Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Kirisame had a very long dream.

Like countless dreams before, it featured a large Japanese-style building, blooming pink flowers, faceless crowds, and noisy, ordinary days.

It was an exceptionally rare scene of azure skies and peaceful life, like something sold in a craft store, complete with beautiful petal effects, sealed inside a glass ball and cradled in her hands.

The glass shell looked exceedingly fragile, like the countless times she had tried—the moment she let go, it would shatter upon the ground.

Then there would be blackened earth, the crying faces of uniformed children with blurred features, figures disappearing one by one, until all that remained were many unsheathed blades, silently thrust into the ground.

...A sad ending, perhaps.

Kirisame had thought she would die many times before, back when she couldn't draw a blade, had no strength, and was just an ordinary child. Her childhood memories were unreliable, like an old film of poor quality, where a single frame would suddenly flash through her mind, and when she tried to recall it clearly, she could see nothing.

But pain was probably worth remembering.

When bullied by passing monsters, when her leg was broken by something falling from the sky, when she was abducted by a whimsical criminal from another world and vacuum-packed as food...

No matter how dangerous the environment she found herself in, after a while, she would always reappear on the street as if nothing had happened. This bizarre constitution of Kirisame's, like an urban legend, had once scared many street thugs into tears.

Death seemed to have forgotten her, letting a baby who might not have survived even in the normal world grow up so casually.

Kirisame didn't actually have any particularly strong desires. She just felt that living was hard, and she didn't dare to die on purpose. She wanted to follow fate's course and die with composure, but she just couldn't die.

Perhaps the time hadn't come yet; Kirisame wasn't in a hurry.

But in such day-to-day attrition, survival gradually lost its meaning.

Kashū Kiyomitsu was the first blade to meet Kirisame.

At the moment he thought he would exhaust his spiritual power and vanish, a vivid burning pain coursed through his entire body, startling him.

According to what his former colleagues from Awataguchi had said, for a blade, the sensation of being burned was quite terrifying. But amidst the agony, he actually felt a strange joy.

Sure enough, after having lived as a human for a few years, even pain became tolerable compared to disappearing without a trace.

Thoroughly washed by flames, a new power, different from spiritual energy, poured into him, and the sensation of being "connected" in life was clearly tied to his heart.

When he passed out and woke up, he found himself crouching on a pile of building ruins, staring directly into the wide eyes of a child who was far too close. The golden eyes, so reminiscent of Lord Tsurumaru, instantly set off alarms in the Tsukumogami's heart. He quickly stepped back, staring warily at the child.

The child stared unblinkingly in his direction, looking as if she wanted to say something but held back.

Kiyomitsu: Stare...

Kirisame: Ah, ahh—ahh—

Kiyomitsu: Tense

Kirisame: ACHOO!!!!

Kiyomitsu: Pfft

Yasusada: Pfft

...So she can't see us.

That was the first meeting between Kashū Kiyomitsu and his young female lord.

—To be honest, it was very disappointing.

The child, just standing by the bridge, looked like she would jump into the river at any moment.

Even if she could draw a blade, a three- or four-year-old couldn't swing one. The new lord had no mind for blades, so naturally, there was no talk of wielding them.

In a year, the most Kirisame did was drag him and Yasusada around, or simply hold them in her arms and stare blankly. Compared to the dangerous environment she was in, it was quite worrying.

...Oh well, live one day and earn one day. Kiyomitsu, who reached out to poke Kirisame's cheek but passed right through, thought calmly.

The change occurred the first time that Mikazuki Munechika was taken out by the lord. To be precise, she didn't actively "draw" him; Lord Mikazuki unilaterally went to where she was.

Speaking of Lord Mikazuki, it was hard to say if he was lucky or unlucky. All these blades, under the new lord's hand, would more or less develop some special ability, unknown even to themselves until the lord figured out how to use them—like Lord Yagen's healing.

As for Mikazuki Munechika, the trigger was unconsciousness.

Unlike their role as guardian spirits, the only way for Lord Mikazuki to see what the lord looked like was to look in a mirror... He had appeared no more than three times since the lord obtained her first blade, but each time, it was a deep, soul-to-soul connection, even though the lord would remember nothing upon waking.

No one knew what this old tachi had done the first time he appeared, but from then on, their lord was like a changed person.

—Mikazuki Munechika did nothing. He just made Kirisame understand what she should have understood long ago.

For example, what the blades she had held in her hands since she was three truly were.

It was a forced exchange of "existence" and "power," descending upon her without warning, at the cost of burning blood, entwined in every breath, every heartbeat, every step she took, unbreakable.

Kirisame began to have the dream of the glass ball repeatedly, but this time, she heard a voice pleading.

Someone said to her: Please protect it.

Even though Kirisame didn't care about the "chance to exist" that was so precious to others, for some reason, she heard her own voice.

She hooked her little finger around the outstretched pinky of a person whose face she couldn't recall, only that his eyes seemed to hold the moon.

She said, "Alright."

From that moment on, their lord truly picked up her blade.

Starting with the tantō, piecing together from the fragmented accounts of the blades who returned to the citadel after being summoned, they reconstructed the stumbling growth trajectory of this young girl.

There were fingers cut by their sharp forms when she swung them, the cold wind she shared with them while crouching on streetlights to escape danger during cold nights, the clumsy training she underwent in bizarre places with that rag-wrapped monster, and of course, the shared indignation of the entire citadel when the silver-haired senior made her stomp her feet in anger...

Ten years passed like that.

Just before her consciousness sank into darkness, Kirisame seemed to hear a very light sigh, as if someone had gently brushed the top of her head and lingered there for a moment.

"Mm, you've worked hard. Rest a little."

In the pitch darkness, the young girl's eyes, which had closed, snapped open.

No longer the clear, beautiful golden, but a pair of scarlet crescent moons.

The extinguished black flames reignited, fiercer and more savage than before. The girl leaped down lightly, and the spikes that had trapped her were shattered by her blade in a single counterstrike.

When she spoke, it was in a completely different tone: composed and cold.

Facing the astonished face of the adult female Blood Clan member deep in the shadows, Mikazuki Munechika narrowed his eyes and gave a faint, cold smile.

"Our young lady has been under your care."

It felt like a long time, or maybe just an instant—either way, when she woke up again, Kirisame found herself lying on a rooftop somewhere, dizzy and aching all over, too exhausted to even lift a finger.

...But she wasn’t dead yet.

There was a vague sense of déjà vu about the scene, but unlike the time her boss had told her about, it seemed she could faintly recall a figure this time.

A piece of paper lay by her hand. Kirisame picked it up with her less painful left hand—it was the temporary paper permit, with dark red writing on the back.

"Ha ha, these old bones can never remember the way back. Guess I’ll have to trouble the little lady to find her own way home."

"..."

Below that was an added line, written with elegant strokes, each stroke carried a leisurely, smiling tone. Kirisame could almost hear someone’s amused voice, like an elder comforting a child who was crying:

"If you don’t know what to do, just look up."

Kirisame had once seen the Great Collapse.

The sky was inverted, the sun and moon sinking in the west, stars buried beneath the earth, roads built in the sky, and towering buildings falling like scattered toy blocks, crumbling with a rustling sound. Standing atop the ruins, she could reach out and touch the golden spires of the cathedral hanging upside down in midair.

But aside from her dreams, Kirisame had rarely seen a sky so clear and peaceful.

Hellsalem's Lot was shrouded in thick fog all year round, never blessed with sunlight. It had never known such pure, bright blue.

Kirisame was speechless.

After a night of fighting in the dark and treacherous underground, having narrowly escaped death, the young girl lay on an unfamiliar rooftop, her body half drenched in blood, utterly spent, quietly gazing into the distance.

Far off, rooftops of buildings overlapped one another, the bustle of people's voices, and flickering lights had yet to fade.

Further off, the sun was rising just above the horizon. The world was coming to life.

Shota Aizawa found Kirisame at a place about half an hour away by subway from the scene of the incident.

That night, many Pro Heroes, including All Might, had been woken up from sleep by Nighteye, standing guard all night in tense readiness. Aizawa, whose ability was largely useless in such a situation, was tasked with finding her.

...To have made it this far with such severe injuries—that kid sure can run.

The man sighed as he looked at the little girl who had already fallen asleep on the rooftop after searching for her half the night.

The dark-haired guardian carefully lifted the child, avoiding her wounds. As she groggily opened her eyes, he wanted to scold her for her reckless behavior, but looking at her, he didn’t know what to say.

The world she lived in was different from theirs—a place where you had to fight tooth and nail just to survive. And whether as a child or otherwise, she had done well enough tonight.

In the end, the man gently patted her head.

"You've already done an amazing job. Sleep."

...As for discipline—maybe he’d leave that to the Number One guy later.

Riding on the dark-haired guardian's back as he carried her steadily back, Kirisame remembered the unfinished sentence on the note.

"Isn’t being alive still something to be happy about?"

...Yeah.