Chapter 247: Tolerating Your Recklessness
"Recently, multiple countries have simultaneously issued decrees searching for Rowe…"
"King Arthur declared at the Buckingham Palace conference that anyone who plots against Rowe is declaring war on Britannia."
"Liu Xiu, Emperor Guangwu of Han China, openly challenged the Roman Emperor, who publicly stated that the world belongs to Rome, and Rowe is no exception…"
"An unknown evil force has appeared in Oeyama, Japan. According to folk scholars, it is highly likely to be the Oeyama faction ruled by Shuten Douji, one of the Three Great Yokai…"
…
On the streets of Tokyo, the large screens mounted atop commercial buildings continued broadcasting international news in an orderly stream, just as they always had.
The young beautiful hostess on screen, however, had unknowingly become a spirited girl with mottled red, blue, and black hair.
"Hello, hello, good morning everyone. This is Tokyo TV. I am your host, Sei Shonagon. That is all for today's broadcast. See you tomorrow."
Under the clear sunlight, Rowe stood in the spacious plaza outside the shopping mall and let out a slow breath.
This situation was entirely his own doing.
Even so, wherever he went, there was always a faint sensation of time and space slipping by, like the world had started taking shortcuts behind his back.
Sei Shonagon, a famous writer and waka poet from the Heian period.
Undoubtedly, a Heroic Spirit.
To modern people, the appearance of Heroic Spirits felt abrupt. To the Heroic Spirits who had always existed on the Throne, adapting to modern society was hardly difficult.
Chaos came first.
Then a new order.
As more historical figures appeared, disbelief turned to shock, shock to adaptation, and adaptation into numb routine.
All changes advanced quietly, almost imperceptibly.
Among those changes were, of course, certain individuals constantly aiming methods at Rowe.
He withdrew his gaze from the screen, now dark between broadcasts, and looked down.
A red magic circle had appeared at some point beneath his feet.
"No more knives?" Rowe asked, glancing to the side.
The golden haired girl in a light blue dress tilted her head and smiled.
"If it is useless, of course I will not use it."
She blinked, expression bright, tone almost cheerful.
"I still feel like I am not trying hard enough. The amount of magical energy a normal little knife can carry is limited."
"How does that saying go… discussing toxicity without considering dosage is just hooliganism?"
Manaka pretty eyes curved with amusement as she watched him.
Rowe chuckled.
"You know that one too?"
"Of course." Manaka put her hands on her hips. "I go online too. Do not treat me like a primitive."
"People connected to the Root also go online?"
"Of course." Manaka lifted her chin. "So hurry up and stand there properly. Let me see how effective it is."
Rowe exhaled, clapped his hands once, and stepped forward as if indulging a child's experiment.
Instantly, streams of light rose from the engraved circle, shooting upward and weaving into an invisible conceptual barrier, attempting to seal Rowe in place.
Wind, dust, air, earth, and sky within the range sharpened into invisible blades and pressed down on him.
Manaka had carved this magic circle by linking it to the leylines, then using them to borrow the weight of Japan itself.
She turned an entire country into a weapon.
To kill Rowe.
The result was immediate.
The circle shattered.
The pressure collapsed.
Dust settled.
Rowe yawned.
"Still far from enough."
"It still does not work…" Manaka's red lips curved upward.
She had failed, yet there was no discouragement, no dejection.
If anything, she looked more delighted than before.
Because it was inscrutable.
Because it was unattainable.
Because it did not yield.
For Manaka, born connected to the Root and able to peer into the world's secrets as casually as breathing, only something like this could be interesting.
"It seems I will have to use my real power," she said lightly. "Mister Rowe, do not be scared, alright?"
"Real power?" Rowe raised an eyebrow. "The Beast of Revelation?"
"Eh?" Manaka blinked. "Was I found out?"
"From the original text, that thing does have some restraint over me," Rowe said, calm and almost conversational.
Manaka's smile widened.
"Mister Rowe is lying again."
"Will you not try?" Rowe asked.
"Of course I will."
It had been three days since they left the hotel.
For those three days, Rowe stayed with Manaka. Scathach had also sent him a message. After hearing the beginning and end of it all, she let him go with unsettling confidence.
Skaði and Scathach trusted Rowe completely.
In their eyes, he would not run.
They had already taken the first move.
Even if they could not have him exclusively, they still believed they held some leverage.
During that same period, Rowe endured countless attacks from Manaka. They began with small knives and escalated into increasingly elaborate thaumaturgical methods.
Every attempt ended in failure.
Then Manaka would bring a new method.
Each one stronger than the last.
Each one more complex than the last.
"Then work hard," Rowe said, watching her excitement with satisfaction. "I am genuinely cheering for you."
She was trying to kill him, yet he spoke like an elder encouraging a junior.
"Such troubling confidence," Manaka said sweetly. "Is it not, Mister Rowe?"
Rowe lifted a brow.
"You dislike it?"
"No." Manaka's eyes shone. "I like it very much."
"In drama, the more confident someone is, the more likely they are to stumble."
Rowe's smile did not change.
He only nodded, neither agreeing nor denying.
"Well." Manaka clasped her hands together, sunlight catching in her golden hair and lighting her delicate face. "Even if I want to keep going, a game cannot be played for too long."
"I have to go home first."
"Home?" Rowe repeated.
"Do not look at me like that." Manaka smiled. "I value home, you know."
"You value it like a game."
"Is a game not good?"
In her eyes, being called a game was already the highest honor.
Someone connected to the Root could not share the perspective of ordinary people. Likewise, it was difficult for her to perceive ordinary emotion as anything but a pattern.
The reason she could live normally before was simple.
She treated life itself as a game.
Everyone else was an NPC.
Only she was real.
Even now, toward Rowe, her attitude was the same.
She had simply found a new game, and he happened to be the most interesting rule.
"Then I am leaving first," Manaka said brightly.
A brief departure from this game.
To participate in another one that had been running for more than ten years.
Rowe stood at the street corner and watched the golden haired figure recede.
Three days of constant companionship had made the air around him noisy.
Now, with Manaka gone, the world turned quiet.
Rowe felt an inexplicable sense of unfamiliarity.
That tranquility lasted only a moment.
As he continued down the street, mist began to gather. Light and shadow scattered, and the city's outlines blurred. From a distance, it looked like a chaotic interplay of brightness, like a painting soaked in water.
A voice echoed from the top of Tokyo Tower.
"The geodetic detector in the Shibuya area has issued an overload warning."
Tokyo Tower was not only a broadcasting hub.
Before this era, it had also served as a masked watchtower, monitoring the hidden world beneath modern life.
The Japan branch of the Divine Land Spiral Pavilion.
"Have you sent people to investigate?"
"It has already been entrusted to the specialists dispatched from Divine Land."
"No… wait. News from over there. The people we sent have lost contact."
"I have already reported it to Wuzhiqi. Wuzhiqi happened to arrive in Japan recently."
"What happened in Shibuya?"
What happened was simple.
A large scale disturbance in the leylines, driven by something from beyond the stars.
The sky twisted.
The earth vibrated with no visible source.
People's consciousness fell into dreams, dazed and lost.
Rowe had seen a scene like this more than two thousand years ago.
The Divine Land two thousand years ago.
The Six Heavens Ancient Ghosts revived.
"Are the Great Old Ones also coming to take a bite of this world now that it keeps growing?" Rowe murmured.
In an era where Servants walked everywhere, evil gods, or rather, existences connected to evil gods, also seized the chance to descend.
Rowe walked slowly through the mist. The buildings on both sides blurred and faded, their edges dissolving into ink.
Distant hills and near water became mere outlines.
Within that blurred world, wriggling black shadows slid past, and dark tentacles spread like spilled water.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Gunshots and low urgent voices came from ahead.
"What is that?"
"I do not know."
"I know." Someone's voice shook. "I saw it in old texts. That is a Six Heavens Ancient Ghost."
"Six Heavens Ancient Ghost? Weren't those dealt with long ago?"
"It might not be the same, but it is definitely something similar. The records left by our patriarch describe it clearly."
The speaker held a firearm, firing while retreating, struggling against the spreading tentacles.
At the front was a tall figure with a metallic presence. Dozens of dark muzzles extended from his hands, back, and bare chest, spitting sparks.
He alone unleashed immense firepower.
Those bullets were not ordinary ammunition.
They were products of Mystery fused with modern engineering.
Unusual tools.
Even more unusual people.
But being unusual did not stop the tentacles.
Fortunately, he was not alone.
A young man in a Daoist robe threw talismans one after another, supporting the strain. Nearby, several people held a ritual formation, condensed mana shaping an invisible barrier.
They barely resisted the tide.
Their power, however, did not belong to Japan.
"People from the Divine Land Spiral Pavilion," Rowe said quietly, stepping forward. He had no intention of simply watching.
He did not fear the Great Old Ones.
If anything…
He wished he could anger Them.
"Who is there?" The young man in the Daoist robe jerked his head around.
He saw a figure approaching through the mist.
Eyes threaded with gold and red glimmered faintly.
"A Daoist successor," Rowe said, glancing at him.
The young man froze, not reacting.
A girl beside him spoke first.
"Senior, you are…"
"You do not need to know who I am," Rowe said plainly.
Saying it out loud would only invite trouble from certain women with excellent hearing and terrible personalities.
Rowe was not that foolish.
"You only need to know I am here to help."
The one in the Daoist robe was a Daoist successor.
The steel like figure was a Mohist successor.
Those holding the formation were Legalist successors.
"Daoists draw talismans and build miniature bases to connect the world. Legalists use rigid ritual structures to link heaven and earth. Mohists forge flesh into steel and answer with firepower."
The Spiral Pavilion acted as the emissary of the Heavenly Court in the modern world.
The spokesperson of gods and immortals.
And the inheritors of the Hundred Schools.
Rowe was not in the Divine Land, but he knew that much.
A roar echoed.
The tentacles surged again.
The Mohist successor spread his hands, about to unleash heavier firepower.
Then the mist around them suddenly tore apart.
The tentacles struck something invisible and vanished as if erased.
The Mohist successor stared.
The Daoist successor's eyes widened.
The Legalist successors stiffened.
They looked at the figure who had dismissed the massive tentacles with a casual motion.
Rowe turned back, golden eyes steady.
"Leave. Now."
"This is not something you can participate in."
It was a reminder, offered because they were descendants of old acquaintances.
It was also, in its own way, the duty of that old Heaven to protect its people.
Then the Daoist successor suddenly lit up.
"Wait. I know who you are. You are Rowe, right?"
Rowe paused.
"…?"
Was this not supposed to be the part where he left with a mysterious back view and a lingering aura of legend?
Was it truly acceptable to guess his name out loud like this?
"Rowe?" someone blurted. "The Rowe Emperor Guangwu issued decrees about?"
"No, no, no, I heard Mister Rowe is also the incarnation of the Heavenly Emperor in the human world."
"When the First Emperor turned into the Dragon Veins of the Nine Provinces, it was with his help…"
Rowe stared at them.
For a fleeting moment, a dangerous thought appeared.
Can I silence them?
Before he decided, the Daoist successor spoke quickly, eyes sharp with survival instinct.
"But do not worry. As long as you do not want us to, we will not report it to our superiors. Mister Rowe, please rest assured."
That was better.
Rowe nodded.
"Good."
"This matter is still not something you can participate in. Leave here."
"Yes."
They answered in unison.
Rowe scanned their faces as if confirming, then turned and walked away.
A moment later, behind him, the voices began again.
"Did he leave?"
"Is he really the legendary one? He feels… different."
"He is too approachable. I did not even feel nervous. But the old records also described him like this."
"Are you really not reporting it? When we came, His Majesty gave us countless instructions."
"Not reporting it? Of course we will report it. His Majesty said whoever finds Mister Rowe first gets a chance to enter Pan. Why are you pulling my sleeve? Why are you still pulling it…"
"Because of me, of course."
The excited Daoist successor's face went rigid.
He slowly turned his head.
Rowe had returned.
He wore a faint smile.
A moment later, the street was quiet.
Where the mist had been torn open, a slender woman with long white hair appeared, stared at the people lying dazed on the ground, and scratched her head.
"Oh dear… what happened here?"
She ruffled her hair, then looked ahead.
Mist rolled thickly.
That familiar, irritating sensation made Wuzhiqi frown, and it also deepened her confusion.
"If it is really something similar to the Six Heavens Ancient Ghosts… why did it not kill them?"
"Why only knock them out and erase their memories?"
Would the Six Heavens Ancient Ghosts show mercy?
Of course not.
The Great Old Ones would not either.
Those unnameable existences representing primordial cosmic order did not care about human life.
Survival was an accident.
Compassion did not exist.
But Rowe did not kill indiscriminately.
Those people were annoying.
They did not deserve death.
Still, the sudden disaster needed to be resolved.
And its source.
In Rowe's perception, a dazzling gate of light burned ahead.
Ahead.
The Sajou family residence.
Coincidence, or accident.
Either way, Rowe could not stand idle.
Stop the disaster.
Anger the evil god.
"My world cannot tolerate your recklessness."
…
"Mistress, you are finally back."
Within the Sajyou estate, located in Shibuya's most desirable district, Manaka walked down a long corridor, smiling as she spoke to a household servant.
"Hmm. Is Father back?"
"Yes. Master just got off the plane."
"Did he say anything?"
Manaka smiled as she asked, yet her emotionless gaze made the young servant tremble.
"No… he did not say anything."
"If he did not say anything, he would not come looking for me, would he?"
Manaka stated it as a simple fact, one that would crush most people, yet her tone did not change.
Yes.
Her father, Sajyou Hiroki, the head of the Sajou family, had not returned to this home in many years.
Because he feared his daughter.
Because he feared her.
Just like the maid in front of her now.
Under Manaka's gaze, the maid finally could not bear the pressure.
"Master said… he wants to send you to the Clock Tower in London for your studies."
"Yes, Manaka."
As the maid's words fell, another voice sounded from deeper inside the house.
A slightly deep, hoarse voice.
"I think you should go and see that place."
"The Clock Tower?" Manaka tilted her head and looked at the man who walked out.
Her nominal father.
"What would I do in such a boring place?"
"Father would not simply be afraid and want to send me away, would he?"
"H how could that be?" Sajyou Hiroki's expression turned unnatural.
Manaka's wooden clogs tapped softly as she stepped forward.
"My daughter is a monster. She is my daughter."
"I cannot despise her."
"But a monster is still a monster."
Manaka smiled brightly as she spoke, eyes calm.
"Very normal thoughts. Very normal emotions."
"Is that not right?"
Manaka's smile did not waver.
A person born with knowledge, seeing the truths of the world without effort, was not a genius.
Such a person was a monster.
That was understandable.
"How can Sister say that about Father?" A younger girl stepped out from behind Sajou Hiroki.
Sajyou Hiroki tried to shield her, but he could not stop her movement.
"It is Ayaka. So you came too."
Manaka looked at her younger sister without changing expression.
"But doing it for my good is a vague definition."
"In reality, it is fear of what terrifying things I might do."
"Especially now, with the world changing so suddenly."
"That is also the responsibility the head of the Sajou family must bear, is it not?"
Sajou Hiroki did not deny it.
He could not.
Sajou Ayaka looked at him in disbelief.
"That is why I say humans are fragile," Manaka sighed. "Fear. Dread. Helplessness."
"Unfortunately, I am not in a very good mood today."
She lifted her gaze.
"And this family game ends here."
The smile on Manaka's face slowly faded.
Crimson light spread from her, and a dangerous aura rose, heavy enough to bend the air.
"Manaka…" Sajou Hiroki's face changed. He pulled Sajyou Ayaka behind him.
Ayaka looked bewildered.
The maid had already fled aside.
"I am tired of playing," Manaka said coldly.
Then a massive surge of mana erupted.
At that same moment, tentacles that pierced into the estate from outside disintegrated under the light.
Sajou Hiroki had no time to process what those tentacles were.
His mind went blank under the pressure.
Yet he still clutched his younger daughter and used his body as a shield.
"Father… Manaka Sister…"
Manaka's expression remained empty.
Humans were fragile dolls.
A little force was enough to shatter them.
Not only flesh.
Even spirit.
And then.
Ultimately.
"Even if I know the Great Old Ones can affect the mind," a troubled voice said, "and even if I know you are only linked to the Root and not the Root itself, so being affected is possible…"
"But is it not a bit much to use the power you use against me to deal with them?"
The mana did not falter.
The light did not waver.
Yet blood still splashed, and a figure stood upright in the doorway.
Rowe.
He had rushed over, guided by the sensation.
He pressed a hand to his chest and watched the wound heal, the last traces fading like embers.
Then he looked at Manaka.
"But it is still lacking, is it not?"
"Ah." Manaka was not surprised he had arrived.
Her eyes shone.
"Still lacking to kill Mister Rowe?"
As he said, her earlier outburst had been influenced by the Great Old Ones.
And yet, to another extent, it was also caused by the person standing in front of her.
"I have always envied Ayaka," Manaka said softly.
"I also wanted to be like Sajou Ayaka."
"Not knowing so much."
"Having a real thirst for knowledge."
"Living simply."
"Having the capital to be willful."
She smiled again, bright and delicate.
"But now, I do not envy her anymore."
"Because now, I also have the capital to be willful."
Her gaze fixed on Rowe.
"And I also have someone who can tolerate my recklessness."
Manaka's voice turned gentle, almost intimate.
"Is that not right, Mister Rowe?"