[Utsusemimaru stands transfixed for a long moment, desperate to give voice to a thousand prayers and fears and regrets and yet unable to find words sufficient to express them. As the minutes pass, he almost wishes the spirit would speak first, to save him the pain of deciding how to begin. He searches the spirit's face for guidance, relying much as he had done in the past on his master's strength and leadership.
But the spirit remains silent.]
I... I'm sorry... [Finally the words force past Utsusemimaru's lips, a soft, halting apology when his lord's even gaze becomes too much for him to bear. The ghost reacts then for the first time, lowering his eyes with a look of sorrow and pain.
Utsusemimaru realizes that must be what the spirit is waiting for; that what his lord regrets the most is Utsusemimaru's own failings.]
I'm sorry... Oyakata-sama, I'm so sorry... [The mistakes of his past have always weighed heavily on Utsusemimaru's heart but not so painfully as they did in that moment. He falls to his knees before the spirit.]
I should have been stronger. I should have- I should have tried- [Tears begin to fall faster than he can stop them, four hundred years of guilt and hopelessness and anger crashing down on him at once, because he knows the anguish he feels, the pain he caused his lord, is all his own doing.]