Chapter 168

Nick kept his torso angled, and his weight on the balls of both feet, one hand hovering near his sash of ofuda. Their visitor had sat herself just outside his barriers as if she was doing him a favor, smoothing robes that glimmered like fresh blood over beaten gold.The cook-pot’s glow licked her sleeves, yet the limestone at her back stayed unlit—no shadow stretched across gravel. Nick’s senses registered her outline perfectly, but recorded nothing behind her except a neutral draft.

He inhaled slowly, cycling the Stalking Gait to cool his nerves, and gestured with his free hand. “We’re listening.”

The fox-woman’s lips parted in a smile made of pointed teeth, too wide yet gorgeous enough to veer toward terrifying. “Good,” she murmured.

Nick had the peculiar feeling that she had been waiting for a long time to share her story. There was an undeniable relief in her shoulders that couldn’t be faked. And yet, his instincts kept shouting that she was not only dangerous but also wrong. Something was off about her, as if an artist had tried to replicate a vision of beauty and had gone just a bit too far.

“Once,” she said, “there was only a clearing amid swaying golden grass. A weary vixen and her hunter-husband, traveling east, chose the soft loam as the birthplace of their firstborn. The child’s first wail blessed that soil, and it suffered no illness for many years, despite a fever striking the community. Other mothers heard and came, leaving tokens—ribbons, painted bones, ivory beads—so their unborn kits might borrow the earlier blessing. From the tokens grew a crude post of cedar, a kannushi bell. From the bell grew a thatched porch where midwives waited. Births were successful; word spread. What is health for one kit is hope for a clan.”

Images shimmered in the torchlight as she wove the memory: translucent silhouettes of foxkin women kneeling beneath a wind-tossed canopy, milk-pale moons diffused through the summer haze. Nick felt pressure stir at the back of his skull, as the illusion tried to burrow deeper.

He kept breathing, not revealing that he sensed something was trying to affect him. activated, shredding the magic before it could do more than brush against him. This was nothing compared to rejecting the will of a goddess.

Still, he kept a weary eye on the girls, finding their gazes lost in the flickering images.

“The seasons cycled,” the fox-woman continued. “Foxkin welcomed wolfkin, lynxkin, and even harefolk. Tribes braided their tails and crests into one banner. They raised clay walls and named the place Hira-Iki, the Flat Rest. The simple bell-shrine grew into a hall of birch arcs and water basins—The House of Pure Breath. All were welcome.”

Rhea’s eyes shone as she learned the history of her people. Nick doubted even the oldest of her elders knew this much. Berea’s conquest had erased everything that could have been considered a separate culture, and while small aspects were preserved and passed along as stories and lessons, a civilization’s worth of knowledge had been lost.

Not allowing that to distract him, he soon spotted another incongruity: the fire spat sparks, yet not one ember dared to land on the visitor’s robe. Smoke curled around her tails but never stained the fabric.

“Contact with men,” she said, and the word dripped disdain, “was fitful at first, mostly in the form of peddlers trading tin needles for dried meats and ivory. Skirmishes flared at river bends when the herds became too thin, and we needed to expand our hunts to avoid starving. Yet nothing of that softened iron hearts, especially when She urged them to reject us.” In the illusion, hulking humans in bronze armor gestured with their swords; behind them, temples bearing the sunburst sigil of Sashara, the Burning Goddess.

“But men are numerous as rats, and ambitious as locusts. When they united, their eyes fixed on our grassland. Beastfolk stood—oh, we stood proud.” Her tails snapped like pennants. “Sky-duels between our mikos and their sorcerers painted the skies crimson. We matched them raid for raid. Yet attrition is a god in itself, feeding on the exhausted.”

“So we prayed.” Her voice slid into a lower key; the air cooled despite the coals. “We prayed to Inari-ōkami, Lady of Good Harvest and the Small Blessing. She listened.” The cavern brightened with phantom moonlight; Nick felt prickles crawl up his arms as he sensed power in the echo. A phantom of what had once been, not real, but still mighty.

“Inari’s heralds carried healing winds, knitted arrow wounds, turned poisoned breaths sweet. With her aid, the Battle of Four Streams was ours. For a moon, we believed.”

Nick’s nape hairs lifted. Like perfume clinging to old cloth, a powerful presence still lingered in the memory. He considered what a goddess might do to influence the course of a major battle. If what he’d seen in the dungeon was any indication, it would have been a terrible sight to behold.

The storyteller’s smile waned. “But intervention draws retaliation. The men’s Burning One was young then, but oh so powerful. She descended through her priests. Their fire-breath never cooled. Her paladins marched without fatigue; their sunspears burned the night. Attrition chose its side.”

Here, her pupils elongated into slivered gold. The fire’s hiss grew into a wind, though there was nothing for it to stir this far below the ground.

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“When the beast-hosts could no longer fight, they retreated to the greatest shrines, among which the Palace of Silver Healing, as it had become known. Its corridors that rang with birthing cries turned into war wards. Yet the tide did not break. Sick and whole, soldier and midwife—they were butchered on its steps, as traitors had brought in a danger too grave to open its doors. We were forced to watch as our kin was killed just a breath away because It instilled too much fear in Her.” The fox’s voice cracked, briefly revealing a profound rage beneath lacquered calm.

“Her last miracle was a curse.” The woman’s tails furled together. “As medicine in the right dose heals, in excess it kills. The Palace was attacked from within, and at her miko’s will, it became an unescapable trap, meant to purge It from the World. Those who had breached its heart drowned in concoctions too potent for anyone to survive. The goddess bled herself to defeat It, then departed the Material, scattered like dandelion to the wind.” She sighed, a sound so sad that Nick almost missed the implications. He reinforced the wards, knowing that the end was coming, and sent a silent command to the totem.

Rhea hugged her knees, her face pale. Elia’s ears lay flat, tears streaming down her cheeks. Both broke free from the illusion but were wise enough not to reveal it.

“The beast gods were banished, their temples razed, the tribes scattered. Some fled west into Green Ocean, shedding civilization to return to their ancient haunts. Others sailed south-east beneath cloudless stars, seeking refuge. Only Inari left her breath glowing in empty halls, determined to constrain what could have been our greatest ally against the Burning One.” Her gaze skewered Elia. “We—her last stewards—were trapped in that dying pulse.”

At last, Nick saw her veil slip. The skin under one eye was faintly mottled, as though bruised by disease.

“And so,” Nick said evenly, “the Palace turned into a poison garden to prevent this mysterious ally from escaping.” He dipped a finger into a chalk circle, ready to snap power into the ward if she so much as moved. The owl totem should be able to break the illusion on the girls at his command, but he didn’t want to take any chances.

“I wonder, are we hearing lament, or a recruitment pitch?”

She chuckled softly. “Perceptive mageling. Both. The Burning Goddess grows unchecked; her sect razes anything that reminds the world of the older gods, even now. Perhaps you witnessed Her vanguard.” Her amber gaze flickered, turning a deep black for a moment. “Yet within the Palace of Silver Healing sleeps remedy and weapon. Your small hands could breach wards that men ignore. That which has forced Inari’s hand is powerful indeed. If it were to be let in, it could destroy the Hated One.”

A tremor ran through her glamour. Darkness rippled across her cheeks like oil beneath skin. Where perfect, high bones had been, Nick glimpsed fissures dripping faint lavender pus that evaporated midair. Even so, she remained beautiful—terribly so.

Nick’s breath stilled; snarled at the spiritual wrongness, pushing his heart into galloping rhythm. .

He touched the fresh eagle bone at his belt. .

Elia’s voice trembled but cut through the tension. "Those... singers we met. What led to their condition?”

“Power demands a tithe,” the spirit rasped. Her glamour fissured wider—skin peeling to reveal pustules rimmed in dark flesh. “When the Great Power was trapped, silver wind became violet rot. Some died screaming. Others staggered away, losing their memory to poison. I…” She lifted a distorted hand; nails blackened, dripping sapphire ichor. “I adapted. Pain burned away doubt and left me sharpened. I have been waiting for a long time.”

Each word peeled away more of her glamor. The roiling stench of rot seeped through Nick’s air shield, making Rhea gag. Elia’s will remained firm.

“But vengeance is a currency!” The woman cried, voice now a chorus of overlapping registers. “The Burning Goddess still nurses her flame on beastblood. Strike now, while her gaze does not stray from mortal politics, and topple her pyre. Join me. Wear the blessing that burns disease into power. Rise as plague and purifier both!”

Viscous gas, violent and insidious, oozed from her pores, hissing upon contact with Nick’s invisible barrier. A hiss immediately began where droplets touched the floor.

Nick’s hand snapped, unfurling an ofuda, and his shield whirled viciously.

Yet Elia lifted her chin; one tear traced her cheek, but she spoke with iron. “The gods’ war ended long ago. The young should not bleed for old grudges.”

The spirit’s pupils flared. “Then you are cattle.” Gas exploded outward, and a blast of sludge smashed against Nick’s double wall like a tidal wave.

He reacted immediately, having been prepared for treachery from the start, and the owl bloomed to light, scouring away the last of the illusion, while three unfurled before him.

The darts left silver contrails, ripping holes in the airborne sludge. The spirit’s torso burst apart—but not in gore. Flesh liquefied into magenta ooze, splashing and reforming three strides back.

His mind catalogued its properties even while his stance shifted.

He inhaled to gather a cyclone for follow-up, but Elia caught his sleeve.

“Let me,” she said. Her words trembled like wind at the cliff's edge, yet white flames winked to life along her arms, brighter than he had seen.

Nick read her resolve: grief for a fallen ancestor, forging wrath into something powerful. He responded by funneling oxygen, drawing unseen currents, packing them like bellows around her flames. White transformed into incandescent platinum.

Heat punched outward, and the creature hissed in retreat. Elia stepped into the churning gales, eyes a pale sunfire.

“For the singers,” she whispered—and screamed.

She thrust both palms; gouts of star-white foxfire erupted, torching air into plasma. Nick kept feeding her oxygen, shaping her a path through the toxic gas so that her flames could continue unimpeded. The cavern went bright as the shadows vanished.

The ooze spirit tried to scuttle sideways, twisting and turning with speed far beyond what Elia could match, but the tunnel limited it. Each jet carved burning trails that hemmed it in, cooking molecules before they could recombine. Vapor rose—first violet, then grey, then nothing but clear super-heated air.

Elia advanced, her voice raw, incanting a funeral litany amid the roar of starfire, while Nick continued to feed her the power she needed. He knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that a single misstep here would lead to a terrible fate, so he didn’t hold back, giving her everything necessary to face a more powerful foe.

With every step she took, the flames thickened until the ooze’s mass collapsed inward like sugar in a skillet, shrinking and glassifying.

A screech escaped the boiling spirit, and a pulse of corrupting power exploded through the tunnel.

Nick shielded the girls behind several interlocking barriers, his eyes watering from the heat. His ofuda vibrated, ready to snap if anything penetrated, but nothing did as Elia screamed back and redoubled her efforts to scour it all.

When Elia finally faltered, unable to channel any more power, no matter how easy he made it for her, the tunnel glowed with bubbling lava. A teardrop of obsidian glass remained where the spirit had stood, still glowing cherry red.

Elia swayed, panting, tears cutting soot lines down her face. Nick was beside her instantly, grabbing her elbow before her knees buckled.

Rhea hurried forward with a potion, but Nick held up a hand. White flame still danced around Elia’s hands, and any contact would burn.

She slowly exhaled and closed her palms, and the fire finally winked out. Nick eased her into a seated position as she sagged, creating a shield of fresh air to expel the lingering stench.

The basalt shelf now resembled a forge floor, blackened and cracked. Their soup pot had vaporized. Nick’s owl totem, anchored by his protection circle, alone remained pristine, its light unwavering.

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