The astral body returned to the prison cell after a few hours with Cardinal Six. Upon its arrival, it met a shocking sight.
The Tatsumaki Clan head was on her knees, bowing down to the other Clan heads who only had flabbergasted expressions on their faces. The Sotomura Clan head was nowhere to be found and the guard managing them had removed his helmet, to reveal that he was from the Sotomura clan.
The Astral being couldn’t recognise this man, but the others seemed to know him. He dropped a pile of items before them, then bowed.
“I was unable to retrieve all your personal artifacts, but I did get your main weapons. We must flee the capital now. From what I’ve heard, they’ve already surrounded the borders of the empire and are wiping out all our forces.”
When he said this, the others went to the pile and picked up their weapons. Akihiko took his spear, Yoshitatsu took her sword and Mori took his gauntlets. They performed a quick inspection and were satisfied.
The Tatsumaki Clan head still had her head to the ground in apology. All three looked at one another then sighed.
The first person to speak was Akihiko.
“I get it, alright? It wasn’t your fault that you had to do this. Sorry for being so hard on you, but we need to leave now.”
For the first time since the Astral being appeared, the Tatsumaki Clan head lifted her head to reveal a shocking sight.
Half of her face was grey and that portion looked beastly. With scales as hard as iron and prettier than gold. Her red eyes shone brightly and her teeth were morphed into fangs. To the right of her head, a horn was growing out.
The Astral being took a step closer to inspect, but she got a surprise.
“Who? Who are you?”
She muttered in a daze. It was almost as if the Tatsumaki Clan head could see her. She looked behind her only to meet the confused faces of the other clan heads. Even the Sotomura servant showed confusion.
The Astral being walked to the side, but her eyes followed the astral body. Her body shivered and her lips quivered while following the astral being.
The hell?
“Ibuki?”
Akihiko’s voice came through as the astral being decided to disappear from the room. When she returned to her body, she started thinking through several things.
That appearance the Tatsumaki Clan head had was weird. She knew what exactly was the cause, but she was still surprised to see it.
Then again, spending over three decades using that form of magic, it was a miracle that it took so long for signs of it to show up on her body. The benefits of being a Tatsumaki really were endless in this world.
As if to stray her from her thoughts, Cardinal Six tapped on her forehead curiously.
“What is it?”
She questioned him, but the cardinal only observed her more.
“Y-you aren’t human, are you?”
He said something that struck the girl as weird. She sniffed him and a nervous smile crept up.
“Y-you smell like a beast tamer.”
__________________
“Are you sure?”
With a hint of distrust in his voice, Akihiko asked Ibuki, but the look she gave showed that she was being absolutely serious.
Everyone in the room was sceptical about. After all, she claiming to have seen her daughter’s soul when she was currently suffering from a disease was not convincing at all. Still, the nature of her illness was what made the matter all the more believable.
Akihiko offered her his hand and she gratefully accepted it, standing up.
“Clan head. Your weapons.”
Senku gestured to the cloth on the ground. On it, there were two items. A folded paper fan and a hair clip. Ibuki reached out to both of them, then wrapped the cloth around it.
“Is Shiro still around here?”
She asked with a shaky voice and looked into Senku’s eyes worriedly. The old man, unable to lie to her only kept a shut mouth. That answer was much louder than his words could ever be.
“Where is she!?”
Her voice trembled with rage as she shook the old man by his shoulders. Her apparent strength was enough to make him wince in pain.
“Ibuki, stop that.”
Akihiko tried to free the man from her grip, but he saw that she was too strong. Far too strong for someone who was sick. She pushed him aside, slamming him into the wall and causing an uproar amongst the present members.
They all went on the defensive and looked at her as she growled at them and bared her fangs.
“Oi, Ibuki. Stop that or we will be forced to fight you.”
As if she only just realised what happened, the light in her eyes dimmed and she held her temples in pain. Yoshitatsu went to her side and helped from falling down. When they looked, the scales on her body on grew more.
“Senku-san, are any of our children here?”
“Fortunately, they were rescued by a group of strange people. The only one who got captured was the ojou-san.”
He told them what happened on the night of the raid.
“Why didn’t you save her then?”
Ibuki asked with a weak voice.
“I apologise, but I am bound to the life of the clan head. Even if I wanted to save the ojou-san, my body would not allow me to do so before you. Which is why I have come to rescue you.”
He explained his predicament.
“So, if I’m no longer the Clan head, you can focus on saving others, right?”
“Clan hea-”
“From this moment on, I renounce the position of Tatsumaki Clan head.”
She announced. Just then, a seal formed on the heart of Senku. The seal burnt brightly and he grunted in pain for a moment. It felt like a hot stick of metal was being stabbed into his heart, but he managed through the pain.
After that moment, Senku’s mind went blank. No pain, no sweetness, absolutely no feeling.
Ibuki and the others watched as he wrapped Ibuki’s weapons up in the cloth and stood up.
“Delivery of the Clan Weapons to the next clan head, Tatsumaki Shiro, shall begin. Estimated time: 20 days, 3 hours, 10 minutes and 14 seconds. Farewell, Tatsumaki Ibuki.”
As soon as he said that, he sped out of the room. Everyone was very confused by his sudden mechanical actions, but all they knew was that his priority was now Shiro Tatsumaki.
Since he had chased off after her, that meant he was going to rescue her. Still, there was something very odd about his behaviour.
“If he’s going to Shiro right now…”
“Then they’ll need an escape route.”
Yoshitatsu gulped and gripped the handle of her katana, Falcon Claw. Mori cracked his knuckles and stretched his body out a bit.
“Guess we’ll have to cause a bit of a distraction then.”
From behind, the sound of a collapsing wall entered their ears. Blue lightning cackled from the hole in the wall and electrifying blue dots could be spotted from the darkness.
Walking through, his spear radiating power, Akihiko looked to the floor above them and grinned.
“Let’s end this festival with a loud bang, then go get our kids.”
Simultaneously, without any proper discussion between them, the clan heads had decided to fight the forces of the Dark Church to give a single escape route to the next Tatsumaki Clan head.
Akihiko threw his charged-up spear with all of his might, drilling a hole through the palace walls and shaking the building up. Some unlucky members of the Dark Church ended up in the spear’s trajectory and were injured. Those lucky enough to have been missed by a hair’s breadth looked through the holes and found the clan heads looking through the holes.
Akihiko stepped forward and stretched out his hand. Instantly, his spear flew back into his hand after landing a few more blows on some enemies.
“If the goal is to make as much noise as possible, I’m your man! Wahoo!”
He ran out of the room fiercely, allowing his magic power to rock the imperial palace. The others followed closely behind him, following in his footsteps and shaking up the palace with their power. Though they may not have consumed food for the past couple of days, they were confident in their ability to overpower weaklings.
Surprisingly, the one to lead their charge was Yoshitatsu with her blade cutting down the enemy as if they were merely leaves. She overtook Akihiko in a mere instant and sliced through the horde of soldiers elegantly. The movement of her sword was masterful, soft and swift. With her skill [Sword Domain], anyone within 10 metres of her who was registered as an enemy would receive 10 slashes on their body in an instant.
Unable to defend against her attack, the Dark Church members fell like flies.
She cackled madly as she ran to a halt and sheathed her blade once more. The other members with the exception of Mori did not understand her reason for pause. Even if there were still about 50 people in front of her, they were nothing before her blade. However, she was thinking differently.
It’d be a pain climbing all the floors with so many people in their way. No matter how strong a swordsman was, they would get tired from swinging a heavy blade a thousand times.
“Fuck! Both of you, duck!”
He delivered a warning and pinned them to the ground.
Yoshitatsu unleashed her blade, this time it glowed with a violent red light and drew an arc that sliced through the wall and ceiling. For a moment, the enemies standing across the blade paused, all confused by her actions.
That is, till they heard the sound of crumbling wall. They looked up and across the wall, all they could see were scorch marks. Slowly, they could feel that Yoshitatsu and the others were being elevated while they were going down.
It took a few more seconds for them to realise that she cut off that portion of the building off.
They started to scream for help as they descended.
Mori and the others stood up to look at her with various expressions.
“Are you insane? You could have cut us down!”
“Are you insane? You could have cut Shiro!”
“Oh, you’ll have to show me that trick again.”
Both of them looked at Akihiko and he shrugged. As a power hungry, battle junkie, all he cared for was strength.
Yoshitatsu scratched her nose and let out a mischievous giggle.
“Think that was enough of a distraction?”
“If that didn’t get their attention, nothing will.”
Anyone on that side of the 60-floor imperial palace was definitely dead from the fall.
The others walked to her and looked out the new opening in the castle. The cold wind blew on their faces as they peered at their city from the 5th floor.
The imperial palace was built on a hill that overlooked the city. Even on the base floor of the palace, anyone would be able to see the entire capital city of New Kyoto.
The streets were dead silent, the usual night lights were no were to be found. Bodies littered the floor, although there were some living people hiding in buildings.
It had been three days since the raid, but the Dark Church had left the streets to be bloodied and the people were terrified. The clan heads could only imagine what their followers were feeling at the moment.
Fear, sadness, rage and hopelessness among other things. This made their blood boil and the veins in their bodies snaked out. Even Mori who could be called the calmest of the group, had his skin turning red.
“They dare…”
In that moment, the Clan heads felt a bit stupid for thinking merely about themselves and their children.
“Run away to our kids? How laughable.”
“Our ancestors are definitely embarrassed by our actions.”
“Let us take back Empire and free our people.”
“You say it like we had a different option.”
<A/N: The Clan heads have decided to fight for their Empire. Will they make their Ancestors proud?>
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