Act III


confrontations of siblings


The seal went down in flames.

Night sky, before hidden by the rushing spiritual energy, was visible again. Hard wind tore at her robes and goosebumps prickled her skin.

They had broken through. Just like that. As though hundreds of onmyoji working together didn't mean anything!

Yura growled and tossed out Shikigami. But there were so many yokai all of a sudden, even her numbers hardly made a dent.

"Akifusa-nii, what are you doing?!"

Her big brother, her mentor twisted his head at a horrible angle to face her. Yura gasped. His skin! His eyes, those blemishes – What were they? What happened to him?

"Yura. Yura. Yura the genius. Yura who summoned Hagun. Yura. Yura. Yura who everyone acknowledges. Yura who -"

"There are yokai everywhere! We've got to stop them! The Fukuju branch specializes in defence and they're completely defenceless! We need to help them!"

Akikusa-nii's hair was blown by the wind as he stared at her entirely unmoved. "I know. I made the weapons the yokai are using."

No.

Yura snapped her arm up, Rentei already equipping. "Why are you helping yokai? They're killing us! Killing our family! You're an onmyoji!"

This was horrible. What Yura did – the onmyoji laws she broke because of Nura-kun – they didn't matter. This is what helping yokai meant! This was what was forbidden! Not yokai sneaking uninvited into houses!

She aimed -

-her body moved for her before she had time to react. Tuck and roll, Yura came up gunning for the place she had stood before.

Where Akifusa-nii now stood.

"Yuuuuraaaaaa Maaaaaax!" Bolts of her energy tore through the air, her body shook from the recoil.

If Nura-kun didn't always sneak around, she'd have died just now. "Buyoku!" She called. Her samurai shikigami withdrew from the battle against other yokai and positioned itself at her back.

Yokai are black, we are white. What the hell happened to the Akifusa who so strongly believed those words?

The sclera of his eyes was invaded by tendrils of darkness.

She swore. "Who was it?! Who did this to you? Snap out of it!" Rentei gathered energy. A blast that tore up the ground shot from her arm towards Akifusa-nii.

Her mentor moved before the impact. Where -

"Run. Gengen." Water surged, its gurgling sounding like growls.

"Yura." Her brother's voice said from above. He was scowling down on them, the force of his displeasure directed at Akifusa who had dodged his attack as well.

"Ryuuji," Akifusa-nii's voice said. "Yura. Always protecting Yura. Even though I..."

Her brother jumped down from the low roof, a look of total disdain on face. "Huh? Did you says something? Can't hear you, I'm deaf to the words of demons, you know."

Yura shivered. "Onii-chan -"

A pulse of Fear thumped against Yura's skin. Her eyes sought Akifusa-nii. Something violent stirred in her stomach at the repulsing sight. It was like the onmyoji was devoured by the darkness.

What was happening to him?

"Yura," her brother said, voice at that pitch between mercilessness and condescension. "Go get Mamiru and tell him to find the bastards pulling the string behind this. They'll be watching from the shadows."

A weight lifted from her shoulders. "So a yokai did this to him? Then if we can beat it -"

"No," her brother cut her off shortly. He opened more flasks of water. Something exploded in the background. Screams were carried by the wind. "Go fetch Mamiru, then protect the others. I'll take care of Akifusa."

Akifusa watched them. Real yokai Fear emanated from him. But at the same time Yura couldn't shake the feeling that there was something very human about him still.

"Go!" Her brother shouted, and her body moved on its own.

She didn't look back. She couldn't afford to look back. The Second Seal, Soukoku-ji, was falling. If they could hold out until dawn, at least protect the seal itself -

Iron filled her stomach as she ran. There were battles everywhere. More and more yokai. And so, so many bodies. Fury raged and she powered it into her shikigami. But it wasn't enough. No matter what she did, it was useless. She lacked power. The Keikai family lacked power. The Harogomo Kitsune yokai were too strong.

She could summon eight shikigami at once and even the Hagun, but in the end it made no difference.

She found Mamiru just as he was blowing a pair of yokai to bits. But even Mamiru-kun's monstrous strength changed nothing.

"Mamiru-kun! Onii-chan said -" As soon as she had got the words out, he ran off in the direction Yura came from.

She hesitated briefly. What was she supposed to do now? Akifusa-nii? Or the seal?

It wasn't really a choice. Akifusa-nii might still be able to be saved. She'd find the yokai who did that to him and tear it to shreds.

Frustration and despair and humiliation pumped her blood faster. Her feet pounded the ground.

Nura-kun flashed before her eyes again, arrogant and smirking, selfish and audacious.

He was so different, it was painful. Even Nura-san, when he came to the Keikain main house …

Yura gritted her teeth, jumped over a body and rushed back down the path she came from. Akifusa-nii. Onii-chan.

Taking a short cut through the undergrowth, she laid eyes on the scene. Onii-chan's victory. Alive. But just as she wanted to call out to him, something happened. Her brother gasped, and fell. A spike the size of her arm slid out of his leg.

It grew out of Akifusa's neck.

Wha..?

"Onii-chan!" The world narrowed down. That...thing…grew and twisted into a long shape, a large eyeball taking up the most of it. "Damn you, yokai! I knew it was your doing! Get out of Akifusa-nii right now!"

It giggled. "Harogomo Kitsune-sama, I don't think I can keep hold of this body much longer. May I leave it?"

Pine trees rustled. Fear that had been slowly growing suddenly was right there. Yura's head snapped around. Her blood froze at the sight of white, white bones in the form of a skeleton yokai taller than the average house. An army was illuminated by the light of flames and ghostly orbs behind it. On the demon's head – a girl. Her Fear shot right into Yura's very bones.

They had been right there? Yura hadn't noticed them?

"Do not," the girl said, pale face and lips forming a fairly pleasant smile. "This is a battle between onmyoji. We can't just have it end, now can we? Not before the conclusion."

Yura snapped.

Papers all carefully scripted by her hand, embedded with names and a call each rose at her energy's fire. "Shikigami Hagun!" It had been a long time since she had summoned it last. She remembered the oppressive, disbelieving silence when she had, and the sudden activity and praise. She had not been allowed to hold Hagun since, just like any other onmyoji, but she had been sent to Ukiyoe to gain that right. When she had returned and been told to script her own vessels for it, it had not been because she earned it but because it was necessary.

Hagun however still answered her call, unchanged from back then. Skeletons rose out of the papers and lined up behind her. The pool of power she sensed from it was near endless. It rocked her perception.

Mamiru-kun darted in and removed her brother from Akifusa.

With this, with Hagun -

The air shimmered above Akifusa-nii's head. Light and darkness gleamed off the blade of a sword as it cut ruthlessly, without stopping through the conjunction between Akifusa-nii and the demon possessing him.

Both Akifusa and the demon screamed. Akifusa-nii silenced first, if only because he lost conscience.

The other, the demon was half formed on the ground. Nura-kun stepped on its struggling body and held the tip of his blade ready to pierce the eyeball. Difficult to perceive as usual, darkness was still visibly coiling around her school friend's form, harsh and destructive. His eyes were glowing with such cold intensity it was well visible from even over a dozen meters away.

The voice that came from his mouth was nearly unrecognisable, it was so dark. "Long time no see, creepy giggling fuck."

The demon was silent for as long as it needed to focus on its assailant. Then it shrieked. It wasn't a normal kind of shriek. High and terrified, it seemed to almost dissolve in its attempt to get away from the Nurarihyon. It was the shriek one would expect when faced with a greatest nightmare. "Nura! Nura! Nura Rikuo! Nura! Curse you! Release me! Unhand me right now!"

Nura-kun dug the tip of his sword into the yokai's shoulder. The yokai silenced. It giggled half mad.

"Nura. Nuranuranura," it muttered. "Nura Rikuo! Harogomo Kitsune-sama! Save me!"

Vaguely, Yura was aware of something -looking like spider threads - snagging Akifusa and dumping him at her brother's feet, but she couldn't be bothered to follow it to its source. The scene happening in front of her caught her spell bound.

"Who is this young one, Minagoroshi Jizou?" Harogomo Kitsune questioned, not seeming very invested in saving one of her own. On the contrary, she seemed to be hardly noticing him, her full attention on Nura-kun. "He is familiar yet I am sure I have never met him before."

"Rikuo," a voice warned lowly from the darkness of the trees to Yura's right. "The Nidaime said not to engage her."

"Hoh," Nura-kun said darkly, not taking the eyes of the yokai under his feet. "She doesn't recognize me? How very interesting. Then there is only one question left to ask before I kill you." He twisted the sword viciously. "Who do you belong to really? Hyaku Monogatari? Or someone else? Who is the one really picking a fight with the Nura Clan? Tell me!" He shouted, voice charged with power so much that it seemed to bear its own weight.

The demon froze under him. "YOU."All of its three eyes focused on Nura-kun with sudden intensity that chased away all the terror. "You! It was you! You were the one! You! If only YOU hadn't interfered! How dare you -"

Swishing of air with considerable force.

Nura-kun only barely managed to bring up his sword in time.

The force of the impact send him flying down the path. He crushed into the stone hard enough to leave a crater. Harogomo Kitsune's yokai descended on him like flies. Nura-kun picked himself up and didn't even bother to look at them.

Yura had her mouth half opened to shout a warning when those yokai disintegrated, were torn to shreds, crushed, frozen, cut or otherwise by at least three dozen shadows suddenly announcing their presence.

They landed at the Nurarihyon's back and those small fry yokai were suddenly not so eager anymore to attack.

Yura recognized Oikawa-san and at least half of those yokai Nura-kun had tricked her into admitting to the main house this afternoon. There were also those two from Nejireme-yama.

It was only a small part of the hyakki he was usually surrounded by. Yet this intimidating presence to stand at a stand still with the yokai army all of the Keikain had been overrun by…

"Who are you?" Harogomo Kitsune slid down from her perch, landing on the ground with floating ease. Yura tried to get Hagun to attack her while the fox was so…fixed on Nura-kun, but the army of the dead didn't move.

"Truly, you are familiar," she said, so very intrigued. "Your face irritates me. Yet I would know had I encountered a yokai such as yourself before. Minagoroshi Jizou, who is he?" Hair fell away from her face. "Do not tell me you do not know."

That yokai who had possessed Akifusa stopped stuttering his gratitude for the rescue. Words stuck in his throat. "Harogomo Kitsune-sama. My Lady. He is no one you need to concern yourself with."

Her eyes were cold. "You are of my following, no? If he is a concern of yours it must be one of mine. Do not make me ask again."

Minagoroshi Jizou stuttered. Its body was still half destroyed.

Why didn't it answer?

The invading yokai army stirred with murmurs.

That at least seemed to snap the yokai out of it. It bowed deep. "That one you see over there is a nothing. Just a filthy halfbreed from the Kanto region. He is not your equal."

"Naturally," Harogomo Kitsune said, stroking hair over her shoulder. "Still, so very familiar. Have we met before, boy?" She rubbed her temple.

Nura-kun's face smoothed over. His eyes were extremely cold and calculating. He easeed faintly out of his ready stance. "You tried to kill me eight years ago," he said flatly. "Mostly my father, but also me." His lips curled. When his eyes slid to Minagoroshi Jizou they filled with loathing. "That one so pathetically whining stood by and laughed."

Harogomo Kitsune stilled. "Your father." Her second hand joined the first in rubbing her temples. "How foolish. I have never met an ayakashi that slips through Fear and wards alike. Such a useful ability. Why would I wish to kill you if I'd rather you join my ranks."

Nura-kun stared blankly. "You exchanged blows with him just the night before last."

The ranks of Harogomo Kitsune's yokai stirred more.

Just what was going on here? Yura couldn't make heads or tails of it. But at the same time there was nothing she could do but watch.

A yokai wearing the skin of an old man approached the fox girl respectfully. "He is a descendant of the yokai who destroyed our ambition four hundred years ago, my Lady. The resemblance is strong."

"….Four hundred years…? Ah yes, now I remember. How odd, I would have sworn I could never forget the face of that brute." Fear leaked out of her again, and only now Yura noted its previous absence.

In fact until now she had been positively amiable towards Nura-kun.

What was going on?

Malice so acid Yura felt it eat at her skin flowed out of that petite form. "How shall I kill you?"

Nura-kun shifted his blade, gold eyes glowing over the edge of it. Mist curled along his feet, the special magic of a hyakki. It spread and rose, quickly deepening shadows and playing with perceptions.

"Rikuo," one of his followers said, annoyed. He was handling a pair of sickles.

Yura felt she was choking on tension and tried again to get her Hagun to move. Instead it spoke. She almost fell over. But not as much as she did when out of nothing a hand grasped her. Her feet left the ground as she was slung over someone's shoulder.

"Wha – let me down you – Nura-kun?"

"We're leaving," he told her shortly. Yokai were all around them but either they were following Nura-kun's lead or they didn't even glance at them. They were all focused on the Nura-kun and the others who still stood surrounded on all sides. A large scale illusion.

"Unhand me, yokai! I can walk myself!" She kicked and struggled until Nura-kun set her down. "Let go of me." She tried to bat his hand of her shoulder.

He clicked his tongue, irritated. "Can't," he said shortly. "You're human so my Fear that keeps us unnoticed won't include you unless I do this. Your brother and his friend are already gone, by the way."

"Still, stop! What are we doing anyway, running? We've got to beat her!" She tried to get him to let her go again.

"I hate to agree with an onmyoji, but she has a point." A blond female yokai grunted. "Oi, Rikuo, we came here 'cause you promised us a fight. Not to babysit and rescue humans." Waving her hand, she caught tendrils of manifested Fear in her palm, twirling them annoyed.

"Shut up, Toono Yokai," Oikawa-san snapped. "The Young Master knows what he does. Rihan-sama's condition to come watch were not to fight."

That yokai with the sickles grunted, arms crossed. "For you maybe. But we from Toono don't take orders from anyone, Nura or not. Rikuo, explain yourself."

Nura-kun sighed. Running a hand through his hair, he opened his mouth -

It wasn't Nura-kun's voice that spoke. "Yes, really, that was a wonderful getaway. I'm impressed. So this is what being part of a Hyakkiyako is like. Very exciting!" A white clad onmyoji was floating over their heads. He studied Nura-kun. "Tell me, are you Nura-chan's son or grandson? You look very much like him, two peas in a pod I would say."

Oikawa-san eeped and pointed. "W-w-who are you? How can you do this? What sort of demon are you? Have you come to harm Rikuo-sama?"

"So slow," the sickle guy muttered.

"You're that one who spoke to me!" Yura shouted, recognizing him. "You can move? You can talk? Even though you're just a shikigami?"

"Why yes, I can." Her shikigami said, smiling cheerfully. Floating to the ground, he just walked alongside a demon parade as though it was nothing. By now they had left the temple ground and it seemed Nura-kun's deception was discovered, going by the howls of fury.

"I'm Hidemoto, the 13th. Nice to meet you, descendant. On that note, cut the thought of going back to fight her out of your mind. It's foolishness. You'd have died. I don't really fancy loosing my summoner already."

Yura's mouth shut.

Had her shikigami just told her what to do? Had her shikigami just lectured her?

"Nura-chan's relative, good job on recognizing that."

Nura-kun eyed him and his lips pressed together. "Whatever. I didn't decide it because of that." He gave his attention to the two who had complained and some of the others beside. "I'm sorry guys. I didn't expect that it would be like that. I know you don't like to follow orders."

Somehow this was different from Nura-kun's usual parade. The majority didn't seem to be his subordinates at all and searched him for his sincerity. Yura hadn't noticed how much she had let her guard down until now where it was clear those yokai might -

She sweat dropped. Or maybe not. They stopped their grumbling so fast it could hardly be called a token effort.

The only guy who might possibly not be entirely obedient to Nura-kun's words was the one with the sickles who mumbled, "whatever. We did get to fight some. It wasn't an entire waste."

"Don't be angry with me," Nura-kun requested. "There'll be other chances to fight against the strongest yokai Kyoto has to offer."

...did he seriously not notice how they only tried to pretend?

Ah. No. Yura didn't want to know. Yokai politics and powerplays and stuff were none of her business. No, thanks.

"Rikuo-sama," Oikawa-san spoke up, interrupting Yura's fierce self hypnosis. "Isn't it about time you let that girl go?"

"Hm?" Nura-kun blinked. He looked around. They were pretty far away from the temple by now, in the middle of the town.

Yura turned red and beat his hand of with a smack. "Don't touch me, yokai! I didn't need your help!"

Nura-kun held his hands up. The parade's magic of mixed Fears dispersed. "Sorry, sorry." He smirked. "Next time I'll just knock you out and save myself some bruises."

Yura tossed three dozen ofudas at him. "Be gone! Be gone! Be gone, evil spirit!"

"So," said her shinigami, completely ignoring Yura's attempts at exorcism. He seemed very fascinated by Nura-kun. "No really, are you Nura-chan's son or grandson? My guess is grandson as you seem a bit young to be Yo-hime's child. Is he doing well?"

Nura-kun blinked at the ghostly onmyoji all the while avoiding Yura's ofuda with insulting ease. "The old man's my grandfather. What do you want?"

Hidemoto the 13th smiled. "Catching up with an old friend would be nice," he suggested. "But mostly, since the old fox is running around …. is your Clan fighting her, and do you still have the sword I made?"

Nura-kun did a double take. "The sword you made – you mean the Nenekirimaru?"

"That's the one."

Folding his hands into the sleeves of his kimono, Nura-kun studied Yura's ancestor with more attention than before. "We do. It's the sword of the Supreme Commander. My father's at the moment. There seems to be a story here. Do I need to know it?"

"Oh, not really. It's long and boring," Hidemoto waved a dismissive hand. "What's important is that without that sword and Yura-chan's Hagun together Harogomo Kitsune can't be defeated."

Nura-kun's lips twitched, though not in a smile. "We're having our own issues with her, so cooperating shouldn't be a problem."

"Rikuo-sama, should you not speak of this to Rihan-sama first?" Oikawa-san proposed. "The onmyoji did turn down our assistance after all."

Hidemoto's smile lost its sincerity. "They did what?"

Nura-kun shook his head at Oikawa. "It's fine. What the onmyoji want or don't want has nothing to do whatsoever with what we do. If they've got an issue with how we are fighting and interfering then that's their problem. So long as Yura is willing to work together regardless of her family's position, we don't care." He glanced at Yura from the corner of his eyes. "You want to defeat her, don't you?"

Yura gritted her teeth. What was she supposed to say to that? "Of course I do."

He grinned.

Just like that Yura had given her word to break even more family laws, possibly a hell of a lot more. Damn word twisting yokai!

"Wonderful!" Hidemoto clapped his hands. "And don't you worry about the Keikain – I'll be giving them a stern talking too. Turning down the help of the yokai that defeated Harogomo Kitsune four hundred years ago – really what are my descendants thinking?"

What?

"I'm not particularly worried," Nura-kun said drily. "We're just here to cut ties with the fox. The onmyoji've got no say in that."

What did he say?

"I couldn't help but overhear by the way. You seem to be a pretty combative bunch. Would you be interested in taking out some strong yokai in specific locations that we need to rebuild the seal?" Hidemoto wondered, looking at the assembled yokai curiously.

About three quarters of them promptly got glints in their eyes, Nura-kun included. "How strong are we talking?" The blond girl demanded.

"Oh, high level, upper echelon, legendary strong. Old, experienced. That sort of thing." Hidemoto said casually, cheerfully.

"Where would we find such yokai?" Nura-kun wanted to know.

"Rikuo-sama," Oikawa-san hissed lowly. One of the two Gyuki demons jabbed an elbow in his master's side without effect.

Hidemoto hummed. "I'd like to let you know later. Since it wouldn't help much if you took them out without an onmyoji around to apply the seal."

Grumbling. Crazy yokai.

Also crazy ancestor.

Yura got a headache thinking too much about how this situation developed.

"Fine," Rikuo-kun said. "It's almost morning anyway and there's a lot of stuff I need to talk to the old men about. Yura knows how to contact me."

Overhead, the sky was indeed turning gray. In some of the buildings around them, lights were already turned on in preparation for the day.

"Come on guys, we're heading back. Maybe the others will have left some drinks for us." Nura-kun's haori swirled with the wind of his motion as he turned down the street. "Nice meeting you, Hidemoto. Try to stay alive Yura. Till later."

None of his yokai murmured anything as polite, though Hidemoto happily returned the sentiment and waved until the demons were gone from sight.

Yura felt exhausted. Damn yokai, stupid yokai she couldn't just blast into oblivion. What was wrong that they costed her more energy than the battle before?

"Ah, ah, ah, you can't rest yet, Yura-chan." Her ancestor said, voice only carrying half the amiability it had before. His gaze was focused in the distance. "There's a lot you've still got to do, starting with letting me meet the current head of the family."