Chapter 77
She felt a little strange: this was Inari Grand Shrine, or in other words, the "border" that existed under the name of Tamamo-no-Mae.
Of course, the priests of Inari Grand Shrine would not acknowledge this; they refer to it as the "Inari Realm."
As the only officially recognized orthodox religion in the Higashi, Inari Grand Shrine is granted additional titles every year.
Theoretically speaking, the Inari Grand Shrine should have given her a stronger feeling... just like in Otogiyama and the Forest of Yokai.
But now, Riki feels no emotion whatsoever.
No, it's not that I didn't feel anything unusual at all, but it was like being separated by a hazy barrier, unable to see clearly or touch it.
Just as Riki was feeling uneasy, a Sorceress hurried over from the end of the Imperial Road and waved to Riki.
"Please come with me."
Already harboring doubts, Riki quickly followed. She opened her mouth to ask, but the Sorceress only replied, "When we get there, someone will answer you."
The faster they traveled, the more anxious and uneasy Riki became.
She realized that she was heading deeper into the Inari Grand Shrine, and theoretically she had already penetrated deep into the borderlands, where she could reveal her true form at any time.
No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't feel her "true self".
Finally, she arrived at her destination.
This is a flat area with several benches, offering a view of the distant rolling hills and parts of Kyoto.
A young girl dressed in a white furisode kimono was sitting on a bench waiting for Riki to arrive.
Her face still retained a touch of childishness, and when she sat on the bench, her wooden clogs barely touched the ground.
"Ah, it's Sister Youqi!" The girl jumped down, her expression slightly confused. "Huh, why don't I see a tail or ears..."
She spoke very softly for the second half of her sentence, and Riki didn't hear what she was saying.
The Sorceress who led the way bowed respectfully to the girl. "Your Highness, the person has been brought here."
"You don't need to call me Lord Shiina," the little girl said, frowning.
"The proper etiquette cannot be disregarded." Sorceress the Shrine Maiden sighed. "Lord God, I will take my leave now. I will come immediately if you need anything."
"Okay. Goodbye, Shiina-neechan."
"This is a very polite little girl. She seems to hold a high position at Inari Grand Shrine, "Riki thought.
"Hello, Sister Youli." The little girl bowed slightly. "I am Suzuran, the shrine maiden of Inari Grand Shrine. You can also call me by my name, Lisa."
The term "shrine priest" refers to the priest in charge of rituals. In Inari Grand Shrine, the Chief Priest is usually appointed by the next generation before taking office.
It can be said that this little girl is the future Chief Priest Inari Grand Shrine.
"My name is Riki."
Riki hesitated for a moment before asking, "Miss Suzuran, is this the 'border'? How do I get back to the Forest of Yokai?"
Inari Grand Shrine knows about the existence of border areas such as the Forest of Yokai and Otogiyama.
Since Tamamo-no-Mae's "death," these priests have been regularly performing the Higashi Great Purification to exorcise those lingering and stubborn influences.
They had also visited the Forest of Yokai before, leaving behind torii gates as markers, nominally "registered".
Without Inari Grand Shrine and its branches in various places, the Higashi would certainly not be as peaceful as it is today.
"The situation in the Forest of Yokai is not optimistic. Fortunately, you also worship Tamamo-no-Mae, so we built an Inari there, which can be considered as incorporating the Forest of Yokai, which is about to collapse, into the Inari."
Riki clenched her fists suddenly, regret and resentment welling up from the depths of her heart: it was too late after all...
"Then, what about the fox spirits?" Riki asked in a deep voice. "What happened to those fox spirits who lived in the Forest of Yokai?"
"I've already spoken with them, and they've all agreed to be Tamamo-no-Mae's messengers." Suzuran smiled, her eyes crinkling. "Humans also call us foxes, so now we have foxes and tanuki (raccoon dogs) too."
Riki cast a suspicious glance at her. "Where's the evidence? I haven't seen a single demon tanuki."
"Huh?"
Now it was Suzuran's turn to be puzzled. "The demon foxes...? Aren't they right beside you? Can't you see them?"
Riki's mind went completely blank.
Suzuran suddenly realized. "Ah, so you're not a fox spirit, but a human? You can't see, but that's okay, I can make you see."
She picked up the gohei that was placed to the side and pointed it at Riki.
In an instant, the empty plain became crowded. On the left were foxes with different fur patterns, and on the right were raccoon dogs with green leaves on their heads, casting curious glances.
Several beautiful tails appeared behind the lily of the Suzuran, and lively fox ears appeared on its head.
Riki stared at the demonic foxes, her face deathly pale.
"You, you all, how could you...?"
She found that she could no longer speak the language of the fox demon, and the language she used to understand was now just noise to her ears.
Riki reached out her hand, trembling.
She turned into a human.
Suddenly, Riki frantically pulled out the amulet, which had turned to ashes, from her waist and handed it to Suzuran: "Can you... can you take a look at this for me?"
Suzuran frowned as she brushed away the ashes.
"No, this amulet can only be destroyed by Tamamo-no-Mae's divine power, and I have no way to put it back together... Oh, I think I understand what happened."
Her voice fell softly into Riki's ears, but it struck her like thunder, leaving her mind blank.
"The contract between Lady Tamamo-no-Mae and the great tanuki 'Tanutarō' has been terminated."
"After the law that protects all things ends, all the demon tanuki will be dethroned by the laws of the mortal world and become ordinary tanuki, losing their magic and wisdom."
"And your 'demon tanuki' side has been slain by Lady Tamamo-no-Mae, so you are now purely human, and naturally you cannot see foxes or demon tanuki, nor can you understand their words."
"So, so..." Riki muttered in a desperate voice, almost fainting, "I almost killed all the Tanuki spirits in the Forest of Yokai?"
"Yes." Suzuran nodded. "It's all thanks to Lady Tamamo-no-Mae's divine decree. Otherwise, everything would have been irreversible."
Riki did not answer. The effects of the gohei gradually wore off, and the scene before her blurred and disappeared again, leaving the place empty and desolate once more.
She is already human.
She can never go back to her hometown.
Everything from the past was severed from her in an extremely brutal way.
She is truly alone now.
Riki shakily got up and staggered down the mountain.
"Hey!" a voice came from behind.
Riki turned around blankly.
Miss Suzuran was standing not far away, calling out to her, "Why don't you stay at Inari Grand Shrine for a while?"
"Inari Grand Shrine would take in a sinner like me?" Riki curled the corners of her lips.
She probably wanted to laugh, but her expression was worse than crying.
"Lady Tamamo-no-Mae merely granted your wish; she didn't say you were guilty." Suzuran walked down and took Riki's hand. "Lady Tamamo-no-Mae taught us that people must always live on. If you feel lost, why not try becoming Sorceress?"
The shrine maiden named Sorceress was already waiting nearby.
"Oh, right," Suzuran seemed to remember something, "Now that we've become human, we should take a human name, shouldn't we?"
"How about you take Shiina-neechan's surname? After all, she's the first person of your kind you've met since you came to Inari Grand Shrine."
Riki did not refute.
Or perhaps she was simply too exhausted to refute it anymore.
Or perhaps her inner convictions had vanished; in any case, she had no objection to the new name.
"Alas, Your Highness, this is against the rules..." The Sorceress smiled wryly and turned her gaze to Riki. "So, what is the child's name...?"
"Riki," Suzuran replied.
"Alright." The Sorceress maiden nodded. "Then let's call him Shiina— Shiina Rikki."
118 Singularity
For later scholars, the events of this era remain largely obscure.
History seems to be presenting a different face once again, so much so that people from different eras are being recorded simultaneously.
But for people at that time, this was irrelevant—because it would take them a long time to understand that history had changed and been distorted.
This is Singularity.
Of course, some people are "aware of this" but don't see it as a problem; instead, they are happy to see it happen and enjoy it.
In Kyoto, on Suzaku Bridge in front of Nijo Castle, a burly man wielding a long spear meets a female swordsman with two swords at her waist.
Honda Tadakatsu, who had survived dozens of battles without a scratch, stared at the female swordsman who called herself "Miyamoto Musashi," but the sweat on his forehead just wouldn't stop.
He could sense that hidden within those sheaths was a power beyond his reach.
"Sword Saint...?" The man known as Kongō Nin'ō roared, wielding his famous spear like an impenetrable wall. "Let me see if your swordsmanship can even survive on the battlefield!"
The spear was 21 feet long, and the Sanskrit characters on its blade shone brightly.
—Dragonfly Tonbokiri, one of the three famous spearmen of the Higashi.
The female swordswoman, draped in a bluish-gray haori and a straw hat, simply drew two long swords from her waist.
Storms, flames, torrents... none of these images exist, yet Honda Tadakatsu feels as if his body is being ravaged by these Catastrophe.
"Shinmen Musashi no Kami Fujiwara no Genshin, proceed into battle."
Across the fortified city formed by the famous spear, Miyamoto Musashi's voice clearly reached Honda Tadakatsu's ears. "Hand over the dragon body in your hands!"
In the Meigetsubō in the East Market, the old swordsman, who had lost his sight, was drinking alone.
From the shadows, the peerless assassin leaped through the air, his fingertips glowing with crimson and deep blue—a potent curse extracted from the blood of the Dragon of Takachiho, a single drop capable of piercing the bodies of hundreds from the inside.
However, the ninja calmly accepted the curse and even used it as a weapon.
Just as her fingertips were about to touch the old swordsman's back, the seemingly oblivious blind swordsman suddenly drew his katana from his waist without warning and stabbed it into the ninja's heart like a gazelle leaping over a cliff.
"When!"
Fingertips clashed with the sword blade as the ninja flew through the air past several tables and chairs, landing with a thud in front of the stage, bowing slightly and pressing his palms together.
"Hello, I am Mr. Tomita Kodachi Musou Tomita Seigen,' and I am Mochizuki Chiyome."
The old swordsman turned slightly to the side, his cloudy white eyes looking at Mochizuki Chiyome.
"Oh, the smell of Dragon Blood —it seems you obtained the blood of the Dragon of Takachiho... Hmm, and dragon's saliva too, is that it?" Tomita Seigen's cloudy eyes gradually revealed cold, vertical pupils resembling those of a reptilian creature. "How terrifying, how terrifying..."
"However, I have no reason to lose."
A pale white torrent appeared on the kodachi, with countless compound eyes swirling behind it.
All of those eyes had vertical pupils.
Kyoto, outside Seiryo-tei.
A gaunt man wearing glasses stared at a swordsman clad in armor.
"They've already started fighting, huh huh huh." The bespectacled man revealed a half-stern smile as he looked at the Asura Sword Demon who had survived the battlefield. "Let me give you a heads-up. What I obtained was the tooth of the Dragon of Takachiho, as well as Dragon Scale."
"I see. So Kanemaki Jisai, the founder of the Zhongjuan-ryu swordsmanship, has already been defeated by your sword."
"Ito Ittosai, you are truly a disgrace, but you are a fine successor in swordsmanship."
Sword Demon's usually impassive face revealed a satisfied smile, "Since that's the case, there's no reason for me to hold back."
"I propose we settle this with three swords, Yagyū Tajima no Kami," Ito Ittosai said with a smile, his eyes narrowed. "After all, the night is still long."