"I don't understand much about business matters, but the Toshiyuki family must have its own way of enduring, to have lasted until now."
Amamiya Rin's noncommittal expression left Tsuneki Maaya a little put out, her mood dimming slightly.
"I'm sorry. That was blunt of me."
Amamiya Rin stopped, turned to face her, and lifted a hand to brush a stray petal from her shoulder, his voice carrying just the right note of apology.
"No—it's not Mr. Amamiya's fault. I was just too serious about it."
A faint flush rose on Tsuneki Maaya's cheeks, and the irritation she'd built up scattered like cherry-blossom mist in the wind, most of it gone in an instant.
"Speaking of Kuzunomiya-no-Mikoto's protection, I imagine the Toshiyuki family has witnessed many divine wonders, to have achieved such glory today."
Amamiya Rin smiled faintly, and the calm of it eased the tension from Tsuneki Maaya's shoulders.
"Divine wonders... glory... The Toshiyuki family of today is far from glorious anymore."
She tilted her face up, a nameless shadow of melancholy settling over her lovely features, making no effort to hide the emotion churning in her eyes from him.
Amamiya Rin picked up the thread, his tone even. "Is that so? I'd say otherwise—to hold a footing in Tokyo, and to gather so many guests from prominent families for a single wedding banquet—how is that not glory for the Toshiyuki family?"
"Those guests who can even claim ties to prominent families are only branch relatives or subordinates, sent to deliver a congratulatory gift on the main house's behalf. Besides, if the family truly still had the glory of those years, the position of young master would never have gone to..."
Right at the sharpest point, Tsuneki Maaya stopped short, biting hard on her lower lip and swallowing the treasonous words back down.
Whatever her grievances, she was the eldest daughter of the Toshiyuki family—family shame wasn't meant to be aired outside.
She turned her face away, looking toward the sweeping eaves of the distant haiden, her voice dropping, tinged with self-mockery.
"I'm sorry, that was a slip of the tongue. I shouldn't have said such nonsense in front of a guest."
"No, I don't mind. That you'd say such things to me means you trust me, and that makes me glad."
Amamiya Rin leaned down slightly, bringing his eyes level with Tsuneki Maaya's.
In the dusk, his calm, quiet eyes seemed to hold the warm glow of the lanterns beneath the eaves, mingled with the moonlight spreading through the cherry grove—gentle enough to drown a heart in it.
For a moment, the falling blossoms, the sound of the wind, the distant clamor of the whole garden all blurred into faint shadows—in his eyes, only she remained.
Tsuneki Maaya's heart clenched, a deeper flush rising on her cheeks, even the tips of her ears burning hot. Her tightly pressed lips parted, and her breathing grew unsteady.
The gloom she'd just pushed down, the composure she'd maintained on the surface—all of it lost its footing entirely under his gaze.
"Today's groom, Tsuneki Hisayuki, the young master of the Toshiyuki family, the future head of the house—he isn't a legitimate heir of my family at all. He's an illegitimate child, born to my father and a lowly maidservant in our household."
The words she'd swallowed back moments ago could no longer be held down. Years of accumulated resentment and grievance, more than a decade's worth, spilled from her mouth.
"That maidservant seduced my father—they meant to run away together, but my grandfather found out and separated them in time, sending her off to the countryside. What no one expected was that she was already carrying my father's child by then. And that illegitimate child has now become the heir of the Toshiyuki family."
"Then..." Amamiya Rin's voice paused, and he asked, puzzled, "Does the Toshiyuki family truly have no other heirs?"
The question was like a key, unlocking a Nightmare Tsuneki Maaya had sealed away for years. Amamiya Rin's voice drew that unwanted memory up from the depths of her mind.
Tsuneki Maaya's face paled, her breath catching for a beat. A flicker of unease crossed her eyes, as if she'd been pulled back into that lightless summer.
"There used to be. I had an older brother, three years my senior, already named the family's heir long ago. But when I was young, my brother, my younger sister, my father, my mother, and I all fell ill with a strange disease at the same time. My father, my mother, and my brother—their skin rotted away in patches until they died. My sister and I were also on the brink of death. But on the very night my father, mother, and brother died, our conditions suddenly improved. The sores on our bodies healed overnight."
Her fingertips dug deep into her palms, leaving deep red marks, her voice carrying a chill that wouldn't fade.
"My grandfather never allowed the doctors to perform an autopsy, and he wouldn't even permit a funeral. After my father, mother, and brother died, he decided on his own to have them cremated. Afterward, since the family had lost its heir, he brought that illegitimate child back into the house."
"You suspect this has something to do with Tsuneki Hisayuki?"
A sharp glint flickered in the depths of Amamiya Rin's eyes.
A strange illness. The parents and eldest son dying suddenly. Only the two girls miraculously surviving. And right after, an illegitimate child from outside brought back into the family.
Was this really a natural calamity?
Better to call it a curse wrought by some mysterious power than an accident.
"It's too convenient. It's as if something was clearing away every obstacle standing between him and the seat of power. My grandfather... probably knew about it too."
Under Amamiya Rin's spell, Tsuneki Maaya's expression darkened, anger flashing in her eyes as she uttered these treasonous words.
Had any other member of the Toshiyuki family heard her, they'd likely have been frightened enough to plug their own ears deaf.
Amamiya Rin said nothing in reply. His gaze drifted toward the brightly lit haiden in the distance, his brow furrowing slightly as his mind raced to string every clue together.
First, there was an eighty-percent chance that Kuzunomiya-no-Mikoto, the deity the Toshiyuki family worshipped, truly existed.
He couldn't confirm whether it was the legendary white fox Kuzunoha, but just from the name alone, its true form had to be a fox—and it might even be the famous nine-tailed fox. After all, in Japanese manga and games, that was always the pattern; whenever a fox came up, the nine-tailed fox was never far behind.
Amamiya Rin guessed that this Tsuneki Hisayuki must have some connection to the nine-tailed fox—whether for revenge or to claim the seat of family head, he'd laid a curse on his father, mother, and brother, while the head of the Toshiyuki family, a believer in Kuzunomiya-no-Mikoto, had quietly allowed it to happen.
Of course, this was only a guess. It wasn't necessarily Tsuneki Hisayuki himself wielding the nine-tailed fox's power—and it wasn't necessarily him using the fox's power at all. More likely, it was the fox using him.
After all, by Tsuneki Maaya's account, her parents and brother had died when she was still young—meaning Tsuneki Hisayuki couldn't have been much older himself at the time. How could a mere child make use of a thousand-year-old fox spirit? The reverse made far more sense, and it was, after all, a fairly common pattern.
"Miss Maaya, has anything else strange happened in the Toshiyuki family, besides this?"
Amamiya Rin thought it over briefly before pressing Tsuneki Maaya further.
Tsuneki Maaya's body stiffened slightly, hesitation crossing her face. She bit her lip, clearly on the verge of speaking and then holding back—she plainly knew something, but the family's taboos kept her from telling an outsider so easily.
But when she raised her eyes and met his gaze, gentle and encouraging, the barrier of propriety in her mind collapsed once again.
"Strange things... If you insist on strange things, then there is one pattern in our family: every eight years, the main house takes in a pure, virtuous young woman as a bride. But not long after, that bride mysteriously disappears. According to what's passed down in the family, the bride is spirited away by Kuzunomiya-no-Mikoto into our clan's sacred domain."
Tsuneki Maaya leaned closer to Amamiya Rin, her voice soft.
"Spirited away?"
A chill flickered across Amamiya Rin's eyes.
Call it a spiriting-away if you like—but wasn't this simply a sacrifice, dressed up in nicer words?
A sacrifice carried out once every eight years, with the wedding ceremony itself serving as the ritual—and this time, the offering was none other than Hinako Shimizu.
The thought crystallized at once in Amamiya Rin's mind, and his expression darkened.
Living human sacrifice. An evil god named Kuzunomiya-no-Mikoto. A Toshiyuki family that grew rich amid chaos and calamity... The fortune teller's tarot cards hadn't been wrong at all. Tonight, he was going to send some hinin straight to hell.
"Spirited away? Isn't it a sacrifice! A sacrifice to a fox?"
The moment Tsuneki Maaya's hesitant words faded, a clear, hard, cold female voice rang out from the deep shadow of the cherry trees.
Following the sound, they saw a young woman step slowly out over the fallen blossoms carpeting the ground.
She wore a pale blue dress, her black hair sleek and glossy, neat bangs falling just above her brows, the sides gathered into low twin ponytails bound with wine-red ribbons—crisp and sharp in bearing.
Still, her eyes showed unconcealed resentment and coldness.
Tsuneki Maaya's expression shifted slightly—she recognized who this was.
"You're... Igarashi Sakuko? I remember you. You're on the bride's side—a friend of Hinako Shimizu's."
Tsuneki Maaya's expression turned unpleasant, coldness seeping into her eyes.
This was bad—someone else had overheard everything she'd said.
Cold and composed on the outside, Tsuneki Maaya was in a state of intense anxiety inside.
She ran back over what she'd just said.
That the family had fallen on hard times, so the guests here were nobodies—if that got out, it would insult every guest present and invite contempt from other families as well.
That the young master, Tsuneki Hisayuki, was illegitimate, and that she resented him for it—outsiders would only laugh it off, but the family would never tolerate such disrespect toward the young master, such a challenge to family authority.
Worst of all, she'd flatly claimed that Tsuneki Hisayuki, backed by some power, had murdered her father, mother, and brother, and that her grandfather had quietly allowed it—slandering both the current and the next head of the family in one breath. Being simply cast out and disowned would count as a stroke of luck amid misfortune.
As she calmed down and grasped just what she'd said, and what consequences it might bring, a wave of dizziness swept through Tsuneki Maaya.
Right now, she almost wished she'd actually fainted.
For a moment, Tsuneki Maaya could hardly believe it—what madness had come over her, to say all that out loud?
"How long have you been eavesdropping?"
Tsuneki Maaya pressed her fingers to her temples, took a deep breath, and asked Igarashi Sakuko.
"Since your family died of that strange illness."
Igarashi Sakuko said bluntly.
"That wasn't a strange illness. It was a curse—a curse laid on the Toshiyuki family by the fox that seized the seat of the agricultural deity."
This girl, who'd appeared out of nowhere, whose identity was unknown except that she was a friend of the bride, had blurted out something so shocking and inexplicable without any lead-up at all.
"What... what are you talking about?"
Tsuneki Maaya froze completely, the coldness on her face replaced by shock. Her mouth opened and closed as she stared at the resentful young woman before her, at a loss for how to respond.
"Miss Igarashi, is it? What do you know?"
Amamiya Rin's expression didn't change at all. While speaking with Tsuneki Maaya, he'd already sensed someone approaching and hiding nearby—he simply hadn't said anything to expose her.
He hadn't expected such a pleasant surprise.
"Of course. I'm from Ebisugaoka, a shrine maiden of Igarashi Shrine, and its future head priestess as well. I'm also Hinako's good friend. I know a thing or two about the Toshiyuki family and about Hinako."
Igarashi Sakuko raised her head, introducing herself with evident pride.
"An esper?"
Amamiya Rin looked somewhat surprised.
Aside from Indou Ranko and the pair from Huanghun Jinshi, this was his first time meeting an esper—and one from an orthodox shrine lineage, no less.
"That's right! I'm an esper."
At Amamiya Rin's question, Igarashi Sakuko's voice rose, as though she'd grown excited.
Her manner seemed a little off, somehow.
"What nonsense are you spouting?"
Tsuneki Maaya, however, wasn't impressed in the slightest by Igarashi Sakuko's claimed identity. As for shrine maidens, she herself was practically one—but espers? Weren't those all just con artists putting on a show?
"Miss Igarashi, I don't care how much you overheard or what you know. I hope you'll keep your mouth shut and not go spreading nonsense outside... and that you won't do anything to disrupt this wedding."
Tsuneki Maaya's voice turned unusually cold, her gaze sharp as she stared at Igarashi Sakuko, as if trying to press her into submission.
If Amamiya Rin hadn't been watching, she'd have already called the servants to seize Igarashi Sakuko and lock her away.
After all, this wedding was a matter of great importance. If Igarashi Sakuko was allowed to run her mouth and cause trouble, the Toshiyuki family would surely lose all face—and she herself would face the family head's punishment.
"Miss Igarashi, from this moment on, please forget everything you just heard. Go back to the banquet, stay with Miss Shimizu's parents, and quietly see this wedding through to the end. It's for your own good, and for Miss Shimizu's as well."
Tsuneki Maaya took two steps toward Igarashi Sakuko, her composed face and icy words making no effort to hide their threat.
"For my own good, and for Hinako's good—that's exactly why I won't back down!"
But the girl called Igarashi Sakuko showed no fear at all. Instead, she seemed eager, almost thrilled, as if gearing up to fight something—giving off an air that seemed a little too pleased with itself.
"Please calm down, Miss Maaya."
Tsuneki Maaya's expression grew uglier by the moment, taking on a chilling edge. Just as she was about to snap, Amamiya Rin stepped forward and placed himself between her and Igarashi Sakuko.
At the sight of Amamiya Rin blocking her path, Tsuneki Maaya's movements stilled. The anger and anxiety churning in her chest faded away, most of it gone, her tense body relaxing, her mood settling into something calmer.
____
🔥 HELP UNLOCK THE NEXT BONUS CHAPTER!
* Comment & Win: For every 5 REVIEWS on this chapter, 1 bonus chapter is released!
* Power Stones: Hit 100 POWER STONES? Bonus chapter unlocked!
* Early Access: Can't wait? Support on P@treon: Walnut-chan to read up to 40 chapters ahead and unlock a library of 60+ stories!
🔥 New history: DanMachi: Inheriting the Legacy of Alternate Versions — posted on The_Mikudayo