She’s there the next moment in explosive fashion, this formless body of mine moving and fetching Sekai from where she sat. Feet grind against tender hands whose semblance fades in a flowered waft of blue luminescence, and all that remains from the fading garden is Sekai’s sapling. The surface of the lake above thrums like a drum, chanting to the glory of the oni effortlessly lifting herself from the sulk she'd left on the ground, holding a cursed red blade in her only hand. Her slit eyes are of pure hatred. “… You…” She snarls, horns tall and body broad, exuding violence in a most primal way. Some unknown instinct made me clutch tighter to Sekai, the child tucked securely in the crook of my unseen arm. “Again and again! You!” Growling turns into full screaming, the blue petals caressing her skin ignited by creeping pink thunder. “You have stolen my life once when I got sealed and then twice with that human trash of a shrine maiden. I’m sick of your pitiful existence parasitizing off me! This body is mine, this existence is mine—not yours!” She brandishes the cursed blade, fuming.

Though the body had reacted, the mind took a moment to catch up.

Douji…

“Mother Kasen!” Sekai yells, squirming in my hold. Again, the body reacts first, jumping away from the jagged slash of the red blade. It bites air, yet its pursuit isn't dissuaded, Douji maddeningly hopping and rushing, her swings that of an animal. The grace I fought Konn with that night after the meeting at the Scarlet Devil Mansion—the same Ibaraki-Douji would use when toying with her victims—wasn’t present, only a visceral and loaded manner of slashing and striking and thrusting with the cursed blade. An animal fighting with its claws, nothing more.

No, much more. This animal is a part of me—

The sword bites towards Sekai, body turning to defend and jump away. Douji had read it all, attacking where I had dodged towards. Blood spurts as this formless body of mine is cut, spraying red all over Douji's visage of hatred. The glee of bloodlust had fled her eyes, and in its place was a cold demand for my death.

—Therefore, knows my every move.

I create distance with a burst of lightning, chains of white light spurring towards her to bind her down, yet the sword chews them in record time, those gleaming slit eyes never once straying away from me. “F-Fight back, Mother Kasen!” Sekai wails, eyes wide on the sapling. It’s unharmed… The despair in her eyes tells me a dark tale, one Douji must have understood too, her eyes narrowing dangerously: what happens if that sapling is damaged? “In this state, I’m too weak to provide help, but…” She squirms out of my hold and climbs my back, then lassos my neck with her arms after fixing her weird hat in place. “… I’m with you!” Douji doesn’t wait, already on the move with blade ready to gnaw and gash—

—Only to jump back when, from the surface of the lake, descends a massive serpentine beast, heart clenching in pain with the lack of iridescent green scales and long whiskers. The serpent bites the spot Douji was, chunking it before coiling around the blue sapling and roaring towards the oni.

Once more, the now kaleidoscopic lake surface thrums, and a golden branch wafts down. Sekai catches it and, straightaway, twin Hakurei Spheres sprout around her.

I blink, utterly perplexed.

Sieged by twin Hakurei Spheres, she reminds me of little Reimu…

… Little Reimu, fighting to survive against what she’d thought a friend of hers.

Heart pounds—longing, aching.

“Father Anon, Father Goro… I’m sorry I’m borrowing these and for the toll it must take on your minds, but you’ll forgive your little girl, won’t you~?” She speaks, pointing the 'Gohei' at a cautious Douji—after the first Onikirimaru, she'd never repeat that mistake—her voice laden with intoxicating hopes and dreams and a childish grin that blossoms further the ache. Overwhelming guilt threatens to take my heart, yet the memory of those brave scarlet eyes fending off Ibaraki-Douji shall never die. “This life is yours, Mother Kasen! All yours! So fight for it, as I’ll fight for mine!” Without a hitch, the Hakurei Spheres spew a deluge of Danmaku towards the cautious oni; the beast of rancor slithers and pounces at the wary oni, Sekai’s stars and half-moons excitedly homing after Douji, the same way Reimu’s would.

Heart beats like crazy, the guilt pulsating like an earthquake.

Sekai fights.

Death calls, sins plentiful.

So much death, so much failure towards that family of wide, red eyes…

The mere thought of bearing that burden—that responsibility—makes my legs go wobbly.

Douji barrels through Sekai’s Danmaku, cutting the stars and moons down with the sword and dodging the serpent’s lunges, those burning slit eyes focused on me.

Sekai fights for her life anyway.

Reimu fought Douji for her life with brave eyes.

Deafening mistakes weigh my shoulders down. Rape, inaction…

In this very second, however, it's all but noise, and I bolt towards Douji to fight for my life.