Shuurei passed the next couple of days mostly not moving from her bed in the hidden palace. Actually, she when she tried to recover leisurely, she found her body had become all worn out, so for awhile she found it even painful to move. Her body had been like a puppet whose strings had been cut, but after she had slept much, eaten nutritious foods and taken medicine, and passed her time reading books, she felt something return to life in her, up to the very tips of her fingers. The last time she had passed the time in this way had been in her childhood.
She didn’t need to do do anything.
Before, when she had been made a supernumerary official and been suspended, although it was a time when she didn’t need to do a thing and could rest, she had only become impatient. She had thought it would be no good, that not doing a thing was forbidden.
(…Whether I return or not, I can’t be an official, so maybe I’ve gotten careless….)
She had really spent her time not using her head much. However, that was also comfortable.
Shuurei felt Jin’s gaze, and turned her face towards him. Jin often looked at Shuurei in this way, seated in a chair, his long legs crossed. Actually, he was looking through Shuurei, at another princess, who resembled Shuurei.
“….do I look like her? Like Jyuusan-hime.”
“Sorry if I bothered you. It’s because I can’t meet the real one.”
He said it lightly. Since they didn’t know when Ruka would come, either Jin or Shuuei, who possessed Bakuya and Kanshou, would be by her side most of the time. Now it was Jin. Shuurei didn’t remember, but it seemed that she had been possessed by Ruka once. However, now there had not been even once a trace of Ruka. She had a feeling that she really had to think about Jin’s reasons for coming here, but she couldn’t make her head work. Perhaps it was because she thought somewhere in her heart, that the first priority, more than it being necessary to think about her self, was her last duty as an official, the dissolution of the embargo, and now she was no longer an official. She was no longer an official. There was no point in thinking. It was finished, everything. That was how she felt. She had lost all of her energy to do anything, as if the tendons in her heart had been all cut.
“She ain’t coming, is she, that Hyou clan auntie.”
At those words, Shuurei suddenly remembered Nine Colors Cove. The Hyou clan auntie. That was referring to Ruka. A small bell rang in some corner of her head. She felt a though something had been drawn out now.
“……Yes, she hasn’t come.”
She repeated this like a parrot. Jin smiled a bit.
“You’re still pretty tired, little lady. You really overdid it.”
“By now I’m mostly back to normal.”
“Your head and heart are tired. When you have a hard time thinking, mostly all that’s happening is that your eyes are open.”
Her head and heart were tired. Was that true? That might be true. She had realized something.
(….I haven’t even said once ‘I want to go back.’)
It wasn’t that she didn’t want to go back, but “you don’t need to go back” made her feel more relieved. She had thought, and chosen. Even if others had cursed her, she had persisted. However, she had decided. If none other than Ryuuki thought that he would be in trouble if she continued to be an official…..her role was over. Although it was only that that time had come, certainly, Shuurei, as Tantan had said to her, had thought . Then, she had come to a place where she didn’t need to thik about that, which had relieved her. A backward solace.
“Great that you don’t need to come back, right?”
Jin spoke as if he had read her mind. With a lightness as heavy as paper. She tried to glare at him, but he was indifferent.
“…..most of your core, little lady, is that of an “outside” woman. When you’re working, it’s the opposite.”
“Wha? What do you mean?”
“If it’s for the sake of a man, you do everything for him, enduring everything while keeping quiet. Fitting the words ‘it can’t be helped.’ That’s why men depend on you. Cause that kind of thing happens, it’s obvious that sometime you’ll be killed by a man.”
“….killed, you say.”
“‘yourself.’ That means ‘killing yourself.’”
Shuurei had been stabbed in the chest. She couldn’t answer straight away that it wasn’t so.
“Other than the strange old lady and old man here, I think the Hyou clan suits you well. It’s because the original duty of the Hyou is, using the temples in the ‘outside’ as bases, to go around rescuing the people when there are disasters or wars, to accept the pleas of the people, and to fight with officials at times. They save those who have been mistreated by the authorities, and are their last refuge. That’s why the shrines and temples related to the Hyou clan on the ‘outside’ are allowed to be places outside of the reach of official authority. It’s nearly independent authority. That’s the ‘duty’ of the Hyou clan, not only exorcising spirits or strange prayers or funerals.”
Shuurei’s eyes widened at this unexpected talk. That did, certainly, resemble what she wanted to do. To protect, with great power, the weak people who had been trampled like weeds or abandoned. That was why she wanted to become an official. If she were not an official, she couldn’t do that. But.
“….I..I didn’t know. Is that what the Hyou clan is?”
“After a sort. Especially, that old lady Ruka was pretty amazing during the years of turmoil. She encouraged the entire clan, both men and women, to study, made them polish up their knowledge and magic, and sent them one after the other to the ‘outside’ to save people. I’ve heard that Ruka especially put work first, whether they were men and women, and made them work hard. In medicine, astronomy, disasters, agricultural studies, etc, and in the accumulation of information and countermeasures, they have a high level of practical knowledge, more so than anywhere else in the country. Well, that’s about something that happened decades ago, and now it seems that Ruka is not as intent as she was before… Here, just by being a woman, someone has a lot of authority given to her, with many expectations and responsibilities, so if you want to, and if you can persist in negotiating with Ruka, and gain her approval, even if you don’t go ‘outside,’ what you can do may be far more than what you could as an official.”
“———-”
“Of course, here when marriage is decided, it’s the woman who has the right to choose the man. It’s like ‘don’t mess around, if I might die having children, then it’s going to be someone I want to have children with.’ For sure. Even if the marriage has been decided, once you run to the Hyou clan, you develop that right. It’s the ‘right to choose.’ You can even get rid of an accepted engagement. Probably, even if the other person is the king.”
“——————-Um….wait..wait a sec….”
Shuurei was in turmoil. She had thought ‘there’s no helping it.’—certainly, she had thought so in the depths of her heart—but now that didn’t seem to be so. Then, what should she do?
—–Really, it probably wasn’t that she hated marriage. It wasn’t that she hated the idea of entering the Inner Palace and spending her life supporting Ryuuki. She had considered it several times. However, Tantan had been right when he said “I don’t understand, but I have a feeling I’m making a huge mistake somewhere. But I don’t know what that is, so I don’t want to think about it,” she had a feeling that there wasn’t one reason for that, but many. What was it that made her think that she shouldn’t enter the Inner Palace now?
Somewhere, she had realized that she had bent. She hadn’t been satisfied, she had bent.
When she saw Ryuuki’s tired out face, she had thought that this was enough. Even now, she definitely did not think that her answer because of that had been mistaken. But, after she left Kiyou, it had somehow gradually snuck up on her that from a larger viewpoint, this may have been a ‘huge mistake.’ For her…. probably, for Ryuuki as well.
If she stayed in the Hyou clan, at least she could put off entering the Inner Palace. She couldn’t deny that she had thought ‘I don’t need to return.’ But, a new path had unexpectedly opened for her.
(…..what if I return to the court and enter the Inner Palace like this….?)
If she trusted in Riou’s words, inside the birdcage of the Inner Palace, she would only be waiting for death. That might be good. She would wait for her own early death, and then after Ryuuki would promote Jyuusan-hime. ….If she died, though, it would be as if the women’s national exam had never existed. When she remembered Shuuran in Sa Province, the inside of her nose hurt. Various things would be cleaned up with Shuurei.
(…If I don’t think about it like it’s someone else, I can’t do it….)
But, if she was in the Hyou clan, she could live. Even if she wouldn’t be an official, there were things she could do in the Hyou clan. Even if that was if she could persuade Ruka. However, Shuurei did not know if that was really what she wanted or not.

Riou, who was carrying a mountain of books and medicinal herbs with Shuuei, and walking in the corridors, frowned.
“It’s too quiet….”
“Is it that old lady of the Hyou clan?”
Shuuei listened again. He had wondered if it was dangerous to leave Jin along with Shuurei, but Jin had said “right now, it’s alright.” He was a man of his word. He could say ‘right now.’ It was a fact that, as he had thought, that it was better than letting him roam freely around 24/7.
“That may be so. My aunt could, right after Kou Shuurei came here, appear directly in front of her, and with a loud laugh, say that she was possessing her, and then do so unopposed. I didn’t think that she would do things by halves like this.”
“And so then?”
“…..the way things are now, my aunt can only do things by halves….?”
“That might be so. Judging from how all means of contact have been completely sealed off, maybe something strange has happened in the Hyou clan. How long as it been really quiet?”
He was worried about Shuurei, but he was also worried about Shusui. He had asked Riou about her, but he did not know where she was. He had gone searching around for her when he entrusted Shuurei to Jin and Riou, but he was not familiar with the area, and also, the construction of it was different from the ‘outside’ (the outside world). Since it was of a rather ancient layout, that alone made him get very lost. It was far too wide, and he couldn’t even figure out at all where he should be wandering around. He would have tried to ask someone, but there was hardly anyone around.
“….I heard that all of the magicians and priestesses above the middle ranks had been sent away. When I looked around, the people are really mostly ‘powerless,’ and even then there’s too few of them. When I ask people, no one knows what’s going on. That’s why they help take care of Kou Shuurei. They probably think she’s a normal ‘refugee.’…”
“Your dad?”
Dad. Riou thought about trying to call his father than next time. It didn’t suit him at all.
“He said ‘I have no interest in that’.”
“…….It’s amazing that he’s the head of the clan. But, since she tried to manipulate Shuurei’s body once, she probably wants to do it. Is it possible to make Ruka-dono give up on Shuurei’s body?”
Riou’s eyes widened.
“To make….my aunt give up on Kou Shuurei’s body?”
He had never considered such a thing. That other people could change his aunt’s will, was something that up till now he had never even considered. From the beginning, Riou thought that the only thing he could do was to try stop-gap measures to prevent his aunt from taking over Kou Shuurei’s body. However, that couldn’t couldn’t continue forever. Riou was ‘powerless,’ so it was natural he could take no measures to cross swords with his aunt.
A way to make Ruka give up on Kou Shuurei’s body.
….There was one.
And it came falling from the heavens with a shock like lightning striking. Although, it was maybe different from ‘making her give up.’ There was a way. Although it wasn’t easy.
—He should kill Ruka.
If he did that, then certainly, he could guarantee the safety of Shuurei’s body. However—kill his aunt? That thought came with self-hatred and guild at himself for having thought of such a thing, but it spread through Riou’s brain. It wasn’t only for Shuurei’s sake, but for something else as well. This clan was strange. He thought that, the stagnation which had piled up over the long years and months, had caused, as if it were a human body, something to become warped, and sealed, quietly, releasing the sweet smell of corruption, it was rotting to death, beginning at the edges. His father Riou was also odd, and it could be said that only in the way he didn’t do anything was he harmless. But, Ruka—
Ruka.
Near him, he heard a sigh. Riou started, as if his base thoughts had been seen through. Suddenly, Shuuei got closer, and patted Riou’s head as if to attempt to calm him down.
“I think it’s better to stop with that solution, if it makes you make that strange face. Please forget about it.”
“…….”
Riou opened his mouth as if to gasp, but nothing came out.
Maybe that was so…..but.
Riou did not turn his face towards Shuuei, because he did not want him to see his expression.

******
Again, several days had passed without anything happening—-one evening, Shuurei woke up. The light of the blue moon filled the room. It was a mystical color, almost as if a ‘saaaaaan’ sound could be heard. It was like the bottom of the lakes in Nine Colors Cove. She realized with a start that on her cheeks there were the cold traces of tears.
Shuurei sniffled, and wiped the remaining tears on her sleeve. Although she may have cried for some reason while asleep, she was now used to it. It was as if the various emotions sunken within her up till that point were now slowly melting and washing away. Even though this was a time she was passing not thinking about anything. Certainly, somewhere within Shuurei that had been cut into tiny pieces had been eased. It was a deep period of rest, which she had not had up till now. As Jin had said, it seemed that more than her body, a far deeper place was completely tired out.
….She could see in the corner of her field of vision that Jin was leaving the room. Jin moved like a large beast, his footsteps making no sound. It was only simply by chance that she had seen him leaving in the middle of the night. Shuurei suddenly got up. She thought a bit, and took a step, still barefoot. Even if she thought a bit, actually that was not much different from not thinking at all. She felt for some reason that it would be better to follow him. She had heard from Shuuei that now the Hyou clan was a little strange, but she was astonished that it had gone in one ear and right out the other. She had become used to not using her head, so when she tried to use it, it seemed she got tired easily. It was frightening.
Maybe the reason she was pursuing him was because there was the cut end of something within her. She thought that Jin was the “key” to something. Now, in a corner of her unused head, some ‘key’ sparkled faintly. Thinking of nothing, she stuck to him and followed.　Somehow he had probably noticed her, and if he shook her off along the way, that couldn’t be helped, she thought. But, why did Jin worry her? Could it be that he had gone out like this every night?
(…..Huh? That’s weird. He hasn’t got “Bakuya.”)
As she had expected, after she had followed him for awhile, Jin turned around. As if he were saying ‘well, well.’
“….if you’re going to follow me, then get next to me. It bothers me.”
“Is it okay for me to come with you?”
“Sure. Cause if something bad happens, I can lose you right away.”
That was true.
“Then, I think I’ll go and see what this bad thing is when you give me the slip.”
The eye that wasn’t covered by the eyepatch flashed with a bit of amusement.
“Haven’t you gotten back a bit of your energy? Well, shall we prepare for a walk at night?”

(This is like that time at Nine Colors Cove….)
At that time, she remembered she had walked with Jin up to the shrine on Treasure Mirror Mountain. While walking with Jin, Shuurei looked around her. It had hurt to move her body, and Riou and Shuuei had faintly disapproved, so this was the first ‘excursion’ she had made. The corridors were lit with lamps placed at intervals, so the palace rose into view with a mysterious elegance. It was as if it continued endlessly. There was no sign of any human presence, and she felt as though she were lost in another world. Shuurei looked up, far away. She could see some gigantic things lined up, which were black in the moonlight.
“Mountains….?”
“Yes. Seeing them in the morning is an amazing sight. Riou said that they’re covered in snow all year long. This great mountain range can’t be compared in altitude to Ran Province’s Crouching Dragon mountain range. At this time, it’s snow covered mountain peaks, as far as you can see.”
“Snow covered mountains?! But, it’s not that cold? It’s around the same as autumn at Kiyou.”
“It looks like that in the Hyou clan domains, it’s regulated so that people can live here. The high priestess is amazing. Certainly, without magic, it’s impossible to come and go from here. I tried going out, but this isn’t a place where people can live. Even I’d die in three days. This place isn’t one that was separated by magic from the outside world, but someplace originally like that.”
Shuurei felt that her back had become slightly cold. The Crouching Dragon mountain range in Ran Province was of an outstandingly high altitude. Despite this, this was a great mountain range which that couldn’t compare to….? A place which all exits and entrances were sealed off?
“……where is this place….in this country?”
“If you think about it for awhile, you’ll figure it about. Anyway, even if you knew, there would be no point. What I think is far more mysterious is that you haven’t furiously said ‘I’m going to see Ruka!’ and gone flying off.”
Shuurei couldn’t speak. She heard the sounds of some unknown insect chirping.
“Well, it’s because if you met Ruka, you’d have to say something. Whether you’ll stay in the Hyou clan or not, or what will become of your body. But you’re so lost that you don’t know what to say when you meet her.”
All of Jin’s words were correct. It felt like when Tantan had spoken to her, but she also felt that Jin was calm, as though he knew enough to predict how Shuurei would reply.
Actually, more than lost, she had mostly stopped thinking. Although she had tried to moved, she didn’t move. She continued to think that she must consider things, but she passed the time vacantly and blankly. Maybe it was because this wasn’t about her duties, but about her own personal matters, that she had neglected to think. Come to think of it, she felt that when it had become troublesome to think of matters relating to herself, she’d set them aside. But this time—
“You don’t want to think about it? Probably, you simply don’t want to give the logical answer.”
Shuurei raised her head in surprise. Jin’s opened eye looked down on Shuurei.
“You don’t want to follow the “best” answer that logically flew into your head. It may be the “best,” but whether it is the “right” answer to you, you don’t know. It’s unexpectedly easy to make a mistake.”
She had always thought this, but Jin was really, unlike his outer appearance, an extremely thoughtful person. Although it was a casual conversation, if she thought about it afterwards, she realized that there were many meanings contained within it.
“Well, even if you can’t work your head, you should consider it somewhere in your heart.”
While walking under the light of the blue moon, Shuurei looked at her own two hands. Her body.
At Jin’s words, she felt as though the emptiness in her head, and for only a second, unnecessary things had disappeared.
If it was something that she had to decide with her heart and not her head… Then if she said that was alright…
“….I’ll give out one answer. But it may not be “the best.”
Jin’s eye narrowed, and he gave a brief ‘hmph,’ of response. He appeared to be smiling a bit. Like he already knew what kind of answer she was going ti give.
“But, on the rest….I still don’t know, so I can’t go and see her.”
At that time, there was a strangely unpleasant sound, like the wings of insects buzzing.
Jin stood still in an unnatural manner. There was an empty pause as though the darkness had grown thicker. The sound of the insects had stopped at once.
“—-That’s good.”
There was a hoarse voice which came from Jin’s mouth, but was not Jin’s voice.
“….Eh?”
Shuurei’s eyes went into points, and she let out a foolish voice.
There was the cry of a mouse. When she looked at her feet, the white mouse was squeaking. In that second, Jin transformed into someone who was not Jin. And at that moment, there came one by one, soundlessly, like shadows, black-clothed, blade-wielding people, who gathered around him. Shuurei’s head, which had been vacant since she had been brought here, cleared completely at once. At that time, she felt as though she could even hear the noise of something snapping. All the hair stood up on her body. What was this? Shuurei yelled out rather foolishly:
“What?! Whaaaat?!”
“Shuurei-dono!”

At a speed faster than that of the human body, the blade of one of the black-clothed figures flashed at Shuurei’s throad. Shuuei parried it and made it fly just in time. Then Riou rushed in to protect Shuurei’s back. In his hand, he grasped a slender sword. It was the first time she had seen him do this, and his movements were clean and practiced.
“You! By whose orders did you do this?!”
Although they did not appear to be disturbed by Riou’s shouting, she noticed that they appeared to be slightly irritated. Even so, perhaps because they felt themselves to be at a disadvantage, the black clothed people did not cross swords with them, but cleanly vanished into the darkness.
When Shuurei looked down at her feet, the white mouse had again disappeared off to somewhere.

****
“Wha?! I went out of the room alone?!”
When Shuurei had returned to the “Room of Tranquility,” she was again astonished. She had gone out alone?
“That can’t be! I saw that Jin was going out, so I followed him—- hey, it was just a couple of minutes ago I was walking with Jin!”
Shuuei and Riou looked at each other. Jin?
“No, Jin didn’t leave this room from the beginning. Shuurei-dono, was alone, right?”
“….Shuurei-dono, Riou-kun said that he was invited to go somewhere by the form of the person he was bothered by the most, so does that mean that something about Jin bothers you?”
Shuurei rubbed her temple. “Something” was sparkling in the middle of the mud.
“Yes….Was it that when I was in a daze, that something, in my unconscious, was faintly pulling me? …. Is the Jin-san who came here with you the real one?”
“Yes, he was definitely the real one. ….But now, for some reason, he’s not here.”
“You don’t know the reason he came here?”
“Yeah, it looks bad to make excuses, but getting that guy to say something is an incredibly difficult feat….. I tried several times, but he didn’t take the bait at all. He’s really careful and cautious. Other than the ridiculous statement ‘I came here asked to do something by someone,’ there was nothing.”
Shuuei looked up at the ceiling, but Shuurei realized that something in her head had been caught on the fishhook. She was absorbed in repeating it. It was as if she thought about unnecessary things, it would get away.
“……Jin-san came here, asked by someone, to do something…”
“Shuurei-dono?”
She had had strange encounters with Jin at strange times. First was in the jail, and at the assassination of the Undersecretary of the Military, he was with Shusui….
Shuurei wanted to cut her head open at that moment and die there. Just as Jin had said, really, from the time she had come here, her eyes had been blind even though they were open, and she only thought of passing the time with her head as vacant as a flowerpot. Well, it had been very good in a way, though. —Shusui.
“Where is Shusui? She’s always been a person of the Hyou clan—right?”
Riou looked a the carpet, but the white mouse wasn’t there.
“….Yes. She was always trying to help you and the king. You should believe in Shusui. Now, she has probably been imprisoned somewhere in this house—I think. Ran Shuuei and I have searched here and there, but we haven’t found her yet. Maybe she’s locked up someplace ordinary people can’t search. However, it’s certain that she’s alive.”
Shuuei was surprised at his last words. Considering Riou’s personality, he probably wasn’t lying. There were many things he wanted to ask about in detail, but Shuuei understood that now was not the time to do that.
Shusui had been captured. Shuurei bit her lower lip. The things she had to do had increased by one. Because the reason she had been captured probably had to do with Shuurei and the king.
“….General Ran, I have something to ask you.”
“What?”
“Were you there in the shrine in Nine Colors Cove after I had fainted?”
Shuuei was confused by this sudden change in subject. Nine Colors Cove?
“I was in there. Sorry, though, I wasn’t near you, but at the king’s side, though.”
“Yes. That’s natural. Rather, that helps me. Then, I’d like to ask you about that time, accurately, and in detail.”
She said this with the face of an official.

Notes: Probably, the Hyou clan’s palace is situated in the Banri mountains, which are previously stated to be impassable, but that the first king (the brother of the founder of the Hyou clan) passed over somehow.

Commentary:
Well, yet another incident of ambiguous significance. BTW, I can’t believe no one ever told Shuurei what happened at Nine Colors Cove. Oh well, somehow I am unsurprised. :P Yuushun is only the most conspicuous culprit in the “not telling people important things” crowd.

Wow, Shuurei finally remembers that Jin is an INCREDIBLY SUSPICIOUS PERSON. Omg, you mean Jin came to the Hyou clan’s palace told to do something by someone? No, I thought he just went there because he needed a vacation. :P Jin’s lord, whoever he is though, is a lucky dude, though. Jin’s not only a great warrior, he’s very cautious and clever.