The Kamaitachi's shriek still echoed through the air.
It staggered backward, blood gushing from the eye socket Kōbe Hikaru had run through, staining its ash-grey fur a deep, ugly red.
Kōbe Hikaru didn't give chase.
Not because he didn't want to. Because he couldn't move.
That last strike had burned through nearly everything he had. [Bloodthirst Frenzy] carried no backlash, technically — but the expenditure was real. His limbs had gone soft. His vision swam at the edges.
"Damn you…"
The Kamaitachi's voice was thick with resentment and fury.
It fixed its gaze on Kōbe Hikaru. The one eye remaining in its hollow socket gleamed with a sickly green light — the feral, cornered light unique to a beast that had been driven to the edge.
Kōbe Hikaru tightened his grip on the hilt and forced himself upright.
He knew what was coming. A wounded animal was the most dangerous thing in the world. Especially when that animal was a Corporeal Sublimation-class yōkai that had crossed Seven Changes.
"You…"
The Kamaitachi opened its maw. Deep in its throat, currents of air began to gather.
Its charging sequence had been interrupted before. Its internal organs were damaged. But it was still a Sublimation-class existence. It still possessed the power to crush any Physical Transformation yōkai beneath its feet.
Kōbe Hikaru drew a slow breath and braced himself for the final exchange.
And then — the Kamaitachi froze.
Its body snapped backward as if yanked by an invisible force, retreating three full jō in an instant.
Shhhk——!
A streak of white light blazed past Kōbe Hikaru's temple — so close it stirred his hair — and tore through the exact spot where the Kamaitachi had just been standing.
A demon-breaking arrow.
Kōbe Hikaru turned.
Kikyō stood before the shrine hall.
Her hand still held the released-bowstring pose, white kosode and red hakama swaying gently in the night wind.
And the Shikon Jewel floating before her — it was calm. The pale violet light it cast was soft and steady. The violent black miasma that had churned within it moments ago was gone.
Magatsuhi had been suppressed.
Completely suppressed.
"…All done?" Kōbe Hikaru asked.
Kikyō didn't answer.
She simply nocked another arrow and drew the bow, the arrowhead leveled at the Kamaitachi.
The motion was fluid — effortless, like water flowing over stone. Not a trace of fatigue in her form.
But Kōbe Hikaru knew. She had to be exhausted. Holding the Four-Spirit Sealing Formation and suppressing Magatsuhi for that long — the spiritual power it had cost her was no less than what he'd spent.
The Kamaitachi stared at the shrine maiden who had just entered the battlefield. The savage light in its remaining eye dimmed.
What replaced it was wariness.
Even fear.
It could feel the power packed into that arrow. This was no ordinary demon-breaking shot.
And it had heard the name. Shrine maiden Kikyō — the one who had driven back countless high-ranking yōkai. A name that carried weight even among beings like itself.
"Planning to run?"
Kōbe Hikaru's voice came from the side.
The Kamaitachi's pupil contracted.
Somehow — without it noticing — the blood-soaked Ghost Warrior had already moved to cut off its retreat.
He looked like he could topple over at any moment. Like one strong gust would finish him.
But he was standing in its way.
"Move!"
The Kamaitachi snarled.
It was done fighting. One eye gone. Internal organs damaged. More than half its demon-qi spent. If it kept going, even if it managed to kill this insignificant little demon, that shrine maiden would put an arrow through it.
Not worth it.
The Shikon Jewel was tempting — but survival came first.
And as a Corporeal Sublimation-class yōkai, it possessed a level of cunning and reason that no low-ranking demon could match.
It decided to force its way through. Using the fundamental nature of the Kamaitachi — wind itself — and the speed of a Sublimation-class existence, once it broke past these two, neither of them could catch it.
Its body began to compress.
From two jō down to one.
Speed surged.
It launched itself forward as a streak of grey shadow, charging straight at Kōbe Hikaru —
Clang!
Steel rang out.
Kōbe Hikaru's blade caught the first strike. Barely. His body was driven back several steps from the impact — but he held.
The Kamaitachi hesitated.
It had assumed this little demon had nothing left. That one more blow would finish him. It hadn't expected him to still be moving.
In that split second of hesitation — the ground shook.
The roots of the Old Locust Tree — already severed — tore free of the earth again and coiled around the Kamaitachi's rear legs.
The Big Stone rolled in and slammed into its flank.
The water remaining in the well froze into needle-sharp shards of ice and flew straight for its eyes.
The hoe lurched through the air — crooked, wobbling, pathetically slow — but it angled itself perfectly to block the Kamaitachi's path of retreat.
It only held for a moment.
Half a breath. No more.
But it was enough.
BOOM.
A sound like a thunderclap split the night.
Kōbe Hikaru turned his head — and saw it.
Kikyō's arrow was on fire.
The entire shaft, consumed in light. Pure spiritual power, refined to its absolute limit, wrapped around the arrowhead and blazed into a lance of blinding white radiance.
It was too bright. Bright enough that Kōbe Hikaru had to squint. Bright enough to turn the entire shrine grounds into high noon.
[OVERFLOW — Arrow Strike]
Kikyō had poured every last drop of spiritual power she had left — everything that remained — into this single shot.
One arrow. Winner takes all.
The Kamaitachi felt death.
The scent of it was overwhelming. So overwhelming that every instinct it possessed screamed at it to run.
But it couldn't run.
Its legs were tangled in tree roots. Stone blocked its flanks. The hoe blocked its retreat. And that damned Ghost Warrior was standing right in front of it.
"No——!"
The Kamaitachi let out a howl of pure desperation.
It threw open its maw and poured every last shred of its demon-qi into a single roaring gale, hurling it against the arrow in a last bid to hold it back.
The gale was purified the instant it touched the white light.
Like snow against a bonfire.
Like shadow meeting the sun.
It didn't even manage to delay the strike by a fraction of a second.
The white light pierced through the Kamaitachi's chest.
BOOM——
Spiritual power detonated inside its body and tore that Sublimation-forged frame apart from within.
The Kamaitachi's shriek cut off like a severed string.
Its body began to dissolve.
All that wind — gathered and compressed over untold years — finally scattered. It unraveled into countless thin currents and dissolved into the night sky, until there was nothing left.
Kōbe Hikaru stood where he was and watched.
A true high-ranking yōkai. Corporeal Sublimation-class.
One arrow. Instant kill.
That was the power of the strongest shrine maiden of the Warring States era.
Her raw physical resilience wasn't particularly impressive by comparison — but wasn't that always the way with human practitioners? Glass cannon builds. High damage, low survivability.
Though in Kikyō's case, her defense wasn't exactly weak either. The barrier arts she wielded were masterclass-level. Among human practitioners, she was already an outlier.
[Shikon Jewel — Naohi: Affection +8]
[Current Affection: 34 (Trust)]
[Naohi Affection has surpassed 30. Bond Dialogue (II) is now unlocked.]
[First Talent Unlocked: Spirit Sight]
[Effect: You can perceive spiritual energy as it drifts freely through heaven and earth.]
Kōbe Hikaru stared at the notification on the panel.
Spirit Sight?
He blinked.
And then — he saw it.
Countless pale blue motes of light were drifting through the air around him, flowing slowly on the night breeze — some rising toward the sky, others sinking gently into the earth.
This was… spiritual energy?
He raised his hand and reached toward the nearest cluster of motes.
They passed straight through his palm. No reaction whatsoever.
So — he could see it, but he couldn't absorb it. Not yet.
Still, that was more than enough.
At minimum, he could now identify which areas had dense concentrations of spiritual power, which locations were suited for cultivation, and discern the relative strengths and weaknesses of human practitioners at a glance.
And if this ability could evolve further — from simply seeing to actually touching — then he might eventually try to build up Affection with spiritual energy itself.
That was a problem for another day.
What genuinely surprised him right now was something else entirely: this ability could activate without him physically carrying the Shikon Jewel.
It seemed that as long as the Affection link between him and the Shikon Jewel was maintained, its granted abilities remained active.
They still didn't belong to him in the truest sense. But the convenience was undeniable.
He raised his head and looked toward Kikyō.
She was still standing where she'd been.
But her body was swaying. Faintly. Almost imperceptibly.
That final arrow had emptied her completely.
She had hit her limit too.
Kōbe Hikaru walked toward her.
His steps were unsteady — but they were steps.
Kikyō watched him approach. She didn't retreat. She didn't step back to put distance between them.
She simply stood there, still and quiet, and waited for him.
Moonlight fell over them both.
A Ghost Warrior drenched in black blood.
And a shrine maiden, pale and drained, barely holding herself upright.
Neither of them had anything left.
But they were both still standing.
"…That's over, I take it?" Kōbe Hikaru said.
"It's over," Kikyō replied.
The Shikon Jewel hovered behind her, radiating a soft, steady violet glow.
Magatsuhi — fully suppressed.
The Kamaitachi — purified.
The Blood-Bat Swarm — scattered and fled long ago.
The crisis of the full moon night.
It was finally over.
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