He couldn’t feel his body. His vision went black. He felt himself floating, stretching, falling, on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on, and then it was gone.
Suddenly he felt pressure all over his body. It took a moment to realize it was the familiar sensation of Earth’s gravity.
He opened his eyes. His gaze flickered over white curtains, a white ceiling, bed rails, and tubes from an IV. His master was holding the hand with the IV in it, her eyes swollen and staring at him.
“…Uh?” Why was she here? Where was he?
His voice wouldn’t obey him. No sounds came out. It must be really worn out, he thought. All he could get his voice to do was make little “ah” and “uh” noises. As he wondered why, Nanahoshi Kaede spoke up.
“You’re a fool.”
His master was stricter than any demon, yet here she was starting to cry again, having clearly cried far too much already. That bad? So bad even she cried? What had happened? What was going on?
What happened to me? The Squad? Hanabi?
A wave of panic ran across him. Hanabi had been blown away. What happened to her? He couldn’t just lie here. He tried to sit up.
“Calm down, Kuon,” Kaede said, pushing him back down. She wasn’t letting him fight her, yet her touch was still gentle. “They’re all safe. Hanabi, too. Don’t worry.”
What happened? Kuon thought again.
Kaede began to explain. Right after the Kiryu went into the Gate, the veteran attacker squads who’d been learning Fencing from Kuon managed to finagle orders to investigate, entering the Gate. (How? Through sheer annoyance. “Sorry to bring this up on open comms, Colonel, but didn’t I see you at a singles café in town the other day? Sorry I didn’t say hi, but don’t worry, I won’t tell your wife. Oops, I failed to make it clear which colonel I’m talking to! There’re so many people at command with that rank…huh? We should go into the Gate and investigate, you say?”)
Inside, they found no sign of the Queen, but apparently they did come across an injured Bushi Hime with no Kiryu; the sniper who’d saved her; their Fencing instructor, who was uninjured but unconscious with a pulse so low he was on the brink of death; and a squad leader looking ready to die himself, dragging their instructor towards the Gate.
Kuon had been unconscious for a full day. Hanabi was transferred to a civilian hospital right away. Tooka was investigating the cause of the Heavy Magic Engine stall. It was important to know why, since it had nearly wiped them out.
“Now, Kuon…” his master said, having explained everything. Her glare had a powerful rage behind it. It felt like the temperature in the room had dropped by ten degrees Celsius.
In short, Kuon was pretty sure he was about to die.
“Soryu Ranbu,” she said. “That’s a forbidden art, and I’ll regret telling Suzuka Hachishiki about it into my next life…but you do understand why Mumyo Tosen is the ultimate art, right?”
“Because it’s so powerful?” he rasped.
“If you evade another question, I will kick you out.”
You know the real answer, he admonished himself. “Because using it too often will kill me.”
Right. Shichisei Kenbu’s ultimate art, Mumyo Tosen, was an art that caused Magic Dispersal inside a target, but it also took a considerable toll on him. During the battle, waves of that Dispersal came back up the Blade to him—faint waves but unavoidable. The wind of death both blew away his target and damaged his own light of life. That was why he’d been knocked unconscious. The Magic Dispersal had struck him right as he was nearly drained from using Chijin three times in rapid succession.
Mumyo Tosen guaranteed its target’s death, but the price for that was a portion of the wielder’s life.
His master had made sure Kuon knew that. After the Capital battle, he’d been reminded of it again while swinging a wooden sword as punishment for ignoring her orders not to use it. There was no excuse this time.
Kaede sighed, half angry, half resigned. “You really do love sacrificing yourself. You haven’t learned a thing since your last life.”
“You always say death can’t fix stupidity. But…” He didn’t tell her that he didn’t want to die. She knew that without him saying so.
“Listen, Kuon. Don’t try to do it all yourself.”
“If I stop trying, then Hanabi-senpai will be the one doing that.”
“Is that why you didn’t tell Fuji or the army about the price of the ultimate art?”
“That and it just seemed like a pain in the ass.”
“You’re talking like En now. Where do you two get that from?” Kaede muttered. Probably from her, when she thought about it. “Anyway, you are not to use Mumyo Tosen again without my permission.”
“If I do, will you kick me out again?”
“No,” she said, averting her eyes. “I won’t. But I won’t forgive you, either.”
That sounds worse, Kuon thought. But the next thing she said was even harsher.
“If the Shichisei Kenbu I taught you kills you a second time I’ll never forgive myself.”
Kuon had nothing to say to that. He didn’t dare even look up, not allowing himself to see her face. He just stared at her hands.
They were unmistakably the hands of a sword master. But today, they looked so much smaller.
They sat for a long time in silence.
✦ ✦ ✦
After he was released from the hospital, Kuon got a message from Hanabi telling him not to bother visiting her. He was worried and wanted to see her and thought about it a long time, but then decided to respect her wishes and went to practice. His master looked at him like he was an idiot and immediately said as much. “You’re an idiot,” she said a second time. “Just go!”
After that it was all a blur. It took him an entire day to figure out which hospital she was even in. As the Empire’s sole Division 5, the school’s strongest Cavalleria, and the adopted daughter of the Motegi clan, her personal info was appropriately secure, but really Rin-san could have made this really easy if she’d have just told him.
Meanwhile, his parents started asking if he would think about quitting this whole Cavalleria thing, and he had to insist he’d rather die than do that. Tooka took a break from investigating to come and apologize, and she started crying so hard that he had to comfort her.
After all that had settled down, Kuon started thinking way too hard about what to bring with him to see Hanabi. He tried to choose some flowers or sweets or a book she’d like and wasted way too much time on that. Before he knew it, he was standing outside the hospital, holding the fruit basket his master had given him. It wasn’t until he actually opened her door that he realized he should have called ahead and told her he was coming.
Now he was in front of her, staring at her bandaged arm.
“You were in bad shape, too,” she said. He’d been released two days before. “But thanks for coming.”
“No, I was just…asleep. And I managed to kill the Queen, so…it’s all good.”
Hanabi looked dejected. “I had no idea Mumyo Tosen was that bad for you. You should have said something.”
“Sorry…” He hadn’t wanted to worry her, but that wasn’t his place to say.
“Um, Kuon-kun,” she said hesitantly. “Is there anything else you’re hiding from me?” There was an anxious look in her eyes.
I was Suzuka Hachishiki in a past life. He nearly blurted it out. “Er, um…no…?” His tendency to just confess to anything really made this tough, and he was definitely acting really suspicious.
Hanabi gave him a long, serious stare. “…Really?”
“R-really,” he stuttered.
“Okay, then. Sorry.”
“S-sure.”
“But, yeah… Mumyo Tosen is really strong but comes with a price. That means we can’t just make you bail us out every time. I’ve got to be better.”
“No, I’m fine, honestly.”
“And we definitely need the Kiryu. I’m worried about the engine, but…”
“We still don’t know why the Heavy Magic Engine stalled.”
“Yeah, unfortunately.”
“Tooka came to see me yesterday. She’s really sorry this happened.”
“Yeah. She came here, too. Things just go wrong sometimes. We made it back alive, and the operation succeeded, so I told her all’s well that ends well, but…” Hanabi glanced at Kuon. “I dunno, it’s hard to believe she’s really a kid sometimes. Same as you.”
“Ah ha ha…” He figured this was because they both had been reincarnated, but he couldn’t say that. Although in Tooka’s case, her mental age really was about ten.
He felt like he was hiding more and more things from Hanabi, and this was really driving him into a corner. The ground was crumbling beneath his feet.
At any second he might fall.