The arrival without shadow
The Doppelgangers didn't enter through the main entrance. They weren't sworn enemies, nor sincere pilgrims. They were specters disguised as believers, ghosts of the old world walking in a temple they didn't yet understand.
Kagebara greeted them courteously. His temples were open, his surveillance diffuse. No one needed permission. No one asked for explanations. It was part of the trap: a place without judgment couldn't issue warnings. It only offered space… and expected each person to decide what to do with it.
Sasori was the first to act. He presented himself as a wandering priest who had lost his mark. During nighttime prayers, he approached the most unsteady worshippers, whispering phrases like, "The Tree still sings within you… you only have to surrender to its command." He didn't sow fear. He sowed doubt. And when someone fell, his ability activated: certainty became guilt. Peace, a weapon.
Mei , for her part, planted fake roots around the periphery of the Garden of Wounds. They seemed harmless, but each one was programmed to repeat a falsified fragment of judgment. When someone approached, the roots whispered, "You are impure. The Tree would not have accepted you." Their power wasn't in direct harm. It was in spiritual attrition.
Hako was more subtle. He walked among the artisans of suffering, dropping fragments of broken symbols, causing the tattoo artists and engravers to unwittingly copy them. Soon, Kagebara's spirit instruments began to resonate with vibrations that did not belong in the city.
Akihiko watches from the root
Akihiko didn't stop the Doubles. Not because he couldn't. But because he needed to know how far the poison could go before it became irreversible.
From the lower chambers, I observed the effects. A monk began to speak in his sleep in a strange voice. A young woman lost her balance after hearing a prayer that never existed. The Black Tree emitted a dull vibration, as if detecting someone trying to reconnect what had been severed.
Akihiko met Rekka at the Heart Shrine.
"They're here," she said, without surprise.
—They don't come to destroy. They come to be out of tune .
—And what will you do?
Akihiko looked at the altar. Above it, a flowering root was slowly bleeding.
—I'll make them hear their own voice… without a mask.
III. The mirror of lies
That night, during a public ceremony in Kagebara's core, Akihiko presented himself to everyone. He didn't dress like a leader. He didn't raise his voice. He simply placed a stone in the center of the plaza: the same one The Silenced One had given him.
—Many have come here seeking what they lost. Others, what they want to rebuild. But today, among us, there are those who sing with voices that are not their own.
The Doubles tensed. No one had accused them directly. But the roots began to shift beneath their feet. The counterfeit markings thrummed with dissonance. The imitated voices began to repeat themselves out of sync.
Akihiko closed his eyes. And he spoke:
—The white root doesn't seek followers. It doesn't want temples. It only wants to remind the world that flourishing isn't a privilege, but a right.
And then, as if his voice had become a catalyst, Kagebara's roots responded.
Not with words. With presence. Hako's false marks were erased. Mei's roots withered. Sasori's echo was absorbed by a real vibration: that of the Black Tree, which, though incomplete, held something the Doubles would never understand: memory born of true suffering.
Judgment without Judgment
No one executed the Doubles. There was no need to. They were exiled. Not out of hatred. Out of incompatibility. Their power didn't resonate. It didn't work. Kagebara didn't need punishment. Only consistency .
Before leaving, Sasori turned to Akihiko.
—Do you think you'll win? That this new world will be better just because it's different.
Akihiko didn't reply.
He just put the stone back in his coat and walked towards the roots.
END OF CHAPTER 108