“Oh, welcome home, Seiji.”
The speaker was at a table in the center of the room, seated in a Queen Anne chair with a vaguely plantlike design. His white kimono seemed to embody the epithet King of a Thousand Flowers.
Shiroshi.
During Seiji’s life as a freeloader, this sight had become routine. Every time he’d seen Shiroshi during the past week, though, he’d felt his chest fill with relief. It was a conditioned reflex, a sort of lingering trauma.
“Perfect timing,” Shiroshi said. “I had something I wanted to discuss with you. Why don’t we have tea?”
Beniko appeared with the tea wagon, and in a twinkling, the table had been set. Just having a plate of fresh-baked apple pie set down in front of him made Seiji’s chest grow tight. He promptly dug in and was savoring the crispy crunch of the crust on the tines of his fork, when…
“I take it you’re feeling better, then?”
“Oh, yes, I’m all healed u—koff. ” Crud. Apparently, his cough was still hanging around. “E-excuse me. It’s taking a while.”
“Well, it wasn’t a simple cold, so this is to be expected.”
Hm? What was that supposed to mean? Puzzled, Seiji blinked at Shiroshi. They hadn’t had time for a proper conversation during the past ten days, so this was the first time they’d been face-to-face in quite a while.
Shiroshi didn’t look well. His skin was fair to begin with, but now it seemed bloodless, and there were dark circles under his eyes. Seiji almost asked, Are you all right? but caught himself.
There was no way Shiroshi could be “all right.”
“Well, where should I begin…?”
With a little sigh, Shiroshi brought his cup of black tea to his lips. Seiji involuntarily followed suit. The heat from the liquid seemed to seep into him.
“I’ll start with Odoro. Thanks in part to Beniko’s first aid measures, his wound soon closed. He’d lost so much blood that I’m told his heart stopped temporarily, but his condition has now stabilized. Perhaps due to the emotional shock, though, he hasn’t yet regained consciousness.”
“…Is that right?”
Seiji couldn’t blame him. The twin brother whose death he’d mourned for five whole years had reappeared out of thin air, alive and well, and turned a shotgun on him.
“…Death has taken a great man from us.”
“Wait, you just said he wasn’t dead.”
“Ah, no, I was thinking of all the additional trouble we’ll have if he regains consciousness, and I accidentally said what I wished I could say.” Covering his face with a hand, Shiroshi heaved a deep sigh.
…He seems really wiped out.
Seiji nearly asked, Want a cig? but a visual of Beniko wielding a kitchen knife loomed in his mind, and he hastily shut his mouth. Better not risk it.
“Well, setting Odoro aside, allow me to get to the crux of the matter,” Shiroshi began, but then he bit his lip, hesitating. Seiji was feeling a tiny scrap of pity for Odoro, who’d been summarily shelved, when… “It very much looks as though Odoro is not the only one who is not dead.”
“Huh? Wait, who are we talking about now?” Seiji’s voice cracked.
“My father—Sanmoto Gorouzaemon. Shinno Akugorou as well.”
No, no way. Not even possible!
“B-but Beniko said they’d ‘passed away’ a whole week ago.”
“Yes, they aren’t alive. However, we can’t state categorically that they are dead, either.”
What on earth did that mean? Seiji was completely bewildered. Sighing a little, Shiroshi returned his teacup to its saucer with a light clink.
“To cut to the chase, I’m told their bodies aren’t rotting.”
“Huh? Meaning…?”
“Apparently, their souls are still ‘alive.’ In other words, it’s believed that rather than killing them, Ibara simply extracted their souls from their physical vessels and sealed them somehow. They may still be in his possession.”
“Um, so if we retake them and put them back into their bodies—”
“Yes, it’s possible they will come back to life. However, that is troublesome in its own way,” Shiroshi said bitterly. “If Ibara holds the souls of two demon kings, he couldn’t ask for better hostages.”
A startled “Oh” escaped Seiji.
Of course, he thought. If Ibara had gone to the trouble of sealing their souls instead of simply killing them, he must have had a solid reason for it. And, in all ages and places, once a criminal had hostages, the next thing he did was—
“Ah, speak of the devil,” Shiroshi said, rising smoothly to his feet. Using both hands, he flung the windows open, revealing the gloom outside. “Now then, let us hear his demands.”
Before Seiji could ask, Who from? there was a ferocious gust of wind.
The curtains billowed out, framing a wintry twilit sky. When the gust subsided, a blue will-o’-the-wisp had appeared on the table. It crackled, floating in midair, and burned itself out, and then Takamura was sitting in one of the room’s chairs. As always, his entrance could have been a special effect.
“Well. What brings you here today?” Shiroshi asked.
“I’ve been fired from the Enma Ministry, you see, so I came to pay my respects.”
…Hold it.
Whoa, back up. What did he just say?
“Um… What do you mean?”
Seiji was about to ask whether a wave of downsizing had hit the underworld, but Shiroshi spoke first.
“When we were discussing the Mirror of Illumination the other day, Seiji, I believe I told you it was possible that there was a second traitor very close to me.”
“Yes, you did say that.”
“It’s Takamura.”
Seiji felt as if someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over his head. All the blood in his body retreated into his core, and his fingertips grew cold. Even then, he couldn’t seem to process a single piece of what he’d just heard.