The five Hashira who opened every beginning, and the one-armed swordsman.
And the old man who led them.
With the elder's tale, I bring this elegy to a close.
I have no right to argue over their deaths.
Time has made me a monster immune to its passage, so I lack any merit to judge the worth of a human life.
And yet...
After I finished the story and drifted into contemplation,
Hm?
It was Tsugikuni Yoriichi's face that broke my train of thought.
Tears traveled down the wrinkles that had gathered like crumpled silk around his eyes.
He...
"You…"
…was crying.
"Brother, it's pitiable."
The next words were sympathy.
Perhaps stirred by emotion, his voice was thick with grief.
What did he find pitiable?
Did he feel something at all from the story I'd just told?
"You've truly lived a long life, Yoriichi."
I was receiving sympathy from the younger brother who had become an old man.
What had he felt that he pitied me?
It was a new revelation.
"To be pitied by you."
Sixty years ago, you never showed an ounce of emotion.
Unless tragedy struck, you moved like a mannequin.
Now you laugh at little provocations, you cry, you display joy so naturally.
One does not age in body alone.
"What do you think is pitiable?"
I met his gaze and posed the question.
Tsugikuni Yoriichi did not wipe away the tears sliding down his face, as if my question took precedence over everything.
"Brother, how much longer do you have to live?"
…
I did not know.
I looked up at the night sky and stared at the red moon hanging there.
How much longer must I live?
I am now close to eighty years old.
My appearance may match that of sixty years past, but in this Sengoku period I have walked nearly eight decades.
It is a life incomparable to the one I led as a modern man in my previous life.
The person here now may be closer to a Sengoku-era Tsugikuni Michikatsu than to a twenty-first-century modern man.
And now that I have become a demon, I shall live on.
I might survive until a nuclear bomb falls on these islands.
I might even reach the twenty-first century in this body.
At the very least...
I cannot die until Kibutsuji Muzan is slain.
For there will be no one but me capable of facing that bastard.
Moreover, my friends entrusted their blades to the future.
They opened the dawn and poured everything into the present, leaving their swords for the future to bear.
As Yoriichi said, those who surpass us and the Hashira are destined to appear in every age, in every place.
When I first heard it, I viewed it through bitter eyes, but now I do not dismiss it outright.
Of course, no one shall reach the heights of Yoriichi.
Yet the next protagonists might be descendants of Sumiyoshi, or of Yoriichi, or of Rengoku.
Or they may emerge from some wholly unexpected quarter.
But there is no guarantee they will appear.
No guarantee that they will master the swords our friends left behind.
Nor can I entrust those blades to them recklessly, whether they are born or not.
Our generation is special, after all.
Therefore, I cannot place that burden solely on them.
With great power comes great responsibility.
And because it was we who were special, our burden must be heavier than theirs.
"I shall live on."
I must live.
That is the elegy of those who departed before me.
Yoriichi, I understand what troubles you.
For that is who you are.
But all those who have left me departed unburdened.
"Do not worry. I shall be back soon."
For I do not wish to leave you behind in concern.
I do not wish to send you off carrying that worry alone.
"Soon?"
This last time, I will throw you some bravado.
I watched the doubt in Yoriichi's eyes as I continued.
"We are born dying. The end exists even before the beginning."
Do not worry. Leave the future in your brother's hands.
"If living is to keep learning, then our final lesson is the end itself; to discover the end fully—that is what death truly means."
Now that my friends have entrusted their swords, I cannot die.
Yet that is no reason for you to fret.
"We must not seek knowledge. Those who cannot transcend death must seek nothing."
Therefore, do not seek.
Do not worry.
This brother is not a feeble man worthy of pity.
And ensuring that you live without worry, smiling and happy—that is my privilege, as your eldest.
So...
I hope you can finish in peace, without a care.
Yoriichi paused, seemingly pondering, then perhaps coming to a realization, he nodded.
"You are still... so kind, brother."
Then he spoke quietly.
"Of course."
For I am your brother.
I let out a soft chuckle as I looked at him.
…Suddenly, a question arose in my mind.
Why did you send Tamayo away?
And why did you never tell anyone that?
You did not even tell me.
You consented to hide the short lives of those who might conceal their spots, yet you never spoke of this.
That report was the first and last.
I never brought it up until now.
…
Should I ask?
If I do not ask now, I may never have the chance...
"Brother!"
Just as I was about to question Yoriichi, Uta, having finished her girl talk with Uzui, interjected in our conversation.
I watched her smile and gave a small one in return.
Yes.
I need not ask.
I decided not to.
It might be a trivial matter, or it might have been your private choice.
And because you did it simply because you wished to, there is no reason I must know.
@@@
Thus we continued our conversation.
We spoke and spoke until we grew tired of words.
Then,
"Uta, are you sleepy?"
Her eyelids grew heavy, and her eyes began to close.
"Yes... I'm drowsy..."
She nodded in reply.
I watched her with a heavy heart.
Tsugikuni Yoriichi must have noticed too; there was no reason he would not be aware.
Still, he simply smiled and gently stroked her head.
Uta, like a child, received those withered-aged hands and slowly began to speak.
"When my family died of the plague, I suffered greatly. I was so lonely."
Yoriichi, Uzui, and I listened silently.
"Thank you, Yoriichi. Brother, Uzui. I... I was truly, truly happy to meet you all and live with you."
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She clasped Tsugikuni Yoriichi's hand and rested her shoulder briefly on his.
"So when I wake up... we shall talk again, like today, like before…"
Then she gently closed her eyes.
Her breath grew faint and trailed off.
"Agreed, Uta. When you wake, we shall speak much more."
Yoriichi kept his shoulder still as not to disturb her.
"Sleep well, Uta."
I watched her slumber with a smile.
Tsugikuni Yoriichi then took something from his robes and handed it to me.
A crudely carved wooden flute.
This was…
"Yoriichi, you have kept this on you all this time?"
I looked at him incredulously; he smiled faintly and spoke.
The last time I saw this was just before I departed sixty years ago, when he played it for me.
"Did I not tell you? I carry it thinking of you, brother."
I wordlessly withdrew the sun earring from my robe.
"You, too."
At his words, I simply nodded.
The wooden flute I had given him, which he promised to carry always.
To return it now meant...
"You're leaving?"
A question slipped out without thought.
"I must. I cannot leave Uta alone."
He nodded as though he had already anticipated it.
I see.
I have not even practiced with it.
It is too soon.
"Brother, Uzui."
Tsugikuni Yoriichi then smiled brightly and spoke.
"Thank you."
A smile I had never seen before.
Like the sun, Yoriichi.
You could smile like that all along.
Why never show it to me?
I chuckled and said,
"So, Yoriichi, you also…"
I could not hear his next words.
…
He gently laid his head on Uta's, smiled, and departed just like that.
He ended his life not with his sword, but holding his wife's hand.
Now I need not put on any more bravado before him.
With his departure, I cannot die either.
But my chest felt no liberation.
Perhaps because it had been eighty years together.
"Young master...?"
"You foolish man."
I spoke softly so as not to wake those asleep.
"My words were not yet finished, so how could you just leave?"
For the first time since his death, I chastised him not with bravado but with a gentle petulance.
Still,
I told him to depart worry-free and easily.
What if I held regrets?
Could they truly go in peace?
They cannot.
Then I shall put on my own bravado.
"I for one..."
It is always easy before you, so this shall be no different.
So, I will smile.
So that you can finish with a smile, til the very end.
I offered my farewells with a smile.
My voice trembled greatly, however.
"Thank you, Yoriichi."
I hope my words reached you truly.
My farewell scattered into the air, drifting toward the red moon.
The cause of my bravado.
The origin of all breathing.
My younger brother.
Tsugikuni Yoriichi, with Uta, smiled as he took his final breath.
@@@
After the sun set.
The moon rose elsewhere.
As foretold, the black night that devours all regained its hold and continued to devour countless lives.
Yet people stood against it with what the starting Hashira had left behind.
Elsewhere, the moon cut down countless nights.
Thus a long time passed.
But time merely flowed on.
The stalled gears did not turn.
The story would not begin; there were only lines upon lines of death and killing.
There was no trigger to start the next tale.
When only senseless words were being strung together,
By chance, a trigger was found.
"Am I... late?"
When the moon met the two butterflies,
the stalled gears began to move once more.
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