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Natsuki listened on with furrowed brows and his hands clenched together as news from the capital came through the radio. Just a few days ago, he was still a squad captain, a few levels shy from the upper echelons. If he worked as hard as he had been doing the past few years, he could be even replacing one of the old farts who’d kick the bucket soon enough from that round table.
But things could change in a snap. Just like his brother’s fate—one day was drinking himself to death, dying by someone’s blade the next. Now the name he had built brick by brick had been cast aside along with everyone else who went against the Sword Saint, branded as criminals to be slain at sight. Well, that’s just how the world worked. It was futile to demand justice where it was lacking in the first place. They must forge it with their own hands.
Hearing enough, Natsuki reached for the radio and switched it off. At once, the sound of the surrounding forest took over the barely furnished space, reminding him that they were alone and now technically on the run. With a sigh, Natsuki rose and headed for his only companion in this remote corner of the country.
Uruha stood in the middle of the empty yard, save for a couple of already ravaged makeshift targets Uruha had assembled out of the deadwood scattered around their temporary hideout. Only one remained standing, unaware of the fate about to befall it. The black flames that enveloped them moments before Shiba appeared at the underground library and whisked them away to safety healed their wounds and restored the body parts Uruha lost during the fight with the Hishaku. Right now, those newly healed fingers gripped the sheath tight, preparing for another Iai strike.
Shing!
As swift as ever, the target was slashed in half even before Natsuki could register Uruha unsheathing his blade.
“A stationary target wouldn’t do shit, you know?” Natsuki remarked as soon as Uruha returned to a resting stance, the sword fully sheathed again. “You’re just making the blade dull.”
“I was just making sure my joints got repaired properly.” Uruha turned to look at him with a small smile. “But I shouldn’t have doubted Samura-san in the first place.”
An expression all too familiar with Natsuki flashed on Uruha’s face then, similar to the face that stared back at him in the mirror days after Ibuki’s death. Like the face Uruha himself made when the black flames healed them and he uttered Samura’s name.
It’s been a few days since the raid at the headquarters. For security, Shiba instructed everyone involved to disperse and hide until he, Azami, and Rokuhira Chihiro came up with their next plan of action. With Samura gone and Tobimune’s healing abilities rendered inactive, they couldn’t gamble on their lives as carelessly as before. And so, for the past few days, Natsuki stayed together with Uruha in one of Shiba’s hideouts and personally witnessed how Uruha came to terms with his grief.
Or rather, actively avoided it.
This was the first time he had mentioned Samura’s name again.
“Did you get to talk to him?” Though Natsuki would have no love lost for Uruha, it didn’t mean he couldn’t understand what could be going through his mind the past few days. “Before he ‘killed’ you, I mean.”
Uruha stared at him with an open mouth and wide dumbfounded eyes, as if he couldn’t believe Natsuki just started talking about something so personal of his own volition. He then turned his gaze away, his eyes blinking rapidly.
“A bit.” Uruha finally answered after a silence too long that Natsuki almost thought he asked the wrong question. “He told me about his plan. The original one, anyway. About how we, the enchanted blade wielders, were sinners and will die by his hand. It’s…not very touching for a last conversation.”
“Well, I guess you do win that competition.”
A gust of strong wind blew through the forest and rustled the leaves of the trees, scaring away the flock of small birds perched in their gnarly branches. A piece of maple leaf flew past, but Uruha’s left hand caught it before it completely drifted away.
“I’m sorry about Ibuki-san, I don’t think I’ve told you yet.” Uruha turned to Natsuki with a solemn expression. “I should have fought harder against that Hokuto and killed him to avenge Ibuki-san.”
“Leave that bastard to me. He should die by my hands.” Natsuki declared with conviction. “In any case, I received the message you sent through your guards back then.”
“But I’ve never had the chance to say it in person.” Uruha shook his head tiredly. “So much has happened in such a short time. Dying, resurrecting, almost dying again. Now, we’re on the run. It feels wrong to say this, but I’m glad we have this brief period to breathe.”
“The power we felt back there, the one that felt like having our life sucked out of us…was that what you had to deal with in the island? The reason why my brother came back the way he was?”
“A part of it, yes. But I believe it’s the fact that we couldn’t save a single soul on that day that really got to him.” Uruha opened his hand and let the maple leaf finally drift away with the wind. “I guess I should be more affected, too. The rest of the enchanted blade wielders were.”
“I’ve always known you’re a bit twisted.” Natsuki commented with a slight frown, watching the leaf that Uruha just let go of float away. “Prodigies usually are.”
“Maybe you’re right.” Uruha chuckled bitterly, reminded that aside from himself, Soga Akemura was also hailed a prodigy of his time. However, he could not begin to think about the gap between them when he had not even caught up to his own master. If he was this lacking, was there hope to catch up with Soga Akemura on his own? “Anyway, we’ve only seen the tip of what the Shinuchi could do. I have reasons to believe Samura-san faced its full strength with Chihiro. And if the situation right now tells us anything, it’s that we have a lot to prepare for if we want to defeat the Sword Saint.”
With the Sword Saint declaring war against those he deemed “enemies of the country”, their lives would not be getting easier any time soon. Natsuki had lived a relatively predictable life in the past years, but he never stopped making himself stronger. There were several figures that stood ahead of him, both in sorcery and swordplay. But as long as he, Misaka Natsuki, lived, no one could say he wouldn’t be able to catch up to them.
“I don’t care whether they’re the Sword Saint or the Sword God, I’m blasting past through them with my own strength.”
Uruha’s face brightened up at his words, and then he fully broke into a laughing fit, his eyes disappearing behind his eyelids as he clutched his stomach with one arm and leaned the other on Natsuki. His laughter gleefully rang in the afternoon air, drilling into Natsuki’s ear annoyingly.
“What the hell are you laughing at?” Natsuki snarled, hitting Uruha’s shoulder with a push that barely budged him. “Looking down on me, huh?”
“No, no, I wouldn’t dare.” Uruha clarified in between his giggles. Wiping a tear from his eye, he said, “I’m just…really happy and relieved that even after everything, I still have you.”
“What the hell are you saying?” Natsuki shrugged Uruha’s hand off him, feeling the telltale signs of heat rushing to his own cheeks.
“Don’t deny it, we worked great as a team against those Hishaku guys.” Uruha continued, unbothered by Natsuki’s reaction. “I think it would do us good to continue this partnership, yeah?”
Even if Natsuki wanted to, he couldn’t deny that Uruha was speaking the truth. Until that day in the underground library, he never thought he’d feel at ease fighting alongside another swordsman again. After all, the very reason he took up wielding dual blades was that with Ibuki’s death, he couldn’t envision himself fighting next to someone else.
But of course, Uruha came along. Like he did before over eighteen years ago. And now, instead of taking up the spot that Natsuki thought should be his, Uruha dared to stand next to him.
And if that last battle was any indication, it didn’t seem to be too much of a terrible idea.
“Work on your speed then.” Natsuki said in resignation, gripping the hilts of his blades. “Three years soaking in those hot springs rotted the swordsman out of you. If you want to be my partner, you must be better than that. Let’s do one round.”
Uruha’s eyes shone as he recognized Natsuki’s stance, wrapping his own fingers around the sheath and hilt of his sword, stepping a few feet away and assuming his own battle-ready form.
“I’ll be in your care then, Natsuki-senpai.”
“Don’t start getting respectful now.”