Outside the execution ground.
On the busiest street in Capital City.
A noisy, tightly packed crowd surged toward the execution ground.
Firefighters, police, civilian organizations, ronin, samurai, and more.
No one noticed the group of men sitting in several battered cars by the roadside.
Their faces were calm, a stark contrast to the fear and anger of the crowd outside.
"Brother Thirteen, how do you write the 'life' in 'next life'?"
Thirteen had the window open and was smoking leisurely.
Beside him, a boy of seventeen or eighteen held his phone, carefully typing a text.
Thirteen glanced at the boy and teased, "Scared?"
"No, Brother Thirteen. I'm worried I won't make it back, so I'm telling my sister to take good care of the family."
The boy scratched his head with a sheepish look.
"Brother Thirteen, I might be young, but my ancestor was a god of war who left Sichuan to fight the enemy and came back alive. After the Great Cataclysm, our family fled from place to place, but we never lost our ancestor's spirit."
With that, the boy carefully took a little booklet with a peeling cover from inside his clothes.
It bore an indistinct photograph and faded writing.
"Sichuan Army, XX Division, XX Regiment, Private First Class Li Defu."
The boy gently stroked the little red booklet, his eyes full of reverence.
"I just can't accept it. What gives Kou Islanders the right to kill people in our Dragon Kingdom? I brought my ancestor's spirit to the island this time to let him vent his anger." The boy carefully tucked his ancestor's certificate against his body. "My mother said I mustn't disgrace myself on this trip out of Sichuan. Brother Thirteen, let me detonate the bomb."
Thirteen, always peerless in courage, shuddered.
He wasn't afraid of