The cold moonlight, like silver frost, spilled across the sword-marked floorboards of the shrine's main hall. The candlelight flickered before Miroku's eyes.
Shion's small figure curled up in her mother's embrace, her large violet eyes no longer filled with pure fear but now clouded with a deeper confusion.
Her mother's words about 'the evil in human hearts' and 'the priestess's fate' were things she, still so young, couldn't yet understand.
Miroku held the clay jar, but her gaze pierced through the swaying candlelight, settling on the silent crimson figure standing a few steps away.
That white three-eyed fox mask blocked all possibility of scrutiny.
The air in the hall was so stifling it felt suffocating, leaving only the mournful howl of the wind outside and the distant, muffled sounds of the battlefield being cleared.
Just then, the figure moved.
Under the stunned gazes of Miroku, Shion, and Ashigami, Menma slowly raised his hand, his fingers resting on the edge of the cold mask.
Click.
A faint mechanical sound echoed clearly in the deathly silent hall.
The mask was gently removed.
Moonlight and candlelight intertwined, illuminating a face that defied all expectations.
There was no trace of the imagined weathering or scars… it was an extremely young, even handsome, boyish face.
His spiky black hair was slightly messy, falling over his forehead, his skin a healthy light tan with clean, sharp features.
Yet, what was most startling were his eyes… the right one was a deep, night-like black, while the left was a purely eerie, molten crimson, as if burning with lava!
Calm, indifferent, carrying a detachment that transcended age, as if surveying the mortal world from above, he quietly returned the stares of the three inside the hall.
Ashigami, who was kneeling to the side, sharply inhaled, instinctively leaning back, hardly able to believe his eyes.
'The infamous Shura, who had shaken the Ninja World with his terrifying reputation… his true face was this young?'
Miroku's pupils constricted instantly. She had foreseen starlight, foreseen darkness, but never in her prophetic dreams had she seen this face clearly.
Shion, meanwhile, widened her eyes, her little mouth slightly agape as she stared curiously at the mysterious boy nearby. She had thought he was an uncle, but it turned out he was just a big brother.
Menma casually placed the white three-eyed fox mask, which symbolized fear and power, on a low table beside him, producing a soft clink.
His voice remained calm, but without the mask's barrier, it carried a clearer, more youthful tone… though the cold core within it hadn't changed in the slightest.
"During the Warring States Period, the Senju Clan and Uchiha Clan ended the chaos of clan wars and established the Ninja Village System. But the conflicts didn't disappear… they simply moved to a larger battlefield."
His gaze swept over the clay jar in Miroku's arms, "The evil in human hearts stems from the soil of chaos and injustice. As long as the Ninja World remains divided, as long as Daimyo and nobles scheme against each other for selfish gains, as long as villages wage war for their own interests… oppression, war, and displacement will never end. The root of evil will always have fertile ground to grow."
Menma took a step forward. The moonlight illuminated half of his face, his heterochromatic eyes like whirlpools, exuding a powerful, mysterious pressure.
"There is only one way to break this cycle." His voice was clear and resolute.
"End the division. Achieve the unification of the Ninja World! Just as the clans once came together to form villages and ended the Warring States Period, we must now establish a single, unified nation!"
"All Ninjas, all people, living under one system, one law."
"The privileges of Daimyos and nobles must be eradicated. Resources must be distributed fairly. Only then can oppression disappear!"
"When human wars vanish, when order replaces chaos, when the children of the next generation, and the one after that, are born without knowing hunger or the fires of war... After two or three generations, the hatred flowing in their blood will naturally fade."
"Human wars?" Miroku keenly caught the qualifier, her pale face showing doubt.
She stared intently at Menma's mismatched eyes.
"Shura-sama, are you saying... that beyond the conflicts among us humans, there are... other threats?"
Menma's gaze shifted from Miroku's face to the cold moon hanging in the deep night sky outside the high window.
The pale light cast a silver edge on his youthful profile, making the crimson of his left eye appear even more eerie.
"Miroku-dono-" His voice trailed off.
"The enemies of the Ninja World are far more numerous, and far older, than you imagine." His gaze turned toward the vast, unknown expanse of the stars, "A shadowy puppeteer who has lurked in the darkness of history for millennia watches over this world. And beyond the sky, from the depths of the endless sea of stars, greedy eyes covet what lies here. To me, the wars of mankind are nothing more than child's play."
"Beyond the sky?!" Miroku's body trembled slightly, her breath quickening.
As a priestess, her senses far surpassed those of ordinary people.
The moment the words 'beyond the sky' left Menma's lips, an indescribable force made her soul shudder.
Her violet pupils dilated, swirling like a kaleidoscope.
She 'saw'… as if countless eyes, from unimaginably distant places, were coldly watching this tiny planet beneath them!
The vision lasted only an instant, but it left her back drenched in cold sweat, her face deathly pale.
Shion, sensing her mother's sudden terror, flinched and clung to Miroku tightly.
Ashigami, meanwhile, turned ashen. He didn't understand the deeper meaning behind those words, but Miroku's unprecedented reaction left him shaken.
The hall fell into a silence deeper than before.
Menma withdrew his gaze, refocusing on Miroku's pale, horrified face.
He offered no further explanation, simply waiting. He knew… this priestess, who could sense the evil in human hearts and glimpse fragments of the future, had already brushed against the barest edge of the truth.
Time seemed to freeze. The candlelight flickered uneasily, casting wavering shadows across Miroku's heaving chest and the clay jar in her arms.
Finally, after a long moment, Miroku took a deep breath, as if mustering every ounce of strength she had left.
Slowly, she raised her head. Gone was the confusion in her eyes… replaced instead by a resolve so fierce it bordered on tragic.
Gently, she adjusted Shion in her arms. Then, to Ashigami's shock, the priestess of the Land of Demons, still holding the sealed clay jar, bowed deeply before the young Menma.
"Miroku, the Priestess of the Land of Demons-" Her voice was a little hoarse, but unusually clear and firm: "hereby pledges the allegiance of the Land of Demons... to the Land of Stars!"
…
The first faint light of dawn struggled through the gloom that shrouded the Land of Demons, spilling over the shattered tiles and dried bloodstains of the shrine.
The air still carried the lingering scents of smoke, blood, and the faint stench of death.
But a new order was quietly descending with the rising sun.
A squad of about thirty Ninjas emerged from the forest surrounding the shrine. Clad in matching deep blue uniforms, nearly black, and wearing Star's forehead protectors, they moved swiftly and silently. Their sharp eyes and disciplined bearing radiated trained efficiency.
The leader was none other than Kanon.
She stepped forward quickly, nodding slightly to Hikari, who stood silently outside the shrine's entrance. Her gaze swept over the exhausted Kimimaro and Haku before she swiftly issued orders.
"Medical team! Tend to the wounded immediately!"
"Sealing team! Establish multiple barrier perimeters!"
"Cleanup team! Secure the battlefield and recover all bodies… watch for enemy corpses with hidden techniques!"
"Guard unit! Take over shrine defense and secure key routes! Eliminate remaining hostiles!"
Her commands were crisp and authoritative. The Hoshi-Nin moved like well-oiled gears, springing into action at once.
Medical-Nins rushed into the main hall with medical kits. Sealing specialists began setting up barriers around the shrine. The cleanup crew worked in grim silence, efficiently gathering the scattered remains of the fallen. Armed Ninjas fanned out, taking up defensive positions on the high ground surrounding the shrine.
Supported by Ashigami, Miroku stepped out of the main hall, Shion still in her arms.
The cool morning air filled her lungs, washing away some of the blood and stifling heaviness from inside.
She took in the scene before her… the disciplined, orderly Hoshi-Nin were a world apart from the arrogant, oppressive private soldiers of the Land of Demons' nobility.
Their focused expressions, the silent care with which the dead were being handled… it all brought a long-forgotten warmth and hope to her heart, weary and frozen from centuries of fate's cruelty.
Menma stood silently on the shrine's high steps, his white three-eyed fox mask once again concealing his face.
His crimson cloak fluttered faintly in the morning breeze.
He looked down at the shrine below, now stirring with new life, and at Miroku, who are still holding Shion and her eyes filled with complex emotions.
Behind the mask, no one could see his expression.
Hikari appeared soundlessly at his side, a step behind him, like the most loyal shadow.
Her dark blue high-collared clan attire looked especially stark in the morning light as her calm eyes swept over the busy Hoshi-Nin.