By the time Sesshōmaru's silhouette had vanished beyond the mountain ridge, the sky had fully brightened.
Morning light spilled across the hillside outside Kaede's Village, stirring back to life the insects and birds that had been silenced all through the night by the oppressive weight of daiyōkai yōki. Faint, scattered chirps rose from every direction.
Shinji stood on the slope, the demon mask already gone from his face. The black pearl still rested in his hand, and he turned it over against the light, clicking his tongue in quiet wonder. Its surface refracted a deep, dark luster, as though a small, concentrated piece of the night sky had been sealed within.
From behind him, inside the village barrier, footsteps approached. Kikyō emerged from the direction of the torii gate. White uwagi, crimson hakama. Her longbow was slung across her back.
Her jet-black hair was bound behind her head with a white ribbon, though a few stray strands still brushed against her ears. Her pace was a little quicker than usual. The daiyōkai's yōki had lingered for several hours.
Though it had carried no hostility, that crushing presence had kept her on high alert the entire time. Only now, with that aura finally and fully receding into the distance, did she allow herself a breath of relief. She lifted the longbow from her shoulder, her grip on it easing.
She walked up beside Shinji, her gaze sweeping across the now-empty hillside. Both of the dog-demon brothers were gone.
"Gone?"
"Gone."
"That daiyōkai…"
"Sesshōmaru. Tōga's eldest son. He didn't come for a fight, he needed my help with something. Once it was done, he left."
Kikyō glanced at him. Her dark eyes held no further questions. She trusted him.
But her gaze quickly fell upon the pitch-black bead in his hand. "What is that?"
"Something good."
Shinji spun the black pearl between his fingers. That pale face of his wore an expression Kikyō had seen many times before. The look of delight he always got when he acquired something new.
Every single time. Whether it was the Cat-Demon's Claw, the comb of Yura, the venomous dragon's reverse scale, or Muramasa, whenever a new artifact landed in his hands, he looked just like a child who'd been given candy.
Kikyō watched his expression, and the corner of her mouth twitched faintly. She wanted to smile. But she held it in. Still, seeing Shinji happy, she couldn't help but feel happy, too.
"Another one that can 'talk' to you?"
"Mn."
"You're gathering more and more things."
She had said this before. More than once. Her tone was still that same cool, untroubled calm, betraying no emotion. But Shinji had long since grown intimately familiar with what lay hidden beneath that "coolness." Probably exasperation. Wry amusement. And some inexplicable, stubborn awkwardness.
He didn't elaborate. He simply closed the black pearl in his palm and shut his eyes. Feeling.
There was still power lingering within this bead. Though Sesshōmaru had used it once to tear open a rift into the cleft of the underworld, that single use hadn't completely drained the energy inside.
It had merely… gone dormant. Like a door that had been locked. The key had turned once, the door had opened, then closed. But the lock was still there. As long as there was a way to turn that key again… the door could still be opened.
Sesshōmaru couldn't do it. This black pearl had been created by Hōsenki. To reactivate it required the power of its maker, or something of equivalent value, capable of resonating with the lingering force within.
The former went without saying. If Hōsenki could actually be found, it'd be simpler to just have him make a new one on the spot. The latter was also immensely difficult. To Sesshōmaru, this was trash.
Or rather, to any being incapable of communicating with inanimate objects, this was trash. But Shinji was not other beings. He had a cheat. A System. An Affection gauge.
[Black Agate Pearl]
[Quality: Demon Artifact]
[Description: A treasured jewel created by the Western Lands daiyōkai Hōsenki, who sealed the coordinates of the underworld's cleft within the bead using a unique method. The holder may activate its power to open a passage into the boundary between life and death. On the other side of that passage lies the tomb of the great daiyōkai Tōga.]
[However, it has already been used once. The power within is currently in a dormant state. It cannot be reactivated through conventional means.]
[Current Affection: 0 (Indifferent)]
[Note: It does not know you. It knows only the one who created it. But if you can make it know you, accept you, its power can be awakened once more. It may even grant you the boundary-crossing power to open the passage to the underworld.]
Zero.
The same starting point as every other artifact.
Muramasa had started from zero and eventually reached one hundred. The Cat-Demon's Claw had started from zero and eventually fused into his very body. Yura's comb, the reverse scale, the prayer beads, all of them had started from zero, or even from the negatives.
This black pearl was no exception.
Shinji closed it in his palm and began channeling his yōki into it. His own yōki, the power of the Ninth Essence Transformation, pure and threaded with the attribute of lightning.
The pearl did not respond. Its cold surface remained utterly still. That was expected. At zero Affection, an artifact was completely indifferent to its holder, like a stone on the roadside. You could speak to it, and it would never answer.
But so what? From zero to one. From nothing to something. He had walked this road too many times now. Months ago, he had sat beneath a waning moon the color of bone ash, day after day, pouring his yōki into a throwing blade. In those silent nights, he had spoken to a dead, withered cat-demon's claw, spoken until the day that claw finally stirred in response.
He had patience.
Yōki continued to flow. One breath. Two. Three. Ten breaths. Thirty breaths. A hundred breaths.
The pearl still did not respond. But Shinji knew, it was listening.
Artifacts were different from living beings. They had no subjective consciousness. No joy, anger, sorrow, or pleasure. But they had spirit. All things possessed spirit, and an artifact's "spirit" determined how it received external power.
Muramasa's nature was greedy, it needed constant feeding to deepen its bond. The Cat-Demon's Claw was cold-natured, it needed steady companionship to thaw. Yura's comb was volatile, it needed attention and stimulation to be placated.
So what was the black pearl's nature? It had been created by Hōsenki. It was a crafted object. A tool designed to perform a specific function.
The nature of such artifacts was usually, stability. Stable. Reliable. Not easily accepting of outside interference.
To make it accept him, he couldn't rush. He couldn't force it. He had to seep in, bit by bit, like water wearing through stone.
Shinji had a knack for this. He was a veteran player, after all.
[Black Agate Pearl: Affection +1]
[Current Affection: 1 (Aware)]
There. Quickly. The System panel flickered.
Just a single point. An insignificant, minuscule point. But that single point meant, through the crack of the door, a sliver of light had slipped through. It had noticed him.
Shinji closed his fingers around the black pearl, the corner of his mouth curving upward.
Kikyō stood beside him, watching him make that face at a pitch-black bead. "…That happy?"
"Mn."
"It's just a bead."
"It's a bead," Shinji agreed. He tucked the black pearl into his robes and patted his chest. "But it's also you and me. Our future."
Kikyō's brow shifted, just slightly. But Shinji didn't hide much. After a brief explanation, he added, "But there's no rush."
He looked toward the eastern sky, now brightening with the dawn. "First, we deal with Muramasa."
No matter what, his immediate priority, his first objective, remained clear. Muramasa needed reforging, and that meant finding Tōtōsai. The Nichirin Blades needed to be tracked down, and that also meant following the trail to Tōtōsai.
Tessaiga needed to be obtained, and that required reactivating the black pearl to reopen the passage. Three threads. Two directions. All he needed to do was take them step by step.
Kikyō looked at him.
The morning light fell upon her face, tracing the delicate line of her jaw and the straight bridge of her nose. Her jet-black hair, bound back by the white ribbon, cascaded over her shoulders, and against the collar of her white miko robes, her neck seemed especially fair.
"Then let's go back," she said. "Kaede still hasn't had breakfast."
"Mn."
Side by side, they walked down from the hillside, back toward Kaede's Village. The morning sun spilled over the torii gate, gilding that old, weathered wooden frame in a warm layer of gold.
The barrier's spiritual glow softened further in the sunlight.
As Shinji passed beneath the torii, his hand drifted unconsciously to the black pearl tucked against his chest.
Its temperature was still cool. But in his perception, deep within that bead—in that underworld nestled between the cracks of life and death, in a place impossibly far and profound, something seemed to be slumbering.
On the day it awoke… the door to the underworld would open once more.
This, too, was truly their future. Step by step, growing stronger. So that they could better protect the village before their eyes. Protect their home. And live the life he wanted.