"What?" Minami Kyouko couldn't believe there existed a man with such appalling lack of gentlemanly grace.
Fang Zuo ignored her, sidestepping Minami to continue downstairs.
He descended too quickly, leaving her no time to think.
Tap, tap, tap.
Minami Kyouko scrambled after him in a flurry of hurried steps.
"Sumimasen... I... I beg you."
The words were barely a whisper.
"Can't hear you." Fang Zuo moved to pass her again.
"Chotto matte!" Minami gritted her teeth, loudly stopping him.
She bowed deeply at 90 degrees.
Revealing a long, pale neck.
Then, lifting her head, she truly surrendered herself.
Her beautiful face wore a pleading expression. "Please loan me your jacket, Fujino-kun. Sumimasen. Please, I beg you."
Fang Zuo nodded, satisfied.
He slowly cupped her chin, tilting her face up, making her stand straight.
He shrugged off his suit jacket, squatted slightly, and with an intimate gesture, tied it securely around her soft, pale waist.
This fleeting moment of gentleness made Minami feel as if Fang Zuo were her man.
Perhaps he wasn't so terrible after all.
Once tied,
Fang Zuo helpfully pinched the sweat-clinging fabric right against the curve of her pelvic mound.
Gave it a gentle tug.
Pulled the deeply indented material away.
Na...?
Na...ni?!
Minami Kyouko's red lips parted, her brain flooded crimson with mortification.
So shameful.
Utterly blank.
Could a man like this exist?
She couldn't believe any man would dare such audacity.
Yet the instantaneous flash of sensation confirmed its reality.
Before she could react, the man leaned close to her ear, his voice low and intimate:
"Remember to wash the jacket before returning it. Your… scent is quite strong."
He walked downstairs without a backward glance.
Leaving her mind utterly hollow.
Minami stood rooted, cheeks burning hotly, still processing the shock.
Just as the heat reached an unbearable intensity,
the detestable man turned his head at the bottom of the stairs. A knowing smile touched his lips.
"Almost forgot. Tonight, you might experience something… special. Don't miss me too much."
Baka! Baka! Baka!
Kuso! Kuso! Kuso!
Go die, detestable man!
Die! Die! Die!
Fury consumed Minami Kyouko. She kicked the wall savagely, picturing his face.
Only slowly sobering did she hobble downstairs, wincing with each step.
For the first time in her life, a man had pushed her to the brink of madness.
Fujino. I will remember you.
Fang Zuo emerged from the building as night fully descended.
He briefed the officers on the scene and deftly avoided the mob of reporters.
Settling into a taxi, he turned his senses inward.
The wooden scabbard rested within the grasp of his still-translucent Nascent Soul.
Its previous owner's spiritual imprint had long been erased.
Fang Zuo had easily refined it, making it his own.
The Yellow Emperor Cypress – among the oldest surviving in Shenzhou.
The ancient Jianmu tree perished in primordial chaos.
Countless descendants had been exhausted by mighty cultivators over the millennia.
That man had waited a hundred years for Yang-essence lightning to strike this cypress.
This lightning-struck Cypress wood was likely the finest spirit-wood attainable in the modern world.
Naturally imbued with heavenly thunder, enriched by millennia of reverence at the Xuanyuan Temple.
As a Sword Cultivator, he held the unshakeable belief:
Only material of this caliber deserved to cradle his blade.
Prior to this, though hailed as the world's last Sword Immortal,
he didn't even possess a sword.
It mirrored Fang Zuo's own plight: revered as modernity's last viable candidate for Ascension,
yet doomed to fail his tribulation.
Bitter.
Fang Zuo sighed.
But unlike the Sword Immortal, he hadn't perished soul and body. There was still hope.
Suddenly, the lotus silk undershorts artifact in his dantian pulsed violently.
Fang Zuo snapped his eyes open. A cold smile played on his lips. "Truly, the reckless never learn."
No longer sparing his spiritual power, he vanished from the taxi's back seat.
The terrified driver swerved wildly, nearly crashing. Convinced he'd seen a ghost, he spun the wheel towards Asakusa Temple, desperate to find an Onmyoji.
On the highway speeding away from Tokyo.
Shiraishi Nagiso and Sawada Yui sat back-to-back, tightly bound in the rear seat of the Lexus.
A teenage boy sat in the front passenger seat, clutching a sharp knife.
His eyes were pools of utter black, devoid of pupils.
He mumbled incoherently.
The driver, Nagiso's long-time chauffeur, sat rigidly silent.
His eyes were blank, fixed straight ahead.
Hands moved mechanically on the wheel.
Both driver and boy were puppets, manipulated across a distance.
"Oka-san… I'm so scared," Yui whispered, trembling.
Large tears rolled silently down her cheeks.
Nagiso herself was shaking uncontrollably, voice strained with effort. "Don't be afraid. It will be okay."
"Will… will Onii-chan come? Will he save us?"
"He will. He will definitely come."
But despair filled Nagiso as she stared out the window.
The direction was Kyoto, Tokyo shrinking rapidly behind them.
She knew their destination.
To stand before that terrifying old man.
The Takeda clan would never relinquish her and Yui – sacrificial lambs.
Even if her Master found out, it would be too late.
"Master."
In this moment, all thoughts of politics, elections, vanished from Nagiso's mind.
Only him.
His strong chest.
His warm embrace.
The profound fullness and savage impact only he could provide.
Just the memory sent a flush of heat across her skin. She swallowed hard, squeezing her thighs together tightly.
Stifling the moan bubbling in her throat.
Death seemed forgotten.
She felt… resigned.
Only this visceral mixture of satisfaction and desperate longing could quell the overwhelming terror.
The next instant, Nagiso's surroundings shifted violently.
She was back in her familiar villa living room.
The ropes binding her lay slack on the floor.
Yui knelt beside her.
And the man she obsessed over sat on the sofa, smiling faintly at her.
"Master."
"Onii-chan!"
Mother and daughter flung themselves towards Fang Zuo.
They clung to him fiercely, one on each side.
Sobs wracked them openly now – unrestrained, desperate weeping.
No words were needed. Only in the warmth of his embrace, surrounded by his familiar scent, could they purge the choking fear.
Fang Zuo whispered a slumber charm over the pair.
They slumped peacefully asleep in his arms.
Standing up slowly, Fang Zuo regarded the tear-soaked patches darkening his shirt.
He walked to where the chauffeur and the black-eyed boy stood rigidly motionless, held in place by an invisible force.
He examined them with detached curiosity.
"Come out," Fang Zuo stated flatly. "Spare me the effort of pulling you forth by force."
Simultaneously, the boy and the driver's eyes rolled back, showing only whites.
Thud.
Both bodies collapsed heavily to the floor.
Twin tendrils of thick, greasy black smoke coiled upwards from their open mouths.
The smoke writhed in the air before coalescing directly in front of Fang Zuo.
It formed a face – an old man, rendered in stark, three-dimensional blacks and greys.
As vivid and detailed as an ink wash painting come to life.
Every detail was crisp: the deeply etched wrinkles, the sunken eyes, and most notably, the clusters of dark age spots spotting the ethereal visage.
"Speak," Fang Zuo commanded, returning to the sofa, casually crossing his legs. "How did you acquire authentic Daoist Zhuyou Technique?"
The purity of the craft intrigued him. It wasn't the bastardized arts like Ōmi Hachiman's Kenbu Shinto or the Sakura clan's Shikigami methods. This was the real, orthodox Zhuyou Technique, the path still open. He had to know.
Some distance away, in Minami Kyouko's apartment:
She twisted in her bed, face flushed, a low moan escaping her lips as an uncontrollable tremor ran through her body.