"May the Main God bless us! My friend, you do not know the past of our ancestors, and so you cannot understand the inseparable blood ties between us Rubber People brothers, nor our forever-connected origin in the Sky God... Therefore, for now, you cannot trust us, and we cannot bring you into the great family of Rubber People brothers... But we are still full of goodwill, and regard you as friends with whom we can trade and communicate!"
Bright sunlight lit the Ainu village by the sea. The armored Kingdom Warriors gripped golden bronze spears in their hands. The tall Deer Tribe hunters carried sharp horn bows. The Ainu villagers clutched their mismatched wooden spears tight, tense and terrified.
The tribal chief, Kita-jima Fishskin, struggled to keep a smile on his face as he listened to Chishima Shell's pleasant translation, and to the "lying ghost talk" coming from Zuwaro's mouth. For one instant, he almost thought the "fur-wearing chief" before him had been transformed from an evil "Fox Kamuy."
The "Kamuy" spoken of by the Ainu People were all things that had spirit, divine spirits. They could be kind guardian spirits, or evil destructive spirits. And the legendary "Fox Kamuy" loved lying most of all, speaking pretty but false words to extort other kind Kamuy, even stealing power from the bodies of other guardian spirits... Yet when he thought of his tribe's utterly destitute state, he found it hard to imagine... just what did they have that was worth the other side scheming for with soft words, instead of simply coming to rob them outright?
"My friend... ah? You are called Fishskin?... Chief Fishskin, this is the symbol of our guardian Main God, the 'Kamuy of Ocean, thunder, Storm, and Sun,' an emblem to which one can pray and make