Chapter 46

“…How dare you…!” “Drop it, you two,” came a voice from the balcony. “Why do you think you’re always fallin’ behind?” Standing in a puddle of rust, Bisco chastised the two through gritted teeth. His emerald eyes refocused at last, and the glint in his glare and renewed redness of skin showed he was more or less back to normal, given the circumstances. “Whatever. We all know I’m gonna have to take him down anyway. I’ll bring back the Scriptures, then you guys can fight over them all you want.” “Lord Akaboshi, Kelshinha possesses two of the Scriptures. His might is beyond compare. Pray, take me with you. I shall protect you with my life.” “No, thanks. I’ll go by myself.” “Lord Akaboshi!” “Mr. Bisco speaks true, Kandori,” said Amli, sounding a little proud. “As far as we inhabitants of the towers are concerned, Kelshinha is already unstoppable. Thus, we must rely on outside arts, those that are not beholden to our ways. We must rely on the strength of the Mushroom Keepers.” Raskeni frowned ever so slightly as she watched Amli happily go on about Bisco. The man himself, however, turned and took up his cloak and bow, staring up at the tower heights where Kugunotsu had fallen from. “I’ll go meet up with Milo and take down the old man. You two stay here and look after the Scriptures. He might use some kinda magic to get at them from a distance.” “Goin’ by yerself, Akaboshi? Can you even walk?!” “I can feel my strength returning. The Rust-Eater wants to break free.” Bisco drew his bow and fired a volley of arrows, causing a series of King Trumpets to spring out of the side of the tower walls like a staircase. “You mustn’t! I should go with you in case something happens!” cried Amli. “You’ll just get in my way! I need my partner! Anyone who doesn’t understand the mushroom arts is just gonna get caught up in them!” “Bisco, my dear brother…!” Amli ran up and clung to Bisco’s waist. “You…you need me! We don’t know when you might need healing! Take me with you, please! Let me help you!” “No, Amli! You stay here!” It was her master who called her back. Amli didn’t even turn around. With a single glittering eye, she looked up at Bisco. For two seconds, he hesitated. Then he picked her up, put her arms around his neck, and leveled an anchor arrow at the nearest mushroom. “If you let go, you’re gonna die.” “Eek!” Bisco nocked his anchor arrow and dashed up into the sky, Amli’s overjoyed cry ringing in his ears. With lightning speed, he ascended the mushrooms to the tower’s upper reaches. “Lady Kyurumon! We bring word that Lord Kugunotsu of the High Hall has fallen in battle!” “Kugunotsu is dead…? And the Scripture?” “It seems to have been taken… Two of the Scriptures are now inside Kelshinha’s body, which means his power has grown even further. I advise we fall back to the Fire Tower and prepare for total war.” Kyurumon grimaced and muttered a curse under her breath. The anger mask raised its voice and bellowed at the assassin: “I will return to the Fire Tower and rally the other assassins. The rest of you, go after Kelshinha. Whoever returns with his head will be made my Speaker.” ““Yes, ma’am!”” replied the assassins, before scattering off into the night. Kyurumon’s eye twitched with rage before she leaped across the power lines and headed back to her room. “What on earth happened here…?!” Kyurumon, flanked by her guards, arrived to find her room a scene of utter devastation. “What is all this? Milo! Where’s Milo?! What has she done?!” “L-Lady… Kyurumon…” Just as she was about to lay the blame on Milo, Kyurumon heard a weak voice coming from the rubble. She ran over to find him lying there, his body covered in injuries. “What happened? Who did this to you…?” “Kelshinha,” said Milo weakly. “He came…to kill me. I fought him alongside the guards, but we were no match for his spear…” “How dare he come here! …How on earth did you manage to survive?” “He got away, but I wounded him. He should be out of commission for a while. I didn’t let him take the Scripture…or anything else in this room…” “You are a stalwart soul. I will never forget your conviction.” “Your words…are too…kind…” Kyurumon laid Milo down on the bed and whispered sweetly into his pale ear. “I surround myself with the strongest and most beautiful. Milo…your beauty, fortitude, and devotion are second to none. You deserve to be by my side always…” She whispered as if in a trance, completely forgetting her anger from a moment ago. “Won-lib-aspal-shad-karna…” In a powerful voice, she spoke the syllables. Soon, the two guards standing beside her cried out, clutching their throats. Two thick streams of blood flowed out of their mouths and into Milo’s, as well as into the cuts all over his body. In mere seconds, the wounds closed and his pallid face became ever so faintly flushed with life. “This is a miracle cure, a mantra that old fool Kelshinha revealed to me once in the bedroom…” Kyurumon twirled her finger, and the three masks flew and hovered above the fallen guards. In that short moment, their bodies had shriveled up like mummies, leaving them well and truly dead. The three masks lifted the bodies up by their robes and, one by one, tossed them into the fireplace. “This is…healing magic?” Milo stared at his pristine body in disbelief. Kyurumon smiled before her voluptuous body swayed and she fell on top of him. “L-Lady Kyurumon! Oh no, y-you’re…” “I have overused the mantras today… Milo, pray your modesty does not become rudeness. Comfort me. It is your duty, too, to please me. Is that not so?” “W-well…” From between her blue lips, her crimson tongue traced Milo’s collar. Milo tried hard not to make a sound as he looked into her captivating smile. “B-but…Kelshinha could return at any time…” “Heh-heh-heh. It was in this very room that I took his organs… While he lost himself in my body, I cut open his belly. Corpulo took his spleen. Kugunotsu, his liver…” “…” “His own students were able to pull the rug out from under his feet. He is a fool and a coward. We have nothing to fear from him now. He can never stand against my power.” Not heeding Milo’s warning, Kyurumon continued to nibble on his ear. “Milo,” she said between heated breaths. “You did very well to guard my room, but Kelshinha can search all he likes. The Scripture he seeks is not here. It is somewhere far beyond his reach.” “…Wh-what do you mean…?” “What I took from him…was his lungs.” Kyurumon sat up straight and, in the dim light of the room, opened her robe, baring her plump breasts before Milo’s eyes. He could clearly make out the scars lining her chest. “They are inside me now, and he can never have them. No one can…” “…You put the Scripture inside yourself?!” “My breath is the breath of truth… I can bestow eternal beauty upon whomever I choose.” Her nose brushed against his, and the rings in her ears chimed. “Be mine, Milo, and I shall grant you beauty everlasting.” Milo tried to object, but Kyurumon closed her lips around his. Her tongue was like a snake, relentlessly assaulting that of the sweet maiden before her. It was a devilish kiss, one that had enslaved so many women before him. The seductive air that spewed from her Scripture filled Milo’s own lungs. He tried to pull away, but she clasped him in her strong arms. Unable to speak a word, he tried to force her off him. Suddenly, a sharp pain ran through her long tongue, and she looked down to see Milo’s teeth clamped around it. Before her eyes, what she thought was the young girl simmered with an aura of darkest black. “Heh. Heh. Heh-heh-heh… Ha-ha-ha-ha!” The thing laughed cruelly, still holding her tongue in its teeth. “Y-you!! Ih can’h he…!!” “You were always such a careful child… What possessed you to put one of my organs inside your own body…?” With a wicked smile, the girl wrenched Kyurumon’s tongue between her fingers and lifted her off the ground. “Now you have presented me with the perfect opportunity. I always wanted you, of all people, to feel the pain I felt.” “On! Vawa! S—!” But Kyurumon’s mantra was far too slow for the girl, who kissed her once more and squeezed her body with fearsome strength. Her bones cracked, and one by one her organs spurted blood, until blood poured from Kyurumon’s mouth and stained her pure white skin scarlet. “Ugh… Gblhhh!!” “Won-shad-mudoshinha-snew. Now pay for your betrayal, you loathsome whore.” The girl chanted a mantra before placing her lips over Kyurumon’s and inhaling with all her might. Before long, a pair of reddish, glistening organs rose out of her throat, covered in tattoos. They were the Scripture, Kelshinha’s very lungs. “Now they are returned to me.” “Gh…hah…!” Kyurumon coughed up blood and collapsed onto the bed, yet still, with miraculous tenacity, she extended one arm out toward the young girl. “I—I’ll…” “Hmm?” “I’ll see you… in Hell, Kel… shin…ha…!” Her hand reached his face and her nails clawed at his skin, flaying away the false layer and revealing the grinning face of the old man beneath. “In Hell? Foolish to the end, girl. Just who do you think sits atop its throne?” The beautiful skin of the young girl crumbled into rust and fell away, exposing Kelshinha’s full glory. With two Scriptures already inside his body, his muscles and figure were far beyond anything possible for such an elderly man. Kyurumon glared at him with all the hatred her vengeance could muster…before her head fell limp to the ground, and she breathed her last. “…I had presumed you would put up a little more of a fight than that old fool Kugunotsu, but it seems I was mistaken. The viper’s legendary sense of smell must have declined much if you could not see through the Mantra of Transformation at all.” Kelshinha looked down at Kyurumon’s body and muttered to himself, “How odd. I feel no emotion whatsoever for the one who was once to be my wife.” Then, with a single finger, he poked a hole in his own neck and tore away his chest. There in the beating, red mess of his insides sat rust-coated organs and a single gleaming stomach. “Liver. Pancreas. And now, my lungs… It no longer matters who possesses the remaining organs, for none can stand against the power of my mantra now…” Raising the lungs in front of him, Kelshinha began to chant… Then, with a Thud! an arrow shot through his mouth, tore a hole in his throat, and embedded itself in the wall behind him. Kelshinha scowled as the Scripture fell from his hand. “Ngh?!” From the wall behind him came a Gaboom! Gaboom! as the cactus mushrooms launched a volley of needles. Kelshinha dodged them by leaping off Kyurumon’s bed and onto the power lines outside.