Chapter 33: The Incident Concludes
The bright moon sailed across the sky, and the stars scattered across the heavens gave off a dim, distant glow, pricking the darkness like needles of cold light.
At this hour, Houjou University Attached High School abandoned park should have been silent and lifeless.
And it was.
There was no wind. No rustle of leaves. Not even the chirping of insects.
The whole place felt like a city abandoned by the living.
Then the surface of Bing Lake stirred.
At first, it was only a tremor.
The foul, pitch black water began to ripple in widening rings, as though something hidden deep below was violently pushing upward. The stagnant lake, which had long since become a dead pool reeking of rot and Yin energy, started to churn harder and harder, until the entire surface looked like a pot on the verge of boiling over.
Then came the explosion.
Boom!
The blast tore through the night with enough force to shake the surrounding ground. It was as if a giant bomb had detonated at the bottom of the lake. The entire body of water erupted skyward in a towering column, black spray and filth exploding in every direction. Mud, shattered stone, and rotten water rained over the abandoned park.
The sound rolled across Shibuya Ward like thunder.
Inside nearby apartments, lights flickered on one after another.
"What was that?"
"Did something just explode?"
"That sounded close!"
"Was it near Houjou University Attached High School?"
People jolted awake in confusion, some stumbling to their windows, others fumbling for their phones, all of them staring toward the academy grounds with alarm and uncertainty.
Ordinary people could only hear the explosion.
They could not see what truly followed it.
But the onmyoji stationed throughout Shibuya Ward could.
Across different Supernatural Affairs Offices, men and women trained to read the unseen abruptly raised their heads at the same time. Their expressions changed almost instantly.
Because mingled with that explosion was a tidal surge of Yin energy so dense it made their skin prickle.
For a single instant, many of them thought the same thing.
A powerful yokai had revived in Shibuya.
And if it was not suppressed immediately, the district might drown in blood before dawn.
One after another, they threw on their kariginu, grabbed their ritual implements, stuffed talismans into their sleeves, and rushed to mobilize.
Then, just as quickly, they stopped.
Because the Yin energy was changing.
"No... wait."
"It isn't expanding."
"It is dispersing."
"It is... rootless."
An older onmyoji standing at an office window narrowed his eyes, shock spreading across his face.
That terrifying surge of Yin energy was not growing stronger. It was collapsing, unraveling, dissipating minute by minute like smoke in the wind.
This was not the pressure of a revived yokai.
It was the residue left behind after one had been destroyed.
The realization sent a chill through everyone who understood what it meant.
If the remnant Yin energy alone was enough to make them mistake it for the awakening of a major calamity, then the thing that had just been eradicated must have been far beyond ordinary.
And in all of Shibuya Ward, there was only one person below National Level whose name came to mind.
White Fox Gin Tsumugi.
As that name surfaced in one mind after another, the mood in every office turned strange.
He had only just shaken the district with the news of his promotion to Ninth Rank Professional Onmyoji.
Now he had done this.
No one said it aloud, but the same thought hung over all of them.
That young man was becoming harder and harder to measure.
At the White Fox Office, Kotoko stood by the window on the second floor and looked toward the distant direction of the academy.
The tension in her shoulders finally loosened.
"It seems the Director came back alive after all."
Only now did the worry she had kept buried under her usual sharp tongue begin to fade.
It was not that she lacked faith in Gin Tsumugi's strength.
But this time, the enemy had possessed a full Domain. That alone put it on a completely different level from the yokai he normally handled. Concern had been inevitable.
Sora, standing beside her, also let out a soft breath.
She had been trying very hard not to show it, but she had been nervous too.
Kotoko pushed up her sleeves, sat back down, and immediately slipped into work mode.
"Sora, organize every file related to the Wedding Dress Tree case. I need a complete report for the authorities, the Onmyo Bureau, and the Onmyo Alliance. They will also need to handle the aftermath."
"Got it, Kotoko neesama."
Sora answered at once. A sweet, relieved smile still lingered on her face, but her hands were already moving as she gathered the necessary materials.
Kotoko opened her laptop and began typing rapidly, the cold light of the screen reflecting in her eyes.
"A Ghost Domain appearing in Shibuya..." she murmured to herself. "Even if the main forces of the Onmyo Agency and the Onmyo Alliance are tied down, they cannot shelve this one."
This incident had already crossed a line.
It was no longer something that could be treated like an ordinary local haunting.
Back at Bing Lake, the stench of mud and scorched Yin energy still clung to the air.
Gin Tsumugi stood at the edge of the nearly drained lakebed, looking down at the wreckage left behind after the collapse of the domain.
Broken stones.
Charred debris.
And at the center of it all, the blackened remains of the Wedding Dress Tree.
He had expected the entire domain to be swallowed cleanly by the void once it collapsed. Instead, fragments of it had been spat back into reality.
So even in death, the thing had left behind a trace.
Still, his biggest reward was not lying in the lakebed.
He pulled up the system.
[Abe no Seimei (Progenitor of Onmyodo)]
[Role playing progress: Youth Stage (35%)]
[Character Abilities: [Basic Talisman Compendium (Minor Accomplishment), Shikigami Contract (Minor Accomplishment), Five Pointed Star Incantation (Minor Accomplishment), Spirit Speech Technique (Proficient), Uho (Proficient)] [Immovable Binding Technique (Proficient), Fire Boundary Spell (Proficient)] [Ghost Averting and Evil Dispelling Incantation (Advanced)] ]
His eyes lingered on the number for a moment.
Thirty five percent.
Before this mission, it had only been ten.
A full increase of twenty five percent.
Of course, not all of that came from the Wedding Dress Tree alone. The countless ghost servants and wedding brides had contributed their share, but the main portion had undoubtedly come from the tree itself.
That was enough to leave him deeply satisfied.
Then a quiet voice broke through his thoughts.
"It's over."
Touma Kazusa stood a short distance away, staring at the charred remains in the middle of the lakebed.
Her expression was complicated.
Relief. Disbelief. Exhaustion. A dull ache that had nowhere to go.
Ogiso Setsuna looked much the same.
Only people who had personally endured that kind of helpless terror could understand what it meant to escape it alive. The fear. The sleepless nights. The sense that every tomorrow might simply never arrive.
The two girls looked at Gin Tsumugi together, then bowed deeply.
"Thank you, Gin Tsumugi kun."
"If not for you..."
Neither of them finished the sentence.
They did not need to.
He understood.
Gin Tsumugi waved it off as though it were no great matter.
"I accepted the commission. Finishing the job is part of the work."
Even so, the steadiness in his tone made both girls feel their throats tighten.
Then Kazusa and Setsuna recounted everything the old woman had told them while he was fighting, including the origin of the Wedding Dress Tree, the noble lady who had given it to Mingao Village, and the matter of the seal.
Gin Tsumugi listened without interrupting.
When they finished, he fell silent for a while.
"So the one who sealed the Wedding Dress Tree a thousand years ago may well have been its original owner..."
His brows drew together slightly.
That explained certain things, and at the same time made others even murkier.
If the seal had truly been left by the tree's original master, then the old assumption recorded in the Onmyoryo archives contained a major flaw. The so called passing onmyoji might never have been an onmyoji at all.
Just because Onmyodo traces were left in the seal did not prove the caster's identity. There were many ways to mislead later generations.
The deeper he looked into this case, the more obvious it became that the hidden truth behind it was not simple.
But for now, that was no longer the priority.
He looked at the two girls.
"Do not mention any of this to anyone else."
Setsuna and Kazusa nodded at once.
Neither of them had any desire to get dragged any deeper into the supernatural world than they already had.
"The authorities and the Onmyo Agency will arrive soon to clean this up," he said. "We'll leave before that."
Neither girl objected.
Together, the three of them turned away from the ravaged lake and the scorched remains of the Wedding Dress Tree and walked off into the thinning night.
.....
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