Whispers of Shikiban:The king walks among us-Chapter 60 --

They didn't speak.

Not with words.

The Earth Shikiban closed in—seven titans born of stone and silence, each one carved from the bones of mountains and the memory of disasters. They didn't creak. They didn't groan. They just moved—with the weight of inevitability. Gravity didn't resist them. It followed.

Their skin looked forged from obsidian and grief. Cracks glowed with that pale, ancient fire—not flame, but memory made light. Their eyes: hollow, endless, whispering death without breath.

And in their center—

Kagetsu Reika.

She didn't look victorious. She didn't look strong. She looked alive in the most painful sense of the word. Blood slid down her arm like it wasn't in a rush anymore. Her ribs screamed when she breathed—so she didn't. She existed between gasps. Her thigh was cut. Shoulder mangled. Palm shredded.

22 minutes left on Ryujin.

Her flesh expired five minutes ago.

What stood now wasn't a girl.

It was what people remembered afterward.

The first Shikiban moved.

No warning. No signal.

Just violence, like nature coughing up its oldest grudge.

Its arms shifted—no longer limbs, but mechanisms unfolding from themselves. Plates rotated like ancient gears remembered how to spin.

"Silt Vortex Form: Hundred-Ring Execution."

The air screamed. Discs shot out—concentric death spinning like prophecy, each ring a guillotine humming with elegance.

Reika moved.

Barely.

One ring brushed her cheek. Skin split. Blood drew a red line across her face like it was signing her will.

She didn't blink.

The second titan responded—no hesitation. No wasted motion.

Hands up. Earth split.

Magma poured from the wound like the planet bleeding out its secrets.

"Ashforge Drive."

From flame: a spear, molten, perfect, inevitable.

It hurled it with the precision of judgment.

Reika didn't dodge.

She caught it.

Her skin hissed. The sound was sickening. Palm blackened, muscle boiling, bone exposed—

She broke it in half.

Dropped the molten pieces at her feet like trash.

Glared forward. Daring the next one to try.

The third construct didn't walk. It glided. Sand whirled around it like smoke with intent. Dust obeyed it, danced for it, killed for it.

"Glassbinding Field: Crescent Reap."

The air became teeth.

Scythes. Hooks. Chains of razor-thin glass slashed from every direction.

Reika spun low. A dance of desperation. Blade kissed her thigh—another slashed across her already-ruined shoulder.

She didn't flinch.

Didn't dare.

These weren't enemies. They were sculpted vengeance—war forged by the Earth's oldest rage.

But—

She smiled.

It wasn't joy. Or confidence.

It was war, grinning through broken teeth.

She raised her hand.

The world buckled.

Behind her: space folded. Not shattered, not bent—folded, like origami in reverse.

And from that fold, an eye opened.

Violet. Cyclonic. Vertical slit like a god watching through a keyhole. It pulsed with something raw. Something wrong.

The Shikiban hesitated.

She whispered.

"Technique Activation: Broken Clown Judgement."

The eye blinked—

And three of them collapsed.

Not broken.

Just... gone. Trapped in stillness. Neural cores fried. Limbs twitching, locked in a terror too ancient for language.

Reika stepped forward.

Dragging her body like it weighed a thousand years. Each step cracked the ground beneath her. Her aura pulsed, violent and violet.

Another titan lunged.

Too late.

She ducked. Uppercut. The impact shattered its arm. Elbow spin into its chest—crunch. Core ruptured.

One down.

Six left.

They adapted fast.

Chains wrapped her legs. Lava walls erupted around her. Glass scythes reformed in midair.

The battlefield became a cage.

She didn't look trapped.

She whispered again.

"Secondary Pulse."

The dragon's eye blinked again—this time, darker. Its edges crumbled like overexposed film.

From her chest—another eye, small, rapid—

It blinked once—

And vanished into steam.

Then—

Silence.

The world stopped making sense.

Colors faded. Time turned viscous. The ground forgot to echo. The sky dimmed like it was holding its breath.

She was no longer in the battlefield.

She was the battlefield.

Reika blurred.

—One: Knee to a jaw. Titan teeth exploded.

—Two: Snatched a chain mid-spin. Yanked. Slammed two constructs together like toys. The valley cracked.

—Three: Dropkick. Her ankle snapped on impact. Ryujin corrected the bone mid-air. She landed whole.

She rose.

Breathing like a god who forgot what mercy felt like.

Only one remained.

The largest.

Glyphs etched across its entire body glowed—burning slow, sacred. Its hands pressed together in a prayer that sounded like judgment.

Then—

It spoke.

Its voice was a canyon opening beneath your soul.

"Your flame is borrowed.

Ours is carved."

Everything went still.

The air sank. The world seemed heavier, like the planet remembered how to punish.

Its aura expanded—

And crushed the moment.

It raised both hands.

"Heiroseal Convergence: Eight-Fold Burial."

Eight totems erupted from the ground. Ancient. Towering. Each one carved with symbols that existed before people knew how to name things.

The world bent.

Light warped.

Reika dropped to one knee.

Blood painted her lips.

It wasn't the force.

It was the despair.

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She could feel herself failing.

And still—

Her eyes.

Burned violet.

Unforgiving.

She smiled again.

A broken thing. Lips cracked. Teeth red.

"...Then I'll borrow more."

She bit her thumb.

Blood.

Smeared a glyph across her collarbone.

The Ryujin core howled.

"Override. Ryujin Auxiliary Drive: Pale Crown Execution."

The dragon's eye didn't blink.

It screamed.

Light erupted—no color. Just force. Violet and white, divine and cruel. It tore through the burial field like paper.

The final titan moved—

Too slow.

She was already inside its guard.

Fist out.

Through its chest.

Right into the core.

"Clown's Judgement: Final Bell."

The glyphs dimmed.

Shattered.

The titan stumbled—

Fell.

Like a mountain choosing to collapse.

Reika stood.

Torn.

Bleeding.

Her body was a battlefield that hadn't realized the war was over.

The dragon's eye behind her closed.

The field dissolved.

Only smoke remained.

Only silence.

[18:03 Remaining]