A series of gusts blew up from the bottomless chasm of the hole.
The stone platform suspended in the center of the hole was circled by stone lanterns that illuminated it with dim light.
The light shining down on the altar and the gigantic water men from the cavern’s top where the water streams originated from was bluish in color and the fusion of the two lights made the platform look brighter than anything else in the hole.
The platform had now become the focal point of hundreds of samurai.
There were bright individuals among them who had soon caught onto the link between the water streams and the water men.
After witnessing the fearsome prowess of the water giants, the samurai began to wait in silence and didn’t dare to make any rash movements.
However, Yajiro, the blonde dandy, did the opposite. He continued to descend the chain and climbed onto the platform, but while the spectating samurai were waiting for the good show to unfold, he remained stationary.
“Hahahaha! Yajiro chuckled proudly, “Do you really think I’m an idiot who would mess with the water giants? I’m just going to wait in this spot until the water stream dries up by standing in a favorable location. The earlier bird gets the worm!”
Yajiro turned around and grinned his teeth towards the kunoichi and the samurai woman on the wooden ring.
The samurai woman and the kunoichi seemed fascinated by their leader’s masculinity and wit, so they showed reverent expressions in response to his grin.
“You’re so smart, Brother Yajiro!” The kunoichi even waved her hand while shouting at him excitedly.
Lily just watched this in silence as she felt disinclined to comment on this episode.
The water streams from the cavern’s top enlarged suddenly at this moment and left everyone disappointed.
However, the water split into a new stream midway and converged towards the center of the stone platform to form a gigantic being.
“This can’t be! Is it another water giant?” The samurai were astonished.
“No,” Lily muttered softly as she was able to sense a powerful eldritch aura from this stream unlike the water giants.
As for Yajiro, he had yet to notice this new being’s arrival because he was making a complacent gesture towards Lily and Mizue right now. The water being’s form turned clear gradually as it transformed into a robust, 8 m tall, dark green kappa.
The kappa emanated an eldritch aura that was powerful enough to stifle all the samurai present in this space.
The kappa’s features were as ugly as that of bizarre creatures with a purple mist oozing out of his yellow duckbill and he also wielded a dark purple heavy wooden pole with his muscular hand.
“A monster… Where did this monster come from?” The samurai exclaimed one after the other.
“Kyūbōzu… It’s Kyūbōzu, the chief of Lake Biwa’s kappas!” A samurai from Omi exclaimed.
What?
Lily was also stunned by the appearance of the huge kappa that exuded a powerful aura at the middle-stage Permanence level and wielded an even scarier dark-purple wooden pole as a weapon.
“It’s the Water-Escape Art!” Kagura said from the mirror, “This is an innate skill that can only be used by powerful kappas. As long as there’s a certain amount of water, they can travel to a connected location like this that has no special defensive measures in place. This Kyūbōzu must’ve traveled to this cavern via the water stream flowing down from above! Kappas are usually weak, so this tough-bodied Permanence level archdemon definitely possesses some fearsome skills!”
Yajiro was about to revel in pride initially after becoming the center of awe, but the icy wind from behind sent a shiver through his spine. His smug expression hardened a little when he noticed the abnormality of the situation.
He looked back and went into a daze when he saw the monster towering behind him.
However, one of the advantages he possessed over others was his quick reflexes, so he made a frantic escape before Kyūbōzu could even make a move.
He escaped so quickly that the casual yet swift pole strike from Kyūbōzu failed to hit him, leaving behind rubbles of stone where he stood previously.
Yajiro jumped off the stone platform in desperation and threw a hook towards the iron chain to dangle below it and barely managed to preserve his life.
Kyūbōzu opened his bill to talk in the language of humans while spewing out purple mist.
“I am Kyūbōzu, the chief of Lake Biwa’s kappas. The treasure is mine since I’ve guarded it for years. I’ll kill anyone who dares to step on this platform with the intention of snatching it!”
“What?!” The samurai exclaimed in fury. They had traveled from distant lands and braved dangers, betting their lives on the line to overcome the challenges before them to reach this location, so they were naturally unwilling to let the monster hog the treasure when it was on the cusp of landing in their hands.
However, the monster’s massive size as well as the fearsome aura had intimidated them deeply.
A trio exited one of the passages at this moment.
It was none other than Tamurakonoe, Tesshin, and Ui.
“I wasn’t expecting the passage to have such a troublesome mechanism in place!” The white-masked Tesshin frowned.
The trio had been the first to enter the palace, yet they had fallen so behind now as the type and difficulty of the mechanism was unique to their respective passages. Although the trio was quite powerful, their luck was pretty average.
“Whoa! It’s a huge kappa! It’s a kappa, right?” Ui exclaimed loudly.
Tamurakonoe’s gaze turned sterner when he saw the kappa.
“Lord Tamurakonoe. It looks like this kappa’s guarding the treasure with the intention of hogging it,” Tesshin stated.
“Let’s wait and see. The kappa has some decent strength and it’s quite unusual for one to grow so huge, so he must possess some exceptional skills. If we dispatch this kappa, wouldn’t it actually benefit the fishermen?” Tamurakonoe said.
Lily’s group was about 100 m away from Tamurakonoe’s group on the other side of the wooden ring.
“It’s the group of powerful Kansai samurai,” Lily was warier of this pretty man than the kappa as the latter just intended to contend with the samurai for the treasure. Lily believed that it was still possible to obtain the treasure since the samurai had the number advantage, but the trio from the West actually intended to kill her. Fortunately, they had yet to discover that she was the one they were hunting and had just come to obtain the treasure like her.
“T-That kappa looks so dominating and formidable… If he was to catch me…” Mizue blushed hard while holding Lily’s hand.
Shimizu furrowed her brows when she saw this and remarked internally, “How could you snuggle up to Lil’ Sis Lily like that when you’re married, you b̲i̲t̲c̲h̲. Do you have any modesty left as a woman of a certain age?”
Shimizu also felt a little intimidated by Kyūbōzu’s aura as the archdemon had unleashed it unrestrainedly. This allowed Shimizu and the others to sense the archdemon’s strength without probing it. However, it was still unknown whether this was the archdemon’s whole strength or just a part of it.
Shimizu pulled Mizue, “I’ll protect you.”
“Eh?” Mizue wanted to rely on Lily, but she still agreed to the suggestion reluctantly.
Shimizu arrived beside Lily, “What’s the plan now? If this kappa doesn’t leave, the treasure will fall into his hands when it loses the protection of the water giants.”
Lily’s bosom heaved up and down intensely as she watched the wooden chest as well as the murmuring water streams in silence.
The samurai of Heian were brash and dauntless by nature, so there were still a bunch of them who neglected the kappa’s threat and continued their descent towards the round platform.
A bunch of samurai landed on the platform simultaneously.
“How can we just give up after coming so far?! Let’s get him!” “Let’s do it! We’ll kill the kappa and take both the treasure and his spirit jade!”
The samurai who landed on the platform showed vicious expressions as they charged at the kappa while raising battle cries.
A few of them jumped to attack his torso while some attacked his legs.
There were also some who shot arrows at him from nearby.
Kyūbōzu issued a long and primeval howl as he raised the wooden pole in his hand. His pole strikes were faster than the samurai’s imagination despite possessing a massive body and sliced through the wind as they struck the samurai.
“Boom!”
The wooden pole struck two of the samurai who were in midair and blasted them into pieces of flesh!
A samurai on the platform who dodged the pole slashed at the kappa’s body, but the strike just left a faint scratch on his hardened flesh and didn’t even manage to cut through his skin.
A bunch of long tentacles that were as broad as arms emerged from Kyūbōzu’s chest and abdomen then, one of which coiled around the samurai like a dark-green python and twisted hard.
“Spurt!” The guts of the twisted samurai’s body exploded outward, his flesh and blood scattering in all directions. His severed head flew out at the same time and landed beside Yajiro who had just climbed up the iron chain and this shocked him so much that he nearly slipped down.
The samurai’s blades shimmered against the light as they attempted to cut Kyūbōzu’s heels, but his legs were as broad as a tree’s trunk and quite tough on top of that, so their desperate attacks just managed to damage his skin a little. However, these injuries were as light as splinter wounds to humans for Kyūbōzu thanks to his massive body, and he was practically invincible against the arrows striking him since they just bounced off him.
Kyūbōzu raised his foot suddenly and this prompted a few samurai to dodge out of the way.
“Boom!”
The first stomp missed.
However, a samurai who rolled aside to dodge it wasn’t able to stand up in time for the second stomp that followed it, so the shadow looming over his head became the last thing he ever saw before he turned into mincemeat.
The Awakened samurai were no more than bugs waiting to get squashed by Kyūbōzu.
Kyūbōzu’s tentacles were faster than his pole strikes and stomps as they lashed towards the two archers while leaving behind dark-green afterimages before picking them up and smashing them against each other, causing their heads to explode when they collided.
The remaining samurai lost their battle will after witnessing Kyūbōzu’s devastating power and fled in panic. A few of them even fell into the chasm amidst the chaos and vanished into oblivion.
The samurai who were spectating felt dread after watching this tragic scene and remained silent without stepping forward as even the brave ones valued their life.
The water streams turned smaller by the second and the two water giants also diminished in size simultaneously. The muscles of the water giants also contracted, and they no longer looked as majestic as before, looking just like average porters who were less than 2 m tall now.
“This doesn’t look good,” Lily worried, “It feels like the two water giants are turning weaker as the water streams dry up. If this continues, the scramble for the treasure might begin before the streams even disappear!”
What should I do?
Lily needed the treasure as it meant having yet another assurance when she made for Mt. Ooe after arriving in Heian-kyo and was also certain that a treasure guarded by such mystical means was definitely an incredible one.
But what should I do? Should I wait for the kappa to take the treasure and snatch it from him then? The trio from the West is probably planning to do the same thing, so it might be hard to accomplish this. Moreover, this kappa can also use the Water-Escape Art. Do I just stand back and watch him escape with the treasure?
“No! The treasure is mine!” A strong desire welled up inside Lily.
Right at the moment when Lily was about to make a decision from the anxiety, a black-dressed samurai landed on the platform resolutely unlike the others who were scared. The samurai had his head with tied hair lowered and acted as if Kyūbōzu didn’t exist as he crossed his hands while holding a broadsword in one of them.
“I’m Asano Hiroi, the best swordsman of Omi and the 13th successor of the Ono-ryu Iai! You’ve engaged in evil deeds along with the group you lead in Lake Biwa for years, and I’ve long wished to subjugate you. I’m glad you’ve shown up in front of me today to become an obstacle in my journey to obtain the treasure. Hmph! There’s room for forgiveness if the Heavens have sinned, but there’s no room for it when an individual sins! It’s unfortunate that you’ve come across me today, Kyūbōzu!”
The black-dressed samurai oozed with elegance, chivalry, and righteousness and he smirked calmly at the massive Kyūbōzu fearlessly.
“It’s a Spirit Jade powerhouse! A Spirit Jade powerhouse has finally made a move!” A nearby samurai from Omi exclaimed, “You outsiders might not know this, but Lord Asano is the sole Spirit Jade powerhouse in the Omi province!”
“Kill that Kyūbōzu, Lord Asano!” “Lord Asano is ridding the people of evil, so he deserves the treasure!”
The nearby Omi samurai cheered after seeing a true master make a move.
