32 Ashikaga

After we brought our small reunion party to a close, I immediately headed for the baths. It had been years since any hot water touched my body.

"Young master?" Ano asked.

"Is the bath ready?" 

I had asked her to heat up the bath prior to my arrival. In this time period with no electricity or modern appliances, heating up anything required charcoal, thus the whole process would take a while. That is of course, unless I used the much larger, naturally heated hot springs in town. 

"Ah, right. I'm sorry but it's not ready yet, please wait a few more minutes." She replied.

"Sure." I said as I made myself comfortable in the hallway.

Ano sighed seeing me do that.

"I didn't mean you could just sit there. Do something else, I'll call you over when it's done. Besides, we're expecting guests tonight, the young master of the household can't be seen sulking around in the hallways." She lectured.

"But no one wants to be around me. My sister even said I should take a shower before talking to her." 

"Then go hang out with your equally unwashed brother. Oops, silly me, a servant shouldn't be saying those things." She said with a soft laugh.

"Don't worry, we all consider you as part of the family by this point." 

That seemed to have pleased her as she let out a wide grin.

"Well, just go to your room for now, I'll call you over when it's done."

"Sure." I agreed and picked up my tattered bag containing all the books I gathered along with my sword and left for my room.

I carried mountain slicer with me the whole day, partly because I didn't get a chance to even get back to my room and partly because I didn't want to let it out of my sight ever again. It had served me well over the years and it quickly became my most prized possession.

I rested its hilt against the beltline of my hakama pants and began moving through the hallways of the mansion.

'I hate navigating through this house. I'd need four hands to count the number of times I got lost. I would much rather be using the roof.' I sighed as I begrudgingly made my way through the twisting corridors.

Then, as I was walking, I heard the voices of people coming from around the corner, causing me to stop dead in my tracks.

"So this is the famous estate." A cold feminine voice sounded out.

"We're glad it is to your liking, Miss." A familiar voice, belonging to one of the servants, said in reply.

"Never said I liked it." 

"Haha…" Awkward laughter ensued.

'I better get out of here. I don't know who that is but she doesn't sound fun.' I thought while turning around and walking in the opposite direction.

It was too late, the two people had already made their way around the corner before I managed to make my escape.

"And… Who's that?" The woman asked in a distasteful tone.

"Huh? Oh…" The servant looked at my back as he tried figuring out who I was and what I was doing there. "He must be one of the servants, I'm really sorry Miss Ashikaga, this one seems to have missed the memo."

"Hey you, turn around and identify yourself." He commanded.

I did as instructed and turned around to face the two people standing behind me.

The servant must've been a new hire, I didn't recognize him. He was moderately tall, but didn't stand out much. Though when compared to the woman standing next to him, he might as well have been garbage.

She was tall, beautiful and cold. Long dark blue hair flowed past her shoulders while her bangs stopped short of her piercing blue eyes. Her skin was pale, a trait commonly shared by nobility in Hokkaido, beautifully contrasting with her blue hair. 

Her calculating eyes carefully scanned my entire body, presumably in search of threats as her neutral face quickly turned into a frown after her eyes met my sword.

"Ah! You're one of the recruits, aren't you? You're not allowed to be in here! How dare you make us look bad in front of our esteemed guest!" The outraged man yelled, mistaking me for a random recruit who didn't know his place.

"Recruit you say? Is this who my soldiers have been training alongside of?" The woman scoffed.

'I get that I don't look the best right now, but can no one in this actually recognize a member of the family?' I thought, baffled by the number of times I was mistaken for someone else. 'Well, whatever.'

"And.. who might you be, young miss?" I mocked. 

"Who… Who do you think you are?!" The servant angrily shouted while pointing his finger in my direction.

The woman simply remained unfazed, though her frown got a little deeper.

"It seems your servants aren't just unhygienic, but also ignorant." She shot back.

The man's head quickly shifted between me and the woman, his expression changing from one filled with fury and a placating one.

"N-no, you see, the rest of the servants and recruits are very well mannered, this one is just the exception, haha." The man desperately tried salvaging the situation. "And you, you still haven't answered me! Who are you?" 

"Me? Don't tell me you can't recognize your own master." 

I ran my fingers through my long hair, fixing it up and revealing to the man a deep set of crimson red eyes.

The man still looked confused, but his agitated demeanor was all but gone. His eyes darkened as he looked into mine, realizing the mistake he'd made.

"Y-young master, I-i didn't recognize you. I am truly, deeply apologetic over my own ignorance" The man still apologized despite likely having no idea who I was. The red eyes and white hair were probably the only thing he needed to prove my standing in this household.

The woman's frown deepened as she entered a state of confusion.

Seeing the woman's confused expression, the servant was quick to explain the situation.

"Young miss, this is the young master of the house, Yukiko Fujiki." 

The woman's eyes briefly widened before her face returned to a neutral resting position.

"I see. Well, I guess apologies are in order." She coldly said.

There was something off about her. Maybe it was her rectangular rimmed glasses resting atop her small nose or maybe it was her demeanor.

Yet, she didn't hold any malice. Her words were certainly razor sharp, but there was no ill intent behind them. If she was harboring any, she hid it very well.

She cleared her throat.

"I apologize if my words hurt you. That was their intended purpose." She robotically said while giving me the smallest bow imaginable.

'Y-you're kidding right. I expected her to have more finesse, after all she is supposed to be a political strategist.' 

"Servant, you may go now. I'll walk her the rest of the way." I said.

"Are you sure? I was the one tasked with brin-" 

"I'll pretend I didn't hear anything you said if you just go away." I interrupted with a smile.

"Yes sir." 

The servant didn't even think twice about the offer and accepted, walking away and leaving me alone with the girl.

"Let's go then." I said as I started walking towards my dad's office, soon she started following behind me.

After a while, I lost my way again so I had to come up with some way to distract her from finding out.

"Say, why are you wearing those things on your nose?" I turned my head to look at her glasses.

"To see into people's souls." The woman flatly said.

"Your vision is terrible, isn't it?" I asked, taking note of her thick lenses.

She clicked her tongue and remained silent.

"You're too blunt." 

"Same could be said about you. It's bad manners to ask someone personal questions when you've only just met." She said, pushing up her glasses with her middle finger.

"Maybe, you're just different from what I expected." 

"What did you expect?" She asked.

"Someone cunning, manipulative and cruel. I heard the rumors." 

"They're not rumours, and how do you know I am not those things? Appearances can be deceiving."

"Don't flatter yourself." I scoffed. 

She scoffed back.

"Me? You're the one that showed up out of nowhere in tattered clothes. You look like you haven't taken a bath in years."

I saw the light at the end of the tunnel. Everyone I had met with said the same thing.

"And you're the person who is a marriage candidate for my brother. I wish you the best of luck, you certainly are going to need it." 

She halted her steps.

"What?" 

I also stopped and turned around to face her.

"What? You didn't know?" 

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm not sure if I should tell you now…" I trailed off. 

"Out with it, if you want your head to still be on your shoulders." She said, her voice now radiating with malice.

I laughed at the threat, but told her anyway.

"Well, the thing is, apparently you used to be a marriage candidate for my older brother. Now that you're the clan head though, my father is considering re introducing that offer. I assumed that's part of the reason you were here." 

Her face remained neutral, but her fists were clenched. Then, she let out a heavy sigh and relaxed.

"I see. Thanks for the heads up, now at least I won't be caught off guard." She said in the same flat tone she used for every other sentence. 

"So what do you think?" I questioned her.

"About?"

"Getting married, you're young." 

"I've been on this planet long enough to experience things you couldn't even dream of. And about marriage, if your brother is anything like you, I might as well just run away now." She answered honestly. 

"What's wrong with marriage though?"

"There are still things I want to do, I can't get tied down. By the way, we've been walking along the same corridors for a while now."

"Have we now?"

'Dammit, she noticed quicker than I expected.' 

"Are you sure you're from around here?" She teased.

"This way. I'm sure of it." I said while pointing in a random direction. After all, there are only so many hallways in this house, eventually we'll get there.

Truthfully, it didn't use to be this bad. Before, I had all the routes down to a tee, but after the expansion, remodeling and other stuff, my directionally challenged brain couldn't keep up.

"So, why did you kill your own family?" I asked, despite the extremely heavy handed nature of the question. I desperately wanted to distract her from the fact that we were lost.

She remained silent for a while.

"What about you? You are a swordsman right? What is your motive for taking the lives of others?" She asked, avoiding my question.

"All's fair in love and war." I answered simply.

"What does that mean?" She asked, confused about the foreign expression.

"What I'm trying to say is, fighting and killing on the battlefield is different." 

"How so? A life is a life."

"The difference is that warriors head into battle accepting that they might very well die that day." I elaborated.

"A hero during war time is only a mass murderer during times of peace. I've seen plenty get ruined by that same mentality you hold."

Perhaps she was right. Even with experiencing two different lives, the only things I killed were demons, bugs and game. In my first life, I lived in the comfort of the 21st century, never having to partake in any wars. Neither was I a psychologist or a philosopher. In this life, I still haven't been exposed to any real combat against other humans. Maybe someone like her would be more knowledgeable about these things, despite her young age.

"Maybe you're right." I admitted. "But you still haven't answered my question."

"That's awfully bold of you. Do you really expect me to answer?" 

"Yes."

I couldn't see it, but I could feel her rolling her eyes.

"I have my reasons."

I shrugged.

"Fair enough, I guess." I said, still unsatisfied with her answer, but I decided to not pry any further. My questions would have to be answered some other day.

Finally, after what felt like hours of walking, we reached my father's office.

I knocked on the door and moved to the side so Ashikaga could enter. 

"Come in." My dad responded from the other side.

She took a deep breath and gently opened the door.

"You're very late." 

"Through no fault of mine I assure you." She said.

My dad raised an eyebrow and gave her a questioning look.

"Your son seemed to have gotten lost while making our way here." 

"Oh good, so you've already met Tatsuya then? Actually I called you here to talk about that." 

The girl looked confused for a second before putting two and two together and replying.

"No, the one with red eyes. I seem to have forgotten his name." 

Now it was my dad's turn to be confused.

"You have my apologies for the inconvenience. Yukiko, come here." 

I did as I was told and moved behind the woman, it was the first time I noticed I was barely half a head taller than her.

"Go outside and apologize," He said.

She also turned around to face me. Faced with all that pressure, I gave in. It wasn't like I was prideful enough to not admit when I was wrong.

We stepped out of the door frame and to the side. Then, my apology video began.

"I deeply apologize, Lady Ashikaga. It wasn't *wink* my intention to waste your precious time." I said while giving her a deep bow.

She let out another sigh.

"Apology accepted, let's stop wasting any more time." Her tone was flat but I could tell her mood was anything but.

"Well then, I'll be off." I announced.

"You're excused." My dad replied.

Seeing I got the green light, I made my way out of there and headed to the baths. 

'Ano is probably searching for me right now.'