Chapter 9: Yagyu Challenges the Veiled Flow!

And the method by which those strongest among them would be chosen was this: a champion’s challenge.

Without a trace of agitation, Abe no Seimei announced the manner in which the five strongest would be decided. Then, with a smile, he added, “For the bouts that follow, I ask that you all show restraint. The eventual victor will be the one sent to face an even more terrifying foe, so this is not merely a matter of honor, but of duty. I urge you, my lords, to think carefully.”

He had barely finished speaking when the hall, which had been quiet with uncertainty, fell into a murmur of exchanged glances.

The lord seated at the head, who had not spoken until now, gave a single cough.

At once, everyone turned toward the solemn-faced Great General Yoshitugu.

With a slight raise of his hand, Seimei, who stood before him, immediately cast a spell to amplify the great general’s voice.

Then the great general said flatly, “The five strongest shall each receive a reward of one thousand ryō. Regardless of whether the later campaign succeeds, they shall be granted the title of ‘Strongest Under Heaven,’ and their school or training hall may be established in the capital. I will personally petition the emperor to bestow upon it an imperial designation.”

The moment those words fell, everyone seated below erupted with fervor.

Yuan sat in a corner and motioned for Hazy to watch the expressions on their faces, smiling as he said, “Hazy, look. Wealth, fame, and rank are the true motives that make men risk their lives. This is where the real spectacle begins.”

But Hazy only looked baffled. “The title of strongest under heaven is nothing more than an empty reputation. What is there to fight over? Besides—”

She turned to Yuan, her eyes resolute. “Even if they fight over it, what use is it? Even the strongest man is only human. How could he compare with Lord Yuan?”

Cough, cough. Hazy, isn’t that a little too much blind praise?

Yuan’s old face went red. Since seeing him cut down the Spider King with a single blow, this girl seemed to have become nothing less than a die-hard admirer.

By then, Seimei on the stage had seen that everyone was now thoroughly roused, and he immediately smiled. “Please, my lords, be at ease. Wait but the space of a single incense stick, and I shall prepare a stage upon which all of you may display your skills.”

As soon as he spoke, he formed a series of peculiar hand seals. After rapidly chanting a spell, he unfolded the five-bone folding fan in his hand and gave a light sweep toward the front.

In an instant, countless tiny paper figures flew out from the fan’s ribs, growing in the wind. Upon landing, they straightened into human-sized forms and bowed to Seimei in unison.

Smiling, Seimei waved a hand, and the dozens of paper figures sprang into action. Some hauled in timber from outside the field, some sought out saws and axes to shape the materials, while others began driving stakes and assembling the frame. With each figure assigned its task in perfect order, several rough stage platforms soon took shape.

The men of ability below could not help but gasp at this onmyoji art of his, as though he were scattering beans to raise an army.

Yuan, too, watched Seimei’s grand display with some envy, unable to help sighing. “If I could do that, I could start my own construction crew and be a contractor in no time. This Seimei is too sly—if I beat him down until he submits, perhaps he’d be willing to hand over this onmyoji art.”

Hazy, who stood nearest, heard her lord muttering to himself and looked utterly confused. Construction crew? Contractor? She had no idea what he was talking about.

On the stage, however, Seimei, who had been casually showing off, gave a faint twitch at the corner of his mouth and cast a strange glance toward Yuan in the corner.

After thinking for a moment, he pinched another spell with the hand hidden in his sleeve and moved his lips.

Bored, Yuan’s ear twitched. He glanced at Seimei on the stage, and the other man gave him a wink.

“Tch.” Yuan scratched his ear, his expression oddly complicated. “You really are something else, offering terms I can’t possibly refuse.”

“Likewise. After all, I’m afraid you might take me seriously.”

“If a Hazy-style swordsman sets his sights on me, let alone being Seimei, even if I truly bore the name Abe, I’d probably lose all peace of mind.”

Hazy looked at Yuan, who was speaking to himself, and asked curiously, “My lord, who are you talking to?”

Yuan shrugged. “Someone unpleasant.”

With that, he patted the girl’s small hand. “Hazy, once the stages are ready, go up and have some fun. Let’s see how many people you can defeat.”

“What? I’m going up too, my lord?” Hazy blinked. “I thought we were just here to watch.”

“That was the plan. But that fellow has agreed to teach us some of the secret arts he’s collected—ones that can be used with demon power as well.” Yuan motioned with his eyes toward Seimei.

Hazy immediately showed that she understood, and her eyes lit up with longing.

Though Hazy’s style was formidable when it came to slaying demons, who would not want to possess so many marvelous spells like this onmyoji?

Looking at the excited girl, Yuan’s smile faded slightly.

Hazy. If I cannot take you away after all. Perhaps, remaining in this demon-hunting hall—

Not long after, before even a single incense stick had burned through, Seimei’s paper shikigami had finished their work.

Five square stages, each more than ten meters across, now stood in the training ground, filling the vast space almost to overflowing.

Abe no Seimei spread his fan with a sweep, and the paper figures all took wing, shrinking as they flew back into the fan.

Then he declared in a clear voice, “The stages are ready. My lords, any who have confidence in themselves may now ascend and challenge the others. You need not fear exhaustion or injury. So long as it is not a mortal wound that kills you on the spot, I, Abe no Seimei, in the name of the strongest onmyoji of our age, guarantee this: even should you be forced into repeated battles, I can replenish your strength in full. Even if your limbs are severed, I can restore them as though whole.”

Having said that, he returned to sit beside the general with a confident smile.

The field fell into a brief silence, broken only by the rustle of whispered discussion.

Hazy looked to Yuan.

Yuan smiled and nodded at her.

The girl immediately rose without hesitation. Under the astonished gazes of the crowd, she quickly took several steps forward, then sprang lightly onto one of the stages.

Standing there, she gathered her courage and boldly proclaimed, “Hazy-style swordsman—Hazy—now challenges the heroes of the world!”

“I’m going to.” Yuan covered his face as he looked at the girl, who had become brazenly and dazzlingly bold the instant she got on stage.

Sending you up there was already plenty attention-seeking, and now you’re shouting a challenge to everyone? Clearly you think there aren’t enough opponents!

To his surprise, following Hazy’s lead, several others immediately rose from their seats, each choosing a different stage and leaping up.

“Mist-Eye Bright-Wisdom Style swordsman—Momoi Kuran! If you have the nerve, come challenge me!”

“Shinto One-Mind Style swordsman—Fukui Saemon! I invite all mighty warriors to fight me!”

“Treasure Hall School—Kakuzan En’ei. This humble monk is willing to offer his meager strength for the sake of all living beings!”

In the end, there were four stages left, yet five people had gone up, and inevitably one stage now held two challengers.

They immediately confronted one another. After a few terse introductions, they launched into battle at once.

From the moment those two shouted and began fighting, the entire scene changed in an instant.

More and more swordsmen and monks of varying backgrounds followed, ascending the stages to challenge the reigning champions.

Among them, a swordsman whose school name no one could quite remember leaped with bitter hatred onto Hazy’s stage. With a shout full of fervor, before he had even drawn his blade, the girl’s lightning-fast strike severed his entire right arm. She then kicked him flying to the ground.

As he howled in agony, his arm and body were carried before Seimei.

Under Seimei’s miraculous onmyoji art, the arm was soon reattached without issue.

Though he ultimately left the stage unharmed, the pitiful sight of being cut down in a single blow by such a tiny girl still made everyone who stepped up afterward dare to compete only for the remaining four stages.

In truth, once a girl mastered Hazy-style swordsmanship, the manner of her combat was no longer at all like that of any ordinary school.

It was not merely the difference between realistic swordplay and stage combat, but rather the difference between realism and an animated fantasy world.

Yuan sat calmly below, observing the battle for the stages as champions changed one after another, Hazy excepted, and roughly gauged the level of individual human strength in this world.

If he compared them to certain anime or films he had seen on Earth, the experts invited to this “court gathering” were mostly somewhere between Sword of the Samurai and Rurouni Kenshin.

In other words, they were on the lower end even of the “low-martial” spectrum.

Ordinary people like these, if they cooperated well in groups, might barely manage against common ghosts such as Red Oni. But if they met a third-tier yokai like a Furnace-Step, they would probably be slaughtered with ease.

Let alone facing an Oni King like the Spider King.

No wonder a school like Hazy-style, which could use demonic power to gain inhuman speed and strength, was hailed as unmatched under heaven.

Everyone else practiced realism; it practiced immortality. If it was not unmatched under heaven, then who was?

He wondered what the “human peak combat power” of this world would look like.

As Yuan thought, his gaze shifted toward several places that had drawn his attention: the Yagyu, the Mirror-Gaze, the Thunder God, the Storm, and the Temple of Light King clans.

The stage fights were raging with full force, yet these schools and families remained unmoved.

Their eyes upon the people in the arena were calm, but scrutinizing—almost the same as Yuan’s own evaluative stare.

These, perhaps, were the true group that had mastered powers beyond the ordinary, powers like Hazy-style.

Thus time passed slowly amid the self-forgetting struggle of those ordinary men.

After about an hour, no new challengers came forward. Only Hazy and the four other warriors who had successfully defended their stages remained standing there.

Seeing this, Seimei once more stepped before the stages and, using voice transmission, laughed aloud, “If no one else will step up, then shall I declare the result?”

At his words, all but Hazy looked delighted and expectant.

Yet they were clearly rejoicing too soon.

The next instant, under Seimei’s serene smile, several figures finally rose from their places and ascended the stages in astonishing fashion.

“Temple of Light King—Fudomine, with compassion!” A towering monk more than two meters tall, unlike any ever seen in this world, walked step by step onto the stage, seized his opponent as the man tried to resist, and with a casual fling sent him flying off the platform.

“Mirror-Gaze Family—Mitsumaya, forgive me!” A graceful beauty in shrine maiden robes leaped onto the stage. As her opponent’s swordsman charged, two greatbows floated up behind her out of thin air, fully drawn. Two arrows flew, pinning the enemy’s feet in place.

“Thunder God Grand Shrine—Mikazuchi Aya.” A woman cloaked from head to toe in a hooded priest’s vestments slowly stepped onto the stage, pointed a finger, and the spear fighter opposite her collapsed onto the platform, trembling as though struck by lightning.

After a brief silence—

Just as Hazy was still enjoying the spectacle, a man from the Yagyu camp, a greatsword upon his shoulder, leaped in several bounds onto the stage to confront her.

He removed his straw hat, revealing a face scarred with twisted blade marks.

“Yagyu clan heir, deputy chief of the Demon-Slaying Hall, Yagyu Tsukito.”

“I challenge Hazy-style!”