What would it take to be at ease?
That night too, I was alone in the keep. No answer came. Beating my enemies didn't make it easier. Nearly taking the realm didn't make it easier. Then what on earth would I have to do for this weight in my chest to lift?
Leaning on the railing, I gazed blankly at the castle town sinking into the dark. The golden walls threw back the candlelight, so that only the space behind me was strangely bright.
Just then, I suddenly remembered that night, nine years back. When I'd burned Mount Hiei and sobbed, and for the first time, in front of Kicho, spoken that wish aloud.
I want to go back to being an ordinary man.
I want to go back.
But how? There was no book anywhere in the world on how a ruler of the realm throws the realm away. It wasn't something you could quit by bowing and saying, "I quit." If I suddenly disappeared, my retainers would fight among themselves at the foot of this castle, and there'd be war again. If I ran away, they'd send pursuers after me to the ends of the earth. All the more so for the Demon King of the Sixth Heaven.
Thinking that, I'd sunk this wish to the bottom of my heart for years now and given up on it.
But.
That night, in the dark, I realized something.
I'd already become a Demon King no one could get close to. My retainers all prostrated themselves before even my shadow. No one looked me straight in the face. Their knees trembled as they shuffled forward.
In other words—no one was looking at the real me.
In that instant, something cold shot up my spine. Something I'd never felt before, that I couldn't tell was fear or excitement.
No one is looking at me.
Then. If one day this "Oda Nobunaga" just vanished. Wouldn't it be that no one would really come to examine the remains?
Think about it, I told myself. My heart was beating oddly fast.
Who on earth could get near the corpse of the Demon King of the Sixth Heaven? If a single charred body turned up inside a burned-down castle, where in this world was there a fool brave enough to dig through the ashes and check, "Is this really Nobunaga's body?"
Everyone would just shake from far away, convince themselves "The Demon King is dead," and that would be the end of it.
Being feared means no one comes near. No one coming near means—if one day I just vanished, no one would be able to follow me.
This name of Demon King, which had tormented me night after night for so long. This sign I'd carried, heavier than any armor I'd ever worn. Now, here, for the very first time.
It looked like the one key that could set me free.
With shaking hands, I gripped the railing. Sweat was oozing from my palms.
That's it.
I just have to be taken for dead. The Demon King of the Sixth Heaven just has to vanish from this world.
And I.
Will go back to being just a human being, who doesn't have to be afraid of anyone.