Chapter 126: Little Brother, This Is the Last Time
Natsuya, Uzui, and Sabito were currently in a somewhat quiet alley in the old
district of Nagoya. They had found an oden stall that was still open and sat
down.
The rising steam chased away the night's chill, acting as a small ritual to wash
away the gloom and exhaustion of the battle against the Lower Moon. Bowls filled
with assorted fishcakes and daikon simmered in a hot, savory broth, providing a
much-needed warmth to their stomachs.
However, the atmosphere was nowhere near as warm as the food. The usually
boisterous "God of Flashiness" was uncharacteristically silent. Even after
several cups of sake, he remained listless.
Beside him, Sabito didn't look much better. He wore a heavy, stoic expression
that mirrored Giyu's classic "depressed" face.
Natsuya looked at the pink-haired boy. Yep. Total Giyu-face.
"Oi," Natsuya said, poking a fishball with a bamboo skewer. He tried to spark
some energy into the group. "We just decapitated a high-tier demon. Can we at
least get a smile during dinner?"
Sabito: "Yes, Kokonoe-senpai." (Monotone)
Uzui: "I'm just not feeling flashy today..."
Failing to make any meaningful contribution to the fight—not even seeing the
Lower Moon's face before it was deleted—had dealt a blow to their pride. But for
these two, the events of the "Lucid Dream" were what truly stung.
Sabito's recovery was easier; once he woke up, he knew Giyu was still alive and
well.
But Uzui was different.
The dream where he had personally slaughtered his brother, Gennosuke, had ripped
the scab off a set of memories he had spent years trying to outrun.
"What's wrong? Not feeling like the God of Festivals anymore?"
Natsuya patted Uzui's shoulder and handed him a skewer of radish. "Here. I know
you like Salmon Daikon. Have a radish and turn that frown upside down."
Uzui: "..." My favorite food is Fugu Sashimi...
Natsuya, seemingly oblivious to Uzui's lack of appetite, shoved the oden skewer
into the ninja's bowl anyway.
"You look like trash. Still caught in the after-effects of the Blood Demon Art?"
"Yeah."
"Bad dream? Psh. It was just an illusion created by a demon. None of that bad
luck actually happened in reality."
"Kokonoe..." Uzui downed another cup of sake. "In the dream, I killed my
brother."
Natsuya shrugged. "So? Like I said. It was a dream."
Uzui went silent for a long time, his fingers tracing the rim of his cup.
Finally, his voice dropped into a low, hollow register.
"It was a dream, but it wasn't just a dream."
"Outside of that nightmare, in the real world... I truly did kill two of my own
brothers with my own hands."
Sabito, who was mid-chew, nearly choked on his fishball. He stared wide-eyed at
the senior Slayer beside him.
Natsuya's hand paused over the food. He raised an eyebrow.
A ninja killing his own brothers? What is this, a 'Ninja Gaiden' backstory?
"What happened?" Natsuya asked.
Though Uzui usually masked himself in flamboyance and Chunibyo energy, the sake
and Natsuya's presence seemed to have lowered his mental firewall. For the first
time, he spoke to outsiders about his past.
"My clan has existed since the Edo period," Uzui began. "People think the
Shinobi died out with the changing eras, but the Uzui line has always remained
active in the shadows of the Koga region."
"In my generation, there were nine siblings. I was the eldest."
To survive the shifting tides of history—the arrival of the Black Ships, the
Sword Abolishment Edict—the clan had developed a set of cold, grotesque rules to
ensure their continuation.
The training was lethal. It was grueling. Uzui understood that. Even when three
of his siblings died during forest survival drills, he felt the pain, but he
never questioned the necessity of the clan's survival.
"Then came the 'Shinobi Selection.' It was like a Gu ritual—putting venomous
insects in a jar to see which one lives. They gathered bandits, ronin, and
ninjas from rival clans and trapped them all in a forest."
"The last one standing would be the 'Sharpest Blade' my father required."
Uzui's mouth twisted into a self-deprecating smirk.
"Everyone was masked. A shinobi never reveals his true face during an operation.
The 'prey' released into the woods were masked too. No one knew if the person
they were fighting was a man, a woman, or an enemy."
Natsuya's "Gamer Brain" already saw the plot twist coming.
Sibling-slaughter script. Only one survivor allowed. Standard 'Grimdark'
setting—even crueler than the Demon Slayer recruitment.
"Compared to me—who had survived the clan's harshest training—those outsiders
were nothing. I cut them down easily."
"Until... I ran into two opponents who were surprisingly capable."
Uzui took a deep breath, speaking the words that had haunted him for a decade.
As Natsuya expected, Uzui had won that duel. But he had noticed something wrong
with their techniques as they died.
When he removed those two blood-stained masks... he didn't find rival ninjas or
legendary samurai.
"I won, but under the masks... were the faces of two of my brothers."
"The selection wasn't a test against the world. My father had masked all of us
siblings and thrown us into the same jar to slaughter one another until only one
remained."
Natsuya felt a rare spark of sympathy. He actually hand-delivered his own
brothers to the graveyard.
Beside them, Sabito's face was pale. He imagined personally killing Giyu. The
thought was enough to create a permanent shadow on his soul.
The oden stall owner, who was busy drying cups, felt his hands shake. He stole a
terrified glance at the group, his brain screaming: What kind of horror story
are these people talking about?! This has to be a script for a new play. It has
to be!
Uzui's story wasn't over. "Later, I found Gennosuke. He was the brother second
only to me in strength. He was in the middle of a fight with two others. I
rushed in and told him the truth."
"But before I could finish, the other two removed their masks. They were the
last of our siblings—our youngest brother and sister."
"And then... without a second of hesitation... Gennosuke slaughtered them both
right in front of me."
Natsuya: "?" Wait, that's not how the 'Redemption Arc' usually goes.
Uzui saw Natsuya's shock; it was the same look he had worn that day.
"By the time I found him, Gennosuke had already become exactly like our father.
He was a 'Blade' with no bottom line, a tool that could butcher his own kin
without feeling a single pulse of regret."
"To 'pass' the exam, he turned his sword on me. He tried to kill me, too."
Natsuya nodded in realization. "So you took the initiative and deleted him? Just
like in the dream?"
Uzui: "..." Seriously, bro? I'm having a trauma-dump here.
"What do you mean 'took the initiative'?" Uzui sighed. "Kokonoe, would you have
'deleted' your own sister if she tried to hit you?"
The "God of Festivals" shook his head. "No. I didn't kill him. I abandoned the
selection and defected from the village."
Although the details differed from Natsuya's "Naruto" prediction, he now
understood the specific pain of this "Bro-con" (Brother Complex) ninja after
being hit by a Tsukuyomi nightmare.
I get it. The Village. The Brother. The Rogue-nin elder sibling. All the tropes
are present and accounted for.
Natsuya ignored the depressing atmosphere and slapped Uzui's back.
"Alright, fine. Since we're sharing, I'll tell you a story about a ninja I used
to know."
"His name was Senju... or maybe Uchiha. He found himself in a very similar 'Life
Bottleneck'."
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