“What?! Lord Kamakura, you say?!” The Mino Triumvirate was taken aback by Lily’s declaration. Although Mino had long lost contact with Kamakura, the samurai of Mino still viewed themselves as samurai of the East, and Lord Kamakura was the leader of all eastern samurai.
Although this alone wasn’t enough for the Mino Triumvirate to believe Lily’s words, the sweet scent that had suffused the air as a result of Lily’s perspiration from the dance movements made the simpleton trio’s minds waver.
They were long dissatisfied with the current situation where they had to collude with the monsters. Lily’s words, and mainly the mystical effects of the dance, actually left the trio perplexed about their subsequent actions, even prompted the most righteous one among them, Inaba Shigekado, to turn back and cast a questioning gaze towards his lord.
“You fool!” Ouchi Koreyoshi bellowed, “Don’t let that witch’s words bewitch you! Lord Kamakura would never give out such an order!”
“What?!” Lily felt shocked when she heard this as she had mentioned Lord Kamakura’s name to verify the doubts she held. However, Ouchi Koreyoshi’s adamant refutation still left her stunned.
Ouchi Koreyoshi seemed quite certain about Lord Kamakura’s intent despite the latter being quite an enigmatic man. This didn’t make sense even for someone like Viper!
Lily was also sure that he would’ve provided some additional explanation if this was a scheme of his, but he hadn’t done so.
This made Lily wonder if he really knew Lord Kamakura’s intent1.
“Mino Triumvirate. This woman is using her pretty looks to charm you! She’s actually made you question the lord you serve and believe a mirror girl forsaken by the world instead! Why haven’t you killed her yet?!” Ouchi Koreyoshi stated firmly, his wise words containing a mighty power as the leader of the Mino Triumvirate that roused the trio from their confusion.
“Mino Triumvirate. Have you actually forgotten what kind of path you’re treading?! Show your true strength to this woman!” Ouchi Koreyoshi’s final words became the waking call for the Mino Triumvirate.
Bursts of spirit power broke out from the trio’s bodies as they closed in towards Lily once again.
Demonic flames shrouded the trio now.
The trio had actually long become demonized and just happened to retain some sense of conscience within them.
“Hmph! As I thought…”
Lily’s tranquil eyes flashed with iciness.
Lily’s plan wasn’t actually to falter the Mino Triumvirate, and neither did she believe they would change sides based on the few words she had spoken. She just intended to falter the trio’s battle intent and look for a chance to gain the upper hand, but she then realized that the Dance of the Bell Maiden actually had a beneficial influence on her words. This made Lily brainstorm and devise a plan, which was to verify her doubts about a certain matter by mentioning Lord Kamakura’s name.
And she had her answer now.
Why was it that she had suffered an assassination right after arriving in Owari?
Why was it that she had come across assassins even though she had begun journeying west secretly?
Lily was certain that the traitor who leaked her whereabouts was either Lord Kamakura or someone very close to him2.
However, Lily didn’t believe that anyone had the ability to spy on her conversation with Lord Kamakura with the strength he possessed.
Ouchi Koreyoshi, had also divulged that Lord Kamakura actually knew he was colluding with the Hundred Demons in a moment of desperation. The fact that he had admitted this so openly, in turn, strengthened Lily’s conviction and made her think that an eminence like Lord Kamakura really wasn’t worthy of her trust3.
However, even if this were the case, she failed to understand why he hadn’t dealt with her personally. After all, she was practically powerless in front of him.
It made her wonder whether he was a self-righteous hypocrite who had taken his reputation into consideration as the master of Hachiman Palace.
Or that he was unable to take action for some reason.
Lord Kamakura possessed remarkable abilities, yet he allowed the demon parade to travel through Kamakura City silently. It was said that the East was under Lord Kamakura’s protection, and this was the reason the powerful monsters didn’t dare to invade it. However, Lily wondered whether that was really the case.
“Hah!” A burst of fiendish, eldritch flames broke out from Inaba’s body. His strength was originally at the 7th-stage Awakened level, but he had long reached the Spirit Jade Stage after obtaining the method to train in fiendish demon spirit power!
The other two were the same.
The three Spirit Jade powerhouses charged at Lily and the powerful bursts of eldritch energy coming off them actually ended up extinguishing the oil lamps in the floor, causing even the windows to blow outside the tower as the floor sunk into deep-blue darkness.
Lily’s vision had long blurred, so it didn’t make much of a difference to her whether the surroundings were bright. Although she was in a dazed state, her senses had actually sharpened, and this allowed her to sense the desire hidden within the trio’s murderous intent. Lily was able to dodge their sharp weapons even within the darkness by performing the Dance of the Bell Maiden by using that desire as the markers.
The darkness actually filled Lily with higher confidence and made her bolder since she didn’t need to worry about getting seen by them in the shameless costume she had donned.
Ujiie Huzen’s eyes shone with demonic flames as he attacked Lily’s flank with his tachi, but she bent back and blocked Huzen’s tachi with the Sakura Parasol in her hand by arching back to the floor, giving rise to golden sparks. At the same time, she raised Evil Slayer up with her other hand and drew a beautiful arc of moonlight to cut off Huzen’s blade-wielding arms.
“Spurt!”
Ando Morimasa’s tachi slashed towards Lily’s waist at this moment, but Lily stretched her legs forward and hooked them around the short-heighted Huzen’s neck to flip around with her impressive abdominal strength and straddle his shoulders from his back.
This made Ando stab towards Lily, but she loosened her legs to bend back and flipped over to land on the floor on one of her knees. She gripped Yasutsuna with her hands simultaneously and unleashed a crimson crescent sword beam clad in silver evil-slaying lightning that slashed deep into Huzen’s back from his left shoulder to the right hip, cutting through his heart and spirit jade in the process.
“Aaahhh… Wife. Daughter. I’m finally free to meet you. Perhaps we are really mistaken, milord…”
Ujiie Huzen collapsed to the floor and turned motionless.
Inaba Shigekado’s eyes lit up with demonic purple flames in the darkness as he heaved his blade towards Lily like a fearsome evil spirit.
However, Lily grabbed the fallen Sakura Parasol with one hand and spun it quickly to fend off Inaba’s heavy blow with the resultant spinning force. Lily stabbed her blade into the floor in the moments when Inaba lost his balance and used it as a pivot to swing her leg forward like in a dance movement.
“Bam!” The kick sent Inaba flying while Lily used the momentum of her swing to stand on both her feet.
Ando’s tachi came stabbing at Lily the moment she stood on her feet though, but she arched back firmly and formed the shape of a bow with her body, which caused the tachi’s blade to pass through the cleavage between Lily’s lofty breasts, its rough, cylindrical hilt giving rise to a fiery hotness on the breast skin it brushed against.
“Ngh…” Lily rasped out a distinct moan irrepressibly because of the fiery hotness coming from her chest and seized this chance to flip over and straddle the hilt of the naginata before spinning around to kick Ando’s neck with her heel, knocking him down to the floor by making him lose his balance. She then straddled Ando’s body nimbly with her wholesome body like a noble empress and delivered the final, mesmerizing judgment to him!
Yasutsuna stabbed into Ando’s chest deeply and shattered his spirit jade.
“Crack!”
The final remaining member of the Mino Triumvirate, Inaba Shigekado, attacked Lily from the back once again, but she performed a jump roll to dodge it, causing his blade to mutilate his companion’s corpse.
Inaba withdrew his blade and spun around to execute a horizontal slash, which Lily fended off with her blade. Lily would’ve long beaten Inaba if she had been able to exert the full strength of Tsukuyomi Swordstyle since his strength was pretty close to Takeda’s. However, she actually got blown away by the clash as she was restrained by the feebleness of her body right now and rolled across the floor to reduce the momentum and come to a crouching stop.
A burst of demonic flames broke out from Inaba, the strongest of the Mino Triumvirate, as he slashed forward heavily and opened up a deep fissure on the floor. Lily dodged sideways in the last second and flung her long sleeves forward to bind Inaba’s neck with the long, red sleeves and pulled them hard as if she were dancing!
By borrowing the momentum of Inaba’s heavy strike, Lily managed to pull him down towards the center of the fissure on the floor.
She then lifted her foot jeweled by the high-heeled wooden sandal and stomped down on Inaba’s body.
“Boom!” Causing the floor to rupture and make them both fall to the second floor!
Inaba got up frantically and slashed up to cut through Lily’s sleeves.
Lily also regained her hands’ freedom the moment Inaba slashed through her sleeves and executed a half-spin to slash at his flank side!
Although Lily was unable to exert her full prowess, Yasutsuna’s strength was strong as ever!
The blade slashed deep into Inaba’s body, cutting off his arm and severed several ribs as it opened up a gruesome wound on his waist.
Inaba retreated back to heal with his spirit power.
However, Lily didn’t allow him this leeway and actually launched a spinning Sakura Parasol towards him, which ended up disrupting Inaba’s spirit power when it struck him. This caused him to lob the parasol aside with his blade and reveal Lily’s sharp set of eyes in the darkness behind the red parasol as she stabbed the blade in her hands towards him!
Inaba possessed a sturdy body, but he was quite agile too. He dodged to the side immediately and evaded Lily’s stab before countering back with a downward strike to her waist!
Lily angled her body to the side by borrowing the forward momentum in this critical moment and spun around to slash out with Yasutsuna!
Inaba’s blade arrived at almost the same moment!
“Clang!”
The two blades produced sparks as a result of the clash!
And the floor re-embraced darkness once the light subsided.
The two maintained their final stance for a good while before Inaba pushed his blade down.
Lily also raised her shimmering blade up while resting against the floor.
Inaba’s blade sliced deep into the floor and arrived an inch away from Lily’s slender waist.
Lily’s blade, however, was pointed towards the fissure on the ceiling with blood dripping down against the shimmering runes on the blade.
A deep blade wound had opened up on Inaba’s chest and his dimmed, broken spirit jade gradually darkened inside his sliced-open heart.
Bam! Inaba fell head-first.
Lily also broke out in cold sweat as she lied back against the floor, her breasts heaving up and down intensely.
“That was a close call…”
Lily regained her senses after taking a few breaths and pushed the dead samurai’s corpse on her aside before standing up. She then flipped over in the air and jumped back to the third floor before skidding her blade against the floor to send sparks flying at the oil lamp to the side.
“Swoosh!” The third floor regained its dim illumination once again.
However, it was only her and Ouchi Koreyoshi remaining now.
Although it seemed like a long time, the battle within the darkness had actually only lasted tens of seconds.
The Mino Triumvirate was no more.
Lily looked at Ouchi Koreyoshi, who wasn’t as calm as before now and sweated constantly from his forehead now.
“You have any hidden moves left?” Lily questioned.
Ouchi Koreyoshi fetched an octagonal ancient mirror from his bosom, “How about you let me live in exchange for this, young lady?4”
