Eighth Cup: Ancestral Beast

Say, Sakichi. What would you think if I made Hidetsugu the next Kanpaku and left Japan in his hands?

I think that's...

...an excellent idea.

I doubt I'll have any more children of my own now that Tsurumatsu is dead. From now on, I will assist Hidetsugu in my position as Taikou.

That's wonderful, my lord. As your nephew, there is no one better suited to carrying on in your stead than Hidetsugu.

I'm relieved to hear you say that, Sakichi. Then from now on, I want you to serve Hidetsugu as you would me.

Yes, my lord. I, your loyal Mitsunari, shall continue to do everything in my power to serve the Toyotomi clan.

Good. I'll leave the rest to you, then. I'm a little tired.

...His Imperial Majesty hasn't been the same since Lord Tsurumatsu died.

Still, all should be well once Lord Hidetsugu becomes Kanpaku. This should secure the Toyotomi clan's future.

Have Hidetsugu killed.

Huh? I'm sorry, what did you just say, my lord?

I said to have Hidetsugu killed.

B-but my lord, what has Lord Hidetsugu done to warrant death!?

Oh, yeah, good point. Eh, it doesn't matter. Just charge him with treason or some other serious crime.

You...you want me to have Kanpaku Hidetsugu killed, for a crime he didn't commit?

Hm, yes. Maybe we shouldn't have him killed right away.

I know. Send him out to Mt. Kouya or wherever, and have him killed when the time is right. Done and done.

So...you want me to order Lord Hidetsugu to commit seppuku?

Yeah, that's it. Just like we did with Rikyu. We could have him beheaded too, but seppuku's a lot less trouble.

But my lord

All right, you take it from here. I need to go play with Hiroi!

...I-if we do this, our generals will never trust the Toyotomi clan again.

Doesn't he understand that...?

Oh, right, I almost forgot. Have Hidetsugu's family killed, too. All of them.

A-all of them, my lord?

That's what I said, isn't it? Are you going deaf or something? The women. The children. All of them.

My lord, that's simply going too far!

Please, my lord, I urge you to reconsider. Surely you can settle for Lord Hidetsugu's head alone!

Killing everyone in his family would just be

Sakichi... Men are beasts.

Wha

No matter how much they try to dress it up, deep down, they will always be mindless beasts.

And you can only control beasts by shedding blood. You must know this as well as I do.

Besides, this is necessary to insure no one follows in Hidetsugu's footsteps.

Even I did not come to this decision easily.

B-but, my lord

Say, I know. After you make Hidetsugu commit seppuku, have his head displayed at Sanjyo River.

His family's too big to have them executed individually, so just have them all cut down and buried at the Sanjyo River, too.

That way, you can just build a burial mound there so they get a proper grave.

Okay, I'll leave you to it.

M-my lord! Please, wait!

My lord! My loooooord!

Did you say...Komahime of Dewa!?

Indeed, I am.

I came to the capital from the far-off province of Dewa to become a concubine for Lord Hidetsugu.

But once I arrived, you had me executed as part of Lord Hidetsugu's family.

The princess from Mogami...

There...there was nothing I could do about that!

Nothing you could do? Did you say there was nothing you could do?

Once Lord Hideyori was born, the Toyotomi clan would have fractured over whether to support him or Lord Hidetsugu as their future leader.

Even Lord Taikou agonized over the decision to have Lord Hidetsugu and his family killed!

Agonized? Oh, Lord Ishida, you really don't understand people at all, do you?

Lord Kanpaku didn't even know how to agonize over a decision.

Every choice he ever made, he made because he could live however he pleased.

He was an evil man down to his very core. He chewed up and spat out anything and anyone who stood in his way.

You're wrong! His Imperial Majesty did what he did to spare his people the horrors of war!

And he didn't care if he had to murder a few dozen innocent weak people to do it, hm?

Silence! A leader must, at times, sacrifice a few for the greater good.

Only those who understand that can ever be true rulers!

Indeed, it is the law of nature for the strong to consume the weak. Men truly are beasts at heart.

Beasts...

And so there is no reason weak people like ourselves should not devour the strong in turn.

That power... Are you drawing the souls of the dead into your own body!?

Why yes, I am. I should have known the first shrine maiden...the queen of Yamataikoku would catch on.

For years now, I have been taking these weak soulssouls that could normally do nothing but wander this land while suffering no end of persecution...

...and slowly, steadily, taken them into my body as I kneaded them into a sum greater than their parts.

Over time, these countless weak souls became a darkness; they blended in everything else in this world.

Just how many souls do you have in that tiny frame!?

And this darkness will also serve as a sacrifice with which to summon the Ancestral Beast.

Oh man, it's practically already here!

Tell me, Lord Ishida, are you glad I granted your wish in your stead?

I do hope you've enjoyed these proceedings.

Damn you, Rikyu...! Kukochihiko! Stop her!

...

Kukochihiko! What are you doing!? ...! Wait. Not you too!?

It seems, poor though your understanding of people is, you finally see what is happening here.

Lord Kukochihiko, if you would be so kind as to supply the finishing touch?

Bring the sacrifice to the altar, Rikyu.

Kukochihiko... You're betraying me too!?

Hehehe, that's it. That's the look I hoped to see.

Lord Ishida, you are surrounded by traitors everywhere you look.

From the very start, not one person in this entire world was truly on your side.

Ah, it was all I could do to stifle my own laughter when I heard you boasting about your own inevitable victory.

Forgive me, Mitsunari.

K-Kukochihiko!

Hear me, O ancient god of beasts! I present to you the shrine maiden of ruin, and the offspring of the sun!

Use them to bring back the Age of Beasts as recorded in the Age of Gods!

I-I can't move!

A-aaaaaah!

The offspring...of the sun?

Oh? Do you recognize this child about to be sacrificed, Lady Chacha?

But then, of course you would. How could you not?

I-it hurts... It hurts...

It can't be... Are you

I must say, you and Lord Ishida are both so callous, Lady Chacha.

Or did you simply care so much for Lord Hideyori that you forgot all about the first child you lost?

Sute? Is it really you!?

Lord...Osute!?

Hehehe. Ahh, you both make such wonderful faces. Indeed, that is your dead firstborn child, Lady Chacha.

That is Lord Tsurumatsu, the rightful heir to the Toyotomi legacy.

Sute... How!? How did Sute end up here!?

He has been wandering this place for quite a long time. His attachments to the living world must have run deep.

Of course, normally, it wouldn't matter who the sacrifice is, but in this case...

...I thought having it be Lord Kanpaku's child would make for a perfect twist of the knife.

Rikyu! This has gone far enough! How much more do you need to torment not just me, but Lady Chacha as well, before you're satisfied!?

That's it! That's the look I wanted to see! Ahh, there's nothing better than seeing your face twisted in agony, Lord Ishida.

Rikyu! If you hate me, then make me your sacrifice! Leave Sute out of this! He's done nothing wrong!

Oh, Lady Chacha, I don't hate you or Lord Ishida. I only hate His Imperial Majesty, Kanpaku Hideyoshi.

However, His Imperial Majesty is completely unfazed by others' pain.

So if I am to have him know the pain of those he treated so mercilessly...

...then I have no choice but to use his most beloved woman, his most trusted retainer, and his lost firstborn.

So you gathered Lady Chacha, Lord Tsurumatsu, and myself here, all so you could get back at His Imperial Majesty...

Indeed. Here in this liminal space, beyond even the reach of the sun, there is nothing Lord Kanpaku can do to stop me.

So this is where I will desecrate and destroy the people he cared about most...

...just as he did to me.

Then, I will finally have my revenge upon him!

Wahahahaha! That's it? After all that hot air you just spouted? I'm kind of disappointed.

...So, you're here, too.

Man, did Monkey make himself a lotta enemies, huh? Sure sounds like he's got no one but himself to blame for it, though.

Auntie!

Now, Alterman!

"Alterman"!? Oh, forget it! Hang on! I'm going to blast this dark muck away!

Future! And Nobbu!

Seriously, stop!

？！

Alter Me! Wait. Why is your voice different now!?

That ain't the only thing that's different.

Zekken, Mukyurikukou!

You... You burned away my darkness!

I'll keep this dark stuff in check, but I won't be able to do it for long! Hurry, Master!

Let's get outta here, Okita! We can't possibly finish her off right now!

Saito! Yamanami! Get us an escape route!

Got it. Let's go, Saito!

Man, it's so damn hard to walk here. Oh well, doesn't matter to me!

Himiko! Iyo! You two need to get out of here. Now!

Come on, Iyo! Hurry!

I'm sorry, Himiko, but I can't...

My body's already begun to assimilate with the Ancestral Beast. Please, don't worry about me! Just go on ahead!

Okay!

Fat chance! Did you really think I'd do that!?

Himiko!? What are you doing!?

The rest is up to you, Iyo! Haaaaaaaaa!!!

What!? You're...taking my place!?

Sorry about dumping all that overtime on you. How 'bout I take this shift now and we call it even?

No! You can't!

Futuro and his friends are going to need your help. Don't worry, you've got this. There's a reason I chose you for my successor!

You're not going anywhere!

Dammit! Even I can't stabilize my power like this!

Ghh... Aaah!

...It's okay, Sute. I would never leave you behind.

Who're you? No, wait. Are you

Chacha!? Come on, we need to get out of here! Can't you hear me!?

...Radiant Demon Fortress of the Sun!

These flames...!

Lady Chacha... Are you burning His Imperial Majesty's castle

Stop! Are you seriously planning to burn yourself out!?

M-Mother...?

I'm sorry, Sute...

Mother!

If nothing else...I won't let you burn alone.

Man, I thought that was it for us.

...

Could you just...not right now, Nobbu? Really not the time.

Oh, yeah? I thought I'd try to lighten the mood a little. Maybe not my best idea.

So, this is your special someone, Yamanami?

That's right. This is my lovely Akesato. She's a geisha.

Sannan! I missed you!

Maybe if you had come to see me again like you said you would, I wouldn't have caught the bug that killed me.

Sh-she's certainly an, um, unusual geisha, isn't she?

That can wait.

That damn Chacha, was she trying to take everyone out with that attack...?

Chacha...

Well, at least she gave us an opportunity to get away. But now what do we do?

From what I saw, it looked like the magical energy surrounding Rikyu...

...was right up there with some of the nastiest stuff we've ever seen.

And that was still only the beginning. If the Ancestral Beast were to resurrect with its original form and power...

...it would bind this world and the next together, then plunge them both into pure darkness.

A literal dark world, huh? That seems right up Rikyu's alley. Black always was his favorite color.

Yamanami, you were in deep with these guys, right? Anything you can tell us?

I'm afraid not. I didn't even know that Kukochihiko and Lady Rikyu were in cahoots...

That said, this may sound strange, but...

...I kind of got the sense Kukochihiko's heart wasn't in it somehow.

What do you mean? He betrayed Mitsunari, and he was all set to sacrifice Iyo and Monkey's kid!

I know... You're absolutely right, Lady Nobunaga. But still, I can't shake the feeling...

Sorry to change the subject, but what happened to you, Alter Me?

It's kind of a long story.

Basically, Wielder won't be able to move for a while, and since it was an emergency, I took temporary control of her body.

Oh.

Okay, I get it, but it's still super weird hearing your voice come out of Alter Me's mouth!

It's a good thing I made the mechanisms I needed to operate on my own back when Wielder and I were split up.

Oh, you mean that one summer? Never can know what might come in handy later, huh?

It was still way too close, though. The sword of beasts or whatnot did a lot of damage incredibly quickly...

...so I disconnected Wielder's consciousness for a while, locked it away, and shut down her body.

Then, as her sword, I sort of hacked my way inside and rebooted it.

I'm not even going to pretend I understood that, but if you're saying Okita Alter's okay, that's good enough for me.

She is, for now. But unless we do something about the root cause, I don't think she'll ever recover from the wound the sword of beasts inflicted on her.

And by root cause, you mean that darkness, right? What exactly is that stuff, anyway?

It's the Ancestral Beast's black blood... Pure, concentrated dead souls.

Essentially, it's the very concept of tainted death.

So is that what's in the air all throughout this Singularity then?

Yup. I've been analyzing it this whole time, and while the density may be different, it's otherwise identical.

Which means it's coming from the Ancestral Beast.

I swear, I turn around for one second and you're caught up in another world-ending threat. How do you people do that?

This thing was your homeland's god, right, Queenie Two? Any ideas for what we can do?

Honestly, I'm amazed your old country lasted as long as it did, worshiping something like that.

The Ancestral Beast is a heretic god whose name had become taboo, even in Kunakoku.

I heard the founder of Kunakoku managed to seal it away a long time ago, though.

How? They use some kinda legendary ultimate technique or something?

According to legend, the sword of beasts and shrine maiden of ruin sealed it away.

The sword of beasts... That's the sword Kukochihiko uses.

And you're the shrine maiden of ruin?

Yes. At least, that's what they called me...

Welp, so much for that. The enemy's got the sword, and the shrine maiden's not much help.

Very true...

Why did Lady Himiko have to rescue me of all people? If only she was here now, then

？！

Future...

"The rest is up to you," she said? I've heard that somewhere before.

Well, anyway, what are you going to do now, Queenie Two? Are you going to mope while everything gets ruined, even though you're the shrine maiden of ruin?

...No.

I don't know why Lady Himiko entrusted this matter to me, but I'm her successor, so I'll do everything I can to resolve it!

Good. So now that we're on the same page, how do we go about doing that? Anyone got any specific ideas?

Can't win a war on spirit alone. You need to plan, or everything goes right to hell.

How about the man-slayers club? Any special Bakumatsu-era Noble Phantasms that can turn this thing around for us?

Yeah...not on this scale.

Our swordplay can only do so much against a monster from the Age of Gods...

Yeah... Unfortunately, my Sandanzuki's just not gonna cut it. Literally.

Remember, we're dealing with the incarnation of the concept of tainted death; it's all the taboos that show up after someone dies.

Not the kind of problem we can just stab and call it a day.

Exactly. If there was at least something we could do about that black blood...

...then we might conceivably be able to seal away the Ancestral Beast itself, but...

...Well, I'm stuck. I have no idea where we go from here.

A lukewarm cup for me, followed by a piping hot one.

Mmm, I could get used to this. I'll give Mitsunari one thing: he knows his way around a teapot.

I mean, we kind of have to drink it just to move around here, so...

Well, in that case, shall we?

？！

Hm? Tea...

What is it, Nobbu? We don't have a lot left, so please don't try for seconds.

No, no, I'm talking about THIS tea.

Remember what Rikyu told us? The tea counteracts the poison in the air.

So...does that mean it could also have the power to counteract the black blood?

Even if it does, I don't see how serving the Ancestral Beast a cup of tea or two is going to help.

Yeah, good point...

...Tell me more.

Who's there!? Wait. You!?

Mitsunari and Chacha!? You're still alive!?

Ishida! You're hurt!

Never mind me. Please, help Lady Chacha.

...

They certainly don't give up easily, do they?

I'm starting to see how they repaired all those other Singularities.

You're damn right! So if you're wising up and thinking of surrendering, this is your last chance!

Hehehe... Such spirit, even when you teeter on the brink of death. Impressive, even for Yamataikoku's first queen.

Remember, she destroyed Kunakoku all by herself. Don't let your guard down until she's truly dead.

Kukochihiko... Why are you doing this? I saw you accept the light back then.

...

This is the essence of power.

The weaker one is, the more they crave it.

Iyo may have gotten away, but Himiko is a more than acceptable substitute.

With her power as a conduit, we'll be able to pull the Ancestral Beast completely into this world.

Still, the longer it takes, the more chances we give the Chaldeans to try and stop us somehow.

All right, offspring and shrine maiden of the sun, this is it! O Ancestral Beast, you will not find better sacrifices anywhere.

I implore you now to crawl back from the depths of eternal darkness and fill this world with your black blood!

Ah... Aaaaaah! I-it hurts! It hurts! M-Mother!

Motheeeeeer!

N-no way...! I can't believe you actually resurrected that...thing...

Oh my... What incredible darkness!

Now this is true darkness! Pure darkness, dripping with stagnation from every facet of reality!

This is the darkness I have dreamed of for ages!

With such darkness covering the world, the strong and the weak will both be equal in their powerlessness!

Finally, I can usher in an age of true silence!

Good for you.

...What is the meaning of this?

Huh!? Kukochihiko!?

...

I've held up my end of our agreement, Rikyu.

Agreement?

We agreed that I would help you revive the Ancestral Beast. I've done that.

I see... But don't you think this is unnecessarily harsh?

You're one to talk. Besides, this is nothing compared to what you put Mitsunari through.

Kukochihiko... Then, does this mean you

You were right, Himiko. I did get my body back thanks to your light. I could have kept going, and returned to the light completely...

...but I couldn't leave without doing something about the Ancestral Beast.

So that's why...

The Ancestral Beast would have eventually revived on its own. There has been no end of war, both in our time and this one.

And with war comes dead souls. Lots of dead souls.

That's why I had to wake it up now, by force if necessary, so I could destroy it while I still had the chance.

That is why the sword of beasts revived along with me, and came to this land by my side.

I see. So you mean to assume responsibility for all these sins yourself, and take the Ancestral Beast down with you?

I feel bad for what I did to Mitsunari, but I will feel no such guilt when I cut you down, Rikyu.

You're just as I once was: a philistine bent on covering the world in darkness to satisfy your own selfish desires!

My, my. Quite the bark you have, for a mere mongrel pup.

Did you really believe I couldn't see through your little deception, though?

I know you did, and it doesn't matter. I'm still going to take you and the Ancestral Beast down with me!

Hehehe, but as they say, only wicked persons have the opportunity to ascend to heaven. And you, Kukochihiko, are no person.

It's time for you to die, Rikyu. Don't worry. I'll guide you down the path to hell myself.

How very considerate of you.

Farewell... ...Huh?

My sword... It won't move!

Indeed. As the sword of beasts is the Ancestral Beast's only weakness, it was the last loose end I needed to tie up.

To do so, I needed to deprive you of it.

So you mean to absorb it into your own body!?

Lord Kukochihiko, no matter how heroic you may have been in your youth, you and Lady Himiko are both from an older, simpler time.

Bluntly, you're both too pure of heart for your own good.

And that is why you could never hope to match the sheer, unadulterated malice of humans who have endured horror after bloody horror in endless war.

Ghh! I can't believe it. After coming this far...!

Indeed. In the end, a mere beast's knowledge is powerless in the face of human hatred.

Suffice to say...you failed to think this through.

Aaaaaahhh!

Himiko!

Give Iyo a message for me... Tell her, "You are the shrine maiden of ruin"...!

Got that!? Only the shrine maiden of ruin can

Kukochihiko!

So he spent his final words on vengeance. Truly, a pathetic excuse for a hero. Still, this does nicely tie up that last loose end.

While it is a bit sad that you are now my only guest at this tea ceremony, Lady Himiko...

...I will still do all I possibly can to make sure it is one for the ages.

Indeed, this tea ceremony will mark nothing less...

...than the beginning of the Age of Blackness.