Chapter 29 – Loyalty Doesn’t Break in the Cold

It had been a few months since they arrived in Yukihana.

Ren, Yura, and Lilith moved quietly, gathering information, testing routes and contacts, until they finally found the lead they were looking for: the whereabouts of the soldiers who still remained loyal to the Aseina bloodline.

The Shogun had been cunning. He scattered them across the country, breaking clans and families apart, severing bonds so no one could ever again raise the banner of the old nation. At the slightest hint of rebellion, patrols would drag entire families away in the dead of night. There was no room left for the spark of resistance.

But snow doesn’t extinguish fire—it only hides it. Sooner or later, what’s hidden will burn again.

Their first crusade led them to Sekka-hana, the Prefecture of the Snow Blossom—the Aseina homeland. There, among white fields and frozen flowers that braved the eternal winter, voices still lingered, refusing to die.

The streets, once overflowing with life, now lay empty. Doors shut tight, windows half-closed, footsteps muted. It was as if the entire city feared breathing too loudly, lest they draw the Shogunate soldiers’ attention.

“I remember this city being livelier…” Ren murmured, a trace of sorrow in his voice.

“When the Shogun came, his troops wiped out most of our people,” Yura replied in an icy whisper. “It’s likely only a regent remains in charge. The Shogun never cared for the people… only for smothering any spark.”

Lilith stretched her fingers until her knuckles cracked, a sly smile curving her lips.

“Then… how about we light one?”

Ren pointed his katana toward the top of a hill, where a traditional house stood, guarded only by unlit lanterns.

“That’s the main building. We’ll meet there in an hour.”

His voice dropped into a frozen edge.

“Leave no Shogun soldier standing. Not a single one escapes.”

With that sentence, the three scattered like shadows in the snow.

The first to reach the main building was Yura.

The old Aseina estate loomed atop the hill like an open wound. The stone lanterns still lined the path, but the family crests had been torn from the walls and replaced with the blazing sun of the Shogunate. Snow piled on the roof looked like a shroud draped over a corpse.

Yura drew a deep breath. This was the house she was born in, her mother’s home… now defiled by a usurper.

“We meet again, Commander Seiko.” Her voice rang firm, without the slightest tremor.

Inside, a middle-aged Yuki man watched her, sipping his tea leisurely, surrounded by maids and guards.

“Yura Aseina, I presume.” He rose slowly, drawing his katana with a superior air. “My, how you’ve grown, brat. And your mother… still dead, I assume?” he asked with brazen sarcasm.

Once, those words would have made her lose control. But not now. Not after thirty winters in Antarctica.

Ice began spreading beneath her feet, crawling across the tatami and climbing the walls. Frost crept in, the temperature plummeting until the room’s lamps and braziers all sputtered out.

The air grew so heavy even the guards shivered and backed away.

It wasn’t rage that spoke through Yura.

It was the silence of winter itself, unfolding around her. Darkness swallowed the room. Just like Ren when he unleashed his power—but this time, with the frigid stillness of the Aseina.

Seiko raised his katana with confidence, striking first with the strength of a seasoned warrior.

Yura answered without haste. Just a clean motion, a precise deflection, as if she had practiced that moment for decades. Her ordinary blade slipped past his defenses, cutting not only through his guard, but through his composure.

A second exchange was enough. Seiko’s steel cracked against the frost-covered tatami, and in that instant his neck was laid bare.

“Too slow.” Yura’s voice was a frozen whisper.

The finishing slash came so fast the maids barely had time to scream. Seiko’s body collapsed to his knees, eyes wide in disbelief, before toppling in silence.

Yura didn’t celebrate. She didn’t shout. There was no triumph in her gestures—only the stillness of an eternal winter.

The rest of the soldiers surrendered on the spot.

At that moment, Ren and Lilith stepped into the hall, walking past the fallen bodies.

“I told you I could handle it alone…” Ren murmured, a faint note of pride in his voice.

“I suppose you’re right,” Lilith replied, though her smile was little more than a grimace. “But that lousy sword of yours won’t last much longer.”

She pointed at Yura’s katana. Cracks ran along its blade, splintering under the weight of her new power.

“It can no longer withstand her strength,” Ren admitted calmly. “But first things first.”

He stepped out of the Aseina estate and walked into the main square. There, before the fearful townsfolk and the Shogunate soldiers tied on the ground, his voice rose with a spectral chill:

“Citizens of Sekka-hana… My name is Ren Sinclair. With me stands the rightful princess of Yukihana: Yura Aseina, daughter of the legendary Yukino Aseina.”

Yura stepped forward at his side, her bearing noble, as though she carried the weight of an entire nation on her shoulders.

“We have come to free Yukihana from its oppression,” she declared firmly. “To return the land that was stolen from you.”

“Is… is that true?” asked an old woman, clutching her daughter tightly to her chest.

Yura met the people’s gaze head-on, without wavering.

“It will take time. There are no magical solutions, and I won’t lie to you. But you can trust my word—and my mother’s. Yukihana will be free again.”

A murmur rippled through the square, swelling into cheers of joy. For the first time in years, the Yuki allowed hope to pierce their hearts.

The few soldiers still loyal to the Aseina—freed from prison by Lilith—knelt before Yura. Determination burned in their eyes: they would follow her anywhere.