Book 6: Chapter 26: Spirit of the Ancient City

The killing intent in this place was both intense and dense, and the spirit probe was still useless. Looking at the map, there was no indication of such dangerous ruins in Izumo Mountain.

So far, all Lily could do was rely on her instincts and feelings for directions. But it was difficult to maintain a direction in these ruins. The walls and terrain made it similar to a labyrinth.

Lily felt that this was a city destroyed long ago. The various walls and buildings were significantly different from the ones built in Heian-kyo, this city was obviously ancient. Lily looked at the ancient ruins in awe, she didn’t want to recklessly destroy anything and could only walk around the place.

Suddenly from the destroyed end of a wall a shadow rushed out, “Kill!”

The samurai howled as it blitzed towards Lily!

With a quick jump, Lily flipped over the wall evading the attack. Boom! The samurai’s slash destroyed the ancient walls, but all he saw in front was empty space.

Lily had used the fog to conceal herself and moved swiftly behind the samurai. Without hesitation she let loose a slash and slashed straight through his waist.

But before she took another step, two more shadows jumped out and besieged her.

As she killed them a heart chilling arrow came flying at her, the arrow was coated in the spirit flames of a peak-staged permanence expert!

Reacting swiftly, Lily rolled away, Boom! The arrow struck a ruined pavilion and destroyed it, leaving behind a large crater.

Swiftly rolling to her feet, Lily quickly cast an arcane arte and flung out ten bright fire bombs. Ignoring the bright explosions behind her, Lily swiftly ran in the opposite direction.

This ancient ruin was filled with ancient samurai, Lily had to fight her way through while looking for an exit…

But no matter which way Lily ran, it seemed as if she was trapped within this endless labyrinth of ancient ruins, she had to continuously kill ancient samurai as she ran. The weakest of these ancient samurais were at the early stage of permanence, and the strongest reached 60-70% of the power of an early stage throned general. Lily didn’t fear facing one or two of these ancient samurais, but continuously battling against these experts still put a strain on her, after all these guys all used suicidal tactics. A middle staged permanence expert had a chance at wounding her, and if a warrior with strength close to a throne expert struck her in a vulnerable spot, she might lose her life.

And these ancient samurais seemed to be limitless!

Lost in this ancient labyrinth, she continued to battle for three days and three nights…

Her red clothes were all torn up, her beautiful skin was exposed all over, but she ignored it. Though she had other clothes, she knew they would be wrecked if she changed.

“Hah…” She leaned against a broken wall, taking deep breaths.

She had already used up all the anima she had hunted, but thankfully she still had several ten magatamas. Her spirit reserves were still abundant, but if she remained trapped here with all these ancient warriors, she would eventually run out of spirit energy.

Despite this, Lily still wouldn’t absorb human souls or spirit jades. The ethics stopped her from crossing that line. Blade maidens walked the line between humans and demons, if she crossed that line, then what difference would she have from a demon?

These enemies were not wraiths, or ghost warriors, they were regular humans. They were about as old as they looked, nowhere near as old as these ancient ruins. Although they were not people of Heian Dynasty, they were still flesh and blood humans. Only, for some reason they had lost all reason and became murderous madmen.

Lily’s spirit energy continued to decrease even as stress and fatigue piled up on her.

Looking around her, “Why does it feel like I was here two days ago…”

Boom——! From some ruins on the ground, a huge ancient samurai rushed out.

“Damn! Is there no end to this?” Lily quickly drew Yasutsuna.

But——

Boom! Boom! Boom!

From all four sides, ancient samurais jumped out of ruins from beneath the ground.

Lily could feel around ten people.

All of them charged her together. Her domain could not quickly kill all these samurai within 10 meters of her, and her arcane artes could only destroy one of them.

Lily could only run!

She had encountered this situation a few times in the past few days. It was extremely dangerous to be surrounded by ancient samurais.

With one strike she smashed one samurai out of the way and fled. But several powerful arrows and arcane artes came flying.

She dodged while she ran, but after a few steps, from the alley of the ruins in front of her, came an entire team of ancient samurais, all of their eyes blank yet ferocious. They shouted as one “Kill!” and charged her, making her feel apprehensive.

All she could do was change directions and run, but more and more teams of ancient samurais appeared, she felt like she was encircled.

“What’s going on, did I run into their nest?”

There were already over a hundred ancient warriors chasing her, if she fought she would quickly be surrounded. All of these were permanence experts capable of harming her, once she was surrounded, no matter how good she was at dodging, it would be hard to avoid the attacks.

As she ran, she sent multiple sakura blades flying like a storm, but she could only leave injuries on the ancient samurai, it was hard to kill with only her domain.

And at this time, her domain could only detect the terrain 10 meters out, in such complex terrain, it was not as useful as it usually was.

Gradually she fell into a state of being chased by a large number of ancient samurai. If this continued and more and more ancient samurai joined, she would fall into real danger.

Suddenly, in front of her in the fog, the broken walls started shining with white light.

“Child…come here.” A gentle feminine voice whispered out.

Looking in the direction of the voice, Lily saw a middle aged woman standing behind the broken walls. She was wearing a long white robe, and unlike those ancient warriors, her clothes were clean and spotless. Her face was gentle and she radiated a white light from her body.

Only, Lily noticed that her feet were transparent.

“Ghost?”

“Child, come here…” The ghost leant towards a corner of the wall and turned toward Lily with warm eyes.

“Should I believe her? Is this a trap?”

From behind her, the mob of ancient samurai closed in, arrows and arcane artes flying at her back.

“This woman’s dress is similar to those ancient samurai clans. Though I don’t know why she’s a ghost, but an upright clan who fought with their lives on the line shouldn’t be the type to play tricks, but even if it was a trick, facing a ghost was better than facing that big group of permanence slaughtering madmen.

Lily chose to follow.

That ghost knew this place well, even if only ten meters were visible through the fog, she walked through the ruins without any hindrance. Leading Lily through a few turns and corners and they lost the group of ancient samurai.

Letting out a deep breath, Lily felt the killing intent within the mist and could only feel terrified.

“Child, do not worry. They will not come here, this place used to be a place of worship, my clansman still holds this place in reverence.”

“Thank you for the rescue madam. Only, since madam calls those samurai clansmen, why would you help me?”

“Ahaha…do you think that we are a bunch of mad demons who kill whenever we meet another person?”

“Sorry, Lily didn’t mean that. But why did they become like that?”

“So you’re called Lily? What a beautiful name…if only my son had brought back a daughter-in-law like you, how good that would have been.”

“Eh?”

“Ahaha, sorry, when I saw you, I thought how good it would be if you were my daughter-in-law, and then I couldn’t bear seeing you be chased like that, so I came and helped you.”

“……” Though the reason was strange, Lily still bowed and expressed her thanks.

“We were originally the descendants of the Asuka clan, ah… A long time ago, to escape a frightening battle, my clan fled deep into the mountains and lived in seclusion. But this place was not our hometown, and our clan only knew how to fight so we have always been living near these ruins. Only, in recent years, the extended nights have lasted too long, and everytime some clansmen would become strange…up until that month-long extended night, all of my clansmen turned into madmen who would kill whoever they met…” the ghost replied sadly and helplessly.

“Madam, how can I leave this place?”

“Our ancestors set a maze formation here to protect our clan. Whenever someone entered, they would lose their direction.”

The ghost picked up a candle from the ruins, and blew on it, igniting a blue spirit flame.

“Miss, hold this candle, and walk in the direction the flame is blowing when you encounter a fork in the road. You will find the exit, but be careful and do not allow the flame to extinguish1.”

“I understand, thank you madam.” Lily took the candle asking, “Madam, do you want me to do anything for you when I leave?”

Lily didn’t want to owe any debts.

“Ahah, your clothes are ruined, I can see that they’re very high quality and beautiful. Did you come from a palace called Heian-kyo?”

“That’s right.”

The ghost’s eyes twinkled with joy, “Really? Then when you return, can you help me track down my son’s whereabouts?”

“Your son? Can you tell me what his name is?”

Her eyes lit up as she talked about her son, “My son left the ruins many years ago, he said he wanted to see the outside world, but he never returned…A few months before the month-long extended night, a clan member told me he arrived in a brightly lit city called Heian-kyo. But after that, everyone went crazy and there was no more news. Ah, I forgot to tell you his name, he’s called Akimoto Hara.”

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