3 bar menu

Volume 4 Chapter 4 Part 9

「….I, have decided to quit being a monk! 」

「But there’s a monkey mixed in among them! Unforgivable! 」

「Die! Hurry and die! Sagara Yoshiharu! 」

They were all admiring the pretty Oda clan warriors, but Yoshiharu felt them emitting obvious killing intent towards him and him alone.

「Why am I the only one hated… Just why is that? 」

「Hmph, it doesn’t matter. Let us go in, Monkey. 」

Azai Hisamasa and Asakura Yoshikage had already pressed their seals on the agreement. Nobuna was the only one left who needed to do so.

But then, they noticed two people standing at the gates of the main hall. One of them was Wakasa’s shota Onmyouji Tsuchimikado…

「 Uwahahaha, come at me! 」

And the other one was Shogakuin Gosei waving his metal rod around as he laughed.

「What are you doing here, you two? We are here for the peace agreement. Don’t tell me you plan to ignore Himiko’s decree and start the battle with us again? 」

「How could we possibly do something like that? Azai-dono and Asakura-dono have already sealed their approval of this decree as per Himiko-dono’s order. I am just here to hand you Tsuchimikado as per the conditions. But… I don’t mind handing him to you, but what do I do after handing him over? I promised you nothing in regards to that! Wahahahaha! 」

「Exactly, I did not say anything about surrendering…so I plan to defeat you guys here! 」
Tsuchimikado said arrogantly.

「I’m leaving this to you, Tsuchimikado-dono. Don’t worry about anything and give these unclean women a bloodbath they deserve… please! 」

「What a bastard monk! You are just too despicable! And you had the audacity to say that you aren’t defying Himiko-sama’s decree!? 」

Nobuna and the rest were enraged at the deception on Tsuchimikado and Gosei’s part.

「Ahh, Mount Hiei is as remarkable as ever… This inexhaustible ‘Ki’ that was gathered from Kyoto. After absorbing it, I’m 10 times stronger than when I was at Wakasa, no, 20 times stronger! Where is Takenaka Hanbei?! I need to test my newfound strength against her! 」

「I am here. 」

Hanbei raised her hand timidly as her small horse climbed forward up the mountain.

「You are that rising dragon of Mount Bodai, being known as ‘The Modern Zhuge Liang’? You are just a rural Onmyouji at best! Come and duel it out with the direct descendant of Abe no Seimei, the head of the Tsuchimikado clan! 」

Yoshiharu and the rest shouted:「You despicable bastard~! 」and were making a scene, and even Nobuna wasso taken aback that she commented: 「What the hell is wrong with this kid?! 」

「The low level shikigamis this fellow controls are afraid of the gunshots of arquebuses, but no matter what we can’t let Hanbei meet with any danger. 」

Yoshiharu whispered to Nobuna, as she did not bring her arquebus to sign the peace agreement.

Hanbei slowly got down from the horse and with a clear voice declared:

「I understand, let’s have a duel then. 」

「Huh, no, it’s too dangerous, Hanbei-chan! That fellow can control huge amounts of Shikigamis, and he should be much more dangerous now compared to when he was at Wakasa! 」

「Yoshiharu-sama, it’s okay now. Due to you, my body has recuperated. Now is the time to make up for being unable to help after my collapse at Kiyomizu-dera. 」

Hanbei lowered her head with a complex expression.

「But, Hanbei-chan… 」

「Yoshiharu-sama, there’s really nothing to worry about. 」

「Then, Rising Dragon-kun, we can start the duel now? Shikigami army, summon! 」

Tsuchimikado shouted confidently, and in an instant countless scary-looking Shikigamis appeared in the sky and rushed towards Hanbei, Nobuna and the rest.

「There they are, there they are! The demons have appeared! Noooooo! 」

Katsuie started swinging her spear around, intent on mowing down the spirits like she fought regular men, yet she could not reach the flying Shikigamis at all. If this went on, Nobuna and the rest would all die at this peace agreement ceremony.

But at this moment, Takenaka Hanbei calmly drew out a talisman and threw it up into the air.

「Zenki-sama, I’ll leave this to you. 」

「Yeah, leave these chumps to me! 」

The gentleman with a fox face, Zenki appeared in front of Tsuchimikado.

「What, this Shikigami again? Though you did manage to deceive me at Mizusaka Ridge, I’ll give you that. 」

「That’s why I don’t understand how could Sagara Yoshiharu be defeated by a guy like you, someone who is such an easily deceived fool. 」

「No matter what, this is just too reckless. Even if you are a high level Shikigami, alone you can never match my Shikigami army. You yourself should understand that better than anyone else. Since each of these individual Shikigamis’ strength is now 20 times greater than their original strength, then it is a simple numbers game. Just having one of you to fight is so boring, I can’t even win with pride by displaying the full extent of my capabilities to everyone present here! 」

Targeting Zenki, all the Shikigamis rushed forward in an instant. Suddenly, Zenki laughed out loud.

「You didn’t notice? Since my master’s health is good, and we are at Mount Hiei, then that means that my strength is 1000 times greater than back then at Wakasa! 」

「Stop boasting, it’s impossible for any Onmyouji other than Abe no Seimei to be stronger than me! How can a stupid thing summoned by a rural Onmyouji ever hope to be my opponent? 」

「Ehhh? So the descendants of the Tsuchimikado clan have fallen so much behind the times? If you’re the role model for the others, then all of you Seimei’s descendants are useless. 」

Facing the Shikigami army coming from all directions, Zenki spoke softly.

「Pathetic spirits that have even forgotten who you were in life, go back to the darkness from whence you came! Rin~Byou~Tou~Sha~Kai~Jin~Retsu~Zai~Zen! Come, Thousand-arms Guanyin, Bodhisattva of Compassion! 」

Zenki made a series of signs with his hands and pointed his finger towards the heavens while chanting passages from various sutras. As he did so, countless punches visible only to the Onmyoujis and Shikigamis fell from the sky like a murderous rain.

*BLAM!*, *BOOM!*, *KACHAK!*

When the rain of incessant punches finally stopped, not a single Shikigami was left. The whole army of them was destroyed in the blink of an eye.

Like that, the battle to determine the strongest Onmyouji was over in an instant.

「….What…? Such a thing… no… that’s … that’s impossible…!? 」

Tsuchimikado fell on his feet, stunned.

「How is this possible!? Me, the direct descendant of Abe no Seimei, the head of the Tsuchimikado clan, Japan’s strongest Onmyoujis… how… how could I have lost so easily…? 」

「That’s because the power of the Demonic Fox that the Tsuchimikado clan once absorbed has declined over the course of the last few hundred years. Tsuchimikado, the Onmyoujis have fallen to the dark ages of Japan, and my master and I will personally end this Onmyouji era. 」

With a glance, Zenki saw Tsuchimikado’s face suddenly transform. His confident, tenacious look suddenly vanished after he was defeated so soundly. Instead, Tsuchimikado’s face was now filled with fear.

(This is impossible. Such a thing… is definitely impossible!)

There was no reason to ask why, because he realized something.
The rumors that were passed down through the ages in the Tsuchimikado clan told of a certain Shikigami, the one that no matter how great one’s talent is could never be summoned, his real form is…

「…Don’t tell me… Don’t tell me… You… are… the Founder?! 」

「So troubling…, kikiki… 」

Zenki laughed like a fox.

「Tsuchimikado, you still have a long way ahead of you. To proclaim yourself as the descendant of Abe no Seimei, it is still 10 years too early for you to do that. Go back to Wakasa and train from the beginning again. 」

「Uwahh…Uwahhhhhhhhhh! I’m so sorry!!!「

Tsuchimikado cried and tumbled down the mountain, so afraid that he was reduced to childlike blubbering. As he ran, Zenki created invisible hands to knock at Tsuchimikado’s head, making his nose bleed as he kept tumbling down the mountain and soon vanished from Nobuna and the rest’s sight.

「….Ara, ara, I was planning to take his life, but he can thank my master’s kindness for being able to keep it. 」

「Thank you so much, Zenki-sama! With this, Tsuchimikado won’t dare to attack Yoshiharu-sama anymore! 」

「Hmmm, Hanbei-dono, you are really a good child. 」

Nobuna and the rest were stunned where they stood, asking 「What happened? Did Zenki do something? I saw nothing at all! 」, as Zenki vanished into a puff of smoke.