That's right!
There was no need to cling to some grand, arrogant ideal, to nurse the notion of making the world a better place, and then set out to overhaul it with sweeping, drastic strokes.
Amamiya Rin chose to believe in this world.
On a deeper level, what he believed in were those countless ordinary, tenacious people who carried within them a yearning for what was good and beautiful.
Civilization's journey from ignorance to enlightenment—that long and winding road—had never been paved by any single ruler or hero alone. It was built across countless ordinary days and nights, by countless different hands, each bearing wishes lofty or humble, raised up through failure after failure and attempt after attempt.
Amamiya Rin understood his own place very clearly.
He was no omniscient, omnipotent deity. He could not—and moreover would not—substitute his own heart for the will of Heaven, standing high above to decree for all living beings some so-called correct path into the future.
That kind of role was far too arrogant—there were too many cautionary examples from the past.
What he intended to do was very simple: merely to move aside a few of the most stubborn stumbling stones for those countless people who were striving, to clear away the hideous things entrenched in crucial places that manufactured unnecessary suffering, and to extend a helping hand to those still struggling in the darkness, so that they would not be swayed by the evil ideology of their rulers, and could continue to press onward toward a world of Great Harmony.
"I see... I see... So you don't intend to become a ruler, but you won't tie your own hands and feet anymore either? Rin, you've finally figured it out! Now that's more like it. Since we live in this world, we ought to be freer."
Sensing Amamiya Rin's thoughts, Mara Tomie's eyes lit up, and a look of delighted surprise spread across her face. She repeated the words softly, her voice carrying a sigh of satisfaction.
In fact, no hypnosis whatsoever was needed. To dominate this country, the demonic allure of the Tomies alone was already more than enough.
That said, going that route would only make things more prone to spiraling out of control.
Of course, the Tomies wouldn't care whether things spun out of control or not. The only one who needed to consider that problem was Amamiya Rin, and he alone.
"I understand. Then let us do it this way. I will climb by slaughtering this country—slaughtering and climbing, on and on, climbing to the very summit to look down upon this land."
Swordmaster Tomie's gaze was sharp as a blade, her palm already pressed firmly against the hilt, the corners of her parted lips curling into a savage, frenzied grin.
Amamiya Rin nodded slightly.
Both of their reactions were within his expectations.
This was fine. Their ideals need not be perfectly aligned—so long as their paths converged at some point, they could walk shoulder to shoulder.
His gaze turned toward the other side of the room.
That maid still stood in place, like a statue that had lost its soul.
Her eyes stared blankly ahead, showing no reaction whatsoever to the conversation Amamiya Rin and Tomie had just held—a conversation that amounted to nothing less than the theft of a nation—and not a single flicker of expression crossed her face.
The effect of the Brahma-Sound Illusion Art was still ongoing; her consciousness remained trapped within an invisible cage.
"Let's start with her. Takaichi fell to my Brahma-Sound Illusion Art, and even if he wakes up, his personality has already been shattered. Our plan can only begin with this woman."
Before the words had even finished, the maid's whole body shuddered. The bewilderment in her eyes gave way to clarity, and then filled with unease and terror.
Her gaze swept in a panic over Amamiya Rin, then flicked to the two dangerously-auraed Tomies beside him, before finally fixing on Amamiya Rin's face.
"You... what have you done to Lord Takaichi?!" Her voice turned shrill with tension, and her feet unconsciously stumbled back a few steps. "I'm warning you—don't do anything reckless! Lord Takaichi is one of the gods who rule this country! Even in death, after a brief silence they will return anew! Their greatness and their divine power are beyond anything you could possibly imagine!"
She clearly had no memory at all of that middle stretch of conversation; her consciousness was still frozen at the moment she had been interrogating Amamiya Rin, and a threat—all bluster and no backbone—spilled from her trembling lips.
"No matter what you're trying to do, if you make an enemy of Lord Takaichi, it's the same as making an enemy of the entire nation! When that time comes, there will be nowhere for you to hide!"
In the face of the maid's hollow, blustering threats, Swordmaster Tomie let out a wordless, mocking sneer, while Mara Tomie merely smiled with careless indifference, utterly unmoved by the threat.
As for Amamiya Rin, he wore a pensive expression.
"That's right! There's still this!"
Amamiya Rin clapped his hands together, struck by sudden realization.
Even though his personality was about to be shattered in the illusory reincarnation of the Eighteen Hells, Takaichi was not entirely without exploitable value.
"Resurrection? A Soul Reviver? The Soul Reviver's Sword?"
Swordmaster Tomie raised an eyebrow, keenly catching a fragment of Amamiya Rin's train of thought. Her fingers lightly stroked the hilt of her blade, and a fervent interest kindled in her eyes.
The so-called resurrection of the rulers—did it not rely on that Soul Reviver who served the powerful and noble?
In other words, so long as Takaichi was killed, the other rulers—whether to uphold the dignity of their class, or to obtain the intelligence hidden behind Takaichi's death—would inevitably summon the Soul Reviver to resurrect the corpse.
And when that happened, she would have her chance to seize that Soul Reviver's Sword!
As a swordmaster of her generation, she was intensely interested in that Soul Reviver's Sword—a blade untold times stronger than the Tenshōga.
While Swordmaster Tomie was lost in her private scheming, Mara Tomie had already stepped slowly toward the maid.
Her steps were very light, like those of a languid Persian cat. Her uncanny, bewitching eyes shimmered with a hazy glow—soft as moonlight, yet unfathomably deep, as if it could draw in a person's very gaze and mind together.
The maid could not help but look toward her.
In the instant their eyes met, the maid's body froze on the spot.
She wanted to look away, only to find she simply could not. The terror and struggle in her eyes were like a stone cast into water, the ripples gradually smoothing until at last they dissolved into a blank emptiness.
Mara Tomie halted one step away before her and leaned in slightly. A strand of jet-black hair slipped from her shoulder to hang beside her cheek as her eyes gazed into the maid's, her profound stare seeming to peer straight into the maid's heart.
"From lust arises the love that binds; craving and attachment become the demon. Greed and desire are the root, giving birth to all manner of Demonic Obstacles. If one clings to sight, sound, smell, taste, touch, and thought, and lets a grasping heart arise, then one is beset by the Demon of Greed, and the original heart is veiled over."
Mara Tomie's voice was low and gentle, like a spring of warm water flowing into the maid's ears.
"Come—become my little doggy."
It was only a few sentences, yet the maid's struggle lasted less than a second. Her tensed body went slack and soft, and her eyes brimmed with a fervent, hollow infatuation.
She gazed at Mara Tomie, her breathing growing rapid, an abnormal flush even rising to her face.
"Mas... ter..."
The maid murmured, filled with unquestionable devotion. She unconsciously bent her knees, assuming a posture of submission, as though it were an instinct branded into her very bones.
Mara Tomie curled her lips in satisfaction, reached out, and ruffled the maid's head, praising her.
"Very good. Good little doggy."
And that maid truly, like a tamed hound, let a faint whimper escape her throat. A delighted, fawning look appeared on her face as she strove to nuzzle the top of her head against Mara Tomie's palm, playing the sycophant to the utmost degree.
Witnessing such a scene, Amamiya Rin's expression did not change in the slightest. A villain like this—even after death, in hell she would have to take a few turns through the Path of Beasts before her sins could be redeemed. To be tamed into a dog while still alive was nothing worth minding.
After all, what he sought to protect had never been such non-human things.
A trace of wariness flashed through Swordmaster Tomie's eyes.
It was wariness directed at Mara Tomie.
In the span of just a few words, she could brainwash a living human being into her own dog. Mind control to this degree was simply far, far off the charts!
Even though the demonic allure of the Tomies was usually effective only on men—provoking only envy and hatred in women—this Tomie's power of enchantment had already exceeded that of the individual known as [Kawakami Tomie].
It worked on men and women alike, and could be turned on and off freely at will! To this day, not a single Tomie had ever been able to accomplish that.
Swordmaster Tomie could not help but grip her hilt tighter.
The Vampire Tomie who had the power to devour other Tomies; the Mara Tomie who had the power to brainwash other Tomies—among the special Tomie individuals born within the [Tomie Network] so far, each was more outrageous than the last.
She reckoned her own strength to be far greater than that of the Evil Cultivator Tomie, who had to borrow the Hypnosis App just to implant suggestions. Yet facing a creature like this, what she felt was precisely the same sense of helplessness that Evil Cultivator Tomie had felt when facing her.
"Clang—"
At that very moment, a resonant ring—the sound of iron being severed and steel being cut—rang out from within her heart!
That newly-sprouted sense of helplessness was severed in a single stroke beneath the invisible blade within her heart! Clean and decisive, without the slightest trace of hesitation.
Swordmaster Tomie's gaze was resolute and coldly severe.
Weak—so what of it? Since when had she ever been someone who would admit defeat?
She need only hone the blade in her hand to its utmost—fast enough to cut through every delusion, sharp enough to cleave apart all falsehood, strong enough to sever even spirit and soul in a single stroke!
And when that time came, naturally there would remain only her—the one true Kawakami Tomie!
Some ten-odd minutes later, outside the mansion gates.
The silence of the deep night was torn apart by the wail of sirens approaching from afar. Two police cars pulled up before the imposing front gate of the mansion, their red and blue lights spinning soundlessly, illuminating the scene of carnage before the entrance.
The Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Department was the first to step out of the car. He was in his fifties, his build well-maintained, his face bearing the gravity and caution cultivated over long years in high office. Behind him followed six or seven uniformed police officers, every one of them tense-faced.
As they stepped into the courtyard, the stench of blood rushed at them on the night wind.
The Commissioner's steps came to a halt.
The sight before him made his pupils contract—corpses.
Bodies strewn every which way, dozens of them, sprawled across the gravel path, along the edges of the lawn, beneath the eaves of the corridors. The bloodstains gleamed with a dull, dark sheen under the dim yellow ground lamps.
He had known that an emergency call involving the Takaichi residence would be anything but simple, but he had never imagined so many people would be dead—and judging from their clothing and the equipment beside them, all of them were bodyguards of the Takaichi residence!
What made his heart clench even tighter were the wounds on those corpses.
Blade wounds! Every last one of them inflicted by a sharp edge.
Some had their throats precisely severed, some had their chests and abdomens cut open, and others had their limbs hacked clean off. Riot shields lay scattered on the ground, and a number of handguns had fallen beside the bodies.
The Commissioner's eyes swept across, observing carefully, and he quickly discovered the bullets.
Those handguns were no mere decorations! They were genuine tools that had been used to kill!
Was this some kind of joke? Could it be that a single blade-wielding maniac had broken into the Takaichi residence and slaughtered his way through a security system armed with riot shields, tachi, and firearms?
As the Commissioner considered this possibility, even he found it absurd.
"Commissioner Sekiguchi."
The maid walked out from the mansion's entrance hall and gave the Commissioner a slight bow, her expression heavy yet composed.
"The details."
The Commissioner was terse and to the point. Even as he signaled the trusted subordinates he'd brought along to examine the bodyguards' corpses, he walked toward the entrance hall.
"Approximately forty minutes ago, an assailant forced his way in. His skills were extraordinarily ferocious. He used a melee weapon and is suspected to possess the ability to launch mental attacks from a distance. The security personnel were annihilated to the last man."
The maid said in a grave voice.
"Annihilated to the last man? And Lord Takaichi?"
The Commissioner's expression shifted slightly, and he immediately asked after the safety of the mansion's master.
"Please, come with me."
The maid did not answer directly, only turning aside to gesture the way, her expression as heavy as iron.
Seeing her attitude, the Commissioner's heart sank abruptly.
If Lord Takaichi were still alive, there would be nothing to conceal or hold back. Even if wounded, so long as an ambulance were called at once... In other words, was this a situation where an ambulance had already become meaningless?
Thinking of this worst possibility, the Commissioner drew in a deep breath. Even as he prayed in his heart that it would not be so, he quickened his pace to follow after her.
Passing through one long corridor after another, the two arrived in silence at the bedroom. The door was left ajar, and a cloyingly sweet, nauseating fragrance of incense drifted out into the air.
The Commissioner held his breath and pushed open the door.
The warm yellow glow of the bedside lamp enveloped the room. The first thing to meet his eyes was a figure collapsed upon the carpet... that body curled up in a bizarre posture.
It was Takaichi!
He could never mistake it—though that face was now so contorted it had nearly lost its form, there was no way he could fail to recognize one of this nation's rulers of the shadows.
The Commissioner's pupils contracted, and his breath caught in his throat.
He strode forward quickly, crouched down, and with professional expertise examined Takaichi's body—no, it was already a corpse.
The moment he reached Takaichi's side, the Commissioner realized this worst-case scenario had come to pass.
No breathing, no pulse, pupils dilated. The condition of the skin was utterly bizarre: the tongue swollen and purple, the corners of the mouth ulcerated and drooling, large patches of shriveled, wrinkled markings across the neck and chest as if from severe burns. The skin of the limbs showed unnatural subcutaneous bruising in many places, as though it had suffered prolonged binding or crushing... yet all these wounds were fresh, and there was no sign of any external blade or flame having directly acted upon them.
What truly sent a chill through the depths of his heart was the expression frozen on Takaichi's face.
It was not mere agony, but an expression of extreme terror, despair, and even utter breakdown—the features contorted almost beyond humanity, as if in life's final moments he had endured suffering no ordinary person could ever bear.
This was no ordinary murder scene at all, but an act of torturous slaughter aimed at both body and mind!
What was more, an act of torture like this would absolutely have required no small amount of time and no small array of implements.
"Who was it!? Who on earth did this? What exactly happened here?"
Shaken and terrified, the Commissioner rose to his feet and loudly demanded of the maid.
Takaichi's status was far too special. She was truly one of the gods who held the lifeblood of this nation in hand, a key member of the ruling class hidden behind the scenes.
Her death—and especially her death in this manner—was certain to set off a massive earthquake across the entire country. And when that came, there was no telling how many people would be dragged into it!
Even at his own level, he already knew that these rulers possessed some resurrective divine power that defied all reason, hailed as the blessing of Amaterasu Ōmikami.
But a death like this was, in itself, no longer as simple as mere death.
This was a provocation.
A naked, blatant provocation! A provocation that trampled upon the faces of every last ruler.
The Commissioner's face was ashen.
It was as if he could already see the fury and the storm that would follow, sweeping through the entire pinnacle of power. That he himself would be dragged into it was no longer even a question.
____
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