Chapter 63

"Thank you, Sakura." Okita-kun thanked his counterpart the moment he left the darkness, and then continued to suppress the curse that constituted the spiritual foundation deep inside with the help of Miss Okita's still-unfolded Flag of Truth. "Haha, come on, my rare loss of composure was actually exposed outside..."

"Then why is there everyone's curse in your spiritual base?" Ms. Okita watched as Okita-kun suppressed the curse deep into his spiritual base, put away the Flag of Sincerity and asked him, "I remember that the files of New Chaldea didn't say that you two had a bad relationship, right? And you and the Shinsengumi here actually get along pretty well..."

"As for Phoenix Chaldea, it's still thanks to your existence." Okita-kun looked at Miss Okita with a smile, and shrugged helplessly, "Besides, the relationship between me and the Shinsengumi cannot be said to be bad, it can only be said that there is more distance between us than between you two - and, although that thing is a curse, it is ultimately just something like accumulated dissatisfaction."

"It's just like all the dissatisfaction that Mr. Serizawa and Mr. Yamanami have towards me - the regrets of other team members before their deaths, etc., are all concentrated on my side." Okita-kun sighed and looked at Kashuu Kiyomitsu who did not follow Ms. Okita and was left there. "After all, it was not until today that I thought, could there be my Kashuu Kiyomitsu's curse in here?"

"Because I'm different from you. It was just because it happened to be Kawai Kiyomitsu who was taken away that day, and because I still had Yamato-no-kami Yasunari as a backup - so after Kawai Kiyomitsu was broken, I quickly gave it up." Okita-kun closed his eyes and thought of the spiritual base data left in Chaldea, "But it's useless to think about these, because I have become a Heroic Spirit, so the composition of the spiritual base is fixed."

"I don't have the Noble Phantasm of the Shinsengumi captain, the Banner of Truth. My second Noble Phantasm is an Innate Barrier, which is an Innate Barrier derived from the Seikatsu. After all, from this perspective, we can see how much those curses will affect me... Once that Innate Barrier is deployed, it will forcibly return me to the state before I died of illness."

——When New Chaldea shared the data and spirit base atlas with Phoenix Chaldea, Okita-kun's spirit base data received a round of thorough evaluation from the directors.

Then, they all looked at the data of Okita-kun's second Noble Phantasm without saying a word - an inherent barrier that can cause a large amount of group damage to the enemy, but will force Okita-kun himself to return to a seriously ill state... It seems that an exploration formation cannot use this Noble Phantasm without Merlin or Caster.

However, after Roman and Lancer Mello dragged Ms. Okita's data to compare several times and verified it with the Heroic Seat, they got the truth hidden under the surface of the data - Okita-kun was cursed. And this curse will continue to grow with his firm will, until one day he shakes that belief, then this curse will completely devour him.

"Ah, I roughly guessed what his second Noble Phantasm was." The Paradise Fairy who blew up the first Noble Phantasm at the end of the special point explained Okita-kun's Noble Phantasm to the Savior who came to understand the shared progress at that time, "The part that constitutes the soul base of that guy contains quite a lot of curses, and it is the kind of curse that will become stronger as the person becomes stronger - in short, the second Noble Phantasm is the result of being distorted by the curse."

The curse contained in Okita-kun's spiritual base twisted the Banner of Truth that should have belonged to him into an inherent barrier derived from a ci-shi ju - in the final analysis, if his own faith was not strong enough, the inherent barrier of his second Noble Phantasm would have long since turned into the type of Nobukatsu Oda's only Noble Phantasm.

In other words, once the Noble Phantasm is deployed, the spiritual foundation of this world will be destroyed.

But in the final analysis, at least everyone of the Heroic Spirits acknowledges and accepts their own death - but this does not mean that they have not had the firm belief to overcome death, and it is obvious that Okita-kun relied on such a firm belief to turn the state of spiritual destruction brought about by the Noble Phantasm into a state of serious illness.

——Although the person himself may not know it, this is undoubtedly the truth.

"I've heard about that from Master." Ms. Okita calmly sat down next to Mr. Okita and waved to Kashuu Kiyomitsu to come back. "Master, they have long concluded that your second Noble Phantasm should actually be a self-destructive Noble Phantasm like Nobukatsu's - but you relied on your own belief to turn the outcome of self-destruction into a serious illness."

“It’s not great, but isn’t it amazing?”

"As for me, I've always envied you." Ms. Okita lowered her eyes and thought of everyone in the Shinsengumi. "I envied you, always and always. From your lifetime to now, you have always firmly believed that you are a member of the Shinsengumi and that you are the captain of the Shinsengumi's 1st platoon... I can't do that."

"Even now, I still feel that I am not worthy of being a member of the Shinsengumi."

"Boy, now you understand what I said before?" Ichimonji Norimune narrowed his eyes and looked at Kashuu Kiyomitsu who had just come back after wiping his tears, and said in a long and meaningful voice, "Love is power, but also a shackle - and that's why we sword men must never lose love. "

"I think I can understand what you said before, old man." Kashuu Kiyomitsu returned to sit next to Yamato-no-kami Yasutsu, turned his head to look at his companion who was obviously still in shock, "Ansutsu, I'm back - Okita-kun seems to have recovered. If you have anything to say, you can talk to him."

"Haha... I really do hope that if there really was a master who could possess me in the past, it wouldn't be bad if it was them." Ichimonji Norimune chuckled, finally stood up and left the corridor, turning back to look at the four people sitting there, "These two, even if they are not members of the Shinsengumi, will be excellent swordsmen."

"Even if I am a collective concept, I still hope that someone can swing me."

"Well, I'll leave now. If you want to see me again, you can wait until the evening banquet. I'm going to inform the lord to change the scenery from the plum rain to something more suitable for the banquet."

After Ichimonji Norimune left completely, Yamato-mori Yasusada turned his head to look at the two Okita Sojis sitting together on the other side - Ms. Okita was obviously still angry about the previous accident, and Okita-kun was apologizing to her for it; however, Yamato-mori Yasusada vaguely felt that the two of them were not really paying attention to it.

"Come to think of it, the words that Yasuda said before the sparring match, was it because we saw the black cat before we passed away?" Okita-kun turned his head to look at Yamato-kami Yasuda, and a vague shadow of the black cat appeared in front of him. "Although I just think that day was a flash of brilliance, and it has nothing to do with the black cat - but in the end, in the stories passed down in later generations, this is becoming more and more magical."

"I actually have a very deep impression of that time - after all, they kept the fact that Mr. Kondo was dead a secret until the day I died... Because they always comforted me by saying that I could return to Mr. Kondo's service after I recovered from my illness." Ms. Okita closed her eyes and thought of the day she saw the black cat, "So I thought, at least try to swing the knife again."

——But at that time she couldn't even hold the knife.

It was a rare sunny day, and the warm sunshine gave Ms. Okita the illusion that she might be getting better. But now that she has become a Heroic Spirit, looking back she can only realize that it was a last glimmer of light before death, and everything in this world seems to be announcing that she will not live long.

So after drinking the medicine, Ms. Okita happily went downstairs and tried to practice her swordsmanship - but she could no longer hold the sword, so she gradually lowered her expectations, and in the end it became...

——As long as I can swing it once, it will be fine.

However, she couldn't even do this - she picked up the knife several times, and the knife fell several times.

Then, Ms. Okita saw a black cat in the sunlight.

Unlike the various versions that have been circulated and adapted in later generations, Miss Okita did not try to kill the black cat - she just put down the knife, as if she had thrown away her past life and returned to her childhood, squatted in front of the black cat and held up her face, then talked to this black cat that was not afraid of people, and finally hugged it to bask in the sun together.

Miss Okita's life came to an end just like that.

"Eh? Ah... indeed." Yamatomori Yasutsugu subconsciously avoided the sight of Okita-kun and Okita-san, and recalled the discussion of Yamatomori Yasutsugu and others in the Extreme Swords Men's Forum about the attitude of the previous master encountered during training. "After all, we are also affected by anecdotes - the anecdote of the black cat is related to me, because I saw Okita-kun's death."

"And in the anecdotes, there's always a saying that Okita-kun died because he saw a black cat. If that's the case, if we kill the black cat... will Okita-kun be able to survive?"

"Even if history cannot be changed, this is a delusion that every Yamato-no-kami Yasunari would have."

Almost all the Yamato-no-kami Yasudasa who went to practice were reprimanded by the former head of the sect, Okita Souji: "Don't use me as an excuse for not doing what you should do. It will be very troublesome for me."

Therefore, when Yamato-mori Yasusada saw Ms. Okita, even though he knew that she was also Okita Souji, he would still feel an inconspicuous sense of disharmony with Ms. Okita.

In the final analysis, Ms. Okita, who is like Sakura, is better at scolding herself than scolding others - but Okita-kun is the complete opposite. If Yamato-kami Yasunari really went through training with him, he would undoubtedly be scolded more harshly than that sentence.

"Ansei." Okita-kun looked at Yamato-mori Ansei and sighed helplessly, "I will be proud of being the captain of the Shinsengumi's 1st Squadron - even if the Shinsengumi no longer exists and is destined to be eliminated by history... I will still be proud of this identity. So, please don't be trapped in my shadow - but please remember, even if I am no longer in this world... you will always be my beloved sword."

"Hold your head high and be proud of who you are, An Ding."

As night fell and the party ended, the Servants found excuses to get rid of the familiar swordsmen, and at the same time avoided Fujimaru Ritsuka and Mash and gathered together.

"First, I want to ask everyone a question." Abe Haruaki sat in the main seat, his eyes calmly scanning every participant, "I think... you should have noticed something abnormal about them, right? This abnormality is no longer the difference between parallel worlds, but a more fundamental distortion."

"I have a feeling they are no longer the original Fumoshin."