The Undercover Agent

Choyo-machi at midnight was the busiest time of day, yet no matter how lively a place was, there would always be quiet corners.

Within Choyo-machi, in a secluded alley, there was a small, desolate izakaya. The door of the izakaya was ajar, and despite it being the peak hour for business, it seemed to be deliberately avoiding customers, resulting in not a single patron inside.

The owner of this izakaya was a yokai disguised as a renegade monk, his entire body covered by tattered monk's robes, and his face concealed by a straw hat with strips of cloth. This was a yokai completely wrapped from head to toe.

The yokai owner sat behind the counter, seemingly lost in thought, muttering softly in an almost inaudible voice.

“Owl... isn't going to show himself?”

As he pondered, the yokai owner took out a small bamboo tube. Just as one hand gripped the tube and the other began to form a hand seal, he suddenly felt a disturbance at the doorway.

“Who's there!”

The yokai owner abruptly turned his head, only to see an empty doorway.

“Just the wind...?”

The yokai owner shook his head, about to return to his business, when suddenly he felt a sharp pain at the back of his head, his vision darkened, and with a muffled groan, he collapsed to the ground, his concealing straw hat falling off.

Nura Rihyon looked at the unconscious “yokai” before him, patted the bludgeon in his hand, and called out towards the shop door.

“It's done.”

The cheerful Yamausagi and Tamamura entered the shop, approached the unconscious owner, and straightened him, revealing a face indistinguishable from an ordinary human's.

“Oh, oh~ Found it! A bead that emits demonic power! He's not a yokai either.”

After rummaging through the owner's clothes for a while, Yamausagi pulled out a pale green bead. He now had three such beads in his hand.

“Another human disguised as a yokai... Are these all Onmyoji? What exactly are they trying to do, lurking in this town?” Tamamura said, scratching his head as he looked at the human on the ground.

“Who knows? Onmyoji lurking in this Ghost Market certainly aren't up to any good. Maybe they're gathering intelligence for the Onmyoryo so they can better capture us as shikigami,” the yokai boy Nura Rihyon said with a laugh, shouldering his bludgeon.

“Lord Owl is truly resourceful, finding even these hidden individuals. I wonder where he gets his information.”

“Next, we'll help him carry this one to the hiding spot, Tamamura, it's your turn.”

“Tch... we should just kill these undercover agents directly. Isn't this too much trouble?” Though he grumbled incessantly, Tamamura dutifully hoisted the unconscious human. While not much taller than Yamausagi, he was the strongest among them.

“Hurry up, we still have one more. Once the leading Onmyoji is dealt with, their shikigami hidden in the town will no longer be a concern. This Choyo-machi... will be free from the Onmyoji's surveillance...”

...

The moon slowly set in the sky, gradually climbing over the distant mountains, and the rising sun illuminated the rooftops of Heian-kyo.

Kamo no Tadayuki strode quickly along the Onmyoryo's long corridor. Though advanced in age, his pace was exceptionally swift, so much so that the Onmyo-sei to his left and right struggled to keep up.

Reaching the council chamber, Kamo no Tadayuki didn't wait for the Onmyo-sei but opened the door himself and walked directly to his seat.

At this moment, Minamoto no Mitsunaka and Fujiwara no Saneyori were already in their respective seats. The three of them were in the same state as yesterday, except now their expressions were grim, and the atmosphere was exceptionally heavy.

After a prolonged silence, Kamo no Tadayuki finally broke it.

“You two already know, don't you? This morning... no, it was last night's incident.”

“Yes... The guards at Rajomon found four men, bound with ropes and stripped of their clothes, outside the gate at dawn this morning, during the Oma-ga-toki. After confirmation, they were our undercover agents placed in the demon realm.” With a serious expression, Fujiwara no Saneyori slowly articulated the information he knew.

“According to their accounts, while they were maintaining their disguises in the demon realm, they suddenly felt a pain at the back of their heads and then lost consciousness, having noticed no abnormalities beforehand. This... they must have been knocked out by some kind of demonic spell...” Minamoto no Mitsunaka said with a grim face, his expression perfectly composed.

“After they woke up, their eyes were covered, so they couldn't see who had captured them. After being forced to release their shikigami, they were abandoned in front of Rajomon.” Kamo no Tadayuki paused here, then continued.

“In the shadows, a voice directly identified itself as Owl...”

Having said that, Kamo no Tadayuki glanced at his two colleagues beside him.

“Gentlemen... what do you make of this?”

“A provocation.” Minamoto no Mitsunaka crossed his arms over his chest.

“A warning.” Fujiwara no Saneyori's expression remained calm.

“It's a message. Owl has something he wants to tell us,” Kamo no Tadayuki said, letting out a long sigh.

“He wants to tell us... ‘I know your intentions, I know your methods, and you are within my control... but I do not wish to be your enemy.’”

Kamo no Tadayuki spoke these words from Owl's perspective, which immediately plunged the room into a long silence, with no one speaking first.

Their side had only just issued orders targeting Owl, and Owl immediately purged all the Onmyoryo's undercover agents in a Ghost Market. This indicated that Owl was very aware of the Onmyoryo's intentions to target him, and he used this action to explicitly warn the Onmyoryo! Not killing these agents showed that Owl did not wish for a full confrontation with the Onmyoryo; he exercised restraint.

“So the question now is, how did Owl get our information? How did he know we were deploying undercover agents in the demon realm to investigate him? How did he know the specific details of our agents?” Kamo no Tadayuki broke the silence, cutting straight to the crucial point: the leak of their intelligence. This ruled out divination; no human or yokai could divine their actions.

“Unclear.”

“Don't know.”

Fujiwara no Saneyori and Minamoto no Mitsunaka each offered a reply, unaware that they themselves were the culprits behind the information leak.

One of them had revealed the Onmyoryo's plan to use undercover agents against Owl to Owl, while the other had sold the specific information about the undercover agents to Owl. The difference was that one was aware, and the other was not.

Kamo no Tadayuki did not know that the colleagues sitting on either side of him, who were of equal rank, were Owl's “undercover agents” in this incident.

“Sigh...”

Kamo no Tadayuki, unknowingly playing the role of Gin, sighed inwardly and said helplessly.

“Enough. It seems this Owl's capabilities far exceed our expectations. Sending more undercover agents would likely be discovered by him. The first time was a warning; what the second time would bring is unknown... It's better not to venture into such meaningless danger.”

“As for this Owl... we will temporarily continue to observe him.”