The Celestial Patriarch and Matriarch looked on the afflicted Samurai with great compassion; and while they were in their presence, the beast inside the Sacrifants was somewhat subdued – though it wouldn’t last long.
“As you have found from the Naga Book of Secrets,” they explain, “a Pact was agreed to, between all the Powers of Creation to Bind the Father of Demons using the bodies of Man and great magic focused in a special Shrine.”
“You are those to whom this duty has fallen at this incarnation of yourselves. From the beginning, only the most honorable of Spirits have shared in carrying out this burden, and now is no different.”
“With the destruction of the Shrine however, and the corrupted Fire Herald certainly after you to complete the liberation of Masaki-Dai-Oni, Creation has been plunged into unprecedented peril.”
“No doubt that the Moon Goddess U-Mani could address this, but the Gods sleep. And what to her would be a simple matter, to us would end Creation as we know it, as the Goddess irrevocably wiped clean the slate of existence to start things anew.”
“If this were so, we do not know what would become of us. We prefer then to see if we can solve this ourselves.”
“Therein must be why we – at a future time – sent Kioko back to us. She is an Incarnation of Sakura and shares a link with her. We suspect, that should Sakura be lost, Kioko would then become the vessel for the portion of Masaki-Dai-Oni in Sakura. And, as we now hold Kioko in deep Stasis, perhaps that will be enough to prevents Masaki-Dai-Oni from ever becoming whole.”
“What?” Sakura asks, “Who’s Kioko? I don’t get it.”
“When you died, saving your friends,” the Heavenly Parents answer Sakura, “Another incarnation of yourself, a So-Kitsune from the future, was sent to replace you. The honorable Samurai of Sendai brought her here, where we set her to sleep to await rebirth into her own time-line.”
“Oh, I see,” Sakura nods.
The Celestial Patriarch and Matriarch then continue - “Unfortunately, we don’t believe the Elemental Herald, corrupted or not, can be kept long from coming after, should Kioko become a vessel for its Demon Master. While we can certainly mount a significant defense, the Herald is god-spawn, not to mention demon enhanced, and would cause great loss before we could subdue it.”
Here the Patriarch and Matriarch stop talking and look into Creation itself. Then with a stoic countenance they add, “Yes; The Elemental Herald comes for you even now. It is currently two hours behind you. It will follow you one at a time, killing you as quickly as it can, until it has brought back its Master.”
“We can suggest two courses of action,” they conclude, “We let it come and fight it here in the corona of U-mani the moon – which hopefully will burn off its demonic corruption to the point we can try to revive the Herald himself.”
“If successful, then we can then work to restore the Shrine. Once complete, you will then give your lives to reclaim the demonic prisoner.”
“The drawback here, is that you are currently corrupted to the point that you cannot enter U-Mani’s corona without yourselves being lost and giving more power to Masaki-Dai-Oni. Given that, the Herald has little reason to actually come into the corona at all, until Kioko is the only one left.”
“In this you are lucky however, as Yunikawa has blundered. Had he waited to take his own life, letting you attain the Celestial Palace beforehand, he would have achieved his cause – as you would all have been consumed by holy fire before you could have escaped. Masaki-Dai-Oni, being then released, would have dropped back down to Earth to claim it his own.”
Then, after a thoughtful pause, they finish with – “The second option is to travel to the Heart of Creation and use your magic to control the Heartstone. Use it to travel back in time to when Yunikawa was young. Take his life and send him to the Shrine, before he can ever live long enough to learn of its secrets and cause such calamity in the first place.”
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Topic: Mythic Nippon Adventure VI (Read 183237 times)