My dearest long-lost brother,

I can scarcely contain my excitement, and my hand shakes even as I write this.

It may shock you, but I have done the foolish and requested a vacation so I may visit you in the mortal world. Although Tanimura-san has placed me under strict surveillance, I am certain that I can use my wiles to make him bend to my will.

Our time has finally come, and I look forward to reuniting happily as siblings should.

Your ever devoted sister, Isa

******

"Having fun, Lady Misaki?" Hideo finally said after a few minutes of standing behind her undetected and watching her scribble characters like a student trying to complete an exam before time ran out.

"What?" Lady Misaki dropped the ink pen and turned her head towards him. Her stunned eyes soon narrowed in loathing. "How dare you. Don't you have any respect for my privacy?"

Hideo gnashed his teeth. He was suddenly reminded of the many nights in which he would come home after a long day at work and check on Yukari, only to be met with rage at him intruding her sacred space. He'd failed to recognise the fault in his actions at the time, but now that he had repeated the same mistake out of habit, guilt was beginning to fill his mind.

"I'm sorry," he replied in a desperate attempt to salvage the situation and regain her trust. "If it's any consolation, I can hardly read your handwriting anyway."

"Oh." Lady Misaki seemed to believe him, judging by the way her frown faded, and she proceeded to fold the letter with care. "It's the writing instrument you've given me. I can't hold it properly."

"It's called a pen. They became commonplace during my lifetime."

Lady Misaki gave him her full attention. "I see. Your era really must have been incredible."

Hearing those words brought a smile to Hideo's face. He reminisced on how Japan had transformed from a still industrialising nation in his childhood to a great military power by the time of his death.

Granted, he had recently learnt that this same rapid progress had culminated in such unfathomable cruelty and fanaticism that people had died in the millions, leaving survivors such as his own daughter with lasting trauma as they struggled to build things anew.

"Is something wrong, Tanimura-san? You look forlorn all of a sudden."

Hideo sighed and removed both hands from his pockets. "If I'd known then what I know now, I would have let Yukari rest and then joined her in death."

"But if that had happened, she would have been reincarnated, and you might never have received this chance to sort out your regrets."

Hideo thought about those words for a few moments and realised Lady Misaki was likely right. He'd been lucky enough to be deemed useful because of his supernatural gifts, but Yukari might have been judged as just another unremarkable human and discarded as a result.

"Anyway, it's getting late and I'm tired," Lady Misaki proclaimed, disrupting his deep thoughts. She sprung up from the dressing table chair and bounced across the room in her pyjamas before flopping onto the bed like an excited child. She kicked her slippers off lazily, then rolled over with a happy sigh. "It's so warm and comfortable here. Do you really want to stay on the couch tonight?"

Hideo tensed his shoulders at her drastic change in demeanour. It was as if she had removed another mask to reveal her true identity as Ichiro's younger sister, and right now, she seemed more like a teenager than a grown woman.

"No, I'm all right," he stated while backing away. "I have no intention of playing your childish games."

"Suit yourself, Tanimura-san," Lady Misaki murmured in the midst of a wrestling match with her pillow. "You don't know what you're missing..."

******

Hideo became aware of someone nudging him in the shoulder several hours later. He immediately opened his eyes like any competent police officer and pushed his assailant away with just enough force to create a safe distance between them.

"Ow, what was that for?" Lady Misaki whined like a petulant child while nursing her reddened forehead. "Why are you so violent?"

"I'm sorry," Hideo said through gritted teeth. "It's ingrained in me as a shinigami and former kendo practitioner. One cannot simply let their guard down, whether it's around an opponent or a restless oni."

"Well, you should learn to be less uptight. Your wife must have been miserable when she married you."

Hideo remembered his wife Tsuru's eagerness to fulfil their marital duties and shook his head. "On the contrary, she was happier than any sane woman would be. To the world, she was a proper lady, but to me, she was a complete degenerate."

"I see," Lady Misaki replied. "My former master was like that too. He professed his liking of me because of how exotic I looked."

"Please, spare me the details."

"No, I insist. It's about time I told you about my past and how I ended up in a strange land so far from home."

Hideo's interest and curiosity were piqued, so he glanced around the elegantly furnished room before relenting with a shrug. "Fine, go ahead. But don't take too long. The staff already find us suspicious, and they could come at any moment to see what we're up to."

"Understood." Lady Misaki inhaled in preparation for her tale. "You already know that I was kidnapped in front of my brother as a child. Well, I think that my captors drugged me because I wouldn't stop kicking and screaming. I lost all sense of my surroundings, and when I woke up, I found myself chained below deck with several other girls. We started crying and calling for help until a man came down and threatened to beat us all."

"That is quite a story," Hideo said in disbelief.

"We were taken to Nagasaki, and some barbarian of a merchant thought I was worth buying. He put me on another ship, and in the end, I arrived at a place called Macau. While I was there, I saw people I could never have imagined. There were not just Chinese, but others with light hair and fair complexions, and many more who were varying shades of brown. In just a year, I was forced to learn to converse in all of their languages, so that I could survive within my master's house."

A knock on the door startled Hideo and brought a premature end to Lady Misaki's story. The two of them rushed forwards at once before a tanned woman in a black uniform entered.

"Good morning," she greeted in a foreign accent that Hideo couldn't place. "How are you? Did you enjoy your night?"

"It's been wonderful," Lady Misaki replied in good cheer. "Truly an unparalleled experience."

Of course you say that, thought Hideo. You're the one who got to sleep in the bed.

"Well, I'll leave you to pack for now." The hotel staff member retreated while keeping her head bowed, which made it difficult to discern her facial expression. "Let us know if you need anything."

Lady Misaki turned to Hideo again once the door had closed. "Don't tell me you still have slaves in this era. I thought it was a thing of the past."

"She's not a slave. She's a paid employee," Hideo corrected her in the hope of preventing a terrible misunderstanding. "She chose to be here."

"Nonsense. Nobody would leave their country unless they were forced to."

"That's not true. People do it for all sorts of reasons."

"Like what?"

"To escape poverty or war, for example."

Lady Misaki shook her head. "That doesn't sound voluntary to me."

"Maybe so, but it's not important right now." Hideo retrieved his prized briefcase from the other end of the couch and stood up in a hurry. His back gave a creak, and he winced. It was truly unfortunate that he'd been assigned a meatsuit resembling his forty-five-year-old self, since he now had to deal with all of the pain and health risks that came with being middle-aged. "We have only two and a half days left to complete our business. That's not much time at all."

"So, what will we do, then?"

"I already have a rough idea of where your brother and his wife are located, but we'll have to take the long way there because this place is full of cameras."

"I don't know what that means, and I don't like the sound of it."

"You should feel that way." Hideo shot Lady Misaki an impatient glare so she would hopefully stop dawdling. "What you're about to see today is nothing compared to the quiet alley we snuck through last night, so you'd better have nerves of steel."

Lady Misaki pouted. "I've had my share of frightening experiences. I'm sure I can cope with another."

"I'll take your word for it." Hideo's patience ran out and he crossed the room to fetch her bag before tossing it towards her. "Now, hurry up and get changed. We don't have forever."

******

A/N: Macau is a city and special administrative region in southern China that became a trading centre for the Portuguese in the late sixteenth century. It was one of the main destinations for Japanese slaves, along with others from Southeast Asia, India, and even Africa.