had changed.

It wasn’t the usual crisp air that cut through grass and stone. Now it carried weight—like a breath rising from cracks that should’ve stayed sealed.

Ao stood near the cavern mouth, arms folded, staring down at the shattered Infernal Treasure they had dragged out and buried beneath stone. Even broken, fragments of it still pulsed faintly, the glow of the Carnage Energy seeping sickly through the rubble. They had also shown Opener, Cannonline, Joe Doe and Tenbuyer the seal.

Sea Again stood beside her, gaze fixed on the wreckage.

“That thing had no souls but was merged with the Carnage Energy,” he said at last.

Ao frowned. “Merged?”

He nodded.

“But that doesn’t just happen,” she pressed.

Sea Again’s jaw tightened. “No… but whether it was its own will or someone else’s… I can’t say. Either way, it’s what frightens me.”

The words sank into her bones like grit.

A soft rush of wings drew her eyes upward. Tenbuyer landed lightly, folding his wings tight. “No Carnage Energy left nearby,” he reported.

Suisen’s voice came from behind, quiet but edged with fatigue. “Or maybe it has been hidden too well.”

He stepped forward into view. Zenchi Kintoki hung at his side, clean and polished, but dulled. The silver-blue shimmer of the Shingetsu was gone—as if the blade had swallowed too much of something it couldn’t release.

The Demonic Katana endured, but dimly.

Cannonline crossed her arms. “If the Carnage Dimension leaked into ours, is this contamination or breach?”

Suisen didn’t meet her eyes. He looked to the horizon. “After finding a seal and an Infernal Treasure infused with Carnage Energy... it’s breach.”

Joe Doe exhaled through his nose. “So we’re not just freeing demons trapped in Infernal Treasures anymore. We’re sealing cracks that should never have opened.”

“Or fixing a wall flawed from the start,” Suisen added.

The way he said it stuck with Ao—not as drama, but resignation, like someone who’d already accepted the damage couldn’t be undone.

“No wonder this place wasn’t on the map,” Tenbuyer muttered, scanning the ridge. “It wasn’t forgotten. It was erased.”

“Erased,” Benikage echoed. “Or hidden deliberately.”

He stepped forward, thoughtful. “If someone put a seal in that place and scrubbed the area from records, he wanted it buried.”

Ao glanced at the map. This ridge hadn’t appeared until they were nearly on top of it. The path, the weather, even the terrain had cloaked it—until the Carnage Dimension called them close enough.

“How many more are like this?” she asked.

No one answered. The silence was heavier than stone.

Opener finally said, “We rotate watch and stay mobile until we know what we’re fighting.”

“I’ll take double watch,” Joe Doe offered. “We don’t know what else slipped through that breach.”

“I’ll map the zone with Tenbuyer,” Benikage said. “If we find another trace, we leave. No debate.”

“Agreed,” Cannonline said.

Ao’s gaze drifted back to Suisen. He stood quiet, distant but never absent. He listened. He moved. But when he sheathed Zenchi Kintoki, it was cautious—like he wasn’t sure the blade would answer him next time. His grip trembled faintly, not with fear, but with the slow leak of certainty.

That night, they camped outside the canyon, a small fire glowing between them. Joe Doe kept watch, Cannonline half-dozing with her eyes still sharp.

Ao leaned against her pack at the fire’s edge, counting stars until her thoughts tangled.

Across the clearing, Suisen sat alone with the Demonic Katana resting in his lap. He didn’t polish or meditate—just watched the firelight flicker on its dulled edge, as if waiting for it to remember how to shine.

She’d always thought breaking meant noise—cracks, screams, shatters. But what was happening in him was quieter. Like stone worn down by water, too slow to see until it was gone.

Maybe the blade hadn’t just burned through enemies. Maybe it had carried something out of him it could no longer hold.

The Zenchi Kintoki hadn’t failed him in the fight. His movements had been precise, his discipline sharp. But afterward, its glow had dimmed and became faintly golden. And now, Suisen wasn’t calm. He was holding calm. That steadiness scared her more than the thing they’d buried.

She looked away before he noticed, though not quickly enough to ignore how much she still did.

Tomorrow, they’d move. Hunt. Fight. She’d be ready. But tonight, she stayed awake longer than usual—just in case the stars started falling too.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The next site with a seal with Carnage Energy wasn’t a fortress or shrine. It was a burial field—long forgotten, and quietly, profoundly wrong.

Two weeks’ travel brought them to a basin beyond volcanic cliffs, where the land dipped into dark soil streaked with fractured stone. Nothing stirred there, even the wind. The silence pressed heavy against their chests, as if the earth itself demanded stillness.

Ao crouched beside a gleaming leaning stone, half-swallowed by dust. With her thumb, she brushed until faint lines of a seal emerged.

Her breath tightened. “This has the same red and black pattern as the seal we found in the cave. That one was too ruined to be recognizable, but part of this is Grandpa Mugai’s hand.”

She paused. “But the other part—these turns, these breaks—they don’t match anything he taught me.”

She glanced back in time to catch Sea Again and Benikage trading a look—too quick, too pale.

“Maybe Master Mugai refined it later,” Sea Again said, almost too fast.

Ao studied him a moment longer, then turned back to the stone. The seal’s veins ran black where the Carnage Energy seeped in, spreading like mold through damp wood.

Then she stood, scanning the basin. The wind pulsed in and out with unnatural rhythm, as though the ground itself were breathing. At her feet, a half-burned post jutted from the soil. The air beside it shimmered faintly, like memory caught in light.

Suisen stood a few steps away, Zenchi Kintoki drawn. Its glow flickered instead of burning—a faint golden pulse, then dim again. The blade’s uncertainty mirrored his stillness.

“They’re not moving,” Suisen said, tilting his head.

Ao frowned. “What?”

“The echoes. Normally there’s something—anger, grief, or regret. Traces of what was left behind. This time…” His grip tightened. “Nothing. Just hunger, waiting for a chance to wake.”

“Sounds like the kind of bedtime story I’d rather skip,” Benikage said, arching an eyebrow.

Sea Again pressed a hand to the soil, eyes closed. “Something’s buried deep. And not everything wants to stay under.”

“Destroy the site?” Opener asked, hand on her weapon.

“No.” The word tore out of Ao too sharply. Everyone turned. She drew a slower breath, softening but not retracting. “If we destroy it, we could unspool the whole weave. Grandpa Mugai layered his seals. One thread loose, the rest collapse.”

Cannonline folded her arms. “Then what?”

Ao let her gaze travel across the warped terrain—the veins of Carnage, the shuddering hum beneath her feet, the way the air pulled inward like a wound refusing to close.

“We don’t break it,” she said. “We contain it.”

Joe Doe tilted his head. “Suppress the seal?”

Ao nodded once. “We track the fracture and reinforce the pattern. Benikage, Tenbuyer—help me.”

Tenbuyer groaned, wings twitching as he drifted closer. “Great. Nothing like a little cursed archaeology to remind me why I dropped out.”

From Suisen’s Point of View

That night, campfire light flickered against the cliffs.

They’d set camp just far enough from the burial field to breathe, but close enough to return if the ground shifted.

The others had drifted off—Cannonline half-dozing, Benikage snoring, Sea Again motionless in meditation. Joe Doe and Tenbuyer paced the perimeter. Opener scribbled notes by lantern glow.

Suisen sat apart, cross-legged by the fire, the butterfly crystal cupped in his palm.

He told himself he would give it back to Ao. He always told himself that. Yet every night he studied it instead, turning it until the firelight caught strange angles in its heart—hoping meaning might reveal itself if he stared long enough.

“You know,” Ao’s voice came soft behind him, “instinct doesn’t sharpen by staring.”

He startled, closing his hand around the crystal before she lowered herself beside him. She didn’t press.

The silence between them stretched, broken only by fire crackle and the whisper of pine above.

“I wasn’t enough,” he said at last. His tone carried no question, no plea. Only fact.

Ao didn’t answer.

“In the cave,” he went on, “I used everything—breath, balance, timing. And still… I nearly lost it.” His hand brushed Zenchi Kintoki’s hilt. “I wasn’t meant to hold it.”

“You weren’t meant to hold it alone,” she said.

He looked up. For a moment, firelight bridged the gap between them, and nothing else existed.

Ao rose, hesitating before turning toward the trees. “I don’t know what’s changing in your Zenchi Kintoki,” she said evenly. “But if it ever starts burning instead of breathing—promise you’ll let me see it.”

Then she was gone, her footsteps swallowed by the night.

Suisen stayed by the fire, hand resting on the sword.

The Demonic Katana no longer glowed.

But it hadn’t gone dark either.

Not yet.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

The next site with a seal with Carnage Energy greeted them with silence—then the earth gave way.

What began as a faint tremor—barely enough to unsettle the path—erupted into a deafening rumble as the ridge cracked beneath their feet. Stone tore loose, boulders roared down the slope, and a choking cloud swallowed the air.

The team split on instinct. Ao, Sea Again, and Cannonline dashed forward. Suisen’s group stayed above, scanning from higher ground.

“Rockfall!” Tenbuyer’s voice rang as the slope collapsed.

Suisen’s chest clenched as the dust swallowed the trail—and Ao with it.

He didn’t think. He ran.

“Suisen, stop!” Opener lunged, fingers brushing his shoulder—too late.

Suisen was already gone, leaping headlong into the haze. He ignored the shouts, the slope, the sharp rocks ripping his skin. Nothing mattered but the fear twisting through him.

He had to find her.

From Ao's Point of View

Far below, Ao groaned and pushed herself upright. Her limbs throbbed with cuts and bruises, but nothing was broken. Around her, the collapsed path had become a deep ravine hemmed in by blackened stone walls, smoke and dust curling like breath.

She winced, brushing grit from her eyes. The Demonic Fist pulsed as if echoing her heartbeat.

Something shifted in the haze. She turned just as a shape slid from the mist.

In front of her appeared another living Infernal Treasure with a fractured soul core and merged with the Carnage Energy, smaller and quicker than the one in the cave near the forgotten village. (1)

Its outline flickered, never one form for long. Shards of Kurofune armor and tongues of flame coiling in grotesque sync. Its aura crackled with that same cave-born wrongness. A jagged red and black marking was on its left leg.

Its eyes locked on her. Then it charged.

Ao met it head-on with her Demonic Fist. Her strike landed—but the creature twisted into the impact, reshaped itself, and countered with a mirrored stance.

She pivoted, changed angles, shifted timing.

It mirrored again.

Not reacting—replicating. Not learning—stealing.

From Ao's and Suisen’s Points of View 

Above, Suisen clawed his way across the jagged slope, hands torn, shoulder bloodied from the plunge. He didn’t stop. His focus tunneled on Ao’s faint traces, like heat through fog.

His body screamed at him to stop. He didn’t.

The ravine opened, and he saw her.

Ao staggered back, unarmed, the mimic’s claw raised.

Something inside him snapped.

He dropped like a blade, his voice cutting the air: “Ao!”

She barely turned before Suisen struck the ground between them, sword-first. The impact shook the dirt, forcing the mimic back.

He stood low, Demonic Katana drawn. The Zenchi Kintoki blazed—not with its usual calm light, but fiercer, runes edged with gold, heat shivering from the blade like a pulse.

Suisen drove forward. Steel clashed, sparks spraying.

Ao scrambled up, the Demonic Axe snapping to her grip. She caught the wild fire in his eyes and scowled. “You were supposed to flank it, not dive off a cliff!”

He didn’t answer. He wasn’t planning. He wasn’t analyzing.

He was burning.

Every strike came faster, heavier. The Demonic Katana shook in his grip, golden embers flashing along the spine as if something clawed beneath the steel.

They fought together—less in rhythm than in momentum. Pebbles rained from above, the others scrambling down, but they were still far.

Ao feinted low, twisting her blow at the last second. Suisen deflected from the right, forcing the mimic’s claws wide.

Her fist cracked its shoulder. His blade raked its side.

The Zenchi Kintoki hummed louder, not in harmony but in warning.

Ao struck again. The mimic shrieked, warped, faltered—its stolen rhythm broken.

She struck high. Suisen struck low.

The creature reeled—and fell.

From Ao's Point of View 

The faint red and black glyph with Carnage Energy shimmered on the crumbled wall, revealed beneath scorched stone. Ao dropped to seal it.

Silence followed, dust still curling in the air.

They stood breathing hard, motionless. Suisen lowered the Demonic Katana. Its golden hue faded back to silver-blue—but not completely.

Ao glanced at him, sweat streaking her face. “You didn’t have to throw yourself at it like that.”

“It was adapting to you.”

“Yeah, and I was adapting back,” she muttered.

Suisen’s gaze lingered on the blade’s dim glow. “I couldn’t risk losing you. Not again.”

Her eyes barely softened.

“That’s not an excuse to get yourself killed, Suisen,” she said quietly.

He smiled faintly, cautious.

She rolled her eyes, though she didn’t look away.

For a moment, neither moved. And though no words bridged the space between them, something had  shifted, no longer broken in the same way.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

The canyon air felt wrong, as if the ground itself was holding its breath.

They had expected a collapsed site. Instead, something pulsing with Carnage Energy had broken free and moved through the ravine like smoke given form.

Its Shirofune body shifted in constant flux between fire and armor. Limbs melted into claws. Its featureless face was a scorched plate of burning metal. Its soul core was shattered. A melted red and black marking was on its right side.

“Don’t let it reach the high ridge!” Opener shouted. “That’s a portal fracture point!”

“Understood!” Ao called back, already sprinting forward, Opener flanking her.

Their fists struck in tandem—her Demonic Fist against his bare knuckles. They moved like a single unit, Ao matching his rhythm with precise, explosive footwork. Every strike landed with clean force.

“Breath, foot, strike. Same tempo!” Opener reminded her mid-dodge.

She adjusted instantly, each punch sharper than the last.

“You’ve come a long way,” Opener grinned. “That’s my girl.”

But the creature was learning.

A jagged limb lashed out, clipping Opener across the ribs. He rolled back with a grunt. Ao stepped in without hesitation, covering him.

Suisen had watched from above, blade drawn, but hadn’t joined the fight. Not from hesitation—because the rhythm between Ao and Opener was undeniable. Balanced. Lethal.

Then he saw it.

A second attacker, a broken Shirofune body held together by shattered red and black runes of Carnage Energy, peeled itself from the cliff wall and lunged for Ao’s blind spot.

Suisen’s instincts screamed.

“Ao!”

She turned just as he slammed into it mid-air, Demonic Katana flashing.

The Zenchi Kintoki met the blow, but something was wrong. Its blade vibrated violently in his grip, its usual calm glow sputtering.

Fear hit him, sharp and cold. In one heartbeat, the Demonic Katana changed.

Golden claws erupted along the spine. Heat surged through the hilt, burning into Suisen’s palms. The blade shrieked in recognition.

The Zenchi Kintoki knew the threat before he did.

This wasn’t clarity. It was survival.

Runes carved themselves into his flesh. Blood mixed with gold. He didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop. He drove the blade forward—once, twice—and the echo shattered into ribbons of flickering light.

The first Shirofune fell, screaming as the Zenchi Kintoki cut it down in a single hit.

Ao returned to his side, breath short. “Your hands—”

“I’m fine,” he muttered, even as blood dripped down his wrists, soaking the hilt. The Demonic Katana pulsed against his skin, no longer waiting for his direction, but hunting.

It pulled at him now, wild and unstable. Its arcs burned trails in the air. The Zenchi Kintoki didn’t respond like a tool. It lashed out like a predator.

The second Shirofune lunged, and Suisen met it head-on, blade howling.

Each blow cut deeper. The Demonic Katana no longer danced, but the toll mounted fast. Grip slipped and steps faltered. Pain flared in his hands with every clash.

By the third exchange, the Shirofune’s energy mechanism lay exposed. Suisen’s stance broke. He staggered.

“Suisen!” Ao called.

Opener caught him just as his knees gave way.

The Shirofune charged, but Ao didn’t hesitate. She leapt into the gap, driving her fist straight into the mechanism Suisen had exposed.

Impact cracked the canyon walls. The Shirofune collapsed, unraveling in a storm of ash and embers.

Silence fell, heavy, scorched, final.

Ao panted, knuckles scraped and smoking, the aftershock still ringing in her arms. The sight of Suisen’s hands burned in her mind.

For a long moment, the only sound was the hiss of cooling stone and his ragged breathing. Then Opener knelt by a crumbled wall, fingers brushing across a faint glow etched into stone.

“There’s a red and black seal here,” he called.

Ao approached, jaw tight, breath uneven. She studied it, then nodded. Without a word, she began containment.

From Ao's Point of View 

Later, they regrouped in a clearing farther down the slope. Suisen slumped on a boulder, hands bandaged and bloodstained. Cannonline crouched beside him, inspecting the damage, while Ao stood nearby, arms crossed.

Gold still shimmered faintly beneath the wrappings. The runes hadn’t faded.

"You two really are idiots," Cannonline muttered. "First her, now you."

Suisen nodded faintly.

"Stupid," Ao added.

He blinked. "...What?"

"You didn’t even try to stabilize the Zenchi Kintoki. It could’ve torn your arm off."

"It saved me," he said, voice low.

She didn’t reply, but the fire in her stance slightly softened.

Suisen leaned back, exhausted. The Zenchi Kintoki rested beside him, no longer glowing, but still warm.

Present Day – At the Dojo

"So that’s how you got those scars?" Raiji asked, eyes on Suisen’s palms.

He looked down at the faint golden lines tracing his skin and gave a half-smile. "Yeah. Didn’t mean to—it just happened. Something inside snapped."

He paused, gaze lowering.

"That’s how it always starts. These techniques… they don’t wait for permission. They come out when you’re desperate enough."

Raiji tilted his head. "So… I shouldn’t use them?"

"You can," Suisen said, steady now. "But only when you know what you’re willing to give up."

Raiji nodded.

"Survival is powerful," Suisen added. "But it’s not peace. Don’t let it become the only way you fight."

Raiji balled his fists, determined. "So you use it to protect someone. Not just to win."

"There's a difference," Suisen agreed. "And now you know it."

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

After a while, Ao left Suisen in Cannonline’s care and wandered just beyond the camp. She settled on a fallen log, one arm resting loosely on her knee, eyes drifting toward the edge of firelight. The flames had burned low, but rest wouldn’t come to her.

From where she sat, she could still see Suisen. He wasn’t sharpening the Zenchi Kintoki, just holding it. The Demonic Katana had returned to its base aspect after it had assumed the new form Kintsume, the Golden Talon, as Suisen’d called it.

He looked like someone who had survived… but wasn’t sure what was left of him afterward.

Ao let out a slow breath. “He’s burning up from the inside now,” she murmured.

She hadn’t noticed Sea Again approach until he settled beside her without a word—the kind of presence that didn’t ask permission, just shared the space. A moment later, Benikage flopped onto the other side, chewing lazily on dried meat.

“Always figured he’d be the one to crack first,” Benikage said lightly. “Too smart for his own nerves.”

Ao didn’t reply.

“Still standing, though,” Sea Again added. “Or sitting, technically.”

Ao leaned forward slightly, voice low. “He’s hurting himself. Not from weakness… but from caring too much.”

Benikage shrugged. “Aren’t we all? Some of us write bad poetry about it. Some turn their lives into a tragedy. Some already did.”

“And some of us misuse their strength,” Ao said. “Turn it inward instead of outward.” Then she fell silent.

Sea Again tilted his head, faint smile on his lips. “So now strength isn’t loud anymore?”

She looked down, thoughtful. “I used to think it was. That being strong meant hitting harder, moving faster, always staying one step ahead. Never letting anyone see you fall.”

Her gaze drifted back to Suisen. “But then I trained with Opener, and I started seeing it in others, too—that strength that doesn’t have to shout.”

“And ever since Suisen returned as a real demon, he’s changed. He doesn’t fight like a machine anymore. He fights like someone who feels. Who moves even when it hurts,” she added.

Her hand flexed around her arm, unconsciously tightening. “I’m starting to think that kind of strength matters more.”

Benikage gave a low whistle. “That’s almost philosophy. You getting soft on us?”

“Don’t push it,” Ao muttered, but she didn’t smile.

Her eyes stayed on the fire, sharp and steady now. “Back at the canyon, Suisen’s Demonic Katana changed—like it wasn’t just reacting. And those seals half similar to Grandpa Mugai’s…”

She stopped, then turned toward Benikage.

“Benikage,” she said quietly, “you were Grandpa Mugai’s best student, weren’t you?”

He blinked, caught off guard. “Once. Long ago. Why?”

“Did he ever talk about where his soulcery techniques came from? Or how he made seals?”

Benikage hesitated. The smirk faded. “Only that it cost him more than he expected.”

Ao studied him for a moment, saying nothing.

“How many sealed sites with Carnage Energy have we found?” she asked.

He didn’t answer immediately. After a moment, he said, “Four with that red and black pattern.”

Ao’s jaw tightened. “And that I had to contain.” (1)

“If the pattern holds,” Benikage added, “there might be a fifth. Possibly more. But five would form a ring. A deliberate one.” He glanced away. “Tenbuyer and I are mapping them now.”

After that, they remained in silence, letting the fire crackle between them. The night air had cooled, stretching long between breaths.

Then Sea Again spoke, calm.

“You know, Ao… Suisen wasn’t trying to prove strength. He was just making sure you didn’t fall.”

Ao’s eyes lowered. “I know.” Her voice was barely a whisper—but it carried weight. Something inside her had shifted, just slightly. A softness that hadn’t been there before, close to a possibility of forgiveness.

The moment lingered, then footsteps approached, quiet but purposeful. Cannonline stepped into the firelight, a sealed scroll in her hand, brow furrowed with curiosity. Opener followed close behind, his expression serious.

“We just received this by priority portal relay,” Cannonline said, holding out the scroll. “It’s marked private. From Fuji.”

Ao blinked. “Dad?”

Cannonline nodded. “And Pirilika.”

Opener tilted his head, glancing between them. “Let’s find somewhere private.”

They stepped away from the others, toward a quiet patch near the treeline where the firelight didn’t quite reach. Ao took the scroll slowly, broke the seal, and unrolled it. Her eyes skimmed the parchment once, then again, slower.

To the family we trust first,

There’s something we want to talk to you about. In person.

— Fuji & Pirilika

Silence stretched between them.

Opener crossed his arms. “Any idea what that means?”

“I should’ve investigated the moment I saw that strange light in Pirilika’s eyes,” (2) Cannonline muttered. “Something’s up.”

“Strange?” Opener echoed, raising an eyebrow.

Cannonline nodded. “When I brought Ao’s kimono, I saw her eyes sparkling more than usual. I didn’t ask then, but maybe I should have.”

Ao didn’t speak. She kept her eyes on the scroll, fingers curling tighter around its edge. Her breath slowed. A pressure built beneath her collarbone, but it wasn’t fear, not exactly. Something had shifted.

Something she couldn’t name yet.

And she wasn’t sure if it was going to be good news.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The next day, Cannonline opened a portal to the Nethership. Ao, Opener, and Cannonline stepped through to find Fuji, Pirilika, and Pii-Chan waiting in a quiet room on the upper deck.

The silence stretched—long and awkward, thick enough to cut with a blade—until Ao finally broke it.

“Okay… who’s dying?”

She tried to keep her voice light. But something in her gut already knew this was something big. Something that would forever change things.

“No one’s dying!” Pirilika said quickly, waving her hands. “At least—I really hope not!”

She reached out and gently took Fuji’s hand.

Ao blinked.

Fuji didn’t flinch. If anything, he stood taller—calm and steady, and for the first time in Ao’s memory, quietly sure.

Now the silence made sense.

Ao had always known her father was strong—unyielding, stubborn, quietly fierce. But this was strength, too. The kind Opener had spoken of. The kind Suisen had begun to show.

And now he was showing something else—a softness that wasn’t weakness, but its own kind of strength.

Part of her had believed, deep down, that he’d remain alone forever. That the Empathy Killer curse, even if lifted, had carved a hollow too deep to fill. Yet here he was—holding someone’s hand not like a demon tolerating closeness, but like someone who had found peace in another’s presence.

“We’re getting married,” Pirilika said. Her usual cheer was still there, but beneath it was grounded resolve. She wasn’t hiding behind optimism. She was choosing it, knowing exactly what it meant.

No one moved. Even Cannonline looked like she’d forgotten how to blink.

“…You’re what?” Ao said, stunned.

“We wanted you to know first,” Fuji said. “Before we tell the others. Before I challenge Master Higan for the Zesshosai title.”

He paused.

“I trust you’ll keep this from Master Higan until then. Once I’ve earned the title… we’ll hold the ceremony sometime after.”

Ao didn’t answer immediately. Her eyes flicked between the two of them, unreadable. Then they settled on her father—on the calm in his eyes, the quiet certainty in the way he stood.

Her mind raced, tracing back past events. She’d been so focused on her own path—graduating early from Evil Academy while serving as Miss Beryl’s stand-in, (1) retrieving Grandpa Mugai’s Demonic Fist, (2) then training with Opener in Wahei. Through it all, she had seen her father and Pirilika in fleeting moments, always supportive, always steady.

She realized their bond had blossomed later, after the Grand Journey began, a turn of the Dark Sun ago. After the Empathy Killer curse had lifted for three full turns, leaving space for something new to grow.

Across the room, Opener snorted into his teacup.

Cannonline shot him a look but said nothing. Her posture remained tense, eyes shifting between Fuji and Pirilika like she was analyzing opening moves in a duel.

Fuji answered the question forming on all their faces.

“We don’t know exactly when. But after the Empathy Killer lifted—three turns of the Dark Sun ago—something changed. Quietly. Steadily. Then, this past turn, it deepened—while she was beside me. Picking fights, saving lives, dragging me into missions I never agreed to… and never leaving.”

He didn’t smile, but warmth flickered at the edges of his voice.

Pirilika let go of his hand and stepped forward.

“I remember what you told Fuji once. That you’d never accept a woman weaker than you as family.” (3)

She looked Ao directly in the eyes.

“If that’s still true… I’ll walk away. No matter what I feel. If you say no, I’ll accept it.”

Ao froze, unprepared.

Her eyes moved from Pirilika to Fuji, measuring something she could only name in the quietest corners of her mind.

Silence stretched.

Fuji didn’t move. His fingers remained loosely linked with Pirilika’s, shoulders rigid—like a demon bracing for a sword strike.

Opener’s gaze flicked between them, unreadable.

Cannonline stood like stone, brow arching slowly, ready to back Ao’s judgment if needed.

Even Pii-Chan said nothing.

Ao stepped forward. The air shifted subtly but heavily, as though the room itself was holding its breath.

Pirilika didn’t flinch. Her tail stilled. Her ears lay low. Her hands were steady.

This wasn’t the girl Ao used to call an airhead. (4) This was someone who stood her ground. Who let herself feel, and still didn’t flinch.

And that… meant everything.

Thunk.

Ao tapped Pirilika gently on the head with a knuckle.

Pirilika blinked. Ao smiled warmly.

“Pirilly,” she said, “strength isn’t just physical.”

Her hand settled gently over Pirilika’s chest.

“You’ve always had the kind that matters most.”

Pirilika’s ears twitched. Her eyes shimmered.

Fuji let out a soft chuckle.

Cannonline exhaled slowly, shoulders easing. Opener gave a subtle nod.

“I’m happy for you, Dad and Pirilly,” Ao added. “I mean it.”

And then she went to hug them tightly. Cannonline’s shoulders eased completely. She crossed her arms, giving Fuji a pointed look. “You’re lucky I prefer having a son-in-law over earning more stress wrinkles.”

Opener smiled wryly. “I always knew you respected Pirilika, Fuji. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have let you near her all these turns of the Dark Sun. But I’ll still be watching over my daughter’s happiness.”

Fuji dipped his head.

“I’ll keep an eye on both of you,” Cannonline added with a teasing smirk.

Pirilika laughed nervously. “Okay… that went better than I thought.”

“Who would’ve thought our families would ever merge like this, after everything that happened between me and Mugai?” Opener said with a wry smile. “Life has its ways of surprising us.”

Later, Opener and Cannonline asked Ao for a moment alone with Fuji and Pirilika. Cannonline opened a return portal.

Ao stepped through—back to the others, back to the journey. Something in her chest felt lighter.

Not because everything had changed.

But because now—finally—it could. She could see it. In herself. In others. The strength to change—quiet, slow, but real.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

When Ao returned to camp, she was immediately swarmed by Sea Again, Benikage, Tenbuyer, and even Joe Doe—each practically vibrating with curiosity.

Their expressions reminded her of Auntie Higan eyeing dessert before devouring it.

A few steps back, Suisen sat with his hands bandaged, calmly munching rice crackers. Only his eyes betrayed how closely he was listening.

“Promise me what I’m about to say doesn’t leave this camp,” Ao said, arms folded.

Sea Again arched a brow. “You do know you’re asking demons to keep a secret?”

Benikage smacked him lightly on the back of the head. “We promise—only because I’m dying to know.”

Suisen wandered closer, still eating.

Ao drew a steady breath.

“My Dad is going to challenge Auntie Higan for the title of Zesshosai.”

Benikage and Sea Again exchanged a glance.

Then Benikage fired confetti from his sleeve like he’d been waiting all week. Sea Again popped open a sake bottle Tenbuyer had been saving. Within moments, the two of them—together with Joe Doe and Tenbuyer—were drinking like festival season had begun.

Suisen, however, just studied Ao. “That’s not the whole news, is it?”

Ao hesitated. “After the challenge… Dad and Pirilly are getting married.”

Silence fell like a dropped blade.

Benikage set his sake cup down with exaggerated care. “Didn’t think this sake was that strong.”

Sea Again blinked. “The kid is… what?”

Joe Doe tilted his head. “Pirilly?”

Suisen answered calmly, still chewing. “Pirilly is Ao’s way of calling Pirilika.”

Joe Doe blinked again.

“Wait… so the son of Lord Mugai is about to marry the daughter of Opener?” Tenbuyer asked, astonished.

Ao nodded.

“…Imagine their kids,” Joe Doe muttered.

Suisen extended a hand.

Grumbling, the others tossed him a few HLs.

Ao stared. “You seriously bet on my Dad getting married?”

Suisen shrugged innocently, still munching. “Technically, I bet he’d propose before the next Nethermoon eclipse. Close enough.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You don’t have foresight anymore. How did you guess?”

“It was simple,” Suisen said. “If it had been a scandal, a resignation, or a surprise baby, Fuji and Pirilika wouldn’t have sent a priority message.”

He held out a cracker to her.

“Come on. We should celebrate. It’s a terrible day to be sad.”

Later That Evening

By the time Opener and Cannonline (who had just returned) were pulled into the celebrations, laughter filled the camp. Sea Again had passed out on Benikage’s shoulder like a badly folded kimono.

Ao drifted outside the firelight and sat on a moss-worn log. Shadows stretched long, and she stared into them—not thinking, just breathing.

She didn’t notice Suisen until he set a warm cup of tea beside her.

He said nothing. Just sat on a nearby stone, leaving space.

“You didn’t make a joke,” Ao said eventually, eyes still forward.

“About the wedding?”

“You bet on it,” she said. “And you didn’t gloat.”

“It didn’t feel right,” he said. “It’s not a punchline. It’s… important.”

She nodded faintly.

He didn’t press. He simply stayed.

After a while, Ao murmured, “You scared me.”

He looked over. “During the fight?”

She didn’t answer right away.

“I saw your hands,” she said at last. “The way that sword cut you. You didn’t think. You just… burned. And judging by those bandages… you’re still burning.”

Suisen stayed quiet.

“I know what it looks like to survive that way,” she added. “It’s how I used to fight, before Opener trained it out of me.”

Her eyes flicked to him.

“That form of yours… it didn’t look like clarity. It looked like desperation.”

“I know.”

She sipped her tea.

“I haven’t figured out how I feel about what you said… about me and my Dad.” Her voice softened. “But I saw you in that last fight. And… I didn’t hate what I saw.”

He blinked once, slow. “That means more than you think.”

She stood, leaving the cup beside him.

“Don’t make me regret it.”

“I won’t.”

As Ao walked back toward the fire, she didn’t look back. She didn’t need to.

She knew Suisen was still there, sitting in the dark, quietly holding hope between his hands like something newly alive.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

That night, stirred by the news of Fuji and Pirilika’s marriage, Suisen dreamed he was back in his cyborg body.

In the dream, he stood beside Higan and Yeyasu, listening as they scolded Fuji. They accused him of cruelty—of breaking Pirilika’s heart so badly she had abandoned Hinomoto to return to Wahei for good.

They didn’t know the truth, only the story Ao believed: that Pirilika had confessed her feelings, and Fuji had done the worst thing imaginable. He had humiliated her.

Not with indifference. With disdain. Cruelty. As if the Empathy Killer curse inside him had twisted love into disgust before he could even name it.

Suisen wondered if Fuji had lashed out because caring had been unbearable—because the curse had poisoned the very act of wanting a future.

Moved, Suisen reached out to comfort him. Fuji struck his hand away.

Suisen jolted awake. The dream dissolved, but the pain in his hands was real. His wounds weren’t healing. By midday, the bandages were soaked through again.

Each time he tried to lift the Zenchi Kintoki from where it lay, heat rippled up his arms. Like the Demonic Katana remembered how it had once burned through him.

Not as a weapon. Not as a partner. But as survival, made steel.

He sat beneath a rocky outcrop while the others packed camp. Every time his eyes closed, he felt the blade crackling under his skin again.

Then came that quiet prickle of being watched.

From Ao’s Point of View

Across the clearing, Ao was looking at him. His movements were slower. Not broken, but hesitant. Like every breath scraped raw on its way out.

Sea Again joined her silently, following her gaze. He nodded.

“That Zenchi Kintoki form,” he said, “isn’t meant to be wielded lightly.”

“It wasn’t meant to be wielded at all,” Ao replied.

“No,” Sea Again agreed. “But sometimes instinct overrides sense.”

Benikage approached with a canteen, eyes narrowing toward Suisen. “He’s burning out from the inside. He doesn’t even realize it yet.”

“He does,” Ao said. “He’s just pretending it doesn’t matter.”

Sea Again was quiet for a long time. “…That’s the part that worries me.”

From Suisen’s Point of View

Later, Suisen sat by the riverbank, sleeves rolled, hands bleeding again. He plunged them into the current and hissed as the cold hit raw flesh.

The sting shocked him, but the ache lingered.

The water dulled the pain, numbed it—maybe even hid it—but it couldn’t cool the fire beneath.

Ao stepped beside him.

“You need to stop using that form.”

Suisen didn’t look up. “It wasn’t a choice.”

“Then make it one now,” she said, steady but firm. “That blade will eat through you if you let it.”

He finally met her eyes. “I thought if I pushed through, maybe I’d understand it. Maybe I could shape it before it shaped me. But it’s not listening anymore. It doesn’t want to be shaped.”

Ao crouched beside him, voice softer now. “You’re not a weapon. And this isn’t a puzzle to solve.”

He looked at the faint golden sparks flickering across his palms, echoes of the new form of the Demonic Katana.

“I’m not afraid of dying.”

“I know,” Ao said. Her voice faltered. “But I am. So don’t… don’t make me watch it happen.”

Her voice caught. She stood before he could answer.

But her words stayed with him. Not forgiveness. Not yet. But fear for him. And that meant something was still there.

Back at camp, Cannonline rewrapped his hands with a sharp scowl.

“You’re shaking,” she muttered.

“Just fatigue,” Suisen said, too calm, too measured. He couldn’t fall behind—not with Carnage Dimension breaches spreading.

Cannonline’s eyes lingered on his grip. “If you keep shredding your nervous system, don’t expect me to regrow it.”

“Noted,” he winced.

She paused, then softer: “Instinct makes you survive. But you don’t have to survive alone.”

He didn’t reply. But the words burned hotter than the pain, like the Zenchi Kintoki did. That form hadn’t felt like an ending, more like a path taken by instinct.

And maybe not the path the Demonic Katana had hoped for.

Present Day – At the Dojo

Raiji thought he understood strength. He had trained, fought, pushed his limits.

But one dusk he saw his big brother Suisen training in silence, and the way he gripped the Zenchi Kintoki like it whispered only to him.

The golden scars on his hands told the rest. Faint, but different shades. He had used that form more than once.

Raiji realized Suisen could still call on it—but chose not to. Because choosing not to burn just to survive was the hardest strength of all.

Raiji looked down at his own hands. Still unscarred. Still whole. He hoped he could be that strong one day.

But not too soon. And not without understanding the price.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

The air was quiet, but without the usual weight. That alone made it feel strange.

A wide plain of moss-covered stone stretched before them, centered around five living Infernal Treasures resting in half-buried altars. They pulsed faintly, like hearts beating in slow, uncertain rhythm.

The group stood at the edge of the ring, weapons lowered, waiting.

“Is it just me,” Tenbuyer whispered, “or is this place… not hostile?”

“It’s not just you,” Sea Again murmured. “This is the first place since a while that doesn’t feel like it wants to kill us.”

“Before we go deeper, look at this map I drafted with Tenbuyer,” Benikage said, unfolding a sheet over a flat rock.

Four symbols marked the Carnage Dimension breach sites they had found: the cave near the Forgotten Village, (1) the burial field, (2) the collapsed ravine, (3) and the cliffside. (4)

“These four sites,” Tenbuyer explained, tapping each mark with a wing, “form almost a perfect circle.”

Ao leaned in, narrowing her eyes as she traced the pattern with a finger.

“I contained a seal similar to the ones of Granda Mugai at each one,” she said slowly. “If there’s a fifth… it wouldn’t just complete the circle. It would close it. This site is one of the possible centers.”

Benikage folded the map away as Cannonline stepped forward. Her gaze lingered on the runes etched into the stone altars, her expression softening with a faint hum of recognition.

“It’s been a long time since I saw someone sealed like this. And from the arrangement…” She let her hand hover above the stone. “They chose it themselves.”

Ao nodded. “They have been sleeping for a long time.”

Suisen stepped closer. Usually, a place like this would hum with echoes—fragments of grief, rage, or longing clinging to the stones. (5) Here, there was just a hollow pressure, as if hunger itself had been carved into the silence.

He drew a slow breath. “They don’t remember who they are anymore,” he murmured. “It’s like the echoes were stripped away, leaving only the emptiness.”

Cannonline knelt, drawing a release circle with practiced precision, marking the points for the soul-preserving tools.

“Ao, channel with me?”

Ao raised her hand, the Demonic Fist glowing faintly. “Ready.”

Together, they used their ritual on the altars one by one. The altars glowed, softened, and opened, light spilling outward like lanterns. From within stepped five young demons.

A girl with moss-colored hair clutched her head. “Where… am I?”

Another flinched at his own voice. “I… I don’t remember who I…”

Fear rippled through them, brittle and rising.

That’s when Suisen moved. He stepped closer, silent at first, meeting their eyes—steady, patient

“I know it’s hard,” he said gently. “I know you don’t remember your name, or where you’re from. But you’re not alone.”

One demon, short and trembling, whispered, “We were part of something. I think I… had friends.”

“You still can,” Suisen said. “Start with what you remember. A sound. A smell. A dream. It doesn’t need to make sense yet.”

He drew a cloth bundle from his kimono, unfolding it to reveal a narrow spool wound with faint golden threads. They shimmered softly, like breath hanging in winter air.

“This is a soul-thread generated by my Demonic Katana Zenchi Kintoki,” (6) he explained. “It only appears when the blade is wielded with clarity, not conflict. Each one carries memory—not just what I did, but who I was with, and why I couldn’t let them fall.”

Cannonline’s eyes widened. “The soul-thread technique… I thought it was only myth.”

“It’s real,” Suisen said, unwinding a single strand with care.

He let it glimmer between his fingers, glowing faintly before dimming to a softer light.

The moss-haired girl reached out. Her fingers brushed the thread, and then she gasped as something flickered in her eyes.

Suisen smiled. “You don’t need to remember everything today. Just that you’re safe. That you belong somewhere again.”

Another demon’s voice cracked with doubt. “What if I did something terrible? What if that’s why I was sealed in an altar?”

Suisen didn’t look away. “Then you start from here. From now. Not from who you were—but who you choose to become.”

Behind him, Ao stood in silence. She didn’t speak, but her eyes held the weight of someone who understood.

Suisen wondered if she saw that the five demons weren’t so different from his past self. Or what it meant to live so long under a burden that it blurred into identity.

By nightfall, the group confirmed the site held no seals similar to the four that Ao contained. The fifth location would have to be elsewhere.

Around the campfire, the five demons sat cloaked and tentative, sipping soup from Tenbuyer’s pot. Their faces were uncertain—but alive, like the sky after stormbreak.

Suisen sat among them. He didn’t lead. He listened. Letting them speak in fragments, encouraging with quiet nods as they pieced together shards of themselves.

The moss-haired girl lifted her gaze hesitantly. “Can we… choose new names?”

“Of course,” Suisen said. “A name isn’t just what others call you. It’s who you decide to be.”

She smiled shakily. “Then I want mine to mean beginning.”

Cannonline nodded. “We’ll help you find a safe place.”

Ao added, arms folded but calm, “They’ll need guidance.”

“They’ll have it, Ao,” Suisen said, as he tilted his head toward the stars, watching the faint shimmer above.

Ao’s gaze softened, almost grudging. “At least they’re themselves again.”

At those words, Suisen realized that helping them find their way back, he was still walking his own path.

One that didn’t end with the memories of Ikki Edogawa, but began with choosing who to become.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

It took them two full days to guide the five newly freed demons out of the basin. The ground wasn’t what slowed them—healing was.

They moved carefully, together. Pausing when breath faltered. Speaking when words rose. Resting in the silences without forcing them. Some carried scraps of memory, others none at all.

Suisen didn’t press. He simply walked beside them, steady as stone.

On the second afternoon, when they stopped on a hill coated in blackgrass, the boy with stitched sleeves glanced up from a mossy rock.

“Why do you keep looking at the sky when we rest?”

Suisen followed the drifting clouds for a moment before answering. “To remind myself it’s still moving. Even when we feel like we’re not.”

The boy blinked, then tilted his chin upward too. “…Oh.”

That night, with fire crackling low and Cannonline passing out rations, Suisen reached into his pack. He drew five thin strips of ceremonial cloth—soft and white, meant for offerings, for swords, for promises.

He laid them in the center of the circle.

“These are yours,” he said. His voice was quiet, but the flames seemed to lean toward it. “Not because you must take them. But because you deserve something to call your own.”

The moss-haired girl, her eyes molten gold, leaned forward, hesitating.

“But… we don’t have names.”

Suisen nodded. “That means you get to choose one.”

The firelight shivered across their faces—half-hopeful, half-afraid. They sat in the hush of people staring at a road they weren’t sure they were allowed to walk.

The moss-haired girl broke the silence first. “I want to be called Hajime. It means beginning. That’s what today is.”

Suisen smiled as he handed her the first strip. “It’s yours, then.”

The boy with stitched sleeves spoke next, his voice small but steady. “Fuku. I want to bring good luck. Even if I don’t remember how.”

A soft laugh slipped through the stillness.

The round-faced girl with tiny horns covered her mouth, grinning. “Then I’ll be Mikan. Because… I like oranges. Is that dumb?”

“No,” Ao said, surprising even herself. Her tone was softer than usual. “It’s yours. That’s what matters.”

Suisen passed her the cloth. “Then Mikan it is.”

The tall, wiry one looked skyward before murmuring, “Kiri. Because I feel like mist. Still blurry. Still here.”

The last demon spoke almost at once. “Taiyo. For the Dark Sun. It feels far away, but I want to walk toward it.”

One by one, they tied the cloths around their arms—slow, deliberate, like they were wrapping new skin over old wounds.

Suisen leaned back, though his bandaged hands still trembled. “You’re more than what was taken from you,” he said. “And more than what you lost.”

Ao’s voice came low, quieter than usual. “You’re demons again.”

Later, after the others had drifted to sleep, Suisen lingered by the fire. He turned the logs with deliberate, careful motions. Each shift made his wrapped hands shudder, but he didn’t stop.

Soft footsteps brushed the grass behind him.

Hajime stood there, clutching her cloth band tight against her arm. Firelight caught the flicker in her eyes as she stepped closer.

“I thought you were asleep,” Suisen said.

“I was,” she whispered. “But I dreamed I was still inside the Infernal Treasure.”

He didn’t answer.

She lowered herself onto the rock beside him, voice barely above the crackle. “When I woke… it felt like the silence followed me.”

Suisen’s gaze stayed on the fire. “Silence leaves scars too.”

Her fingers dug into the cloth. “How did you stop hearing it?”

“…I didn’t,” he said at last. “Not completely.”

Her breath caught.

He turned his eyes to the faint glow of Zenchi Kintoki. “I filled it with better things. Voices I trusted. Names that felt real. Choices that didn’t come from fear.”

Finally, he met her gaze. “You chose to exist again. That’s everything, Hajime.”

She didn’t reply, but her shoulders eased. She stayed beside him, holding the silence with him—no longer the same silence as before.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

Ao stood among the trees, watching Suisen. She realized she didn’t know how to name what he had done—when he told her she’d been made to love her father. (1)

But in these days, he was bringing a beginning to the five demons, and she wondered if that meant they could begin again too. The thought surprised her.

Far off, soft wings stirred the shadows. A butterfly drifted between the trunks, weightless, as if it belonged to some silence older than theirs. Ao watched it vanish, then let her gaze fall back to Suisen, now speaking with Hajime.

Ao saw the way he listened—not trying to fix her, just leaving space for her to breathe. She folded her arms across her chest. Suisen was simply staying. Even with scars on his hands. Even after everything. And that, gently, struck her.

Maybe he was becoming what she had once told Pirilly strength should be. (2) The kind that held steady even when it hurt. That didn’t flinch when someone else stumbled. The kind that waited.

But she wasn’t ready to forgive him. Though, for the first time, the wall between them didn’t feel so tall—more like a path lit faintly by fireflies.

The stars had shifted when she heard footsteps approach. Opener came to stand beside her, hands tucked behind his back in the familiar way he always carried since her training began.

“You’ve been quiet a long while, Ao,” he said, voice low.

“I didn’t realize it was timed,” she muttered.

Opener’s shoulders lifted slightly. “Time doesn’t measure thinking. It just means I knew where to find you.”

She huffed, half amused, half reluctant.

They stood side by side, watching the glow of the camp.

Fuku laughed at something Benikage said. Taiyo beamed, proud of having tied his bandage one-handed. Mikan, excited enough for all five, chased Joe Doe in clumsy circles with half a fruit still clutched in her hand. Kiri sat apart, humming softly under her breath.

Hajime lingered near the fire, glancing toward Suisen now and again, as if checking that the silence hadn’t returned to claim her.

“They’re starting to be real,” Ao said softly.

“They are real,” Opener replied. “They just forgot for a while.”

Ao hesitated. “Is that… how it works for all of us?”

Opener didn’t answer immediately. “You think being strong means never forgetting who you are.”

She looked at him.

“But sometimes,” he continued, “being strong means remembering who you want to be—even after someone told you that you can’t.”

Ao’s gaze dropped to her feet. Her voice caught. “I haven’t forgiven Suisen.”

“I know,” he said quietly.

“I don’t know if I will, Opener.”

“You don’t have to.” His voice was gentle. “Forgiveness isn’t owed. It’s chosen.”

She drew in the night air. It brushed cool against her skin, carrying the smell of Tenbuyer’s scorched herbs and the faint damp of river moss.

“He’s different now,” she said at last. “Not just stronger. Just… more real.”

“Then let that be enough,” Opener told her. “For now.”

Ao crossed her arms tighter. And for the first time in a long while, the weight on her chest didn’t feel like it was hers alone.

After Opener returned to the fire, she stayed beneath the trees. The stillness held small sounds: Mikan’s laughter echoing against stone, the wind through the grass, the crack of embers as someone fed the flames.

She toyed with a strand of hair, braiding and unbraiding it absently. Her thoughts strayed, uninvited, to Suisen—the way he looked at the five demons, as if expecting them to live.

It struck her that he wasn’t shaping himself out of duty anymore. He was listening. Letting things hurt. And—more than that—letting things heal.

She pressed her back to the tree trunk.

It still made her angry, what he had done. What he hadn’t. That he carried so much alone. But in her chest was something fragile, something that didn’t belong to her past. She didn’t want to name it yet. And she didn’t want to throw it away either.

By the time she returned, most of the camp had quieted. Kiri’s humming faded. Taiyo curled near the embers, cloth band snug around his arm. Hajime, Fuku, and Mikan had fallen asleep back to back.

Suisen sat on watch, eyes half-lidded, a steaming cup of broth in his hands. He didn’t look up when she approached. She lowered herself beside him—not close, not far.

For a moment, nothing changed. Then, as if to steady the weight of the silence, Suisen shifted his grip on the cup, cradling it with both hands. The faint curl of steam drifted between them, carried by the night breeze.

A lone butterfly drifted past, wings catching the faint firelight before disappearing into the dark. For a moment, it felt like even the silence had chosen to move, as they stayed like that, side by side, sharing the quiet.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View 

Thanks to Cannonline’s care, Suisen’s hands had healed enough for use, though faint golden scars still marked the skin.

Once he was sure Hajime, Fuku, Mikan, Kiri, and Taiyo could begin their own paths—and that Hajime could reach him if she needed—he and the others set out again on the Grand Journey.

It was early morning when Ao’s scream split the quiet.

Suisen, Sea Again, Benikage, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer sprinted toward her, weapons half-raised—only to find Opener and Cannonline embracing happily, and Ao standing with a letter clutched in both hands, her eyes bright.

“We have a new Zesshosai!” she cried, holding the letter high.

Sea Again and Benikage slapped palms, while Joe Doe and Tenbuyer offered quick congratulations.

For the first time in days, Suisen’s smile came without effort. Fuji becoming Zesshosai felt… right. A sign that not everything in the Netherworld was broken.

“What name did Fuji choose?” Suisen asked.

Ao’s grin widened. “My Dad chose the one I gave him. I never doubted it.”

“Ah…” Suisen tilted his head. “But mine was way cooler.”

Sea Again blinked. “Wait... You had names prepared?”

“It’s a long story,” Suisen said, raising a hand. “Back when Fuji, Pirilika, Ceefore, Yeyasu, Higan, Ao, and I defeated the first Zesshosai in the Carnage Energy, Fuji started talking about succeeding Higan. We got carried away and each picked a name for him.” (1)

He ticked them off:

“Pirilika picked So-and-so Zesshosai.

Yeyasu picked Lord Yeyasu’s Minion Zesshosai.

Ceefore suggested Kaboom Zesshosai.

I went with Invincible Mecha Dragon Zesshosai.”

“And I chose I-Love-Ao Zesshosai,” Ao cut in smugly.

The group fell into silence.

Opener frowned. “But the letter says Fuji Zesshosai.”

“Exactly!” Ao said, triumphant. “The very name I shouted before he even thought of it. So technically, I win.”

“That’s the first time I’ve ever heard you lie,” Suisen said, unconvinced.

“It’s true,” Benikage interjected. “During the Ultimate Martial Arts Tournament—before Fuji’s team faced Yabanyanko—Ao, who was commentating, yelled to the crowd…” (2)

He straightened, mimicking a younger Ao with uncanny accuracy:

‘My dad! He’s the bestest around! It’s Fuji Zesshosai!’

“…I see,” Suisen murmured, then gave a short nod. “Sorry, Ao.”

He turned to Benikage. “Given your strength, I assume you and Fuji clashed in the finals. Let me guess—he won?”

Benikage froze. His face drained of color. Slowly, he crouched down as if the memory itself had weight.

Ao broke into laughter. “He never made it to the finals! Auntie Higan stole his Demonic Spear behind the scenes and turned him from Total Victory Magistrate to Total Colonoscopy Magistrate!” (2)

The group groaned.

Sea Again gave a long whistle. “So not only did you survive being Ao’s crash-landing pad—twice (3)—but also Higan Zesshosai’s legendary move on the rear?”

Benikage only nodded, eyes haunted.

“If you die before me,” Sea Again went on, “I’m selling your body to science. No way they won’t pay for the secret of how you’re still alive.”

While the others teased Benikage back to life, Suisen’s thoughts wandered. Fuji came from a line marked by power: his great-grandmother Kanzan, his grandmother Rekka, his father Mugai, and Rekka’s own student—Higan, Fuji’s mentor. All of them had once held the title of Zesshosai.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if you became the next one,” Suisen said to Ao, the thought slipping out as he thought about her power.

Ao shook her head. After a pause, she said, “That’s not my path.”

Her gaze lowered to her hands. “Cannonline and Opener want me to ask Dad and Pirilly when the time’s right. Dad’s free from her contract now—until the wedding and the marriage contract—but… I don’t feel like I want to keep doing missions for the Nethertime Support Force.”

Her voice softened. “I want to choose something for myself. Even if I don’t know what it is yet.”

The words settled deep in Suisen.

“I haven’t told anyone—not even Yeyasu or Higan—that I’ve gone back to being a demon,” he admitted. “And I don’t think I want to return as Foreseen Magistrate, either. Maybe I’ll ask Yeyasu and Higan what else I can do, when we’re back for Fuji and Pirilika’s wedding.”

He hesitated. “When is the wedding?”

“In two months,” Ao said. “And we’re all invited—even if Dad and Pirilly don’t know about Joe Doe and Tenbuyer. We’ll let them choose.”

Silence lingered, the air edged with something unspoken.

“I’m still angry,” Ao said at last. “I’m not ready to forget what you said.”

“I wouldn’t ask you to,” Suisen replied. “Only to let me try to be someone worth walking beside again.”

Ao’s gaze lifted to the pale morning sky. Her voice came quiet, steady.

“I think I want that.”

Suisen didn’t move. The space between them shifted anyway.

“If I go,” Ao said, “I walk.”

“I’ll walk too,” he answered.

She didn’t stop him from following, and he didn’t try to lead. When she glanced back once, he was already keeping her pace.

Overhead, a single butterfly drifted through the morning air. Its wings caught the light and carried it upward, rising between them and the sky.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

Two months slipped by in a blur. The day before Fuji and Pirilika’s wedding had come.

Later, Suisen would think of those weeks—quiet, almost weightless—as nothing more than the calm before the storm.

Joe Doe and Tenbuyer, tied too deeply to Fuji and the other Infernal Treasure Wielders, chose not to attend. Instead, they made their way to Lord Mugai’s grave, intent on sharing the milestones his son had reached—and the joy of his marriage.

So the Grand Journey paused, its travelers briefly scattering.

Suisen hadn’t expected to be this nervous.

His fingers shook faintly as he walked a seldom-used corridor of Ewwdo Castle. The passage opened onto a hidden garden, a retreat only the Edogawa family knew—a place meant for stillness.

Sunlight filtered through as he stepped out into the clearing, words tumbling in his head, none of them right. How was he supposed to explain what he had returned as?

Fate had already moved first.

Yeyasu sat under a tree, eyes closed, shoulders slack with fatigue. He hadn’t noticed Suisen yet.

Suisen froze, caught in that fragile space between choice and accident.

When Yeyasu’s eyes finally opened, his expression was blank—just for a breath. Then recognition struck, sharp as lightning. His eyes widened, tears rising in an instant, spilling before he could stop them.

Suisen’s own vision blurred to match.

Neither spoke. They didn’t need to.

They crossed the distance and clung to each other, shaking, wordless, everything said in silence.

Suisen had come back. Not as a Foreseen Magistrate, not as a living Infernal Treasure, not as anyone’s experiment—just himself. A demon. Yeyasu’s brother.

When Yeyasu finally pulled back, he gave a wet laugh and swiped his face faster than Suisen could.

“You dramatic bastard,” he rasped. “You couldn’t have just sent a letter?”

Suisen grinned faintly. “Wouldn’t have been nearly as fun.”

Yeyasu shook his head, though his hand stayed firm on Suisen’s shoulder, unwilling to let go.

“I’m telling Rekka you cried,” Suisen said.

Yeyasu smirked. “You’re assuming I’ll deny it.”

“I don’t think there’s any need,” said a quiet voice from the path.

They turned.

Higan stood there with little Rekka in tow.

“Why’s Daddy crying?” Rekka asked, gripping her training staff tight, her brow furrowed in fierce concern. “Did someone make you sad? I can bonk them.”

Suisen nearly laughed. Yeyasu choked trying not to.

“No bonking today, Rekka,” Yeyasu said, crouching to ruffle her hair.

Up close, Suisen could see her parents in her: her mother’s crimson hair, horns, appetite, and sneak attacks; her father’s sharp eyes, sharp teeth, relentless cheer. He remembered the photo Yeyasu had sent of her defeating a Moboo (1) v2.0 (2)—rear-first. The memory still made him suspect she’d become the first spellcaster in history to end fights with a sneak strike to the backside.

“These are happy tears,” Yeyasu explained. “Because your uncle Suisen came home.”

“Oh…” Rekka blinked, then looked at Suisen. “So he’s family too?”

“The best kind,” Yeyasu said.

Rekka studied Suisen gravely, then stuck out her hand.

“I’m Rekka. I like ohagi riceballs, spells, and my mom and dad. Are you staying?”

Suisen knelt and shook her hand gently.

“For a while,” he said softly. “I came back for something important.”

“Good,” she said, satisfied. “We have cake later.”

And off she went, toddling toward her mother, probably already plotting more impossible questions.

Yeyasu’s eyes followed her until she disappeared, then turned back to Suisen.

“Alright. You didn’t come all this way just for a hug. I know that face—tight mouth, eyes already searching for words.”

Suisen’s smile faded.

“You’re right. After the wedding, we’ll resume the Grand Journey. But before that… there’s something I want to discuss. With both you and Higan.”

Yeyasu clapped his back. “We’ll talk soon.”

As Suisen left the garden, the breeze brushed past him. For once, it didn’t push him forward.

It felt like home.

Later

That afternoon, Suisen sat with Yeyasu and Higan.

“I understand,” Yeyasu said after Suisen finished. “But I’m not the one who should tell you how to start over. If you mean it, you have to decide what that looks like. I’ll support you—but only if it’s yours.”

“He’s right,” Higan added. “When my master Rekka was killed, no one told me to become the next Zesshosai. That choice was mine. Everything since then has been the result of that choice.”

Suisen listened quietly. Their words sank deep.

When Yeyasu asked about the Grand Journey, Suisen gave the practiced story, skipping the truth about the Carnage Dimension. The last thing they wanted was to disturb the peace of those they loved.

By evening, it was time to meet the others at Yubana’s Inn in Gero Haunt Springs.

Yeyasu and Higan couldn’t join—they had duties as Shogun and Empress—but Suisen knew they’d meet again the next day, when the Netherworld itself would shift.

When Fuji and Pirilika would marry.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

While Suisen returned to Ewwdo Castle, Ao, Sea Again, and Benikage made their way to Gero Haunt Springs.

Cannonline and Opener had briefly returned to Celestia, planning to arrive later that evening with Ceefore and Nitra.

Before parting, Sea Again and Suisen had made everyone promise to keep secret the truth of their demon bodies.

Sea Again also instructed Ao to craft an invitation for Fuji and Pirilika—to meet in a secluded clearing where Fuji had once trained alone under Sea Again and Benikage’s watchful eyes.

Hidden just beyond sight, the three of them watched as Fuji stepped into the clearing, his hakama worn properly.

Ao blinked. “It’s the first time I’ve seen him wear it like that…”

Sea Again chuckled. “Looks like becoming Zesshosai finally broke his brain.”

Benikage let out a low whistle. “Not bad.”

Then Sea Again called out.

“Hey, kid! You still got my sheath with you?” (1)

Fuji didn’t miss a beat, turning to them with a wry smile.

“Only if you’ve got enough money to pay for all the time I stored it.”

Pirilika giggled beside him. “Oh, Fuji, you’re always so dishonest. But I know you’re happy Sea Again is back in his demon body.”

As they approached, Sea Again and Benikage exchanged a look, then turned to Ao and Pirilika.

“Let us speak to him alone for a moment,” Benikage said softly.

Ao nodded, and she and Pirilika stepped back, giving the three former students of Mugai’s Dojo their space.

Later, Ao would learn that Sea Again and Benikage had asked her dad Fuji a single, quiet, heavy question:

If Pirilika were to die someday in a tragic accident… what would you do?

They had seen what happened to their master, Mugai, when his wife Fuyo had died defending a young Fuji. Her death hollowed him, reshaped him, left him cruel in ways he never noticed.

They needed to know Fuji wouldn’t walk the same path.

The answer remained their secret even in their last days. But Ao understood that if her Dad hadn’t given a right one, the Grand Journey might have ended there for Sea Again and Benikage.

Much later, Sea Again and Benikage would join the newly founded dojo—not to rest, but to guide the next generations, ensuring grief would never be mistaken for destiny.

In that moment, however, Benikage simply nodded, and Sea Again crossed his arms, giving Fuji a look Ao had never seen before.

“You passed, kid,” Sea Again said, voice low and serious. “Now show us if your blade still speaks for more than pain.”

Fuji blinked. “You want to spar?”

“Not with me or Benikage,” Sea Again said, nodding toward the trail. “Suisen’s arriving tonight. Let’s see how much you’ve both grown.”

Benikage smirked. “Zesshosai or not, your title should still bleed for it.”

Fuji closed his eyes for a breath. When he opened them, calm had settled—but eagerness bared its teeth beneath.

“Fine. Let’s see if Mister Wires-and-Metal survives the evening.”

“Don’t underestimate him,” Sea Again warned. “We trained with him long before the Grand Journey started. He’s picked up tricks even you might find… interesting.”

Pirilika rejoined in time to hear Suisen’s mention.

“Wait—Suisen? But he doesn’t fight with a sword. Wouldn’t that be unfair?”

“Not with the parry and disarm techniques we taught him,” Benikage said smoothly. Neither Fuji nor Pirilika knew that Suisen was now a full demon, wielding a sword style all his own.

“Wow! I have to see this!” Pirilika clapped, eyes sparkling. “Maybe it’ll inspire the next Tempoora collection!”

Then, almost immediately, her expression softened.

“Still… it’s strange, isn’t it?” she murmured. “How far we’ve all come…”

She launched into excited chatter, discussing potential releases and seasonal ideas.

“Maybe something called Haunt Heatwave! Or—wait! Duel at Duskwear!”

Fuji said little, listening, his smile soft and steady.

From her spot nearby, Ao felt something stir within her.

Seeing her father and Pirilika—side by side, calm and certain—made her wonder what kind of spar Suisen would bring… and what it might reveal about him.

Evening settled over the Haunt Springs.

The air hummed quietly.

The spar between Fuji and Suisen was about to begin.

Chapter Text

From Ao and Suisen's Point of View

That evening, the group from Celestia arrived first. When Ceefore saw Sea Again restored to his true demonic form, her eyes lit up. Even Nitra offered a rare, approving smile.

But the real surprise came soon after, when Suisen walked through the entrance quietly.

Fuji, Pirilika, Pii-Chan, Ceefore, and Nitra all turned, staring in silence at the unfamiliar figure—until Fuji finally broke it with a dry remark:

“Hmph. That voice… Looks like Suisen turned into a tall bastard overnight. Though not taller than me.”

“For just a centimeter,” Pirilika said lightly, teasing, her gaze flicking between Fuji and Suisen with the same practiced precision that had built the Tempoora empire.

Fuji clicked his tongue and flicked her lightly on the forehead. “Don’t start measuring demons with your eyes again, Piriko,” he muttered.

“Interesting heterochromia,” Pii-Chan noted, eyes lingering on Suisen’s hair and eyes.

Ceefore circled Suisen, mischievous glint in her gaze.

“So… now that you’re a real demon,” she said, squinting, “I guess I can’t dismantle you for experiments anymore. What a pity.”

A flicker of restraint crossed Suisen’s face, but he replied smoothly, “You know what’s nice about all this, Ceefore?”

She blinked. “No. What?”

In a blur, Suisen slipped behind her and locked her in a firm—but not painful—headlock, mimicking the exact move Fuji had once used on her. (1)

“Aaaagh! Help! Nitra, save me!” Ceefore howled, flailing her arms.

“Sorry, Cee… but I value my life,” Nitra said, not looking up.

“Traitor!” Ceefore cried.

Laughter echoed warmly through the inn.

As Suisen finally released her, Nitra’s eyes gleamed.

“Wait… that sword!” she exclaimed. “That’s not just decorative. That’s an Infernal Treasure.”

“The Zenchi Kintoki,” Suisen confirmed, quiet but proud. “Now in the form of a Demonic Katana.”

“Oooh,” Ceefore cooed from her recovering spot. “You’re full of surprises, Suisen. I might be interested in you again after all.”

The headlock returned—tighter this time.

“Okay, okay, I take it back!” she wheezed.

Pirilika stepped forward, giggling. “Suisen, let Ceefore go. Otherwise, the spar with Fuji can’t start.”

Suisen blinked. “What spar?”

“One we set up earlier,” Sea Again said, rolling his shoulders.

“Don’t tell me you’re scared,” Benikage teased.

“No,” Suisen replied calmly, releasing Ceefore. “But next time, I’d appreciate being informed about decisions that involve me.”

“Deal,” Sea Again said. “Consider it a late engagement gift for the groom—and a test for you.”

Fuji stretched his arms with casual precision, grinning at Suisen.

“Come on. Let’s see if you’re more than just one centimeter shorter than me.”

“Only one way to find out,” Suisen said faintly smiling.

Pirilika and Ao lingered, watching Suisen stride toward the field. Pirilika nudged Fuji lightly. “You’ll go easy on him, right?”

Fuji didn’t respond, though a twitch at the corner of his mouth betrayed him.

The outside training field was quiet except for insects and distant chatter from the veranda. Lanterns cast long shadows across the grass, swaying like ghosts beneath the night sky.

Suisen faced Fuji, one hand resting on the hilt of the Zenchi Kintoki.

Fuji hadn’t drawn yet. He stood relaxed, grounded—like a mountain awaiting a storm.

“You sure about this?” Fuji asked. “Not too late to back out.”

“No backing out,” Suisen said, exhaling slowly. “I want to see who I am now.”

Fuji nodded and drew the Kanzan Musashi, its edge slicing the air like thunder wrapped in silk.

Suisen’s heart didn’t pound with fear, but with a focused calm that surprised him more than the challenge itself.

He stepped forward, unsheathing the Zenchi Kintoki in one clean motion, falling into stance.

Fuji made no preamble. He simply moved—fast.

Suisen barely raised his blade in time to parry; the force rattled through his arms. He pivoted, redirecting.

He swept low. Fuji blocked.

He stepped inside. Fuji shifted weight like a dancer, elbow catching Suisen off-balance.

Suisen spun, ducked, lunged with a rising arc—Zenchi Kintoki blazing gold.

The clash lit the field briefly, but Fuji didn’t flinch.

He dipped low, reversed his grip, and disarmed Suisen cleanly.

The Zenchi Kintoki flew across the grass, humming faintly, mourning the loss.

Fuji’s blade stopped just shy of Suisen’s throat.

Suisen breathed hard, but didn’t step back.

Fuji held the pose a second, then sheathed his Kanzan Musashi.

“Well,” he said. “Not bad for a beginner.”

Suisen retrieved his sword, nodding. “I lost.”

“But you didn’t run,” Fuji replied. “Your spirit didn’t break.”

He turned to the others. “That counts for something.”

Ceefore clapped. “That was HOT.”

“Agreed,” Nitra added, arms folded.

“Just too fast,” Pii-Chan said.

Cannonline adjusted her glasses. “The Zenchi Kintoki’s feedback loop stabilized under pressure. Still suboptimal against Fuji’s tempo-shifting style… but clearly improving.”

Opener nodded. “And not just the blade. He’s moving like someone who knows what he’s protecting.”

Benikage leaned toward Sea Again. “He still lost, though.”

Sea Again smirked. “Yeah. But it’s the first time he looked like he meant it.”

Ao realized that if she ever fought side by side with Suisen again… she wouldn’t need to check behind her to make sure he was still there.

Later, as the others drifted back toward the inn, Fuji placed a hand on Suisen’s shoulder.

“You’ve got something worth forging,” he said.

“I’m not done shaping it yet,” Suisen replied.

Fuji grinned. “Good. Neither am I.”

Above them, the stars blinked—soft, distant, indifferent.

But in Suisen’s chest, clarity clicked into place. Not a vow to win—just the quiet promise that next time, he wouldn’t fall so easily.

Not to prove anything. But to protect what mattered.

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View

The ceremony unfolded beneath a canopy of ancient lantern trees, their glowing branches swaying gently in the evening breeze.

Gero Haunt Springs shimmered behind them, mist curling faintly over the courtyard as dusk fell. Floating lights illuminated the open-air shrine in warm, dreamlike hues.

Fuji stood at the center, clad in formal Hinomoto attire—though he had refused the full ceremonial hat, claiming it made him look like a noodle vendor. His posture was stiff, hands at his sides, visibly itching to fight something… or at least to be done with all the staring.

But the moment Pirilika stepped into view, all that tension melted.

She wore a kimono edged in golden thread. The intricate design braided together her Wahei heritage, her Hinomoto future, and her unmistakable nekomata spirit.

Her tail swayed with restless energy, betraying nerves she didn’t voice. Her hands trembled faintly as she reached for his.

Fuji met her halfway, taking her hands in both of his. His guarded expression softened into something peaceful.

Her gaze steadied—not because the nerves vanished, but because he was there.

Yeyasu stepped forward in full Shogun regalia, with Higan and Rekka at his side.

“As the grandest, wisest, and most devastatingly handsome officiant in the Netherworld, I now pronounce you—”

“Get on with it,” Higan murmured.

“—ugh, fine. Partners in life, in battle, in taxes, and probably in sleep deprivation soon enough. You may now kiss the bride.”

Pirilika giggled, a sound that rippled like wind through hanging bells.

Fuji leaned in and kissed her gently.

The guests—demons, angels, and a few curious spring spirits—cheered.

Even the lanterns above seemed to weep glowing motes into the dusk, like stars falling into mist.

From Ao’s Point of View

The celebration stretched long into the night.

From a distance, Ao watched Fuji and Pirilika dance, a warm smile tugging at her lips.

Yeyasu approached, Rekka slumped against his chest, her head heavy to one side. Her small hands still clutched a half-eaten rice cracker.

“So… how are you feeling, Ao?”

“I feel great, Uncle Yey-yey,” she replied.

He smiled.

Ao leaned closer, lowering her voice. “Can you keep a secret?”

“Always,” he said, nodding.

She glanced back at the newlyweds, their figures glowing beneath drifting lanterns, and whispered:

“Many turns of the Dark Sun ago, when Dad was still cursed, I told him I’d never accept a mother weaker than me.” (1)

Yeyasu raised an eyebrow.

“And the truth?” Ao added, sheepishly shrugging. “Back then, I just didn’t want anyone near Dad who might hurt him. But even then… I think I knew if he stayed cursed, he’d never be this happy.”

Together, they looked back at Fuji and Pirilika—Fuji now letting her lead, Pirilika glowing as always… only now with someone finally mirroring that light back.

Ao’s smile returned, a mischievous spark in her gaze.

“…And who knows? Maybe someday I’ll have a little brother. Or sister. Or two.”

Yeyasu chuckled. “Twins? Bold call.”

“I just want naming rights,” Ao grinned, folding her arms behind her head.

Above them, one final lantern floated higher than the rest—burning gold, then vanishing like a star.

From Suisen’s Point of View

Suisen stood at the edge of the spring garden, a little apart from the celebration.

The music had softened into something slow and warm. Lanterns drifted across the water, laughter echoing gently in the background.

“I’ve seen warriors win whole wars with less certainty than those two had walking down the aisle,” Opener murmured to Cannonline.

Cannonline folded her arms, studying the dance. “Their coordination’s slightly awkward… but the emotional sync is near-perfect. It suits them.”

Suisen tilted his head, catching the exchange. He glimpsed Ceefore trading quiet smiles with Nitra, while Sea Again and Benikage were already halfway through a sake bottle, cheering as if it were a championship fight. Higan was telling something to Pii-Chan.

His gaze returned to Fuji and Pirilika.

He hadn’t known what it would feel like—to see Fuji dancing awkwardly, smiling easily, choosing joy.

Beside him, someone who didn’t just support him, but walked beside him. Fought beside him. Called him out. Chose him anyway.

“Pretty good view,” Sea Again said, stepping up beside him. Benikage followed, while Sea Again offered Suisen a cup.

Suisen accepted. “It is.”

Sea Again sipped. “Thinking of crashing the dance floor?”

“Not my thing.”

Benikage tilted his head. “I think you’d be good at keeping up.”

Suisen didn’t answer. His eyes drifted toward Ao—still chatting with Yeyasu, laughing softly.

He didn’t smile. Not yet. But something in his chest eased.

“Maybe,” he said, “when I’ve figured out the next step.”

Sea Again hummed low. “You’ve come a long way from the Foreseen Magistrate you once were.”

“I’m not sure I ever really knew who that was,” Suisen admitted.

“You don’t have to,” Benikage said. “Not when you’re writing something new.”

They clinked cups.

The wind passed over the garden, stirring the lanterns and catching the edge of Suisen’s kimono sleeve.

It carried warmth, and a fragile, unspoken promise: what lay ahead might not be easy—but this time, it would be his.

Arc Two — Memory, Meaning & Bonds — End

Chapter Text

Present Day – At the Dojo

“Before we continue the story,” Suisen said quietly, “have you ever done something you knew you weren’t supposed to, Raiji?”

Raiji blinked. “You mean… like, specific, or in general, big brother?”

Suisen gave a soft huff of amusement. “General.”

Raiji scratched the back of his neck. “Well… yeah. One time stands out.”

He leaned forward slightly, eyes narrowing as memory surfaced.

“You remember that day I told you, ‘Again with the ‘when you’re older’?’ (1) That wasn’t random. A few days earlier, it was a rest day at the dojo. Mom was in her study working on her next Tempoora line, and Dad had just brought her food…”

His voice dipped into something sheepish.

“…So I slipped into their room.”

Suisen raised an eyebrow but didn’t interrupt.

“I’d been told I was too young to handle a real weapon. But Kanzan Musashi always… pulled at me, but not in a scary way. More like it remembered something I hadn’t lived yet.”

His fingers curled loosely in his lap. “I reached for the hilt. A faint light pulsed along the edge. Gentle. Almost welcoming.”

He paused, a rueful grin flickering. “Then Dad’s voice came from behind. ‘Looks like your paternal grandmother’s saying hello.’”

Raiji froze in the retelling, mimicking the way he’d stiffened back then. “He was just standing there in the doorway—arms crossed, face unreadable.”

He chuckled, almost fondly. “Then he goes, ‘Funny how life works sometimes.’ Said my sister awakened a Demonic Weapon tied to his father’s soul. But me? I resonated with his mother’s.”

Raiji looked skyward, thoughtful. “Didn’t get it then. Barely get it now.”

“Then he saw my face. He sighed and said, ‘We’ll explain it when you’re older.’ And then, ‘Speaking of age… what did your mother and I say about grabbing weapons without permission, Raiji?’”

Raiji laughed. “I tried to run, but I didn’t make it. Dad hoisted me over his shoulder like a sack of turnips and hauled me straight to Mom—for a proper scolding, together.”

Suisen shook his head slowly, a trace of a smile tugging at his mouth. “Of all things you could’ve brought up…”

He leaned forward. His smile vanished.

“…Kanzan Musashi wasn’t just a sword you touched, Raiji.”

Raiji blinked. “What do you mean?”

Suisen turned toward the pale light rising over the hills.

“Before I tell you, you need to know—even your parents, Fuji and Pirilika, don’t know this. And I trust you’ll keep it that way.”

Raiji stiffened. “Seriously?”

Suisen nodded. “I’m not asking you to agree with the decision. Just to understand why it stayed hidden.”

He locked eyes with Raiji.

“And when the time comes… don’t judge what your masters, Sea Again and Benikage, did by what you would’ve done. You weren’t there. Neither was I. But I’ve pieced together enough.”

Raiji’s grin had faded. His posture straightened, alert now.

“I’m listening.”

From Ao’s Point of View

Two months after the Grand Journey resumed, a letter from Hajime arrived unexpectedly.

In it, she wrote of strange nights in her village where a sound like bones being chewed echoed through the dark.

Each morning left only the torn remains of whatever unlucky creature had been chosen.

They had tried to handle it themselves, but the attacker was always too fast, too clever.

So the group went to Tensei Village (2)—as the five demons called their new home—to help.

That night, Tenbuyer volunteered—boldly, maybe foolishly—to act as bait. His flight and luminous powder made him the best chance at escaping and signaling.

He fluttered at the edge of the village, loud and careless, a tempting silhouette against the faint glow of the Nethermoon.

The plan worked.

From the darkness, a shape flowed across the ground, shadow becoming substance. It surged upward beneath Tenbuyer, a formless wave that hardened into a clawed hand. It snatched him midair.

Ao and Suisen—positioned closest—moved instantly.

Tenbuyer flailed, wings flaring. With a sharp cry, he burst into paralytic powder. The shadow recoiled, just long enough for Ao to strike with the Demonic Fist—clean, fast, aimed for center mass.

But the figure twisted, impossibly quick, slipping past. It landed in silence and fixed its gaze on her.

Its eyes lingered on the Zessho Mugai. Then shifted to the Zenchi Kintoki, already drawn in Suisen’s hands, and it screamed in pure seething rage.

Then it attacked.

Ao met it first, her strikes sharp and unrelenting. She managed a grazing blow along its shoulder.

Suisen joined her, golden blade cutting through the night. This wasn’t defense anymore—it was brutal and precise war.

The figure fought with hatred. Not general. Personal. And it knew how to fight them.

One detail gnawed at Ao even as she struck: the way it looked at her Demonic Fist—and at Suisen's Zenchi Kintoki—with equal loathing.

Then, in a blur, it feinted high toward Ao’s throat. Suisen lunged, parrying to shield her.

But the enemy flowed with the feint, pivoting down. A devastating palm thrust smashed under Suisen’s guard, catching him square in the head. His body folded and hit the dirt hard.

“Suisen—!” Ao broke formation, reaching for him.

But it was too late. The figure moved like lightning, seizing Suisen’s unconscious body, and it turned to flee.

Ao lunged, snatching up the Zenchi Kintoki, and bolted after.

Tenbuyer—shaken but airborne—shot high, wings scattering bright spores in a flare-signal pattern to summon help.

Meanwhile, Ao ran, Demonic Katana gripped tight, fury blazing in her chest, her thoughts reduced to one burning vow:

She was not going to lose him.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The forest blurred into shadow. Ao ran, breath sharp in her chest, the world narrowed to the trail of blood ahead. She let a thin line of frost scatter behind her—a brittle breadcrumb trail for the others.

But forward, there was only the scent of blood, and the frantic hammer of her heart.

A sound of uneven steps came first. Then the smear on the cavern floor, glistening in the dim light. Her strike had landed deep in the shoulder, and now it bled—not only red.

The blood pulsed with threads of venomous black, like ink spreading through water. The same red and black pattern etched into her father Fuji’s Demonic Sword, Kanzan Musashi.

Her stomach tightened. She clenched the Zenchi Kintoki, its blade thrumming low and uneasy in her hands. The Demonic Fist sparked faintly on her other arm, its glow fragile against the cave’s pressing dark. The air itself felt alive, as if she’d stepped into the throat of something vast and waiting.

A sound broke the silence. A wet inhale, close.

Ao spun. The figure lunged from the shadows, not to warn, but to kill her.

Impact crushed her into stone, the wall splitting with a violent crack. She grit her teeth, bracing, her feet sliding as the weight drove into her. With a twist of her stance she dropped low, spun, and hammered her elbow into the figure’s ribs.

It staggered, gasping. From the wound spilled that vile blood, hissing where it struck rock.

It didn’t cry out. It only clutched its side, trembling, as its form began to flicker.

For one harrowing instant, Ao saw it bare. A gaunt silhouette, with Kurofune's pieces as half-armor. Long, tangled black hair. A single dragon demon horn jutting cracked from its skull, burning faintly at the root. Its face was marred by jagged red and black markings of Carnage Energy.

The vision burned itself into her sight. Then it hissed—pure agony bound in hatred—and fled deeper.

Her pulse roared in her ears. She wanted to chase it, but first she ran to where the figure had dropped its prize.

Suisen lay slumped against stone, unconscious, but breathing. She pressed two fingers to his throat, and she felt a weak and steady pulse. Relief struck her like a blade pulled from her chest.

The instinct to guard him pulled hard. But instinct alone wouldn’t keep them alive. She set the Zenchi Kintoki carefully at his side, her hand flexing as the Demonic Axe surged into being.

The hunter in her woke.

She followed the trail, deeper, the cave walls tightening around her like ribs closing in. Each step found another smear of that cursed blood.

A thought turned cold in her gut. The creature wasn’t retreating. It was leading her to it.

A blur moved between stone pillars. Pressure whispered at her skin.

“Come on…” she murmured, lifting her weapon, voice sharp with challenge.

She pivoted—the Demonic Axe arcing—only to find herself striking a feint. The real attack lashed from her exposed flank. Not a strike, but a thrown arc of its own blood that splattered across her arm.

Her strength shattered. The power in her veins froze, then cracked apart. The Demonic Axe flickered and dissolved.

She dropped to one knee, body locking under the seal’s grip. Red and black threads coiled through her limbs, smothering her from within. Only the inert shell of the Demonic Fist remained, dead weight on her hand.

Ao sucked in a breath through her teeth, forcing her stance steady.

“All right,” she muttered, fists rising, gaze locked on the dark ahead. “If you wanted a fair fight, you picked the wrong girl.”

The darkness lunged.

Ao lunged back.

From Suisen’s Point of View

His body was a map of pain. His head—its epicenter. But worse than the pain was the void.

Suisen opened his eyes. Nothing came into view.

Cold panic knifed through him. He was blind.

He tried to sit, his limbs screaming protest. His pulse throbbed like hammers against his skull.

Hands scraped rough stone—then touched the familiar steel of the Zenchi Kintoki. He clutched it. The Demonic Katana’s hum seeped into his bones, steady, like a borrowed breath keeping him alive.

Somewhere deeper in the cave he heard a scuffle and a muffled impact.

The Zenchi Kintoki's hum grew louder, insistent, like a compass snapping to its mark.

He braced against the wall, pulling himself upright, free hand stretched into the dark. His sight was utterly gone.

Suisen exhaled, hard. Panic wouldn’t help. He crouched, low and steady, and reached back to his father's training he hadn’t touched since boyhood. The days of practicing blindfolded, ears straining, breath slowed.

He stopped trying to see.

And listened.

Air moved—thin currents funneling down from above, shifting around a presence, sliding across his blade like a whispered invitation.

Maybe sight wasn’t needed. Not now.

He stepped forward, guided by the hum of his Demonic Katana, and the echoes of a battle he could not yet see.

The darkness lunged.

Suisen lunged to meet it.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

Ao didn’t retreat. Even sealed, stripped of her demonic power, she stood her ground.

The figure circled slowly, its breath a ragged, unnatural rattle. Each step came jagged, shoulders twitching like a marionette with broken strings. Flesh scraped stone, a sound too deliberate to be aimless.

It wasn’t waiting to strike.

It was savoring the kill.

“Let’s see how smug you are when I break your nose with bare hands,” she muttered, dropping into the stance Opener had drilled into her bones.

The figure lunged. Ao twisted low, air brushing her cheek as claws raked the wall behind her. Stone split. She pivoted, driving her elbow into its ribs. Not enough to break, but enough to throw balance.

A hiss. Then a wide sweep. Ao ducked, this time driving her knee into its chin. The jolt burned up her leg. The figure only staggered, then rebounded faster—unnatural speed. Its backhand slammed her ribs.

Pain bloomed hot. She slid a step but refused to fall.

It wanted fear.

She spat blood to the side. “That all you got?”

The figure circled again, one shoulder twitching. No feints now, only raw aggression. It lunged.

Ao slipped aside, pain biting her side, and jabbed its throat. A flinch—then a snarl. Its retaliation came sharper, faster, like it was already learning.

She caught the next blow on her forearm. Bones rang like iron. Her power was gone, but not instinct.

A sound behind her—soft, familiar footfall. She turned sharply.

“Suisen?”

From the misted tunnel, his shadow stepped into the faint glow, blade drawn. Careful. Searching.

“I can’t see,” Suisen said, voice steady. “Where is it?”

Ao didn’t hesitate. “Two steps right. Duck. Swing at the echo.”

He moved at once—ducked, sliced upward. The Shingetsu tore a shallow line along the figure’s side. It shrieked, leaping back, limbs twitching now to track them both.

Suisen frowned. “Not enough clarity.” He shifted stance, abandoning Shingetsu. “Guide me again.”

“Clockwise. Three steps. Listen for the shift.”

They moved. Not polished. Not perfect. But in rhythm.

Ao listened harder than she ever had. The air changed before the figure struck—the cut of its limbs, the drop of pressure, the held breath. And Suisen followed.

He stopped trying to see.

He listened—to her breath, her steps, the scrape of hatred circling them.

The Zenchi Kintoki pulsed. Not sound—absence. Steel blurred, edge softening to haze. Mist coiled along the hilt, memory of wind waiting to move.

Ao feinted right. Suisen cut left—through a false body splitting from the figure. A decoy shattered, rhythm unbroken.

“Left, now!” Ao shouted.

He turned, blade low, weight fluid as a reed in current. The strike flowed without pause.

Zenchi Kintoki shimmered, every flick shifting shape, anticipating the next breath. The edge cut through shadow’s lie. The figure shrieked, a real wound tearing its shoulder, blood black-red against stone.

But it wasn’t done.

It bounded off walls like a streak of shadow, twisting midair to split them.

“Above!”

Suisen slashed upward, but the figure twisted, horn pulsing. Its limbs moved with twitching imitation—learning his rhythm. Mimicking.

Ao lunged, catching its arm with her own. Pain exploded down her shoulder. She locked her stance.

“Now!”

Suisen didn’t swing blind. He waited for her weight to shift, her breath to break. Then he moved.

Not aiming. Trusting.

The blade slipped through the figure’s wrist. Clean. Final.

The severed hand hit stone with a wet thud. The figure screamed—not only in pain, but fury.

Suisen dropped to one knee, chest heaving, blind but centered. Ao stood beside him, arms streaked in drying blood, teeth clenched against ache.

“You moved like you knew my every step,” she said, quiet.

“I listened.”

Zenchi Kintoki rested in his lap—not a blade of clarity now, but of mist, of breath, of intent.

“Yorukaze,” Ao whispered. “The night wind. A blade that doesn’t cut flesh, but the will behind it.”

Suisen only exhaled—soft, steady—the cave’s air sighing with him.

The figure clutched its bleeding stump, then crawled back into the mist, shrieking until distance swallowed it.

A butterfly fluttered near them, then it vanished into the mist where the figure had fled.

For a long moment, only their breath filled the silence. Then, as the scrape of retreat faded, they rose.

It wasn’t over.

Not yet.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The figure didn’t flee far.

It staggered deeper into the cavern, dragging one clawed hand along the wall. Red-black streaks hissed against the stone, steaming where they touched.

Ao followed first, steady. Each breath steadied her limbs. Her powers remained sealed, but the rhythm of her movement was her own.

Suisen came next, Zenchi Kintoki in hand, guided by sound and the trail she left him. His steps no longer strained for direction. They simply followed.

The tunnel widened into a chamber where the ceiling cracked open to a slice of cloud-choked sky. Rain filtered through, striking stone in soft, steady drops.

The figure stood in the center.

Its body flickered like a candle’s last flame. Armor split at the chest, the horn at its temple barely clinging to the root.

Ao lifted her hand, palm open. “We don’t need to keep doing this.”

The figure didn’t speak—maybe couldn’t. Its eyes were no longer furious but dim, drenched, lost.

Suisen stepped beside her, blind but present. His sword remained lowered.

The figure took one step forward. Then another.

For a moment Ao couldn’t tell if it would strike or weep.

Then it collapsed.

She caught it before it hit the ground. To her surprise, it didn’t resist. It crumpled against her like something too tired to stand, then let out a final, hollow breath.

She eased it down, rain drumming in the hollow. Suisen knelt at her side, blade across his lap, face turned toward the sound.

The body didn’t dissolve. It stayed gaunt, horn cracked, flesh still warm with dying heat.

Different from the Infernal Treasures they had fought before. Almost… a demon.

Her hand brushed the horn, then traced the markings carved into its face.

“These marks,” she murmured. “And its blood... have the same red and black pattern as Kanzan Musashi.”

Suisen’s throat tightened. “Impossible. The Seven Founding Weapons can’t be replicated. No record ever said so.”

Ao’s eyes stayed on the body. “Maybe not. But something about this… is wrong.”

Later, they sat beneath the broken dome of stone. Mist drifted in with the rain, breath of a sleeping mountain.

Suisen rested with the Zenchi Kintoki across his knees, its glow faint now. The air had stilled, but motion lingered like an echo in the silence between them.

Ao studied him. Calm, blind, hands slack. She had felt it in every step—he hadn’t forced or burned. He had flowed. Trusted.

“This time,” she said softly, “it wasn’t survival.” (1)

“No,” Suisen answered.

“You weren’t burning yourself out.”

“You wouldn’t have let me.”

She exhaled. Her voice lowered.

“I’m not ready to talk about what I felt after what you said about me and my Dad.” (2)

“I know.” His reply was quiet.

Silence stretched, then Ao pressed her hand against the stone beside her.

“But you didn’t fight to prove anything tonight. You didn’t try to lead. You just listened. Moved with me as you are.”

Another pause. Then, at last, she whispered, “I forgive you.”

Suisen bowed his head. He didn’t reach for her hand. He only breathed, “Thank you.”

The glow faded from the Zenchi Kintoki. It lay quiet across his lap, still as the wind after a storm.

Footsteps echoed down the tunnel.

Ao tensed, then eased. She knew that gait.

“What happened here? Did you two start without us?” Opener’s voice cut the mist as he stepped into the chamber, eyes scanning rain and ruin.

“We didn’t start it,” Ao muttered. “We ended it. But my powers are sealed, and Suisen can’t see…”

Cannonline dropped beside Suisen, tools in hand. Relief softened her face.

“Temporary damage. With treatment, his sight will return by tomorrow.” She uncorked a vial, dabbing pungent oil across Ao’s arm. “I learned this in Celestia. Your demonic powers will return soon.”

“Any seals?” Ao asked.

Cannonline shook her head. “None.” Then she glanced at her. “Are you in pain?”

But Ao wasn’t listening. Her gaze fixed across the chamber, where Benikage and Sea Again knelt over the corpse. Their faces were carved not with curiosity, but horror.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Suisen asked, head tilting at the silence.

Sea Again answered too quickly. “Nothing. It’s nothing.”

“No—it is,” Ao said sharply. “I saw those same looks when we found seals using techniques like Grandpa Mugai’s. (3) And now this. What are you hiding?”

Benikage’s jaw tightened. Then words broke free.

“I… don’t know if we can tell you, Ao. After this, you may never see your grandfather Mugai the same way. Maybe not even your own birth.”

Ao didn’t flinch. “I’ll take that risk.”

Without thinking, she reached for Suisen’s hand, steadying herself for what they were about to hear.

Chapter Text

“Mom! One day, I’m gonna be an amazing warrior, just like Dad!” (1) Fuji declared, fists clenched, eyes bright with conviction as he looked up at his mother, Fuyo.

Fuyo’s smile was soft, warm enough to melt the tension from the air. She reached down to ruffle his hair.

“Oh, I’m sure you will, honey. And you’ll be so much better than Dad. Strong, and kind… the best warrior ever,” Fuyo replied warmly, ruffling his hair. (1)

“Really?” Fuji’s eyes glittered.

“Maybe in your next life, kid,” Sea Again’s dry voice cut in as he and Benikage approached.

Fuji puffed his cheeks in protest. “Just you wait! If I train hard enough, I’ll get stronger than all of you! Then you’ll see!”

He dashed off, muttering about sword drills and ohagi, tiny fists swinging like he was already shadowboxing fate.

Benikage chuckled. “He’ll have to chew through a lot more lunches before he even touches me.”

Sea Again smirked, but Fuyo’s gaze lingered on the path where Fuji had vanished.

“He cares about you both,” she said softly. “More than he says.”

Her tone shifted, quiet but heavy.

“Promise me something. If anything ever happens to me… promise you’ll stay by Fuji’s side.”

“Don’t say that, Fuyo. That’s bad luck,” Sea Again muttered, brows drawn.

“Promise me,” she repeated, firm.

They promised.

Time passed, until an ordinary day twisted into something else when a demon arrived at the dojo. His name was Demmodore Opener, a complete stranger and emissary of the United Netherworlds.

Unbelievably, he defeated Mugai, the greatest swordsman in Hinomoto, and bearer of the title Zesshosai.

Mugai stood ready to die with honor. But Opener only smiled.

“Killing you would be baka! Let’s stop fighting and be friends.” (2)

And just like that, he walked away.

Nothing was the same after that.

Mugai never accepted the defeat. He convinced himself that it was a prelude to invasion—that the demon who had bested him would one day return, not as a tourist, but as a conqueror.

What followed was pure obsession. He pushed himself and his students into relentless training and began studying the forbidden arts of Soulcery.

From his research came a crude and sentient gauntlet. It thought. It learned. Later, it would become Joe Doe.

From that prototype, one of the Seven Founding Weapons was born, the Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai, forged with the power of soul binding.

Then came tragedy.

Fuji, still young and eager, skipped training for the first time in his life. He was fed up with the endless drills, the pressure, the constant demands to be stronger. (3)

That same day, a vengeful bandit, once defeated by Mugai, attacked Fuji. Fuyo threw herself into the fray to protect her son.

“Fuji… just live. You don’t have to worry about anything…” (4)

Those were her last words.

“Mom! Mom! You can’t die! Mom! Aaaah!” Fuji sobbed in despair. (4)

“Stop crying, Fuji. You’re too soft,” Mugai snapped, his voice cold and hard. (4)

“Your mother died because of war. Because I was weak. Because I lost to Opener… Love, friendship, compassion… demons don’t need emotions. Throw them away, son, and join me.” (4)

“But, Dad…! I’m alive right now because Mom saved me! I don’t believe she did anything wrong! I… I don’t want to! I’m gonna be a warrior—the kind of man who’d give his life for someone else! Just like Mom!” (4)

“You idiot,” Mugai muttered before slapping his son violently. (4)

He lifted Fuyo’s body and demanded to be left alone.

Fuji followed him anyway.

That night, no funeral was held.

Sea Again and Benikage wandered aimlessly, until they saw Fuji—his face bruised—sitting quietly on a slope overlooking the inn that had belonged to his mother.

“I won’t even have a grave to cry on,” he murmured.

“Why not, kid?” Sea Again asked gently.

“I don’t know. I begged Dad. He beat me and said he’d take care of it.”

“Where were you when it happened, Fuji?” Benikage asked.

Fuji’s voice cracked. 

“Near the cave with a red and black seal. The one where he experiments with those ‘Infernal Treasures’ we’re not supposed to touch.”

Sea Again and Benikage exchanged a grim look, then set off toward the cave to intercede for a grave—unaware they were about to witness something that would haunt them for the rest of their lives.

The ridge behind the dojo sank into shadow, the air thick with a bruised, metallic weight. Even the insects had fallen silent.

At the mountain’s base, they found the cave. Mugai’s red-and-black seal was scorched, burned from within.

“This is no training cave,” Sea Again muttered.

Benikage knelt and touched the rocks, that they were still warm. Then, they entered.

The chamber was small, yet the air pressed on their chests, heavy with grief carved into stone.

What they found froze them.

A sanctum of soulceric circles half-fused to the walls. Torn notes scattered, scrawled in Mugai’s hand—ink smeared, formulas half-erased. Some were arcane equations. Others read like confessions, crossed out violently.

And in the center, half-buried in shattered glass, was a mass of metal fused with the remnants of Fuyo’s body. Strands of her black hair. A broken dragon horn, edges scorched and faintly pulsing with Carnage Energy.

Benikage staggered back. “No… no, it can’t be…”

“Why would Master Mugai—?” Sea Again’s jaw clenched. His eyes fell on some fragmented pages of Mugai’s journal.

First resurrection test: used a fragment of Fuyo’s soul, bound with Carnage Energy and the Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai — failure. If it had ever lived, it had forgotten how. A decisive failure.

Second trial: used a purer extraction of her soul, catalyzed by traces of Carnage Energy — failure. However, it yielded an Infernal Treasure, the Demonic Sword Kanzan Musashi. A partial success.

Benikage’s fists trembled. “Master Mugai carved his wife apart. Pieces of her soul, shackled to that thing on the ground…”

Sea Again’s voice was hollow. “He tried to bring her back…”

Benikage whispered, trembling: “Look at the runes. They’re recursive… Given how they are cannibalizing themselves, there wouldn’t have been resurrection. It would have been like a code meant to consume her soul until nothing remained...”

Chapter Text

Later, Sea Again sat alone in the rain. He hadn’t spoken in hours.

Benikage stood nearby, silent as stone.

They sealed the cave, leaving its contents intact. Whatever lay inside, it dared not be disturbed.

Fuji approached timidly, his face still bruised from his father's hand, his steps slow with a grief he couldn’t yet comprehend.

Sea Again met his eyes. “Don’t ever go back there, kid.”

“…Why not, Sea?” Fuji asked.

Sea Again hesitated.

“Because your mother isn’t in that cave. And your father… it’s best to leave him alone for a while.”

Benikage crouched.

“We’ll stay with you. No matter what happens next,” he said.

Fuji didn’t answer, but his tiny hand reached out.

Sea Again took it.

From then on, Sea Again and Benikage remained. At first, it was to honor Fuyo’s words. But as the seasons turned, it was Fuji himself who bound them—his stubborn courage, the small weight of his hand in theirs.

They knew something had changed in Master Mugai. But they believed—perhaps foolishly—that the demon they once respected still lived behind the obsession.

They were wrong.

Mugai’s abuse of Fuji escalated. He forced the boy to learn the basics of building Infernal Treasures and to witness the deaths of apprentices, calling it strength training. He cursed his own son with the Empathy Killer, stripping away the very emotions Fuyo had died to protect.

Eventually, Mugai challenged Opener again—and lost, dying in the match.

In the aftermath, Sea Again and Benikage didn’t stay. They broke their promise to Fuyo and left Fuji behind.

The era of warriors in Hinomoto came to an end, but to survive, one had to find work.

Work that came from none other than the Demmodore Opener himself, who offered them positions as Magistrates under the new Shogunate, along with two Infernal Treasures—one for each of them.

Sea Again received the Demonic Gun Hicchu Ryoma. Benikage, the Demonic Spear Banji Tadakatsu.

Lost, adrift, and desperate for purpose after abandoning the dojo, they hesitated… They thought it must be fate knocking again at their door—a cruel, ironic fate that bound them to the very power that had destroyed their Master Mugai. And so, they accepted.

Several turns of the Dark Sun passed.

During his duties as Ocean Magistrate, Sea Again found himself face to face with an odd quartet:

A blonde nekomata girl with two sets of ears, the thief known as the Chivalric Mouse Girl, the ridiculous Shogun Yeyasu, and a dragon demon with a sharp glare, the top half of his hakama tied lazily at his waist with a red rope.

“…Yep. And he’s got one of the Founding Weapons, too. Hicchu Ryoma, the Demonic Gun that always hits the target,” said the dragon demon to the cat girl. (1)

“Oh? I don’t recognize you, but you sure know your stuff,” Sea Again replied, genuinely surprised. (1)

At those words, the dragon demon’s expression darkened.

“…Hmph. You don’t recognize me, huh? You sure act high and mighty for some traitor who joined up with the Demmodore.” (1)

A series of battles followed, and during the skirmish, Sea Again’s Demonic Gun was stolen by the Chivalric Thief, also known as Ceefore.

But just before retreating, realization dawned on Sea Again.

“Wait a second… I recognize you! Aren’t you Little Fuji!?” (1)

The dragon demon denied it, but it was clear to Sea Again—the technique he had used was unmistakably that of his father, Mugai.

Sea Again couldn’t believe how much the boy had changed since he last saw him.

Then again, neither could he speak—he had changed too.

Still, he decided to offer him a job under the Shogunate; otherwise, he feared Fuji would meet the same fate as his father.

“Don’t talk about my father!” Fuji snapped, cutting him off before he could finish. (1)

Another battle broke out.

Sea Again was defeated—and Fuji vanished again for a while.

The next day, Sea Again told Benikage—now going by the name Crimson Dark—about his encounter.

But Benikage said nothing. He simply turned away, his silence a heavier admission of guilt than any words could be. The conversation ended there.

Not long after, Benikage entered the Ultimate Martial Arts Tournament.

There, in the arena, he saw the one Sea Again had described in vivid detail—Fuji, after a battle, clearly suffering under the weight of the Empathy Killer curse.

“…I see that the soulcery spell continues to fester in your body,” Benikage muttered. (2)

Fuji turned, startled. “What…!? Benikage? Is that you!?” (2)

At those words, Benikage’s heart clenched.

“Don’t call me that,” he said coldly. “The hero who fought against the Demmodore… Mugai’s disciple… He’s ancient history. I’m Crimson Dark now. The Total Victory Magistrate. The Demmodore has bestowed the Demonic Spear upon me.” (2)

Fuji’s eyes burned. His words carried frustration and disbelief.

“So it wasn’t only the Ocean Magistrate...? You’re one of them too?” (2)

But Benikage didn’t flinch.

“Say what you want.” (2)

After other exchanges, he extended an offer to join the Shogunate, but Fuji refused without hesitation.

Benikage wanted to reextend the offer after the final match, but before that, he lost the Demonic Spear—defeated by Higan Zesshosai, one of the future wielders of the Seven Founding Weapons.

Benikage's mind fell further into despair after that. He had failed as Mugai's best student. He had failed as the Total Victory Magistrate. He had failed at everything.

Chapter Text

After his first defeat upon seeing Fuji again after so many turns of the Dark Sun, something shifted in Sea Again—and not entirely for the better.

In his grief, the truth warped. He told himself Fuji had sparked the chain of ruin—that if Fuji hadn’t needed saving, maybe none of it would’ve happened.

But the truth is, he never forgave himself either.

He hadn’t been able to protect Fuji. He hadn’t stopped Master Mugai.

When it mattered most, he ran.

Ran from the dojo with Benikage, rather than face what might follow after the death of his Master.

Fuji—who carried the blood of Mugai, and the blood and will of Fuyo—became the living reminder of everything Sea Again had failed to save.

And so, he became the easiest place to bury that shame.

One day, unable to carry it anymore, he sought the ultimate penance: to become the very thing his Master Mugai’s sin had created. He went to Cannonline and made the request to be turned into a living Infernal Treasure.

And so his body was reforged—twisted into a gray-bodied cyborg, echoing the form Suisen himself had once worn.

With his new body, Sea Again faced Fuji and his group—Pirilika, Ceefore, Yeyasu, Higan Zesshosai, and Suisen..

“Please stop! Why do you hate Fuji so much that you chose to become an Infernal Treasure!?” (1) Pirilika demanded. 

“It’s simple! My kind Master Mugai became obsessed with power! It's all because of Fuji!” (1) Sea Again snarled, before recounting the story of Fuyo’s death and his Master Mugai’s descent. 

The others objected, insisting the blame lay with Mugai himself and his own weakness.

At their words, Sea Again turned to Fuji, rage spilling out. “It doesn't matter what anyone says! My hatred for you will never end! My master met an early death because of you!” (1)

Fuji’s reply was low, bitter. “…Hmph. You think I don't know that? I'll never be free of this sin—” (1)

But Pirilika’s voice cut in, steady and heartfelt.. “Wait just one moment, Sea Again!” (1)

“What? The hell do you want, girlie?” Sea Again snapped. (1)

“Fuji may indeed have a heavy past weighing on him. And I understand how sad you are about the deaths of Fuji’s parents. But I don’t think Fuji is a bad person! I mean, look at him now! He’s fighting to save so many people!” (1) she said, her conviction sharp as steel. 

Sea Again was ready to bark back… but for a fleeting second, her eyes caught the light in a way that froze him. That warmth, that stubborn faith in Fuji—it was the same as Fuyo’s.

The memory struck like a blade.

The Empathy Killer curse flared inside Fuji, unleashing its full force—but Sea Again barely noticed. His chest was tight, and his voice raw.

“You’re just a little girl! You couldn’t possibly understand what it’s like to lose my precious master or how much I hate Fuji!” (1) he shouted.

But deep down, the words he longed to say were different. He would have wanted to beg her to not become another Fuyo.

And then Pirilika spoke the words Sea Again would never forget.

“I trust Fuji with all my heart! He’s my hero!” (1)

He couldn’t bear the weight of those words.

Another battle erupted—and once again, Sea Again was defeated.

Later, the truth surfaced: Master Mugai had not died, as many believed. He had secretly defeated Opener and hidden himself inside the Demonic Fist—both to recover from his wounds and to eventually possess Opener, carrying out his plan to eradicate empathy from the Netherworld.

Mugai was ultimately defeated—by Fuji, Pirilika, Ceefore, Yeyasu, Higan Zesshosai, Suisen, and Ao.

Not long after, a rift opened, revealing the existence of the Carnage Dimension. Benikage tried to stop it himself—but was defeated. It was Fuji and his group who finally overcame the threat.

Time passed, until the day Sea Again—restored as a true demon through Ao and Cannonline’s ritual—and Benikage learned that Fuji, now free from the Empathy Killer curse, was going to marry Pirilika.

Together with Ao, they traveled to Gero Haunt Springs. Not to oppose the wedding, but to ask Fuji a single, heavy question:

“What would you do… if Pirilika were to die tragically?” (2)

Fuji gave them an answer they kept to themselves, held quietly in their hearts until the day of their deaths.

But in that moment, they understood that the tragedy of the past would not be repeated.

From Suisen's Point of View

After Sea Again and Benikage finished telling their story, silence lingered like smoke.

Then a new, horrifying thought occurred to Suisen that perhaps Mugai’s obsession had never been entirely his own.

It was Joe Doe, strangely enough, who finally broke the silence.

“Secrets like that don’t stay buried forever. I’m just surprised it took this long even for me to know.”

Sea Again and Benikage didn’t respond.

Suisen, meanwhile, recalled the words Joe Doe had once told him—the day he revealed that Mugai had killed him and sealed his soul inside a cyborg body, the experimental model GS-00. (3)

“…I was never meant to be anything but a tool,” he whispered.

Joe Doe shook his head. “No. You were meant to break. But you didn’t.”

He stepped back into the shadows, pausing once more. “You survived Lord Mugai’s design. The question now is: what will you become?”

Back then, Suisen hadn’t known how to answer.

And even now… he still didn’t.

But Ao’s hand—still tightly clasped in his—reminded him that whatever answer he gave in the future… it would never again be a pawn of Mugai.

He would become someone who helped build.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View 

That night, Suisen dreamed again—for the first time in a long while—of his past as Ikki Edogawa. But this time, he wasn’t in a cell. He was in a jar.

And a story came back to him.

A collector once found a chrysalis and sealed it in glass, wanting to watch beauty emerge without risk.

But when the butterfly hatched, there was no space to stretch its wings.

They curled inward, wilted, unused.

It never flew. It simply faded.

Not from age—but from never becoming what it was meant to be.

Suisen startled awake.

His hand went to his chest, where his pulse beat too fast. Then to his eyes—where dampness clung.

Only then did he realize he could see again, just as Cannonline had predicted.

He exhaled, shaky with relief.

The woods around the camp were hushed. He followed the silence.

That’s when he found Ao—crouched beside a stream, her arms over her head. Her hair stuck to her shoulders in damp strands. The Demonic Fist rested beside her—quiet, like a husk waiting for something new.

Suisen didn’t speak. He sat down near her. And waited.

“When my Dad created me,” she said at last, “he said he needed my help for revenge… but he never told me who.” (1)

Her voice wasn’t cracked. It was hollow, scraped smooth, like it had been worn down too long.

“And then one day… he left. Told me to live for myself.” (1)

She gave a bitter laugh, sharp and small.

“Except… I never knew what ‘myself’ even was.”

Her fingers pressed into the soil, clawing faintly.

“That was when Grandpa Mugai found me. Said he was my father’s father. (2) I thought… maybe I could figure out who I was with him. I thought… if he loved me, maybe I could love myself.”

Her hands began to tremble—small at first, then uncontrollable.

“I learned soulcery. I did everything he asked. He even gave me the Demonic Bow, Zenryo Yoichi, to keep my collapsing body stable, since I was a defective living Infernal Treasure…” (3)

Her words caught.

“But now I know what he did to Dad. What he took from him. All the abuses he did on him.”

Her throat worked as she swallowed.

“And still… I love him. Even now. Isn’t that sick?”

Her eyes flicked toward Suisen, red and wet.

“I know what he did was unforgivable,” she whispered. “Loving him doesn’t change that. But pretending I don’t… would be a lie too.”

Suisen was quiet a long while before he spoke, gently.

“You’re not sick, Ao. You’re healing. Same as me.”

She blinked at him, uncertain.

Suisen’s gaze shifted to the Demonic Fist, pulsing faintly beside her—like a memory trying to speak.

“You’re a butterfly now—outside the jar.”

Ao frowned, startled.

“What?”

“I dreamed,” he said. “A chrysalis was sealed away too long. By the time it hatched, its wings curled in. It could never fly. But you—” his voice steadied—“you aren’t trapped anymore. You hatched. You survived. All that’s left is to stretch your wings.”

Ao stared at him, her breath shallow.

“What if I can’t?” she whispered. “What if I was never supposed to?”

His answer came without hesitation.

“You were made for someone else’s plan. So was I. But that doesn’t mean it ends there.”

He touched the memory he had long kept sealed.

“Ao… your grandfather Mugai killed me when he was possessing Opener. And he sealed my soul into a cyborg body—the one you first met me in.”

“And you don’t hate him?”

“I did,” Suisen said softly. “But I don’t anymore. Because if I keep hating him… he’s still writing my story.”

He met her gaze, quiet and unflinching.

“You’re not Mugai’s legacy or just Fuji’s daughter. You’re Ao.”

The wind shifted, and just then a butterfly passed between them, fragile and bright. And free.

Ao’s eyes followed it until it vanished among the trees. Then her gaze dropped to the Demonic Fist.

“I think… maybe I finally know what I want to do after the Grand Journey, Suisen.”

Suisen stayed silent, letting her speak.

“I don’t have all the answers yet,” Ao continued. “But I’ve seen what Opener built after being freed from Grandpa Mugai’s possession. How he kept going, even with the scars. That matters.”

She hesitated, her hand brushing the Demonic Fist—not with fear this time, but with something nearer to acceptance.

“During training, Opener didn’t just teach me how to fight. He showed me how to listen. How to see people not as enemies, but as voices worth hearing. That’s what stuck with me more than any combat drill.”

Her voice softened.

“I don’t want to live defined by the damage left behind by the people I loved—even if I still carry them with me. I want to build something different.”

Her shoulders lifted, light for the first time in memory.

“When this journey is over… I’ll join the United Netherworlds. I want to show people there’s a way to forge peace—without always drawing a weapon. And to do that, I’ll need to reform it from within.”

Suisen gave her a small, quiet smile.

“You just chose your own story, Ao.”

Ao looked at him.

And this time, her smile held.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View

After a while, Ao and Suisen turned back toward camp. They wanted at least a few hours of rest before returning to Tensei Village to bring word that the threat had been dealt with. (1)

But as they neared, it was clear rest would not come easily. The camp wasn’t asleep. Figures stood clustered near the tents, their tense voices carried low through the trees.

Suisen and Ao approached quietly.

“No, I’m sure,” Cannonline was saying, her tone flat with certainty. “None of the Shirofune, Kurofune, or even Deathfune models ever used Carnage Energy.”

“And Mugai never shared the blueprints with anyone else, right?” Opener asked, rubbing his jaw.

“Yes,” Cannonline replied without hesitation.

Suisen stood at Ao’s side, listening. The name Mugai turned like a key in a lock inside her chest. He felt it—yet she didn’t flinch.

“I don’t know what to think…” Sea Again muttered, voice raw. “Master Mugai invented the Infernal Treasures and forced his son Fuji to learn the basics. But aside from those two—and you, Cannonline—there’s no one else alive who could’ve made something like that Infernal Treasure Ao and Suisen faced.”

“Not to mention…” Benikage added grimly, “the last one resembled what Sea Again and I found in Master Mugai’s cave long ago.”

“Similar because it didn’t have the same runes along its bod—?” Tenbuyer began, before a sharp crack split through the forest.

Everyone stiffened.

“Who’s there?” Joe Doe barked, already shifting into a defensive stance.

The underbrush rustled—first a faint stir, then the crunch of heavier steps.

“Wait—it’s us!” a voice called.

Five familiar figures stepped from the shadows—hesitant but resolute. Hajime, Mikan, Fuku, Kiri, and Tayo. The five demons who had once been sealed living Infernal Treasures. (2)

“We… heard the battle,” Fuku said quietly. “We came to see if we could help.”

Ao stepped forward. Her voice was calm, but it cut through the tension.

“It’s over. We handled it.”

Silence followed. None of the five demons looked relieved.

“…Can we see it?” Tayo asked.

Suisen tilted his head. “Why?”

“To study it,” Kiri said, steady now. “If we ever face something like it again, we should be ready.”

Cannonline glanced at Opener, then gave a brief nod.

“Come.”

They led the group to the remains.

As the five demons drew closer, their faces shifted—recognition first, then dread.

Mikan’s voice cracked. “It looks like… it. The monster that haunted us when we were still living Infernal Treasures…”

“…Now I remember why we sealed ourselves away,” Hajime whispered, her hands trembling. “We weren’t protecting anyone. We were running—because that thing hunted us every day just for existing.”

Ao turned sharply to Suisen, her voice raw.

“When we fought it… I’ll never forget the way it looked at my Demonic Fist and your Demonic Katana. It hated our Infernal Treasures.”

“…But this one isn’t the same,” Hajime murmured, leaning closer. “…Because this thing doesn’t have recursive soul-runes.”

Sea Again’s head snapped toward her. “What did you just say?”

The air went taut. That detail should only have been known by Sea Again, Benikage, Ao, Cannonline, Opener, Tenbuyer, Joe Doe, and Suisen himself.

Unless the five demons had seen the true source of the horror.

And if they had… then what they fought now was only a shadow. A creation built in its image. A sign the true threat hadn’t ended when it was sealed.

Joe Doe broke the silence, his tone hard.

“You said you sealed what you saw back then,” he said to Sea Again and Benikage. “But what if, over time, Carnage Energy gave it life? Evolved it until it escaped?”

The two exchanged a glance, uneasy. Then Benikage spoke first, slow and heavy.

“It didn’t even twitch when we sealed it in the cave. Just a faint pulse of Carnage Energy in an inert shell. We thought sealing it was mercy… safer than destroying something we didn’t understand.”

Sea Again’s jaw tightened. “Master Mugai had labeled it a failure. His note said, ‘If it had ever lived, it forgot how to be.’ (3) We thought that meant it was safe—dead in every way that mattered.”

“But time might’ve given it teeth,” Suisen murmured. “And will.”

“Maybe it wasn’t inert,” Sea Again said bitterly. “Maybe it was just watching. Waiting for us to forget.”

“There’s only one way to know,” Opener said. “Do you remember where you sealed it?”

They nodded.

“Then we go as soon as possible,” Opener continued. “Cannon, how fast can you prepare a portal?”

“By tomorrow night,” Cannonline said. “Maybe sooner if I push.”

“Do what you can,” Opener said. “But don’t burn yourself out. We’ll need you sharp if we find something worse waiting.”

The group fell into silence.

“Let’s escort our friends back to Tensei Village,” Opener said finally. “Tomorrow, we prepare.”

The others began to move, but Suisen lingered on the shattered frame of the enemy he and Ao had faced.

Something in its silence gnawed at him.

He didn’t know how—but he was certain that whatever had created it was still watching.

And it wasn’t done yet.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View 

The next day, while Cannonline was busy preparing the portal to Gero Haunt Springs, Benikage and Sea Again—with help from Joe Doe and Tenbuyer—were stringing ropes between trees, rigging the saplings to spring back violently when cut.

The purpose, they claimed, was to create unpredictable 'enemies' for sensory-deprivation training. During the exercise, they would give Suisen verbal instructions while he remained blindfolded—training him to use the Yorukaze.

They’d proposed it after hearing from him and Ao about the new form his Zenchi Kintoki had taken.

Apparently, this form of training was developed by Mugai himself, so all four of them knew it well. But Suisen still had doubts.

“What are they doing?” Ao asked as she approached with Opener.

“They’re setting up a training field,” Suisen replied.

Ao’s eyes scanned the setup and quickly locked on one of the trees—a particularly bendy one—that the group was struggling to tie down.

“Hang on, I’ll help,” she said, stepping forward.

And as if on cue—as though the whole thing had been choreographed—the tree wrenched itself free from Sea Again’s grip. Benikage, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer tried to stop it, but the trunk snapped back violently, curved, and whipped toward Ao.

She moved to dodge—but not fast enough. A branch caught a few strands of her hair, tugging the tie from her ponytail. It snapped into the air and vanished into the brush.

“My Surprise Hair Tie! It was a gift from Pirilly!” (1) Ao shouted, then turned to Benikage, Sea Again, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe with a dead-serious expression.

“You’re all helping me find it. Now.”

“We’re seriously looking for a hair tie in a forest? That could take months,” Benikage muttered.

“If I were you, I’d just cut your hair. No more hair ties needed,” Sea Again said.

“And you’d save on hair care products,” Tenbuyer added with a straight face.

“Smart. Less risk in battle. Enemies can’t grab her by the hair,” Joe Doe chimed in.

Ao’s glare twisted into such murderous intensity that the four veteran demons instinctively recoiled.

“Didn’t you hear me? We’re finding my Surprise Hair Tie. Now!” she declared, storming into the underbrush.

As she marched ahead, her long hair now loose and flowing, Suisen found himself staring in inspiration.

In that instant, he knew exactly how to give her back the Butterfly Crystal. He would have it encased into a hairpin crafted just for her.

While Suisen drifted in that thought, Opener’s voice cut through.

“You look terrible. Deep circles under your eyes.”

“I couldn’t sleep after everything we learned,” Suisen muttered. “And judging by your face, neither could you.”

Opener paused, then exhaled slowly.

“You know… if I had understood Hinomoto’s codes, maybe things would’ve gone differently. I challenged Mugai with respect. But I didn’t understand what a duel meant in his culture. I didn’t know what I was truly asking of him.”

His tone was steady, but his hand slowly curled into a fist at his side, as if trying to hold something that kept slipping through.

“And if I had honored his request—given him the death he sought—who knows what would’ve followed? Maybe Fuji would’ve grown up with vengeance in his heart and killed me to avenge his father. Maybe Cannon and Pirilika would have grieved until that grief hardened into hatred. A chain reaction. Grief birthing revenge, revenge birthing more grief. Cycles like that don’t stop—they ripple. Across generations.” (2) 

He looked off into the distance, expression unreadable.

“Instead, I walked away, told him it would be stupid to kill him. (3) And that decision… led to everything that followed.”

Suisen was silent for a moment, then said quietly, “You tried to build a friendship. I won’t fault you for that. But bridges can’t be built without studying the river first.”

Opener gave him a sideways glance—and nodded.

“I spent my whole childhood studying those rivers,” Suisen continued. “Their laws. Their history. Their beauty… and their pain. I studied them so deeply that even my brother Yeyasu once asked me what I wanted to do for myself.” (4)

He looked up toward the sky.

“When this journey ends… I want to become Hinomoto’s first ambassador. Not just to bridge the past—but to ensure what happened between you and Mugai never happens again.”

Opener blinked, caught off guard. Then gave a slow, solemn nod.

“You’d be damn good at it, Suisen.”

Suisen offered a faint smile. “Because I know what it’s like to lose yourself. And what it means to choose who you want to be.”

He looked toward the clearing, where Ao was now barking orders like a battlefield commander, commanding the search for her lost hair tie with unshakable resolve.

“You know,” Opener said, voice softening, “Ao told me and Joe Doe—right before he muttered something about 'needing to prepare a training' and wandered off—that she’s forgiven you. She also said she still wants my training, this time to prepare for joining the United Netherworlds. She wants to build peace from the inside. I think… she’s finding her path. I’m so proud of her. And I think… Mugai would’ve been too.”

Opener’s gaze followed Ao. A slow smile touched his lips, laced with awe and something gentler.

“You two might go farther than I ever did.”

Suisen didn’t answer right away.

But in the quiet that followed, a thought came to him—firm and quiet, like a stone dropped into still water—that maybe that’s what legacy is.

Present Day – At the Dojo

After hearing that, Raiji reflected on his big sister Ao’s hurricane energy, his brother-in-law Suisen’s quiet resolve, and his grandfather Opener’s old regrets, now softened into wisdom.

He didn’t fully understand everything they had lived through. Not yet. But he saw the way they stood straighter now. Not because they were unbreakable, but because they had been broken… and stood anyway.

Raiji looked down at his unscarred hands and wondered if he would be that strong one day. Because, he considered, strength wasn’t about power.

It was about choosing not to let history repeat.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s and Suisen’s Points of View

Fortunately, Ao had managed to recover her Surprise Hair Tie.

As she tied her hair back with an annoyed huff and a triumphant grin, Cannonline arrived—worn out but resolute—to announce that the portal to Gero Haunt Springs was ready.

And so, the group now stood before the place where Sea Again and Benikage had once sealed away Mugai’s failed resurrection experiment. (1)

But to their horror, the seal was broken.

More disturbing still—judging from the regrown grass and undisturbed soil near the entrance—whatever had been inside had already been gone for some time.

“…What have we done?” Sea Again whispered, voice hoarse.

“We should’ve destroyed it,” Benikage muttered, trembling slightly. “Why didn’t we have the courage?”

Tenbuyer and Joe Doe moved cautiously into the cave that had once served as Mugai’s sanctum. The others followed, urging Sea Again and Benikage forward.

Inside, the air was stale with silence, broken only by the brittle crackle of dry leaves underfoot. Joe Doe and Tenbuyer approached a pile of handwritten notes scattered across a shattered altar.

“These notes…” Tenbuyer murmured, scanning them, while Joe Doe carefully turned the brittle pages. “…they were continued by another hand. I know Lord Mugai’s script too well to mistake it. The earlier lines on Carnage Energy seals are his, but these… someone else finished them.”

“Ao,” Joe Doe called, beckoning her closer. “The seal structures described here... do they match the ones we’ve seen at the other breach sites?”

Ao stepped forward, scanning the page with sharp eyes. Then she nodded grimly. “Exactly the same.”

Meanwhile, Opener and Cannonline sifted through half-burnt pages.

“Cannon,” Opener asked quietly, “can you confirm if these describe the Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai or the Demonic Sword Kanzan Musashi?”

“Unfortunately not,” Cannonline said with a frustrated sigh. “They’re too ruined.”

“I don’t think we need to…” Suisen’s voice carried from the far end of the chamber. He stood beside Benikage and Sea Again, unrolling a scroll.

It was one of the fragments Mugai had written before Benikage and Sea Again found them. (2)

First resurrection test: used a fragment of Fuyo’s soul, bound with Carnage Energy and the Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai — failure. If it had ever lived, it had forgotten how. A decisive failure.

But at the bottom, a continuation had been added, written in the same hand as the newer seals:

Everyone must suffer. Everyone must pay for my incomplete existence caused by the Demonic Fist.

I was labeled a failure, and an Infernal Treasure was named and preferred to me.

Five of them. Then I will erase all the Infernal Treasures from existence.

The words seemed to hang in the stale air long after Suisen stopped reading.

No one spoke.

At last Cannonline stepped forward, her face pale. “It’s clear now. Carnage Energy wasn’t just a power source for Mugai’s test. It allowed his first experiment to evolve.”

She glanced toward the scroll, jaw tight. “Every living Infernal Treasure is in danger.”

Sea Again’s voice dropped to a rasp. “We left it sealed without a name or a life. But it became alive… and aware. Caged in silence.”

“The Carnage Energy changed it. Let it grow. Let it shape its own version of Mugai’s research,” Suisen added quietly, his gaze fixed on the melted claw marks burned deep into the altar walls.

Ao stepped closer, brow furrowed. “The last line before it vowed to destroy the Infernal Treasures… what did it mean by five of them?”

Joe Doe spoke, unease in his tone. “Do you remember the living Infernal Treasures we found at those sites with the red-and-black seals (3) and near Tensei Village? (4) What if they’d been attacked and branded by it?”

Opener folded his arms. “It could be. If it found them, it might have attacked simply because they lived. Because they were named. Given purpose.”

“And it wasn’t,” Cannonline said. “It was never given a choice. Never given an identity. Just a half-born soul trapped in a failed test.”

The weight of the realization settled like dust.

Sea Again’s hand clenched at his side. “Benikage and I thought sealing it was mercy. But we created a mind that bled in the dark for decades—screaming in silence—while the rest of us simply lived.”

Benikage’s voice cracked. “We left it to rot. Now it sees us as liars... monsters allowed to feel, while it was told not to exist.”

Tenbuyer exhaled slowly. “And now it’s rewriting the script, with vengeance as the thesis.”

A few heartbeats passed in silence. Then Benikage froze, as his gaze dropped to something half-buried in the dust. He crouched without a word.

“What is it?” Ao asked.

Benikage didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he brushed the grime away and pulled free the map he did with Tenbuyer. (3) He laid it on the floor, then slowly aligned it with the residue etched into the stone beneath their feet.

Two points matched exactly.

His face paled. “The cave near the forgotten village… (4) and the cliffside.” (5) His voice was barely above a whisper. “They’re both here.”

Tenbuyer leaned in, peering at the faded ink. His eyes narrowed.

“The handwriting on these two labels isn’t Master Mugai’s… and look—” With one of his wings he traced a faint, curving line that connected the points. “Part of a circle. These two sites are points on its circumference.”

Ao’s eyes sharpened. “Which means… there’s a missing piece.”

“Fifth of them…” Suisen whispered. No one said the words fifth site, but the thought settled over all of them like a shadow.

“Unfortunately,” Benikage murmured, “there’s nothing written here to explain why it chose those locations…”

Ao stepped forward, voice low but resolute.

“Something has to change. We can’t keep calling it it. That’s how its hate started…”

Chapter Text

From Ao’s and Suisen’s Points of View

Ao’s words seemed to catch everyone off guard.

Tenbuyer tilted his head. “So… what about we call it her, then, since she was born from parts of Lady Fuyo’s body?”

The pronoun hung in the air—subtle, deliberate. No one corrected him.

Suisen’s gaze dropped to the floor. “You’re right. If she’s alive, we can’t keep referring to her without a name.”

Ao gave a single, sharp nod. “She deserves one. Not as mercy… but because naming her means we’re no longer hiding from who she is.”

“You’re right,” Sea Again said at last, breaking the long, heavy silence. “Then we give her a name—something that reflects what we’re truly facing.”

“The Nullborn,” Cannonline offered.

A pause. Then Opener spoke—almost to himself. “…Sushigami.”

Benikage blinked. “…Sushi? As in—raw fish?”

Joe Doe smirked faintly. “It’s been a while since we’ve heard one of Opener’s malaphors. Give him a second—he’s winding up.”

Opener straightened, his gaze sweeping the chamber.

“No. I meant… Kurogami. Black, like the void she crawled out of. Goddess—because she was made from pieces and given nothing else. And in that emptiness, she crowned herself queen of her own hunger.”

The name lingered in the air, heavier than dust, curling in the shadows like smoke that refused to disperse.

Ao felt it settle against her thoughts, dark and deliberate.

Beside her, Suisen’s fingers tightened imperceptibly on the hilt of Zenchi Kintoki—as if bracing for something unseen.

“We gave her hunger… and no name,” Suisen said softly. “Now she’s starving for meaning.”

Before anyone could reply, a faint sound—like the slow scrape of claw against stone—broke the stillness.

At the far end of the chamber, a single word burned itself into the wall. Fresh. Jagged. Deliberate.

Why.

As the group prepared to leave the sanctum, Joe Doe—walking close to the wall—paused, a flicker of uncertainty crossing his face.

“Something wrong?” Tenbuyer asked.

“No… it’s nothing,” Joe Doe replied slowly—but his eyes didn’t leave the wall. “…But did that wall pulse?”

“What?” Tenbuyer frowned. “The wall looks normal.”

“Probably just stress,” Joe Doe muttered.

“Let me take a look,” Cannonline said, stepping over and scanning him. She found nothing—no punctures, no marks.

“Let me know immediately if you feel anything strange again,” she said firmly.

Back at camp, the group sat in a loose circle around a low fire. Silence stretched, thick and heavy, each lost in thought.

Finally, Opener broke it.

“If there really is a fifth site, we haven’t found a single clue.”

“That’s because Kurogami doesn’t want us to,” Cannonline murmured. “There must be something about it that makes her need to stay hidden.”

Suisen looked down at his hands. The scars across his knuckles hadn’t faded, even after months.

“But she’s still driven by one thing,” he said. “Her hatred of Infernal Treasures. Wherever she strikes next… it’ll be tied to places where living Infernal Treasures remain. Ones we haven’t reached yet.”

“That’s half the Netherworld,” Joe Doe muttered. “And it’s even more urgent now that Carnage Energy is spreading in our dimension.”

Opener rubbed his temples, calm fraying at the edges. “Which means we have only one real option.”

Ao finished his thought for him. “We resume the Grand Journey.”

Heads turned toward her.

“If we keep moving,” she continued, “we’ll draw her out. Let her chase us. We don’t have to find the fifth site—we just need her to reveal it. My Demonic Fist and Axe, Suisen’s Demonic Katana, even Joe Doe himself… they could be the key.”

Sea Again raised a brow. “So… you’re using yourselves as bait?”

“We already are,” Suisen answered quietly.

Benikage exhaled and nodded. “He’s right. Wherever we go, she’ll eventually follow. And she might be creating new prototypes—stronger ones—to stop us.”

“And if we find the fifth site first,” Tenbuyer added, “we might get a chance to seal or destroy it before she evolves any further.”

Opener glanced around the fire.

One by one, the group gave silent nods.

Even Joe Doe, who had stayed quiet until now, finally spoke.

“If she wants to rewrite the Netherworld’s story… then I say we keep writing ours. Loudly.”

A beat passed.

“Grand Journey 2.0,” Ao said, hands on her hips. Then added, quiet but firm, “This time, we don’t just free living Infernal Treasures. Now we also hunt.”

Her eyes flicked to Suisen. “Because this isn’t just about stopping Kurogami—it’s about ending the Carnage Energy and the breach that made her.”

Cannonline turned to Benikage. “Pass me the map you did with Tenbuyer.”

He did, and she unrolled it, tracing their path.

“I’ll mark the nearest possible site where living Infernal Treasures might still be. We’ll need to pass through towns, villages, and potential Carnage zones. With luck, she’ll sense us before we risk civilian lives.”

“Not luck,” Suisen said. “Strategy.”

He looked up, voice steady and strong.

“We walk forward—together. That’s how we win.”

Arc Three — The Carnage Dimension Breach — End

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View 

The next day, the group set out at dawn. Cannonline had plotted a route avoiding major population centers, at least until they could be sure Kurogami wouldn’t strike again.

But one place on the map demanded attention.

“Tamasu Village,” (1) she said. “A minor trade stop, known for its jewelers. Small enough we can slip in and out without drawing too much attention.”

As they neared the village, nestled deep in the woods, they spotted something impossible in Hinomoto: a trio of Cockatrices. (2) Their size and plumage marked them as creatures from the Carnage Dimension. And they had an unmistakable red and black marking on their left wing.

“Those monsters aren’t from our Netherworld… There must be a dimensional fracture letting them through,” Tenbuyer said, hovering close.

He darted forward to investigate—and was immediately struck in the chest by one of the Cockatrices’ eggs, crashing to the ground near Joe Doe and Ao.

Before they could help, another egg slammed into Ao’s kimono—the one Pirilika had sewn and gifted her as a lucky charm for the Grand Journey. (3)

Ao trembled for a heartbeat, then unleashed her Ice Powers. The air shimmered as frost spread across the clearing, encasing the trio, herself, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer in a frozen cage.

Then she charged, shouting she’d pluck them featherless.

Joe Doe helped Tenbuyer to his feet, and the three of them launched into a full-on brawl with the Cockatrices.

“Shouldn’t we help them?” Suisen asked, eyes scanning the chaos.

“Can you stop a volcano mid-eruption?” Cannonline replied calmly.

“Honestly, stopping Yeyasu from teasing Fuji might be easier right now,” Suisen admitted, a wry smile tugging at his lips.

“Oof, that’s gotta hurt,” Opener muttered, as one of the Cockatrices pecked Ao’s backside with its beak.

“Not as much as this,” Benikage said, grinning, as Ao promptly bit the creature’s wing in retaliation.

“Is it just me, or did it suddenly go eerily quiet?” Sea Again asked, uneasy.

He wasn’t wrong. From the underbrush, more Cockatrices emerged, one launching an egg straight into Opener’s face.

“Gatty!” Cannonline cried.

To everyone’s shock, and despite her lack of physical prowess, she whipped out a frying pan and charged the Cockatrice that had dared to hit her husband.

“And to think, back when she was human, Cannonline admitted she’d lose to a level 1 Prinny,” (4) Suisen said, impressed despite himself.

“I always thought she really ran the house,” Sea Again murmured.

“I want a wife like her,” Benikage added.

And just like that, round two began, everyone diving headfirst into feathery chaos.

Suisen attempted to channel Yorukaze, but the Zenchi Kintoki remained inert. As he had suspected, the trigger required a real physical impairment—like the temporary blindness from his last trial. (5)

Still, a strange clarity filled him. He shifted into Shingetsu, manifesting new soul threads by battle’s end.

Afterward, they helped Ao to her feet, still coughing up feathers, and moved toward the source of the fracture.

Every eye fixed on the rift’s edges, crackling with raw Carnage Energy. The air bent and warped, proof that only a master’s hand—or Kurogami’s—could have torn it open.

With a series of precise kicks, Ao sent the exhausted Cockatrices flying back into the dimensional breach and sealed it shut, cutting off the rift that had allowed monsters to leak through.

For a moment, Suisen simply watched her—fury coiled with control, exhaustion giving way to grace. By the time he realized Joe Doe and Tenbuyer were staring at him, it was too late to pretend otherwise.

He said nothing. They didn’t ask. The silence said enough.

Still egg-splattered and feather-dusted, the group reached Tamasu Village by late afternoon. They checked into the nearest inn to wash up and rest.

Suisen, however, didn’t rest.

He slipped out unnoticed, ready to put his plan into motion.

Through the winding alleys of Tamasu Village, he pulled the Butterfly Crystal from his pocket and paused, staring at it.

Finally—after nearly six months of secrecy, since he’d found it while saving Ao from a Sea Angel (6)—this crystal would return to its rightful owner. In a new form, one that could express his feelings.

He was nearly at the artisans’ main street when a voice cut through the quiet breeze.

“Well, well. Look who’s sneaking off like a thief in broad daylight.”

Suisen froze.

He turned slowly to see Tenbuyer, grinning as he hovered above the street. Joe Doe stood beside him, arms crossed, half-smirking.

“Looking for something?” Joe Doe asked, feigning innocence.

“No,” Suisen said—too quickly.

Tenbuyer’s eyes narrowed.

“No? Because this really looks like someone trying not to be followed.”

“I’m betting that crystal’s for Ao,” Joe Doe said. “No way you’re reckless enough to make a gift for Cannonline with Opener still breathing.”

Suisen’s silence confirmed it.

Tenbuyer beamed. “I knew it.”

Suisen rubbed his temple. “I’m commissioning something for her. In secret. That’s all.”

“What exactly are you planning?” Joe Doe asked, tone softening.

“I was thinking of having this Butterfly Crystal set into a hairpin,” Suisen replied.

Tenbuyer raised a brow. “Oh-ho. Excellent choice.”

Joe Doe stepped closer. “Considering it’s for Lord Mugai’s granddaughter, we’ll keep it quiet.”

“And help you pick the right metal for a reasonable cost,” Tenbuyer added with a wink.

“Maybe platinum?” Suisen suggested.

“Terrible choice,” Tenbuyer muttered. “You need something that reflects her powers.”

“Something delicate… but unbreakable,” Joe Doe added thoughtfully.

Suisen smiled faintly, grateful, flustered, and light all at once.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t thank us yet,” Tenbuyer said, smirking. “We might ask for front-row seats when you give it to her.”

“Or we’ll do it for you,” Joe Doe chuckled.

“You wouldn’t dare,” Suisen replied.

“Try us,” Tenbuyer grinned.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View 

As they walked along the road, Joe Doe casually asked Suisen why he had never objected when he and Tenbuyer joined the group, despite their fierce opposition to the Shogunate and their earlier threat to kill Yeyasu.

The group had crossed paths with them months earlier, in Sardine World, while freeing demons whose souls had been sealed into Infernal Treasures. Just as Ao and Cannonline completed the ritual, Joe Doe and Tenbuyer had appeared, shaken, after witnessing Ao unleash the powers of the Zessho Mugai.

After tense explanations, the two had asked to join the mission, saying they wanted to see firsthand the rise of Lord Mugai’s granddaughter. And it was Ao who convinced the others, vowing to take responsibility if they ever betrayed the group.

“You never even blinked when we joined up. Not one suspicious glance. Why?” Joe Doe asked.

Suisen thought a moment, then shrugged. “You didn’t come with lies. Just purpose. That’s enough.”

“You do remember we threatened your beloved brother, Shogun Yeyasu?” Tenbuyer pressed. (1)

Suisen didn’t miss a beat. “I stopped worrying about Yeyasu’s survival the day he and Higan told me they were getting married. No demon—besides Fuji—could beat her in a fight. And I’m sure even my niece Rekka would protect her father, despite her age.”

The two demons nodded in agreement.

Then Suisen added, more thoughtfully, “Though I’m not sure who would win between Higan and Ao. They’re two of the few I’ve seen master more than one distinct combat form.”

Joe Doe smirked, shaking his head. “Maybe let’s not test it.”

As they walked, Tenbuyer’s sharp eye caught a modest shop tucked between two larger ateliers. Its faded sign bore a single word: knot.

“My merchant instinct says this is the place. Let’s go,” he said, wings flicking as he darted ahead.

Suisen turned the Butterfly Crystal once between his fingers. It was cold, like it had been waiting for a hand that wasn’t his.

Inside, lacquer and silver perfumed the air. Rows of delicate metalworks lined the walls—hairpins, bangles, amulets—each one as quiet and purposeful as a poem.

The artisan emerged from the back: a short, elderly demon woman with iron-gray hair, thick lenses, and a tiny hammer tucked behind her ear. Suisen had seen warriors carry less.

“You’re late, boy,” she said, squinting at Suisen as if she’d been expecting him.

“I didn’t make an appointment,” he said, unsettled.

“Exactly. So you’re late.” She waved them in. “Name’s Master Knot. Come. Sit. Talk.”

Tenbuyer leaned toward Joe Doe. “She reminds me of Cannonline.”

“Which means we don’t argue,” Joe Doe whispered back.

At the low table, the woman unrolled a cloth and gestured. “Metal.”

Inside were samples of rare alloys: sunsteel, moonsilver, cryolite, hinoki jade, and an opalescent strand labeled Kōri-no-tsugai, a frost-conductive filament once used in cryo-weapons, like those wielded by the former Tyrant Overlord Killidia (2), now softened into ornamental design.

“This one,” the woman said at once, pointing to the Kōri-no-tsugai.

“It hums like her,” she added, tilting her head as if hearing a note only she could catch.

The words pressed heavier into Suisen than they should have.

His eyes widened. “How do you know who it’s meant for?”

“Boy, you carry the look of someone forging an apology, a promise, and a prayer all at once. That’s not for a mistress or a mother. That’s for someone who made you forget who you were, and helped you remember who you wanted to be.”

Suisen blinked, stunned. His mouth opened, but no sound came, and in the silence Tenbuyer smirked. “I told you she was good.”

The woman picked up the Butterfly Crystal next. Her fingers brushed its edge, and her brow lifted slightly.

“This is old work. Hand-cut. You want it set at the center, don’t you?”

Suisen nodded.

She began sketching. The design unfolded like mist across water: a hairpin shaped like a butterfly mid-flight, one wing from Kōri-no-tsugai, the other from polished dusk-silver. The crystal rested at its heart, encased in a lattice of snowflake fractals and crane feathers, melding Ao’s ice powers with her affinity for flight and freedom.

She turned the paper toward him.

Suisen stared. The details pulled at him—like the design already knew its owner.

It wasn’t flashy. It didn’t scream strength. But it held presence, a stillness with weight, like the hush before a storm breaks. A quiet echo of Ao: what she had begun to show the Netherworld, and what she still kept hidden.

A shape worthy of a promise.

“That’s exactly what I need,” Suisen murmured.

The woman gave a single approving nod. “It won’t be flashy,” she said. “But it won’t break.”

She wrapped the materials again, each fold deliberate. Her voice dropped a note between fondness and warning.

“A true gift doesn’t ask for anything, not even thanks. But it remembers the one it’s meant for. That’s the kind worth forging.”

Tenbuyer and Joe Doe exchanged side-eyes, grins tugging at their mouths.

Heat crept up Suisen’s neck. “...I’ll do it.”

“So when do you plan to give it to her?” Joe Doe asked, smirk sharpening. “Don’t worry, we’ll make sure you survive it.”

“When the wind’s still enough,” Suisen said, half to himself.

Master Knot gave him a rare smile. “Six moons, boy. Come back then. I’ll keep it breathing until you’re ready.”

Outside, the wind had quieted.

But still not enough.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

A few days had passed since they’d left Tamasu Village with no new clues about Kurogami. Then Cannonline—after a sleepless night investigating with Opener—finally pinpointed an outpost buried in the Zakuro (1) Wastes, a desert where people whispered of Infernal Treasures that breathed.  

Ao, demon of frost, was less than thrilled. The heat clawed at her with every step, but she kept silent.  

That morning, though—worn thin by exhaustion—she shoved out of the tent in a storm of mutters.  

Just a few steps away she found Joe Doe surrounded by Cannonline, Sea Again, and Suisen. Farther off, Benikage, Tenbuyer, and Opener watched, all thoughtful.  

Ao padded closer.  

“How come no one woke me up?” she asked under her breath.  

Opener gave her a small smile. “We knew the heat was draining you. So we rotated shifts, searching for an oasis. When Joe Doe, Suisen, and Sea Again finally found one… Joe Doe collapsed. And despite being a soul in a cyborg body… he dreamed.”  

Ao blinked.  “Dreamed?”

“You’ll hear it from him soon,” Opener murmured.  

Cannonline already had. “Neither of you dreamed when you were in cyborg bodies, right?” she asked Suisen and Sea Again.  

Both shook their heads. Suisen added quietly, “I only remembered what it felt like after I became a real demon again.”  

Ao glanced down. She hadn’t known dreams either, until Celestia had made her a real demon. (2) She’d almost forgotten how strange that first night had been.  

“Are you sure it wasn’t just a malfunction?” Sea Again pressed.  

“No,” Joe Doe said firmly. “The voices and the flashes vanished when I woke. I can’t recall them. But they were… close to what you call dreams. And now I feel drained.”  

“No Deathfune unit should mimic that,” Cannonline mused. “If you agree, I’ll monitor you for a few days.”  

He nodded.  

“But how do you even know what dreaming is?” she asked.  

Joe Doe looked at her, then at Opener. “When I possessed his body, there were moments during sleep when his will pushed through. In those seconds, he always imagined you, Cannonline. You and Pirilika. Always in Hinomoto. That’s how I learned.”  

Opener blinked. “I never knew…”  

“They weren’t far from reality,” Joe Doe muttered with a sigh. “The love this demon has for his wife is absolute.”  

“Oh really?” Cannonline teased.  

And just like that, she and Opener vanished into their own little love cloud.  

“…While they float off,” Ao said dryly, “can someone show me the oasis? With this heat, I’m five seconds from doing something I’ll regret.”  

Benikage smirked. “I’d almost ask you to go ahead.”  

“Suisen, go with her,” Tenbuyer suggested, unreadable.  

Sea Again stepped forward. “I’ll join—”  

“No. Stay,” Joe Doe cut in, too fast.  

He flicked a glance at Tenbuyer. Something silent passed.  

“I’m too drained,” Joe Doe groaned. “I might collapse again. I’ll need both of you to carry me.”  

Benikage snorted. “I can manage—”  

“No,” Joe Doe cut him again, locking eyes with Tenbuyer for a heartbeat. “I’ll need both.”  

Tenbuyer’s antennae twitched. His voice stayed calm. “It makes sense. Safety in numbers.”  

Ao narrowed her eyes but let it pass.  

Suisen still looked puzzled. Whatever this was, he wasn’t in on it.  

She met his gaze—sincere, awkward, steady. Her instincts tugged.  

“Alright,” she said. “Let’s go.”  

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View 

The oasis shimmered ahead, a wound of green and blue in endless beige.  

Ao breathed relief, casting frost around herself. Suisen walked beside her in silence, eyes flicking her way with that calm intensity.  

She didn’t notice, as she was too busy muttering.

“If I had the Dark Sun face me, I’d punch it,” she said at last.

Suisen almost smiled. “I could design a solar dummy for you.”  

“I’ll consider it, Suisen,” Ao said.

Voices drifted from the spring.  

Three succubi, half-submerged, turned with hungry grins.  

“Oooh, look at that,” one purred.  

“That tall, brooding one’s my type,” another cooed, blowing Suisen a kiss.  

The third winked. “Quiet ones are fun to break in.”  

Ao’s eye twitched. Suisen blinked.  

“Are you demons of the oasis?” he asked evenly.  

“Oh yes,” purred the first. “Come cool off~”  

“No, thank you,” Suisen said. “We’re here on recon.”  

“Polite and dutiful.” One slinked closer, trailing a finger down his arm.  

Suisen stiffened. “Physical contact without permissi—”  

CRACK.  

A shard of ice struck the ground at her foot. Frost hissed through the air.  

The succubi froze. Ao stood there, smiling like a glacier, hand still glowing blue.  

“Oh no,” one hissed. “She’s possessive.”  

“Let’s go,” another snapped. And in a swirl of mist, they were gone.  

Silence settled.  

“Ao, did you just partially freeze the oasis?” Suisen asked.  

“Only the flirtation layer,” Ao muttered, arms crossed.  

“Should I thank you?”  

She looked away. “I didn’t do it for you. I just didn’t want to get dragged into some oil-and-giggle ritual.”  

“Understood.”  

But Suisen’s lips curved faintly. He gazed at the empty spring, exhaling.  

“…Still nice to know you’d vaporize someone for me.”  

Ao blinked. “What?”  

“Nothing.”  

She flushed hotter than the sun, cast more frost over the water. “Let’s fill the canteens and go before more ‘hospitality’ shows up.”  

Suisen followed, as a quiet smile lingered on his face.  

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

The air cooled as night crept closer, but warmth still lingered in Suisen’s thoughts. Not from the Zakuro Wastes, but from Ao.  

He hadn’t expected her to intervene like that.  

The shard of ice had struck the sand with the same sharpness she carried in battle—controlled, precise, furious beneath the calm. And afterward, she’d stood with arms crossed, cheeks faintly pink, freezing the spring without hesitation.  

Now she walked ahead of him, kicking sand in practiced indifference, never glancing back.  

He wondered if she realized what it meant to him.  

Since regaining a demon’s body, sensations struck differently: the chill of night, the warmth of shared meals, the fragile flutter when she brushed his arm or murmured his name half-asleep.  

He hadn’t spoken of it. Not yet. Words still felt like risk.  

But when he returned to Tamasu Village to retrieve the Butterfly Hairpin he’d commissioned, he knew he’d need courage.  

Back when he was a cyborg, none of this could have taken shape. Now it pressed closer with every step.  

He exhaled slowly, matching her pace. For now, this was enough.  

To walk beside her. To protect her. To wait until fear gave way to certainty.  

Even if it took the whole Grand Journey.  

From Ao’s Point of View  

The Dark Sun finally sagged lower, its wrath softening to a dull red haze.  

Ao and Suisen crossed the sandy ridge, canteens clinking at her side. The silence was comfortable, but his eyes kept flicking toward her.  

Not directly—just those sideways glances he thought she wouldn’t notice.  

She noticed.  

“What?” she snapped.  

“…Nothing,” he said, looking forward again.  

She sighed, kicking a rock down the dune.  

“You’re staring like I’ve grown a horn.”  

“I wasn’t staring. Just… observing.”  

“…That’s worse.”  

He said nothing. Something unspoken hung between them.  

Back at the spring, she’d acted on instinct. She didn’t regret it. She just didn’t understand it.  

“Don’t you think I overreacted?” The words surprised even her.  

“I think you made a judgment call,” he replied evenly. “You didn’t hurt anyone. You reestablished boundaries.”  

Ao narrowed her eyes. “That sounded suspiciously like praise.”  

“You kept me from being fondled by three overly affectionate succubi. Gratitude seems appropriate.”  

A huff escaped her lips. “Next time I’ll let them drown you in rose oil.”  

“I’ll take your frostbite over their perfume any day.”  

Ao stopped walking. That was… strange. Kind. Personal. And it didn’t make her want to punch him.  

She shook her head. “You’re getting weird.”  

“I’ve always been weird. You’re just noticing now.”  

She couldn’t argue.  

The camp shimmered ahead through thinning heat. Sea Again stood watch on the dune, visibly relieved. Benikage, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe were deep in talk. Opener and Cannonline—mercifully—had rejoined reality.  

As she and Suisen crested the ridge, quiet settled again. Ao let it.  

But as they reached the fire, she found herself saying, almost too soft to hear:  

“…Thanks for the walk.”  

Suisen paused. “You’re welcome.”  

She slipped past him into the circle of firelight. The heaviness in her chest from that morning eased, and not from the Dark Sun’s retreat.  

Something else had cooled the heat inside her.  

Present Day – At the Dojo  

“…So you’re telling me my big sis froze an oasis just because some succubi flirted with you?” Raiji said, grinning.  

“They were… persistent,” Suisen answered calmly.  

“And you’re surprised she got flustered? That was her way of saying, ‘Back off, he’s mine,’” Raiji declared.  

“Not everyone notices their own feelings right away,” Suisen replied with the faintest smile.  

Raiji feigned shock. “You, missing something emotional? Impossible.”  

Suisen didn’t answer. For now, it seemed no one else had noticed the quiet glances between Nova—an angel, adopted daughter of Ceefore and Nitra—and Raiji. Not even the two of them seemed aware of that quiet and subtle pull.

And if, one day, his hunch proved right… Fuji’s reaction would be something to see.  

Disciple and successor of Higan, older-sister figure. Brother-in-law to Yeyasu. Uncle to Rekka. Father-in-law to him. Son-in-law of Opener and Cannonline. Husband to Pirilika. Father of Ao. Father of Raiji. And—possibly—future in-laws with Ceefore and Nitra through Nova.  

One sprawling, fire-breathing family tree with Fuji at its center.  

Suisen almost smiled. At this rate, Fuji might combust on the spot.  

So for now, silence was wiser.

Chapter Text

From Ao's Point of View

The vanilla sweetness clung to the air, syrup-thick. Curtains swayed in open doorways though no hands moved them. A pot still steamed over an abandoned hearth, yet not a single voice rose from within. Too lived-in to be deserted. Too silent to be natural.

As everyone glanced around, unsettled, a sultry female voice sliced through the stillness.

“Ooohh… that mature nekomata is mine!”

Opener, who had just removed his hat against the heat, froze mid-motion, blinking toward the sound. Cannonline turned the same way, her eyes sharp enough to cut stone.

“I’m taking the green-haired one,” another voice purred, drifting from Sea Again’s direction.

“And I want the black-haired and gray-skinned one,” a third chimed—clearly meaning Benikage.

The perfume shifted, sharpened. Heels scraped over packed earth. Bracelets chimed like warning bells. One by one, figures slid from alleys and doorways—Empusas, Lilims, Carmillas (1)—glossy, confident, dripping with lust. Their smiles gleamed, their steps deliberate, as if the whole street had been waiting for their entrance.

Ao’s lip curled.

“I’m almost offended at being left out,” Tenbuyer muttered.

“Why? Shouldn’t you be into female mothfolk?” Joe Doe asked dryly after a beat.

“A wise merchant doesn’t close himself off from experiences that could… enrich him,” Tenbuyer said with a grin.

Joe Doe sighed and dragged a hand down his face.

“You have five seconds to vanish before I freeze this entire place,” Ao said icily, hands already glowing with frost.

Cannonline nodded, all in.

Benikage and Sea Again exchanged a glance filled with regret.

“Maybe don’t freeze all of it,” Benikage mumbled.

“Some of us were open to dialogue,” Sea Again added pointedly.

“I think it’s better not to leave room for such dialogues,” Suisen said, already halfway to drawing the Zenchi Kintoki—when a new voice rang out. Firm. Regal. Unimpressed.

“Are these the two you met at the oasis?”

The sultry crowd parted, and a tall, imposing Hecate demoness stepped forward, flanked by the same three succubi Ao and Suisen had met at the oasis.

“Yes, Mother Naamah,” one of them said. “We needed that male energy to power Saphira Vale! (2) And because of them, it took us twice as long to collect it!”

Opener cleared his throat and stepped forward, his voice carrying the same calm weight that had once forced cannibal clans into truce.

“I’m sure this is all a misunderstanding,” he said. “We come in peace, and we didn’t realize this region required, um… a certain kind of energy tax. If we caused any delay, we sincerely apologize on behalf of—”

“Nobody apologizes!” one of the succubi snapped, pointing straight at Ao. “That girl delayed our collection targets! And she was about to turn us into demon popsicles!”

Ao didn’t even blink. “I stand by that.”

“Ao,” Opener chided gently, “didn’t I teach you not to act impulsively?”

“You’re right… I don’t even know why I did it.” She sighed, arms crossed. “Next time I’ll just let Suisen rot in their clutches.”

Opener’s eyes gleamed. His grin tilted mischievous, and his gaze flicked—just for a heartbeat—toward Cannonline before returning to Ao.

Then he lifted his hands smoothly.

“Let’s not escalate. Perhaps we can negotiate a tribute—resources, charms, maybe even enchanted potpourri if that pleases you—”

“I believe you meant incense, Gatty,” Cannonline deadpanned.

“No incense can replace the missed energy donations,” one of the Lilim huffed, winking aggressively at Sea Again.

Sea Again eased back a step. “I’m not a donor. I’m a warrior.”

“I wouldn’t mind seeing your battle tactics up close,” she purred.

Benikage cut in. “Look, we didn’t know you were harvesting, or whatever. You could just put up a sign next time.”

“Oh, and ruin the mystique?” a Carmilla smirked. “Besides, you owe us double—for standing there looking delicious and mysterious.”

Suisen raised an eyebrow. “Should we be flattered… or file a restraining order?”

“I vote both,” Sea Again muttered.

Then, without warning, one of the succubi clapped her hands.

“Enough talk! Let’s settle this the old way.”

“You mean—?” another succubus grinned.

“Trial by combat!”

The air shimmered with magical heat. Silk fans flicked open. Lip gloss glistened with enchantment. Incubi-style dance music blared from nowhere.

“What’s happening?” Cannonline asked flatly.

“A duel,” Opener sighed, rubbing his temples. “Outdated tradition in some seductress tribes. The loser gets their life energy drained. They call it… Knock-him-Off.”

“We didn’t come here for this,” Joe Doe said to the demonesses. “We heard there were demons imprisoned inside living Infernal Treasures, but clearly that was false. We’ll just leave.”

“There are living Infernal Treasures,” Naamah said calmly. “But we hide them from visitors because they don’t resemble us. It complicates certain… negotiations. However, if you defeat my three daughters, we will take you to them.”

Ao raised a brow.

The three chosen succubi stepped forward, striking dramatic poses.

“Let’s take the green-haired one, the bkack-haired and gray-skinned one, and the one with brown-and-green hair,” one said, eyes glittering. “Their energy feels succulent.”

Sea Again sighed, cracked his neck, and rolled up his sleeves. “Fine.”

Benikage didn’t bother hiding the smirk. “Time to disappoint some expectations.”

“This is ridiculous,” Suisen muttered, then his tone shifted. “...Blindfold me. It’s a good chance to practice the Yorukaze form without guidance.”

Ao didn’t even flinch. If anyone could duel blindfolded, it was Suisen, as he’d proven during the battle when he’d been temporarily blind. (3)

She crossed her arms, watching the spectacle unfold.

“Should I still freeze them?” she asked.

“Give it a minute, Ao,” Cannonline replied. “Let’s see if those three make it worse first.”

Joe Doe, now seated on a crate, leaned toward Tenbuyer.

“How long could it last?”

“Depends. If we’re lucky, someone’s pride gets shattered early and they end it with a dramatic monologue.”

Joe Doe groaned. “We’re going to be here all day. And every moment we waste on this spectacle is a moment Kurogami’s plan advances. We can’t afford games.”

Nobody bothered to disagree.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The moment the magical circle finished forming in the center of the village square, Suisen, Sea Again, and Benikage stepped calmly into it.

Their opponents, the daughters of Naamah—Velissya, Nylaré, and Kalivra—entered with theatrical grace, moving in perfect synchrony.

One flicked her nails into claws of glittering charmstone. Another snapped open her fan, its edge humming with wind enchantments. The last bounced lightly on her toes, perfume magic coiling from her wrists like scented smoke.

“Begin!” Naamah declared with a sweeping gesture, her voice carrying across the square.

Velissya struck first, blowing a shimmering kiss through her clawed fingers. A compulsion spell—pink-gold and glittering—spiraled toward Sea Again.

He shifted aside, but not far enough. The magic grazed his temple, just enough to fracture his focus.

“Gero Haunt Springs… before Fuyo’s death?” His voice faltered, eyes briefly distant. Then his jaw clenched. He raised his blade, slicing through the haze in a single, savage arc. The illusion burst into dust.

“Nice trick,” he muttered. “But it’ll take more than that to break me.”

Nylaré swept in on him, twin fans flashing, wind sharpening every swing. “Come on, bushido warrior! Let’s make this interesting.”

Benikage rolled his shoulder once, settling into a low guard. His expression didn’t shift.

“You mistake me for someone who still finds flirting disarming.”

Steel clashed with silk-turned-steel. He parried her first strike, slid past the second, and cut into her rhythm with a swift sweep of his leg. She toppled, caught herself in a backward roll, and landed light as a dancer, lips curved in a smirk that said she’d enjoyed the tumble.

Kalivra darted for Suisen, perfume spilling off her in cloying waves, thick and venomous.

“This time,” she purred, “no one’s going to interrupt us like they did at the oasis. I’ll taste your energy properly.”

Suisen, blindfold tight across his eyes, stood unmoved. The Zenchi Kintoki shifted subtly into Yorukaze stance, his aura steady as stone.

“…You should’ve aimed for my senses,” he said, stepping just beyond her grasp. His blade whispered through the air and drew a shallow line across her hip—not enough to wound, but enough to shame.

Kalivra hissed, fury flashing across her painted lips.

At the circle’s edge, Ao’s mouth tugged into a smirk before she could stop herself. Pride burned sharp and cold in her chest—the same pride that came whenever Suisen mastered a new technique. She crushed it down quickly, arms folding to cage the feeling.

Cannonline’s gaze caught hers, one like she was fitting puzzle pieces into place.

“Do I have something on my face?” Ao asked, frowning.

Cannonline only shook her head. A faint unreadable smirk lingered anyway.

Ao turned away sighing, and spotted Opener scribbling in his journal again. He always did it at the strangest moments, pen scratching fast as though every heartbeat mattered. No one had ever managed to glimpse what he was writing. Maybe one day, if they had the courage to look.

A roar of cheers from the seductresses jolted Ao’s focus back. The three daughters had regrouped, whispering enchantments in urgent unison. Perfumed heat rose like a tide. Shimmering veils thickened. The air pulsed, tight and charged.

Velissya’s claws lengthened into writhing charmstone whips. She snapped them forward, striking at Sea Again with lethal speed.

He didn’t dodge. He caught them barehanded. Magic tore into his skin, carving red lines down his palms, but he only tightened his grip.

“Trying to bind me?” His voice rumbled low. Blood dripped, but he didn’t flinch. “I’ve had enough of chains.”

With a guttural roar, he ripped the whips apart and hurled the fragments aside. Then he surged forward and slammed his forehead against hers. The crack echoed across the square. Velissya crumpled, her silk collapsing into ruin.

“That’s the first time I’ve seen Sea Again fight without a sword since he got his demon body back,” Joe Doe murmured.

“And apparently his head’s just as deadly,” Tenbuyer added, almost admiring. “That one’s out for the count.”

Nylaré blurred, multiplying into six identical selves. The clones spun around Benikage in a taunting dance, fans slicing the air with mock elegance.

Benikage narrowed his eyes. “Illusions.”

He planted his sword in the ground. “Full Pulse.”

Energy blasted outward. Five fakes shattered into glittering shards. The real Nylaré staggered, reeling from the disruption. By the time she blinked clear, Benikage was already at her side.

“Try again when you understand what’s at stake.”

The hilt of his blade struck her gut, clean and merciless. She folded with a gasp, falling to the ground.

Kalivra, desperate, unleashed her last weapon. Perfume exploded outward, thick as honey, saturated with false warmth and aching need.

Suisen didn’t so much as shift. Blindfold still firm, he stepped into the storm, caught her wrist, and turned her own momentum. His body flowed like water, until she was lifted and slammed into the dirt, dust erupting around her like confetti.

Silence fell.

Velissya groaned. Nylaré whimpered. Kalivra lay stunned, staring blankly at the sky.

Naamah rose, her expression unreadable stone. “Your technique is… excessive.”

“No,” Opener said smoothly. “It’s focused.”

“Well, I certainly enjoyed watching,” Cannonline added, tone dry—but Ao caught the subtle arch of her brow.

“I expected something more long and dramatic,” Tenbuyer muttered.

Joe Doe sighed, heavy and long.

Benikage cracked his shoulder, voice clipped. “We done here?”

Sea Again pulled out a handkerchief, dabbing at his bloodied knuckles. “Trial by combat complete. Can we skip the courting phase?”

Suisen untied his blindfold at last, blinking once against the light.

Naamah exhaled, a slow acceptance. “Very well. You’ve earned the right. Follow me. The Infernal Treasures you seek… lie beneath the Old Heartroot.”

And just like that, the Grand Journey moved on.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The Old Heartroot was exactly what its name suggested—an immense, petrified root of some primeval demonic tree. Its hollow core spiraled downward like the throat of a buried beast. Moss clung to its curves, phosphorescent fungi bleeding green-gold light across the descent. Every step felt like entering a living memory, half-rotten, half-sacred.

Naamah walked ahead with the steady poise of a queen in her dominion. Her daughters stayed behind, licking their wounds, their pride bruised deeper than their flesh.

The tunnel widened into a cavern. Veins of dormant soulcery lined the walls, like an organ that had not drawn breath for centuries.

And at its heart knelt two figures.

They were built like Joe Doe—segmented plating, the same Deathfune frame—but their armor bore molten scars of red and black markings, Carnage Energy burning through the metal itself. Their optics flickered weakly, as if light itself struggled to remain inside them.

Ao’s chest tightened.

“They’re—” she began.

“Deathfune units,” Cannonline finished, her tone grim. “Series-identical to Joe Doe. I didn’t think any remained after I taught Sea Again how to shut them down.” (1)

Joe Doe stepped forward, slower than usual. His voice, usually a flat monotone, faltered.

“…Designation numbers?”

The unit on the left lifted her head. Mechanical, but weary: “DF-04.”

The right followed, strained and hollow: “DF-07.”

Naamah’s gaze softened only slightly. “Inside these shells lie the souls of my sisters. Asterika—on the left. Veliryn—on the right. Once, they were the strongest warriors of our village.”

Cannonline crouched beside Veliryn, eyes tracing the jagged burns etched across her plating. Opener lingered at Naamah’s side, sharp-eyed, as though reading not the words but the posture behind them.

Naamah’s voice darkened, steel scraping stone.

“One day, Demmodore Opener came to us. He wore a gauntlet like the one that girl wears now.” Her gaze cut to Ao, venom laced in the glance. “And he killed them.”

She snapped her fingers.

Asterika lunged, clamping onto Opener’s arm. Veliryn seized Cannonline’s wrist.

The group tensed to intervene, but Naamah raised her hand, eyes gleaming with cruel satisfaction.

“Take one step closer, and I order my sisters to detonate.”

The cavern froze.

Veliryn’s grip trembled faintly against Cannonline’s pulse. Opener stood motionless, eyes fixed only on Naamah.

“After that day,” Naamah pressed on, “they returned on patrol for the Shogunate. When they saw me… memory bled through the cracks. They told me what happened. Who did it.”

Her voice dropped to a blade’s edge.

“They remembered the Demonic Weapons Magistrate. Demmodore Opener’s right hand. The one who forced their souls—and many more—into these husks.”

“You’re right,” Opener said, after a beat of silence.

The words split the air, sharp as frost cracking stone.

“I wore the Demonic Fist, Zessho Mugai,” he continued. “I let it consume me. In possession… I killed your sisters. And I didn’t stop myself.”

Cannonline didn’t look at him. Her voice came low, as though dragged from the marrow.

“And I… preserved what was left. I bound their souls into Deathfune units.” She lifted her eyes to Veliryn’s flickering optics. “I cursed them into living Infernal Treasures. And I have borne that sin ever since.”

Naamah’s eyes narrowed. “You speak easily of guilt. Does that erase their torment?”

“No,” Cannonline said instantly.

Opener’s voice followed, measured, unwavering.

“We don’t ask for forgiveness. That would make it clean.”

His gaze dropped to the place where the Demonic Fist once clung to him.

“Some legacies leave blood at both ends of the blade. I survived possession. Which means I chose to live with it.”

Cannonline’s free hand covered Veliryn’s, not pulling away but holding.

“If punishment is what you need, I won’t resist.”

Ao moved, but Suisen’s hand caught her arm.

“Wait,” he whispered. “This choice belongs to her.”

The cavern stretched with silence.

Naamah stepped closer, touched Asterika’s head. The Deathfune leaned into the touch—clumsy, desperate, like a child reaching for warmth she couldn’t recall.

“My sisters have endured pain you cannot fathom,” Naamah murmured. “Their souls scream every hour. And yet…” Her gaze sharpened, weighing Cannonline and Opener. “…you don’t speak from a pedestal.”

She exhaled. “Release them.”

Asterika and Veliryn obeyed.

Opener and Cannonline stepped back in respect.

“I will not thank you,” Naamah said evenly. “But I will hear you.”

Cannonline straightened. “If Ao and I join forces, we can restore your sisters to their true bodies. Return them as demons. If we fail… you may kill me.”

Ao froze, her pulse hammering, struck silent by Cannonline’s conviction.

Naamah’s eyes narrowed, unreadable.

“So,” Cannonline pressed, voice steady, “what will you decide, Naamah?”

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

Naamah had ordered the others to remain above.

Before leaving, Suisen had pressed a small cloth bundle into Cannonline’s hands, containing a cluster of soul threads gathered after the battle with the Cockatrice group. (1)

The strands pulsed faintly through the cloth, like cobwebs spun from moonlight. Fragile. Refusing to vanish.

Now, only Ao, Cannonline, and Naamah stood in the cavern’s quiet.

The Deathfune units—Asterika and Veliryn—slumped against the wall, their breaths mechanical and uneven. The sound sat uneasily in the air, halfway between a sigh and the grind of worn gears, as if each inhalation was a chore and each exhale a surrender.

Naamah loomed over them. Her stance had softened, yet not relaxed—like someone who had learned too well what danger came when guards were lowered.

“You claim you can restore them,” she said finally.

Cannonline’s reply was steady, but beneath it ran a tautness that only Ao could hear.

“I can. With Ao’s Demonic Fist, Zessho Mugai, and my restoration tech, we can extract their souls from the Infernal Treasure and reconstruct their bodies from the anchored essence.”

Naamah’s gaze narrowed, sharp with doubt.

“It’s been decades. And before that, they were warriors and my sisters. Not machines. What returns may not be them at all.”

Ao stepped forward. “We know.”

For the first time, Naamah’s eyes locked fully on her.

“The Infernal Treasure you wear carries the same name as Swordmaster Mugai—the one whose crimes Shogun Yeyasu exposed. That isn’t coincidence.”

Ao didn’t flinch.

“I’m his granddaughter. His son’s daughter. And I’m also the spiritual granddaughter of Cannonline and Opener.”

Cannonline’s breath caught, the faintest tremor betraying how much those words cost her to hear.

Naamah moved closer. The air thickened, charged, as though lightning prepared to strike.

“I buried friends, daughters, and sisters because of Swordmaster Mugai, the Demonic Weapons Magistrate, and the Demmodore. Do you bear that weight, girl?”

“Yes,” Ao answered.

“Even though you didn’t wield the blade?”

“I carry his name. The ruins he left behind. But what I build on those ruins is mine. That’s who I am.”

Naamah studied her for a long, unbroken silence.

“…You don’t look like him.”

Ao’s tone was quieter, but iron-set. “Good.”

Cannonline’s eyes flicked to her, a flash of approval hidden in restraint.

Naamah turned to the Deathfune sisters, fingers brushing Veliryn’s cheekplate. The touch no longer carried rage—only grief, distilled and motionless.

“Tell me what you’ll need,” she said.

Cannonline knelt, her voice even but edged with strain.

“Twenty-four hours. Normally less. But I’ve never worked with a living Infernal Treasure scarred by Carnage Energy.”

She ran her fingers across Asterika’s soul core. Its glow sputtered, veins split with red-black cracks. A hiss escaped from within, like something still smoldering.

“Their signatures are twisted and unstable. The corruption has eaten into the cores. I’ll need to stabilize them before I can reintegrate the circuits. Once their inner cores hold steady… I’ll draw their souls out. Ao will bind them back into demonic bodies. But it won’t be gentle.”

“I’ll keep them still,” Naamah said.

Ao blinked.

“You trust us?”

“No,” Naamah answered, straightening. “But I trust your words.”

Her gaze returned to Ao.

“If you fail, I’ll burn this Heartroot to ash with that woman still alive. If you succeed… I’ll send word to the others.”

“The others?” Cannonline asked.

Naamah gave a slow nod.

“Your mass production of Infernal Treasures went farther than you realized. More remain hidden across dozens of villages in the Netherworld.”

Ao’s breath caught. “You’ve been protecting them.”

Naamah’s jaw tightened.

“Me, and other leaders of what’s left. We’ve hidden them from the Netherworld that broke them. But if there is a way to restore them…” Her voice cracked, faint but real. “…Then I will not stand in your way.”

The cavern’s silence deepened.

Cannonline unpacked her restoration kit, setting the tools on the stone floor.

Ao curled her glowing hand into a fist, frost-blue light spilling between her fingers.

Naamah laid her palm against the Heartroot’s bark and whispered something in her native tongue. Then, she turned back to them.

“Tomorrow,” she said. “We start.”

From Suisen’s Point of View

Opener hadn’t moved for nearly ten minutes. His eyes fixed on the Heartroot’s entrance, fists clenched white.

Everyone felt the tension rolling from him like heat from a forge. Two people he loved most were down there. One of them Cannonline, his wife, who had just offered her life as the price of failure.

The air above the Heartroot pressed heavy. Even the creak of its ancient wood seemed too loud.

Suisen saw it clearly in Opener’s posture. Not only worry, but also the weight of his past being judged in the chamber below.

Then Tenbuyer leaned toward Joe Doe, whispering.

Joe Doe shook his head twice, but Tenbuyer persisted. At last Joe Doe sighed and waved him on.

“For the symbolic price of one HL,” Tenbuyer began, “because a merchant can’t give away knowledge for free, I can tell you something you’ll thank me for when Cannonline and Ao return.”

Opener didn’t stir at first. The others thought he hadn’t heard.

Finally, he answered, deadpan:

“So I have to pay, but Ao gets your pork buns free?”

“I’d never charge the granddaughter of Lord Mugai,” Tenbuyer said with a sly grin.

Opener tossed him the coin without turning his gaze from the Heartroot.

“This better be worth the HL.”

Tenbuyer bent close, whispering. Midway through, something faint loosened in Opener’s shoulders.

Joe Doe, dryly, supplied the translation.

“He’s telling him about a place near the Zakuro Desert. Back when Tenbuyer was a sideshow act, before Lord Mugai freed him. (2) Hidden Haunt Springs that only few known. Perfect for… a couple who need time alone.”

Opener exhaled softly, still staring forward.

“If my Cannon walks out of there, I’ll take her.”

Benikage chuckled. Sea Again joined him.

Suisen covered his face with his hand, but a small smile slipped beneath it.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The following day, the cavern felt colder—its silence a stillness that came before the ritual.

Asterika and Veliryn sat cross-legged at the center, their optics dim. Cannonline’s tools were arranged with soldierly precision: Suisen’s soul threads, conduits, circuit reintegrators, and a phial of liquid soulcery.

Naamah stood behind her sisters, both hands resting firmly on their shoulders.

Cannonline adjusted the calibrations on the reintegrator, then glanced toward Ao.

“Once I breach the Infernal Treasure’s core, there’s no turning back. The soul will begin to detach. Once it’s in the soul-preserving tool, you’ll be able to guide it like before.”

Ao flexed her fingers. The Demonic Fist pulsed in time with her heartbeat.

“I’ve got it.”

They began with Asterika.

Cannonline’s hands were steady, her focus absolute as she unlocked the core’s containment seals. The sound was like metal exhaling after centuries under the Dark Sun’s tension. Faint golden light seeped out fractured and unstable.

Ao pressed her palm against Asterika’s chestplate, letting the Demonic Fist’s power seep through. The soul resisted—afraid and fragmented—but Ao didn’t pull. She only held patiently the door open.

Asterika’s frame shuddered. Naamah’s grip tightened but she didn’t interfere.

When the last wisp of light slipped free, the shell slumped forward, empty. Cannonline guided the reintegrator, rebuilding the demonic body from the anchored soul that Ao had placed in the preserving tool. Bone-white patterns spiraled into the air, knitting a silhouette from essence and memory.

The work drained them both. By the time Asterika’s breathing steadied in her restored body, Cannonline’s hands trembled from the strain.

Naamah knelt beside her sister, eyes wide with disbelief that slipped into something more reverent.

They began again for Veliryn. It went faster, but the weight pressed harder. Ao caught flashes of Veliryn’s last moments: blood, fire, and the wrenching theft of something vital.

The grief cut so sharply she nearly lost focus. Her pulse faltered, the Demonic Fist’s glow dimming. Cold sweat broke across her brow, the drain hollowing her out.

“Hold,” Cannonline murmured, eyes never leaving her work.

Ao steadied her breath, anchored herself in the rhythm of the ritual, and pressed through the memory until Veliryn’s soul yielded, sliding into her hold.

When it was done, both sisters sat as demons once more—pale, exhausted, but alive.

Ao placed Suisen’s soul threads gently in their hands. The sisters gasped, their fingers curling around the gift. Ao thought briefly of Suisen entrusting those threads to her, knowing the weight of every life they touched. She guided them carefully into Asterika and Veliryn’s palms.

The two sisters turned to Naamah.

In unison, they said softly, “It’s been a while, sister.”

Naamah’s lips parted, then closed. She turned her face away for a heartbeat, hiding the rawness there, before she looked back at them.

Then she faced Ao and Cannonline.

“Come to the village this afternoon. I’ll give you a map of every place the living Infernal Treasures hide, and I’ll tell you how my sisters came by those Carnage Energy markings.”

Her voice was calm, but her fingers lingered a moment too long on her sisters’ shoulders before guiding them toward the upper tunnels.

Later

The cavern lay empty now, only Ao and Cannonline left, packing away the tools.

“You held steady,” Cannonline said without looking up. “Even when Veliryn’s memories hit you.”

Ao shrugged faintly. “It wasn’t easy. You had the harder part.”

Cannonline paused, then met her gaze.

“That’s the part nobody warns you about… Restoration doesn’t just save the soul. It makes you carry the echoes.”

Ao’s eyes softened. “You look tired…”

For a moment, Cannonline studied her.

“You know,” she said finally, “when you called me your grandmother in spirit yesterday… I wasn’t sure if you meant it.”

“I did,” Ao replied without hesitation. “And I still do. Opener is my grandfather in spirit. You’re my grandmother. You’ve taught me, fought beside me… and shown me that inheritance isn’t only the circumstances of my creation or the weapons I was meant to wield.”

Something eased in Cannonline’s expression. The cavern filled with nothing but the quiet drip of water from the ceiling.

“Then I’ll say this once: whatever teaching Mugai left in you—it’s not what I see.”

Ao’s throat tightened. She adjusted the Demonic Fist, more for something to do with her hands than need. “Thanks… Grandma.”

For just a second, Cannonline’s lips curved—not into her usual smirk, not her sharp grin, but something quieter.

“Come on, Ao,” she said, slinging her satchel over her shoulder. “We’ve got more names to cross off that list.”

She took a few steps, then added over her shoulder, “Knowing my Gatty, I’m sure he’ll cry when I tell him you called him grandfather.”

Ao laughed, the heaviness in her chest easing. “You’re right, Cannonline.”

And, as if summoned, Opener appeared. Without a word, he wrapped Cannonline in a fierce hug.

Ao smiled, stepped past them, and began climbing toward the upper tunnels to rejoin Suisen and the others.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

"I never thought I’d feel sorrow watching two demons suffer in a body identical to my own," Joe Doe murmured, mostly to himself. His voice was low, almost haunted.

Suisen tilted his head, curiosity flickering in his eyes. “Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live in a body that’s just yours?”

Joe Doe considered the question for a moment, then shook his head. “Honestly, no. When Lord Mugai was alive, I simply possessed whatever bodies were most useful to his cause. After his death, I grew so accustomed to living in this Deathfune unit that I never questioned it.”

Suisen was about to reply when Ao’s voice broke through the quiet tension.

"Cannonline did great. Everything went fine," she said, a hint of relief in her tone.

“Opener was really worried for her… and for you,” Sea Again added gently.

“And when Naamah came out of the cave, Opener ran straight off to find you,” Benikage chimed in.

“Naamah told us she’ll meet us at Saphira Vale this afternoon, but she didn’t give any details,” Tenbuyer noted.

“You’ll find out this afternoon,” Ao promised, her gaze steady.

After a while, Cannonline and Opener rejoined the group.

From Ao's Point of View 

That afternoon at Saphira Vale, Naamah stood quietly for a long moment, her eyes weighed down by painful memories

“My sisters and I were attacked by a powerful enemy. From its appearance, it was unclear if it was a demon or some complex Infernal Treasure, its form inscribed with soul-recursive runes.”

She paused, her voice tightening.

“I don’t know why, but it seemed to have a particular hatred for my sisters’ former aspect. When it struck them, it did more than wound their bodies... It infected them with Carnage Energy, leaving the markings that scarred their previous forms. The only reason my sisters are still alive is because I hid them from the Old Heartroot.”

Her voice faltered as she looked around at the others.

“Living Infernal Treasures are not just weapons or tools. They are souls bound to metal, trapped in a limbo between life and death. And now, many of them may be suffering the same torment as my sisters—if not worse—if that thing is hunting them as it hunted us. And from your expressions, I see that you know who it is.”

The group nodded in grim silence, the weight of her words settling over them like ash.

She produced a weathered parchment, its ink faded but still legible. “This map shows where they hide.”

Her eyes locked with Ao’s.

“If you are to heal what’s broken, you must act quickly. And if you fail, the cost will be more than lost souls. It will mean the end of all hope for those still trapped.”

Her words sank in, silence pressing down more heavily than the parchment in her hands.

Later, after receiving the map from Naamah marking the locations of the living Infernal Treasures and having left Saphira Vale Village, Ao finally broke the silence.

“So it was Kurogami who attacked Naamah’s sisters. She’s the only one with soul-recursive runes on her body.”

“Indeed,” Cannonline said. “That means her attacks are escalating, and we should expect something new…”

From Suisen's Point of View 

That evening, the group gathered to study the fragile document outside Saphira Vale, comparing their position with Benikage’s and Tenbuyer’s map of the four sites previously marked with Kurogami’s seal. None of them could have completed the circle.

Tenbuyer broke the silence with a small smile.

“Funny how things turn out, Opener... Those famous Haunt Springs are right next to Kuzunaga Village, (1) nicknamed Freefall Village,” he observed.

“I’d say a… strategic detour in that direction is necessary,” Opener said. “I think it’s time to split into scouting groups.”

“Why?” Cannonline asked, raising an eyebrow, unaware of Tenbuyer’s tip to Opener.

Suisen raised his hand at that moment, prompting Tenbuyer, Joe Doe, Sea Again, and Benikage to toss a few coins at him.

“There’s no fun in betting against you,” Benikage muttered. “You guessed every word Opener said right to the letter.”

“This is the second time I’ve seen this play out… (2) Do you five always go wild whenever you’re left alone?” Ao grumbled.

The five chuckled. Then, unexpectedly, Ao asked about the village’s nickname of Freefall.

“The reason is as sad as it is simple. The village is surrounded by cliffs and peaks so high that many who’ve lost hope climb them to end their lives. That’s why people call it Freefall Village.”

A hush fell over the group, the weight of the name sinking in.

Except for Ao, whose eyes brightened with interest.

“And tell me... are those peaks very high?” she pressed, intrigued.

“Yes,” Tenbuyer said innocently. “Why?”

Ao didn’t answer. Instead, she suddenly started to tremble.

Joe Doe stepped forward, concern plain on his face, only to be caught completely off guard by Ao’s arms wildly flailing as she screamed in pure delight at the prospect of crashing from the sky. It was one of the things she adored most, second only to her time with Dad Fuji.

The impact was brutal. Joe Doe's massive frame—all 800 kilograms of it (3)—toppled backward, crashing onto Benikage, who fell hard onto his back.

Silence fell.

“I swear I didn’t expect that!” Joe Doe stammered, scrambling up in panic.

Benikage said nothing; he only fixed him with a glare sharp enough to cut steel.

“Is it time I sell your body to science? How did you even survive?” Sea Again teased, smirking.

“No,” Benikage growled, “but my back really hurts. I can’t get up.”

“Just your back?” Sea Again teased again, offering a hand.

Benikage groaned in pain. Cannonline went over and examined his back.

“Who would’ve thought a cyborg could take down a great warrior like you without even using weapons?” Cannonline remarked. “I’ll inject a painkiller. It’ll work slowly, but that will make it more effective.”

And so, the Grand Journey resumed, with Benikage miraculously able to walk despite his sore back.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

A week later, a note was pinned outside Ao’s tent:

We went ahead to scout one of the Haunt Springs. Head to Kuzunaga Village to stock up on supplies. You’ll find the list of what’s needed on the back of this sheet.

— Opener & Cannonline

As they drew closer to Kuzunaga Village, Ao’s excitement rose with the peaks themselves.

“They’re pretty impressive, aren’t they, Ao?” Tenbuyer asked, glancing over his wing toward her—only to find she was gone.

“She just ran off toward the tallest peak,” Suisen said with a sigh.

“Suisen and Benikage, go get her before she makes one of her famous landings and levels Kuzunaga Village,” Joe Doe ordered.

“Why me? I’m not eager to become Ao’s landing pad for the third time—not with my back in this condition,” Benikage protested.

“Because the supply list includes heavy goods,” Sea Again said matter-of-factly. “Pick your cause of death.”

“Some days,” Benikage muttered, “I almost hate my life.”

And so, Suisen and Benikage—the latter still wincing from his injury—watched as Ao prepared to launch herself from the highest peak.

They’d at least managed to talk her out of using them in the jump. Suisen had pleaded the fragility of demon bones, while Benikage had threatened to have Tenbuyer cut off her pork bun supply.

Ao reached the summit. Moss slicked her footing, or maybe she simply misjudged her momentum. Either way, the launch went wide.

She spiraled down in a flashy twist, missed her landing zone entirely, and crashed headfirst into the Haunt Spring beside them. Strange-colored waters erupted in a spray that drenched Benikage, who was far too slow to escape.

The pool bubbled and shimmered. Ao’s pale skin glowed with ghostly flames, her sky-blue hair drifting as though suspended underwater.

Benikage, dripping and furious, opened his mouth to snap, only for Suisen to burst into uncontrollable laughter, quickly joined by Ao herself.

Benikage leaned over the fractured surface of the spring. The reflection staring back at him was pink-skinned and bone-white haired.

He wiped water from his face and glared at Ao. “You call that a graceful landing? I’ve seen slugs with better coordination. Look at what you’ve done to me!”

Ao flicked her luminous hair back with a smirk. “At least I’m glowing now. You’re just… a Hinomoto knock-off of Void Dark.”

Suisen chuckled. “Well, Ao, if we ever need a lantern in a cave, I know who to call.”

“As long as I’m not her landing pad again,” Benikage growled. “Twice is enough.”

Ao grinned wider. “Maybe you’ll grow to love your new ‘dark emperor’ look.”

“Don’t push your luck, young lady,” Benikage warned. “Next time, I might just have to teach you a lesson, even if Fuji kills me afterward.”

Suisen shook his head. “That would be a sight. The new Dark Emperor Benikage versus the new Zesshosai Fuji.”

“My Dad would definitely win,” Ao said warmly. “He’s the best samurai ever.”

Benikage snorted. “Always the doting daughter. You couldn’t be more attached to him if you actually shared blood.”

Suisen’s smile softened. “And that’s what counts.”

Ao puffed her cheeks, exhaling a tiny huff. “Alright, enough jokes. Let’s get moving before someone else ends up as my landing pad.”

“Still,” Suisen remarked as they started back toward Joe Doe, Tenbuyer, and Sea Again, “this is the first time I’ve ever heard of a Haunt Spring changing a demon’s physical appearance.”

“Maybe it didn’t just change that…” Benikage stretched cautiously. His eyes widened. “The pain I’ve had since Joe Doe fell on me… it’s gone.”

“Are you sure that’s not just Cannonline’s painkiller still in your system, Benikage?” Ao teased.

“Haunt Springs were once used to heal warriors’ injuries. I should have thought of that earlier, and—”

A will-o’-wisp cut him off, drifting across their path. Its cold blue glow twisted in the mist.

It pulsed once. Ao and Benikage collapsed, fast asleep.

Suisen froze. The wisp didn’t drift away like a normal spirit. It hung there, throbbing brighter, feeding on the silence. The scent of Haunt Spring water thickened—sweet, metallic.

His eyes narrowed. “This isn’t natural…”

Mist rolled in low, coiling around his ankles. The air dropped cold.

And then she appeared.

A Titania. A monster foreign to this Netherworld, pulled through by another breach in the Carnage Dimension. Beauty sharp enough to wound. Wings shimmering like frost over black glass, their right pair marked with curling red and black. Her faint smile tilted her face into mockery.

“Mortals and demons alike sleep so easily in the embrace of the spring,” she murmured. “Their dreams… are so sweet to taste.”

Her voice was music poisoned with malice.

Suisen’s gaze flicked to Ao and Benikage, breathing but already caught in her dream-web.

“You’ve come far from your Netherworld,” he said. “The Carnage Dimension breach must’ve been generous to send you here.”

“Generous,” she echoed, “or deliberate. The Carnage Dimensions hunger for fresh prey. And Hinomoto’s Haunt Springs…” Her fingers hovered just above Ao’s glowing hair. “…carry flavors worth savoring.”

Suisen’s hand slid to the Zenchi Kintoki’s hilt. “If you want them, you’ll have to go through me.”

Her smile widened. The will-o’-wisp fractured into a dozen orbs, circling him in a slow spiral.

“Oh,” she whispered, “I was hoping you’d say that.”

Mist thickened, swallowing the place whole. Mountains melted into shadow. The rush of water warped into whispers in a dead tongue. Shapes writhed in the fog.

Suisen drew his blade, steady. “An illusion won’t save you.”

The Titania’s laugh rippled like silver bells in a storm. “Then prove it.”

She spread her wings. The air shivered. Frost crawled across the moss at his feet, the crystalline growths whispering with voices that weren’t there. The mist coiled higher, wrapping cold silk around his arms, tugging at his movements.

Suisen ignored the bite. His mind traced the rhythm of her magic, the flicker of wisps, and the notes in her voice threading compulsion.

He angled the Zenchi Kintoki, letting it catch the thin light that pierced the fog. “Dreams don’t make us weak. You’ve never fought someone with a reason to stay awake.”

Her smile deepened. The ground beneath them vanished.

And the fight began.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

The Titania’s laughter cut through the mist like shards of ice, crystalline and cruel. Shapes flickered at the edges of Suisen’s vision.

Phantoms lunged, the ground crumbling into a false abyss, but he let them pass, like mere shadows brushing moonlight.

His focus narrowed to what was real: frost crawling over moss, mist coiling around his arms, cold gnawing into bone. Each breath burned, each exhale swallowed by haze.

A will-o’-wisp drifted closer, glow rippling like liquid light. Suisen moved with it, the Zenchi Kintoki in Shingetsu form flashing silver-blue.

The wisp shattered like brittle glass.

The Titania’s smile faltered. Irritation rippled across her flawless face. Her wings beat once, stirring the mist like a caress before the kill.

“You are so predictable,” she murmured.

New wisps bloomed, glowing the same hue as the Haunt Spring. Suisen’s gaze flicked to Benikage—trapped inside a Void Dark replica—and to Ao, faintly glowing in her sleep.

Cold clarity struck: the Haunt Spring and the wisps weren’t separate. Their glow matched because they were the same power.

The Haunt Spring wasn’t just enchanted—it was corrupted. Every droplet a trap, reality itself rewritten.

And if it came from her, it could wound her.

The Titania’s laughter swelled. Mist bent toward her fingers. Frost snapped into a whip where Suisen had just stood. Other forked spears followed, jagged shards hissing into the haze.

She pressed harder. Fangs of frost snapped midair. Feints bled into feints, illusions twisting into reality. She moved like the edge of a storm.

Ground slicked to glass. Voices whispered in half-familiar tones. For a heartbeat, Suisen staggered—ears ringing, chest compressed with cold. The world tilted.

He let it break. Phantom voices, false ground—he let them pass. Frost beneath his feet was truth enough.

Pivoting sharply, Suisen plunged the Zenchi Kintoki into the Haunt Spring. Water shivered upward, streaking like mercury toward her.

It struck like burning coals. She recoiled with a cry, frost wavering on her wings, the mist loosening from his arms. Where water touched, the sweet-metallic scent soured, hissing like acid.

“You insignificant—!”

She flung both hands. A blizzard devoured the space between them.

Suisen slid low, blade soaked in Haunt Water. It thrummed, alien energy whispering along its edge.

Frost spears fractured air. Steel met ice, and each clash made the Spring’s power flare—shattering shards, backlash ripping through her stance. She flinched, rhythm faltering.

The wisps screamed, whipped into a spiral around her.

Suisen waited. The breath between strike and counter. The stillness before rhythm resumed.

Zenchi Kintoki moved—silver through frost and flesh. The Spring’s power burned bright.

Her shriek broke crystalline beauty, twisting into something raw and unnatural. The wisps winked out.

The mist thinned. Cold bled away. Silence settled.

Suisen turned to Ao and Benikage. Ao stirred first, her glow fading back to pale skin.

“—Suisen?” Her voice trembled, hand brushing hair aside before reaching for his sleeve. Relief softened her face when she touched him.

Benikage groaned, restored to his usual form. “What just happened?”

Suisen exhaled, the tension breaking into a tired smile. “You fell asleep after touching the Haunt Spring's waters. Maybe you’re just not cut out for swimming.”

Ao laughed softly. Benikage only frowned.

The quiet lasted a heartbeat too long.

As Suisen slid Zenchi Kintoki into its sheath, the air thickened. Shadows bent unnaturally, pressing close, as if the mountain itself had paused mid-breath.

Then—soft at first, like a whisper threading through stone—a woman’s voice came. Low, deliberate, laced with menace:

“So it is true… even the most vivid dreams shatter so easily.”

The mist stirred as though recoiling.

Benikage stiffened, color draining from his face. Ao’s hand tightened unconsciously around Suisen’s sleeve.

At the edge of vision, something shifted.

First, pressure—a weight in the chest, air thinning, every breath dragged like through water. Then a silhouette, dark hair cascading in sharp, fluid lines that seemed to cut the haze itself.

A single horn curved from her temple, catching what little light remained.

Her steps were unhurried, but each one pressed harder on the world around them. Moss shriveled. Frost returned in rivulets, spiraling outward from her feet.

Only when she drew fully into the open did the last detail emerge.

Across her skin, recursive soul runes glowed faintly. They shifted like molten script, words written and erased in endless loops—an impossible language inscribing itself directly into her being.

The sight made the silence feel deafening.

Kurogami had arrived.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

Kurogami didn’t move at first. She simply watched, recursive soul runes crawling across her skin like the slow rotation of an unseen machine. Mist coiled around her legs, twisting and curling as if alive, drifting with intent. Every swirl seemed to measure, to weigh, to memorize their reactions.

Her gaze slid to Ao’s gauntlet—the Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai—and her lips curved, a shadow of a smile.

“You…”

The word barely left her lips before she folded space. A blur—black hair and dragon horn cutting through the mist—closed the distance faster than a heartbeat.

Ao raised her guard, but the impact struck with a soundless quake. Pressure collapsed inward rather than exploding outward. Frost and moss buckled beneath her feet, craters forming before sound could follow.

“Too fast…” Ao muttered, spinning back into stance. Her strikes sliced in storms of feints, elbows, and sweeps designed to shatter joints.

Kurogami didn’t dodge. She wasn’t there. Each strike collided with empty air. Each follow-up cut angles that hadn’t existed a heartbeat ago.

Yet her afterimages hesitated, ever so slightly. A fractional pause, almost imperceptible, whispered calculation rather than instinct. Suisen noticed. The slight slack, the faint hesitation, suggested she wasn’t trying to kill—only to observe, to measure.

Then claws struck. Afterimages slashed in perfect sync, doubling blows before Ao could react. One grazed Suisen’s shoulder as he advanced.

Ao summoned the Demonic Axe, swinging both hands. Mountain stone cracked beneath her strike.

Kurogami caught the effortlessly the blade with one hand. Ao’s breath hitched.

Benikage lunged behind her, sword arcing for a flawless diagonal. Kurogami pivoted her head without moving the rest of her body. The blade cleaved only air, slicing an afterimage. Her elbow jabbed into his ribs without warning, flinging him ten meters into a splintering tree.

Suisen pressed in, Shingetsu form flashing silver-blue arcs. He aimed for gaps in her rhythm. None landed cleanly. Minimal shifts in her stance deflected each strike. Her eyes never left Ao.

Still, faint imperfections lingered between movements: the mist stuttered, frost slowed, a faint exhale escaped her lips. Suisen tensed, ready to exploit them, but he did not. Each subtle pause mapped her intent. She controlled the fight like a conductor shaping a symphony of ice and shadow.

“That… was my birthright,” Kurogami murmured, lunging.

She reappeared before Ao, palm striking. Momentum warped around her. Ao blocked, the gauntlet spiderwebbing cracks through stone beneath their feet.

Ao staggered, arm numb. Instinct gnawed at Suisen: they could not win like this.

Zenchi Kintoki flared gold. Pain ripped through him—sharp, familiar, terrifying—a price he might not survive paying twice. (1)

Molten lines raced along the blade. Heat radiated outward in suffocating waves as he assumed Kintsume form. Wild, burning power surged. Each heartbeat stabbed with agony; his palms tore under the strain.

He struck anyway, shattering her rhythm, buying Ao and Benikage space. Sparks of gold and black danced as the first blow clashed against her forearm. The second carved the mist itself before she caught it barehanded.

Her grip tightened. Blood dripped—his, not hers—from his split palms.

“You could burn yourself alive,” she said softly, “and I would still take what is mine.”

Even in the chaos, Suisen saw the flicker: curiosity, cold and precise, not blind rage. She calculated, weighed strength, measured timing, deciding where to push and where to hold back.

A roar tore from her as she charged. Head lowered, shoulders driving forward. Impact surged outward in a shockwave, throwing Suisen back and tearing roots from the mountainside. Stones split and cracked beneath the force.

Ao gritted her teeth, swinging the Demonic Axe. Scales shimmered over Kurogami’s arms and chest. The clang of impact rebounded sharply, nearly buckling Ao’s knees.

Benikage staggered upright, blood trickling from a deep split. “We… can’t… hold her!” he rasped.

Kurogami’s fingers brushed the gauntlet.

Benikage’s eyes met Suisen’s, a grim understanding flashing between them. He couldn’t stop her in time—so he didn’t try.

He seized Ao’s arm and Suisen’s collar, and with a roar born of will more than strength, hurled all three backward—off the cliff.

Wind shrieked past Suisen’s ears, tugging at his limbs like iron chains. The cliffside blurred, jagged and unrelenting. Benikage twisted their fall, sword scraping sparks against stone, slowing descent just enough.

Ao gripped his arm, trembling but unyielding. Suisen wrapped around them both, every heartbeat jabbing with pain.

Time fractured. Moments stretched. One instant, Suisen looked up.

The cliff’s edge was empty. Mist curled over shattered stone. Kurogami was gone.

Her runes—the same light that had burned through the Haunt Spring—vanished. Yet absence pressed heavier than presence. The mountain felt colder, shadows deeper.

Even falling, Suisen felt it: a pulse of intent. She hadn’t fled in fear. She had vanished deliberately, leaving space to test, to watch, to ensure the next encounter would belong entirely to her.

Pain tore through his back as they tumbled, but survival clung stubbornly.

A ledge jutted from the cliffside, rough but merciful. Benikage angled them into it. Bone-cracking thud.

They rolled. Coughed. Groaned.

The were alive.

Yet Suisen’s gaze stayed locked upward. The cliff, the mist, and the weight of her absence pressed a single truth:

Kurogami had not been defeated.

She had chosen to vanish.

And when she returned, nothing—not the Demonic Fist, Demonic Axe, nor the Demonic Katana—would be enough.

Arc Four — Grand Journey 2.0 Part One — End

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen’s Points of View

The ledge held, but barely. Pebbles skittered loose and vanished into the abyss, carried away by the wind that howled along the cliffside. The three of them sat in silence at first, their breaths sharp and uneven.

Ao’s Demonic Fist still glimmered faintly, though her fingers twitched as if each heartbeat made holding it harder. Benikage slumped against the rock face, one hand pressed to the gash in his side, the other gripping his sword in a clutch that looked more like desperation than readiness.

Suisen glanced upward again. The cliff above was empty, nothing but mist rolling and curling in indifferent patterns. And yet, the air seemed to remember the shape of Kurogami.

“She didn’t chase us,” Ao said finally. Her voice was steady only because she forced it to be.

“She didn’t have to,” Suisen murmured.

Benikage lowered his head. “No. She let us go… like toys she can pick up later.”

Suisen turned to him. “You saved our lives throwing us off that cliff.”

“If I’d had the courage—or the recklessness—back then, (1) we wouldn’t be here now,” Benikage said. His voice was frayed at the edges, heavy with something he couldn’t quite spit out.

“No one can know that, Benikage,” Ao said softly.

Benikage’s sigh misted the air, long and slow, before he fell silent again.

Another gust dragged a curtain of fog across the ledge. It writhed like memory, curling and shifting with a rhythm that reminded them all of Kurogami’s runes—air rewriting itself. Even without seeing them, the image burned in Suisen’s mind.

“Can you stand?” Suisen asked.

Benikage’s jaw tightened. “We’ll have to. By now, Sea Again, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer should be done gathering supplies in Kuzunaga Village. We should head back to camp.”

“And maybe Cannonline and Opener are there too,” Ao added, pushing herself upright despite the tremor in her knees. “So we can actually get treated.”

They set off. Each step jolted pain through battered limbs. The wind trailed behind them like a restless spirit, carrying tatters of cold mist that clung to the path.

From Suisen's Point of View 

The camp came into sight. Everyone else had returned, but the atmosphere felt heavier than it should. Opener, Tenbuyer, and Sea Again stood close together, their expressions tense. Cannonline knelt beside Joe Doe, who lay unconscious once again.

“I don’t understand,” Cannonline muttered, checking his instruments. “Even during the previous blackout, (2) the readings showed no anomaly. So what’s causing this?”

The mist clung to the camp’s edges, too still to be natural. It curled around crates and tents like an eavesdropper, and Suisen half expected soul runes to flicker inside it.

Opener spotted them first. His expression sharpened. “What happened to you?”

“We’ll explain,” Benikage said, his voice worn but firm. “After you patch us up.”

From Ao's Point of View 

Once wounds were wrapped and breaths steadier, Benikage recounted the desperate clash with Kurogami. Silence stretched afterward, heavy as stone.

Then Joe Doe stirred. Still unconscious, he whimpered in a voice no one had ever heard from him before.

“Nooo, Mom, I don’t want the syrup! It’s gross!” His lips trembled as if forming words stolen from someone else’s dream.

“…This takes me back,” Sea Again said, a thin smile flickering. “That time the kid had a high fever. Fuyo had to chase him half the day just to make him drink the medicine.”

“And when stubbornness didn’t work,” Benikage added quietly, “Fuyo offered… an alternative.”

“What alternative?” Ao asked.

“Nooo, not the syringe, nooo…” Joe Doe whimpered, voice cracking, hands making a weak, defensive gesture.

Sea Again’s smile collapsed. He looked at Benikage. Their shared glance was sharp now, stripped of humor.

“…He’s dreaming about the kid’s past,” Sea Again murmured. “But how?”

Suisen noticed the tremor in Joe Doe’s fingers, the uneven hitch in his breathing. Not the mechanical hum of a Deathfune unit, but something messier and fragile. Something alive.

No one spoke it aloud, but unease thickened in the silence.

From Ao's and Suisen’s Points of View

Joe Doe’s eyes flew open. Disoriented, he pushed himself upright. At that instant, one of Cannonline’s instruments beeped.

“Did I faint again? I only remember finishing the supplies… and then nothing,” Joe Doe said.

“And not only that, my friend... you dreamed again,” Tenbuyer said.

The instrument beeped again, registering a spike at last.

“Is something wrong, Cannon?” Opener asked.

“The anomaly was too brief to record fully,” Cannonline admitted, frowning. “But I suspect the Deathfune body is developing biological traits. Something is interfering with the energy that powers it.”

Joe Doe’s eyes darkened. After a pause, he said quietly: “If it happens a third time… I’ll have to seriously consider possessing a new body. I won’t be a burden to you.”

“Do you remember what you dreamed?” Tenbuyer asked.

“No. I forgot everything on waking, like before,” Joe Doe said.

“You dreamed about Fuji’s childhood,” Suisen told him. “When he was sick.”

Joe Doe froze. “How…? During the fight at Ewwdo, I only exploited Fuji’s emotional scars tied to Ao’s birth and—”

He stopped dead, panic flashing across his face. Cannonline, Opener, and Ao all glared at once.

“Don’t kill me! We were enemies back then!” (3) Joe Doe blurted, raising his hands in genuine fear.

“If I were you,” Tenbuyer drawled, “I’d seriously think about finding a new body. In case Fuji’s in-laws and his daughter decide to dismantle you…”

Joe Doe’s eyes widened. A nervous laugh slipped out—half panic, half disbelief. “Am I… going to die?” He glanced at Cannonline, Opener, and Ao. Their expressions gave him no comfort.

Suisen’s lips twitched, almost a smile. Benikage muttered something about absurdity under his breath.

Ao’s fingers stilled, though. The tremor that had betrayed her earlier was gone. What replaced it was rigid calm, colder than her voice had ever been.

“You… did what?” Her words were not a shout but a shard of ice, thin and sharp enough to freeze the air. Everyone froze with it.

“Well,” Sea Again said, clearing his throat in the dead silence, “the dismantling option is looking more and more reasonable. Just saying. Tempting, really.”

The three of them—Cannonline, Opener, and Ao—exhaled as one. And after a tense moment, they let Joe Doe live.

For now.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View 

After a few days, the search for living Infernal Treasures resumed, and the group made their way to Kuzunaga Village together.

The village air pressed down on them like a sodden shroud, thick and oppressive, befitting its grim nickname: Freefall. Even the breeze felt heavy, dragging the mist rather than scattering it.

A handful of zombies lingered in the streets. Their movements were brittle and mechanical, hands clutching cups of hemlock as though the liquid inside was the last tether to sanity. Every sip came with a tremor. Every glance toward the shadows came edged with terror.

Ao’s eyes flicked ceaselessly across the alleyways, her shoulders coiled tight as wire.

“Where first?” she murmured to Opener, her voice low enough that only the mist seemed to hear.

Opener’s gaze swept the streets. “We split up. Market, plaza, baths. Even the dead may still remember how to talk.”

Suisen noted how his tone held neither command nor request, but it was a verdict.

Joe Doe fell into step beside Suisen, and Tenbuyer naturally shadowed them. Sea Again and Benikage angled toward the plaza, while Ao, Opener, and Cannonline headed for the public baths.

That left Suisen, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe with the market.

Later

The central square of the village sprawled ahead, its fountain half-choked by vines, benches sagging under the weight of slumped corpses that refused to finish dying.

“Strange,” Tenbuyer muttered. “A few days ago, when I came here with Joe Doe and Sea Again, the market wasn’t this empty.”

Suisen gestured subtly at the scattered figures. “And besides the zombies, were there any signs of life then?”

Joe Doe’s grim nod was all the answer needed.

“Let’s try approaching,” Suisen said.

They moved toward the fountain. Joe Doe drifted slightly ahead, his steps hesitant but eager to prove his worth.

One zombie teetered on the rim of the fountain, its merchant’s apron hanging in tatters. Both hands clamped a chipped cup so tightly its knuckles were bloodless. Letting go looked tantamount to surrendering breath.

“Excuse me?” Joe Doe’s voice wavered in the stillness. “We’re looking for information. About… unusual occurrences? Powerful artifacts? Living Infernal Treasures?”

The zombie’s head swiveled toward him with the grinding scrape of stone. Clouded eyes locked onto Joe Doe’s face. Its jaw quivered, and a low, wet groan seeped from cracked lips. Not hunger—fear.

The cup rattled. Hemlock sloshed. “…Thirsty…” The word croaked out like a reflex, like a mantra meant to drown memory. He raised the cup again, swallowing fast to silence the rest.

Joe Doe let out a slow exhale. “Dead end. Literally.”

“Patience,” Suisen said.

On the far side of the fountain, three zombies huddled together. They weren’t drinking, but staring intently at the ground in front of them. Suisen followed their gaze.

A patch of cobblestone bore stains darker than the rest—rust-red, with faint scorch marks radiating outward. The air above it carried a residue of heat, long since cooled but unwilling to vanish.

The zombies stared at it like survivors unable to look away from an unhealed scar.

“Fire,” Tenbuyer murmured. He leaned down, studying the pattern. “Recent? Or… unnatural?”

He drifted higher for a better vantage. “Unnatural heat leaves a signature. Contained, but volatile. Something burst here.”

Joe Doe tried again. “Did you see it? What caused this?”

One of the staring zombies jerked at his voice, as though struck. Lips trembled, refusing words. Then, with a shudder that rattled its chest, it raised a single finger skyward.

The gesture shook with dread. The arm dropped, limp, a moment later. Its head bowed as though crushed by its own memory.

Joe Doe craned upward. The sky above was a flat sheet of gray. “Up? What does that mean? Something fell? Flew away?”

“Or descended,” Tenbuyer said, scanning the rooftops, eyes sharp for scorch or shadow.

Suisen shifted his gaze between the burn-mark and the zombies who’d already gone slack again, cups rising once more to parched lips. Their silence said more than their gesture.

“This mark is a clue,” Suisen decided aloud. “Something powerful manifested—or broke free—right here. They remember enough to fear it, not enough to name it.”

Tenbuyer’s eyes narrowed toward the street that wound outward from the square. “The scorch lines suggest a path. Could lead to the outskirts… or the cliffs.”

Joe Doe sighed. “So the market gives us witnesses too broken to speak, and a burn mark pointing vaguely ‘up.’ Not much, but something.”

Tenbuyer’s lips curved faintly. “In a village called Freefall, even ‘up’ carries irony.”

But Suisen didn’t linger. His eyes had already caught the faint trail—the scorch marks didn’t stop at the fountain. They bled into the cobblestones, stretching away like a malignant vein toward the village’s edge.

“This is our path,” he said. His tone left no room for debate. “We follow it. Now.”

Tenbuyer and Joe Doe traded a glance—equal parts apprehension and resolve—before stepping into line behind him. The silence of Freefall Village closed in tighter, as though the village itself wished they hadn’t noticed the trail at all.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View

The path narrowed, the air thinning as they neared the cliffs at Kuzunaga Village’s edge.

Joe Doe adjusted his footing on the uneven stones, his voice low. “It feels like we’re being led right off the Netherworld’s edge…”

Suisen’s eyes rose toward the clouds. They sagged low and gray, swollen with a silence too deliberate to be natural. The air itself grew heavier, tinged with ozone so sharp the hair along his neck prickled.

It wasn’t just quiet, but it was a held breath. A pressure straining to break.

And then it snapped.

A vast shadow sliced across the belly of the clouds. Another followed in perfect symmetry, twin streaks of menace.

“Above us,” Joe Doe whispered.

From the heavens descended two colossal Zmeu, (1) Twin Dragons of the Carnage Dimension. Their wings cut the sky with hissing force, horns long as streets, faces streaked with red and black markings. Molten and onyx scales burned in the dim light as they circled each other in spirals of death.

One exhaled a heat so dense the air itself bent; the other’s breath glazed stone with frost.

“They’re the scorch mark’s source,” Tenbuyer muttered, hovering for a clearer view. “Naamah’s map is accurate. Living Infernal Treasures indeed live in Kuzunaga Village.”

“Stay calm,” Suisen said, eyes narrowing. “Observe first. Then act.”

The Zmeus roared together, a thunder that shook the cliffside. The fire-breather struck first, its maw spilling flame.

Joe Doe flung himself aside, barely escaping the blaze. Tenbuyer shot upward, beating wings drawing the creature’s focus. Suisen’s hand fell to the Zenchi Kintoki. The Demonic Katana shifted fluidly into the Shingetsu form, silver-blue rippling across its edge like liquid moonlight.

The three fell into motion without discussion. Joe Doe’s speed bought them space. Tenbuyer dissected patterns midair, his voice sharp with clipped instructions. Suisen anchored them with precise and measured strikes.

“Left flank!” Tenbuyer barked. “The ice Zmeu’s wing joint is exposed!”

Joe Doe sprinted along the cliff, dodging jagged stone, and unleashed a searing blast at the weak point. The Twin Dragon shrieked, staggering.

Suisen leapt at the opening, blade arcing silver-blue across the ice Zmeu’s chest. Frost split and cracked along its scales, the beast recoiling.

Then the rhythm changed. The Twin Dragons moved in tandem now, flame and frost spiraling into one catastrophic descent.

“Their rhythm is too tight! Unpredictable!” Tenbuyer’s voice strained, for once edged with desperation.

But Suisen’s gaze narrowed in calculation. His hand moved to his sleeve, smooth and certain. A strip of cloth slid free, and he tied it over his eyes.

“Yorukaze,” Tenbuyer breathed.

Joe Doe’s throat tightened. “Then we’d better match him, and fast.”

Suisen stood still for a single breath. Then his aura sharpened, stance lightened. He no longer reacted; he anticipated. His body swayed like a reed catching the wind.

“Stay close to my rhythm,” he said. His voice was even. Absolute.

The Twin Dragons dove. Suisen stepped aside a fraction before talons raked earth, his blade rising into the fire Zmeu’s exposed belly. He pivoted seamlessly, sweeping away the ice Zmeu’s breath, scattering frost into mist.

Joe Doe’s pulse thundered. “He’s moving like… like he already knows.”

“Exactly,” Tenbuyer snapped, already adapting, calling out aerial cues. “Right side, Suisen! Ice Zmeu banking!”

Without looking, Suisen lunged left, blade catching the wingtip as it cut too low. The Twin Dragon howled. Joe Doe surged forward, blasting its weakened joint with scorching force.

Step by step, strike by strike, their movements wove together. Suisen’s blindfolded precision bent chaos into rhythm. Tenbuyer’s tactical calls trimmed waste. Joe Doe’s speed stitched every gap closed.

The fire Zmeu faltered first, slamming into the cliffside with its wing broken. The ice Zmeu shrieked, trying to shield its twin.

“Now!” Suisen commanded.

They struck in unison—Joe Doe’s rapid blasts, Tenbuyer’s barrage, Suisen’s slashes.

The Twin Dragons collided midair, their wings shattering against each other. They fell in a crashing storm. One melted into slag, hissing against stone. The other froze solid, brittle scales splintering to shards.

Silence returned, broken only by the soft crackle of cooling rock.

Suisen untied the blindfold, tucking it away. His breathing was steady, his gaze sharp. He studied his companions—measured first, then approving. “Impressive. You both adapted the instant I shifted rhythm. That is rare.”

Tenbuyer’s half-smile was faint but real. “Teamwork beats raw strength. Joe Doe and I have had practice… but with you, it clicked.”

Joe Doe exhaled hard, still flushed from the fight. “I didn’t think anyone could fight like that blindfolded.”

Suisen didn’t answer immediately. His eyes lingered on them. Tenbuyer, already cataloging the lingering energy, murmuring about Carnage Energy's residues. Joe Doe, scanning the perimeter with faint sensor-hum, sharp and protective.

In them, Suisen didn’t just see allies. He saw cornerstones. An Ambassador of a new Hinomoto would need more than words—he would need eyes that read the unseen, a shield that anticipated danger. And here, in the ashes of Twin Dragons, he glimpsed that foundation.

He filed the thought away. Later, he would write to Master Knot, and if she approved, he had another proposal meant for Joe Doe alone, one he would present when retrieving the Butterfly Hairpin.

“Let’s return to the village,” Suisen said at last.

Both nodded.

“We warn the others. See if they uncovered clues of their own.”

They turned from the scarred cliffs, heat of molten slag warming their backs for a heartbeat before the damp cold of Kuzunaga reclaimed them.

The silence that greeted them wasn’t weighted anymore. It was simply silence, an empty page waiting for what came next.

Chapter Text

From Ao's Point of View

Ao’s footsteps echoed on the slick tiles, each splash reverberating through the cavernous bathhouse as she entered with Cannonline at her side.

Mist curled from the steaming pools, winding around their ankles like living tendrils. The scent of mineral water carried an undertone of metal, old and sharp, as though the place itself exhaled through every crack in the stone.

Female zombies—mostly Zombie Maidens—floated listlessly in the pools. Their hollow eyes tracked the newcomers, movements jerky but purposeful, as if stirred by some current beneath the surface.

Whispers drifted in the steam, their vibrations brushing against their skin like invisible hands.

“Why are they staring at us?” Ao muttered, tilting her head as the mist swirled across her shoulders.

“Maybe it’s been a long time since anyone alive set foot here,” Cannonline answered. Her tone was calm, but her gaze flicked at every ripple with soldier’s caution.

A muffled thump echoed from the men’s side.

“That’ll be Gatty,” Cannonline sighed, resignation softening her voice. “Probably having a… discussion with the zombies.”

Ao laughed under her breath. The sound rang bright against the silence, rippling through the mist. For one strange heartbeat, all whispering stopped—then resumed, more hushed than before.

They slipped into the water. Instantly, the pools stirred. Ripples spread outward, not from their movement but in recognition, as if the water itself sensed them.

“Think it’s some kind of Haunt Spring massage?” Ao asked, wonder coloring her voice.

Cannonline shook her head slowly. “No siphons. No channels. This isn’t mechanics. The water is… carrying something.”

Ao brushed her fingers across the surface. The vibration thrummed back at her like a muted voice. She and Cannonline swam toward the center, where the pulsing was strongest.

The whispers grew louder. Zombies raised trembling fingers, pointing to cracked pipes, fissures along the stone rim. Not language, but instinct guiding them toward something hidden.

The bath’s heartbeat quickened, matching their breath.

“Suit up, Ao. I want to test a resonance,” Cannonline said, already pulling the reintegrator close.

She tapped the cracked tile beside her. The sound plunged deep, far deeper than stone should allow, echoing through the pools.

Ao struck the surface with her Demonic Fist, each blow steady, rhythm beating like a second heart. The water answered, shivering as steam thickened around them.

“It’s reacting to us,” Ao said, awe and unease mixing in her voice. “Our rhythm. Our breath. Even the zombies… they’re pointing at the weak spots.”

“Yes.” Cannonline’s jaw set. “It feels like Naamah’s hand is in this.”

A cold shiver ran through Ao. If true, the entire bath was a snare.

The pools trembled. Mist thickened into grotesque faces that warped and dissolved. The zombies froze, their whispers strangled into silence.

“We can’t force it,” Cannonline warned. Her calm voice anchored the rising dread. “Push too hard, the whole pool erupts.”

“Then we guide it,” Ao said, centering her breath. “One step at a time.”

They moved together. Ao’s voice carried rhythm with short and deliberate phrases, less words than pulse. Cannonline’s reintegrator struck tiles in counterpoint, weaving pattern through the air. The bath responded, shadows crawling toward their harmony.

The zombies shuffled closer, hollow eyes glinting faintly. They swayed in rhythm, trembling hands nudging the energy into place. Ao lifted her Demonic Fist in acknowledgment, her silent thank-you mirrored in their gaze.

Then the pools roared. Tiles cracked, water surged, and a hum pressed against their skulls like the earth itself was breathing.

Mist coalesced into a delicate silhouette. For an instant, the true form of the living Infernal Treasure towered above them. Twin buns. Black headwear marked with a single ornament. An ofuda scarred across the forehead.

Ao’s pulse spiked, but her voice stayed steady. Together with Cannonline, she funneled the surge back into order.

Water spiraled upward in shimmering columns. Shadows stretched, convulsed, then shattered into smoke.

Ao’s Demonic Fist pulsed with her heartbeat, faint light guiding the collapse. Cannonline’s taps dragged the resonance down to calm.

The surge broke. The pools quieted. Mist softened into pale, drifting wisps.

From the surface, a Shirofune rose, scarred by faint streaks of Carnage Energy red and black markings, their veins crawling weakly across its flank.

Cannonline knelt, brushing its skin. “It hasn’t spread far,” she murmured, tools already flashing in her hands. A soft hiss filled the bath as the veins shriveled and died.

She exhaled, sweat gleaming on her brow. “Done. Ao, it's your turn.”

Ao steadied herself, body aching from the strain. She stepped aside as a Pai-chan (1) convulsed, her soul detaching from the Infernal Treasure’s grasp.

The others shuffled close. Their whispers had softened, carrying gratitude. Ao knelt, meeting their eyes. “You helped guide us, didn’t you?”

A few nodded.

“Then you’ll be safe now,” Ao said warmly.

Cannonline lowered her reintegrator. “That went well.”

Ao studied the freed Maiden, brows furrowed.

“What is it?” Cannonline asked.

“Kurogami attacked her like Naamah’s sisters,” (2) Ao said slowly. “But she survived. Could she have escaped death somehow?”

“Considering we found her submerged here…” Cannonline paused. “It’s not impossible.”

Outside, they rejoined Opener.

“What happened in there, Gatty?” Cannonline asked.

“One of the zombies insisted on touching my nekomata ears,” Opener said, irritated.

Cannonline chuckled. “I can’t blame them. They’re adorable.”

Ao rolled her eyes, though her shoulders eased. “If you two start flirting right here, I’ll scream.”

Their laughter rang light, a relief against the lingering weight of the baths.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The entire population of Kuzunaga Village seemed to have gathered in the main square, the chosen meeting place of the group.

A sizable group of demons and zombies surrounded Suisen, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe, who all looked as though they had just fought.

“What do you think happened?” Ao asked Cannonline and Opener.

“Oh, something that made my heart beat faster,” a female voice purred.

Ao turned, already dreading who it belonged to. She wasn’t wrong. Kalivra, (1) one of Naamah’s daughters, had appeared, flanked by Benikage and Sea Again.

“Don’t tell me you came all the way here just to collect male energy,” Ao said, irritation already showing.

“Huhuhu, yes I am. That young boy,” Kalivra said, pointing toward Suisen in the distance with an exaggerated little sigh, “was very happy to help me.”

“He did what?” Ao asked icily, her tone sharpening.

“That’s a demon for you,” Kalivra chanted playfully, eyes glittering with mischief.

“Ao, she’s joking,” Sea Again said quickly, shooting Kalivra a look. “While we go check something with Opener and Cannonline, Kalivra—maybe tell the real reason you’re here before Ao freezes Kuzunaga Village solid.”

As Sea Again and Benikage moved off with Opener and Cannonline, Ao caught them exchanging a glance. Their eyes lingered on Suisen for a beat too long before flicking back to Ao, amusement tugging at their mouths—as though they enjoyed watching her bristle more than anything else.

Ao frowned, unsettled, but forced her attention back on Kalivra.

“Well?” she pressed.

Kalivra tilted her head, lips curved in a sly smile. But before she could answer, Sea Again gave a low whistle and Benikage chuckled quietly. Ao turned just in time to catch them still looking Suisen’s way, some unspoken joke hanging in the air.

“Ahem,” Kalivra said smoothly, reclaiming Ao’s attention.

"I am here at the request of my mother, Naamah, who asked me to alert the inhabitants of Kuzunaga Village of your arrival. But when I arrived, two Twin Dragons appeared in the village, and only part of the population managed to escape before the dragons killed those trying to flee,” she explained.

“And where are these dragons now?” Ao asked.

“Those three already took care of it,” Kalivra said.

“Oh,” Ao said, genuinely impressed.

“And that’s not all. I have an official request from my mother, Naamah, for you. A village not marked on any map, sealed off by the force field of its mountains, so no portal or Nethership can reach it. They’ve sent a plea for help, as their living Infernal Treasure has gone mad and begun attacking them. My mother Naamah asks for your aid. Will you help them?” Kalivra asked.

Ao nodded.

“Very well. I gave your two friends indications for Yukihaka Village. (2) Until we meet again,” she said, blowing a kiss toward Suisen, who hadn’t noticed at all.

The days that followed their departure from Kuzunaga Village slipped into a steady rhythm.

The villagers had prepared them generously for the road ahead—supplies, charms, and a few nervous blessings. As Naamah’s words foretold, Yukihaka Village lay far from any portal paths, and even Netherships could not reach it.

That meant a long march on foot.

For nearly a month, they traveled, crossing rivers that carved through valleys, trudging over uneven mountain passes, and pausing in nameless hamlets for rest. At night, when the fires burned low, Suisen sometimes stared quietly into the embers, his expression unreadable.

Ao noticed the change before anyone else.

At first, Ao thought it was only the exhaustion of the long march, but Suisen’s pauses grew longer, his steps slower. She found herself instinctively adjusting their pace, offering him an extra hand when stepping over rough terrain, subtly nudging him forward when he lagged, though she wouldn’t have admitted it to anyone.

By the time the snow-marked ridges of Yukihaka came into view, Suisen collapsed to his knees in the snow, his breath ragged.

“Suisen!” Benikage rushed to catch him, while Joe Doe steadied his shoulder. His skin burned to the touch, despite the biting cold around them.

Ao crouched beside him, pressing her palm to his forehead. Heat flared against her skin. “This isn’t ordinary sickness. He has a really high fever.”

Her pulse quickened at the thought of how fragile he looked, though she dismissed it as mere concern for his safety. She brushed the snow from his cloak and adjusted it more snugly around him, almost without thinking.

Benikage tightened his jaw. “Then he can’t go on.”

Cannonline scanned the mountain path ahead, then back to Suisen. Her voice was firm. “If we force him, it could kill him. We’ll need to split.”

Silence hung for a moment, broken only by the wind whipping through the snowy pines.

Finally, Sea Again exhaled, resting a hand on the hilt of his blade. “Then we move ahead. Cannonline, Opener, Ao, and I will continue to Yukihaka Village. The rest of you keep Suisen alive until we send for you.”

Ao nodded slowly. “Fine.”

Benikage crouched beside Suisen, wrapping a cloak tighter around the boy. “Leave him to us.”

Joe Doe gave a small, reassuring smile. “We’ll manage. Just don’t take too long.”

Snowflakes began to fall, dusting Suisen’s pale face. His lips moved faintly whispering words barely audible, somewhere between a dream and delirium.

Ao leaned close, catching only fragments: names, and echoes of battles past. A quiet, unnameable tug tightened in her chest. She brushed it aside as mere concern, but the unease lingered, sharp as the wind.

Straightening, she looked once more toward the peaks where Yukihaka Village lay hidden. “Then it’s settled. The four of us go on.”

The wind howled like a warning, carrying with it the promise of something waiting in the frozen village beyond.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The snow-laden peaks of Yukihaka Village emerged through a gray mist, jagged and foreboding like teeth gnawing at the sky.

Even before Ao and her companions set foot inside, a cold unease crawled down her spine.

She glanced sideways. Cannonline clutched her cloak tighter, following just behind Opener. Sea Again walked ahead, one hand resting lightly on the hilt of his blade. The air tasted of ash and old fire.

The village lay eerily silent. Rooftops were splintered, walls toppled inward. Smoke still curled from blackened beams, and snowbanks lay gray with soot. The stench of burned timber and charred flesh lingered heavy in the air.

Then the silence broke.

A guttural roar, heavy as molten rock, erupted from the village square.

From the smoke surged a twisted form of a living Infernal Treasure. Charred iron plates of a Kurofune fused with searing flames, eyes glowing like coals in a dying forge. Red and black markings of Carnage Energy oozed across its body.

Ao’s eyes narrowed. “It’s the same as Asterika and Veliryn and the Pai-chan. (1) Kurogami struck, but didn’t finish the job.”

“Then let’s show her why no one crosses us,” Opener muttered, stepping forward.

Sea Again drew his sword with a hiss. “We strike fast. Ao, cover us.”

Cannonline caught Opener’s sleeve. “I’ll keep the villagers safe. Don’t you fall, Gatty.”

“Never do, my beloved Cannon.” He grinned and kissed her knuckles before launching forward.

Opener’s style was raw, explosive. His fists blurred, hammering molten limbs with thunderous force. Sparks burst with every strike, snow hissing as it melted. The ground cracked beneath the weight of his blows. The Kurofune staggered, but did not falter.

Sea Again moved, in contrast, fluid and precise. His blade traced clean arcs, slipping between gaps in molten plating. Each cut conserved strength, exploiting weakness instead of forcing it.

The living Infernal Treasure roared, molten arms tearing through ruined houses. Beams collapsed. Villagers screamed.

Cannonline darted past Ao, guiding them to safety. “This way! Move!” Her voice cut through the chaos, firm but gentle. She hauled children and elders out of rubble, never once breaking her focus.

Opener smashed aside a falling beam, spun, and drove a backhand into the Kurofune’s chest. Iron dented under the force.

“Good opening,” Sea Again said, slipping beneath its guard and cutting into exposed seams. The Kurofune faltered, its movements slowing.

Ao stepped forward, frost swirling in her palms. “Enough.”

Her Demonic Fist glowed faintly as she struck, spears of ice erupting from her fingertips to pin its legs. Steam hissed as heat met frost.

Then she summoned the Demonic Axe. Frost condensed into a massive, glowing blade, its edge shimmering with lethal cold. She swung with both hands, cleaving deep into its chest while carefully avoiding the sealed souls inside its core.

Molten fragments flew, but the living Infernal Treasure refused to fall. One arm swung wide, tearing through another wall, missing Ao by a breath.

Villagers shrieked, scattering. Cannonline pulled two elders clear, her face pale but determined.

“Opener!” Ao barked.

“I’m on it!” His roar carried fire as he vaulted over the Kurofune’s arm, fists blazing. Each strike thundered, bending iron further, a relentless rhythm of raw power.

Sea Again seized the moment, blade flashing. He carved deeper into the molten seams, his precision guided by the cracks Ao’s frost had revealed. His strikes were economical, calm, lethal.

“Now!” Sea Again shouted.

Opener slammed his fist into the weakened chest. Sea Again’s sword followed, plunging through fractured armor.

The living Infernal Treasure wailed, the sound splitting the air, before collapsing into the snow. Ash and frost swirled together, silence reclaiming the square.

For a long moment, only coughing and weeping filled the air. Then, Cannonline knelt beside the fallen Kurofune, her hands hovering above scorched plating. “Still alive… but unconscious.”

Her gaze lingered on its temple, brow arching as if she’d noticed something. Ao opened her mouth to ask, but before the question could leave her lips, villagers pressed closer. Some bowed low, others whispered shaky thanks, soot still streaking their faces.

One elder stepped forward, his grief etched deep. He knelt before Ao. “We had lost hope. For a month it has torn through us. Can you save it?”

Cannonline’s reply was steady, unshaken. “I’ll need at least two days to purge the red and black markings of Carnage Energy that have sunk deep. Once that’s done, Ao and I can restore it as a true demon.”

She lifted her head, taking in the ruins around them—burned homes, splintered tools, food stores turned to ash. Families huddled beneath fractured beams, eyes hollowed by hunger and fear.

“But healing the living Infernal Treasure isn’t enough,” she said firmly. “You’ve endured fire and ruin, but survival alone won’t sustain you. We’ll help you rebuild. Shelter, fire, food. You’ve suffered too much alone. This time, you won’t.”

Relief rippled through the crowd. Some sobbed openly, others dropped to their knees, pressing foreheads to the dirt.

Cannonline’s eyes cut briefly to Opener. With a subtle excuse, he drew her, Ao, and Sea Again a short distance from the villagers.

“There’s something else,” Cannonline said quietly. “The Kurofune had a mass of metal on its temple. As if something had started to grow there.”

Opener frowned. “What? Another cyborg developing anomalies, like Joe Doe?”

“That’s what it looks like. But the growth is in a vital spot for a demon. I can’t remove it for study—not if Ao and I are to perform the ritual.”

Ao exhaled sharply.

Sea Again sheathed his sword, gaze narrowing toward the mountains. “Someone has to return for the others. Suisen still needs care. I’ll bring them here. Opener, stay with Ao and Cannonline. Once Suisen can walk, we’ll reunite in Yukihaka Village.”

Opener wiped soot from his knuckles, smirking faintly. “Count on me.”

Cannonline touched his arm. “Don’t burn yourself out, Gatty.”

“Not while you’re here, Cannon.” His grin was tired, but it held.

Night fell over Yukihaka Village. The fire of battle dwindled to fragile torchlight. Shadows crawled across broken walls, where villagers huddled close, whispering prayers into the cold.

Ao stood watch at the edge of the square. The mountains loomed jagged against the stars, their ridges sharp as blades.

For a moment, the wind stilled. A shiver raced up her spine. Her body lowered instinctively into stance, fists ready.

But then the wind moved again, sliding through the peaks with a faint, ghostly whisper.

A warning only she seemed to hear that Kurogami was growing more dangerous.

And that she might already be watching.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

Far from the battle in Yukihaka Village, fever dragged Suisen into one of the strangest, most nonsensical dreams of his life.

He found himself once again in his old cyborg body, steel limbs clanking with cold precision. But because of some bizarre curse, Fuji, Pirilika, Ceefore, Yeyasu, and Higan had all been transformed into rabbit demons—eerily similar to those hopping around Toto Bunny’s Netherworld.

Higan, her legendary appetite undiminished, hurled herself headlong into a massive pot of curry rice studded with carrots. She burrowed through it happily, ears dripping with rice, her mouth too full to care.

Pirilika rummaged through her unmistakable pink backpack and produced stacks of fluffy fluffcakes, flinging them like festival gifts to no one in particular.

Ceefore, true to herself, went further—tossing explosives into the bubbling curry. Sparks and smoke burst skyward, yet somehow none of it harmed Higan, who simply kept eating, unfazed.

Fuji and Yeyasu, of course, had found a way to quarrel even in rabbit form. Their argument was punctuated with indignant ear-flapping and furious hops.

Before Suisen could intervene, a heavy thud shook the dreamscape—as though something enormous had leapt and crashed down behind him.

He turned just in time to see Ao, transformed into a rabbit-demon, soaring straight toward him.

“No, Ao, nooo!” Suisen cried out, but too late. She collided with him, knocking him flat.

The sensation of falling ripped through him, and he jolted awake, drenched in sweat. The dream shattered, leaving only the dim glow of lamplight inside his tent. Shapes gathered around him came into focus: Benikage, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe.

“It seems our prince has finally decided to rejoin us,” came a fourth voice. Suisen turned weakly to see Sea Again seated in the corner.

Ao, Opener, and Cannonline were nowhere in sight.

“Why is everyone gathered in my tent?” Suisen rasped, gratefully taking the water cup Joe Doe pressed into his hand.

Benikage’s voice was low, steady. “You’ve just experienced one of the less pleasant consequences of being restored as a true demon. Since collapsing outside Yukihaka Village, you’ve been delirious for three days.”

Suisen’s brows knit. Three days? He pulled the blanket tighter—not against the lingering chill, but against the unease tightening in his chest.

The four exchanged a glance. It was the kind of look that made his stomach clench.

“By the way, Suisen,” Tenbuyer said, his tone deceptively light, “you were calling Ao’s name before you woke. Care to explain what sort of dream you were having?”

Suisen froze. Heat flooded his face, hotter than the fever ever had. He shifted under the blanket and dropped his gaze. “…It was nothing. Just a ridiculous fever dream.”

Benikage arched a brow. “Three days of delirium, and the only name you spoke was hers?”

“Strange coincidence,” Sea Again murmured, folding his arms. The corner of his mouth twitched with amusement.

Joe Doe, uncharacteristically silent, half-covered a smirk with his hand.

Suisen groaned and yanked the blanket over his head. “You’re all impossible.”

“Impossible, perhaps. But not blind,” Sea Again said, calm but cutting. “The body speaks what the mind refuses to admit.”

Suisen lowered the blanket just enough to glare at him. “There’s nothing to tell,” he snapped. His voice was steady, but the burn across his cheeks betrayed him.

He knew exactly what they were implying. Because it was true. He had felt it, admitted it privately long ago. But that didn’t mean they had the right to pry into it—not now, not yet.

The silence stretched. Benikage finally sighed. “Either way, you’re awake now. That’s what matters. You’ll need your strength. The others are still in Yukihaka. The battle wasn’t an easy one.”

The name Yukihaka cut sharper than their teasing. Suisen pushed himself upright, body trembling with weakness. “Then the living Infernal Treasure—?”

Sea Again’s expression darkened. “Defeated. But the damage is heavy. We’ll remain to help with the rebuilding.”

The words pressed on the tent like a weight. Even Tenbuyer’s composed mask slipped.

Suisen drew in a slow breath, steadying himself. His fever haze lingered, but his resolve burned clear. “Then we go.”

Joe Doe tilted his head, voice measured. “You’re barely standing. Rest today. Tomorrow you can read the letter that arrived while you were unconscious.”

Another glance passed between them.

Benikage rose. “At dawn we leave. For now, food.”

When the tent finally quieted, Suisen let his head fall back. The thought of facing Ao after that dream—and after whatever nonsense he might have muttered in fever—tightened his chest. Yet hesitation wasn’t an option. His duty led to Yukihaka. His heart… could wait.

Alone, he unsealed the letter. Master Knot’s neat hand filled the parchment: Suisen’s proposal was not only feasible, but already implemented. The rest detailed the price to be paid.

“Good thing I managed my wages back when I was Foreseen Magistrate,” Suisen muttered, folding the letter shut.

He leaned back, eyes drifting to the dim corner of the tent. The image of rabbit-Ao resurfaced, colliding into him with unstoppable momentum, wild and absurdly soft. A smile tugged at his lips before guilt buried it.

He had felt even in the dream the foolish leap of his heart.

“Ridiculous,” he whispered, though the heat creeping up his neck betrayed him. And he knew he would carry that impossible image with him, alongside the weight of duty and the path to Yukihaka.

Some things, he realized, could not be controlled.

Not even by a fever dream.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

Yukihaka Village was still scarred from the battle.

Splintered rooftops leaned at odd angles, blackened timbers jutted like jagged teeth, and the acrid tang of ash lingered in the cold air. Shards of tile crunched beneath Ao’s boots as the wind slipped through hollow walls, carrying the stale scent of smoke and charred earth.

Four days had passed since the living Infernal Treasure was subdued, and Cannonline and Ao restored the soul within to its demon form.

Now a male samurai lay inside a ruined house turned makeshift hospital, his body stretched on a tarpaulin. The collapsed roof allowed shafts of pale sunlight to slice through the gloom, striping across taut straps that bound his wrists and ankles.

His frame quivered in their hold. Low, guttural whimpers leaked from his throat, each sound stabbing at Ao’s chest. The bindings were for keeping him from tearing his own skin in fits of terror. His eyes darted wildly, never settling, as if shadows themselves were blades.

Ao swallowed hard. She wanted to help, but sorrow tangled with fear. She had no skill yet for easing suffering this raw.

Cannonline crouched beside him, steady hands adjusting the straps with practiced gentleness. Opener stood guard at the doorway, fists loose but ready, gaze cutting to every flicker of movement.

Ao whispered, “What do we do? We can’t keep him like this forever.”

Cannonline’s lips pressed tight. “There isn’t a simple answer. When he was bound as a living Infernal Treasure… something inside him fractured. Healing that will take time.”

Opener’s eyes narrowed toward the street. “And outside? How are the villagers holding?”

Before Ao could reply, movement stirred beyond the threshold. Familiar shapes came striding through the rubble: Suisen at the front, with Joe Doe, Tenbuyer, Benikage, and Sea Again following close behind. Their steps felt steady, anchoring against the ruin.

Even the air shifted when Suisen drew near—his calm presence cooling the sharp edges of the moment. A butterfly fluttered above him.

“They’ve come,” Ao murmured, relief loosening the knot in her chest.

After speaking briefly with an elder at the doorway, Suisen stepped inside. His nod to Opener carried warmth despite his serious eyes.

“It’s good to see you standing, Suisen,” Opener said quietly.

Ao found herself smiling.

“May I?” Suisen asked. His tone was soft, careful. “I’d like to try speaking with him.”

Opener and Ao moved aside. Joe Doe, Tenbuyer, Sea Again, and Benikage remained outside, waiting in silence.

Inside, Suisen studied the bound samurai for a long moment without speaking. He gestured gently for Cannonline to ease the sedative. Then, at a measured distance, he knelt—posture open, unthreatening.

The samurai’s eyes snapped open. The instant he sensed someone new, his body jolted. His breath broke into shallow rasps, wrists straining the straps, lips twitching as though words trembled on the edge but refused to form.

Suisen stayed still. He did not speak, only met the demon’s gaze when it flickered toward him. His hands rested light in his lap.

A violent shudder shook the samurai. His arm jerked upward, bound fingers scraping toward Suisen’s sleeve. Instead of striking, they clung. Trembling.

Suisen didn’t pull away.

“…I did something terrible,” the samurai whispered at last, voice cracked and raw.

Silence answered him. Suisen’s patience drew the words free.

“My wife… my child…” His throat closed. “I killed them when I was a living Infernal Treasure… I cut them down with my own hands.”

The confession ripped through the ruined room. He curled inward, sobs wrenching his shoulders.

Ao’s stomach twisted. Cannonline’s hand steadied her shoulder. Opener’s jaw locked.

Suisen leaned closer with just presence. He gave no absolution, only the quiet certainty that he would not leave.

The sobs tore through the room in ragged waves, echoing against cracked walls. Slowly, they dulled. The demon’s grip slackened on Suisen’s sleeve. His hands dropped to the floor, tentative, a small gesture of trust.

“Yes,” Suisen said at last, voice soft. “You are not abandoned. Not now. Not ever.”

Cannonline breathed, barely audible. “He’s listening…”

Suisen nodded slightly. “He hears that he is not alone.”

The samurai’s eyes, still clouded with grief, fixed on Suisen’s calm. The cries dwindled to murmurs, almost a lull. For the first time, his breath steadied.

Opener exhaled. “I didn’t think… guidance could feel like this.”

“Some battles aren’t fought with fists,” Cannonline murmured.

Ao watched every shift. She saw the breach Suisen’s quiet patience had opened in the shattered soul before them. In that moment, she vowed to keep learning—not only from Opener’s strength but Cannonline’s care as well—so that when her own path carried her into the United Netherworlds, she too could heal the broken.

By the time Takemaru asked for the restraints to be removed, he had gained enough control to walk, eat, and speak without acute fits.

When he tried lifting tools, his hands shook. He whispered apologies before forcing himself forward. Each tremor grew shorter—first steadied by others, then by his own refusal to yield.

As days stretched, he joined the reconstruction. Hammering, lifting, repeating. The rhythm of work held him in the present.

Yet shadows lingered. Nights were hardest. Certain sounds still made him flinch.

Winter fell sharp and relentless. Smoke curled from half-rebuilt chimneys. Two months passed as Yukihaka was rebuilt board by board. Takemaru endured, stable enough for daily life, though true healing remained a long path beneath the Dark Sun.

When the group prepared to resume the Grand Journey, heavy snow swept the mountains, sealing the roads and forcing them to wait three more months.

Joe Doe, unfazed by cold in his cyborg frame, volunteered to scout. Through Cannonline’s communication system, he reported after two months that Maboroshi Village (2) needed help.

Then silence.

By the time the snow melted and the mountain path opened, worry gnawed their steps. The second turn of the Dark Sun of the Grand Journey had begun under the shadow of Joe Doe’s disappearance.

Arc Five — Grand Journey 2.0 Part Two — End

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

Just before setting off again on the Grand Journey, Ao’s birthday had been celebrated. That also meant Suisen’s first turn of the Dark Sun as a true demon was drawing near.

No matter how often they asked him what he wanted, Suisen always shook his head, choosing instead to spend his time training with Sea Again and Benikage.

Sometimes Takemaru joined. He always asked first—his voice steady but his eyes betraying unease—saying he wanted to learn coping techniques, to live normally again.

When the four gathered, the hours melted into the sound of blades clashing and quiet talk of breathing, meditation, and focus. Steel rang like a metronome, punctuated by silence where stillness itself became its own lesson.

Later, Ao would discover that Suisen had begun writing to Takemaru as well, just as he had with the five demons of Tensei Village (1).

Meanwhile, Ao pushed through double training sessions with Opener. She refined her Demonic Fist techniques, each punch, block, and stance drilled into her bones with relentless rhythm. She tried to mask her grin whenever Opener sighed, pretending to be exasperated by her drive.

Sometimes, as she glanced outside the window, snow drifted in lazy spirals. Soft flakes at first glance, yet her eyes caught the odd shimmer as some twisted in the air like fragile white butterflies.

Cannonline and Tenbuyer had their own project—countless experiments to pry open a portal and leave Yukihaka Village early. Each attempt fizzled, collapsed, or sparked harmlessly into the air, leaving them muttering and starting again.

Then came the day Ao secretly dubbed the Suismonic Birthday.

She found Suisen standing in the corridor, his calm mask nowhere in sight. His face was flushed, his composure frayed, while Tenbuyer hovered above, wings fluttering, chirping in tones Ao couldn’t decipher.

Before she could even ask, Suisen lunged, his usually measured steps replaced by raw instinct. Tenbuyer squealed and darted away, flapping frantically down the hall.

Ao blinked, frozen. Awe and exasperation tangled in her chest. In all the chaos of the Netherworlds, she had never seen Suisen like this.

She muttered under her breath, “I should be taking notes… purely for research.”

From Suisen’s Point of View

“Are you sure Master Knot will keep the hairpin for a whole month?” Tenbuyer asked again, dragging out the words with mock innocence.

“Yes,” Suisen replied, jaw tight. “In my letter I explained I won’t reach Tamasu Village until then, and I sent a sum for the trouble.” He tried to keep his voice level, but his patience frayed with every syllable.

“I bet the hairpin will look amazing…” Tenbuyer’s eyes gleamed with mischief.

Suisen stiffened. “And?”

“Oh, nothing. Just that Joe Doe and I can’t wait to see Ao’s face when you finally hand it to her.” (2)

Suisen inhaled, and counted to ten. “Try it, and you won’t make it to dawn.”

Tenbuyer fluttered back but his grin only widened. “That glare—you look just like a certain dragon demon utterly protective of his beloved daughter…”

“Tenbuyer.” Suisen’s voice dropped into a low warning.

“What? I’m only saying you’re fitting right into family dynamics!”

That was the last straw. Suisen abandoned meditation and restraint and lunged. Tenbuyer shot away with a shriek, wings a blur.

From Ao’s Point of View

“Who would’ve thought the paragon of calm could lose his temper like this?” Cannonline said lightly, stepping up beside Ao.

Ao sighed. “This is… worth remembering.”

“Let’s follow them, Ao. I still need Tenbuyer for the portal experiments,” Cannonline added with a chuckle.

They rounded the corner in time to see Tenbuyer pinned against the wall, wings spread wide in panic, Suisen advancing with the Zenchi Kintoki drawn.

“Suisen, let him live,” Cannonline said evenly.

Suisen snorted but lowered the blade.

“Cannonline, I love you so much right now,” Tenbuyer squeaked, launching himself into her arms. She caught him, startled by his sudden clinginess.

Then a shadow stretched across the corridor.

Opener stood with his arms crossed. His expression was unreadable, but the weight of it pressed the air thin.

“Tenbuyer,” Opener said, his tone calm but edged. “I believe you can fly on your own now.”

“O-Of course! Just showing my gratitude. Purely professional gratitude!” Tenbuyer stammered, peeling himself off Cannonline and hovering at a safe distance.

“I expected your first demonic birthday to be calmer,” Ao said with a sigh, approaching Suisen. “But… happy Suismonic Birthday.”

Suisen’s irritation melted. A faint glow touched his features.

“Ao, you’re a genius!” he declared, and before anyone could react, he grabbed Cannonline’s hand and tugged her along.

Cannonline laughed. “I see I’m surrounded by so much love today.” She let herself be pulled, disappearing from sight.

Opener and Tenbuyer exchanged baffled looks. Ao only smiled, warmed by the moment. She couldn’t help wondering how Suisen managed to stay composed most of the time.

From Suisen’s Point of View

“Cannonline, I have two requests for my first demonic birthday,” Suisen said once they were out of earshot.

Cannonline arched a brow. “From me?”

“You’re the only one I can ask. When you regain portal access, I’ll need one opened in secret to Tamasu Village before we meet Joe Doe.”

Cannonline’s lips curved knowingly. “And let me guess… this involves Ao, and a village known for its jewels?”

“Cannonline…” Suisen warned.

“Fine, fine. And the second?”

“I commissioned an orb that must be infused with a special feature.”

“You already know what you want to do with it, don’t you?” she asked.

Suisen nodded. “I’ll explain when the orb is ready.”

“Then it’s a deal.”

Present Day – At the Dojo

Raiji leaned forward, eyes wide, practically glowing. The thought of Suisen—his stoic and disciplined big brother—acting like that was beyond imagination.

“You mean… you kept both birthdays? The day you became a true demon and the day you were reborn as a cyborg?” His voice bubbled with wonder.

“Two presents every Dark Sun... that’s the coolest thing ever!” He mimed unwrapping gifts, already lost in daydreams.

Suisen waved a hand in front of his face, a faint smile tugging at his lips. “Ao insists on it. I never asked for gifts.”

“Sometimes you’re so boring, big brother,” Raiji muttered, puffing his cheeks.

“Ever consider that if I change my mind, you’ll have to give me presents too—as my brother-in-law?” Suisen teased.

Raiji froze, then shivered dramatically. “Suddenly, I like you boring.”

Suisen burst out laughing. “Remember that when you’re older, Raiji, or I’ll hold it against you.”

Raiji’s grin sparkled with mischief. “Deal. I’ll hold you to it when I grow up!”

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen’s Points of View

After sneaking off to Tamasu Village in secret—with Cannonline’s help—Suisen finally rejoined the group at what, in theory, was supposed to be Maboroshi Village.

But the spot marked on Naamah’s map held nothing but rivers winding into caves and a fog that curled endlessly, swallowing sound and shape alike.

“Do you think the map has an error?” Ao asked, squinting into the haze.

“I doubt it,” Cannonline replied. “Otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to open a portal here.”

“Should we try getting closer?” Opener suggested.

They moved toward the river on the left. Sea Again walked at the edge, when the water rippled and a Sea Monk (1) rose from its depths. A monster not native of Hinomoto’s Netherworld—and unlike the Carnage Dimension creatures they had fought before, it had no red and black markings. Its skin gleamed an odd green, strangely close to the shade of Sea Again’s hair. Opener immediately opened his mysterious journal, scribbling notes.

The Sea Monk fixed its wide eyes on Sea Again. Tears welled as it snatched a long strand of riverweed, blowing it like a horn.

“My son! At last you’ve returned! What took you so long to buy those Sea Demonweeds? Your father was so worried!”

“What a disgraceful son you are, Sea Again,” Tenbuyer muttered.

Sea Again blinked, caught off guard. “Excuse me, but I’m not your son.”

“How can you deny it? We even share the word Sea in our names,” the Sea Monk insisted.

“The logic checks out,” Suisen said dryly. “Welcome home, Sea Again.”

“Hey!” Sea Again snapped.

“Don’t be fooled, he’s not the father. I know him,” Benikage said sharply.

“That makes me wonder,” Opener mused, pen still scratching, “how long have you two known each other?”

“One day like any other—” Benikage began.

“Don’t tell him, Benikage!” Sea Again cut in quickly. “You know how much we could earn selling the rights to the story of our first meeting?” He crouched to glare eye-to-eye with the Sea Monk.

The creature only wailed louder. “Oooh, you broke the heart of my poor wife when you disappeared…”

Sea Again exhaled through his nose. “That’s enough. With all due respect, I repeat that I’m not related to you.”

At once, the Sea Monk’s gaze hardened. Its hand shot toward Sea Again’s belt, aiming for his wallet, but Sea Again slipped aside and struck, sending the creature sprawling.

The body shimmered, dissolving into the form of a Mythic Fox (2).

“We should have guessed, given the village’s name,” Cannonline remarked.

“But even Nine-Tails aren’t native to Hinomoto,” Ao said, brows drawn.

“Considering their skill with illusions,” Cannonline replied, “it wouldn’t surprise me if they’ve always lived hidden in this Netherworld.”

Sea Again tapped his sword hilt. “Should I wake this sleeping beauty and force him to tell us where Maboroshi Village is?”

“We can’t guarantee he’d tell the truth,” Benikage countered.

While they debated, Opener’s gaze lingered on the fog rolling around the rivers. His ears twitched, his expression sharpening.

“Quiet for a couple of minutes,” he said. Removing his hat, he sat cross-legged, listening with his two demonic ears and his two nekomata ones.

“Tenbuyer. Scatter your poisonous spores into the center of the mist.”

“On it.” Tenbuyer flapped forward, wings beating.

The spores swirled outward, catching in the fog. Slowly, the haze thinned, shapes swimming into view—roof tiles, crooked fences, lanterns. An entire village emerged, as though it had been sleeping under a shroud.

“You did an excellent job, Opener,” Suisen said.

But Opener didn’t answer. His eyes lingered on the houses with unease.

“I don’t like this,” he muttered. “We just broke through a barrier that refined, and no one has attacked us.”

“Then we should prepare for a fight,” Ao said, decisive. “Let’s go inside and search for Joe Doe.”

From Suisen's Point of View 

The streets lay empty. Not abandoned, but scarred—walls gouged with claw marks, scorch lines across the dirt, as if the battle’s echoes hadn’t yet faded.

“Joe Doe! Where are you?” Ao’s voice rang out, joined by the others.

They noticed the villagers surrounding them too late.

“Leave,” ordered a White Fox (3), authority rolling from him like frost. His bearing marked him clearly as chief.

Opener stepped forward with a diplomat’s calm. “We don’t mean harm. We’ve come seeking a friend, Joe Doe, and to help you return any living Infernal Treasures to their lives as demons.”

The chief’s eyes narrowed. At last, he nodded. “If it is the Infernal Treasure you seek, then I will take you there. But this ‘Joe Doe’… I have never heard the name.”

They followed him through the hushed streets. Villagers trailed behind at a careful distance, faces carved like masks, tails twitching with restrained tension. The silence pressed heavier than the fog.

At last, the chief stopped before a shrine half-buried in mist. Inside, asleep, was a Kurofune unit with very faint red and black markings of Carnage Energy.

The villagers bowed their heads as one.

“You see,” the chief said coldly, “this is all we guard. There is no one else here.”

Ao and Cannonline knelt, beginning the ritual.

Suisen, however, glanced down. In the dirt, two sets of cyborg footprints pressed into the earth. One set weathered, softened by time. The other sharp and fresh, as if the walker had just departed.

The chief’s denial replayed in Suisen’s head. The tremor in his voice. The half-second pause before he spoke.

“How long has the living Infernal Treasure been asleep here?” Suisen asked evenly.

The chief’s ears twitched. “Since he arrived and collapsed from the shock of recognizing his kin. He has never stirred since.”

Suisen crouched, brushing a finger over the fresh print. “Interesting. Because these say otherwise. Someone walked out not long ago. And you keep calling it he, as though it is more than a cyborg unit to you.”

Unease rippled through the villagers. Their tails lashed, but the chief’s face held rigid. “You presume too much, stranger.”

Suisen rose, arms folding. He cast a look at Ao and Cannonline, still bent in focus.

“Stop the ritual,” he said. His voice cut the silence like a blade. “The chief isn’t telling us everything.”

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View

Cannonline’s hands froze mid-gesture, and Ao’s head snapped up.

“If we stop now,” Ao warned, her voice sharp, “the transformation won’t complete, Suisen. This living Infernal Treasure will stay asleep forever.”

The chief’s fur bristled, tail stiffening like a drawn bowstring. “You will finish the ritual. My son has waited too long to be freed.”

“Your son…” Suisen let the words hang, studying both the still form within the shrine and the chief’s rigid stance.

The silence pressed tight. The chief’s jaw held steady, but his tail betrayed him with a flick, brief and involuntary.

“Curious,” Suisen said softly. “If this is your son, then these steps must belong to another. One who left.”

Ears twitched across the crowd. A ripple of unease moved through the villagers like wind shivering through grass.

“You’re mistaken,” the chief said at last, voice rough as stone dragged across steel.

Suisen’s tone stayed level, almost conversational, though his gaze was sharp. “Am I? Then why risk delaying your son’s awakening? Unless… there’s someone else. Someone you want hidden more than you want your own son saved.”

The words struck home. Even without confession, truth trembled in the stillness of the chief’s frame. His tail swayed once, heavy as a verdict.

“Chief,” Ao cut in, her voice steady but urgent, “if our friend is here, we must know. We came to help, not to threaten.”

The chief’s eyes flashed, his voice rasping low. “You cannot help him. He does not want your help.”

He hesitated, ears twitching, every syllable fought through instinct. “He begged us to erase his trail. To guard his silence… even from you.”

The villagers bowed their heads, shame and fear woven into the gesture.

The chief’s gaze locked on Suisen. “There was a battle. A Carnage Bahamut (2) descended. Your… friend, Joe Doe, fought it back. He saved us. Then he asked me to let you enter, because my son could return to a real demon. In return, I swore to guard his secret. What he asked…” His jaw tightened. “I cannot speak of it.”

Suisen folded his arms loosely, though his voice rang with certainty. “So you chose to protect him.”

A pause long as a heartbeat. Then the chief inclined his head once. “Yes. I will not endanger either. My son must awaken, and Joe Doe must remain hidden until the time is right. Stranger, surely you understand.”

Cannonline and Ao exchanged a glance and silent words in a flicker of eyes. Then Cannonline nodded. “We understand. We’ll complete the ritual.”

They resumed.

Suisen kept his gaze on the chief, reading every twitch of his ears, every flicker across his face. When the glow subsided, the Kurofune unit’s shell split apart, falling away to reveal a Heaven Fox (1). His eyes opened, wide with recognition, and locked onto his father’s.

“You did well,” the chief whispered, softer than a prayer.

Suisen bowed slightly. “Now, if you are willing, guide us to where Joe Doe is hidden.”

The chief hesitated. Gratitude and guilt warred across his face as he looked between his son and Suisen. Finally, with a breath like surrender, he raised a hand toward a mist-cloaked path. “Follow. When you see him, you will understand.”

From Ao’s Point of View

“Joe Doe!” Tenbuyer’s voice cracked with joy as he flitted forward. “My friend! You’re alive!”

“Don’t come near!” Joe Doe’s voice tore from the cavern, jagged with fear. His body trembled in the half-dark. His gaze turned on the chief, pained and accusing. “Why did you bring them? I begged you to save your son, and to never let them find me!”

The chief’s face stayed still, but guilt burned in his eyes. “I brought them because I owe you my people’s lives.” With a flick of his hand, a will-o’-the-wisp drifted forward, its glow spilling across the cavern.

The pale light climbed slowly, reluctantly, until it caught Joe Doe’s frame.

Ao’s breath hitched.

A mechanical horn jutted from his right temple, twisted in the likeness of a dragon demoness. His synthetic hair, once pale, had turned pitch black. Red and black markings spiraled across his body—deep grooves seared into flesh and steel alike, glowing faintly with Carnage Energy.

“Those markings…” Benikage whispered, voice tight. “They’re the same recursive runes as Kurogami’s soul.”

Joe Doe gave a hollow laugh, broken in the middle. “I should’ve known. From the moment the sanctum’s walls pulsed (3)… I should’ve known.”

His voice cracked further. “Since I came here, I’ve fought it. Every night, it whispers. Every day, it claws. Sometimes I lose minutes. Sometimes hours.”

His words dropped to a ragged whisper. “And when I wake… I don’t know what I’ve done.”

The cavern held its breath. Only the river rumbled, heavy as a heartbeat, ozone thick in the air.

“I’ve purged Carnage Energy markings before,” Cannonline said gently, tools trembling in her hands. “Like the ones on Naamah’s sisters. (4) Let me—”

“Don’t.” Joe Doe’s head jerked up, eyes wild. “It won’t work, Cannonline. Do you know why Kurogami wounded them and let them live?”

Cannonline froze. “The Pai-chan… and Takemaru too…” (5)

Joe Doe’s body convulsed, his voice splintering. “Because they were experiments. Scraps! But me—” His back arched, a hiss shredding from his throat. “—I’m the finished piece. She doesn’t want me broken. She wants me hers.”

Sparks snapped from his frame. The markings pulsed brighter. His breaths came ragged, tearing from him like blades.

“Do you remember the dream I had when I fainted the second time?” (6) His words stumbled into urgency. “It wasn’t Fuji’s memories. It was Fuyo’s. Kurogami was made from her body… her soul. And now she wants mines.”

His voice thinned to a rasp. “She called them a tool. Seal my soul. Destroy my body if you must. Every day it gets harder to stop myself.”

Ao’s chest ached as though her ribs would crack. She whispered, barely audible: “Then why stay here? Why not leave the village?”

“Because if I left…” His voice splintered. Nails scraped sparks from the stone floor. “If I left, Kurogami would drive me to slaughter every soul I passed. At least here, I had walls. Wards. People to bind me when I broke. I couldn’t risk spreading her corruption.”

A whisper, frayed to pleading: “Better to burn alone… than let her kill every living Infernal Treasures.”

Suisen’s voice broke into the stillness, calm but probing. “And you didn’t try to leave your body, to escape her control? If you lacked one, I could—”

Joe Doe’s roar cut him apart. “She won’t let me!” His teeth flashed, the spirals blazing. “The Carnage Energy binds me. She wants me trapped... helpless—”

His cry cracked into a scream not entirely his own. The markings flared, and his body snapped into violent spasms, gathering into a single predatory lunge.

With a sickening burst, Joe Doe hurled himself at Cannonline.

Time fractured. Sea Again and Benikage moved before thought.

“Benikage, left flank!” Sea Again barked, an order forged by countless battles together.

“On it!” Benikage’s voice rang back, already shifting to cut Joe Doe’s path.

“Cannonline, no!” Sea Again’s next shout split the cavern, his charge a blur as both he and Benikage closed in.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

Ao’s instincts flared. She surged forward, but the scene detonated into chaos. Joe Doe’s strike split the air like thunder, scattering bodies in a violent storm.

Suisen and Opener, closest to Cannonline, hurled themselves in front of her, shielding her with their own bodies. The collision echoed through the cavern, a raw and sickening crack.

Joe Doe staggered, convulsing as Carnage Energy spasmed through his veins. His hands lashed blindly, clawing for anchor, and found Suisen’s chest and Opener’s side.

The spirals carved across his frame flared brighter. The ground beneath them pulsed as if alive, veins of Carnage Energy searing outward into fractures already weakened by the sanctum’s upheaval.

For one terrible instant, the three were locked together—bodies trembling against the current of power—and then the floor gave way.

Stone screamed as it split apart. Molten light bled through jagged cracks, and the ledge collapsed in a spray of shards.

Ao’s hand closed on nothing but air as Suisen, Opener, and Joe Doe pitched backward into the black torrent below.

The river roared, swallowing them whole. Spray lashed her face as she staggered to the edge, the current already sweeping them out of reach.

“No! No!” Her voice broke raw against the roar. She lunged after them, but Sea Again and Benikage seized her arms, anchoring her against the abyss.

Cannonline’s desperate cries tore through the cavern, unraveling into sobs that only sharpened Ao’s terror. Her pulse hammered like the river itself, panic clawing at her chest.

The chief raised a trembling hand. A will-o’-the-wisp flared weakly, its light struggling against the cavern’s oppressive dark.

“It will show you their path,” he said, his voice strained. “But I cannot hold it for long. Each one I summon weakens the village’s illusions.”

Ao clenched her jaw. The chief's words made sense. She forced command into her voice, crushing the fear beneath it.

“Benikage and Sea Again, stay with Cannonline! Tenbuyer, with me!”

Sea Again’s grip on Cannonline tightened, his eyes already scanning the treacherous cavern.

“We’ve got her. You find them,” he said. Benikage gave a sharp nod, shifting into a guard stance before the sobbing Cannonline.

Ao dove into the torrent. The cold struck like knives, dragging her down and spinning her through darkness.

Above, she caught a flash of Tenbuyer’s wings, following the dying glow of the wisp.

From Suisen’s Point of View

“…Suisen… Suisen, open your eyes.”

Opener’s voice dragged him back from the dark. The river had hurled them into a hidden chamber, its walls slick with water, the roar of the current fading behind them.

Joe Doe lay unconscious a few feet away, spirals of Carnage still glowing faintly across his cyborg frame. Opener knelt against the wall, one hand clamped over his left side. Blood leaked steadily between his fingers, soaking the stone beneath him.

“A small price for keeping my Cannon safe,” he said lightly, though his pallor and ragged breathing betrayed him.

Suisen forced himself upright, every breath stabbing through his chest wound. Zenchi Kintoki weighed heavy in his grip, its glow faint, its hum uneven.

Before he could speak, Joe Doe convulsed violently. His eyes snapped open, the markings spreading, spiraling brighter.

“Stay back!” Joe Doe roared. His hands ignited with Carnage Energy, movements not his own, the crackling spirals eager to burst free.

Opener shifted instantly. Despite the blood at his side and the tremor in his limbs, he stepped between Suisen and Joe Doe, fists raised.

“Don’t,” Suisen rasped. “You’re bleeding out.”

“Better me than you,” Opener growled. “Your sword is the only chance to end this.”

The next surge tore across the chamber like a storm. Opener drove into it, fists hammering the torrent apart. The backlash hurled him into the wall, ripping his wound wider. He spat blood, steadied himself, and stepped forward again.

Suisen lifted the Zenchi Kintoki into Shingetsu stance. The arc he summoned was thin and wavering, barely enough to deflect. He tried to steady his breathing, but the rhythm was gone.

His chest burned, his grip trembled. The sword dragged like stone in his hands, its moonlight dim, its arcs crooked. His footwork faltered as though the ground itself clutched his ankles.

He lacked the clarity for Shingetsu. Attempting Kintsume would have shattered his ribs. Yorukaze was impossible as he couldn’t trust his instincts blindfolded, nor follow Opener’s guidance in this chaos.

Every path closed, one by one.

Joe Doe staggered, his voice torn between despair and command. “End it! Before she—”

The spirals blazed, drowning his words. “SUBMIT,” a voice not entirely his own bellowed.

Both arms thrust forward, Carnage Energy coalescing into a tidal blast.

Opener hurled himself into it. His fists shattered the first wave, but the second slammed him into the cavern wall, driving blood from his mouth. He collapsed to his knees, one arm hanging limp.

Still, he forced himself upright—body crooked, arm trembling, but his fists raised.

Suisen’s gaze fixed on him, on his blood, the broken stance, and the rhythm still pulsing through his battered strikes. Pure presence. Pure discipline.

And Suisen understood.

Opener wasn’t clinging to victory.

He only fought.

Chapter Text

From Ao's Point of View

Ao and Tenbuyer moved cautiously through the twisting side tunnel, the will-o’-the-wisp flickering ahead like a frantic heartbeat.

Her lungs burned, every inhale sharp and uneven, and her heart hammered so fiercely it felt ready to tear through her chest.

Images clawed at her mind—Suisen, Opener, Joe Doe—already lying broken in the dark ahead, lives extinguished before she could reach them. Her stomach coiled with dread.

“Tenbuyer, eyes on the light!” she snapped, though her voice shook despite the command.

The Mothman’s wings throbbed with urgency, scattering spores in careful bursts to mark their return path. Each shimmering trace clung to the stone like fragile stars. If the cavern collapsed, these motes would be the only guide for the others to make it back alive.

That weight pressed on him. Every flick of his wings carried precision, every puff of spores a lifeline spun in the dark. The tension radiating from Tenbuyer crawled against Ao’s skin, urging her to move faster, sharper, steadier.

Water dripped from jagged stone, each drop echoing like a hollow warning. Shadows stretched and writhed across the tunnel walls, alive in the wisp’s light.

The cavern groaned with a low rumble, loose rocks clattering down the jagged floor. Ao’s foot skidded on gravel. The tunnel seemed to draw in a breath of its own, cold air brushing the back of her neck.

The wisp darted ahead, tugging them deeper through the stone’s veins. Ao’s fists clenched so hard her nails bit into her palms. Panic clawed inside her chest, but she crushed it down with grit.

“Hold on,” she whispered into the dark, part plea, part command. “I’m coming. Just hold on.”

From Suisen’s Point of View

The cavern roared with Carnage Energy. Suisen’s lungs seared, each breath tearing like fire through his ribs, and his grip quivered violently around the Zenchi Kintoki.

The Shingetsu arcs of the Demonic Katana faltered in his hands, the blade straining against the chaos as though it resisted alongside him.

Every swing shaved slivers from the torrent, but the flood never relented. Spirals writhed around Joe Doe like living chains, feeding on his torment, always a half-step faster than Suisen’s blade.

He pressed harder, forcing clarity into his arms, forcing will into the Demonic Katana, but the effort slipped like wind through broken fingers. Frustration chewed at his edges. Exhaustion hollowed him out.

Through the storm, he caught flickers of torment in Joe Doe’s eyes. The faint glimmer of a plea to kill him burned behind the spirals, a soul screaming inside the body Kurogami twisted.

Suisen’s chest clenched, a twist of pain that hollowed his breath. He swung again, desperate, but the Zenchi Kintoki slipped in his grasp, the blade nearly ripped from his hands.

His vision wavered, the edges dissolved. His will cracked apart, fragments of ego scattering like broken glass. The certainty that he could cut through everything alone crumbled, leaving nothing but raw failure.

The Demonic Katana shivered in answer. A white-golden hum rose around it, faint at first, then echoing through the cavern like a wounded cry.

The sound trembled, stretched—then guttered out. The glow dimmed, the hum faded, and in his hands remained only silence and a blade suddenly weightless, fragile as breath.

For a heartbeat, Suisen surrendered, while the blade rested light as a whisper against his palms.

And in that fragile moment, the Zenchi Kintoki quivered. Not awakened, but stirring, as if something deeper waited for the call.

From Ao’s Point of View

Every step dragged like stretched time, the tunnel squeezing closer as if aware of her fear. Tenbuyer’s heartbeat thrummed in the air, quick yet steady, pulsing with her own.

Every sound sharpened—the scuff of her feet, the drip of water, the rush of breath—until even silence carried echoes of carnage bleeding from the chamber ahead.

The tunnel spilled open. Ao stumbled to the ledge, and froze. Her stomach hollowed as though the floor had dropped from under her.

Joe Doe stood in the cavern’s heart, wreathed in spirals of blinding Carnage Energy. Each twitch of his fingers threatened annihilation.

The walls cracked, bleeding light, vibrating with a killing rhythm. Before him staggered Opener, fists raised though his body sagged under bruises and blood.

The wisp flickered once, weakly, then dissolved into mist.

Tenbuyer’s voice came tight, wings buzzing. “I’ll fetch the others and the chief. Ao… save my friend. He’s counting on you.”

The desperation in his words coiled around her chest, squeezing her breath. She nodded, but her throat felt locked. Tenbuyer beat his wings hard and vanished, leaving her to the storm alone.

“Joe Doe?” she called, stepping into the chamber.

He turned for a heartbeat. Ao’s Demonic Fist pulsed with light, resonating not just with the battle but with his presence. It was as if Grandpa Mugai’s soul—woven deep inside—ached at the sight of one of his loyal demons enslaved.

Then Joe Doe screamed, torn between despair and Carnage. “Kill me! Don’t let Kurogami use me!” Spirals flared, flinging him forward like a cyclone of fire.

Ao’s grip tightened on the Demonic Axe. “Opener, no!” she shouted, lunging.

Suisen staggered beside her with Zenchi Kintoki, faltering but present. Their weapons met Joe Doe’s strike in midair, sparks shrieking like funeral chimes.

Opener surged into the breach, fists slamming. One blow cracked Joe Doe’s armored plating, circuits spitting molten light. The impact numbed his arm, but he braced firm, refusing to yield despite blood slicking his body.

“How do we stop him?” Ao panted, sweat dripping into her eyes, the Demonic Axe quivering in her hands. The Demonic Fist pulsed again, steady this time—like a heartbeat answering her fear.

Opener’s eyes narrowed, tracking their weapons. Zenchi Kintoki hummed faintly, arcs bending with Suisen’s struggling swings, while the Demonic Fist flashed in synchronized bursts.

Sparks leapt between them, a low hum swelling in the cavern like a vast hidden heartbeat.

“Your Demonic Fist and Suisen’s Demonic Katana are resonating,” Opener said, voice ragged but steady. “Stop forcing them. Watch the pulses—the Zenchi Kintoki's hum, the Zessho Mugai’s light. Let them answer each other. I’ll hold the rhythm. You move with it—not against it—if we’re going to save Joe Doe.”

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View  

The world dissolved into a vortex of malice. Joe Doe had vanished, replaced by a nexus of pure Carnage Energy that surged forward, consuming air, shaking stone, and twisting the ground beneath their feet.

Black and crimson spirals of Carnage Energy erupted from him like molten shards. Dust and rock tore upward into whorls of raw force. The pressure pressed against Ao, Suisen, and Opener. Hatred itself, a corrupted will concentrated into a single, writhing mass.

Through the storm, Opener moved first. His breaths came ragged, wet with strain. Blood traced a crimson path down his side, soaking into his clothes. His body was battered, every step sharp with pain—yet his gaze never wavered.

He did not strike at Joe Doe. His fists carved into the current, breaking the Carnage Energy spirals with measured blows.

Each impact sent ripples through the chaos, fragmenting waves, creating fleeting openings in the storm. They vanished almost instantly, but they gave rhythm in a pattern the Carnage Energy itself could not follow.

Suisen stepped into those openings. The Zenchi Kintoki was heavy in his hands, trembling with tension. He did not force arcs, did not fight the drag. Instead, he let go. His body moved with the rhythm Opener carved.

The Zenchi Kintoki seemed stripped of power—its glow gone, its hum extinguished. To the eye it was a mere blade. But in Suisen’s hands it grew weightless, a conduit for presence itself.

The Demonic Katana unmade them. The corrupted streams vanished where it passed, erased in silence.

This was Mushin-no-Ken, the Sword of No-Mind: pure being, weapon and wielder indistinguishable, motion without hesitation.

Denied momentum, the Carnage Energy storm turned on Ao. Pressure slammed into her like a wall, hatred given form. Her breath caught, heart racing. Yet her grip on the Demonic Fist and Demonic Axe did not falter.

The Demonic Fist pulsed—not just with power, but with grief, loyalty, protection. Mugai’s spirit thrummed through her, fierce and grounding. In her other hand, the Demonic Axe resonated in harmony, its arcs guiding and shaping.

Ao exhaled and released control. Fear, intent, and hesitation were gone. She became a vessel.

The Demonic Fist poured waves of calm into the chaos. The Demonic Axe traced arcs that carried those waves, opening channels for them to flow. Neither destroyed nor crushed, but their force gave the storm passage.

They listened. Each pulse, each vibration, each flicker of resistance directed their motion. The weapons ceased to be tools of destruction. They became instruments of restoration.

From Joe Doe came a cry, faint beneath the roar.

“Stop me… please.” His voice was frayed, yet true. For a heartbeat the Carnage Energy spirals faltered, flickering like dying embers.

Opener struck again. Blood streaked the ground beneath him, but he pressed forward, each blow anchoring rhythm for the others to follow.

Suisen moved like water through the spaces cut open, his blade tracing silent arcs with only motion. Each pass dissolved the Carnage Energy's corruption, leaving no trace.

Ao moved with the pulse of the Demonic Fist and the arc of the Demonic Axe, her body echoing Mugai’s spirit. Her strikes carried memory, purpose, care. She guided the storm’s rage into streams that could be borne, transformed pain into current, fury into flow.

Together, the three became one. Opener carved the openings. Suisen erased the Carnage Energy's corruption. Ao harmonized the flow, shaping it into order.

The Carnage Energy spirals writhed, collapsing in on themselves, until they shattered, fading into drifting motes of black and crimson light. The cavern seemed to breathe out. Silence fell.

Opener sank his fists into the stone one last time, body trembling. Sheer will alone kept him upright.

Suisen lowered the Zenchi Kintoki. The state of Mushin-no-Ken ebbed away, leaving a tide-pool calm in its wake and a deep, lingering ache.

Ao felt the Demonic Fist pulse softly against her palm, a final message of gratitude and sorrow. Then the glow dimmed, leaving only exhaustion and steadiness.

In the chamber’s center, Joe Doe staggered. His eyes were clear. The Carnage Energy spirals that had once glowed across his frame were scorched and still.

He sank to his knees, battered but breathing.

Ao, Suisen, and Opener exchanged a single wordless glance, exhausted. They had not only survived. They had preserved Joe Doe.

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View

Opener sagged to one knee, every line of his body etched with exhaustion. Blood streaked his fists as they tapped one last faint beat against the stone floor, a fading echo of the rhythm that had carried them through.

“It’s done,” he rasped, voice rough but steady. His role as anchor and guide was complete.

Suisen let out a long breath, tension unwinding. Mushin-no-Ken thrummed awake in him, its Zen detachment, more than philosophy, now was presence, rhythm, inevitability. He no longer wielded a blade. He was the blade. Calm within motion, pure action given form.

Ao lowered her Demonic Axe and Demonic Fist. Her grandfather Mugai’s spirit still pulsed through her, resonant and steady. She hadn’t just fought—she had synchronized, guided, liberated. Her dual weapons, now joined in evolved harmony, could channel and shield, could hold the will of other bound souls without fracturing.

Her gaze flicked to Opener. Without his strength and teaching, none of it would have been possible. He caught her eyes, weary but proud, and let the faintest smile cross his lips.

Joe Doe knelt in the wreckage of his broken body. His voice was weak, yet calm, threaded with gratitude.

“Thank you.”

The Carnage Energy that had enslaved him was gone. His soul, stripped free, lingered intact, though his vessel was failing fast.

Suisen crouched before him, sharp-eyed but quiet.

“You’re not going to hold that body much longer.”

“I’ve possessed plenty before,” Joe Doe rasped. “I can just… find another.”

“And keep drifting?” Suisen’s words cut softly. “Living only in borrowed time, borrowed shells?”

Silence answered him.

“I commissioned something,” Suisen said at last. “An orb. With Cannonline’s help, it can anchor your soul to a demon body. One of your own, for the first time.”

Joe Doe stared, disbelief flickering in his gaze. “And if I take it?”

“You’d still be free,” Suisen said evenly. “But I’d ask you to stand with me. When I become Hinomoto’s Ambassador, I’ll need more than politics. I’ll need people like you. Like Tenbuyer. Both of you, by my side.”

The offer weighed in the air, heavier than steel.

“And… if I refuse?” Joe Doe asked.

Suisen’s lips curved faintly. “Then you’ll drift on. Still an ally. Just not… the comrade I imagine.”

Joe Doe’s reply came soft, almost fragile. “I’ll… think about it.”

Hurried footsteps broke the moment. Sea Again, Benikage, Cannonline, Tenbuyer, and the chief rushed in, voices tangled with relief.

Cannonline embraced Opener before kneeling beside Joe Doe, Tenbuyer hovering at his other side with eyes already wet. Sea Again helped lift Opener to his feet while Benikage steadied him.

“Thank goodness you’re all safe,” Sea Again breathed.

For a heartbeat, relief filled the cavern like clean air after smoke. Then Benikage’s voice cut through, quiet but careful.

“Cannonline… can you repair his body?”

“…No.” Cannonline’s tone was gentle, but final. “This body won’t last. It’s shutting down.”

Tenbuyer broke into sobs, his wings trembling as the chief laid a hand on him.

Joe Doe turned his dim gaze toward him. “Hey… moth-brain.” His voice cracked, but carried a spark. “Stop crying. Looks like… I’m getting a promotion.”

He managed a glitching smile at Suisen. “Isn’t that right… Boss?”

The word “promotion” froze Tenbuyer mid-sob. “A… promotion?”

Joe Doe’s eyes lifted, already fading. “Suisen. Does the chosen body… have to be Hinomoto-born?”

Cannonline’s eyes lit with understanding before Suisen could answer. “No. I was reborn as an angel, remember? With Celestia’s lore of souls, we’ve made this possible. You have a choice—unique, but limitless.”

Joe Doe exhaled, decision burning through his fragility. “…Then I choose. In Veldime, there’s a class called Beast Masters. I’ll take that path.”

Cannonline drew the orb from her satchel. It gleamed alive, not glass or stone but something pulsing with resonance.

Joe Doe pressed it to his chest.

At once, the Demonic Fist throbbed, its core blazing deep azure—the same hue as the orb’s heart. The Demonic Axe chimed, edge ringing like a solemn bell, while the Zenchi Kintoki whispered through the storm like a monk’s chant.

The orb unfolded, spiraling light across the cavern. Spirit threads wrapped around Joe Doe, stripping away the last stains of Carnage Energy. His mechanical shell hissed, cracked, and fell apart, but his soul condensed instead of scattering, whole and radiant.

Ao steadied the flow with her Demonic Fist, Mugai’s spirit guiding her hand. Suisen’s Demonic Katana whispered calm, cutting fear away with each rhythm. Opener, swaying but unbroken, closed his eyes and pulsed the rhythm once more, anchoring the transition.

A silhouette emerged. The Carnage Energy spirals settled.

Joe Doe opened his eyes of a striking blue, the exact shade of Ao’s Demonic Fist's gem.

The cavern hushed. The ritual flame dimmed to a steady glow.

No longer a drifting shadow, no longer a broken husk—before them stood a Beast Savior, pinnacle of Beast Masters. His hand flexed, warm and real, and his voice carried steady for the first time.

“I… am myself.”

The words rang like an oath.

No one moved, until Tenbuyer’s hiccupping laugh broke the silence. Sea Again clapped Benikage’s shoulder with a grin. Cannonline leaned against Opener, eyes shining.

Ao’s gaze, though, strayed for a fleeting moment. From the folds of spiraling light that lingered, a single ember drifted upward, pale and trembling. It fluttered like fragile wings of a butterfly, luminous and white. It circled once before vanishing into the cavern’s dark.

Without a word, Suisen’s eyes followed the same trail. For a brief moment, he and Ao shared silence, watching together. Neither spoke, but the look they exchanged held an unspoken recognition—of endings, of beginnings, of fragile things that refused to die.

And in that quiet, they understood that Joe Doe was no longer a wanderer of bodies. He was a demon with his own soul, ready to forge unbreakable bonds across countless Netherworlds.

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View

The week after the battle unfolded long and quiet. In the infirmary of Maboroshi Village, Ao, Suisen, and Opener moved with the heaviness of bodies relearning stillness, while Tenbuyer provided clothing and everything needed for Joe Doe’s new form.

But Joe Doe could not stay still. With Sea Again and Benikage, he began searching for a weapon. Now that he was a true demon, energy blasts no longer obeyed his call.

One evening, he stopped before a rack of training arms and let his gaze linger on a bow. When his fingers brushed the worn grip, something inside him stilled. The choice was already made.

Cannonline stepped beside him. She took a stance she had practiced since childhood—motion smooth, simple, precise—and drew an invisible string.

Joe Doe mirrored her, clumsy at first, but soon his rhythm aligned with hers. Ao and Suisen exchanged a glance. They finally understood why Mugai had once entrusted Cannonline with the Demonic Bow Zenryo Yoichi, long before it ever touched Pirilika’s hands.

One day, at Joe Doe’s request, the chief Byakuren—the White Fox—placed him under deep hypnosis. Joe Doe hoped to uncover whether, when Kurogami had whispered those half-remembered words, she had left behind any clue about the fifth site.

The chief had agreed without hesitation, and now, at Joe Doe’s insistence, the ritual began.

Byakuren’s voice flowed like a river over stone—low and unbroken—carrying Joe Doe downward into the undertow of his own mind. The others stood silent as his breathing slowed.

His fingers twitched; his shoulders trembled. Then his body locked in place. Byakuren’s words sank deeper, each one a pulse drawing him further inside.

Ao and Suisen watched, unmoving. Joe Doe’s chest rose and fell unevenly, lips moving as though two voices fought to speak at once.

At first there was only a scrape of breath—then fragments surfaced, raw and metallic:

“Ring…”

The sound quivered, heavy as iron.

“Souls…”

A rasp, almost lost to stillness.

“Earth…”

The last word tore free, shaking his frame before silence fell like a stone into deep water.

No one spoke. The fragments hung between them like omens—brittle and incomprehensible—yet charged with the weight of something Kurogami had buried in him.

While Joe Doe lingered in that twilight haze, Cannonline worked quietly in secret. From polished wood and faint soul-threads lent by Suisen, she shaped a bow that shimmered faintly under lantern light. It was not just crafted, but it was woven, the echo of Suisen’s threads bound within its curve.

When it was finished, Joe Doe accepted it as if afraid it might dissolve in his grasp. When he drew the string for the first time, Ao felt a pulse through her chest that the bow was more than weaponry.

The bow’s song reached outward, calling not to strike, but to connect and to summon monsters not as foes, but as companions.

Tenbuyer hovered nearby, wings flickering. “Let me be the first,” he said, antennae trembling. “If it’s meant to call and guide, test it on me.”

Joe Doe’s lips lifted in a faint smile. He nocked an arrow. The string throbbed under his fingers, a heartbeat answering his own.

“Ready, my friend?”

“I’m ready. Show me,” Tenbuyer replied, rising into the air.

Joe Doe drew the bowstring with deliberate care. The bow sang as he released. The arrow didn’t simply fly—it rippled, a slender shaft of spirit-light slicing through the dim, leaving a luminous trail that seemed alive.

It struck the ground a few feet from Tenbuyer. For a heartbeat, nothing stirred. Then the air shimmered; motes of light gathered, spinning like dust caught in a sunbeam.

Tenbuyer’s wings twitched in surprise, and the glow at his thorax flared, pulsing in rhythm with the motes. The spirals coalesced, forming a gentle aura that spread outward.

A Boggart (1) appeared at the edge of the aura, cautious but curious. It circled Tenbuyer once, brushed against him, then paused, neither afraid nor hostile.

Tenbuyer’s wings beat in time with its pace. With each pulse, the bow’s resonance widened. The creature drew closer, guided not by command but by trust.

Joe Doe’s awe showed in the faint curve of his mouth. He drew another arrow, not to strike but to direct. Each nock, each release, carried intention rather than dominance. The Boggart followed willingly, its movements mirroring his rhythm.

Ao felt the brush of their joined energy through her chest, the warmth threading through tension, a harmony that softened everything it touched.

“Tenbuyer…” she breathed, wonder filling her voice. “It’s not just a weapon. It’s a bridge.”

The mothman’s antennae quivered as he hovered, attuned to the soft pull between spirits. “I… can feel it. It trusts me.”

Suisen’s eyes gentled. The Zenchi Kintoki hummed faintly in answer, as if acknowledging the bow’s song.

Joe Doe’s final arrow drifted through the air, then landed softly. The Boggart bowed before fading back into the shadows.

A hush settled.

Everyone exhaled at once, the quiet heavy with realization. The bow was the proof that a weapon that could call, protect, and unite.

Joe Doe had not forged a tool of destruction, but a covenant.

At the heart of that revelation stood Tenbuyer, his wings shimmering with delight. He was the first to be called, the first to answer, and all knew then that the creatures Joe Doe and Tenbuyer would summon in days to come would follow not through chains, but through trust.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

Three months passed—quietly, steadily, like breath over glass.

A tension was growing among them.

Why had Kurogami not reappeared after losing control of Joe Doe? Why, with the marked villages on Naamah’s map dwindling one by one, had there been no counterattack?

A frustration was growing in Suisen, too. Every mystical force in the Netherworld seemed determined to keep him and Ao apart. No matter where they stopped, someone intervened—training, patrols, emergencies. And so the Butterfly Hairpin stayed hidden in his pocket, waiting.

And finally, a melancholy was growing in Opener—subtle, quiet, and perhaps only visible to Suisen. He had started to sit alone more often, staring at nothing, sighing as if the weight of time pressed behind his smile.

One afternoon, while searching for a place to train with the Mushin-no-Ken, Suisen noticed him again. Opener was perched on a rock, shoulders curved, head bowed. For a long while, he didn’t move. Then his hand began to glide across the pages of his battered journal. (1)

Suisen hesitated. He started to turn away, to grant him privacy, but Opener spoke first.

“It doesn’t make much sense to hide it anymore,” Opener said, voice light but weary.

Suisen stepped closer.

“…You’ve written in that journal every night since the start of the Grand Journey.”

Opener didn’t look up.

“It helps me remember,” he murmured. “Helps me… make sense of things.”

Suisen studied the uneven scrawl across the open pages—half-legible, half a tangle of strange metaphors and ink blots.

“What do you plan to do with it?” he asked quietly.

A faint smile tugged at Opener’s lips.

“Maybe publish it. Not under my real name, of course. Just… as a story. Something someone might stumble across and laugh at.”

Suisen raised an eyebrow.

“It may not be well received.”

Opener chuckled under his breath.

“I know.”

The silence that followed felt oddly gentle, like a breeze that didn’t need to fill the space with words.

“Still,” Suisen said at last, “I hope it is.”

Opener smiled faintly. Neither of them could know that someday his journal, chaotic and heartfelt, named Demiyuki, (2) would become the greatest record Hinomoto had ever known.

For now, Suisen only asked if something was troubling him.

Opener’s gaze dropped to his hands.

“I just didn’t expect the Grand Journey to last this long,” he admitted. “And it’s getting harder to accept that when it ends, Cannon and I will return to Celestia and Wahei.”

He hesitated, voice softening.

“I shouldn’t complain. The only reason I can even see her now is because Celestia chose to reincarnate her as an angel instead of a Prinny, (3) after she… well, after she blew herself up to stop Mugai.” (4)

His voice trembled with quiet gratitude. “But getting to share the everyday with her—it’s too precious.”

“Oh, Gatty…”

Cannonline’s voice came from behind them.

Suisen rose, meaning to give the couple space—but before they could say more, another voice purred through the air.

“If all demons were like him, we succubi would be in serious trouble.”

They turned.

Kalivra, Naamah’s daughter, (5) stood with her wings half-furled, smirking.

“What brings you here, so far from Saphira Vale, Kalivra?” Suisen asked evenly.

“Long time no see, boy,” she said smoothly. “I came to deliver my mother’s new request. But first…”

Her eyes glinted.

“Would you spare me a little of your energy? It was a long flight.”

She drifted closer, and Suisen’s hand twitched toward the Zenchi Kintoki.

An arrow thudded into the ground between them.

“Sorry, Ao! I missed,” Joe Doe called, stepping out from behind a tree with Ao (visibly irritated), Tenbuyer, Sea Again, and Benikage, the latter three barely holding back laughter.

Suisen sighed inwardly. Whatever this was, he doubted he’d understand it soon.

“You’re good at finding us,” Ao said coolly.

“The succubus network is powerful,” Kalivra replied, unbothered.

“How else would we share information about new male energy gathering sites?”

“Kalivra, you said your mother Naamah had a request,” Opener interjected, voice firm but calm.

Kalivra turned serious.

“It seems Oboromushi Village (6) has been hiding the presence of a living Infernal Treasure. An Immortal Fox (7) passed through and saw it, reported it to Chief Byakuren, and from there word reached my mother.”

“Tch. So they haven’t given up their old habits,”

Tenbuyer muttered, joining Suisen, Sea Again, and Benikage.

“What’s that supposed to mean, Tenbuyer?” Sea Again asked.

“Nothing,” Tenbuyer said too fast.

Benikage frowned.

“‘Nothing’ doesn’t darken your face like that.”

Tenbuyer’s breath came out sharp, ending the conversation.

The next day, Cannonline prepared a portal to Oboromushi Village—unaware that a secret none of them could have guessed was waiting to be unearthed.

As Suisen followed, his eyes lingered on the journal tucked under Opener’s arm and its ink-stained, disordered, half nonsense.

And yet, for reasons he couldn’t explain, Suisen felt that those scribbles might outlast them all.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

Oboromushi Village rose like a forest of colossal mushrooms, their hollow stems carved into homes for the Winged Warrior clans—Mothmen, Unknowns, and all their kin. (1)

Ao had expected Tenbuyer to feel at ease among his own kind.

Instead, he moved in silence. His wings were taut, his antennae still, the faint rustle of his flight betraying tension more than grace.

The unusual quiet drew glances from the others, but Joe Doe—who seemed to understand what weighed on him—only said, firmly, that they should respect Tenbuyer’s choice not to speak of it. No one argued.

An hour of searching passed with nothing to show. No villager admitted to seeing the living Infernal Treasure. By noon, hunger outweighed progress, and they stopped by a food stall, settling down in the shaded grass of a small park.

Ao’s gaze drifted over the marketplace, where Winged Warrior merchants haggled over bolts of silk and jars of honeyed powder.

“Did you grow up somewhere like this?” she asked Tenbuyer lightly.

A grunt—nothing more—was his answer.

After they ate, Benikage sprawled out on the grass with a contented sigh.

“You’ll be the first to complain of stomach pains later,” Sea Again muttered, arms folded. “Don’t expect me to fetch medicine.”

Benikage was halfway through a retort when a shadow passed over him.

An Unknown descended, wings flaring until she hovered just above his face. She stared for a heartbeat, unblinking, then color rose to her pale cheeks.

“Oh, stranger,” she cooed. “You’re rather handsome with that gray skin and those red eyes, just like mine.”

Sea Again smirked. “Looks like someone’s found you a sweetheart. I’ll leave her to you.”

“Don’t start,” Benikage groaned. “The last time you said that, it ended with—”

He stopped short. The Unknown’s eyes had slid from him to Tenbuyer, and something ugly flickered there. Her teasing softened into disdain.

“Well, cousin,” she sneered. “It’s been a long time.”

“I’m sorry,” Tenbuyer replied coolly. “I don’t recall meeting you, miss.”

Her lips curved in a smile too sharp to be friendly, but she turned back toward Benikage.

Benikage sat up slowly, folding his arms. “Before we go anywhere, I’ve got a few questions.”

She tilted her head, intrigued.

“Can you cook?”

She blinked, then nodded eagerly.

“Can you dance the old traditional steps?”

Her wings fluttered, eyes bright. Another nod.

Benikage rubbed his chin, feigning deep thought.

“I see. But you lack one essential quality.”

The pause drew every eye. Even Ao leaned forward.

“You don’t respect my friend,” Benikage said at last. “So, no thanks.”

Laughter rippled through the group. The Unknown’s blush deepened—now pure fury.

With a hiss, she spun in the air and shot away.

“Freaks,” she spat as she vanished between the mushroom towers. “Just like my cousin.”

Silence lingered.

“It must have been hard,” Opener said softly, “growing up a different color from the other Mothmen.”

Tenbuyer turned, startled. “How did you know?”

“Before she left, she called you a freak,” Opener said simply. “Same word some still throw at me because of my four ears.” (2)

His smile was wry, but Cannonline squeezed his hand in silent defiance.

Suisen’s hand drifted to Zenchi Kintoki, tightening until his knuckles turned white.

Ao’s blood simmered. The idea that anyone would dare insult her spiritual grandfather—Opener, of all people—made her throat burn.

Then a thought struck her.

What if Pirilly had lived the same pain?

Her gaze shifted from Opener to Tenbuyer, and a quiet admiration stirred within her. Both had endured ridicule and still refused to bend.

Opener had risen to become Demmodore.

Tenbuyer had built a life as a successful merchant, even serving as Resale Magistrate—after Grandpa Mugai…

Ao hesitated, recalling what Tenbuyer had once told her father, Pirilly, Uncle Yeyasu, Auntie Higan, Cee, Suisen, and herself at the Infernal Sanctuary.

“Tenbuyer,” Ao said softly, “I know Grandpa Mugai rescued you from a circus, where you were… a spectacle. (3) But how did you end up there? Did someone capture you?”

Tenbuyer’s wings stiffened.

“Some cages aren’t made of bars, Ao.” His voice was calm, but heavy. “I’m sorry. I’d rather not talk about it. Let’s focus on the mission.”

And so they moved on, toward the secondary market.

Ao noticed a poster flapping in the wind. On it, a painted mask was announcing the Annual Event. But before she could ask, Tenbuyer’s wings beat once, sharp and quick, and he flew ahead.

The group walked in silence, close together, while Tenbuyer’s back stayed just a few paces before them—a quiet wall between the team and the truths he carried.

Chapter Text

Present Day – At the Dojo

“I still can’t believe anyone would mock Grandpa Opener for his ears,” Raiji growled, half-drawing his sword as if ready to carve through invisible enemies.

His voice trembled with heat. “And what if… it happened to Mom too?” His grip tightened around the hilt. “If anyone mocked Mom or Grandpa Opener… I’d make them regret it.”

The flicker in his eyes—fierce, protective—was his father Fuji’s fire.

“Raiji, calm yourself.” Suisen’s tone cut clean and cold, leaving no room for argument. “If such a thing ever happened before us, the culprit would already be dust.”

Raiji froze. The authority in that voice left no space for defiance. Slowly, he sheathed the sword. He swallowed hard, then nodded for Suisen to continue.

“Before I do,” Suisen said more quietly, “know that this isn’t easy to recount. These are… sensitive things. Are you sure you’re ready?”

After a long moment, Raiji nodded once. His hand lingered on the sword hilt, but the flame in his eyes steadied.

From Suisen’s Point of View

The rest of that day’s search had yielded nothing.

Evening shadows stretched long across Oboromushi Village, softening the mushroom towers into silhouettes. The group was already discussing whether to camp outside when Tenbuyer finally spoke. His voice was flat, but resolute.

“Let’s take rooms at an inn,” he said. “If my suspicion is right, dawn will reveal the village’s true nature. That’s when we’ll find the living Infernal Treasure.”

Questions followed, but Tenbuyer brushed them aside with a shake of his wings. “You’ll see,” was all he said.

Later, when the inn had grown quiet, Suisen stepped into the corridor. He meant to knock on Joe Doe and Tenbuyer’s door, an idea for late-night training still fresh in his mind.

At the same time, Ao stepped out from her room.

Suisen’s heart jolted. For weeks, every attempt to speak alone with her had been stolen by circumstance or duty. Now, by sheer chance, she was right there.

“Oh—Ao, g-good evening,” he stammered, nerves tugging at his voice. “I wanted to ask if—”

“I’ll kill you! No one touches Tenbuyer!”

The roar froze him mid-word. Joe Doe’s voice—raw, furious—ripped through the hallway. A crash followed: shattering glass, a heavy thud.

The door ahead burst open. Joe Doe staggered out, bow clenched, face shadowed in fury.

Ao and Suisen sprinted forward. Ao reached the doorway first.

She looked inside—and stopped. Her breath caught, eyes wide. She turned toward Suisen, voice trembling but firm.

“Go after Joe Doe!” she said. “Now!”

Suisen hesitated for a fraction—then obeyed.

The Butterfly Hairpin weighed heavy in his pocket as he ran, his pulse hammering. Another chance lost to chaos. Another moment deferred.

From Ao’s Point of View

For a dreadful instant, Ao thought Tenbuyer’s chest would never rise again.

The Mothman lay sprawled on the floor, wings limp, blood pooling beneath him. Broken glass glittered across the tatami, the wreckage of a bottle.

Then—faintly—his chest lifted.

Ao exhaled a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

Cannonline and Opener rushed to his side, their movements quick and practiced. Bandages unfurled, cloth pressed to wounds. Sea Again and Benikage dashed off down the hall, shouting that they would find Suisen and Joe Doe.

Tenbuyer’s eyelids fluttered. His voice came in fragments—something about balances and debts—before slipping back into uneasy silence.

Ao dipped her handkerchief into Cannonline’s basin and wiped the blood from his face. The metallic scent filled her nose, sharp and cold. Each shallow rise of his chest became an anchor; her own heartbeat thundered in her ears.

For a moment, she was a child again, helpless and terrified of losing someone she loved.

From Suisen’s Point of View

Joe Doe was already chasing the culprit—a fluttering shadow cutting through the night sky.

An Unknown, wings beating frantically, weaving between the dim mushroom towers. Joe Doe’s pursuit was relentless.

The bowstring creaked as he drew. Moonlight caught on the arrowhead like a shard of silver.

He loosed. The arrow struck true.

The Unknown tumbled, hitting the ground with a sharp cry. Joe Doe landed hard beside it, seized the creature by the antennae, and hauled it close. His eyes burned with fury.

Suisen skidded to a stop, grabbing Joe Doe’s arm just before the blow fell.

“Let go, Suisen! She’ll pay for this!” Joe snarled, thrashing against his grip.

“Joe Doe, calm yourself! What happened?” Suisen demanded.

“…Tenbuyer’s cousin,” Joe spat. “She showed up at the window. Smashed a glass bottle over him.”

The words hit Suisen like ice water. His grip faltered.

Joe Doe shoved him aside and swung again. The air cracked with motion, but before the strike could land, Sea Again barreled into him, tackling him to the ground, while Benikage pulled Suisen upright.

The night rang with ragged breaths, broken glass, and the low hum of barely restrained rage.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

Joe Doe raged like a storm unbound, every breath drawn sharp and ragged. Yet Sea Again—through sheer force of will or quiet cunning—managed to restrain him, muscles locked, expression carved from stone.

Nearby, Benikage knelt beside the unconscious Unknown, fingers light as he tapped her cheek. “Wake up,” he murmured.

“Are you insane?” Joe Doe’s voice cracked like a whip, hot with fury.

“Benikage’s only waking her,” Sea Again replied, his tone low but steady. “We return to the inn once she’s conscious. Killing a villager—especially before we know what dawn brings—would be reckless.”

The Unknown’s eyes fluttered open. She blinked rapidly, confusion clouding her gaze. Then she saw Benikage, and recognition flashed across her face, instantly giving way to horror. Her pupils shrank.

Benikage’s voice fell like a blade. “Leave. And never return.”

The Unknown stumbled upright, trembling so hard her knees nearly buckled, and fled into the darkness, her wings brushing the dirt with a faint hiss.

From Ao’s Point of View

Dawn broke pale and hollow over Oboromushi Village. Mist clung low to the ground, curling around the mushroom towers as Tenbuyer—still unsteady from his wounds—led them to the main square.

A wooden stage had been raised overnight, its boards raw and damp with dew. Across it stretched a long line of chairs, each with a numbered paddle resting neatly on the seat as silent symbols of transaction.

Slowly, demons gathered. Their silk robes shimmered in the morning light; jewels winked from claws and horns. Their laughter rolled smooth and idle, steeped in arrogance.

The group—save Tenbuyer and Joe Doe, whose faces were unreadable—stood tense at the square’s edge. When the chairs filled, more demons crowded in, paddles clutched in eager hands.

Then, with a flutter of black wings, a Mothman in a bow tie landed onstage.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he boomed, voice slick with charm, “welcome to the annual Freaks Black Auction!”

Applause rippled. His grin gleamed.

“Seeking a servant with three eyes? A juggling zombie to amuse your guests? Then, my dear connoisseurs, let us begin!”

Around her, Ao felt her companions stiffen.

Opener shook his head slowly, disbelief carving deep lines across his face.

Cannonline covered his eyes with a trembling hand.

Sea Again’s grip on his sword whitened his knuckles.

Benikage bit his finger until blood welled.

Suisen stood frozen, breath shallow.

Ao pressed a hand to her heart. Her pulse pounded so hard it hurt.

This couldn’t be real.

Yet before her eyes, demons were dragged onto the stage—bound, displayed, sold to laughter and applause.

Her stomach twisted. Uncle Yey-yey, Auntie Higan… they’d never allow this. They couldn’t possibly know.

But they weren’t here. She was.

The Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai pulsed in rhythm with her heartbeat, and Ao rose to her feet. “Enough,” she whispered, fury trembling at the edges of her voice.

“Ao, sit down,” Tenbuyer said sharply, without even looking her way. His tone could have frozen fire.

“How can you stay so cold in the face of this?” she shot back, stepping toward the stage.

“Ao.” Joe Doe’s voice cut through the noise—flat and commanding—in a tone she had never heard from him before. “Tenbuyer said sit. Do it.”

Her knees went weak. She sank back into her chair, hands shaking so violently she had to clutch her legs to steady them.

Onstage, a Galactic Maiko (1) and a Gray Cell (2) demon bickered over a six-fingered Shaman. (3) Ao barely registered their words. Her eyes were fixed on Tenbuyer’s rigid back, on Joe Doe’s iron expression, on the way everyone around her seemed to breathe through their teeth.

Then came the Wight (4) with ochre skin. And realization struck her like lightning.

Yesterday, Tenbuyer had been called a freak. These captives were called the same—mocked, bought, discarded—for skin, for shape, for birth.

And Tenbuyer… he knew. He’d known of this auction. Sat there, silent. Watching.

Her breath hitched. Grandpa Mugai had once freed him from a circus. And yet… here he sat.

Her mind rebelled. But one look at her companions’ faces told her everything. The same dread. The same understanding.

Tenbuyer had once been bought here.

Before she could speak, the auctioneer’s voice rose.

“And now, our star attraction!”

A Shirofune was dragged forward. His steps dragged, his body swaying like a broken marionette. Carnage Energy red and black markings scored his skin, faintly glowing, disturbingly like Joe Doe’s old ones from Kurogami’s control. Shackles bit into his wrists.

“I knew it,” Tenbuyer muttered bitterly. “Old habits die hard. Fools. They think the markings make him special. They don’t see the puppet strings. If they only knew…”

Joe Doe stood, bow already in hand.

“Prepare to strike once the living Infernal Treasure is sold,” he ordered.

No one argued. Even the air seemed to hold its breath.

The bidding began, climbing fast—voices snapping, paddles slamming, prices escalating into absurdity. Soon only two samurai remained, their offers cutting through the crowd like dueling blades.

The group sat rigid, every muscle coiled.

“Look closer,” Sea Again murmured, alarm in his voice. “He’s trembling harder than before.”

All eyes turned. The Shirofune’s shackled form shuddered violently, limbs jerking with unnatural spasms.

“You’re right,” Cannonline muttered, brows knitting. “If he was sedated… the drug’s wearing off.”

Opener’s hand clamped on his arm. “Then we strike before he loses control. Ao and Suisen, take the left flank—”

He never finished.

With a roar that tore through the square, the Shirofune ripped his chains from their moorings as if they were paper. Iron links clattered like rainfall.

The Mothman auctioneer froze, wings flaring in panic.

“Cannon, evacuate the square!” Opener barked.

The group moved as one—blades drawn, hearts pounding—as chaos consumed the dawn.

Chapter Text

From Ao's Point of View

The possessed Shirofune roared—a guttural sound—as Carnage Energy markings flared red and black across its body, each pulse warping muscle and steel alike.

Sea Again moved first. His blade cut a perfect arc low, aimed to sever the creature’s legs. The Shirofune swung its chain with brutal speed; the clash rang out like thunder. Sea Again was hurled across the stone tiles, skidding hard before twisting back onto his feet, sword raised again, teeth bared.

“Benikage, now!”

Benikage lunged in, twin blades flashing. A precise diagonal slash struck the exposed flank—sparks exploded, but the Carnage Energy red and black markings had hardened like an armor. The Shirofune’s backhand came fast, heavy enough to shatter bone. Benikage slid beneath it, his blade carving shallowly, barely drawing a line of red.

“Not enough,” he hissed.

Opener charged next, movements crisp and furious. His strikes fell like a hammer—one, two, three, four—each blow reverberating through the square. The Shirofune staggered half a step before roaring again and sweeping its arm wide, hurling Opener backward through the stage boards in a rain of splinters.

Joe Doe stood motionless amid the chaos, bow drawn, aura flaring. “Tenbuyer, link!”

Still pale, Tenbuyer spread his wings. Luminous scales shimmered into the air, fusing with Joe Doe’s arrows. Each shot struck true—white fire bursting across the Shirofune’s face, searing its vision.

“NOW!” Joe Doe roared.

The Shirofune reeled, blinded.

Suisen leapt. The Zenchi Kintoki glowed with restrained divinity, his breath dissolving into stillness. Mushin-no-Ken awakened. His blade cut through silence itself, tracing a clean arc across the creature’s chest where the burns flickered weakest.

Ao felt the Zessho Mugai thrum in response, her grandfather’s legacy coiling through her veins. For Tenbuyer’s sake, she let her fury literally crystallize. Frost spiraled around her arm, condensing into a cyclone of glittering shards.

“Wake up!” she cried. Her fist struck the Shirofune’s jaw, the impact cracking chains and scattering ice through the air.

Their combined strike staggered it. For the first time, the creature faltered—half a step back, confusion flickering in its hollow eyes.

Tenbuyer’s voice cut through the noise, raw but commanding. “Suisen! Ao! Cut through it together!”

Joe Doe’s bowstring sang again. “I’ll give you your opening!”

Arrows of light rained down, pinning the Shirofune’s limbs for a heartbeat. Suisen lunged, his blade plunging into the center of the Carnage Energy red and black markings. At the same instant, Ao’s Demonic Fist slammed against the hilt, amplifying the strike in a surge of blue and silver.

The explosion ripped through the square. Carnage Energy flared outward, red and black fire twisting skyward before scattering like dying embers.

The Shirofune dropped to its knees. Chains rattled to the ground. Its eyes cleared—haunted, but free.

Silence fell, heavy and absolute.

Later

While Cannonline tended the red and black markings, tension hung thick among them.

Tenbuyer’s cousin stepped forward, trembling, gaze locked on him. Instinctively, Ao, Opener, Sea Again, Benikage, and Suisen closed ranks around Tenbuyer. Joe Doe’s bow remained taut, the arrow drawn, waiting.

“…If it weren’t for you,” the Unknown whispered, voice cracking, “we’d still have a home.” She turned, wings shivering.

“Niori? What are you doing here?” murmured the Shirofune weakly, eyes half-open.

Tenbuyer froze. The voice was faint but unmistakable.

Niori’s steps faltered. “That voice… Uncle? But... you were dead.”

Cannonline’s hands paused mid-bandage. “His soul was bound into the cybernetic frame,” she murmured. “That’s what made it a living Infernal Treasure. It runs on his essence.”

The Shirofune’s tone sharpened, slicing through the stillness. “You were supposed to run the shop I left you.”

Joe Doe’s face blanched, as if struck.

Niori’s eyes darted between her uncle and Tenbuyer, shame pooling in them like ink. “…It failed. The debts… your drinking left too much behind. I couldn’t keep it.”

Joe Doe’s lips parted, but Tenbuyer raised a wing, silencing him without a word.

“…Ah,” the Shirofune rasped. His dim eyes fixed on Tenbuyer with cold disdain. “So the balance wasn’t paid. Not even after selling off that debt-born freak of a son?”

The words hit like a blade to the gut. Ao’s breath caught. The Demonic Fist pulsed violently at her side, crimson light flaring as if ready to strike. Suisen’s grip tightened around his katana, face unreadable.

Cannonline’s hands froze mid-motion. Every gaze turned to Tenbuyer—horror and pity mingled in their eyes.

Tenbuyer didn’t flinch. His voice came low and steady, iron beneath restraint. “Cannonline. Continue. He needs to be stabilized if we’re to leave.”

“I… I don’t think I can,” Cannonline whispered. Her hands shook.

“I don’t carry debts to Kurogami,” Tenbuyer said quietly. His wings trembled once, then stilled. After a long breath, Cannonline resumed.

When the time came to restore the Shirofune to his Mothman form, Tenbuyer and Joe Doe stepped aside. The man—once father, now cyborg—never asked for his son. As he was led away under Niori’s care, his final glance toward Tenbuyer wasn’t recognition. It was dismissal. A creditor ignoring a beggar.

Ao’s chest ached. She thought of Fuji and of how blessed she was to have him as her father.

The Day After

They walked in silence, the shadow of Oboromushi Village fading behind them. The air felt heavier with every step, though none dared to speak.

After a long while, Joe Doe broke. He let out a low growl and a string of curses that scattered into the wind.

Tenbuyer’s voice came soft but steady. “You know, I always get hungry when I’m debt-free. Shall we eat?”

Joe Doe shot him a glare, half-resentful, half-tired. Then, with a sigh, he tapped Tenbuyer lightly on the head with his bow. “Still the same. You said that every time the old Magistrates met.”

Benikage chuckled. “And Sakoora would burst into song about the menu.”

“While Yayaka and Yubana argued over which dish had fewer calories,” Sea Again added.

“And Akuma turned it into a rant about food and ping-pong,” Suisen said, shaking his head.

Cannonline smiled faintly. “Don’t forget Nitra—always begging Partyasu and Big Bull to stop him before it got out of hand.”

Opener glanced at Ao and quipped, “I feel left out.”

Ao laughed—clear, genuine, unguarded—for the first time since the auction.

Arc Six — Grand Journey 2.0 Part Three — End

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

Once Yeyasu and Higan had been quietly warned about the existence of a Freaks Black Auction, the Grand Journey pressed on.

Days later, beneath a serene blue sky, the group followed Naamah’s map of sites said to contain living Infernal Treasures. The fields stretched endlessly ahead—tall grass rippling under a lazy wind, sunlight glinting off scattered stones.

Then Opener stopped abruptly. He sniffed once, then recoiled with a strangled yowl.

“Ugh—! That smell! Don’t tell me it’s here!”

Ao blinked. “What smell?”

Benikage crouched beside a cluster of faintly glowing herbs. He rubbed a sprig between his fingers, releasing a pungent, minty-sweet aroma that made the air shimmer faintly.

“Inunip,” (1) he said. “Demon Dogs love it. Makes them roll around like idiots.”

Sea Again arched a brow. “And it seems to have an equally strange effect on Opener.”

Opener sneezed so hard his twin tails burst out, fur bristling like bottlebrushes.

“Keep it away from me! I’m allergic! My sinuses feel like they’re being gnawed on by bees!”

Joe Doe smirked. “The great Demmodore Opener, defeated by a weed? If Lord Mugai could see this…”

“It’s not funny!” Opener snapped, voice muffled as he rubbed his twitching nose. “Cannon, the antihistaminic, please!”

Cannonline rifled through her satchel, then grimaced. “…None left, Gatty.”

Suisen straightened. “We can’t leave him like this.”

“We’ll have to resupply,” Cannonline agreed.

“There’s a trading hub to the east... Aonagi Village,” (2) Tenbuyer said. “They should have what we need.”

Suisen nodded. “Then that’s our next stop.”

As the group gathered to move, Sea Again lingered near the field’s edge. A weathered stone marker jutted from the grass—five faint rings carved one atop another, half-swallowed by moss. His gaze lingered, thoughtful, before he turned to follow the others.

Opener sneezed again, louder. “So what are we waiting for? Move!”

Fifteen Minutes Later

The road bent along a cliffside until the sea came into view, a mirror of gray-blue stretching under a sky too still. The air felt heavy, muffled, as if even the wind had been swallowed.

Ao shivered. “It feels… wrong. Like the ocean is holding its breath.”

Tenbuyer’s wings twitched uneasily, but Sea Again was the first to halt. His eyes swept the tide, sharp and wary, as though listening to something no one else could hear.

“The sea isn’t calm,” he murmured. “It’s bound.”

Below them, the village clung to the rocks—a scatter of curved rooftops and smoke rising in thin, unwavering lines. At the harbor, no boats left the bay. Fishermen lingered on the docks, nets in hand but unmoving, their eyes flicking toward the cliffside.

There stood the stones.

Five weathered pagodas, each no taller than a mid-sized demon, scarred by salt and time. They faced the sea like silent guardians. One was broken—the top shattered, fragments lost to wind and tide.

Benikage narrowed his eyes. “Old wards. But if they were meant to guard, why leave them crumbling?”

“Because people here fear the stones more than they trust them,” Sea Again said softly, almost reverent.

As the group descended the path, the villagers stilled. Conversations fell silent. Children playing near the broken pagoda bolted to their mothers, who pulled them inside without a word. The quiet pressed close, thick as fog.

An elder emerged at the base of the slope—bent but steady—white robes stained faintly by salt. His gaze swept across the strangers, lingering on the swords at Sea Again’s, Benikage’s, and Suisen’s sides.

“You travelers should not linger before the Five Pagodas,” he said, voice rough as driftwood. “One has already fallen. We do not tempt the sea further.”

Joe Doe frowned. “The Five Pagodas?”

The elder’s eyes shifted to the broken stone. His lips tightened.

“The Stones of Balance,” he said. “Older than this village. We keep them standing so the sea will sleep. But the broken one…” His words faded into silence, as though afraid to follow their own echo.

Cannonline folded her arms. “And if the sea wakes?”

The elder’s gaze clouded, distant. “Then you will hear the chant beneath the tide. And once you hear it… you’ll understand why no one leaves Aonagi Village unchanged. Their souls hum the same tune as the deep.”

The group exchanged uneasy glances. Cannonline and Opener excused themselves to find medicine, leaving the others in a quiet park overlooking the harbor.

Sea Again remained unusually still. Benikage and Joe Doe demolished an entire jar of sweet-and-sour pickles—Joe Doe’s newfound favorite since becoming a real demon—without his usual commentary about digestion and good eating habits.

It wasn’t until the last pickle was gone that Ao noticed the silence. “Something wrong?” she asked.

“No,” Sea Again said after a pause, his brow furrowed. “Just… remembering.” He quickly smoothed his expression.

Then, turning to Benikage, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer, he asked, “Do you remember the old legend Master Mugai loved?”

The three nodded.

“Ao, Suisen,” Sea Again said, his tone casual but deliberate, “wait here for Opener and Cannonline. We’ll do a bit of… cultural research.”

Before either could protest, the four demons departed down a side street.

Suisen frowned. The setup was too perfect. After countless failed attempts to spend time alone with Ao, suddenly they had a clear hour together—and it reeked of conspiracy.

He refused to fall for it.

So he talked. About the weather, the route, the color of the sea—anything but what he wanted to say. He watched every pause, every flicker in Ao’s eyes, waiting for Joe Doe or Tenbuyer to leap from behind a bush as they’d done before.

Minutes trickled into an hour. The sun shifted, light rippling across Ao’s hair like molten glass. She laughed at one of his awkward jokes, and for a fleeting moment, even the weight of the sea seemed lighter.

Then Opener and Cannonline returned, a small pouch of antihistaminic clutched triumphantly in hand.

Only then did Suisen realize—with a sinking heart—that the perfect chance had slipped away.

He had wasted it all, strangled by his own caution.

He wanted to smack himself… and Joe Doe and Tenbuyer twice as hard for making him this paranoid.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

When Cannonline and Opener returned, she carried a small paper parcel of pills sealed with the apothecary’s crest. Without a word, she handed one over.

Opener removed his hat, ears twitching, and swallowed the medicine in a single gulp. A few ragged sneezes shook through him before they finally eased. With a sigh, he slumped onto the nearest bench, his nekomata tail curling limply out from beneath his clothes.

“Better,” he muttered, eyes half-lidded. “Though I don’t think I’ll forgive any of you for laughing.”

Cannonline rolled her eyes and dropped beside him, arms crossed. “He’ll live.”

Ao giggled. Suisen managed a polite smile, though his thoughts had already wandered to the hour wasted, and the others still gone.

At last, they returned.

Benikage came first, brushing faint streaks of gray-blue sea dust from his palms. Tenbuyer hovered close, wings rimmed with salt crystals that caught the light like shards of frozen glass. Joe Doe followed in uncharacteristic silence. Sea Again trailed last, gaze distant, as if he’d left part of himself by the shore.

Ao brightened. “What took you so long?”

Benikage flicked a glance toward Sea Again before replying, flatly, “Just… cultural research.”

“That’s all?” Suisen asked.

Sea Again’s eyes drifted toward the broken pagoda by the harbor. His silence stretched too long before he spoke, voice low and heavy.

“The balance here is fragile. More fragile than I thought. We should be careful where we step.”

The words fell like stones into still water. Not even Joe Doe laughed.

A prickle crept up Suisen’s arms. He didn’t know what they’d found—only that Aonagi Village was no longer just a stop for medicine. The stones, the silence, the elder’s warning—all pressed like unseen fingers at the edges of something older.

And for the first time in a long while, he almost wished Joe Doe and Tenbuyer really had been hiding in a bush to jump out at him. That kind of chaos was easy. This kind of quiet was not.

That Night

The inn smelled faintly of brine and cedar. Lanterns hissed softly, shadows breathing across the wooden floor. The others drifted to sleep quickly, but Suisen lay awake, Sea Again’s distant stare gnawing at the edges of his thoughts.

He rose to fetch water, padding silently down the corridor. Voices drifted from the veranda. He froze, hand hovering at the frame.

“…not just a broken ward,” Sea Again murmured, tone weighty as the sea.

Benikage’s reply came sharp, hushed. “Then say it. Don’t dance around it.”

A pause. The creak of wood beneath shifting weight.

Sea Again exhaled, long and slow. “I think… one of the rings has already shifted.”

Suisen frowned, pressing closer. His mind flickered back to the stone marker they’d passed in the fields, and the five faint circles etched into weathered rock.

“Impossible,” Benikage whispered, though a crack of doubt ran through his voice. “The Five Pagodas have held for centuries.”

“Held,” Sea Again echoed, voice quiet as the tide withdrawing. “But now one of them is crumbled, Benikage.”

Silence followed. Suisen strained for more, but the two demons said nothing else.

He lingered a moment longer, heart hammering too fast, then withdrew. He didn’t understand what was happening, but Sea Again’s words clung to him like salt mist.

The broken pagoda no longer felt like a ruin.

It felt like an eye.

Back in his room, Suisen lay awake staring at the ceiling. The chance he’d wasted with Ao still burned faintly in him—but beneath it pulsed a colder certainty. Whatever Sea Again had glimpsed, this was only the beginning.

The Day After

Morning broke gray and soundless. Clouds dragged low, smearing the horizon until sea and sky merged into a single, dull expanse.

Suisen rose early, though he hadn’t truly slept. His body felt steady, but his thoughts had spun through the night—Ao’s laughter, Sea Again’s talk of “rings,” the elder’s warning, all looping like waves against stone.

Outside, the air pressed down, too still for a village that lived by the ocean. Fishermen carried nets through the streets, walking quietly, eyes averted. At the harbor, baskets of half-cleaned fish lay abandoned mid-motion, knives still glinting where they’d been dropped.

Ao stood near the upper walkway, gazing out at the gray sea. Her elbows rested lightly on the railing, pale hair stirring in a breeze Suisen hadn’t noticed until that moment.

He hesitated.

“Did you sleep well?”—too light.

“Do you want to know what I heard yesterday?”—too heavy.

He said nothing.

Before he could try, the soft tap of a cane against stone drew his attention. The elder from the day before approached, white robes trailing through the damp.

The old man’s gaze swept across them, lingering on their swords, then on the quiet knowing in Sea Again’s eyes.

“You are not the first outsiders to look upon the Five Pagodas with questions,” he said. “But you may be the first who can truly hear the answer. Do you wonder why we keep them, even broken as they are?”

Suisen swallowed, but stayed silent. Sea Again was already listening, still as a drawn blade.

The elder’s gaze drifted to the harbor. “Because they are not ours to destroy. They were placed here long before Aonagi Village was built. We tend them, we fear them, but we do not touch them.”

Benikage’s voice cut through, sharper than Suisen expected. “Then why are they crumbling?”

The elder did not look away from the sea. “Because balance is not eternal. Something shifts beneath the tide. Some nights, the fishermen hear it first—a sound not of waves, but of a voice carried under them. They say if you listen too long, the tune settles in your bones.”

From the corner of his eye, Suisen saw Ao flinch—her hand twitching toward the Demonic Fist. It pulsed faintly against her skin before she steadied it, forcing the tremor down.

Joe Doe tried for a grin, though it faltered halfway. “What kind of tune?”

The elder turned then, eyes dull as sea-glass.

“The chant of the deep,” he said softly. “A reminder that the Five Pagodas are not monuments. They are doors. And one has already begun to open.”

Silence gathered like fog. Suisen’s skin prickled despite the unmoving air. Ao was still staring out to sea, her expression unreadable—as though waiting for the waves themselves to answer.

And Suisen, once again, said nothing.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

The harbor was unnervingly still. Fishermen carried nets through the streets but spoke in muted tones, their words dying before they fully formed. They avoided one another’s eyes, their movements careful, rehearsed, as if the air itself had turned brittle.

Baskets of half-cleaned fish lay scattered across the docks, silvery scales glittering under the flat light. The sight looked frozen mid-motion, as though the hands that once worked here had simply forgotten their purpose.

A knife slipped from one fisherman’s grasp, splashing into the shallows with a sharp plink. He flinched from the sound as if it were a gunshot, eyes wide with an old, unspoken fear. A little horned girl reached curiously toward the water’s edge, but her mother snatched her back, face pale and tight with dread she didn’t bother to hide.

Ao’s gaze drifted to the sea, unease coiling tight in her chest. Then it happened—not a sound, but a feeling.

Through the Demonic Fist Zessho Mugai, she sensed a vibration, a low pulse that rose through the soles of her feet, humming faintly through the planks beneath her feet.

It wasn’t the push and pull of the tide. It was a deliberate heartbeat older than the village itself.

Sea Again’s shadow fell across the railing. He didn’t speak. His eyes—sharp, knowing—swept over the harbor, the cliffs, the broken pagoda. His brow furrowed slightly, listening to a song only he could hear.

Below them, the water moved wrong.

Ripples folded back against the current, curling into spirals that defied sense—waves following a darker rhythm. Ao blinked, unsure if it was real or a trick born from sleeplessness. But the Demonic Fist pulsed in answer, a deep, sympathetic thrum that made her own pulse stutter in response.

“Ao…” Suisen’s voice reached her, low and uncertain, but her eyes stayed fixed on the horizon.

Something stirred inside her—a chord struck deep within, primal and wordless—pulling her toward whatever called from beneath the surface.

Benikage joined them, crouching at the railing. “You see it,” he said quietly.

Suisen nodded, voice rough. “Yes… but I don’t understand what I’m seeing.”

Benikage’s lips pressed into a thin line. “The Five Pagodas. Something beneath them is stirring. Something that’s waking up.”

The fishermen on the docks froze mid-step. Nets slipped from their hands, forgotten. Heads tilted in eerie unison toward the sea, drawn as if by a single thread.

A faint, high-pitched hum shimmered just above the water—so subtle Ao had to strain to hear it. It wasn’t sound, but sensation: like a needle dragging across her skin.

The villagers paled. The noise, it seemed, was an old memory—a nursery rhyme of terror.

One man muttered a prayer to some forgotten nethergod and fled inland without a glance back. An elderly demoness, seaweed tangled in her hair, traced a complex warding sign with trembling fingers, lips moving in soundless supplication.

Ao’s hand twitched toward the Demonic Fist. The gauntlet felt alive—restless, eager—pressing against her skin like an animal straining at its leash.

Cannonline, Opener, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer arrived, drawn by the palpable shift in the air. None spoke. Even Joe Doe’s usual humor died in his throat. The tremor beneath the tide silenced them all.

Sea Again broke it first, voice calm but weighted. “It has begun. One of the doors… has already started to open.”

The fishermen scattered instantly. Fear lent speed to their steps—nets dragged, excuses spilled, eyes turned anywhere but toward the water that had once fed them. Within moments, the harbor stood empty and still, save for the eight of them.

Opener moved first. He adjusted his hat, composure restored, and strode toward the docks. “We didn’t come all this way to watch from the sidelines,” he said. “Let’s see it closer.”

The others followed, wordless. The pier groaned under their combined weight, the old planks thrumming with that same subterranean pulse Ao had felt through the Demonic Fist. Waves broke just a breath too late, always slightly behind their rhythm—like a song skipping on an old record.

The sea obeyed something unseen, something ancient.

At the far edge, Ao and Suisen leaned over the railing. Below, the ripples aligned into widening circles—deliberate, concentric—as though something vast below pulsed with a steady, powerful force.

Suisen’s breath caught. Ao lowered her hand and pressed her fingertips against the wet wood. The vibration sang up her bones, a discordant melody that set her teeth on edge.

“Do you feel it?” she asked softly, though the question was as much for herself as for him.

Sea Again crouched beside her, placing his palm flat on the dock. “Yes. The second ring.”

“The second?” Suisen echoed, tension threading his voice.

Benikage’s jaw tightened. “The first broke long ago. That’s why the harbor pagoda lies in ruins. But this…” He shook his head, unease flickering in his eyes. “This is new. This is active.”

The hum deepened, rolling through the dock like thunder submerged. Tenbuyer’s wings twitched nervously, shedding a scatter of iridescent scales. “It’s… building.”

Shadows moved beneath the surface. At first faint, like drifting clouds of silt. Then larger, darker—long, sinuous shapes gliding beneath the dock, circling with slow, deliberate purpose.

Ao caught a glimpse of a lidless eye the size of a shield, flashing upward, catching the weak netherlight in its dead, pale gaze. Her body tensed; her grip on the railing tightened until the wood creaked.

Suisen’s hand brushed her arm—whether to steady her or himself, she couldn’t tell.

The dock shuddered violently as something massive brushed the support beams. Water frothed, splitting outward in sharp, intersecting triangles—the wakes of hunters closing in.

Joe Doe’s voice came low, taut. “Those… aren’t fish.”

The hum peaked—a single sustained note—then cut off.

Silence fell.

Then the bubbles began.

One rose first—sharp, lonely—bursting with a pop far too loud for its size.

Then another.

And another.

Soon they streamed upward in ribbons, curling like breath from the deep, like air escaping from lungs the size of houses.

Tenbuyer’s voice cracked. “It stopped.”

“No.” Sea Again straightened slowly, eyes locked on the darkening water. His voice came quiet, certain. “It’s listening.”

The bubbles multiplied, frenzy breaking the surface. Foam churned, concentric circles collapsing into chaos. The sea thickened, its weight dragging the dock downward as if something immense stirred beneath.

Then, from the lightless depths, five colossal shadows surged upward.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

From Ao’s Point of View

Ao staggered, catching herself against a broken post. The wood trembled faintly beneath her palm, and the Demonic Fist thrummed in answer—two rhythms syncing, amplifying, like voices in conversation.

Her breath caught.

It wasn’t the sea that moved. It was something beneath it.

Suisen stepped closer, the Zenchi Kintoki still in his hand.

“Ao. You feel it too?” His voice was taut, but his gaze was steady.

“Yes,” she whispered. “It isn’t stopping. It’s getting stronger.”

The others drew together. Sea Again lowered his sword but did not sheathe it. Benikage straightened, though Cannonline’s hand lingered at his side where she had been binding his ribs. Opener flexed his newly set knuckles with a grunt. Joe Doe lowered his bow but didn’t relax, while Tenbuyer alighted softly beside him, wings trembling faintly.

Then, as if the sea had been waiting, everything stilled.

The waves collapsed inward, folding toward a single point beyond the ruined pier. Circles spread outward from it, vast and impossibly precise—as though carved by an unseen hand.

And from that black center, light began to rise.

Shapes wove upward, lines of radiance intersecting, folding, reforming. A column of four forms emerged:

A sphere—perfect and whole.

A pyramid—sharp and rising.

A crescent—curved and flowing.

A jewel—fractured into countless facets.

Each was distinct, yet together they suggested a structure unfinished, a tower without its base.

The Demonic Fist pulsed in Ao’s hand so hard it hurt.

“The Makai Gorinto,” (1) Sea Again breathed, reverent and grim. “The Demonic Five-Element Pagoda. Just as in Master Mugai’s legend.”

Benikage’s jaw tightened. “Hidden beneath the harbor all along… feeding on imbalance. But one element is missing.”

“Earth,” Cannonline said, her voice low and sure.

“The foundation. The anchor,” Opener added.

Tenbuyer shivered, wings scattering anxious motes of light into the damp air.

“The Midgardsorms…” Suisen murmured, his gaze never leaving the glow. “They weren’t monsters. They were wardens.”

Joe Doe’s hand drifted toward his bow once more, the motion stiff, uncertain. His eyes fixed on the glowing pagoda—shadowed by something more than fear. Recognition.

Ao tilted her head. “Something wrong?”

Joe Doe hesitated a long moment before answering.

From Suisen’s Point of View

“Do you remember the words I spoke under chief Byakuren’s hypnosis?” (2) Joe Doe asked at last, his tone oddly flat.

Suisen nodded, his grip tightening on his Demonic Katana. “Ring, Souls, and…” His voice caught. He turned sharply. “Benikage. Show us the map of the four sealed sites.” (3)

Benikage inclined his head.

Cannonline knelt by the cracked crate where the map lay pinned beneath a stone. She spread it open with steady hands, tracing each mark in turn.

“The cave near the Forgotten Village. The Burial Field. The Collapsed Ravine. The Cliffside. Four breaches. Four rings.” Her gaze flicked to the column of light rising from the sea. “And the fifth is nowhere on this map.”

“But why seal four, only to let the fifth vanish?” Tenbuyer asked, voice hushed.

Joe Doe tapped a knuckle against his bow. “Because without the Earth ring, the circle can’t close. The fifth site isn’t missing. It’s hidden.”

Opener flexed his bruised hands, skin raw but steady. His mouth curved into a grim smile. “So all this time, we’ve been fighting around a hole in the map.”

Benikage hovered his hand above the parchment, finger tracing north, east, south, west. “Four corners. Four guardians.” His hand stilled at the center. “But no foundation stone.”

“Without Earth, the circle cannot close,” Sea Again said.

The words landed heavy, like stones dropped into deep water.

Ao pressed a hand to her chest. “Four seals that I had to contain.”

Tenbuyer’s wings shivered. “If the fifth site is out there, then the battles we fought…”

“…were never enough,” Joe Doe finished, grim. “The door was never fully shut.”

The thought struck like lightning.

From Ao’s Point of View

Ao’s eyes lingered on the luminous forms: the sphere, the pyramid, the crescent, the jewel. Each pulsed faintly, and with every throb, the Demonic Fist in her hand answered in kind.

Her fingers trembled as she reached closer. The pull surged—immense, tidal—like the sea itself intent on claiming her. For one terrible, exhilarating instant, she was certain the Makai Gorinto would respond to her touch—whether to seal, to unseal, or to bind her soul forever, she could not tell.

“Don’t.” Suisen’s voice cut through the pull. Quiet, but steady.

His hand brushed her wrist, firm but gentle, anchoring her. His eyes—calm, unwavering—held hers until she lowered her hand.

The glow rippled once, as though acknowledging restraint. Then it steadied again—silent, inscrutable—encircling them in pale light.

Ao shivered. The Demonic Fist pulsed hard in her chest. For a moment, she felt the same stillness that had come upon her at the Cliffside. Her eyes widened.

“The Cliffside… it was the Void,” she whispered.

“I hear the roar of underground waters,” Sea Again said. “The cave near the Forgotten Village—it was Water.”

“I felt the suffocating Wind in the Collapsed Ravine,” Cannonline added.

“Then the Burial Field must be Fire,” Benikage concluded, voice flat.

Opener exhaled sharply, breaking the silence. “So the pattern’s clear. The Makai Gorinto points to Earth—the place where soil, body, and soul meet.”

“…and only then will the five elements form a ring,” Suisen finished. His jaw was tight, his words precise.

The group fell silent once more—the only sounds the low hum of the sea and the drip of water from shattered beams. The Makai Gorinto’s glow painted their shadows long across the ruined pier, binding them together in its light.

Ao stared into it, her chest constricting.

They had uncovered a truth, but not the truth.

The Earth ring was real.

Its absence was not emptiness but a promise.

Until they found it, every step forward would lead them deeper into a circle unfinished.

Chapter Text

From Suisen’s Point of View

From that moment, the Grand Journey split into two phases. The group pressed on, village after village, restoring the living Infernal Treasures mapped by Naamah—though only a handful remained and Kurogami never appeared. At the same time, they gathered scraps of lore: old monk chants echoing through ruined shrines, half-burned scrolls, and tavern rumors whispered over cheap sake—anything that might hint at the Makai Gorinto.

Most trails dissolved into dust. But once in a while, a fragment fit like a shard into the pattern.

“The crescent—” Tenbuyer gestured with a wing, tracing the curve in air. “It always appears beside vessels: urns, bowls, cups. It’s receptivity—the sign of opening, of being ready to receive.”

“From the realm of souls,” Cannonline added, her voice calm but grounded.

Benikage stooped, drawing a pyramid in the dust with the tip of a stick. “And this shape marks the threshold—the turning point where life leans toward death, or death stirs toward life again.”

Sea Again balanced his sword across his knees, watching the lines. “The sphere is completion—the full arc of life enclosed within the living dimension. No beginning, no end.”

Suisen repeated the words inwardly, fixing them in memory.

“And the square?” Joe Doe asked at last.

Opener replied, voice even but shadowed. “The square is where both realms meet—through the Earth itself.”

Silence pooled between them, heavy and alive.

Then Ao looked upward, as if she could already see the last symbol suspended in the air. “And above them all… the jewel. Unity. Every element gathered into one.”

Piece by piece, their efforts began to take shape.

Kurogami’s choice of four sites—and the Carnage Energy seals laid there—was no coincidence. She had carved a soulcery ring across the Netherworld itself.

But what kind of ring?

Suisen’s thoughts circled the question like wolves scenting prey that would not reveal itself.

How could Kurogami annihilate every living Infernal Treasure through that circle, instead of simply killing them?

Why had she infected Asterika, Veliryn, the Zombie Maiden of Kuzunaga, Takemaru—and even Joe Doe—with Carnage Energy instead of ending their lives outright? (1)

And above all… why had she herself never reappeared since that day at Haunt Spring? (2)

The more they learned, the deeper the fog thickened.

Suisen closed his eyes briefly, the Butterfly Hairpin’s weight warm in his hand. He told himself he was waiting for the right moment—but perhaps the right moment would never come.

When he looked up again, he noticed Cannonline’s shoulders had eased; Ao’s eyes held a quiet joy that hadn’t been there the day before. Opener, though, had folded into silence—not the usual calm of endurance, but something heavier, inward, unspoken.

Three currents pulling apart. None explained. But Suisen resolved to understand each before nightfall.

He sighed, glancing down at the letter from Takemaru—an answer to his inquiry about the Makai Gorinto. Maybe that thread would lead somewhere. But before he could break the seal, a low commotion stirred at the edge of camp.

From Ao’s Point of View

That first month of autumn, the day before Suisen mentioned the letter from Takemaru, another one had arrived—addressed to Ao, Cannonline, and Opener.

Pii-Chan wrote that some bureaucratic mishap had occurred with the registration of Fuji and Pirilika’s marriage in the Netherworld of Wahei, and that their presence was required to resolve it.

From the start, Ao felt something was off.

The marriage had been celebrated in Hinomoto more than a full turn of the Dark Sun ago, and all documents had been dispatched immediately, valid across both Netherworlds.

The next day, Cannonline quietly opened a portal to the Nethership, careful to slip past the comments of the group Ao had nicknamed the “betting quintet”: Suisen, Sea Again, Benikage, Tenbuyer, and Joe Doe.

Fuji and Pirilika themselves met them at the portal. One of Pirilika’s hands rested on her stomach; a nervous, radiant smile trembled across both their faces.

Nothing would ever be the same again.

The next turn of the Dark Sun, Ao’s father would become a parent once more.

Son or daughter—it didn’t matter. The child would be her little sibling, and Pirilika—her Pirilly—would be the mother.

At the news, Cannonline glowed with unrestrained joy. Opener looked as though the air had been knocked from him. The Demonic Fist pulsed once inside Ao’s chest, the rhythm strangely cheerful.

From that moment—even after they left the Nethership—Opener’s silence deepened. It wasn’t distance born of gruffness, but something older, sorrow-tinged, reflective.

When Ao and Cannonline found him sitting alone on a sun-warmed rock outside camp, they joined him quietly.

“What troubles you, Gatty?” Cannonline asked softly. “When our niece or nephew is born, Pirilika will be the same age we were when she first came into the Netherworld… (3) and Fuji will be there beside her.”

Ao smiled, voice gentle but firm. “And I’m sure you’ll be a wonderful grandfather—just as you’ve always been for me.”

Opener exhaled, a sound weighted by centuries. “Ao… may I ask a favor?”

Ao nodded, uncertain but listening.

“Could you give Cannon the coordinates to Mugai’s grave? I would like… to speak with him.”

Ao blinked—startled—but nodded again.

Three hours later, she and Cannonline stood in silence as Opener knelt before the grave, the wind combing through his hair.

And back at camp, unseen by all of them, Takemaru’s letter still lay unopened on Suisen’s bedroll.

Chapter Text

From Ao's Point of View

The mist clung to the blackened shard of stone as if reluctant to let go. The carved letters of Mugai’s name bled into the damp granite, blurred by condensation.

Ao and Cannonline stood back while Opener knelt alone before the grave. His breath left him in a long, uneven sigh—centuries unspooling from his chest.

“Mugai… I don’t know if you’re listening. I don’t even know if I should be talking to you.”

His voice was low, worn smooth by age and restraint.

“I wore your soul on my hand for a long time. Fought as your puppet. Killed as your shadow. Lied to myself, thinking I could steer the madness.

But the truth is… I never beat you.”

A pause. Mist curled between his fingers.

“Fuji did. Ao did. The Netherworld did.”

He crouched lower, palm flattening against the cold stone. The tremor in his voice was so faint that Ao felt it in her chest more than she heard it.

“And now? Now I’m going to be a grandfather.”

His next words were a whisper carried by the wind.

“To a child born of my daughter, Pirilika… and your son, Fuji.”

“He or she will carry my blood. And through Ao—through the Demonic Fist you deemed worthy of her—your soul will live in them too.”

A wry smile ghosted across his face.

“So here’s the irony, Mugai. Your legacy won’t be vengeance. It’ll be a child who doesn’t even know your name, but will carry pieces of you anyway. Pieces I swear to protect.”

He looked up toward the pale peaks lost in mist.

“That’s what family is, isn’t it? Chains we choose to break, and threads we choose to keep.”

His hand fell away from the stone. The air felt lighter.

“You lost your way. I lost mine.”

He straightened slowly, the stiffness of age and battles in every motion.

“But your granddaughter Ao—and her future brother or sister—they’ll build something better than either of us deserved.”

Ao stepped beside him. He didn’t turn, but his voice softened.

“Thank you, Ao… for showing me how to carry him without becoming him.”

Cannonline came forward and wrapped her arms around him. He stiffened at first, then released a deep breath, the tension in his shoulders dissolving.

“Shall we go back to camp?” he murmured after a moment. “I think it’s time to celebrate with the others.”

Cannonline smiled faintly and opened a portal, the light shimmering like a quiet exhale.

From Suisen’s Point of View

For once in his life, Suisen couldn’t think.

The news hit like the flat of a blade to the skull:

Fuji—no, Pirilika—was pregnant. They were going to have a child.

It was absurd and wonderful all at once, almost as shocking as when Higan, swollen with Rekka, had once declared she couldn’t eat sweets anymore. That particular disaster had resolved itself only after the birth, much to Yeyasu’s relief.

And Suisen wasn’t the only one struck senseless.

Tenbuyer and Joe Doe recovered first, blurting out congratulations to Ao, Cannonline, and Opener before diving headlong into speculation about what their Lord Mugai’s grandchild—by extension, Opener’s and Cannonline’s—might be like.

Sea Again looked as though the tide had gone out of him. He leaned on his sword, face pale as moonlit surf.

Beside him, Benikage covered his eyes with one hand, shaking his head slowly, as if the weight of inevitability had just landed squarely on his shoulders.

“This… this is too incredible to be true,” Sea Again muttered, voice thin.

Benikage lowered his hand just enough to glare at the horizon. His jaw tightened.

“Fuji. Of all demons. A child, in the traditional way?”

A short, humorless laugh escaped him.

“I wasn’t prepared for that.”

Sea Again swallowed, his voice cracking. “And yet here we are…”

Suisen could only nod.

Then Tenbuyer, irreverent as ever, fluttered his wings with a grin.

“Well, life really is full of surprises. And soon we’ll find out which of us five guessed the baby’s sex right.”

Joe Doe chuckled and clapped his hands once—like a dealer closing the table.

Ao’s eyes narrowed.

“Wait a second. That’s impossible. We only just told you about the pregnancy.”

Cannonline and Opener exchanged solemn nods.

Joe Doe rubbed the back of his neck.

“In fact… we may have placed this particular wager a few days after you told us about the marriage.” (1)

Ao’s jaw dropped.

“You bet on my dad’s unborn kid?”

“Technically, we were betting on whether Fuji was even capable of fathering one,” Benikage corrected smoothly.

Sea Again groaned.

“Which, frankly, I still find hard to believe.”

Joe Doe tapped his chin.

“And since that question’s been answered—rather decisively—we’ll soon know the winner.”

Suisen had been silent up to now. When he spoke, his tone was flat, almost detached.

“…A boy. And I was the only one who picked that.”

Ao blinked.

“Why are you so sure the baby will be a boy?”

He shrugged.

“Patterns. And luck.”

Ao shook her head, half-exasperated, half-amused.

“You’re incredible, Suisen.”

The quintet burst out laughing. Just like that, the tension cracked; the air lightened. Laughter, rough voices, and the clink of cups rolled through the camp, carrying them back toward life again.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View

Later that evening, as the camp settled into a quiet buzz, Suisen finally found a sliver of solitude.

He broke the seal of the letter and unfolded the paper. The ink gleamed faintly under the lantern light—Takemaru’s script, sharp and deliberate, every stroke a blade.

Dear Suisen,

In my village, the name Makai Gorinto appears only once—on a single, fragmented scroll.

There, it isn’t described as a weapon or a seal, but as a catalyst, possible only through a soul steeped in Carnage Energy.

I do not know what this means. But the elder of Yukihaka Village told me that, in his birthplace—Tsuchimura—(1) further clues may remain.

Each summer, they hold a festival dedicated to the Makai Gorinto.

— Takemaru

Suisen lowered the letter, his gaze drifting toward Ao. She was laughing quietly with Cannonline, her voice soft against the murmur of the campfire.

The words on the page pulsed in his mind—the symbols, the seals, the new village—all spinning around a single, heavy truth.

A catalyst.

Not a seal. Not a prison. Something alive.

The Day After – Early Morning

When Suisen stepped outside the tent, dawn was still pale, the air tinged with smoke and dew.

The camp had the look of temporary peace: Ao teasing Opener while Cannonline tried not to laugh; Tenbuyer fluttering his wings in mock outrage as Joe Doe countered with dry stoicism; Sea Again humming faintly while polishing his blade; Benikage frowning at nothing visible, his thoughts deep in invisible gears.

A fragile calm, earned after the harbor battle—but Suisen knew such things never lasted.

He cleared his throat. The sound was small, yet the chatter thinned. Faces turned toward him—some expectant, others wary.

“I have something to tell you,” he said, raising Takemaru’s letter. “It’s from him.”

That alone brought silence. The circle leaned in as he read.

When he reached the line “not a seal, but a catalyst,” every smile died away.

By the final words—“each summer, they held a festival dedicated to the Makai Gorinto”—no one spoke.

Sea Again was first to break it. “A festival means memory. Tradition. Something still alive.”

“Or twisted,” Benikage muttered, though his eyes gleamed with the light of a strategist sighting new terrain.

Tenbuyer tilted his head, wings rustling. “Either way, it’s more than scraps and riddles. It’s a direction.”

Ao drew her knees up, chin resting lightly on them. The Demonic Fist at her side glimmered faintly, its light matching the pulse of her thoughts. “If the people of Tsuchimura remember anything about the Makai Gorinto, we have to go.”

Opener exhaled through his nose. “We’ve chased whispers, half-burned scrolls, drunken tales in forgotten taverns. Finally, something with a name.”

Cannonline nodded, decisive. “Then it’s settled. I’ll prepare the portal.”

Suisen stared at the letter still folded in his hand. The decision came too easily, too smoothly—but he knew the truth: the path was already laid out.

He glanced up and caught Joe Doe’s unfocused eyes, fixed somewhere far beyond them.

“Something wrong?” Suisen asked.

“…The word catalyst,” Joe Doe said slowly, voice hollow. “It echoes. Maybe from when Kurogami possessed me… (2) if only I could remember.”

The quiet around them turned heavy.

Cannonline said nothing. She simply raised her hands and traced the first sharp arcs of light—the beginnings of the portal.

Late Afternoon

The forest opened to a long slope, and at its base lay a village—modest rooftops pressed close like old friends. Wood darkened by rain, repaired again and again. A temple steeple rose among the cedars, its bell half-hidden by green. Smoke drifted upward in calm ribbons, carrying the scent of rice and herbs.

A painted sign by the gate read:

Tsuchimura — The Pilgrim Rest Village.

Suisen felt the change immediately. The air here wasn’t thick with Carnage residue like the harbor, nor stained by fear like other towns scarred by Infernal Treasures. It was still. Gentle. The silence of a place meant for travelers to lay down their burdens rather than take up arms.

Villagers paused in their work but did not retreat. Some wore plain pilgrim robes; others, the lighter garb of Onmyo trainees and certified monks (3); others still, farmers tending neat terraces of soil. They bowed as the group passed, not with reverence but quiet curiosity.

An elder approached, palms pressed together. His presence was calm as rain.

“You’ve come far,” he said. “Rest here. This village belongs as much to the road as to us—it keeps the travelers’ energy in balance.”

His tone carried the weight of practice, the kind that grows from truth repeated often enough to become belief.

They were guided to a wide porch overlooking the terraced fields, where steaming bowls of rice and miso awaited. The warmth of the food seeped through cold bones more than words ever could. Cannonline murmured thanks, her shoulders easing for the first time in days. Opener ate in silence but didn’t refuse a second bowl. Even Sea Again allowed himself to lean back slightly, though his hand never left his sword.

Suisen sat apart, the Demonic Katana resting across his knees. The calm pressed against him, foreign but not unwelcome. The quiet here wasn’t empty; it thrummed faintly, carrying the weight of all who had passed before.

Chapter Text

From Suisen's Point of View 

As they finished their meal, a young pilgrim gestured toward the temple path. “If your strength allows, you may walk there. Many travelers do. The stones are reminders of those who journeyed but did not reach their end.”

Ao tilted her head, curiosity bright in her eyes. She rose and followed, the others trailing slowly after.

The path wound upward, lined with tall grass and wind-bent cedars. Along its edges stood rows of stone memorials, small and weathered, some etched with simple carvings of waves, mountains, or moons. They were not graves, Suisen realized, but markers—tokens of rest for those who had fallen far from home.

A villager tending the path noticed Ao’s lingering gaze. He bowed slightly. “Travelers who die on the road are given soil here, so their souls may rest. No one is left wandering.”

Ao’s hand brushed the top of one memorial. Her face softened, the tension around her eyes easing. “So even the lost are welcomed.”

The villager smiled faintly. “The road accepts all.”

They continued upward. Suisen kept his eyes low, but when they passed one mound in particular, something made him pause. His step faltered, his breath caught—an unease that stirred not in his mind but in his bones.

The soil was no different from the others, yet the air around it seemed faintly alive, as though something beneath shifted just beyond perception—a vibration, small but undeniable.

He tightened his grip on the Zenchi Kintoki, forcing himself onward.

The group reached the temple gates, where Onmyo Doctors (1) tended herb gardens, drying bundles of leaves and roots in the late afternoon sun. The wind chimes carried a soft, meditative rhythm that wrapped the village in stillness.

For the first time in days, they allowed themselves to rest. But even in rest, Suisen’s hand never strayed far from his Zenchi Kintoki—and his thoughts never left the mound of soil that had stirred beneath his feet, like a soul trying to speak but too afraid.

From Ao’s and Suisen’s Points of View

The first gray fingers of dawn barely touched the village when an Onmyo Master (1) hurried down the slope to meet them. His robe flapped against the morning chill, and urgency sharpened every line of his face.

“Travelers, don’t leave the village,” he said, voice steady but tense. “The river near the eastern terrace… it is disturbed. Currents twist unnaturally, and offerings for the dead—rice, coins, prayers—are being carried downstream only to return to the banks.”

Suisen exchanged a glance with Ao. The words were subtle, almost mundane, but his gut tightened. He sensed the pulse beneath the soil, faintly echoing the unease from the mound the day before.

“Show us. We’ll help,” he said simply.

The group followed the Onmyo Master, descending to the river that curved through the village. Morning mist hovered above the water, a pale shroud over the flowing silver.

The river moved strangely—curling back upon itself in slow spirals, as though recoiling from some invisible obstruction beneath.

Then, from the spirals, five Rivetina (2) ghosts appeared, translucent and twisting, dancing just above the water. Unlike the Midgardsorms, these spirits were smaller, but their presence tugged at the air with palpable tension. Their wails mingled with the river’s murmur, creating a discordant symphony that raised the hairs on Suisen’s neck.

“They are resisting the flow,” Sea Again muttered, observing the restless figures. “Something anchors them here.”

Ao’s Demonic Fist flickered faintly, mirroring the spirits’ pulse. “They are troubled,” she said. “They cannot move on. But it isn’t their fault. Something beneath the earth binds them.”

Opener cracked his knuckles and grinned faintly. “Then we give them a hand.”

The group quickly fell into position. Sea Again and Benikage coordinated, slicing the spirits’ paths with precise sword strikes that disrupted their ethereal forms.

Ao unleashed ice bursts from her Demonic Fist, shockwaves scattering the Rivetina mid-air. Suisen moved fluidly with the Zenchi Kintoki in Shingestsu form, each strike sending the spirits spinning farther from the villagers’ boats and nets, forming temporary soul threads.

Joe Doe’s arrows, tipped with faint light, pierced gaps between their forms, while Tenbuyer’s wings scattered sparkling dust that clouded the Rivetina’s sight, leaving them disoriented and vulnerable.

Though smaller than the Midgardsorms, the Rivetina were relentless. The river churned angrily, reflecting the conflict, and the group realized that driving the spirits back wasn’t enough. They had to find the source.

At last, with a coordinated push, the five Rivetina were driven toward the river’s bend. Ao’s pulse beat in sync with the Demonic Fist, and Suisen’s strikes echoed like hammers on hidden anvils. The spirits howled and shattered, vanishing back into the currents.

The villagers cheered softly, relief etched on their faces. The Onmyo Master bowed low.

“You have done more than exorcise,” he said. “You have returned balance. The river carries souls. When it resists, it is because something beneath the earth refuses to sleep.”

“One thing is certain,” Cannonline said softly, breaking the quiet. “If the earth refuses to hold, then the problem lies beneath. Somewhere below us, where soil and stone meet the hidden currents of life and death.”

Ao’s eyes narrowed. “Then we must see it for ourselves.”

The Onmyo Master’s expression darkened. “There is a place. A cave not far from the river’s source. It has always been avoided by villagers. Few dare enter, for it is said that those who disturb the earth there… awaken the memories of the dead.”

Opener smirked faintly. “Then that sounds like the perfect place for us. Please, lead the way.”

Chapter Text

From Ao's Point of View 

As they approached the cave, Ao saw Joe Doe’s face pale, his hand shooting out toward Suisen, but Suisen was faster. Sweat slicked his brow. Limbs trembling, he surged forward, vanishing into the darkness before anyone could reach him.

They hurried after him, hearts hammering, until the dim light revealed him slumped against a wall. His body sagged, unresponsive. Around him, the cell’s walls were etched in delicate, looping handwriting—a child’s script marking the passage of days, one line after another, each number a silent, haunting echo of time trapped.

The air pressed down, heavy with the weight of something waiting, watching.

For a fleeting moment, Ao felt eyes on her. Something unseen, lingering.

Later – In an improvised camp tent

The group sat in uneasy silence, lantern light throwing restless shadows across the canvas.

Joe Doe’s voice finally broke through, ragged with guilt. “I’m sorry… If I had known this village was so close to the place where Lord Mugai imprisoned him—where he killed Suisen when he was still Ikki Edogawa—I never would have let him come near.”

No one answered. Even Opener’s hands stayed still, Cannonline’s lips pressed tight. The weight of the cave lingered, heavy in the air.

Ao leaned closer, her hand wrapped around Suisen’s. She pressed her palm against his forehead, anchoring him back to the present, while her other hand tightened around his fingers. The silence from the Demonic Fist and in her chest said more than words could.

Present Day – At the Dojo

Raiji’s voice came softly, almost afraid to disturb the memory. “That cave… it was the one where you were imprisoned, wasn’t it?”

Suisen nodded once. Raiji clasped his hand firmly, grounding him. They remained like that for a while, silence a shield between them.

At last, Suisen found his voice.

From Suisen’s Point of View

When the darkness finally began to crack, Suisen clung to the warmth in his hand. At first, he thought it was memory, a trick his mind had made to shield itself.

But the more he reached for it, the clearer it became that it was real.

The warmth pressed steady against his skin, refusing to let go. He forced his eyes open, breath catching as the haze lifted.

Ao’s face swam into view, close enough to see the tension around her eyes. Her lips pressed tight, gaze sharp and unyielding, fixed only on him. Behind her, the rest of the group lingered, expressions caught between concern and restraint.

He blinked, throat dry. Words failed him. All he could do was tighten his fingers around Ao’s, anchoring himself to the only certainty he had in that moment that he wasn’t alone.

Yet even as Ao’s grip steadied him, the shadows of the cave lingered behind his eyes. The walls etched with numbers. The silence that wasn’t silence.

Something gnawed at him. The only proof that Ikki Edogawa had ever existed in that cell were the marks carved into stone.

His brow furrowed.

By all rights, the cave should have been a tomb. But there had been no remains. Only that mound of soil outside, faintly stirring as he passed.

Suisen’s grip on Ao’s hand tightened. He did not speak the thought aloud—not yet. But the question pressed sharp into his mind, heavier than the silence of any prison:

If his bones were not here… then where were they?

From Ao's Point of View

Ao leaned closer, voice soft.

“How are you feeling, Suisen?”

But he didn’t answer. Something pressed at him, unspoken.

“You’re holding something back, Suisen. Tell us,” Ao said gently, firmly.

He turned his head away. “It’s nothing.”

Ao shook her head. “No. It’s something. I can feel it. Please…”

The hush stretched until even Sea Again, normally patient, leaned forward slightly. “Out with it. Whatever you saw, we share the weight.”

Finally, Suisen’s voice rasped out. “There were no bones in the cell. Only the days carved into the stone.”

The words hung heavy, pressing into the air like the shadow of a hand.

Benikage’s frown deepened. “No remains in a prison that should have doubled as a grave? That’s no accident.”

Tenbuyer’s wings twitched, unsettled. “Then the boy’s body—your body—must have been moved. But to where?”

Suisen shut his eyes briefly, then forced the answer out. “The mound outside. The one that stirred when I passed. I think… it holds what should have been here.”

The group fell still. Even Cannonline’s calm faltered, his hand tightening on his knee.

Joe Doe broke the silence. “Then the villagers were right. The earth refuses to sleep. That’s why the river resists.”

Opener’s gaze hardened. “And if the mound is your grave… then it’s not just a memorial. It’s a site.”

Ao’s eyes widened, the pulse of the Demonic Fist quickening at her side. “The missing one. Earth. The last point of the Makai Gorinto.”

A chill settled over the group as the pieces clicked into place. None of them spoke for a long moment, but the conclusion was already written in the stillness between them:

Tomorrow, they would return to Tsuchimura.

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View

The first light of dawn washed the path in pale gold, the fragile quiet making footsteps sound louder than they were. The group moved in a loose line, still wrapped in their own silence after the night’s revelations.

Ao walked close to Suisen, shoulders brushing now and then, as if proximity could anchor her. She had not let go of his presence since he had woken.

Suisen slowed first. His gaze drifted to the side of the path, where the grass caught the morning light in an odd way. Not green, not dew-slick, but edged in faint silver—as if frost had crept in from nowhere.

Ao followed his eyes, breath catching. The blades shimmered quietly, bending under a ghostly breeze that didn’t touch the rest of the field.

“Do you see that?” she murmured.

Suisen crouched, fingertips brushing the silvered tips. The chill clung to his skin, morning air or something more—it lingered. His hand rested a moment, then withdrew.

“It’s beautiful,” he said softly. “It’s like… the ground itself is greeting the day.”

Ao folded her arms, allowing herself a small smile. “Then let's hope it’s a good day.”

Their words were quiet, but heavy. The rest of the group walked ahead, unaware or pretending not to notice.

Suisen straightened, expression unreadable, but his hand found Ao’s briefly, grounding them both. “We’ll know soon enough. Tsuchimura will give us the rest.”

They resumed their steps, the silvered patch falling behind them, but neither looked away until it vanished from sight.

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View

The group had gathered beneath the wooden eaves, the fading sun casting long shadows across the stone courtyard. The elder Onmyo Guru’s robes whispered against the floor as he stepped forward. His eyes were calm, but the weight behind them pressed into the group’s hearts.

“We have much to speak of,” he began, voice soft but resonant. “And little time. You have seen the signs already. The river that resists and the soil that stirs are warnings—echoes of a design broken long ago.”

“A design?” Ao’s voice broke the silence. “A warning of what, exactly?”

The elder Onmyo Guru nodded to her, fingers lifting in small gestures. “Legends say there exist five sites across the Netherworld. Together, they form a perfect circle of the Makai Gorinto… a soulceric ring. A lattice of power meant to bind life itself. The rivers, the soil, the wandering spirits are all entrusted to it.”

Benikage’s brow furrowed. “Five sites? You mean… like nodes of some ancient magic?”

“Yes,” the elder Onmyo Guru said. “And this ring lies dormant… unless a soul bearing Carnage Energy moves within it. If that happens…” His gaze swept across them, and even the air seemed to still. “…the ring can erase all within the Netherworld. Every existence. Every memory. Every shadow of the past. And then, it can be rewritten by the one who awakens it.”

“Erased… rewritten? You mean… reality itself could be… changed?” Tenbuyer asked, her voice trembling.

The elder Onmyo Guru’s nod was grave. “Yes. And it will not ask whether the Netherworld deserves it. It responds only to the power infused into it. The choice is absolute. The consequences… irreversible.”

Opener cracked his knuckles. “So this isn’t just a fight for survival anymore. It’s… creation and destruction in one breath.”

Cannonline remained silent, lips pressed tight, eyes flicking from Suisen to Ao. Joe Doe’s hands fidgeted.

“The ring cannot be awakened casually,” the elder Onmyo Guru continued. “To open the path, a portal must be formed, aided by five Phantoms (1)—spirits bound to the sites. Only then can the entrance to Jigoku Valley (2) appear. There, the convergence will happen. There, the soulceric lattice will align.”

Suisen’s jaw tightened. “Phantoms… And they’re required to make the portal work?”

“Yes. They do not yield willingly,” the Onmyo Guru said. “The Jigoku Valley itself answers only to the lattice. It is both passage and prison, observer and judge. Any who enter must respect the order… or risk being consumed by it.”

Ao’s hand brushed Suisen’s. Her voice, quiet but firm, broke the growing tension. “We’ll face it together. Whatever comes in the valley, we’ll be ready.”

The elder Onmyo Guru’s gaze softened, but his words carried steel. “Remember… the ring is impartial. It does not question morality. It obeys power. And it waits. It waits for the one who dares to awaken it. One soul, one choice, and the Netherworld may end… or be reborn.”

A hush fell across the temple courtyard. Even the wind seemed to hold its breath.

Sea Again finally broke the silence. “So… if the ring awakens, it isn’t just our lives at stake. It’s everything. The river, the soil… even the forgotten spirits.”

Joe Doe’s voice was a whisper. “The mound is tied to the fifth site, isn’t it?”

The elder Onmyo Guru’s eyes lingered on Suisen. “All threads lead here. The mound, the river, the five sites… your presence is not coincidental. But know this: the ring tests the soul as much as it tests the Netherworld.”

The group exchanged glances. Awe, fear, and determination hung thick in the air.

Suisen’s hand found Ao’s again. Their shared gaze said what words could not: whatever the Jigoku Valley held, they would face it together.

The Onmyo Guru’s voice, calm but unwavering, floated above them like a bell in still air:

“Prepare yourselves. The path to Jigoku Valley could open soon. And when it does… there will be no turning back.”

From Ao's Point of View

Joe Doe prepared the arrows he would use with his Beast Saviour powers to summon the Phantoms, while Cannonline and Tenbuyer analyzed how to open the portal.

Ao trained with Opener, while Suisen sparred with Sea Again and Benikage.

Later, when Ao entered her tent, she noticed a note placed neatly on her futon, written in elegant handwriting:

Meet me where the grass begins to silver.

I have something to tell you.

— Suisen

From Suisen's Point of View

The wind was calm that evening. Like everything was holding its breath, waiting for something to change.

Suisen waited beneath the ridge where dusk painted the grass in silver.

When Ao arrived, she didn’t speak.

She just stopped beside him, arms loosely crossed, expression unreadable.

In his hand, wrapped in soft cloth, was the butterfly-shaped hairpin forged in Tamasu Village—the one with the crystal she once carried.

“My Butterfly Crystal… why did you have it?” Ao said, eyes wide.

“I found it the day the Sea Angels attacked you. (3) And I’ve kept it ever since,” (4) Suisen said softly.

He met her eyes.

“I’m still learning what it means to be whole. But when I stand with you… the rhythm becomes clear. My heart doesn’t hesitate.”

He drew in a slow breath.

“I love you, Ao.”

The words settled between them. Not desperate. Not demanding. Just true.

“I don’t expect anything. I just needed to say it.”

Ao took the hairpin gently. She didn’t unwrap it.

“Thank you for telling me,” she said warmly, tucking it into her sleeve.

“Maybe someday I’ll wear it. When the wind’s still enough.”

Neither spoke after that.

The wind moved softly through the silver grass, carrying nothing away.

Chapter Text

From Ao’s and Suisen’s Points of View

Joe Doe loosed five arrows that struck the ground in perfect symmetry.

Where they landed, a circle of light bloomed—humming low, gathering power.

Tenbuyer swept down into its center, his wings scattering spores that shimmered as they fell, fusing with the glowing ring. The air thickened, heavy with the scent of ozone and the taste of impending change.

A faint radiance bled from the Demonic Fist, Zessho Mugai, threads of raw energy unraveling into the circle. At the same time, the Demonic Katana, Zenchi Kintoki, began to hum—low and resonant—its vibration crawling through bone like the heartbeat of something buried deep beneath. Through his grip, Suisen felt inevitability tighten, a pressure that had no mercy and no escape.

The mound stirred. Soil cracked and shifted until the earth peeled back, revealing the fifth seal of Kurogami.

Ao stepped forward, intent on containing it as she had done with the others.

But before she could summon her control, a surge of Carnage Energy lashed out—pure, cold malice.

The blast struck her square in the chest, hurling her backward with a strangled cry. Pain burst through her lungs; the air turned to fire inside her. Even as Suisen caught her, she fought for breath, one hand pressed hard against the burning ache.

Opener dropped beside her, fury tightening his jaw. But before any word could rise, five Phantoms shimmered into being within the circle—forms like smoke given shape, silent and watching. One hovered above the open seal, while the others dissolved into motes of light.

Confusion rippled through the group.

Then the sky itself responded.

Four beams erupted along the horizon, each rising from a distant point. The lone Phantom above the mound flared like a beacon, linking them all.

Together, the five pillars arced and wove into a perfect circle across the heavens.

Cannonline whispered what they all already felt in their bones.

“The portal… it’s open.”

The circle widened—tore—and a gate yawned into being. Sound itself was devoured into its vortex.

The way to Jigoku Valley stood before them.

No one spoke. But a single look passed among them—resolve, quiet and absolute.

And then, they stepped through.

On the other side, the world bent inward, warped beyond reason.

Black stone cracked beneath their boots, sharp and hot as forged glass.

The air was thin, tainted by ash and ozone. Carnage Energy pulsed through the valley walls in twisted veins of red and violet light—like a heart diseased and beating out of time.

Suisen’s grip on Zenchi Kintoki tightened. Ao’s chest still burned with every breath.

And waiting there—with recursive soul runes spiraling across her form—stood Kurogami.

Her smile curved sharp, mocking, a wound that never healed.

When she spoke, her voice carried echoes—the dead, the stolen, the forgotten. Faces flickered in the mist around her, contorted in endless torment.

“You’ve come,” she said, her tone a caress of ice. “All threads lead here. You call yourselves warriors, defenders, heroes… but you are nothing but sparks at the edge of the abyss. Come. Burn yourselves out.”

The runes beneath her feet flared, molten-white.

The ground split with a sound like grinding bones, and from the rift, the dead rose.

Opener charged first.

His fists struck with the force of thunderclaps, Carnage husks exploding beneath his blows. His arms bruised, ribs screamed, but he fought as though pain had never learned his name. When a phantom’s chainlike claws lashed toward Ao, he caught them mid-swing and drove his knuckles through its chest.

“You’ll not touch them!” he roared, voice shaking the dark.

Above, Tenbuyer’s wings spread wide. Clouds of spores spilled into the air, freezing husks mid-step. They crystallized where they stood—brittle, glittering, and motionless. Joe Doe’s arrows ignited in flame, slicing through the frozen field, threading fire into ice until the battlefield glowed like a shattered sun.

“Left flank clear!” Joe Doe shouted, already nocking another arrow.

“Then keep the rhythm alive!” Tenbuyer called, his wings sweeping to cast a new storm of spores. “Don’t let it drop!”

Across the ground, Sea Again moved like flowing water. He parried, circled, slipped through gaps between claws and teeth with serene precision. Wherever his guard faltered, Benikage was there, his blade flashing from the blind side, cutting with surgical cruelty.

“Your left!” Sea Again barked, twisting from a strike.

“I saw it before you did!” Benikage snapped, his sword splitting a phantom’s head clean through. Together they moved as twin edges of the same weapon—seamless, merciless, inevitable.

Ao charged with her Demonic Axe, each swing cleaving phantoms cleanly in two. Suisen flanked her, Zenchi Kintoki in its Shingetsu form, cutting arcs of light that shimmered against the dark. Their blades moved in rhythm—her fire to his silence, her fury to his grace.

Cannonline darted between them, hands glowing with frantic warmth as she pressed against wounds, stemming the spill of black ichor.

“Hold the line!” she cried, voice fierce though her hands trembled. “I’ll hold you!”

Her barriers flared like struck bells, each note a wall of light defying claws and chains.

Step by brutal step, they advanced.

But Kurogami only smiled.

Every strike, every victory—she had already claimed it in her eyes.

She wasn’t retreating.

She was leading them deeper—closer to the heart of the Makai Gorinto.

And then—it opened.

Glyphs ignited beneath Ao’s feet, spiraling like molten script.

Light surged upward, coiling around her in ribbons of soulceric fire. Suisen lunged toward her, but the same energy caught him, binding him in glowing threads.

“AO! SUISEN!” Opener’s roar cracked with panic.

He pounded his bleeding fists against the jagged black stone that rose around them, but it was useless—the barrier sealed with a deafening crack.

Outside, the others struck and struck again, their power erupting in waves of despair.

Nothing broke.

Inside, silence fell.

Ao and Suisen stood in the nexus.

Alone with Kurogami.

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View 

The nexus was not a place.

It was an idea given form.

Every surface mirrored itself into infinity. Each reflection bled into the next until there was no horizon, no ground, no ceiling—only endless recursion.

The walls were carved with spinning glyphs that both reflected light and devoured it in the same breath, symbols turning over and over like the teeth of an unseen machine.

The air itself burned cold in their lungs. Every inhale scraped like glass, every exhale crystallized in pain. Even standing here was agony.

And yet Kurogami moved as if she floated.

She stepped lightly across the mirrored floor, her robes trailing sparks of red and black radiance. Recursive runes unfurled and rewove along her body with each step. Even the chamber bent around her presence, like the space itself bowed to her will.

“Welcome to the lattice of endings,” she said. Her voice echoed, splitting into a thousand versions of itself until it became a choir. “Here, only will is truth. And my will is stronger than yours.”

Ao lunged forward before Suisen could stop her.

The rhythm of the Demonic Fist thundered through her body. A furious drumbeat seized her blood and nerves, dragging her into its tempo. She struck within that rhythm: blows like hammers of living ice, sealing and breaking Carnage Energy projections that spun midair.

Her fists met Kurogami’s open palms. Each collision rippled through the chamber, bending mirrored walls and trembling glyphs, the air itself shattering into sparks of red and black light.

Kurogami only smiled.

“You hit hard, girl,” she said, her grin curving cruel. “But do you even know what you are? Do you know why, after my perfect experiment slipped its leash, (1) I never came back until now?”

The words slid beneath Ao’s guard more easily than any strike.

Her hesitation lasted only a breath, enough for Kurogami.

Space folded.

A single step carried Kurogami across the chamber. Her palm lashed upward, connecting with Ao’s jaw. The crack echoed like glass under strain. Ao’s teeth clenched, and blood traced the corner of her lips.

The Demonic Fist flared in answer, searing her veins with every pulse. Her body screamed with each throb, but she refused to yield.

She pivoted back into rhythm, driving her fist into Kurogami’s guard hard enough to stagger her a step. Fissures of light crawled up Ao’s arms where the Demonic Fist burned too deep, her soul itself beginning to split beneath its weight.

Behind her, Suisen moved.

The Zenchi Kintoki gleamed in his hands as it intercepted Kurogami’s lashes of Carnage Energy. His Mushin-no-Ken flowed like air. Every motion precise, every counter measured. He became the stillness between Ao’s furious beats, the pause that made her rhythm whole.

But to Kurogami, he was nothing.

“You?” She parried his blade with a lazy sweep, sparks skittering from the edge. Her other hand shoved his shoulder, forcing him back with contemptuous ease. “You’re useless! You can’t even keep pace with me.”

Her strikes came faster, each lash of Carnage Energy cracking the mirrored floor, each blow heavier than the last.

Suisen parried, absorbed, redirected. Still, his arms trembled under the force. The blade shivered in his grasp, from the truth that as the Zenchi Kintoki was now, it could not protect Ao.

“Since the day I saw you at the Haunt Spring,” (2) Kurogami purred, voice honed to a blade, “wearing my birthright… I kept a close eye on you.”

Ao caught her next strike on her forearm, the rhythm of the Demonic Fist flaring bright against Kurogami’s Carnage Energy pulse.

“Since I found the schema in that cave and the journal that revealed what I truly am,” (3) Kurogami went on, her tone thick with venom, “I learned it was Mugai and the  Demonic Fist who forged my incomplete existence.”

Her words dripped like poison between blows. Each syllable cut deeper than the strikes themselves.

Ao lunged again, her fists a storm of white-blue arcs.

“I swore,” Kurogami hissed, meeting her head-on, “that if my experiments with the living Infernal Treasures failed—”

Her palm twisted upward and slammed into Ao’s chest with a deafening crack.

“—I would have my revenge.”

Ao’s body flew backward, crashing against the mirrored floor. Glyphs splintered beneath her, scattering into shards of light that floated before dissolving into nothing.

The rhythm of the Demonic Fist screamed through her veins, unraveling into chaos. Each pulse burned like molten glass; each breath sliced her lungs raw. Darkness crept at the edges of her sight, swallowing shape and sound alike.

And Kurogami was already upon her—eyes alight with a fevered, triumphant gleam.

“…Because I will use you,” she whispered, crouching low, pressing her hand to Ao’s chest. “A vessel worthy of becoming the catalyst's core. (4) A soul strong enough to fuse with Carnage Energy itself.”

Black chains erupted from her palm, and they writhed like living things, sinking into Ao’s chest, coiling around her ribs. Each link burrowed deeper, biting into her soul. Where they touched, her body fractured—patches of her form crystallizing, her breath breaking into shallow gasps.

Ao screamed. The sound tore free, raw and unguarded. Her body convulsed as the chains dug inward.

The Demonic Fist thrashed in answer—its rhythm no longer hers, but something monstrous, feral. It fought her, fought everything, threatening to consume her outright.

“This is your end,” Kurogami whispered, pressing harder. The chains sank deeper, cracks of darkness spreading across Ao’s chest. “Your soul will be annihilated. Your Infernal Treasure will be mine. And then, I will rewrite all memory, all history, every truth ever spoken.”

Ao’s fingers twitched weakly, trembling, as she reached for Suisen. Her eyes sought him through the blur of light and pain, even as their glow began to fracture.

For a moment, between the mirrored shards drifting through the air, a single flake of white light spiraled slowly downward. Then, as it turned, its wings shimmered — trembling like a fragile butterfly made of frost.

Ao’s dimming eyes caught it. Suisen’s breath faltered.

Neither spoke.

The butterfly hovered once more between them, as if uncertain which soul to land upon, then dissolved into pale light that vanished into the mirrored air.

The chamber pulsed like a heartbeat. Glyphs spun faster and faster until the air itself began to hum. The walls trembled as though rejoicing in her undoing.

And in that instant, hope itself began to unravel with her.

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View 

Suisen staggered, the Zenchi Kintoki trembling in his hands. His breath came ragged, blood dripping from a cut above his brow and staining the mirrored floor beneath him. His body screamed for rest, but his heart pulled him on.

And then a single word left his lips.

“No.”

It wasn’t shouted. It was spoken like truth itself—raw, steady, unshakable.

Kurogami’s head tilted, mockery twisting her mouth. “No? That’s all you can manage?” Her chains writhed, digging deeper into Ao’s chest, pulling her soul toward crystallization. “Do you think one denial can save her?”

But Suisen’s eyes had changed. They burned with something that reached beyond fear, beyond duty.

Love.

The cave walls returned to him in memory: the lines etched in stone by a forgotten boy; the mound of soil that stirred faintly, holding what should have been his grave; Ao’s hand clasping his—steady, warm—when he thought he would never rise again.

He remembered the words he had told Ao about his feelings.

Suisen lifted the Demonic Katana.

His breath steadied. His heart quieted. The Zenchi Kintoki trembled as if resisting—then slowly shifted. Its edge shimmered with hues that had never touched it before.

Subtle blues deepened into soft gold; a pulse of pink fluttered like a heartbeat along its length. Etchings shaped like butterflies unfurled across the steel, glowing faintly, as if carved by air itself.

The Demonic Katana, Zenchi Kintoki, became its final form.

Kokoroha, the Heartblade.

The air in the nexus changed. Where Carnage Energy had suffocated, the radiance of Kokoroha spread outward—gentle but unyielding, warm as dawn breaking through the longest night. The mirrored walls caught it and reflected endlessly, scattering the hues into infinity.

Kurogami’s smile faltered. “What—?”

Suisen stepped forward. His body was failing, but his heart carried him. The blade no longer felt heavy. It was weightless, because it did not belong to him alone.

Every strike he had ever made to protect another, every bond forged, every promise whispered, every heartbeat shared, all lived in the steel now.

He swung.

Kurogami countered. Her chains surged, claws of Carnage Energy raking toward him. Sparks of black and red shrieked through the nexus. But Suisen’s strike didn’t arc outward, but it curved inward, folding the rhythm back into a Reversal Arc.

Kurogami snarled, pressing harder, her seal driving deeper into Ao’s chest. Chains sank like fangs, triumph close enough to taste. But the Reversal Arc didn’t aim for her body. It struck the ritual itself.

Light folded around the chains, glowing like threads of silk woven by unseen hands. The rhythm reversed. The Carnage Energy pulse shuddered, cracked, and unwound. One by one, the black links froze—then dissolved into mist that evaporated into the mirrored air.

Ao’s body lurched. The suffocating weight lifted from her chest. Her soul’s fractures knit back together, light filling the cracks. The Demonic Fist steadied—no longer chaos, but heartbeat.

Her eyes flew open. Breath returned to her lungs.

Kurogami staggered back, disbelief twisting her face. “Impossible. That technique! No one could—”

Suisen’s knees buckled. He almost fell, but planted Kokoroha against the mirrored floor, steadying himself. His chest heaved, blood dripping steadily, but his lips curved in a faint smile.

“Not impossible,” he whispered. “Just… a reversal.”

Kokoroha dimmed slightly, its glow flickering as if straining under the weight of its awakening. The etchings pulsed once more, then steadied. Suisen’s strength waned, but the moment had been bought.

For a heartbeat, silence.

Then Kurogami screamed.

Her voice shredded the air, raw fury replacing disbelief. “You dare unravel my will?” Chains whipped from her arms, clawing across the mirrored floor, gouging rifts of Carnage Energy that split and reformed like shattered glass. The nexus trembled; glyphs spun faster, cracking under the strain.

She hurled herself at Suisen, claws descending to crush him where he stood.

But Ao moved.

Her body still trembled, muscles scorched by the Demonic Fist, but her eyes blazed with renewed fire. She stepped between them, her fist catching the brunt of Kurogami’s strike. The mirrored floor cracked beneath her, shards scattering like shattered stars.

Suisen turned his head toward her. His voice—faint, but clear—reached her through the chaos.

“Finish it.”

Their gazes locked. And for that heartbeat, nothing else existed. Only their bond.

Ao’s fists tightened. The rhythm surged through her veins again—not consuming, not burning, but flowing steady and true, aligned with her heartbeat.

Her lips curved in a grim smile.

And she stepped forward.

The mirrored floor split beneath her feet. The Demonic Fist roared, steady as thunder.

The battle was not yet over.

But the tide had turned.

Chapter Text

From Ao's and Suisen's Points of View 

The nexus trembled as Ao advanced, each step scattering faint sparks across the mirrored floor. The rhythm of the Demonic Fist roared through her veins—not in the chaotic frenzy from before, but steady as a heartbeat.

It was her rhythm.

Her will.

Kurogami’s chains writhed like serpents, striking outward.

“You think his trick bought you salvation?” Her voice was a lash, sharp and venomous. “I have rewritten countless souls. Yours will be the next to shatter.”

Ao ducked beneath the first chain, her fist blazing with rhythm. The second came from the side, but she met it head-on, her knuckles colliding with Carnage Energy. The impact rang through the chamber like a war drum. The chain fractured, splintered, then collapsed into shards of light.

Each strike became music. The mirrored glyphs rippled and warped with every pulse of her blows, reflections shivering in response to her heartbeat.

Suisen leaned on Kokoroha for balance, sweat trailing down his temples. His vision blurred, yet he refused to close his eyes, not while she stood there.

“Yes… that rhythm,” he breathed. “That’s you.”

Kurogami lunged. Fury ignited her body in black-red fire, claws slicing through the air.

“You cannot undo me! I am the perfect synthesis of Carnage Energy and soul! I am inevitability!”

Ao answered with motion.

Her first strike shattered Kurogami’s claw. The next rippled through her chest, shaking the mirrored walls. Every impact tore another chain apart—light replacing darkness in flashes of rhythm and heat.

But even as cracks spidered across her body, Kurogami laughed—a brittle, crystalline sound.

“Even if you kill me, the lattice will remain. My experiment will endure. The abyss never dies.”

For an instant, the words threatened to pierce the calm in Ao’s rhythm. But Suisen’s voice cut through, soft yet absolute.

“Ao. Don’t listen. She’s nothing but noise.”

Ao exhaled, grounding herself. The Demonic Fist pulsed in answer, synchronizing with her heart.

Then something deeper stirred—not rage, but alignment. The Demonic Fist echoed her intent. It no longer devoured.

It harmonized.

It protected.

She moved before thought. Her fist struck—not at Kurogami—but at the mirrored glyphs themselves.

The world burst open.

Light spiraled from the impact, weaving itself into a glowing lattice that wrapped around Kurogami. At first, the whispers were faint, then they grew, one voice becoming hundreds, hundreds becoming a chorus.

Free us.

She bound us.

Let us breathe again.

The prison of light coiled tighter. Kurogami screamed as her form cracked, shards of black crystal scattering into dissolving mist.

Ao’s fists pounded in time with the chorus. Each blow strengthened the lattice, each heartbeat reinforced the seal.

The voices shifted—anger softening into relief, sorrow into release.

Kurogami clawed at the radiant chains. “No! You belong to me! You are fragments, not whole! You cannot resist!”

But the voices rose higher—no longer fragments. Whole. Unified. Free.

Suisen lifted Kokoroha. His arms trembled, but he thrust the blade forward, its butterfly etchings blazing. The glow joined Ao’s rhythm, threads of heart and steel intertwining. Kokoroha pulsed in harmony, remembering every bond it had ever touched.

The nexus convulsed. Cracks zigzagged across the mirrored floor. Light and shadow collided, collapsing into spirals of dissolution.

Ao roared and struck one final time. The Demonic Fist ignited—ice and flame entwined—her body sheathed in radiance. Her punch landed squarely in Kurogami’s chest.

Direct. Final. Irreversible.

The counter-seal detonated.

A storm of light consumed Kurogami, pulling her inward. Her screams wove into rhythm and flame until nothing remained but a fading echo swallowed by silence.

Then—stillness.

The mirrored glyphs dimmed. Reflections folded into shadow. The infinite chamber collapsed, leaving only two figures adrift in the hollow quiet.

Ao staggered, every muscle spent. The Demonic Fist pulsed softly now—no longer rage, but gratitude. She turned just in time to see Suisen fall.

She caught him before he touched the ground. His body felt impossibly light, as though most of him had already become Kokoroha’s glow.

He smiled faintly, lips trembling. “I guess… I was good for something after all.”

Ao pressed her forehead against his, tears spilling unchecked. “You were everything.” Her voice broke, fierce and raw. “Don’t you dare think otherwise, Suisen.”

Kokoroha flickered once, its light settling into a slow, gentle rhythm. Suisen exhaled—a long, shuddering breath.

The nexus walls crumbled away. Stone, ash, and ozone surged back as Jigoku Valley reclaimed its form.

The others burst through the collapsing gateway—blades drawn, eyes wide—but the battle was already over.

They froze at the sight of Ao kneeling with Suisen in her arms. Silence stretched, broken only by her uneven breaths and the faint beat of the Demonic Fist.

Tenbuyer’s spores shimmered through the air, crystallizing the last traces of Carnage Energy into harmless dust. Cannonline pressed a hand to her mouth, tears sliding freely. Opener and Joe Doe rushed forward, while Sea Again and Benikage stood shoulder to shoulder, heads bowed.

The valley itself exhaled. For the first time, the air carried no corruption—only quiet.

Ao held Suisen closer, her tears falling onto his face. He stirred faintly, eyes flickering open just enough to meet hers.

“You’re… still here,” he whispered.

“Always,” she said, voice shaking.

His hand twitched weakly, curling around her arm. His lips formed one last word. “Ao…”

She pressed her forehead to his again, trembling. “I’m here. Rest. You’re safe.”

The Demonic Fist—Zessho Mugai—pulsed gently, a slow lullaby. Kokoroha gleamed one last time, then stilled.

And in that silence—fragile, luminous, eternal—the Jigoku Valley was quiet at last.

Arc Seven — The Makai Gorinto — End

Chapter Text

Present Day – At the Dojo

Suisen watched Raiji with a puzzled expression. The boy had gone quiet after hearing about Kurogami’s defeat, and shoulders were trembling.

“That’s it!” Raiji suddenly shouted, fists clenched. “Now I’ll become the next Zesshosai!”

Suisen arched an eyebrow. “Didn’t you already declare that, Raiji?”

“Yes,” Raiji said, grinning with unshakable confidence. “But now that I know the truth about Kanzan Musashi’s origins, I’ll do whatever it takes to surpass Dad. The Demonic Sword must never fall into the wrong hands.”

He paused, tone sharpening with rare seriousness. “And by the way, I’ve got a task for you, big brother.”

Suisen tilted his head, curious. “Oh?”

“In your library,” Raiji continued, “the list of Zesshosai ends before Aunt Higan and Dad. (1) Who better than you to write about them?”

“You think I could do that?” Suisen asked, a flicker of genuine curiosity softening his usually composed voice.

“Of course, big brother. And besides…” Raiji’s grin turned mischievous. “It’ll be good practice for when you have to write about me.”

Suisen chuckled despite himself. “You’re already planning ahead.”

Raiji scratched his head, pretending innocence, but the gleam in his eyes gave him away. Then he frowned, hesitant.

“There’s one thing I still can’t figure out. Based on when you married my sister Ao—what, about ten turns of the Dark Sun ago?—when did she actually return your feelings? Wait—no, don’t tell me when you kissed. I don’t want to know that.”

Suisen laughed, though the sound carried a nervous edge. “Let’s just say… the day I found the courage to ask your father Fuji for Ao’s hand, I’m certain my soul briefly left my body and I died a third time.”

He shuddered visibly. “Before he gave his blessing, he gave me a look that could have frozen lava.” (2)

Raiji burst out laughing. “Yeah, that sounds like Dad.”

From Ao’s Point of View

Once the group recovered from the wounds suffered in Jigoku Valley, they turned to their final duty—freeing the demons still trapped as living Infernal Treasures in the last villages marked on Naamah’s map.

When the Grand Journey finally ended—near Ao’s birthday—something inside Cannonline cracked. The stoic Magistrate wept openly, tears of joy and release. The shadow she had carried for so long had finally lifted.

When it came time for her to return to Celestia, Cannonline refused their company.

“If you escort me,” she said softly, “I won’t have the strength to go.”

So, she left alone.

The rest of them—Suisen, Sea Again, Benikage, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer—traveled to Ewwdo Castle. Suisen had already asked Yeyasu and Higan to host them for a while.

Ao, however, chose not to remain in the castle. She accompanied Opener back to Wahei, hoping her presence might ease the weight Cannonline’s absence had left on him. But when they arrived, both froze on the threshold.

Cannonline stood there—suitcases in hand, eyes softer than Ao had ever seen.

“Celestia told me,” she said quietly, “that since my research into restoring demons from their living Infernal Treasures form is no longer needed, (3) I’m no longer welcome there—at least, not until my final day. And besides…” A faint smile touched her lips. “They said my grandson on the way will need me more.”

Opener’s stillness broke. He rushed forward, pulling her into a wordless embrace, tears streaming freely.

Ao smiled faintly and slipped away, looking for a spare room. She doubted either of them would mind adding her to the household’s small chaos.

Time moved on. Two full turns of the Dark Sun slipped by, each moment like a bead sliding along an unseen string.

Raiji’s birth.

Sea Again, Benikage, Joe Doe, and Tenbuyer celebrating his birth at Grandpa Mugai’s grave.

Cannonline and Opener learning the strange rhythm of grandparenthood.

The founding of the dojo, where Sea Again and Benikage laid down their Magistrate badges to become teachers.

Ao’s appointment to the United Netherworlds.

Suisen’s rise as Hinomoto’s first ambassador, supported faithfully by Tenbuyer and Joe Doe.

Through it all, one truth never shifted.

Suisen stayed.

When Ao needed advice on caring for her little brother. When work left her uncertain. When quiet doubt gnawed at her resolve.

He was there.

Never asking. Never pushing. Never expecting.

With hindsight, Ao wasn’t sure she would have had his patience if their roles had been reversed. But she understood now that love could strengthen without binding, protect without possessing.

Her fingers slipped inside her sleeve, brushing the butterfly-shaped hairpin Suisen had given her the night before the final battle. (4)

A confession left unanswered.

A promise unfulfilled.

She exhaled softly. It was time to give her answer when he returned from his latest diplomatic mission.

The day after her decision, the United Netherworlds buzzed with feverish energy. Word spread like wildfire—a peace accord signed between two Netherworlds that had feuded for centuries.

Puzzled, Ao asked her superior what had changed overnight. There had been no sign that either side wanted peace.

The elder official sighed. “The ambassador of Hinomoto offered his life—truly offered it—in exchange for their signatures. The gesture moved them enough to accept.”

Ao’s blood ran cold.

There was only one ambassador of Hinomoto.

After three turns of the Dark Sun since his rebirth as a true demon, Suisen had once again risked everything—for others.

Her fists clenched. Her pulse thundered. Anger and fear collided in her chest.

He could have died.

And yet… the world outside her window was quiet. The wind, still for once, seemed to wait with her.

Maybe now—finally—it was time to act.

Chapter Text

From Ao's Point of View 

She spotted him leaving headquarters with Tenbuyer and Joe Doe, heading toward their homes.

“You were insane,” Joe Doe said loudly. “Those Netherworlds had the courtyard ready for your execution!”

Before Suisen could reply, something soft struck the back of his head. The three turned.

A snowball lay melting on the cobblestones.

In full summer.

From their expressions, it was clear they knew only one person would conjure that. They were right.

Ao stood at the end of the street, eyes locked on Suisen, fury blazing in her face.

“You always do this,” she said, her voice low, but sharp as a drawn blade.

“…Define ‘this,’” Suisen replied cautiously.

“Don’t get clever,” she snapped, her voice trembling now, anger spilling from her chest with nowhere left to go.

Tenbuyer sighed. “Joe Doe, let’s go. It’s unwise to stand in the eye of the storm.”

The two slipped away, leaving them alone.

Ao took a step forward. “I heard about what you did, Suisen. You could have died.”

“What does a single life matter, if it must be given for the good of so many others, in the name of a peace treaty?” he began.

Ao cut him off. “I don’t care about the peace treaty!”

The street fell silent. Her breath hitched.

Her next words came smaller, but heavier. “I care about you.”

She drew in a sharp breath. “Two turns of the Dark Suns ago, when you told me you loved me, I didn’t answer. I wasn’t ready. I was scared that I’d ruin it, and that I’d need you too much. But during this time… you never pushed. You just stayed.”

Another step forward.

“You made me believe I could be more than a former living Infernal Treasure to someone. So I’m saying it now. I love you, Suisen.”

The words lingered between them, fragile and infinite.

Suisen blinked once. “Do I have permission to respond?”

Ao almost laughed through the tears burning her eyes. “Denied.”

She grabbed his collar and kissed him—awkwardly, fiercely, completely.

For a heartbeat, Suisen froze. Then he kissed her back, with all the quiet strength that had carried them here.

When they finally broke apart, Ao rested her forehead against his chest. Her voice was soft, but sure. “Sorry it took me this long, Suisen.”

Suisen had the gentlest smile Ao had ever seen from him.

“It took exactly as long as it needed to, Ao,” he said.

Above them, the stars held still. The wind was calm, as if the Netherworld itself had exhaled.

Ao lingered a moment, then reached into her sleeve. Carefully, almost reverently, she unwrapped the butterfly-shaped hairpin.

Without hesitation, she slid it into her hair.

“I said I’d wear it someday,” she whispered. “When the wind was still enough.” (1)

She looked up at him. “It is now.”

Suisen said nothing, but he didn’t need to. He simply stepped closer and took her hand.

And for the first time in either of their lives, there was no storm left to brace for.

Just this. Together.

That Evening, Eight Human Years Ago – Ao and Suisen’s Home

Ao realized she had drifted asleep on the step where she’d been sitting, lost in memories of the Grand Journey. She stirred only when Suisen gently lifted her into his arms.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you,” he whispered.

As he reached the bed and began to set her down, Ao sat up, suddenly thoughtful.

“I think I’ll be falling asleep like this a lot in the months ahead, Suisen,” she murmured.

Her smile curved faintly, a playful glint in her eyes. “I might have cut that diplomatic meeting short today…” (2)

She paused, teasingly. “…because I had an appointment to test a little suspicion that’s been nagging me for days.”

She glanced sideways at him, lips quirking. “I think my Dad might faint when he finds out.”

Judging by the way Suisen’s eyes widened—realization dawning all at once—her father Fuji might not be the only one to collapse. Then joy surged through him, breaking across his face like sunlight after stormclouds.

Later, when Fuji finally heard the news—that he would be a grandfather at the next turn of the Dark Sun, ten full turns since the beginning of the Grand Journey—he froze so completely that Pirilika had to wave a hand in front of his eyes to make sure he was still breathing.

“I didn’t faint, Piriko,” Fuji muttered.

“I say you did, Fuji,” Pirilika laughed.

“Congratulations, Ao and Suisen!” Pirilika then chirped, practically bouncing. “You know what this means, right? When your baby’s born, we’ll finally have a full set of family birthdays—one every single month! First month of the turn of the Dark Sun is Ao’s… the next is Fuji’s… then mine and Suisen’s… then Raiji’s… and in the fifth month—ta-da!—a brand-new birthday to celebrate!”

When Ao and Suisen learned the baby would be a boy, they said they were considering naming him Fuji, a name heavy with meaning for them both. Suisen’s father, Shogun Gachiyasu, had passed before Ao ever met him.

But Fuji, after a long pause, shook his head.

His refusal was gentle, but firm.

“I don’t want my grandson burdened with a name tied to legacy. He should be free to walk his own path.”

When they told Yeyasu and Higan they’d soon become uncle and aunt to a little boy, Yeyasu feigned outrage. “Why does Fuji get the honor of the name and not me?”

Higan only laughed. “Just pick a name that reflects your new life.”

And so, after quiet reflection, Ao and Suisen chose differently—a name that held meaning for them both, yet carried no weight of the past.

Only hope.

Present Day – At the Dojo

The air was still, much like the night Ao had first worn the butterfly hairpin.

“Hey, isn’t that Renji?” (3) Raiji asked.

Suisen followed his young brother-in-law’s gaze and saw the unmistakable sight—light brown hair streaked with light blue, and mismatched eyes of magenta and green.

“You’re right,” Suisen said, rising as Raiji did. Together, they went to meet him.

“Hi, Dad. Hi, Raiji,” Renji called. “Mom said you’d be at the dojo, so Uncle Tenbuyer offered to bring me. I came after visiting Grandma Pirilika and Grandpa Fuji.”

Since there was no sign of the Mothman, Suisen suspected Tenbuyer was caught in one of his endless debates with Pirilika about economics.

Suisen watched as Raiji immediately began teasing Renji in the same way Yeyasu had once teased Fuji. And in that moment, he couldn’t help but think about how different his life might have been if things between Opener and Mugai had turned out another way.

He would be ten turns of the Dark Sun older. He would never have met Fuji, Pirilika, Higan, or Ceefore—and most of all, never Ao.

He would have remained nothing more than Shogun Yeyasu’s younger brother. A prince of Hinomoto, buried in studies, perhaps trapped in a marriage of convenience.

But a prince in a castle would never have known this joy.

Suisen smiled softly, as a butterfly fluttered in front of him.

Now he had the answer to the question Joe Doe had once asked him what he might have become. (4)

Let history keep its stories of emperors and heirs.

He would take this instead.

Again and again.

Author's Note:

"Conviction Is What Makes Me, Me" has reached its final chapter!

Thank you so, so much to everyone who has followed this story from the beginning, jumped in along the way, or left a kind word.

When I wrote that first chapter, I never imagined we'd make it all the way to Chapter 100!

But I'm so glad we did, because otherwise we wouldn't have gotten to experience:

✨ Ao's journey to realizing she is more than just Fuji's daughter.

✨ Suisen's fight to reclaim his identity and heart.

✨Cannonline’s path to redemption.

✨Benikage and Sea Again finally confronting the mistakes of their past.

✨Opener coming to terms with his legacy and choosing a new one.

✨The reveal of Tenbuyer’s heartbreaking past.

✨Joe Doe's life-changing decision.

It's been an incredible journey writing for these two and their found family. Thank you for reading their story.

What was your favorite moment? Let me know!