Ryūnosuke's rage was blind and all-consuming. Seeing Akira, nearly unconscious, still trying to hold the "Zone" around a trembling Shiori, and Jibetsu standing over them with the air of the master of the situation, he let out a roar and charged forward. His sword, still pulsing with the leaden Scar of destruction, traced a deadly arc.
Jibetsu didn't even turn.
He moved to meet the attack with terrifying, almost lazy grace. His body, hidden by a baggy haori, suddenly gained steely resilience. Instead of dodging, he stepped inside the diagonal of the strike, his left hand, like a dried branch, shot forward. His fingers formed a "clawed" palm and crunched into Ryūnosuke's wrist.
Ryūnosuke gasped in pain and shock. He felt no piercing Kokuro energy. He felt pure, unrefined physical force applied with lethal precision to an acupuncture point. His fingers went numb, and the sword clattered from his weakened grip. Before he could react, Jibetsu's foot, in a short, sharp motion, drove into his solar plexus. Air was forced from the Morohashi heir's lungs, and he collapsed to his knees, choking on a cough.
It all took two seconds.
"Pitiful," Jibetsu rasped, looking down at him. "All strength, no art. The Morohashi clan has truly degenerated."
Kaede, seeing this, didn't charge head-on. Her mind worked at a furious pace. She activated her "Crimson Loop," trying not to attack Jibetsu directly, but to create a paradox: "The air before Jibetsu will become hard as steel." But her Kokuro, barely touching the spider, met a hostile, inert emptiness. His own energy was so compressed and hidden it offered no "hooks" for her manipulations. He was smooth as a polished stone.
"Smarter than your friend," he tossed at her, and something like condescension sounded in his voice. "But your elegant tricks are useless against one who doesn't play by your rules."
He didn't finish them off. Instead, he struck the floor with his foot. The stone beneath his foot gave way, and a complex mechanism rumbled into motion. The hall walls shifted, cutting off Kaede and Ryūnosuke from Akira and Shiori. Poisonous spore powder rained from the ceiling, forcing them to retreat, coughing and covering their faces.
When the dust settled, Jibetsu and his men were gone, having taken the "Ark of Forgotten Whispers" with them. They had left them alive. It was the most humiliating part.
The return to "Tenran" was silent and grim. They carried no wounded—Akira, though exhausted, walked on his own, supporting Shiori, who was still pale and flinched at every sound. But they carried the burden of defeat. Not physical—they had survived. Strategic, intellectual defeat. They had been outplayed. Their strengths had been used against them.
Akira remained silent. His usual void was now filled with heavy, cold realization. His ability, which he had only begun to grasp, was no panacea. It was a beacon attracting the most dangerous predators. He was a shield, but a shield everyone clings to will eventually break.
The next morning, as the full Council was trying to figure out what to do next, the world shuddered.
Even deep within the fortified academy, they felt it—a dull, all-pervading hum emanating not from the earth, but from reality itself. It lasted only an instant, but it was enough to make the walls tremble and the lights go out.
A glowing image appeared in the center of the hall, projected by sensory long-range communication Scars. It depicted the city of Shirakawa—not a major metropolis, but an ancient, revered city known for its temples and archive of basic-level Kokuro.
Or rather, what remained of it.
In the city's place gaped a perfectly smooth, glassed-over depression at least several kilometers in diameter. No smoldering ruins, no signs of struggle. Just... nothing. As if a giant celestial hand had erased the city from the map, like a pencil sketch. Over the depression swirled strange, iridescent ash.
"Technique of the 'Crimson Phoenix,'" Kagetori's calm voice rang out.
Everyone flinched. They hadn't even noticed him enter. He stood leaning against the doorframe, studying the image with an indifferent look.
"One of his favorites in the old days. He doesn't destroy. He... annihilates. Erases the Scar of an object's existence. Flashy, but costly. Apparently, he's recovered enough for such tricks."
A tomb-like silence fell over the hall. This wasn't a raid. It was a statement. A demonstration of absolute, indisputable power and complete disregard for their world.
"We must retaliate! Before he erases everything!" shouted one Council member, his voice breaking with hysteria.
"Where to?" Kagetori asked coldly. "Into battle against one who just erased a city without leaving his home? Do you want to give him a salute of your ashes?"
"We have you!" Director Fujibayashi appealed to him, his eyes pleading.
Kagetori smirked, but there was no mirth in his golden eyes.
"I won't save your world, old man. I'll merely ensure it has a spectacular end. But..." he paused, letting his words penetrate their very consciousness, "if you want to strike a blow that might mean something, you don't hit the tentacles. You hit the head."
He straightened, and his gaze became heavy as lead.
"My sensors pinpointed the source of the surge. And something else. He's hiding in the old caves near the Misty Mountains. And there... is the Well of Souls."
A sigh of horror swept through the hall. Shiori paled even further.
"In Akatsuki's past life," Kagetori continued, his voice taking on a tone of something ancient, almost mythical, "only one being was allowed near him constantly. Shiroyama Raidou. His icy sentinel and jailer in one. And now they are reunited. And they are using the Well. This changes everything."
"It... strengthens him?" Kaede asked timidly.
"No," Kagetori shook his head, and his next phrase plunged the hall into icy horror. "It stabilizes him. Magoro's soul, which was once scattered, is still not fully fused with his new body. The water of the Well of Souls is the glue. It strengthens the bond. And if we let him finish this process..." He swept his gaze over them all. "...Then even I cannot guarantee victory. He will become not just a threat. He will become an immutable law of the universe. Permanent and relentless, like death."
In the ensuing silence, his words hung like a sentence. They weren't just fighting a tyrant. They were fighting time. And time was working against them.