As if worried they had not heard her clearly, the crisp female voice repeated, "You're planning to go dragon-slaying dressed like that?"
The four of them certainly did not look like they were heading out to slay dragons. They were all wearing printed kimonos, white socks, and wooden clogs. Standing in the cabin, they looked less like warriors setting out for battle than a tour group that had wandered onto the wrong set.
The instant the voice rang out, all four spun around in perfect unison, every muscle in their bodies tensing at once. Other than the pilots isolated in the cockpit, there should have been only four living people aboard the Sleipnir. When had this extra fifth person gotten on board, and how?
Lu Mingfei's gaze crashed into the shadows of the rear seats, and his heart nearly stopped. A figure sat there upright, its face covered by a savage Oni Mask, blue-faced and fanged, gleaming beneath the dim reading light with a cold, inhuman sheen.
"Ghost!" he cried instinctively.
Chu Zihang had already lowered himself slightly. His left thumb silently pushed open Murasame's blade, letting a thread of icy light slip from the scabbard's mouth. It felt as though the temperature in the entire cabin had dropped several degrees.
"Who are you?" Finn roared with impressive force, as stout as a lion patrolling its territory—if one ignored the fact that, while speaking, he had nimbly shrunk behind Caesar's broad back, with only half his head peeking out.
Under everyone's watchful eyes, the uninvited guest calmly raised a hand and removed the Oni Mask.
Beneath it was a face utterly unrelated to terror. Brilliant as summer blossoms, gentle as warm jade. Her skin was luminously pale, as though it had never seen sunlight, and the lingering softness of baby