Yumiko suspected that Yukino and the others had long known about Tatsuki's powers; after all, they all seemed to belong to the Paranormal Research Club. Yumiko had looked into the club when she heard Yui had joined: Tatsuki had founded it, and Yukino had signed up too. She and Yukino never got along, yet she still had to admit the girl's grades were excellent. Tatsuki and Yukino—two first-rank scholars. She had written the whole weird club off as a pair of honors students indulging a quirky hobby.
She had never imagined the entire club was filled with espers.
Yui Yuigahama: "S-sorry… I'm not one!"
The one most desperate for information about Tatsuki right now, however, was the masked girl. "Do you people know who that guy is?" That single command of his had forced a Basara to obey—and then he killed it in an instant, stronger than the Twelves Guardians themselves!
Yukino, still on guard despite the girl's earlier help, countered, "When you question others, you should first give your own name."
The girl removed her white fox mask, revealing the pure, youthful face beneath. "I'm Adashino Benio, an Onmyouji from the Adashino family."
Even after witnessing supernatural powers, Yumiko still blurted in shock, "An Onmyouji? There really are Onmyouji in this world?"
"Once you've got espers, Onmyouji aren't surprising," Marin shrugged, utterly unfazed. Surviving a apocalypse game had left her unsurprised by anything.
Yukino's brow rose slightly; her mind raced. She needed to gauge how powerful an Onmyouji could be—whether one might threaten her now-numerous loved ones. Their safety came first, so she had to think it through. Direct questioning would be tactless; better to keep Benio calm until Tatsuki returned.
"I'm Yukino Yukinoshita, a student at Sogo High. As for Tatsu-kun—you should ask him yourself. Let's step outside and wait for him to come back."
Benio pondered, then nodded. "Very well." She produced a talisman—meant to exit Magano—only for Yukino to say, "No need." Spreading her palm, she unleashed freezing air; a frost-rimmed fissure ripped open Magano itself.
"So that's Yukinon's power?" Yui stared, wide-eyed. Now she understood why Yukino and the others stayed close to Tatsuki. They were the same kind of people… How enviable…
Miko shivered. "No wonder I always felt a chill around Yukino-senpai."
"…"
Benio studied Yukino for a long moment before putting the talisman away. To Yumiko, the ever-distant Yukino suddenly seemed like a stranger—wielding ice powers and calling Tatsuki with such familiarity. Their relationship clearly wasn't simple.
The group stepped through the rift and emerged back in the school building.
"Still some time before class—let's head to the clubroom first."
…
Where had Tatsuki gone? He had simply flown to the center of Magano, drawn to where the malice was thickest. Black, viscous matter streamed everywhere, all shed from a monstrous, beast-shaped colossus.
"So this is the King of Impurities."
Why had he come? Because slaying Hijirimaru had earned him one hundred thousand Apocalypse Points, proving that both Magano and Impurities counted as apocalypse factors. Which factor exactly? Obviously, a future apocalypse: Magano had suddenly popped into existence, an other-world overlay. Impurities were monsters born from human emotions within Magano; by special rules they could drag living people inside, turning them into food. Compared with ghosts or demons, Impurities could directly affect humans. Frightening, yes—but to Tatsuki, they smelled delicious.
Ghosts and demons spawned endlessly from the surface world—yet Impurities could exist only in Magano, and their power was bound to it. Destroy Magano completely and no new Impurity could be born. Therefore, obliterating Magano and killing Impurities would erase this apocalypse factor forever.
He eyed the King of Impurities. The brute was motionless, apparently sealed.
"Who are you?" A crisp, puzzled girl's voice addressed him—heard but unseen.
"When you question someone, you should give your own name first," Tatsuki replied.
A cluster of light coalesced before the slumbering king, forming a little girl in traditional Onmyouji garb—a childlike figure. "I am Abe no Seimei, merely a lingering soul," she said—the very Onmyouji who had sealed the King of Impurities here with her own life.
"Tatsuki," he offered—concise; a name sufficed.
Bewilderment filled Seimei's clear eyes. "How did you reach the deepest part of Magano? Are you an Onmyouji?"
"I'm not. I came to wipe out Magano and the Impurities."
"Not an Onmyouji? Then how will you kill them? The King of Impurities isn't so easy to slay." Seimei meant well; she could not imagine where his confidence came from. The king embodied all the impurity power of the human world—hardly a foe to fell lightly.
"Oh?" Tatsuki ignored her doubts and lifted one hand. "Gluttony."
Before Seimei's astonished gaze, the King of Impurities… vanished. Dark-red substance surged forth and swallowed the titan whole; the beast never even twitched.
"Where did the King go?" Seimei's tiny jaw dropped. How could such a giant disappear?
"I ate it."
"Ate it? Are you an Impurity yourself? But… I sense no impurity energy from you." She tried to pin him down—unsuccessfully. Tatsuki was indeed no Impurity.
The power he had devoured was converted into raw energy in an instant.
Even the Stellar Core had been completely digested; the primal energy now at his command could only be described as boundless. In that context, the King of Impurities was nothing more than a side dish.
Still, the Wings of Sin had absorbed a sizable dose of evil power.
"Time to settle Magano, then." Tatsuki spoke to himself.
Abe no Seimei could already feel the King of Impurities—whose seal had cost her everything—sever its final link to her lingering soul. Freedom came with cognitive overload. Who is this man? He had erased the King in the blink of an eye!
"You people—who are you? Where did the King go!"
The impatient bellow was followed by nine dark-skinned shapes, each about the same level as Hijirimaru. Tatsuki recognized every face:
Sakanashi, Gabura, Kamui, Gaja, Yuzuriha, Shioji and one that looked like a black-skinned version of Abe no Seimei herself—Chinu, said to be the very first and once-strongest Basara.
They had materialized the moment they sensed the King's aura vanish.
"—Abe no Seimei…" Chinu's gaze locked on the little Onmyouji soul.
"Long time no see, Chinu." Seimei greeted her cheerfully, as if they were old friends.
Every Basara present frowned at the name Abe no Seimei. Among humans she was hailed the greatest Onmyouji of all time; instinctively they braced for danger and activated their strongest forms.
"Uh… just to be clear, I'm not the one who toasted the King." Seimei scratched her head in embarrassment—definitely a misunderstanding here.
Chinu knew that much; her eyes never left Tatsuki. He spared the Basaras a glance—mere small fry.
Wings of Sin. Pitch-black pinions unfurled.
"!"
Seimei's expression turned solemn in a heartbeat. "A power saturated with evil…"
"I pass judgment: the guilty—shall be condemned." Tatsuki's voice, cool and indifferent, carried through all Magano.
In the next instant the Wings of Sin expanded to the horizon, linking with the very sky. Endless black mist poured upward, swallowing the entire realm.
"What is this stuff?!"
Sakanashi howled in terror—his body was already wrapped in the fog, and so were all the other Basara. In truth, every impurity within Magano had been enshrouded. Judgment had come.
"My power—!" Sakanashi felt his strength draining away. His long-cherished dream of replacing the King hadn't even begun before—
His thoughts never finished; like the other Basara, he crumbled to ash.
From appearance to death—less than a minute. A lightning-quick exit.
A back-and-forth struggle? What a joke. Facing a pile of trash, would Tatsuki waste time chatting? Even one extra word was beneath him.
Only one detail surprised him: Chinu was still alive. She alone remained unjudged. That could only mean…
"You are innocent." The chilly declaration startled both women. The other Basaras were simply gone—even Chinu lost her composure.
"Just who are you?" she finally blurted.
Tatsuki shrugged lightly. "Exactly what you see—an ordinary passer-by lending the world a hand."
"Ordinary…" Seimei's mouth twitched. If that's ordinary, what does that make me—the strongest Onmyouji in a thousand years? A weakling?
Magano's Basaras and impurities—apart from Chinu—had all been judged to dust.
As for Chinu's fate, Tatsuki rubbed his chin. "You're an impurity, yet you carry no sin—why?"
Twin Star Exorcists never explained Chinu very well either. Facing a man who could erase her with a thought, Chinu honestly looked to Abe no Seimei.
"A-ahem, well… Chinu was born from my essence," Seimei admitted. "She inherited a bit of my influence—that's why she's like this."
"Fine, but an impurity's body is still a fact. To prevent any… future relapse, don't blame me." The Wings of Sin dissolved.
"Dominion." Zanpakuto, Shikai.
Starry pupils flashed.
"Serve me."
Chinu dropped to one knee before she realized it, head bowed. "Master."
"Eh?"
Seimei was utterly lost again. What just happened? Chinu herself looked helpless; in an instant she'd gained a master whose orders she could not resist.
"Magano."
Myriad Worlds Mystic Eyes of Death Perception!
Golden star-pupils shifted to icy rainbow-blue.
Both Seimei and Chinu saw those eyes and felt an indescribable certainty of doom crawl over their bodies—even a residual soul could sense death looming.
For the first time, Tatsuki truly experienced his Lv 7 Mystic Eyes. Everywhere he looked, death lines sprawled. He now saw countless threads that had been invisible before—lines he instinctively understood as rules: fire, wind, water, lightning, light, space, time—facets of universal law itself. The lines weren't complete; they showed only shards of each rule, meaning he could kill a rule within a limited region, not across the entire cosmos. For now the region didn't seem terribly large.
More concrete were the death lines of Earth, of the Solar System, of countless planetary systems, and—faintly—the Milky Way galaxy's own thread. The Milky Way's line wasn't fully within his reach yet, but the Solar System and many other planetary systems were threads he could sever with ease.
That he couldn't directly erase the galaxy didn't mean he couldn't destroy it. A galaxy is a stellar system containing hundreds of billions of stars. A planetary system, like the Solar System, is a star plus its attendant planets. Each star, in principle, anchors its own planetary system. By slicing through clusters of interconnected planetary systems, he could trigger cascading collapse within the larger star cluster, hastening the galaxy's extinction—messy, but workable.
Of course, he certainly wasn't crazy enough to sever the Solar System's death line.
...
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