Knock Knock
"Tenryou Delivery! Is anyone in the house? We are here to drop off a rebellious young woman--phwak"
Kujou Sara covered her mouth and the one on her cheek with a single hand. Her thenar pressed against her lips, while four fingers obscured the second mouth that had spoken.
It was saying something outrageous again.
Sara stood in place, composed as ever, and waited for the door to open.
She cast a glance at the unconscious girl behind her, suspended gently in the breeze.
Dantalion seemed to know this woman quite well--well enough to know where she lives. There is also a possibility that he messed with the woman's memories, but Sara doubts he would gain anything by doing so.
...so that seemed unlikely. But not impossible.
"Hai Hai, Is there--General Kujou...?" A woman opened the door and was startled to see Kujou Sara. Did they do something? We don't have any vision wielders--Oh no, is my husband about to be drafted?!
'No wait, where is my daughter?!--'
"Your husband is not going to be drafted, and your daughter is here, as the last bit of mercy I can provide for the defiance of the Shogunate's will--as a collective punishment, you are to be locked down in your home and be under surveillance. Additionally, your household shall be interrogated for information on the escapee's motives and collaborators."
"N-no...! W-what would happen to my daughter..! Yoh! Where are you!--P-please, General Kujou..!"
The mother doesn't know how to react and tries calling for her husband.
Kujou Sara didn't even blink.
This is for the stability of Inazuma.
"You have an hour with her," she said. "Then she will be taken in for judgment."
At her signal, a breeze rolled through the air like a breath of the divine. The unconscious girl, cradled in the wind, drifted forward from behind Sara--gently, weightlessly--
The moment their bodies touched, the wind dissipated.
The mother staggered, knees giving way as she collapsed to the floor with her daughter in her arms.
She clutched the girl tightly, trembling.
"No--no, no, no, no, no Atsuko...!"
With a snap of Sara's fingers, the girl stirred.
The young woman--Atsuko--blinked, dazed, slowly waking in her mother's embrace.
The mother's panic was understandable. She was confused, overwhelmed, unable to process the weight of Kujou Sara's words.
The only thing she understood was that her daughter was in trouble--and by extension, so were they.
Sara turned away.
Her ippon geta tapped against the ground as she stepped.
Behind her, the only sound was the soft sobbing of a mother holding onto her hour of mercy.
This is for the stability of Inazuma.
'Felt like I was watching a movie.'
"..." Kujou Sara didn't reply.
'Felt like I was watching a mo--'
"You say that every time I do my duty."
'Yeah, because it always felt like watching a mo--'
Kujou Sara released a sigh.
She would never doubt Her Excellency--the Almighty Narukami Ogosho, God of Thunder.
Atsuko had committed treason. She defied the Shogun's will.
Atsuko's punishment would depend on many things--whether she was merely a civilian fleeing for freedom, a Vision bearer, or entangled in something far greater. Those details would determine just how harsh her sentence would be.
Granting her one hour to speak to her family before receiving her inevitable punishment--that was the last mercy Kujou Sara could offer.
This is for the stability of Inazuma.
'You basically destroyed their lives, just like the others before this.' Dantalion retorted, seemingly knowing what's going on in Kujou Sara's head. Though his tone was a bit too casual for the situation.
And seemingly having not enough, he continued; Maybe it would've been kinder if you hadn't let them see her at all. Let them grieve a mystery instead of wearing her shame like a mark floating above their heads--haha, and now that family will have a social stigma attached to them.'
Kujou Sara let him ramble.
She knew Dantalion didn't put weight behind those words. He said them because they felt appropriate, not because he believed in them.
He didn't say things because they were true. He said that because they fit the scene.
His actions throughout this encounter said everything.
He's really enjoying the fun he created.
Though it would be a lie to say this was all because of him.
This has become a regular occurrence since the Sakoku Decree was established. Anyone who would otherwise have gotten away--had Dantalion not lit them up like a beacon of light whenever he sees someone like Atsuko--was punished.
Dantalion exploited the one thing Sara could never ignore.
Essentially, Dantalion has become a metaphorical chain binding Inazuma and Kujou Sara, who was the slaver at the other end of the chain, executing the needed actions.
But it's not like Kujou Sara doesn't appreciate Dantalion's efforts.
Despite his motives behind doing so, he indeed had helped her.
After all.
This is for the stability of Inazuma.
Then, a whisper, soft as a breeze, not her own, joined her thoughts:
"Yes... for the stability of Inazuma."
Even mercy had started to look like cruelty.
---
2 Days Later.
"It's time."
Kujou Sara said to herself, her voice low, firm, and cold as steel.
After months of calculated enforcement and near-flawless displays of discipline, her authority was no longer questioned.
Not in Narukami.
Not in the courts.
Not on the battlefield.
Not even among the Shogunate's higher-ups. She had solidified--no, cemented--her position as General in the hearts of the army.
And they feared her.
Not like they feared death or failure. Worse. They feared disappointment.
It was precisely how she intended it.
With the troops resupplied, morale unshakable under iron routine, and the encampment at Narukami stable, she issued a sudden, unannounced order.
They would march.
Destination: Kanazuka.
Objective: Full reclamation of Kujou Encampment
Second Objective: Reclamation of Mikage Furnace.
No fanfare. No messengers. No council deliberation.
Just a command--and a precise mobilization, the kind that only soldiers trained under brutal expectation could execute without confusion or delay.
Sara had waited. Waited long enough for the rebels to hemorrhage their stockpiles, burn through their goodwill, and expose the cracks in their armor.
The Resistance had never been built for prolonged territorial control. They were, by nature, a mobile force--nimble, elusive, relying on terrain advantage and asymmetry. Holding ground? That was a liability.
And Kujou Sara had made damn sure they wouldn't realize it until it was too late.
Kujou Sara is well aware of how limited the resources are on the rebels' side, to the point that the villagers in the land where the rebels claimed had to purchase the overpriced goods of pirates, as they couldn't get any resources from the main city themselves.
Yes, the rebels might have used the Mikage Furnace and attempted to supply themselves with the weapons that the Shogunate troops had--
But not all threats wore silk robes and carried banners of lilies. Some came in mud-caked boots and had no orders at all.
Disorder had already started to fester among rebel ranks.
From Dantalion--her reluctantly trusted informant--she'd confirmed several things.
While Kokomi orchestrated discipline, she could not account for every man under her.
Sara had traced several incidents where rebel scavengers began smuggling Shogunate weapons for personal gain, pirate trade, or side-faction bartering.
While their attack on the Mikage Furnace was done as planned, the raid had been chaotic, inefficient--suggesting poor leadership oversight.
Dantalion had stated--rebel units moving without formal authorization, some even raiding villages Kokomi swore to protect. She suspected they were driven by desperation--poor supply, lowered morale--naturally, after all, you are intently going against Her Excellency, the Almighty Narukami Ogosho, God of Thunder--or rogue sympathizers hungry for coin.
With that in mind, the rebels wouldn't gain any significant change that would change the tides of battle even if she were to delay the reclaimation of the encampment.
Still, just as the rebels' resources dwindled, the Kujou Encampment remained under constant pressure--a key stronghold holding back the Resistance's push toward Narukami.
Though the encampment still held out, surrounded but resisting. The soldiers stationed there were under duress, morale thinning with each passing day. If left any longer, the psychological toll would spread--rot from the inside.
For weeks now, she had let the Kujou Encampment remain contested--not because it was lost, but because she needed the Resistance to think it was worth defending.
That was the first part of her design.
Kujou Sara had studied Sangonomiya Kokomi. The so-called Divine Priestess was not a fool.
Her strategies were methodical and layered. She would never allow a vulnerable position to be held unless it was meant to bleed the Shogunate in return.
She was the kind of leader who turned withdrawals into victories and defeats into propaganda.
A woman who, under different circumstances, might have made a fine officer of the Shogunate herself.
But Kokomi played war like a board game, not a fire. Every maneuver is designed to bleed, not break. She lacked cruelty. That rare instinct to seize a throat when the enemy gasped.
Watatsumi's Kokomi doesn't have the cruelty of a commander.
Sara had read the same battlefield reports Kokomi had orchestrated herself: what she lacked was the heart to commit battlefield casualties leveraged for morale.
While it is not something to be proud of, it is the most logical thing to do in war.
In her place, Kujou Sara would have abandoned seizing Kujou Encampment weeks ago.
It was a trap. A slow-burner. A hook in the flank of Narukami. Every day the Shogunate left it contested, Kokomi could justify the Resistance's deeper push inland, their longer patrol routes, their firmer grip on supply lines fed through smugglers and sympathetic villagers.
But that was Sara's counter-play.
Let them believe they could hold it. Let them send squad after squad to reinforce, pressure it--until the Resistance found itself overstretched.
Right now, they were too far from Watatsumi and too close to Narukami.
That was how you win a siege from the outside:
You cut the road at the other end.
Today, shall the rebels be amputated.
"Bruh, it's 5 in the morning... No wonder they hate you." Dantalion drawled through the mouth on Kujou Sara's cheek. His single eye--set just below her own--darted restlessly, as if constantly scanning.
And he was. In his own twisted manner, he had been setting up "viewpoints," positioning dynamic recording devices--cameras of sorts, hidden from the casual observer--to follow certain soldiers in the field.
To Dantalion, this is peak entertainment.
He even helped out by increasing the pool of soldiers available for the assault--by rounding up escapees and even reclaiming the disillusioned remnants of previous vision holders whose defiance had not been entirely peaceful.
They received the same treatment as would a serf.
Fed just enough, threatened just enough, and shown just enough of Kujou Sara's terrifying efficiency to keep them moving forward. And though they feared her more than the Resistance, the fear was brittle. Like ice in early spring, it could fracture under heat and pressure.
These conscripts would obey Kujou Sara. Of that, Dantalion had no doubt.
But obedience is not loyalty.
And the cracks would show when the killing starts.
It was obvious to conclude that the chance of deserters in that group is highly possible.
Naturally, because they are originally one.
And Dantalion was counting on it.
He had already accounted for it.
Each time one of them broke formation--whether to flee, to switch sides, or merely to survive--they would erupt with light. A beacon would rise from their body like a holy flame, piercing even the thickest smoke.
It was unmistakable. Unignorable.
And it wasn't just for show.
Through slight use of [Illusionary Manipulation] and the body's instinct, Dantalion planted a subtle cognitive suggestion in every soldier and every enemy within radius:
*"The glowing ones are the most dangerous."*
No one would question why they thought that. It would simply feel true.
As true as breathing.
The Resistance would redirect fire.
Allies would hesitate.
And the deserters--caught in a double bind--would find themselves surrounded, hunted, and destroyed by both sides.
He didn't do this out of cruelty alone.
As mentioned before.
To Dantalion, this was peak entertainment.
He was certain to find entertaining individuals throughout this event.
He even has a list of individuals he thinks are entertaining, even before this!
Kurosawa Kyounosuke, who follows Virtue and Justice.
Owada, who is not included in the troops that would venture out of Narukami. Well, he is, after all, a policeman.
Iwakura Mitsunari, who is also not here, but became a Kujou Clan sword instructor.
Fujita Sanshirou, who was given a title by his peers; "Spear Demon Fujita" because he "accidentally" flashed his genitals one time during battle for distraction.
Atsuko, who was just arrested by Kujou Sara two days ago.
"...And I assume you also influenced the other side." It was not a question directed at Dantalion, it was just Kujou Sara musing her thoughts to inform that she knew him enough to assume such conclusions.
For better or worse, she knew that Dantalion also orchestrated the other side just like he had done in the Shogunate.
Even if Kujou Sara had not seen the resistance lines herself, she could imagine the strategies at play. Not from intelligence reports. Not from troop scouts. But from simply knowing Dantalion.
She could already see his fingerprints smeared across the Resistance's movements.
A brilliant misdirection here. A fabricated prophecy there. Whispered dreams of unity across clashing clans and exiles.
And then, there was Kokomi.
The Divine Priestess of Sangonomiya might have claimed all her strategies were borne from meticulous study and rigorous planning--but Sara knew better.
Some of it was Dantalion.
She could imagine how he might've approached it: not through overt manipulation, but through inspiration.
Perhaps Kokomi received a prophetic dream--one that arrived at just the right moment, one she couldn't explain nor verify, yet it mapped out the next five days of Shogunate troop movements with eerie precision.
Perhaps a loyal scout returned with a map etched with routes no one remembered issuing, but which proved uncannily correct.
Perhaps--most deceptively of all--one of her tacticians, long considered a dullard or drunkard, suddenly offered a moment of epiphany that tilted the tide of a battle.
It wouldn't be the first time Dantalion had used an idiot to seed brilliance.
Sara could also guess that Kokomi had her suspicions. She was too intelligent not to. But a commander desperate to protect her people does not always reject blessings--no matter their source.
The Resistance had also become less predictable in ways that could only be described as... performative. More like theatre than warfare.
Feints stacked atop feints. Ritualized formations that resembled ceremonial dances. A battalion marching backwards into battle and still managing to rout the enemy through sheer psychological terror.
Smoke and mirrors, of course.
And where the Resistance had no illusionists of their own, Dantalion generously lent out the idea of illusion.
To those desperate enough to try.
There were whispers among the rank-and-file. Low-ranking Resistance soldiers who, without any orders, began enacting rites they thought would "summon luck." Laying out makeshift talismans. Chanting in tongues they didn't understand.
Some mimicked what they thought Kokomi did. Others claimed they were hearing the voices of ancient heroes in their dreams. Still others carried trinkets that seemed to glow faintly in battle--glows only they could see.
Dantalion had given them nothing.
And yet, he'd given them everything.
Confidence. Madness. Desperation twisted into divine delusion.
It didn't matter whether the trinkets worked. Some of these soldiers became wildly brave. Others became reckless. Both served to shape the battlefield in his favor.
In truth, even the Resistance higher-ups couldn't tell which miracles were real and which were madness.
And that was the point.
Kujou Sara did not admire it. She understood it.
And that was worse.
He wasn't taking sides.
He was watching a fire dance, fanning both ends to see which color burned brighter.
From the outside, it might've seemed like a game of balance. But Sara knew Dantalion's leanings.
He had a soft spot for order. A bias, ever so slight, toward the rhythms of hierarchy and control. The Resistance, vibrant and inventive as they were, had never really interested him in the way the Shogunate did.
From what Kujou Sara knew of Dantalion, he would never let Watatsumi win.
It wasn't personal. It was just… a him thing.
"After this," Sara reaffirmed with him. "I don't want you meddling further… In exchange, I'll go along with your shenanigans."
She had noticed the flames being fanned long before this point--So why hadn't she stopped it?
Kujou Sara did.
Just like what she promised just now, she will go along with what he wants, as long as he won't meddle with Inazuma's affairs.
Sara agrees to let Dantalion's past meddling stand--in exchange for his absolute non-interference going forward.
Perhaps that was what he wanted from the start.
And Dantalion back then had replied to her with; "Sure. I won't modify, reactivate, or indirectly sustain any of what I've already planted. From now on, I will be entirely hands-off."
And that, somehow, was worse.
He would stop. Yes.
But he wouldn't undo.
He even offered a solution--a way to clean the board completely. She refused it.
His meddling in just a few weeks had already made a butterfly effect-like reaction.
Some were even set up like booby traps--for shits and giggles--step into the vicinity, and boom: oracles from your god.
Therefore, Kujou Sara reaffirmed their agreement.
"I could have stopped this, y'know," Dantalion said after hearing her reminder.
"No."
There is no way she would agree to nuking Watatsumi.
If Dantalion used those poles, even without magical properties--just momentum alone--she could already imagine the aftermath.
"This truly feels like a movie." His voice carried a giddiness to it.
Kujou Sara ignored Dantalion. He had repeated that line far too many times.
She turned away and called for the high-ranking officers--those she trusted to carry commands without delay--alongside several Shogunate Samurai and Yoriki.
Before them, she unfolded her plan.
Her voice was calm. Clipped. Unshaken.
Yet as the strategy took shape in the air between them, brows furrowed. Shoulders stiffened. A few exchanged wary glances, others looked downright disturbed.
It was daring--no, more than that. It was the kind of plan whispered of in the corridors of madness.
Ambitious. Ruthless.
This would literally cripple and traumatize the rebels and possibly the entirety of Inazuma.
It would cut the Resistance at the root--but if miscalculated, it would hollow out the very ground it stood on.
The resulting vacuum would not be a tactical inconvenience. It would be a crater--one that the Shogunate was woefully unprepared to fill.
And at the heart of it all stood Kujou Sara.
In this moment, she was the Shogunate's keystone--the irreplaceable axis around which all moved.
Should she perish, there would be no one else left with her clarity, her force, her will. Not even Kujou Masahito, the former Tenryou General, could measure up to her.
She had surpassed them all.
In their minds, a thought crossed through them;
'Does the General think she's a god?'
While it is indisputable that Kujou Sara could be considered a one-man army.
Her feats during her time as a high-ranking officer proved it enough. And when was that? How much has she improved since then?
Because this plan--wasn't some intricate lattice of misdirection or subterfuge.
It was blunt. Direct. Almost brutally so.
Not the craft of a schemer.
Not the mind of a strategist winding coils within coils.
No. This was something far more dangerous:
The will of someone who refused to lose.
And that was what unnerved them most.
Because when she spoke, when she ordered, when she moved--
It didn't feel like she hoped to win.
It felt like she knew she would.
And if she was wrong…
Then not even the gods could help them.
At least, that would be the case--for her side. For them.
Yes. Them.
Three officers would remain embedded within the main Shogunate force, spearheading the frontal assault. The battering ram.
They would strike in a way that would disrupt the rebels' hit-and-run tactics. Box them in. Push them hard.
The others--handpicked, hardened, and unwavering--would go with the General herself.
Along with select elite troops.
Not to fight honorably. Not to seize territory.
But to descend like judgment upon the rebels' retreat.
A scythe to the harvest.
They would not block the escape route.
They would make retreat the mistake.
They would break morale. They would collapse their resolve. They would make the rebels believe all hope was gone.
And the survivors?
Their cells had already been chosen. Their futures are already written.
General Kujou Sara had planned this from the moment she was appointed.
The assault. The aftermath. Every step accounted for.
Everyone in this room understood it.
That the execution itself would always be simple--because it had to be.
Soldiers couldn't be expected to follow convoluted orders in the heat of blood and chaos. Not when each man carried his own doubts, fears, and emotions.
That's not how humans function.
What required precision wasn't the battle.
It was everything before it.
The setup. The alignment. The timing.
What would happen if this connected with that, and then led to this.
That was where the real war was fought.
Though each of them still has to execute something complicated... as planned by the General.
'This has become more chaotic because of that bastard... If I have to guess, everything would be flashy,' Kujou Sara thought.
"This all should be done within this day."
After saying that, she showed something to them.
"It would disintegrate after one use, so this would be used for Fort Fujitou."
In her hand, a black cube floated.
-Chapter END-
Latest Chapter: Chapter 27 - Tantrum
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[0] : No worries, the in-depth details of the war would be mentioned after the Traveler arrives in Inazuma, from the perspective of others, of course, so it's not really that reliable--yk what, just ignore it for now, you'll get it when we get there!