Douji's blood reveals identity.

Is that a trick of my mindscape, or has Sekai’s invasion done something to me? The thoughts come alongside a renewed influx of violence, the boiling blood on my now visible skin stimulating a muscle long forgotten. Fists meet Douji’s blade over the turquoise sapling; no tricks to dwell in with the rancor beast defeated—one blow, and it disappeared…?—only brawl, red iron blurring across my vision, aiming both at Sekai and the little tree as if seeking fumbles, yet all it met was a brutal pushback, blade punched and deflected away, Hermit arts all but eroding to the roar of new shackles that'd appeared with the blood rain.

She knows this body; she’s cruelty incarnate. But her rage is red as blood.

Blade whizzes past above, and this body of mine had lowered itself to the maximum, hands on the ground and legs lifting and hooking around her neck. Gravity and forceful deliverance crushed Douji against the formless ground and away from the sapling, even the still surface of the lake above trembling with the impact. Shackles dance; the cursed blade already on the move after Douji fled the leg lock, her blood revealing more and more of them as it was spilt by the iron whips and timed blows of a newfound strength—she’s lost control of Manipulation of Explained Phenomena solely because she couldn’t even fathom getting backlash from me. It’s enraging—, her eyes glowing in the fading light. Blood boomed in my ears now visible, adrenaline coursed high and teeth had clenched together, that aforementioned muscle an engine of sheer viciousness and rage.

I failed Reimu, Hana, Anon. Gensokyo.

I have not failed Sekai.

Not yet.

The back of the hand slaps the red blade away as it thrusts with enough power to cleave a hill, and the other hand catches Douji’s face and brings it to a flying knee; hot blood bathes; a counterattack comes and misses Sekai by inches, Douji’s left my grasp—

—She doesn’t retreat to gather herself, a beast that growls and tries to match the damage it has sustained. Hand balls and sunders her side, blood a river. The blade wavers in her hold. In her eyes, I see most of myself: shackles and tall horns, eyes much like hers…

… An oni, through and through.

Invisible and without identity before, in her blood that form is regained.

Sekai’s words rush back just as Douji keeps foolishly tackling me, her wits gone—separated from her by Onikirimaru… me—, and the shapeless dread eases itself into a dark reality, one that goes against everything I hold dear.

Have I failed in becoming someone else?

Is this who I'll always be?

It cannot be this way! I’ve always had that under my control; she’s not me! She’s a curse better sealed away and never looked into the eyes. A cruel mistake got me born an oni; humanity’s embodied desires for monsters in the dark inspired Douji…

Hana lies underneath me, then her Father. Reimu is a monster I never tried to help.

Sin after sin.

Why couldn’t I tear Douji out of reality?

A monster she is and will always be, and if she comes back to me—she’s never left, only was hidden away—, then that’ll mean all those sins are mine to bear responsibility over. Such responsibility I met with cowardice and ran from, an inherent fear of her rooted in my every breath. Hermit duties helped; Reimu’s wide eyes and harsh facade but kind interior helped…

Douji returning means I’ll lose all of that.

But have I not already?

Ibaraki Kasen lost everything; she let fear of those sins control her life.

Sins Sekai has reminded me cannot be outrun forever.

The oni fights maddeningly, and she’s grown monstrous, the blade gone and her body morphing alongside the shadows into a mindless beast, which is met by the dimming Danmaku of the unborn child and my fists. I couldn’t question the change or why it was happening, for her blood was the warmest and revved the engine there from birth like nothing else. I flung her massive body around and mangled her; bones cracked and limbs pulled in gory fountains, only for them to regenerate and her millennium-old fury to keep on erupting.

An uncontrolled monster, ignored.

I’ve caused this.

The monster is pushed into the formless ground, two feet sunk in its jugular, great limbs flailing yet pinned true. I tackled its chin, a loud crack echoing in my mindscape, then, with frenetic thoughts, straddled the space between its eyes and began punching.

Punching and punching, eyes wide as the blood went from flow to tsunami, cranium sunk and every manner of brain matter slurred into an indiscernible spray. My existence as a whole was bathed in Douji as I kept wildly pummeling.

Alongside every punch, two words echoed: “I’m sorry.”

At some point, Sekai left my back, watching from a few paces away.

Soon, I had finished and just sat there on… nothing, my breathing ragged.

It was as if Douji had never been there.

I turned to Sekai, my tears flowing freely and pelting my shackles. “… I-I don’t want to be this kind of animal anymore.”