EIGHTEEN

When Nakadai met his death at the hands of the demon, the experience was indescribable agony. Yet even as the flames roared, burning his flesh away from the bone, as the fires drove the life from his body, he knew that the demon had a plan that stretched far beyond turning a peaceful town into a bloodthirsty mob.

The intensity of the pain eventually caused him to lose consciousness—for the final time, he prayed. And once the agony disappeared, there wasn’t anything to replace it, simply a void of nothingness. For the briefest of moments, Nakadai imagined he had found the peace he had sought ever since the dark days of his former master’s disgrace.

That moment of hope, however, was fleeting.

The fires that killed him returned. While he did not feel their heat or their destructive power, somehow they transported him back to the land of the living.

When he arrived, a wizened old woman stood before him.

“I am Miko,” she said. “You are my great uncle. And you will do as I say.” In her hands she held a hooked sword engraved with runes that spelled out the words “Pierce the heart of the dragon.”

Try as he might, Nakadai could not speak—not even to verify that this withered crone was indeed the offspring of the pudgy two-year-old nephew he’d known when he lived. Nor could he control his own actions.

Visible through a haze of fire, the woman who called herself Miko revealed that she had learned of the spell the demon had used to damn him, but the power of her birthright had enabled her to summon him back to the land of the living.

She spoke of the foreigners who had come to their shores soon after Nakadai’s death, and how their foul ways had corrupted Japan. She told him about her own daughter, who had married a Chinese man and moved across the ocean to the United States, and had given birth to a son.

That had been the final indignity, and it had spurred Miko to action. Disowning her daughter and cutting her off from all contact with the family, she had proceeded to search the family history, hoping to find something that might grant her the influence needed to turn the tide of corruption. In doing so, she had learned of the spell that had doomed Nakadai.

She then located masters of the arcane, and studied their arts. They had helped her craft a counter-spell that would return him to the land of the living as a weapon for her to wield. But knowing the dangers that lurked wherever evil was involved, she had set out to have the hook sword forged.

It was to be kept in reserve, in case the demon returned and attempted to assert control.

“And now you will help me rid our land of the accursed Western plague,” the ancient woman said, and that was when he realized that her mind had long since given way to insanity.

“Together we will destroy them, and restore Japan to its noble glory.”

But the years had ravaged her body as much as her mind, and before Nakadai could perform any of the tasks Miko intended for him, it surrendered to the years and she died.

Oblivion returned the moment she breathed her last, and blissfully remained until the day that her grandson, Albert Chao, made use of the same spell. This was the half-breed who had so incensed Miko, and at his hands Nakadai was used to fulfill petty revenge fantasies until blessedly, he was banished again at the hands of a Western woman.

When he returned again eighty seasons later, it was again at the hands of Albert Chao. His descendant had become less petty, but his vicious streak remained, and only Miko’s sword—somehow wielded by a foreigner—kept Nakadai from doing more harm.

Again he floated in the void, for what he hoped would be an eternity. But even as he did so, he knew the demon would never allow it to be.