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Hifumi slowly lifted her head from the grass with a groan, a dull pain pulsing just behind her eyes. It seemed she had pushed herself well beyond her limits in battle once again. However, as a gentle rustle of wind swept down from the hills, rolling through the grass and helping to clear her mind, she remembered that this time she had also managed to best the most powerful demon she had met yet. Her chest swelled with pride at the realization as she pushed herself to a sitting position and took a deep breath of the plain’s fresh air. After fighting for a full day straight, it was no wonder she had passed out. Still, she chided herself for going so far; had she been less fortunate, she wouldn’t have been waking to such pleasant scenery.
“Could still happen one day, if I’m not more careful. Or if I can’t get stronger.” The fact that she had brought down such a powerful foe alone was proof that her powers continued to grow, but she knew better than to fall to complacency. Against a demon, there was no such thing as being over-prepared.
Stretching and dusting herself off, she checked her body for wounds and tended to what she needed to before searching the surrounding area for the mirror she had sealed her foe within. She had been victorious, so it should have still been intact, standing as a monument to her trial and success. The blades were high this time of year, as generous rains rolled down the mountain and past the woods to bring a lush, cool spring to the land. The battle had thankfully mussed much of it, matting the grass down to a more manageable height. Even so, on a cursory glance, there was no glint of metal from the sea of green nor starkly angular lines cutting through the gentle fold of leaves. With mounting panic, she kneeled and parted the grass over and over in fistfuls, combing a wide radius around the epicenter of their battleground. Going until her already worn muscles screamed for mercy, she still found nothing.
Frustration boiling over, she indulged herself in one growling, roaring cry of defeat before slumping her shoulders and turning her attention to a set of boot prints cutting through one edge of the circle. They were distinct from the smooth ovals of her zori or the hideously twisted claw prints her quarry had left and led to a trail of hoofprints that cantered off into the nearby woods. When she had first caught sight of them, she had hoped - in vain - that they might simply be the echo of a hunter who had previously passed through. Now that she gave them a good look, though, the freshness of the mud and trampled weeds was unmistakable. If they had been there before the battle, they would have been flattened along with the grass. No, someone had swooped in and swiped her prize - ‘Again,’ she thought, her lips drawn into a bitter pucker - and this time it was no mean imp falling into unknown hands. If this was trouble, it would be big trouble; and if it was merely an opportunistic thief, they were in further over their head than they could possibly know. She would need to clean this up, and quickly.
~~~
Hifumi’s keen tracking skills came in handy not only when hunting down quarry, but also in chasing after the scavengers who often helped themselves to the fruits of her labors. She could tell from the prints she was currently following that whoever had taken the mirror either hadn’t thought to cover their trail or sucked at it, so she started off after them confident that she would be able to catch up in no time. Unfortunately for her, the season’s well-renowned rains were still in full swing, and the weather turned on her before long. The damage done to the integrity of the trails threw her off where even the thief had failed to, and she found herself having to stop in at various small towns and roadside inns, not only to find dry respite, but also to hunt for leads on anyone who might have passed through transporting a large mirror. Thankfully, it was a difficult item to miss, and where her senses failed her, her deceptively sweet and innocent appearance easily won the trust of strangers willing to point her in her target’s direction.
By the time the skies began to clear, Hifumi estimated that she had lost at least a week or more to this hindrance, but after over a fortnight of travel she wasn’t about to turn around and leave empty handed. Eventually, she found what she hoped was her ultimate destination: yet another humble village tucked away in the woods, indistinguishable from every other she had passed through on her way there. If her intelligence was accurate, though, the man that had been seen traveling with an impressively large, bronze mirror strapped to the back of his mule was the blacksmith of this town. With any luck, that meant this little sidetrack of hers would soon be over.
Cautiously, she traced a stealthy perimeter around the settlement, aware of the very real possibility that the demon may have already escaped and begun exerting its influence over the populace. As she observed, however, everything seemed normal: children were playing in the streets, neighbors were standing and chatting over fences, and folks were making trips to and from the well unharried. The mirror must still be in fact. She let out a sigh of relief. The odds of her target being a mere overreaching thief seemed good, meaning there was hope yet that she could retrieve her prize without incident. Well, without incident aside from the stern talking to she would be giving the troublemaker once she caught him. Now that her mark was within her reach, the time for niceties was over.
~~~
With one firm kick, Hifumi burst open the door to the blacksmith’s shop, conveniently located on the edge of town where a commotion was less likely to draw unwanted attention. The clear signage out front touting a carved and burned picture of a hammer striking an anvil had been equally convenient, as she hadn’t had to bother any of the townsfolk for directions. As the iron door handle cracked against the inside wall and the door came swinging back a few inches, a young woman sitting at a desk within nearly leapt out of her skin.
Jumping up, she slammed both hands on the desk in front of her, red in the face. “E-Excuse me! What in the hell do you think you’re doing!?”
“I don’t have the time or patience to explain, and if it wasn’t for that damned thief of a blacksmith I wouldn’t have anything to explain. Now return the mirror he stole from me!”
“Who do you think you are? Get outta here!”
“I should be the one asking that! Where is he!?”
The woman stepped out from behind the desk, her heavy boots thumping against the wooden floorboards. Her fair-skinned face - framed by straight-cut, orange bangs and trailed by a long, thin ponytail - was bright pink as she indignantly stepped around to position herself between Hifumi and the rest of the shop’s interior. She was a good half a foot taller than the kitsune, and close enough that Hifumi could count the freckles dotted across the bridge of her nose.
“Get. Out.”
“Not until I get my property back!”
“What in the world is going on out here?”
From out of a doorway in the back stepped a barrel of a man. He couldn’t have been any taller than the girl standing before her, though he was far wider at the shoulders, with tanned skin and light red hair criss-crossed all the way down his arms. His beard was darker than the rest of his hair, and kept short - to keep out of the way of his craft, no doubt - but his eyes were a shade of hazel so curiously bright that Hifumi momentarily lost herself in wondering if they weren’t a different color altogether.
“You.” Hifumi quickly rallied, turning her full aggression on the man, who was now nervously glancing about in confusion. Ignoring the woman’s sounds of protest as she pushed past her, Hifumi kept her eyes locked on her thief as she stalked across the room with pointed purpose. “You must be the blacksmith of this fine town.”
“I am.” His voice wavered as he shot a glance over her head to the other woman.
“I hear you recently returned to town with a rare find: a large, intricately accented, bronze mirror.”
“Now just a moment!” the woman pushed past Hifumi just as she had a moment ago. “How dare you barge into someone’s shop and home and start accusing them of thievery! Who even are you? Not a local, obviously. Least, I’ve never seen you before.”
“Gemma,” the man said soothingly. With a sniff, the young woman crossed her arms, ignoring him completely.
“You’ve got some nerve, hurling accusations like that. Arvie is an honest man, not some lowdown neerdowell. He’s been hammering away at the forge the past few weeks like a man possessed, and you try to accuse him of something so base as thievery. Shame on you, girl!”
“‘GIRL!?’ You’re the one with some nerve here! I have a name, you know: Hifumi Akari! And if proof’s what you want, let’s just ask the man of the hour himself, shall we? You!” The blacksmith jumped as she drew one of her long-handled fans and pointed it directly at him. “Did you or did you not come across a large bronze mirror about three weeks ago? Say, lying in the middle of an open field, completely out of place and unattended?”
“Ah, yes, I did, as it so happens.”
“And did you or did you not just so happen to walk off with said mirror, leaving its proper owner completely at a loss and at wit’s end!?”
“What?” Arvie blinked in surprise. “I-I was on the road home from Edgewood. I’d gone all that way for materials, but what with the attacks and the shortage and all, you see, even they didn’t have any metals for trade. On my way back, I happened across a fine, bronze mirror taller than myself and just as you said: lying about in the middle of a field. I figured it must have fallen off a caravan. There wasn’t a soul in sight, what was I to do? I wrapped it up and brought it home with me. Anyone with half a brain and muscle enough to carry the damned thing would have done the same.”
Hifumi tapped her foot impatiently.
“Either you’re lying or you’re blind. I was in that field too, lying in the grass, passed out from exhaustion after fighting all day to bring down my quarry, and that mirror was my prize!”
“I swear to you, I didn’t see nobody else around! I promise! I wouldn’t have just left a poor girl lying in the middle of a field. I’d have helped if I’d seen you.” Hifumi bared her teeth in a snarl, tail still bristling to its very tip. “Believe me, Miss Akari, I wouldn’t have stolen it from you knowingly.”
Hikari let out a huff. Maybe it was his gentle drawl or the fact that she just wanted this whole ordeal done with, but she found herself unable to keep her fury at the level she had been aiming for. The grass had admittedly been high enough that she herself had had to search for the better part of an hour before accepting that the mirror had vanished. Knowing her stature, it wasn’t hard to believe that someone could have missed her.
“Well… All right. The past is in the past, and if you’re willing to correct your transgression now, I suppose I can forgive you. An honest mistake is set aside by the benevolent when the guilty make amends. Now, that mirror is mine by rights, so just hand it over and I’ll be on my way.”
The two humans exchanged a silent glance.
“Don’t underestimate my strength,” Hifumi assured them. “I made that mirror and I can carry it out just fine on my own.”
“Well, you see,” Arvie began, and the fur on Hifumi’s tails puffed up along with her cheeks as her anger swelled once more, “I already melted it down for the metal.”
“YOU WHAT!?” Hifumi’s voice reverberated from every inch of the shop’s wooden walls. As the man wrang his hands guiltily, she squeezed her eyes shut and began rubbing circles on her temples. “I’m dreaming. This is a dream. A nightmare, even. I’m still passed out in that field. I must be. Otherwise, I would have to deal with the fact that you may have just unleashed an incredibly powerful demon back into the world that I had just finished sealing!”
“Miss Akari, I apologize profusely, but-”
Hifumi smacked him over the head with one of her fans.
“You idiot! You don’t understand! That mirror wasn’t just a piece of furniture. I’d sealed a demon inside of it - a particularly strong one at that! If you-” She paused, looking him over with sudden suspicion. “Wait a minute. You melted it down, but what did you make with it?”
“A suit of armor and a sword to match,” he explained, rubbing the top of his head. “I recognize I’ve really put you out. You seem to be a demon hunter, though, right? I’ll happily sell them to you at a discount. I won’t charge a single coin for the materials, since they were yours, rightfully. I’ll only charge for the labor.”
The fan came down again on the exact spot.
“Ow!”
“Idiot! First you steal from me and now you’re trying to sell back to me what you admit already belongs to me!? Gah!” This time, he managed to raise his arms over his head, blocking her fan before it got him a third time. To her surprise, Gemma merely chuckled and covered her mouth with one hand, making no further moves to defend Arvie. “And anyway, something doesn’t add up here. If you made a set of armor and a weapon out of it, the demon’s spirit should have had you dead to rights. You’d have been possessed for sure by now, probably too busy slaughtering your entire village to be scamming me out of more than you already have.”
“Demon? Slaughtering?” All of the color drained from the man’s face.
“Mm hm. I already mentioned the demon, didn’t I? You see,” she said with a smirk and a graceful sweep of her fans, “I’m a master of metallomancy as well as aetheromancy. It’s the combination of the two that allows my demon-snaring mirrors to work as they do. My specialty is sealing demons in these mirrors so that any attempt to break out is simply reflected back at the trapped soul. The mirrors each create a small pocket dimension that- You’re not getting any of this are you?”
Arvie winced and wobbled a palm back and forth. Gemma shrugged. Hifumi let out her largest sigh yet.
“Right. Fine. Like I said, I’d been fighting a demon for an entire day before I managed to get it into that mirror. It’s a miracle that melting it down didn’t unleash it.”
“I knew something wasn’t right.” Arvie shook his head gravely. “After I made the armaments, I… I don’t know, there was just this menacing aura about them. I didn’t have the guts to even try them on.”
Hifumi nodded.
“So that’s why it hasn’t had a chance to possess you. At least your luck makes up for your lack of common sense, but the fact remains: you’ve got some pretty cursed artifacts on your hands now.”
“You can have them. Free of charge. Turn them back into a mirror with your fancy metalmancy and get it out of here. I never would have touched the thing if I’d known. I don’t want anything to do with no curses.”
“While I’d love to wave my fans, reform the mirror, and be on my way, you already went and messed things up by melting it down in the first place. I can’t morph the bronze back into a mirror if someone else has already altered its state. It’s out of my hands.”
“What? No, there has to be something you can do! You said it yourself, that bronze belongs to you. What, you’re going to just leave it here after all this? Leave us cursed to teach us a lesson!?”
“Calm down, that’s not what I’m saying. It is mine, and I plan on dealing with it, but you’re involved in this too, now. In fact, I’d say you owe me one. If I hadn’t tracked you down, you know what would have happened? Either you’d have eventually put it on or you would have sold it to someone who would, and I already explained why that would be bad. So here’s what we’re going to do to fix all of this: we’re going to take the pieces and scatter them as far and as wide as we can.”
“Hold on now, Miss. I’m just a simple blacksmith. You can’t rightly expect me to upend my whole life just to help you move some armor. If you could carry the mirror yourself, why can’t you carry the set yourself?”
“I could easily carry it all myself. The problem is the danger of the demon’s influence. If something happens to me while I’m transporting it and the demon’s spirit manages to get a hold on me, we’re done for; and not just us, I could probably level a town or two in a day if that happened. You, though… Well, if my fans spook you that much when I’m not even using them to manipulate space and matter, then I think I could probably take you. But I’d need to be nearby. Hence, we’ll do it together.
“Besides, not like you need another reason to help other than that you caused this mess, but if you come with me, we’ll be traveling further afield than you probably usually do yourself. You’ll have a chance to try and find those materials you need so badly.”
Arvie hummed and hawed, considering even though Hifumi felt she had made it fairly clear that he didn’t have a choice in the matter. Eventually, he looked to Gemma.
“Well, what do you think? Could you hold down the fort for a while if I went on this crazy adventure?”
The young woman shrugged. “I reckon. Be good practice, anyhow, see how I do on my own.”
With a nod and a smile, Arvie offered his hand to Hifumi, which she gave a solid shake.
“Well then, Miss Akari, I’ll be at your disposal a while, I reckon. Name’s Arvie Balemire, and I suppose we’ll be traveling companions for the foreseeable future.”