Translator: Larbre Studio Editor: Larbre Studio
He walked out the door and rejected Kubo Yuki’s invitation in persuading him to stay for the banquet under the suspicious looks of the students and instructors at the dojo.
When Chikage Tojo walked out, he looked around and found no trace of his partner. He only realized that the others left early due to various reasons after asking others. He was speechless.
Kazuki made his way home quickly.
He sat on a chair, placed the Sun and Moon Sword on the table, and poked the scabbard lightly with his fingers. The Sun and Moon Sword quivered a little. A transparent apparition was ‘flung’ out of the sword the next moment.
Akie Hanzawa saw Kazuki immediately and started to tremble.
The moment he was sucked into the sword, all he felt was fear. He looked around and noticed that he was in a room. Like a piece of white paper, the whole place had no color whatsoever. There was only a ball of light circling around him, emitting a sharp aura. This frightened him, and he did not dare to move.
“What do you want?” Akie Hanzawa did not dare to talk much after he was summoned. Instead, he shrunk into a corner while looking at Kazuki with fear. The student before him was obviously not an average person. After all, he could separate him from Chikage Tojo for such a distance.
Although he was a specter, there was not much he could do other than walking through walls...
Right! Walking through walls.
Akie Hanzawa thought of something and was about to escape by walking through the wall. But before he could make a move, the Sun and Moon Sword rereleased its power as if it wanted to suck him back into that white room.
He was unable to move a muscle due to the powerful suction.
Kazuki looked at Akie Hanzawa, whose face was filled with fear and smiled faintly, “Hello, Hanzawa-san, pleased to meet you. I am Kazuki, an Onmyoji.” He did not reveal his true identity as it was too complicated to explain. So, he used an occupation that the Japanese could accept to start a chat with Akie Hanzawa.
“Onmyoji?” Akie Hanzawa finally stopped struggling because he knew that he could not escape even if he wanted to.
He looked at Kazuki and noticed that he was clearly wearing a school uniform. Even though Akie Hanzawa was an ordinary person, he was not an idiot. He also understood the principle of hiding in the crowd.
“Are... you here to purify me?” Akie Hanzawa asked anxiously. “I did not do anything bad in my lifetime, nor was I a bad person! You asked that fellow Tojo just now, I died saving someone.”
“Hanzawa-san, there’s no need to be nervous.” Kazuki smiled gently. This was his first time meeting a spirit after he had time-traveled. It was only natural for him to hope to absorb him perfectly. “I am here to carry out your last wish and help you ascend to heaven.”
“Is there really heaven in this world?” After hearing him mentioning the ascension to heaven, Akie Hanzawa pushed down his fear, his face full of curiosity. When he was incarnated as an attachment spirit previously, he was sure that supernatural powers depicted in novels and animations definitely did exist.
After becoming a specter for the past month, he did not come into contact with any of it, until Kazuki’s appearance today.
“Of course!” Kazuki said with certainty. To be frank, he did not know whether there was heaven, but he had to give Akie Hanzawa some hope. “The reason you did not ascend to heaven was that a strong obsession towards the world remained with you before you died. That is why you remained here and incarnated as a specter... A specter cannot fulfill its last wish due to its many limitations, and this is where we, the Onmyoji, step in.”
“I believe you.” Kazuki’s explanation was simple, Akie Hanzawa was convinced as the other person did not kill him when he had the power to do so. He made the situation so cumbersome instead. This alone was enough for him to trust him. Besides, he was here to help him carry out his last wish, what reason did he have to suspect Kazuki’s motives?
“So, what is your last wish?”
“Resurrection.” Akie Hanzawa finished and saw Kazuki’s smile distort slightly. He then smiled embarrassingly and said, “Just joking...”
As he spoke, Akie Hanzawa’s expression gradually grew sadder. “My last wish would probably be about my younger brother. I hoped that he could be independent and rely on himself in various senses after I left him.”
Independence and self-reliance, this notion was extremely vague.
After pondering for a while, Kazuki nodded. “I understand. I will go and look for your brother in these two days to observe a little. You can stay in the Sun and Moon Sword for these two days.”
Huh? Akie Hanzawa looked unhappy. “Is it possible... for me not to enter that white room? I feel like that ball of light inside really want to eat me alive.”
“That is your misconception,” Kazuki said. “Look at where I live, if I let you stay in this room, wouldn’t all of my privacy be completely exposed?”
Akie Hanzawa finally nodded helplessly. His trust in Kazuki had something to do with the place he lived. This room before him was tiny. There was a bed, a table, a chair, and a small bathroom, that was all.
The simple accommodation gave him a considerable contrast, which allowed Akie Hanzawa to trust Kazuki. It was hard to imagine that an Extraordinary Individual would live in a place like this. Since he had extraordinary powers, money should come quickly.
After Akie Hanzawa disappeared into the sword’s spirit again, Kazuki took out the gray-colored Magatama from his pocket to observe it carefully.
After eliminating the Tsukumogami incarnated from the Buddha carving and having filtered the reiki through the sword’s spirit, his realm now was still in the First Foundation State. But if he were to subdivide it, it would be the later period of the First Foundation State.
After many calculations, he had only practiced for a week after he activated the sword’s spirit.
The speed of this practice was slow, like a crawling tortoise. The people from the era of the recuperation of reiki needed only a week to reach the Metamorphosis State.
But after all, he was in the era before the recuperation of reiki. With the Sun and Moon Sword, he practiced for 24 hours without rest, including absorbing the reiki of a whole blood-sucking bat, only did he reach such a state. Kazuki was already very pleased with this speed.
They were from different eras, so naturally, one could not judge the speed of a practice based on old concepts.
The gray Magatama before him was dropped from the insides of a Buddha carving. Even the old Onmyoji in the fragmented message did not discover this Magatama.
As for whether the bat Tsukumogami knew about it, Kazuki surmised that he probably knew about its presence. However, it was evident that he did not know what it was, so he just left it alone.
As he was thinking, Kazuki caressed the Magatama as reiki flowed out from his fingertips and entered the Magatama. The Magatama absorbed it quickly...
He also did the same thing in Kubo Yuki’s study previously, which led him to discover something strange about this Magatama.
This Magatama was clear, and it could absorb reiki, but it was different from the Art of Kendo. The Art of Kendo could absorb the universe’s reiki actively when this Magatama could only absorb passively.
He also never once felt any dangerous aura from this Magatama, nor did he smell anything strange. After all, this Magatama had remained inside the body of the Buddha carving for so long. It was still clean and odorless when he found it. This bizarre issue had already surprised Kazuki enough, and it also let him know that this Magatama was probably not something dangerous.
As he was thinking, the absorption of reiki in Kazuki’s hand did not stop. He really wanted to see if there were any changes to the Magatama once the reiki was absorbed to a certain extent.
The change occurred very quickly.
Kazuki released almost half of his reiki, and the Magatama’s rough texture was gradually getting warmer and smoother. Emerald-green lights began to flow steadily from the sharp and thin end within the original gray color. As the reiki entered, the emerald-green lights flowed from the outside to the inside, gushing from the tail end to the head.
After Kazuki had finished inserting all the reiki in his body, the Magatama was completely emerald-green in color, emitting rays of shining green light.
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