"Hehe~"
"The Shogunate, Iga, the Shinsengumi, the Yato Clan, the divided Imperial Gate, Tenshouin Naraku, and the World Government descending from the heavens."
"What a grand 'festival.'"
"Every cell in my body is trembling with excitement. How could the Kiheitai possibly be absent?"
"How interesting~"
"We'll use this 'grand occasion' to take the Shogun's head."
"Then destroy the fallen Shogunate and this rotten world!"
At the front of the Kiheitai flagship's broad deck, a figure stood still like a lone, jagged cliff.
Takasugi Shinsuke.
A light breeze swept past, stirring the hair that fell beside his ears.
His hair was a somber ink-black, yet from certain angles, it shimmered with a deep violet glow.
Like a poisoned blade reflecting moonlight.
A long lock of bangs fell carelessly over his face, half-covering his bandaged left eye.
Beneath the bandages was a hollow that had long since lost its light.
Yet it seemed even more mysterious than the sole remaining pupil in his right eye, as deep purple as a frigid pool.
He wore a luxurious dark-purple yukata.
Under the sunlight, the fabric carried the muted sheen unique to silk.
Its surface was embroidered with intricate, exquisite patterns in gold thread.
On closer inspection, they were not ordinary flowers and plants, but golden butterflies in all sorts of poses, as though they might spread their wings and fly away at any moment.
The patterns on their wings were exquisitely detailed, lying dormant in stillness.
Yet with his faint breaths, they seemed to come alive, flickering between the folds of his robes—bewitching and resplendent.
A slender smoking pipe rested loosely between Takasugi's thin lips.
A dim red glow flickered at its bowl, and pale bluish smoke curled upward.
It coiled around his sharply defined jaw and cold profile.
Though it blurred his expression,