The Shiba estate was currently swarming with mourners.
It was only natural. It was the anniversary of the death of the family's youngest, the future head-to-be, and the direct descendant—Shiba Hozuki.
Shiba Hozuki was what one would call a genius.
While other children were running around playing, he was devouring the Essays of Ichibe Hyosube, books that even adults struggled to read. While other children brandished branches in play-fights, he was learning how to circulate Spiritual Power.
His talent for manipulating Spiritual Power was so exceptional that by the age of ten, he had mastered the art of moving his body through spiritual energy alone. It was no exaggeration to call it a gift from the heavens.
As if blessing this talent, the heavens had also bestowed upon him a staggering amount of Spiritual Power. How could this be anything but a supreme blessing for the family?
Whenever news of the child's rapid progress reached them, the family elders rejoiced. When they heard that he could hold a flawless, insightful conversation with elders two generations his senior, they were often struck with wordless awe.
But the heavens are indifferent.
Though they granted him the blessing of talent, they stripped away every ounce of the child's health in exchange.
The child could not play with branches like other children.
Even the slightest physical exertion would tear his muscles and fracture his bones.
The child could not run like other children.
His heart was so weak that simply walking left him breathless, gasping in agonizing pain.
The child could not eat to his heart's content like other children.
His digestive system was so frail that if he ate even a little too much, or consumed something that didn't suit his body, he would immediately vomit it back up.
The child...
The child...
Suffering from even one of these conditions would be a nightmare, yet born with every conceivable malady, the boy was essentially a living corpse.
The reason he could converse so deeply with the family elders was that they both understood they didn't have much time left to live.
Before the equality of death, anyone can open their heart.
And so, the child was equal to everyone. Even to himself.
"He wasn't supposed to die like this... Not like this... This wasn't how he was supposed to die...!"
"Dear..."
Hozuki's father and the next head of the family, Shiba Kaikaku, shed tears before the child, whose body had grown as cold as ice.
His heart felt as though it were being torn apart, piece by piece, his very vitals wrenched by sorrow. The pain was so intense he felt as if he would cough up blood the moment he opened his mouth.
"Oh, heavens...! Why...! Why didn't you take me instead...!! Why did it have to be this child...!"
"Sob... ugh... h-hugh..."
Kaikaku pounded his chest with his fists. He struck himself so hard it made a dull, thudding sound.
He felt as if he had to do this, or his heart—stunned by the loss of his child—would simply stop beating.
Kneeling before his child's corpse, Kaikaku's weeping was like the wailing of a wounded beast.
But no one pointed it out. In fact, no one even thought to judge him.
Noble honor? Decorum? What did such things matter? His only child was dead. What use was dignity in the face of that?
If the others weren't burdened by their heavy responsibilities to the family, they would have collapsed and wailed right alongside him.
But they did not. They were the pillars and the roof of the house. What use is a roof that leaks?
The elders did not show tears, not because they weren't sad, but because they were the pillars supporting the family.
This was also true for the Current Head of the Shiba Family, Shiba Kankuro. He sat in a corner, quietly composed, mastering his emotions.
"...My Lord."
"What is it?"
He had ordered that no one disturb him. Why had they come?
Though the question crossed his mind, Kankuro decided to listen.
If someone was brave enough to defy his orders, it surely wasn't for something trivial.
Sure enough, the words from the servant—whose face was concealed by a black cloth—were beyond anything he had imagined.
"The Forerunner has arrived."
"...The Forerunner is here?"
Kankuro doubted his own ears for a moment.
Who was the Forerunner? He was the very bedrock of the family, having sustained the clan for over a thousand years.
'The one who has remained in total seclusion on Mount Sarasa... why would he come now?'
His thoughts were brief; his actions were swift.
Kankuro immediately stood up.
"Where is the Forerunner?"
"He is waiting in the inner courtyard."
"I see. You go ahead and attend to him. He has difficulty moving."
"Yes, my Lord."
The servant in the black mask bowed deeply and vanished without even the sound of rustling cloth.
Kankuro lightly adjusted his attire and headed toward the inner courtyard where the ancestor waited.
"...You've come."
"Yes, Great Forerunner."
As Kankuro bowed to pay his respects, the family's ancestor, Shiba Shiryu, reached out a hand to stop him.
"There is no need to bow so low. You have spent all day looking at the ground in sorrow. For now, do not lower your head."
"...Yes."
Kankuro answered and glanced around. The black-masked servant he had sent to assist was nowhere to be seen.
Knowing that the servant was a man of immense loyalty, Kankuro couldn't hide his confusion.
"If you are looking for the servant, I sent him back. I am not so infirm that I require constant care... and I cannot have a busy youth wasting his time on an old man."
"Forerunner, please do not say such things. To call yourself an old man... please, do not humble yourself so."
"I have lived for a thousand years without dying; what am I if not a walking corpse? The heavens truly are indifferent... To take that child and leave a corpse like me behind..."
Shiryu blinked slowly as he looked up at the passing clouds.
Kankuro waited in silence, watching him.
"So, the child has departed first..."
Kankuro couldn't bring himself to answer. He bit his lip and lowered his gaze.
Seeing him like this, Shiryu opened and closed his mouth repeatedly before letting out a quiet sigh.
The sigh was swallowed by the passing wind, but the wind could not carry away the sorrow embedded within it.
He looked down at his wrinkled hands.
How could he tell them?
How could he ever say it?
That because of their Original Sin, that innocent child has fallen into Hell.
That a pitiful child, who did nothing but suffer in a weak body his entire life, has been cast into the depths of Gehenna.
'I cannot say it...'
Because he could not speak it, agony and anguish filled his chest.
Shiryu's lips trembled as he quietly turned away, hiding his expression.
"Kankuro."
"Yes, Forerunner."
"Since I am here, feel free to grieve to your heart's content. I intend to stay for the full month of the funeral, so you may take your time to settle your heart."
"I... I am overwhelmed by your immense kindness..."
His voice was suppressed, sounding calm, but the grief within it was immeasurable.
Holding on any longer would only torment the child further. Thinking this, Shiryu dismissed Kankuro and looked up at the sky once more.
"...What am I supposed to do?"
If they didn't kill him, they would die. It was for the sake of the world. It was for the greater good. It was necessary.
Their actions were adorned with all sorts of flowery justifications, but the moment you peeled back a single layer, nothing remained but hideous selfishness.
He had known and accepted this, yet the debt and guilt born then refused to vanish even after a thousand years.
'O Soul King... O Master...'
The Soul King who sacrificed himself for the sake of the world.
The Master who vanished with a smile, knowing everything that would happen.
What did they do to those beings?
They turned the Soul King into a lynchpin to support the Three Worlds, leaving him in a state neither living nor dead.
They took the Master's incomprehensible power and knowledge, gave it a name and a lineage, and spread a narrative to drag him down to their own level.
'It's a sin... all of it is my sin...'
If he had been the one dragged to Hell, he would have bowed nine times and begged for his punishment.
But he wasn't. No matter how much he waited and hoped for death, it never came. He merely lived a life of deferred demise.
Because of that, he had witnessed countless deaths.
The deaths of friends, the deaths of his own children, the deaths of commoners...
'If I confess my sins now and pay the price, would things get even slightly better...?'
He sighed in his heavy heart, but no answer came.
Eventually, Shiryu could only lower his head again.
"...I should visit the Shihoin clan."
If it followed the way of The Ring invented by that woman, perhaps that child didn't fall into Hell, but entered the path of reincarnation...
Just as he was about to leave the courtyard with that thought.
—CRASH!!
—Aaaaaah!
Hearing a commotion in the distance, Shiryu furrowed his brows.
"Who would cause such an uproar on a day like this?"
Whoever it was, as the Forerunner, he could not simply overlook it.
Shiryu turned his steps toward the source of the noise.