Chapter Text
This summer's rainy season was exceptionally long. Viscous raindrops drifted from the sky, carrying the bitter scent of tea.
"The High Priest of the shrine is back!" the village children ran spreading the news. Adults hurriedly brought out their long-prepared, fine offerings, braving the dampness that clung to their clothes and refused to dry—a dampness they could seemingly never shake off—and rushed without umbrellas into the rain that had been pouring for half a month.
Thus, adding to the scent of dirt and grass in the air, came the aromas of saltwater fish and rice flour carried in the villagers' hands. Amidst crossing footsteps, it was an exceptionally bustling scene. Wealthy merchants flocked in, making a single fortune slip hard to come by. Everyone prepared to welcome the High Priest back from outside the village, treating it like the most important Harvest Festival of the year.
Everyone, except for an eccentric young man with messy, white hair.
He used to live in a small thatched hut at the edge of the village. But by some stroke of luck, he suddenly moved into the estate closest to the shrine one day. It had heavy gates and white earthen walls, acting like a castle's moat, isolating him from everyone else in the village.
That was the day after the village was raided by mountain bandits; the thieves had killed the important figures who originally lived in that estate, along with some unlucky villagers.
Everyone thought the weird youth had vanished too. But the very next day, he suddenly moved into this behemoth of a house in the village.
"He's gotta be a yōkai. I bet he brought those bandits down on us..." someone in the crowd muttered, lowering their voice.
"Shh! Keep it down! I heard he even dared to curse the High Priest. The shrine's just being merciful, otherwise lightning would've struck him dead by now."
"Who could curse the High Priest anyway?" A bystander gave a dry laugh. "The High Priest is a living god, he can do anything. If you ask me, that monster is just asking for it. Come on, let’s go to the shrine to draw an omikuji, and pray the High Priest gets rid of him!"
Driven by this underlying fear, when the Great Priest returned this time, the shrine gates were packed like a bustling market.
"Stolen and replaced again? How many does that make?"
The shrine's miko, Nanami Chiaki, stepped over the heavy threshold and approached the innermost hall. This was the most secluded place in the entire shrine; no one but her dared to come close.
Upon approaching, the first thing she noticed was a scent different from usual. The incense the priest normally used was nearly colorless and odorless, like cold ink, or the chilly sky after a rain.
But today was different. A faint, sweet fragrance drifted in the air—that was Nanami's first impression. Yet, upon closer inspection, there was a rotting, bitter undertone to it.
Without a doubt, the item stolen today was the incense the priest used daily.
"Just who is doing such a... bizarre thing? Stealing your belongings, then replacing them with their own..." Nanami walked into the inner room without hesitation, her brows slightly furrowed. "Do we really not need to investigate?"
"No need. It's boring."
An extremely cold voice came from the inner room. This voice suddenly transformed the plain, naturally warm wooden room of the shrine into a valley where even a breath could echo.
Nanami lifted the final curtain. The window inside was open, allowing the pattering rain to wet the black-lacquered sill. Moisture permeated the air, turning everything in the room into a hazy, dim mirror. And the shrine's priest sat by the window, as if looking at his own reflection in that natural mirror.
But from where Nanami stood, in that dim reflection, there was only a pair of blood-red eyes, gleaming under the flickering light and shadows filtering in from outside.
As if sensing Nanami's approach, he averted his gaze and stood up from his cross-legged position. The long hair cascading down his back moved like black silk, radiating a dark luster. He wore a pure white kariginu, its wide sleeves lacking a single crease.
"Then... do you already know who did it... Kamukura-kun?"
Nanami was used to adding "-kun" when addressing Kamukura Izuru, treating him like a classmate. They had grown up and studied together at the shrine, and both were now around sixteen or seventeen years old. Kamukura seemed to possess omniscient and omnipotent abilities; it had been this way since childhood. Every time he returned from his observational journeys outside, he would be responsible for answering the villagers' doubts and performing a degree of divination.
His divination... rather than divination, was more like analysis. Deconstructing all things to obtain impossibly precise answers. This ability was viewed as a "divine power," something mysterious and deeply revered by the villagers.
But the power of kotodama is boundless. To avoid ruining the mystique, and to prevent the inversion of cause and effect, Kamukura would only write down corresponding, ambiguous fortunes on paper.
Therefore, finding out exactly who kept sneaking close to the shrine, stealing things from Kamukura's room, and replacing them with the thief's own belongings must also be incredibly simple for him.
"Maybe it's for some kind of ritual," Nanami continued to deduce out of interest. "Like that 'urban legend' game I played before, where collecting seven items from someone you like can summon a Yuè Lǎo, the matchmaker god. Ah, but... for that, you have to collect strands of hair or fingernails..."
But Kamukura did not respond to her again. The bell in the outer corridor was suddenly rung by someone, letting out a crisp chime.
Kamukura merely glanced at the windowsill one more time before walking silently past Nanami, preparing for the upcoming divination.
Nanami stood where she was, already accustomed to his cold demeanor, like a lifeless doll. Even though, Nanami was certain that just now, in that faint reflection, it seemed as if a pair of brown eyes had looked back at her.
That gaze carried a clean, warm aura. Just like every time she approached Kamukura, the freezing atmosphere around him would dissipate as if driven away by a campfire, replaced instead by the scent of cotton clothes baked in the sunlight.
It was like a simple, gentle fragrance bleeding from a very, very deep place within his soul.
But other than Nanami, no one could catch a glimpse of that deeply buried light.
The lighting inside the main hall was dim; an old filament flickered overhead, emitting a faint electric buzz. The candle flames swayed within the hall, their bright fire vividly and realistically mirrored in Kamukura's blood-red pupils.
He sat on a raised platform behind heavy bamboo blinds, with candelabras densely placed only around his immediate vicinity. Outside the hall, the villagers voluntarily formed a long queue.
Through the gaps in the bamboo blinds, he could clearly see those fortune-seekers carrying bountiful offerings. As they approached, they would drop to their knees with a heavy thud, offer up various tributes to the altar with both hands, and then press themselves to the floor to voice their wishes.
The more powerful the person, and the more offerings they brought, the further ahead they stood in line.
Those entirely unoriginal words tortured his ears. In his boredom, Kamukura slightly parted the bamboo blinds with a finger, looking out at the stone-paved path outside the hall.
A youth holding a dark green oiled-paper umbrella—with white hair, wearing a white-and-green yukata adorned with bizarre red patterns—wove briskly through the crowd.
He was as fast as the wind skimming over water; looking away for even a second meant he would vanish from sight. But Kamukura could predict the exact direction of his movements. So, rather than letting him slip away like fleeting sand through fingertips, he saw every single move the youth made with absolute clarity.
His umbrella lightly brushed past the pedestrians' sleeves, leaving behind barely perceptible traces of water. And left alongside those traces were pieces of stiff paper—slipped right into their offering basins by his slender fingers.
The shrine's unique omikuji paper. It seemed he had been infiltrating the shrine, stealing those fortune slips.
Just as he would take other things. Kamukura thought of the items taken from his own room: not just the soothing incense, but also the personal cord used to tie his inner robes, the sachet the shrine placed beneath his pillow, the wooden comb that had brushed through his hair, and even the teacup his lips and teeth had just touched, still holding a trace of damp warmth...
All these things had been replaced by this youth's. In Kamukura's room, the things that truly belonged to himself were practically gone.
A boring act.
He also knew exactly what was written on the slips the youth was handing out. Forgeries of his handwriting, of his "divine words"—prophecies tailor-made for these people kneeling below his steps.
The youth might not possess the "divine power" the villagers believed in, but he could still exploit their weaknesses and senseless hopes, delivering prophecies in Kamukura's stead.
Sure enough, when the next fortune-seeker stepped forward, about to present his offerings, a slip of paper suddenly slid from the basin of gold and jewels, fluttering lightly to the ground. The man frowned, picked up the paper, and opened it. Instantly, his expression changed drastically.
Ignoring the items spilling to the floor, he kowtowed three times loudly, his face deathly pale as he blurted out, "Yes, right away! I will do it immediately, everything exactly as the Great Priest commands!"
The rumor that "the Great Priest has already handed down his divine words" spread rapidly beneath the steps. Everyone who read their slip turned ashen, as if struck by a terrifying revelation. One by one, they abandoned their offerings and fled in panic.
In the end, the main hall was left completely empty, accompanied only by the silence of the candlewicks melting bit by bit and the endless, drizzling rain.
During his divinations, there were never any miko or guards by his side, for there was no situation he could not resolve himself. Usually, he would have rolled up the bamboo blinds and returned to the inner hall by now.
But he waited. He waited for the one who had "delivered the oracle" in his place to walk through the shrine's wide-open doors.
Or rather... the yōkai.
Amidst the dreary curtain of rain, the youth with the pale green oiled-paper umbrella walked toward him. There wasn't even a trace of mud or water beneath his feet; it was as if his wooden geta were untouched by this rain falling upon all living things.
He closed the umbrella, letting the water droplets slide down the handle, before tossing it aside. Kamukura sat behind the blinds, watching him motionless.
Watching the cold, hatred-filled flames burning in his gray-green eyes, as if intending to incinerate the entire hall. Yet, his lips still bore a seemingly affectionate smile—just like his favored incense, hiding nothing but a rotting stench beneath a sickeningly sweet facade.
He bypassed the altar where ordinary fortune-seekers would kneel, ascending the wooden steps toward the raised platform.
Suddenly, Kamukura could clearly smell the scent of rain, grass, and incense mixed on him. Only a single bamboo blind separated them.
He even mockingly pulled an "offering" from his pocket: it was the white wooden box that had vanished from Kamukura's room, containing his colorless, odorless incense.
After presenting the tribute, the youth finally spoke. His voice sounded gentle and calm, like a shrine's wind chime echoing from a faraway place.
"The god representing 'Hope' and the Great Priest acting as his proxy... I have done your work for you. Even though it was done by someone like me, I'm sure everyone was highly satisfied, otherwise they wouldn't have fled in such a panic."
Kamukura sat quietly behind the bamboo blind, watching the youth's clenched fists through the gaps—his fingers digging so deeply into the flesh they were almost drawing blood.
"Now, let me ask for a fortune."
The youth's voice still feigned a false calm. Yet as his gray-green eyes pierced through the bamboo blind and landed on Kamukura's face, his pupils constricted violently, almost out of sheer agony.
"Many, many years ago... I believed this world was strictly divided into two kinds of people: those with worth, and those without. Such people were strictly segregated from the moment of birth. A worthless person, no matter how hard they tried, could never become someone of worth..."
Kamukura closed his eyes. For once, it wasn't out of boredom. Instead, just below his left collarbone, a sudden, burning agony flared to life. It was as if someone were repeatedly searing the flesh with a branding iron. The pain spread from that single point to his entire body, until something even began throbbing inside his mind, churning his very brain matter pulse by pulse.
"...Or so it should have been."
The rambling of the person before him suddenly ceased. Kamukura hadn't heard the entirety of it, catching only this final sentence.
"So it should have been..." The youth suddenly let out a sharp, hysterical laugh. "Until he appeared."
"Originally, I thought he possessed something special, some special talent, which was why I approached him... until I realized he was a truly ordinary person... And then... only then did I realize that to me, he was the most extraordinary person in this world... Why did I care about him so much..."
The youth's face twisted in agony, and unconsciously, Kamukura clutched his left chest tightly, panting slightly from the piercing pain.
"But before, because of a few wrong choices, I lost him forever." The youth suddenly pressed against the bamboo blind. His pale fingers gripped the slats so tightly that the old bamboo let out a dry, fragile rustle.
"But, it is not too late." He suddenly revealed a sickly, obsessive smile. "Because you possess his soul."
"So, the fortune I wish to ask for is this, Great Priest."
"It seems you finally possess the abilities he had always yearned for, but you are freezing cold. After he died, I wandered this world for centuries, finally waiting until his soul returned... You have no right to occupy a soul as warm as his."
"Great Priest, tell me: how can I make you return him to me?"
This was not a question. Because before his voice even faded, the youth drew a blade from his chest and thrust it through the blind. Kamukura had one hand clutching his chest; the severe pain made him unable to dodge in time, so he simply caught the sharp edge directly with his other hand.
A curse from the youth was imbued in the blade, but Kamukura casually neutralized it with a trace of counter-curse. Gripping it single-handedly with force, he shoved the blade back precisely toward the youth—
The blood flowing from Kamukura's hand as he grasped the blade carried an overwhelmingly powerful curse. If it so much as touched the youth's neck, he would undoubtedly die.
The youth seemed startled by his speed and failed to react. Frustration, pain, fear... and a sliver of relief and hope flashed through his eyes.
Just a fraction of an inch away... But right then, the agony in Kamukura's chest suddenly transformed into a kotodama. And the voice casting this word of power upon him felt as though it came from his very own soul, buzzing relentlessly throughout his entire brain.
"Please don't hurt him."
The voice said.
The blade suddenly fell to the ground, leaving the youth entirely unharmed. Only Kamukura's blood splattered onto the youth's face.
The metal hit the wooden floor with a dull thud.
The youth reached up to touch the fresh blood on his cheek, his face full of shock.
Kamukura looked down just below his collarbone. There lay a faint, shapeless mark. He raised his head again, looking at the person in front of him.
The youth was still staring at him as if his soul had left his body. His gaze drifted downward as well, landing on the mark on Kamukura's chest.
It was the "soulmate" mark.
It was still faint right now, but it undeniably existed.
And as Kamukura's blood dripped from the youth's cheek down to his own chest, a similar mark manifested in the exact same spot.
But the youth didn't seem to feel pain. Instead, he let out a shrill, piercingly bizarre laugh.
"Ahahahahahah!" Clutching his stomach, he doubled over, laughing maniacally.
Kamukura felt the pain in his chest gradually subsiding. He finally regained the weight of his own body, falling backward onto the grass mat behind the blind.
Gasping for air, as if choked of oxygen by his own laughter, the youth squeezed a muddy, hoarse voice from his throat:
"Did you know? Great Priest..."
"He and I... we never had this mark. We were controlled by fate, left with absolutely no room to choose, yet we still forced ourselves to be together. That was our choice, a choice full of hope."
For the first time in his life, Kamukura experienced the sensation of total exhaustion. Lying on the bamboo mat, he closed his eyes, a thin layer of cold sweat breaking out on his forehead.
"And you... you actually... you stole what belonged to him." The youth gritted his teeth. "I hate you. Just seeing your face... seeing you wear this face makes me sick to my stomach... And you want to kill me, too. But because of this mark, we can't even do that."
The soulmate mark... normally, it would only link the senses and share the emotions of the two people bearing it. The moment their blood touched, this mark appeared.
But because of that untimely kotodama, they were now unable to hurt one another.
"Don't hurt him."
That voice was firm and warm, completely at odds with the freezing, utterly predictable world Kamukura perceived...
So, the "him" in that sentence referred to both of him and the yokai.
Kamukura searched his surroundings, until he saw the blade dropped on the floor. In the cold metallic gleam of the blade, he saw a pair of brown eyes gazing back at him through what should have been his own reflection.
A flicker of excitement flashed through Kamukura's heart.
That was the unknown. That was the only thing in this world that interested him.