Chapter 68: A Court of Broken Scales

Chapter 68: A Court of Broken Scales

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“One star drifts through snow. One writes against heaven itself. One drowns kingdoms in moonlight. One dances before the fall of empires. Above all… thousands of them have the same mission: walking alone beneath the northern sky.”

“Go, Archer,” Enji said, his voice slicing through the supernatural static. He did not turn to look at her. His eyes, now swirling with the violet depths of the Seikai, remained locked on the horrors manifesting before him.

Chinatsu gripped her phantom bow, her jaw clenched tight. “I am not leaving you alone with them, Enji. You’re the Arbiter, not a vanguard. If they rush you—”

“I said go!” Enji’s voice cracked like a whip of dark matter, the sheer force of it making the concrete beneath their feet splinter. “Genki and Kazuaki are blind in the dark below. They do not have the eyes to see the shadows, nor the hands to fight them. Captain B cannot hold the lobby forever. Be the new sun they need, Chinatsu.”

Chinatsu hesitated, her fiery eyes darting between Enji’s rigid back and the monstrous forms of Ame-no-Sagume and Inugami. She knew he was right. If the lunar vanguard reached the command center, the human scientists would be slaughtered in seconds.

“If you die before I get back,” Chinatsu hissed, the golden light of her bow flaring as she took a step backward toward the stairwell, “I will tear your soul out of the underworld and kill you myself, Tenth Sun.”

With a final, desperate glance, the Archer turned and vanished into the darkness, plunging into the chaos below.

Enji was alone.

He stood facing the Night Guard. The wind whipped his obsidian coat around his legs, but his posture was absolute. Sagume tilted her blindfolded head, listening to the fading footsteps of the Archer. Next to her, the massive, shifting mass of the Inugamikazuchi growled, a sound that vibrated the very air.

“How touching, fellow seer,” Sagume whispered, her voice echoing directly into Enji’s skull. “The great Daishimei, sending the fake sun away so he might dimmed in the dark. But you are already well acquainted with death, aren’t you?”

“State your business, Spy of the Heavens,” Enji replied, his tone devoid of warmth. “You are a long way from the shadows of Takamagahara.”

Sagume floated forward, her tattered white robes untouched by the violent wind. She reached into the folds of her garments and produced an ancient, decaying scroll woven from pale moonlight.

“My business is the Law,” Sagume stated, unrolling the scroll. It contained floating, glowing embers that represented souls. “The laws of the Kojiki. The sacred boundary between Takamagahara—the High Plain of Heaven—and Tokoyo-no-kuni—the Underworld. A boundary you have treated as your personal playground, Arbiter of the Central Plains.”

Inugamikazuchi paced to the side, its glowing red eyes tracking Enji’s every breath.

“You dare speak of the cycle of life?” Sagume mocked. “You, who pervert the very souls of this archipelago? The girl you called Satoshi Mei… the 999th incarnation of your vessel. She was a corpse. A human who had already crossed into Tokoyo-no-kuni, yet you stitched her soul back into the flesh to cheat fate.”

Enji did not flinch, though his eyes darkened.

“And this body you wear now,” Sagume continued, pointing a long, skeletal finger at Enji’s chest. “The 1000th incarnation. The brilliant researcher, Mizunami Enji. He died four years ago. Yet here he stands, breathing stolen air, because the Great Arbiter needed a puppet in Yamato.”

Enji remained silent, but beneath the stoic facade, a bitter, agonizing truth clawed at his mind. A puppet? This is my Avatar. He thought. Do they think I asked for this?

It was the great, tragic irony of Daishimei. He was the Lord of Fate, yet he was cursed to experience the frailty of mortal death over and over. In every cycle, his avatars were doomed to die young. Never once had an incarnation of Daishimei lived to see the age of sixty—the recognized "lifespan of heaven."

Sagume’s fingers grazed the glowing embers on the scroll. “Look at your history, Arbiter. We know of your past vessels in the Central Plains. Oushokun. Ryu Ka. Seishi. Yo Gyokukan. All beautiful, all brilliant, and all dead before their time. Tell me, why does the one who commands the Ocean of Stars cling so desperately to broken vessels? Why does the Death God fear death so much that he must steal corpses to linger in the living world?”

Enji’s fists clenched. The names of his past lives echoed in his mind—Oushokun, Seishi, Gyokukan... especially Ryu Ka—Kan Ki. He remembered the cold sands, the drowning, the silken strangulation... and the betrayed. He hadn’t clung to life out of fear; he had clung to it because his duty demanded it. How could he regulate the cycle of life and death if the heavens constantly murdered him before his work was done?

“You may play your necromantic games in the Central Plains,” Sagume declared, her voice rising. “But you will not pollute the Yamato archipelago! You have no jurisdiction here! Lord Tsukuyomi has decreed that your interference is a crime against Izanagi’s divine order. We are here to execute you.”

Enji looked at her, his expression unreadable. But before he could speak, the world shattered.

A blinding flash of crimson light erupted from the direction of Shibuya. A second later, the shockwave hit the building. Then, another explosion blossomed over Ueno. Then Shinagawa. It was a massacre. A synchronized, indiscriminate slaughter of the civilian population.

Sagume stumbled, the scroll falling from her hands. Inugamikazuchi whimpered, its aggressive posture breaking.

“What… what is this?” Sagume gasped. “This wasn’t the decree! Lord Tsukuyomi ordered the destruction of the facilities! We were not supposed to massacre the mortals!”

Enji stared at the burning city. The millions of glowing stars in the Seikai began to wink out, one by one.

Then, Enji laughed.

It started as a low, rumbling chuckle, dry and devoid of humor. It grew louder, echoing across the rooftop. It was a terrifying sound—the sound of a god who had finally run out of patience.

“You absolute fools,” Enji sneered, his laughter fading into a venomous hiss. “You actually believed him.”

Sagume took a step back. “Believed what? Lord Tsukuyomi acts in the name of the Kojiki! In the name of Takamagahara!”

“Tsukuyomi cares nothing for Izanagi’s order!” Enji roared, his voice booming with the authority of the true Shimei. “Did you really think the Lord of the Night crawled out of his exile just to put me on trial? You think he wants to judge me?”

Enji took a step forward, the sheer gravitational pressure forcing the massive Inugami to its knees.

“I came to this archipelago because I sensed an anomaly,” Enji revealed, his eyes burning with cold fury. “A treason that spanned across pantheons. Tsukuyomi hasn’t been sitting in the dark mourning. He’s been conspiring. He struck a deal with rogue deities from the Konron of the Central Plains to stage a coup.”

Sagume trembled. “No… that’s impossible.”

“He promised you a lie,” Enji spat. “Tsukuyomi’s agenda is absolute power. He wants the throne of Yamato. He wants to tear down the heavens and rule over the ashes. And I am simply the perfect scapegoat... as usual... I've played this game a thousand winters.”

The realization hit Sagume like a physical blow. The explosions weren't random. They were a blood sacrifice to feed Tsukuyomi’s ascension.

“He kills his own people,” Enji continued with a giggle, “and he will blame the ‘foreign Death God’ who was illegally tampering with the souls of the archipelago. He frames me as the mastermind of this instability to justify his own tyrannical rise.”

Enji looked at the trembling Spy of the Heavens. They were not executioners. They were just sacrificial pawns.

“You wanted to see the Death God of the Central Plains? Do you know how much I love this role?” Enji asked, his voice echoing across the burning sky. “Then watch closely, Yamato. Because I am about to show you why even myself fear my name.”