Well, a few more people with vital roles were still in hiding, but that was a surprise for later.
“I certainly hope no one falls out of step and alerts the sorcerer to the plan,” Keigetsu fretted.
Reirin glanced up at the giant boulder. “The point of the bait is to draw the sorcerer’s attention and ensure that doesn’t happen.”
As she smiled and pressed a hand to her cheek, her sleeve slid down to expose her slender wrist—and the red bracelet wrapped around it.
The sight of that brought a sullen scowl to Keigetsu’s face. “Are you sure that isn’t going to cause issues?”
“Of course. It’s nothing I’m not used to.”
“Still, don’t you ever do it again. Especially not where I can see,” Keigetsu spat.
“Goodness, you look like you just took a whole swig of vinegar.” Reirin thrust the object she was cradling before her friend. It was a metal spittoon. “Would you care to spew your frustrations into this?”
“Absolutely not!”
After Keigetsu dismissed her banter with a shrill cry, Reirin cracked a lopsided smile and turned back to the frozen waters of the lake. “Well, you may have a point. Perhaps I didn’t need to bother.”
Her eyes narrowed as she watched Tou shuffle across the lake. He occasionally waved at a man on the opposite shore and shouted, “I’m on my way now, Master Keikou!”
“It would appear that Doctor Tou’s approximation of vision isn’t all that accurate.”
Little did he know that the man he was waving to was not Kou Keikou at all. It was Kou Keishou affecting his brother’s voice.
It was almost time. As Tou made his way across the lake, his heart thrummed in anticipation as a certain presence drew near. The target was moving to meet them partway, so he could finally make out the finer details of their qi. The strong yang indicated that it was a man. He was in good health and possessed a deep affinity for earth. His voice also had a wonderfully youthful ring to it. If Tou could get his hands on that body, decades of a fun and fulfilling life were sure to await him.
At this point, he was about halfway to the other shore. Yin and yang were completely out of balance, and the solar eclipse was about to begin. The yin energy had intensified to the point of bearing down on him, sending a shiver down his spine.
I can finally be free of this accursed vessel.
Oh, how long he had waited for this day. It was inconvenient to have such a large audience, but upon reflection, he realized it would get dark during the eclipse. An ordinary person would have no way of knowing what had happened, so the game would be won as soon as he pulled off the switch.
Plus, he had lucked out in another way: Whether for fear that it would break or for dread of the impending eclipse, the majority of the locals hadn’t set a single foot on the ice. Tou was within five hundred strides of the shore, which would give him more than enough room to disguise what had happened and flee under the cover of the eclipse.
It’s about time the Heavens chose to favor me.
Once he got his hands on a new body, he could give the crown prince the slip, run anywhere he pleased, and make the most of his youthful vessel. Supposing the next Day of Ultimate Yin came within a few decades, he could even find another body to steal and effectively make himself immortal.
Fwoosh!
“Whoa!”
With how focused Tou was on his prey, he nearly slipped and fell. The flora, the bugs crawling on the ground, and all other living creatures emitted a faint qi, and Tou used the glow of that qi to see by. As there was no such life atop the ice, it was very difficult for him to navigate.
The crowd on the shore buzzed, and some of the children cried out in dismay.
“Doctor Tou?!”
“But why?!”
Either they were surprised to see their leader show up after a few days away, or they were concerned that he had almost taken a tumble over the ice.
Drat. I had best pretend that everything is fine. The last thing I want is for them to rush over here.
Tou glanced at the shore behind the military officer, planning to say something back to the children. He had moved quite a bit closer now, so he could finally make out the characteristics of the crowd’s qi.
“Wha…?!”
The moment he strained his spiritual eyes to get a better look, Tou gasped. Something was very strange about the auras he sensed on the shore.
On the left side, amid the dim auras of those he assumed to be the locals, were three owners of remarkably pure wood, water, and metal qi respectively. Their strong yin indicated that they were all women. If the glow of the locals’ qi could be likened to third-magnitude stars, these girls had auras eye-catching enough to count as second-magnitude stars.
On the right side, there was the owner of the bracelet, along with someone whose qi was a mysterious blend of fire and earth. While it still paled in comparison to the dragon’s qi, this aura was about as radiant a first-magnitude star.
What truly alarmed Tou, however, were the presences standing atop a large divide in the shore, likely a boulder of some sort. He “saw” two auras there. One had a definitively earthen characteristic, and the other had an extremely intense attribute of water. Judging by their strong yang, both people were men.
In short, a man with shockingly pure water qi was looking down on the lake from a rock.
I recognize that aura!
Tou shuddered as an unpleasant memory came flooding back. This qi belonged to the former youngest prince, the man who had once attempted to cut him down.
With a grunt, he immediately turned on his heel and headed back for the shore whence he came.
“Hm? Is something wrong?” the porter Anki called out, a dubious note in his voice. “Let’s not keep Master Keikou waiting.”
The concerned inquiry put Tou on edge. Was this a trap after all? Was he surrounded by the former youngest prince’s forces?
I have no choice but to retreat. I’ll turn back and escape into the forest for—
Unfortunately, when he turned his spiritual eyes toward the shore by the cave, he sensed an enormous mass of qi rapidly approaching from the forest beyond. That had to be the dragon’s qi.
A pincer attack?! Curses!
He shrank back a few steps, panicked. His head spun, and he tripped over his own feet.
“Forgive me for asking, but are you having trouble walking across the ice? You keep bumping into things, and you look unsteady on your feet. Do you have a bad leg, by chance? Or is it your eyesight that’s impaired?”
Anki’s increasingly pointed questions had Tou tongue-tied. He ventured a fearful glance at the man standing before him, whom he had taken for nothing but a good-natured porter. What would possess him to ask something like that?
Tou immediately denied the accusation. “No, of course no—”
“Really?” the other man asked mildly. His voice was drowned out as a series of metallic clacks rang out all around Tou. “Do you not see what you’re standing on?”
“Huh?”
No sooner did a confused murmur leave Tou’s lips than an explosion cracked through the air.
Ka-booooom!
Upon hearing that tremendous blast, Tou opened his mouth to scream, “Wha—?!”
The rest never had a chance to take form. By the time he realized the entire sheet of ice around him had exploded and shattered, he was already sinking into its frigid depths.
“Goodness. Everyone set off the explosion with perfect timing,” said Reirin as she gazed out over the lake. Observing that the five bombs positioned around Tou had been set off at almost exactly the same time, she let slip a sigh of wonder.
The fuses to the iron kettle bombs were quite short, yet every single archer’s aim had been true, ensuring that all five went off at once. It was a truly impressive feat.
The explosives had been arranged in a pentagon around Tou. Akim had ignited two of them with flaming darts. Keishou, who had been luring Tou in with his “Kou Keikou” act, and the actual Keikou, who was standing atop the boulder, had each set one off with a fire arrow. And as for the last one…
“Ah…”
It was with awe that Reirin stared up at Genyou, who slowly lowered his bow from his spot atop the rock. His given name meant “a radiant string,” and he certainly lived up to it. Despite his reputation as a mild-mannered emperor who loved music, he had plucked sound from the string of a bow in lieu of a qin, unleashing a fire arrow at the farthest explosive with perfect aim.