"In the absence of light, the shadow reveals the truth no eye dares witness."
— Letter from Hotaru no Yakusha
---
Kanazawa Gate stood like a forgotten wound at the city's edge—its wooden beams blackened by centuries of fire and blood.
No merchant passed without quickening their step; no child lingered to watch the setting sun behind its ruined arch.
Tonight, the gate was a tomb.
Shindō Motsura crouched in the choking silence, the weight of his nodachi pressing like a promise against his back.
Behind him, the girl—Yuuki—stood watch, her pale hands steady despite the storm of shadows gathering around them.
---
"Do you feel it?" Yuuki whispered.
"The breath of death before the hunt begins."
Shindō nodded once.
The air was thick with menace—a waiting knife poised above fragile flesh.
From the darkness, figures emerged: twisted silhouettes garbed in robes darker than night, their eyes gleaming like shards of broken glass.
The cultists of Hotaru no Yakusha had come to claim what they believed was rightfully theirs.
---
Steel sang.
Shindō moved like a phantom born of smoke and rage—each swing a sentence written in blood and bone.
His nodachi cut down one attacker after another, the echoes of steel on steel ringing like the death knell of an old world.
Yet with every body that fell, the darkness seemed to grow thicker—as if the shadows themselves fed on the dying.
---
Yuuki remained calm, her voice a soft chant weaving through the chaos.
"Even in ruin, there is a song," she murmured.
"And it is ours to carry."
Her eyes, blind yet luminous, searched the faces of the cultists.
"They follow a god who smiles at their destruction," she said.
"But gods are lies told by men too afraid to face the void."
---
The battle ended as suddenly as it began.
The last cultist crumpled, eyes wide with terror, the flame of their faith snuffed out in a heartbeat.
But the victory was hollow.
For in the center of the carnage lay a folded scroll—bearing the seal of Hotaru himself.
Shindō unfolded it with trembling fingers.
The message was simple:
"You have danced with shadows, but the dance has just begun."
---
Outside Kanazawa Gate, the wind carried the scent of burning cedar and fresh rain.
And beneath the ruins, the fires of war whispered promises yet to be kept.