Chapter Eleven, in which I Learn it’s (Apparently) All My Fault I’m Not Popular

* * * *

I couldn’t run all the way back to the mansion, but the time it took to get there was much shorter than expected. Perhaps time simply felt like it was flying by more quickly amidst my flurry of thoughts. What kind of person was this shrine maiden like? Would she really be able to help me? Was it even right for me to bother her in the first place? And even if she had dealt with spirits before, would she believe my story and wish to assist?

And all the while, I tried to discern what it was I really wanted out of all this. Did I just want to know if there was a way I could ever speak to Kijimuta-san again? And if there was a way… Was there a point? What would I even say?

I couldn’t think of any answers by the time I reached the mansion. The entry was still locked, and a search around the house didn’t reveal any signs of a visitor having arrived yet. I unlocked the front doorway and took a look inside. There weren’t any extra pairs of sandals or boots at the entry. I proceeded to check each of the rooms and hallways just in case—but again there was nothing new to find. The only thing different I noticed was how all of Kijimuta-san’s messages had disappeared.

My hope was that the priest was right about his sister’s tendency to take a long time to get anywhere, and that I had managed to arrive here before she did. Considering she hadn’t left long before I had, perhaps there was a good chance I did get here first. Of course, there was a possibility the shrine maiden did manage to find her way here without difficulty, and upon finding the mansion locked and deserted she decided to return to the village. If that was the case, I simply needed to wait it out here until the old man returned. Once I was payed for my work’s completion, I could return to the shrine and speak to her there.

In the meantime, I needed to focus on the mansion itself. Was there a reason my experience with Kijimuta-san did not match up with the ghost stories that plagued this place in decades past?

I got a fire going in the main room’s fire pit and sat down with a cup of boiled water. Unable to think straight, I had forgotten to add the tea. But instead of getting back up to get some, I simply stared into the clear water, my thoughts struggling to catch up with me. There really was something missing, I felt. Like some part of me just… wasn’t there.

The rising vapors brought to mind the notion of a wispy, evanescent ghost. Without warning, Kijimuta-san entered my life—and now she was already gone. Vanished into nothingness. Maybe things were amended with her parents, but was everything truly settled?

Of course not. Life doesn’t magically end with everything settled perfectly. It isn’t like that for anyone. Such thoughts didn’t make me feel any better though.

I took my time drinking the tasteless hot water. I wanted to just focus on keeping warm, but I ended up thinking about Kijimuta-san’s favorite food—soup. Perhaps the hot water reminded me of that. Just change the ingredients a bit and you have an entirely new soup, she had said. It was a funny thing to say. Kijimuta-san was pretty funny.

My mind wandered on and on, and the minutes soon gave way to what felt like hours. I went about tidying up the mansion as best I could, but that didn’t take as long as I expected. It was times like this when it would have been nice to have a book to read, but I didn’t have money for that sort of thing. I decided to look through what I did have: my texts on ghosts.

I skimmed through the pages and scrolls, but nothing stood out to me. It was all the same words I had read time and time again, and none of it looked that helpful right now. I knew all sorts of techniques for summoning and communicating with ghosts, but I couldn’t utilize any of them. All my attempts at sealing and exorcising Kijimuta-san had made it abundantly clear I couldn’t be an onmyoji just because I wanted to be one.

I returned everything to my pack and made another search through the mansion—mainly just to make sure I hadn’t missed anything suspicious. The silence of the mansion had taken on a more foreboding atmosphere, I felt. In part this had to be due to the absence of Kijimuta-san, but there was also everything the priest had said about his great-grand uncle. Could that man have become a ghost, just as the priest claimed? If such a ghost was still around, that meant he had been dead for quite a long time. There wasn’t anything I would be able to do for a ghost like that. I wondered if the shrine maiden would be able to deal with such an attached spirit, whose vengeance would presumably have only grown deeper and more dangerous over time.

Once back in the main room, I noticed a scrap of paper in a dark corner. I must have missed it while cleaning up my makeshift ofuda charms, so I walked over and bent down to pick it up.

As soon as I did so, I heard a loud bang against the thick wooden wall—a hard thunk that resonated just above my head.

I stepped back and stood up to find a giant kitchen knife sticking out of the wall. It was a meat cleaver I had seen in the kitchen earlier.

There wasn’t a moment for me to wonder what it was doing here. I turned around and found another knife floating in the air, just past the sliding door leading to the kitchen. As soon as I turned around, a single red word formed across the entire far wall of the room—a gleaming, crimson mess strewn about in one frantic stroke.

DIE.

There was only a moment for me to react. I immediately leaped to the right, just as the invisible assailant threw the knife where I had been standing. The phantom had used the sudden inscription of blood as a distraction, but I had luckily already experienced such ghostly messages on the wall before. Fortunately the concept of a ghost actually existing in general wasn’t new to me either—otherwise I would have probably been too shocked and confused to do anything.

Both knives were in the wall behind me now, but I had no way of telling where the enemy was in this room. I had to act right away, before the ghost tried anything more.

I lifted up the ofuda I had picked off the floor and held it straight out in front of me.

“I invoke the Tsurugaoka Curse upon all impurities within this room,” I said with all the bold confidence I could muster. “Any harm intended upon this onmyoji will immediately be returned a hundred-fold to the spirit responsible. I suggest you let me help you, fallen priest Mishima Ichiro.”

The piece of paper I held had nothing to do with a curse, and as far as I knew there was no such thing as a Tsurugaoka Curse in the first place. I was also taking a risk by calling out to the ghost by name like this—there was a chance this wasn’t the priest’s great grand-uncle, after all. But it seemed rather likely at that moment, and I had to give it my all to convince this spirit I was a ghost hunter.

Nothing happened for what felt like a very long time, but it might have only been a few seconds. I didn’t sense any kind of movement. All was silent. There was no sign of anyone but me in the room, which felt both relieving and unsettling at the same time. I had to get out of here, but I couldn’t try to run just yet. I had to wait and see if anything would happen… at least for a few minutes. Or maybe just a minute. I decided on half a minute.

Before even a few seconds passed, writing appeared on another wall. And then another. No, writing was already there. Writing was on all the walls. And the ceiling. And it was all the same word, over and over, gleaming in dripping, splotchy crimson.

DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE.

DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE.

DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE.

DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE.

This ghost… really didn’t like me at all, did he? But as soon as I thought that, I realized the reasoning behind his hatred. It was because of an onmyoji that this ghost’s brother died. The ghost realized I was an onmyoji—or at least, I looked like one to him—and he was awakened from his ghostly slumber to wreak vengeance according to the attachment that kept him in this mortal realm: his utter hatred for those of my purported profession.

It was too late to run. Instead, I stood up straight and folded my arms, careful to not show the slightest hint of fear. All my years of wearing a mask had paid off well—the act was somehow easy to pull off, despite the fact I was in much more danger than I had ever been before in my entire life. This ghost was going to do everything in his power to kill me, and I was utterly defenseless against him.

“I realize you harbor a deep grudge against onmyoji,” I said. “I hold no ill feelings toward you, however. Though I may be a ghost hunter, I only care to exorcise the ghosts I’m payed to deal with. I’ve already taken care of the spirit I was assigned to, and I don’t enjoy working any harder than I must. In other words, I have no need to dispose of you. I will be here only until tomorrow morning. If you leave me alone until then, I will leave you be as well. But if you fight me… Well, I may not be so merciful as to grant you a mere exorcism.” There was a great variety of methods ghost hunters could use to handle spirits, and some were much less painless than others.

Perhaps another half-minute passed, and all remained silent. I couldn’t guess what the phantom was thinking to do. I couldn’t even be sure he was still in this room. There was nothing floating in the air. No more death threats materialized on the walls—but then again, there wasn’t really any space left for another kanji to fit anywhere. I struggled to keep myself from shivering. The fire was still going, but just barely. A part of me kept expecting the flames to suddenly die out, at which point the ghost would come charging at me with a katana or something. I tried to remember if there was a display katana resting on a stand in one of the nearby rooms.

My frantic train of thoughts was interrupted by footsteps. I flinched, but realized the footsteps were outside the room. Someone was running—and the footsteps quickly grew louder. Someone was coming here, to this room. I had to ready myself for the ghost, or whoever this was. But what was there to do when I didn’t know who was approaching, and when I couldn’t see the ghost?

I just hoped I wasn’t about to die.

A woman sprinted into the room. Judging by her white kimono jacket and long, red, pleated hakama skirt, this was clearly a miko—a shrine maiden. Upon recognizing this my tense muscles relaxed a little—but a moment later the shrine maiden was right in front of me, her arm pulled back and already swinging toward me.

I thought to step back, but before I could begin the woman slapped me in the face—far harder than I had expected of her. I stumbled back, but before I could trip over my feet the shrine maiden twisted to her left—really just a continuation of her slap—and proceeded to elbow me in the stomach. Again, far harder than I had expected of her.

I couldn’t have anticipated any of this. Especially when the appearance of the shrine maiden was still registering in my head as my opportunity to survive the haunting of the vengeful ghost. I collapsed onto the floor, unable to manage anything more than a dying groan.

“Hold on a second,” the shrine maiden said. She took a step back and bent down to one knee.

Gripping my stomach, I struggled to look up at the woman, who had an exceptionally fierce look in her eyes. She studied me with a penetrating glare, and in the meanwhile her frown lengthened so far, her head began to shake.

“You’re not a ghost, you idiot!” she screamed. And she didn’t wait for me to even attempt a response before she kicked me in the shin. “Are you in league with the ghost?”

I was at a complete loss for words, though that may have been mostly from all the pain this random woman inflicted upon me for no reason. I had met some bizarre people over the course of my years of travel… but this individual was already a contender for most bizarre—not to mention personal least favorite.

“Just a bystander? You better get up quick then. There’s a ghost loose about the mansion! Do you want to die?” The shrine maiden stood up and began pacing about the room, giving a few cursory glances over the various DIE DIE DIE messages strewn across the walls. “Whatever! If it’s a fight he wants, I’m ready for him! What are you doing here, anyways?”

I was making an effort to get on my knees, but when I saw the shrine maiden running back over to me I considered curling back into a ball. Instead she grabbed me by the shoulders and forced me to stand up. This sent a flash of pain into the leg she had kicked, but with a couple quick motions she had my left arm draped over her shoulder and her right arm supporting my back.

“Did I surprise you there? I had to make sure you weren’t a ghost, you know. Physical violence just doesn’t work with them! Have you ever tried to punch a ghost before? It just doesn’t work.” She bobbed her head forward with each word of her last sentence.

It was difficult to keep up with this woman, in more ways than one. She hurried back into the hallway, forcing me along with her.

“I have to find the ghost! And I can’t let him kill any more people. So follow my lead and you just might live, okay?”

“Yes,” I said, still having to force myself to not groan. “I assume you’re the shrine maiden… Akita-san?”

“Of course!” She turned her head toward mine to stare me straight in the eyes. “If there’s a ghost, you call for me!” She wore such an overwhelmingly stern expression, I couldn’t help but wonder if this was all a joke.

But no, she was just insane. Or something close to it.

We continued down another hallway, but there was still no sign of the ghost I had encountered. Or at least thought I encountered. Given the shrine maiden’s… eccentric nature… I had to wonder if this was some kind of elaborate ruse set up by her. She and her brother were both unusual, and the priest’s playful nature may have just been a much calmer rendition of his sister’s hot-blooded zeal.

Once I was able to walk on my own again without slowing the shrine maiden down, I decided to find out what she knew about the supposed ghost in question.

“This ghost is dangerous then? Have you dealt with ghosts like this before?”

“Yes. No.”

“Yes to the ghost being dangerous; no to having dealt with ghosts before?”

“Yes.”

“Why would anyone call you for trouble with ghosts then?”

The shrine maiden stepped in front of me to turn around, her motion so swift I nearly walked right into her. She shoved me back, then held her arms in a theatrical pose—one hand upon her chest, the other hand raised high to her side.

“I am a ghost expert! It’s finally time for me to prove myself, Random Man I Don’t Know. I’ve been training my entire life, waiting for this day. Everyone’s counting on me to deal with this ghost!”

Perhaps I needed to try a much more basic question. “When did you get here, Akita-san?”

“Hold it! Who are you?”

Now she asks me this? “Tsunoda Naoki. I was hired to deal with a ghost here.”

Akita-san’s eyes widened and she frowned even deeper than I had seen her manage before.

“The cycle is repeating. Are you going to end up killing me when it comes time to be rid of this ghost? My brother might come over and kill you in revenge. See what you’ve done? What a mess you’ve made!”

This shrine maiden was really getting ahead of herself, but I did have to wonder just how interconnected this new series of events was with everything else that had transpired the past few days. Was there somehow a connection with Kijimuta-san to be found in all this as well? At the very least, it seemed clear she had been drawn to this mansion following her departure from her ruined home. Perhaps the ghost that was here first had played some role in everything I was never aware of.

We searched through the mansion, but didn’t encounter the ghost again. I wanted to believe that maybe there wasn’t a ghost here after all, but I couldn’t think of another explanation for the floating knife and all the spontaneously splattering messages in blood. It was too much like the things Kijimuta-san had been capable of, to be anything otherwise.

“What did you do?” Akita-san asked. “How could the ghost just disappear like this?”

“I did threaten him,” I said. “So perhaps he left.”

“We must prepare for his inevitable return.” And with that, she led me to one of the mansion’s bedrooms—the one I had slept in, in fact. In the room I spotted a variety of objects a shrine maiden would employ for communion with spirits. What stood out the most was a bow and arrow, both of which were elaborately carved in a wood with many small and elegant flourishes. The wood used for the ceremonial weapon was dark and polished, and clearly wasn’t meant to be used on a regular basis. This was an azusa-yumi meant for exorcising impurities.

“I see you came prepared,” I said. “When did you get here, by the way? I never did get an answer to that.”

The shrine maiden knelt down to rummage through a small bag of supplies, including paper and ink for ofuda talismans. “Just before you, I imagine. But speaking of which, I didn’t see you here when I first made a search through the mansion. When did you get here?”

“Late morning, though I was here a couple days ago as well. I had to leave for some business in your village.”

It seemed we might have missed each other while searching the mansion. It was understandable, given how large it was—especially if neither of us made much noise. I still wasn’t sure what to think of the shrine maiden in general though. Perhaps she could help me; perhaps she couldn’t. But either way, she seemed dangerous to be around for too long.

“What do you know about the ghost?” she said as she got out her inkstone.

“I only know what your brother told me: a story about a priest’s brother who supposedly became a vengeful yurei here. When the ghost tried to kill me without warning, I threatened him with a curse. He then wrote die a few times on all the walls in that room, as I’m sure you noticed. I suppose it’s not a guarantee that this ghost is Mishima-san, but it seems to fit rather well.”

“Yes, it makes sense if he hates onmyoji,” the shrine maiden said. “And he died filled with regret and wrath, a dangerous combination. After so many years of malevolence building in his heart, it’s not surprising to see just how devoted he is to his attachment.”

“He likely still wishes to kill me,” I said. “And he might be willing to kill you too, if you try to stop him. Even if you are related to him.”

“He’s in a killing mood, so I don’t doubt it.” She quickly finished jotting down the appropriate inscription for her thin paper talisman. Her scribbled calligraphy was much more reminiscent of Mishima-san’s writing than of Kijimuta-san’s.

As she tied the talisman to the end of the arrow, just behind the lethal point, she looked up to me with a stare just as lethally pointed. “Can you actually believe it though? That someone would actually try to kill me? Me? Someone as cute as me?”

Cute was about the last word I’d describe her with—not with such an aggressive look serving as the default expression on her face. But if disregarding that perhaps she did hold the appearance of a graceful miko, with her long hair tied back with red and white hair ribbons. She seemed to be in her mid-twenties, perhaps even the same age I was.

“Who knows, maybe the ghost will be smitten by your pure-hearted demeanor,” I said. “But then again, it seems you’re turning to physical violence once more.”

“This bow and arrow is ceremonial,” the shrine maiden said. “Though I imagine it would kill you if you stepped in front of its trajectory, huh? You better watch yourself!”

“Just keep it aimed at the ghost. You’ve practiced shooting one of these before, I hope?”

“No, this is my first time!” She stood up with her weapon, but held the bow backwards with the wooden frame against her shoulder. She placed the arrow’s shaft crookedly against the string and turned to look at me cross-eyed.

“Please tell me you’re joking,” I said.

She straightened up and returned to her more typical stern expression. “Don’t worry, Onmyoji-san, I have already formulated a plan to cleanse this lonely mansion of its ghostly affliction.”

“And that is?”

“Shooting the ghost with this talisman, of course. But you will play a role as well. How good are you at running away from ghosts?”

“Oh, so I’m going to be the decoy.”

“Decoy! Yes, that is the perfect word for you. The ghost wants to kill you, so all you have to do is run away while I shoot the arrow. Are you up to the task, Decoy-san?”

“No, I don’t really want to be the bait for a plan that hinges entirely on your ability to wield a weapon you haven’t used before.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve used it before. As soon as I get a sense of where the ghost is at, I’ll send him an arrow and we can go back to the village and have a nice big ‘Congratulations to Our Humble Shrine Maiden’ party. Doesn’t that sound nice?”

I had no comment for any of this.

Akita-san pointed the arrow she held toward the sliding door. “Onmyoji first.”

“Are you going to be able to actually hit the ghost with that arrow?” I had to ask. “It sounds like you already know you won’t be able to actually see the ghost.”

“If you weren’t able to see him, then I doubt I will either,” the shrine maiden said. “Given how long the ghost has been bound to this mansion, it makes sense that he has enough power to keep himself hidden from us.”

I had to hope that wasn’t the case, because I didn’t like the idea of Akita-san shooting at an invisible target. My assumption was that I couldn’t see the ghost because I wasn’t actually an onmyoji. But if the shrine maiden had legitimate spiritual powers, then presumably she’d be able to see the ghost—and exorcise him too, assuming everything went smoothly.

Unfortunately, it didn’t sound like she had any experience with ghost hunting. But perhaps there was a way I could help her with this task, and then get the information I was looking for regarding Kijimuta-san.

“If anything goes wrong,” Akita-san said, “just return to this room. I’ve set up a spiritual barrier I can activate once we’re inside, and that should keep us safe from the ghost. For a little while.”

At least there was a chance of survival then, in the event that Akita-san failed to dispel the ghost. I prepared a couple ofuda charms of my own though, just in case I needed to try intimidating Mishima-san again. I wasn’t sure how many times I could fool this ghost, and it wasn’t clear I had really done so the first time, considering I couldn’t see his reaction. Granted, he didn’t attack me again—but perhaps he had simply left to go look for another weapon. There was no way to know what he was planning now, or if he was already taking measures to deal with Akita-san. Considering this ghost was a priest well-versed in spirit-related matters, our opponent probably had a good idea of what we would try to do.

I kept all this in mind as I walked out the door and on down the hallway. The shrine maiden followed me on tiptoe from a good distance away, doing well to not make a sound. I wasn’t sure if the effort would help, but I decided to traverse the various rooms as quietly as possible as well. Perhaps the ghost was quieter than we were, but there was at least some chance we could sneak up on him.

I felt disconcerted about it though. Was Mishima-san that different from Kijimuta-san? He suffered so much he felt he had to kill himself. I doubted he wanted to become a ghost, especially when he was a priest who had been trying to help people his whole life—including in matters concerning spirits. If I had been a real ghost expert and managed to exorcise Kijimuta-san without hesitation…

Well, that was what I tried to do at first. But it was a good thing I didn’t succeed, wasn’t it? She never meant any harm, so making the effort to free her from her attachment was worth it in the end.

But this time, the ghost in question was actively trying to kill me. Was there a way to reason with him? And was there a way to actually bring an end to the burden that plagued him, which made him the spirit he is today? I didn’t feel it likely I would ever learn enough about him to even make such an attempt—not with Akita-san so determined to do away with him as soon as possible.

Realizing this only made me feel worse, though. I didn’t like having to force unhappy endings upon everyone like this.

I checked inside each bedroom while Akita-san held her bow and arrow steady, prepared to fire the moment I bolted out of the way. My plan was to simply run from the ghost—assuming I saw a floating weapon of some sort—and as soon as said weapon was out floating in the hallway I would drop to the floor and hope the shrine maiden could see the spirit and accurately shoot him. It wasn’t much of a plan, but it was the best I could come up with on the spot.

The tea room proved to be deserted, and so did the storage room. There was nothing out of the ordinary in the old man’s bedroom, and there were no floating knives waiting for me in the kitchen. Finally I made my way to the main room and front entry, but with the exception of the ghost’s deathly messages there wasn’t anything suspicious to find.

“Could he have left the mansion?” I asked the shrine maiden.

“I rather doubt Mishima-san would become a wandering spirit,” she said. “This was the site of his tragedy. It would be hard to classify him as anything but a bound spirit, considering all the tales that have cropped up here over the years.”

“There have been more tragedies here, I’ve heard.”

“Yes, lots of terrible stories. I intend to put an end to such nonsense though.”

Akita-san was a rough individual, but her heart at least seemed in the right place, and perhaps that zealous determination of hers would prove beneficial in the end. Looking at this situation from her point of view, it really made sense for her to be passionate about it all. Her great-grandfather, great grand-uncle, and grand-aunt all died at this mansion. It was no wonder she wanted to put an end to this bloodshed, this cycle of vengeful ghosts and ghost hunters.

I had to wonder if she was going about it the right way though.

“Akita-san, do you think there’s a more peaceful or… a simpler approach we can take here?”

“No.”

“Is there’s a chance you could communicate with the ghost?”

“I already tried.” She folded her arms, holding her arrow in one hand and her bow in the other. “I used every method I could think of, but nothing worked. I could sense his presence as soon as I arrived, but he would not respond to any of my summons.”

She motioned her head toward some of the gleaming blood behind her. “I don’t really want to die, and I don’t think the ghost truly wants to kill me either. Or you. So let’s free this ghost of his misery. The sooner the better.”

I supposed there wasn’t much arguing with that. But I decided I’d still try to keep my mind open for any other solutions, should I piece together any decent possibilities at some point.

* * * *

We ended up returning to the room Akita-san kept all her supplies at. She set her bow and arrow down and took on a gaze that leaned more toward daring than simply angry.

“I can try summoning the ghost to us,” she said. She opened her pack and took out a large round bell and some paper tassels, which she promptly tied to the end of a thin walking stick leaning in the corner of the room.

“Will you perform a kagura dance?” I asked. “Would this kind of spirit really be drawn to it?”

“Yes and maybe,” Akita-san said. “It’s worth a shot, and at the very least the music should interrupt whatever the ghost is scheming right now.”

She grinned at that, but I didn’t know if such a ritual would really help much.

My eyes turned at the sign of movement, however. Just to the right of the shrine maiden was her arrow. It was floating in the air, the pointed end arcing directly toward the side of her neck.

I grabbed Akita-san’s hand and pulled her toward me. For a moment she looked surprised, but as I stepped backward and she stumbled forward, the arrow caught in her hair. Akita-san immediately flicked her head to the side, whipping her hair and the entangled arrow in front of her. She grabbed it with her free hand, wrenched her other hand from my grasp, and turned around in one swift motion.

As I regained my footing, the shrine maiden leaped forward, repeatedly swinging the arrow around in long, furious arcs. Hitting nothing but air, she frantically ran about the room, jabbing the arrow in random directions.

Bloody writing appeared on each of the walls simultaneously.

DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE.

The shrine maiden only ran faster and swung the arrow about with more fury, gritting her teeth to fight against her heavy breathing.

I was watching for any floating objects, but there had to be something more I could do. Akita-san clearly couldn’t see the ghost, which either meant the ghost indeed was very powerful and could remain invisible even to a well-trained spiritualist—or it meant Akita-san wasn’t nearly as spiritually-inclined as she professed to be. Both were strong possibilities, but regardless there was no doubt the ghost was here in this room. I had spent the last few days with a ghost—did the same rules that applied to Kijimuta-san likewise apply to Mishima-san?

Kijimuta-san could pick up objects, but only for a brief time. And she couldn’t make contact with the living. Neither of us could touch each other.

It was possible that the ghost here was avoiding the shrine maiden’s attacks, but her movements were all over the place and unpredictable. It didn’t seem likely the ghost would be able to dodge the arrow and its ofuda this many times.

Kijimuta-san also wrote in blood, which she said came from her fingertips at will. Was this ghost the same way? Or was his control over this phantom blood actually far greater? Considering how there was so much writing covering multiple places at once in a single instant, that seemed likely.

With all these pieces put together in my mind, I knew immediately where the ghost was hiding.

I pointed to the floor, below where Akita-san first attempted to attack the ghost.

“He’s lying here!” I yelled. Without a moment’s hesitation Akita-san leaped to the spot, crashing to her knees and slamming the arrow into the tatami floor.

She maintained this position, struggling to breathe at first but gradually managing to take deep breaths at a slow, exhausted pace.

There wasn’t anything else happening. I had expected the ghost to appear screaming and crumbling into ash, or something. But nothing happened.

“Did… you get him?”

The shrine maiden stood up and punched me in the stomach. As I keeled over, she spun in place and kicked me in the back of the legs. I lost my footing completely and landed flat on my back.

“The ghost is getting away!” she screamed. Before I could even attempt to lift my head, she had run out of the room with her bow and arrow.

I was just about ready to switch over to the ghost’s side.

* * * *

It took some time to find the shrine maiden again after that. I searched through each room of the mansion, careful to watch for anything fatal floating about. After one loop through the mansion, I decided to check through the things she brought, hoping to find something I could somehow defend myself with.

There was her staff with bells, but I didn’t have it in me to perform a shrine maiden dance any time soon. Then in her bag were some basic traveling supplies, some food, and a water flask. Beyond that, there was a variety of ofuda as well as a tassel of zig-zagging papers—the kind shrine maidens used for purification.

Among the talismans I noticed what looked like a few shikigami—enchanted paper cut into various shapes, used for the summoning of spirits who serve their master. In this case, the papers were cut to look like basic human figures, and on each of their heads they carried an old kanji I couldn’t discern. I had never seen anyone actually summon a spirit before, but supposedly a shikigami either agreed to protect the master or had been bound by force. According to my readings, some of them were distinct spirits or kami that existed long before encountering the practitioner, but most were simple entities somehow conjured up for the sake of fulfilling small tasks. I had always imagined the vast majority of purported shikigami out there were simply magic tricks. A little preparation and some sleight of hand could quite easily make a paper figure flutter about for a captive audience.

I didn’t think Akita-san was out to fool anyone—she likely fulfilled her day-to-day duties at the shrine well enough, even if she hardly acted the part—but I had begun to doubt the veracity of her claims regarding the spiritual power she held. It takes a fake ghost expert to know one, perhaps. And if that was the case, was there any way she was going to be able to exorcise the ghost? Let alone help me find a way to contact Kijimuta-san? If the shrine maiden had working shikigami she would have used them by now; the fact she hadn’t probably meant there weren’t any spirits in those paper figures.

I decided to borrow one just in case though, if only so I could maintain the appearance of an onmyoji, should I run into the ghost again while searching for Akita-san. Of course, I had to doubt I’d be able to fool the ghost much longer. If I had ever fooled him at all.

Searching through the various rooms once more, I came across a sword lying on display in a nook in the main bedroom. Just above a large trunk that supposedly held the old man’s futon, a long ebony and jade-colored sheath rested within a polished wooden stand, complete with a golden inscription of what I took to be the old man’s family crest: a circle with a very ornate leaf inside it. Upon closer inspection, I noticed there were many tiny leaves etched into the sheath—they were barely visible since they weren’t painted in, but there had to be hundreds of them.

I picked up the sword and unsheathed it a bit to check that it was real. It seemed short for a katana, so it was probably a wakizashi. I didn’t want the ghost to get his hands on this, and I didn’t think it wise to carry it around myself. I was never trained in kendo, and I didn’t want a repeat of what happened with the shrine maiden’s arrow—so I hid the sword behind the futon trunk and left the rest of the room the way it was.

Once back in the hallway, I spotted Akita-san a few meters away. She turned and pointed her bow and arrow directly toward me. I stood motionless, and after a few seconds she pointed her bow down and withdrew the arrow.

“Watch yourself, Onmyoji-san! This mansion is haunted. Or have you managed to exorcise the ghost? I’ll kill you if you did!”

“No, I haven’t seen the ghost anywhere,” I said. “But hold on, you’d kill me?”

The shrine maiden held her bow and arrow in one hand so she could flutter her other hand toward me. “It’s a joke, Onmyoji-san. I would never hurt a soul.”

Quite likely the most ridiculous thing I’d heard all week. And that was saying something.

“I take it you didn’t find where the ghost went either?”

“No, he’s gone into hiding,” Akita-san said.

“I must have been wrong about the ghost’s location earlier. I’m sorry.” I assumed she blamed me for the ghost’s escape, but I hoped this was mitigated by the fact I did save her life just beforehand.

“No, I’m positive he was there, right where you pointed,” Akita-san said. “He just slipped away somehow, right at the last second.”

Perhaps he rolled through her feet and ran off just in time. There was no way to be certain though when neither of us could see him.

“Is there a way we could make the ghost visible?” I asked.

Akita-san frowned. “Maybe we can dump a bag of rice flour on him…”

“No, that wouldn’t work.”

She did that little hand wave again. “It’s a joke, Onmyoji-san. Don’t worry, I can use a shikigami to make the phantom visible. Maybe.”

Maybe?

We headed back to the room Akita-san kept all her things in. Once she checked each corner of the room to try sensing the ghost, she sealed the room off with some ofuda on the sliding door. I hoped it would work, but I wasn’t about to count on it enough to let my guard down.

The shrine maiden held up the paper doll cutout she intended to use. “If I can sense the ghost once more, my shikigami will attach itself to the spirit in question. We’ll be able to see the ghost at that point, and all I’ll need to do then is shoot him with the purifying arrow.”

“He could still dodge you, unfortunately. This is an agile ghost, and he’s aware of the weapon you’re using. Since you only have one shot, we’ll be in trouble if you miss. You’re going to need to bind the spirit first.”

Akita-san didn’t look pleased with my commentary, but still seemed to recognize the validity of my point.

“That’s one too many things for me to do! You bind the spirit, Onmyoji-san. I recommend doing so in a way that won’t put you in my line of fire.”

It made sense for me to assist in this ghost-capturing process, but I didn’t possess the ability to bind ghosts, nor could I do anything else an onmyoji was supposed to be capable of. I wasn’t quite ready to reveal the fact I was a fraud though. There was no telling what this shrine maiden would do.

“I can make the appropriate paper talismans… but I have to admit, I don’t know if I have enough energy left to ensure the binding will work properly. I’ve been dealing with spirit-related matters quite extensively the past few days, so I might be at my limits.”

It was perhaps at least somewhat true. In any line of work, people get exhausted if they keep at it for too long. The work of onmyoji, priests, shrine maidens, and the like could then be considered spiritually taxing. There was only so much one person could do in a given time.

My excuse may have appeared legitimate enough, but that didn’t stop Akita-san from putting on the mask of a demonic oni and staring me down with all the fury of a raging dragon. I could practically feel the pillars of flames erupting around her.

“Fine!” she screamed. She grabbed four pieces of paper and thrust them into my face. “Just place these ofuda around the ghost, and I’ll activate the binding spell myself! I’ll have all the time in the world after that, so I can take my time shooting him afterward.”

I took the ofuda from her shaking hand and tried to smile. “I think it’s a good plan. Thank you, Akita-san.”

She stepped back, closed her eyes, and took a couple deep breaths. When she opened her eyes again, she was still frowning—but she at least seemed to regain her composure. “I apologize. I have to admit I’m nervous right now. I’ve been working for years, studying everything I can about spirits and how to help people who are afflicted by them. I feel like… this is the moment I’ve been preparing for, ever since I became a shrine maiden. I shouldn’t force you to help me if you don’t want to.”

“No, it’s fine,” I said. “I’m a poor excuse for an onmyoji. I would be upset with me too.” I hoped a bit of humility would help at this moment, and indeed she appeared to relax a little more.

“Tsunoda-san, I would rather not judge you if I can help it. The conflict between a shrine official and an onmyoji was what led to this mansion being haunted in the first place. I would rather not continue that cycle.”

“I agree.”

The shrine maiden had said before that she wished to prove her worth, so perhaps she never really felt useful to her little village before. I understood her desire to feel needed by her community at large, and all her heart was being put into this one big chance of hers. This surely explained why she had ventured all the way here as soon as she heard the rumors of a ghost at this mansion.

“We need to decide where to confront the ghost,” she said.

“The main room will be best,” I said. “You’ll need room to fire your arrow. There’s a chance the revealing or binding won’t go smoothly, and you’ll have to fire when the opportunity strikes.”

“The main room,” Akita-san repeated. “The Die Die Die room?”

“Yes, that room.”

“All that blood…” She stopped there and simply frowned at the floor.

“Is there anything you know about it?” I asked.

“I…” She looked up, all the way up toward the ceiling. “I remember the blood. There was so much of it.”

“There’s probably a reason for it, though it may simply be a matter of Mishima-san having killed the onmyoji, just after the head priest died. His most passionate and darkest emotions are tied to all that blood.”

“There was so much of it,” Akita-san said again, now looking back at me. “Mishima-san…” Though she still frowned, her eyes gave away feelings entirely different from mere anger. Was this desperation? Or was it fear?

Something more than I was recognizing was occurring here, and I realized there had to be more to this shrine maiden than I thought. She kept standing there, silent and motionless, and I had to check behind myself a couple times to see if there was something she was staring at just past me. There was nothing though.

Before I could ask what was wrong, Akita-san fell to her hands and knees and started coughing violently. Deep and frantic coughs. There was a liquid element to the way she coughed. It was a terribly hoarse sound, like that of the sick and dying. I knelt down and asked if I could help her somehow, but she just kept coughing.

Blood spit out of her mouth. With each cough came more blood, and the crimson splatters quickly formed a small puddle upon the tatami mat.

This bleeding cough fortunately didn’t last long, but it took a couple minutes more for Akita-san to catch her breath and reorient herself. She was clearly nauseous and dizzy, so I helped her sit up and offered some water. She didn’t drink any, so I assumed she was feeling better.

“I was worried you were choking on something,” I said. “Do you have some kind of illness?”

“I don’t know,” she said in a low, somewhat raspy voice. “This happens every now and then, I think. I don’t really remember why though.”

Now that was stretching it. Was she trying to hide something?

She regained her more common, fiery expression. “It doesn’t matter now. I need to focus on Mishima-san. I can’t let such yurei linger in this realm, tormenting everyone they cross unlucky paths with. I must purify the spirits. I can’t rest until they rest. It’s finally my time to do something!”

“Okay, we can start then,” I said, not wanting her to get any more worked up than she already was. This was our time to act it seemed, and we had to make this count. There was no telling what would happen if we blew our second chance. For one, the two of us would probably die. But I also still hoped this shrine maiden could help me find a way to reconnect with Kijimuta-san. If that was even worth attempting in the first place. It was difficult to focus on that too much right now though.

Akita-san stood up and got her things ready, including her bow and arrow. “Just head to the Die Die Die room then?”

“We should take separate paths, so that hopefully at least one of us won’t be spotted by the ghost on our way there,” I said. It was possible the ghost was waiting right outside the door, actually—but if the sealing ofuda had even a little power to it, the talisman should have driven him away to some remote corner of the mansion. At least for a little while. “You can head straight there down the hallway. I’ll take a route through the storage room, and end up on the other side of the Die Die Die room.”

I knew the layout of the mansion very well at this point, considering just how many times I searched it these past few days. If all went well, I would be able to lie in wait while the ghost approached Akita-san. As soon as she sensed the ghost, she could send her shikigami to reveal his location. Then it would just be a matter of how fast I could run over and apply the four binding ofuda around him. If I could pull that off without getting killed, Akita-san would be able to do the rest.

Hopefully. I now had to worry about her suddenly dying on me at any given moment.

* * * *

I made my way down the hall, through a guest room, down another hall, and on through a long, thin passageway that served as storage. There were hefty bags of rice, piles of firewood, and rows of wooden boxes all stacked against the side of one wall, everything organized in tidy fashion. Once I slid the doorway shut behind me, the room turned pitch black and I had to make my way blind. I knew how far I needed to go though to get to the hall adjacent to the main room, which Akita-san was likely already close to entering.

I hurried mainly to make sure I was there in time for the showdown, but I also couldn’t help but worry the ghost could be lurking anywhere here in the dark. Each and every footstep I took felt far louder than it probably was, but even the slightest noise was probably enough to alert the phantom. I quickened my pace, knowing all too well just how defenseless I was against the vengeful yurei.

Once at the short doorway I forced myself to take quiet breaths, then gently eased the sliding door open just a crack. From here I could see the wide doorway leading into the main room. As planned, Akita-san slid both doors open so I could see events play out easily enough to know when to run in with the binding ofuda. I watched her walk about the room, her arrow drawn and ready. It was too small to see from here, but I assumed she was holding her shikigami in one hand as well, since that would be the first tool she would need ready to use.

Only about a minute or two passed before Akita-san stopped and hurried to the center of the room. She didn’t say anything, but it was clear she sensed the ghost. Finding nothing in the room itself, I turned my gaze back to the entryway and spotted two floating weapons already entering the room. A long kitchen knife and a meat cleaver. They looked like the same two blades he threw at me earlier, so he must have pulled them out of the wall at some point.

The ghost didn’t throw his weapons this time though, perhaps not wanting a repeat of his first attempts to kill me. Unfortunately this likely meant he had another trick up his sleeve. Or was he simply confident the shrine maiden would miss him with her arrow?

Akita-san held out her hand with the arrow and loosened her grip enough to release her shikigami. The paper cutout flew through the air, straight for the ghost’s location. I watched as the two knives reacted immediately. Far quicker than I expected, the ghost took several steps to the side. Realizing he could close in on Akita-san from that point, I slid the storage door open and sprinted into the hallway.

The shikigami meanwhile turned through the air, following right after the ghost. This level of accuracy caught me by surprise, and it apparently caught the ghost off-guard as well. The knives stopped moving as the human paper cutout latched onto its target.

I had just entered the room when the ghost was finally revealed. If this was Mishima-san, his century as a ghost had clearly destroyed whatever semblance he may have ever held with his living self. This was more a personage of blood than it was a human being. Only bits and pieces of a middle-aged man clothed in white and gray priestly attire were visible amidst the streams of blood. About half his face was a pool of blood, as was the majority of his torso and large portions of his arms and legs. This went far beyond Kijimuta-san’s colorless appearance and bleeding fingers—this man had suffered constantly for well over a lifetime, and the blood on his hands had almost entirely consumed him.

The sight of this mass of constantly-shifting streams of blood nearly made me stop dead in my tracks, but I forced myself to regain my momentum.

While startled by the shikigami for a few brief moments, Mishima-san’s focus remained on Akita-san, who was backing away and glancing back and forth between the ghost and her weapon. The two each took only a second to act. Mishima-san chose to throw the meat cleaver—and then the kitchen knife immediately afterward. He either panicked or simply wanted to overwhelm Akita-san while she was startled by his ghastly appearance.

But just as Mishima-san threw his weapons, Akita-san simultaneously released another shikigami. The paper cutout attached to the meat cleaver, but instead of being sliced in half, the paper caused the weapon to turn slightly to the right. The meat cleaver twisted just in front of the incoming kitchen knife, and the two blades crashed into one another. With a violent scrape the two weapons redirected each other’s paths and flew to either side of the shrine maiden.

I reached the ghost and slapped two ofuda on the floor to his right, about a meter apart from each other. Before he could turn to find me there, I was behind him, placing another ofuda to his left.

Akita-san aimed her weapon, her arrow pulled back and ready to fire.

I lunged forward and slapped the final ofuda down a meter in front of the previous one. The box was complete.

The shrine maiden shouted the brief mantra to activate the binding spell, then fired her arrow from only a few meters away. I couldn’t see the final blow as I rolled across the floor, but I could hear the release of Akita-san’s bow string, the whoosh of the flying arrow, and the weapon’s collision into what had to be the thick, sturdy wall surrounding the fireplace.

I wasn’t sure what to think about that last sound.

I pushed myself back to my feet and took a few steps to stand beside Akita-san. As I feared, the ghost of Mishima-san was standing in the binding ofuda, still very much existing and not exorcised. The arrow with its enchanted paper talisman was stuck in the wall directly behind Mishima-san. From what I could tell in the dim light though, the arrow was dripping with blood.

“What happened?” I asked.

Akita-san just stared at Mishima-san. She looked completely out of it, absolutely stunned and terrified. She managed to register my question though, and shook her head to snap out of her daze.

“The arrow passed through him. I aimed for the part of his face that was not blood, but as soon as I fired he shifted… He made that part of his face blood, while another section of his face returned to ghostly flesh.”

That was a handy trick. Apparently some percentage of Mishima-san had to not be blood for him to maintain whatever amount of sentience was left in him—but he could control what parts of him remained ghost… essence. Whatever you would call it.

“The purification ofuda you prepared passed through him though, right? Shouldn’t that count?”

“Maybe it should, but it obviously didn’t!”

I didn’t know how long Akita-san’s binding cards would last, so I hurried to her arrow lodged in the wall and pulled it out, figuring she could just try again—perhaps at point-blank range the next time. But before I could hand the arrow back to her, the ghost began to speak.

It was a mantra. The words he spoke were difficult to discern—the sounds coming from his partly-bloody mouth hardly sounded human at all. Much of it sounded like someone drowning, gasping for breath while flailing at the water’s surface.

“Do you know what he’s saying?” I asked.

“He’s releasing the binding,” Akita-san said. And just as soon as she said it, the four ofuda on the floor around Mishima-san fluttered away. Perhaps I should have expected this, given how we were dealing with a priest who was well-versed in the spiritual arts before he died.

Though free to move again, Mishima-san remained visible. Apparently he didn’t feel the need to try removing the shikigami attached to his right shoulder, which at times still turned into blood just as the rest of his body managed.

The ghost stepped toward us, his visible left eye staring straight through us, lifeless and devoid of feeling.

Akita-san took her arrow from me and raised it to her bowstring—but before she could pull it back, the arrow whipped out from her grasp. The shrine maiden dropped her bow and stumbled back in surprise, and it took me a couple seconds to realize what had happened.

The ghost could control all of his blood, including that which was severed from his spirit entirely. With the arrow soaked in his blood, he managed to whisk it away from Akita-san and send it clear to the other side of the room.

Perhaps there was no use trying to exorcise this ghost by force. Was there any chance I could communicate with him though, the way I had with Kijimuta-san?

“Mishima-san, I learned what happened to you from the village kannushi,” I said. “So I understand your disdain toward onmyoji, and anyone else who tries to hinder your efforts.”

The ghost stopped walking toward us and stood in place. Blood continued to flow and shift in thin rivulets from his left shoulder to his neck and face, from his right arm to his side and hip, from his left leg to his back and stomach. There was no sign of emotion on what parts of his face were visible—he simply looked incredibly tired.

“You’ve been at this a long time,” I said. “We can help you obtain the rest you need. You don’t have to keep suffering like this.”

The blood portions of Mishima-san’s head slid to reveal the entirety of his mouth. I held my breath and awaited his response.

The ghost spoke slowly in a low whisper. “Drown in my blood. Forever.”

Without a moment’s pause, the messages covering the walls all simultaneously released torrents of blood into the room.

“It’s… it’s happening,” Akita-san said. The way she said it reminded me of how she acted right before she started coughing up blood, and there was no time to deal with that now.

“Let’s just get out of here.” I grabbed her hand and ran for the entry. If we could get out of the mansion, the ghost shouldn’t be able to follow us.

The doorway ahead was draped with blood, and the entire room had already filled with enough of it to go up past our ankles. Mishima-san watched us slosh through the quickly-rising pool of crimson, but he didn’t bother chasing us.

He didn’t need to. A concentrated waterfall of blood crashed down in front of us, blocking our path. I winced at the splatters of blood pounding against my face and struggled to maintain my balance. Waves of the fluid pushed against my knees, and Akita-san looked like she was going to pass out. Her eyes rolled back, but I pulled her with me away from torrent, hoping to snap her out of it.

I felt about ready to throw up myself from the overwhelming stench, but a geyser of blood was building up from the wall near the entry. I ran as hard as I could with the shrine maiden, and only barely managed to pass the fountain of blood erupting from the wall. The force of it was more akin to a giant, bursting firecracker than it was to an unclogged drainway, and it took all my effort to keep from falling completely into the pool of blood beneath me.

Asphyxiated for fresh air and feeling about ready to just kill myself, I pushed my way into the entry and forced the front door open. The blood didn’t flow out of the mansion, to my surprise. Instead it simply continued to rise, and from here in the lowered entry area it was nearly up to my chest. Apparently the ghostly blood could not escape the room, as if there was a glass wall holding it in.

However, I managed to jump out, to my great relief. I tugged on Akita-san’s arm to help her along, but she suddenly stopped running. I turned back and pulled again, but now she had stopped moving entirely. She inexplicably stood her ground, but at the same time looked all the more panic-stricken for it.

“What are you doing?” I yelled.

“I—I can’t leave!” she screamed.

“You’ll die if you stay there, you idiot!” I pulled on her arm harder, but she gritted her teeth and somehow managed to pull back with equal force. The waves of blood were reaching her shoulders now.

“I caaaaaaan’t leave!” She flailed her arms in and out of the blood, her head rocking frantically in all directions. “The ghost has me bound to the room, or something! I can’t—I’m unable to leave!”

The absolute worst development. Had the ghost somehow reversed the binding spell to prevent the shrine maiden from reaching the front door? Was that even possible? There was no time to figure any of it out.

I leaped back inside and pulled Akita-san along with me. If we couldn’t leave the mansion, then I’d have to settle for at least leaving this room. Fortunately climbing up the step from the entry back into the main room lifted us up a little higher—but all this time the walls had continued to pour blood into the room, and now the entire ceiling had begun raining crimson showers as well. Adding to my sense of dread was the fact I couldn’t find Mishima-san. The ghost could be flowing about anywhere in this room, considering he was mostly blood himself.

The two of us pushed our way through the macabre pool, struggling to make our way to the open yet blood-covered entryway leading into the hall. Just as was the case with the front doorway, the blood somehow managed to remain inside the room, all of it under the ghost’s control.

The blood had risen too high for us to trudge through, so we had to use our arms to help propel us forward. We were only halfway across the room by the time we were essentially swimming, fighting to keep our heads above the tainted liquid.

Another burst of blood rushed from a near wall, and I couldn’t move quickly enough to avoid it. Not wanting to get hit, I took a deep breath and ducked into the sea of blood, and had to hope Akita-san either did the same or was far enough away to avoid the blast entirely. I kept swimming until I felt far enough away from the pounding geyser, then pushed myself to the surface. I had to stand on my tiptoes and strain my neck so I could breathe above the blood. Unable to see anything, I stretched out my arms and turned a bit in hopes of reaching Akita-san, but I couldn’t feel anything but the heavy, beating waves.

I frantically wiped my hands a dozen or so times and proceeded to smear away enough of the blood from my eyes to open them at least a slit. “Akita-san, where are you?” I looked behind me, searching all throughout the room, but there was nothing but red.

“Over here, you idiot!” a voice shrieked.

I turned and found her near the doorway, having a difficult time keeping her head above the blood. The waves kept slapping at her face, and she took a frantic breath each time she got her mouth back out of the liquid.

But before I could make it over to her, I caught a glimpse of something floating a few meters to my left. Pieces of a man’s face emerged from the sea of blood, including a lone eye that stared directly at me. It took a moment for me to even realize this was Mishima-san, and in that moment he started to glide toward me like ripples on a watery surface. Long, pale fingers reached out of the pool, and streams of the crimson liquid rose swiftly toward me, emerging from the ghost’s arm of blood. It was a moment likely intended to scare me to death—perhaps quite literally. But somehow seeing Mishima-san maneuver through this blood so effortlessly just pissed me off.

“Run, you stupid onmyoji!” Akita-san shouted. “I mean, swim!”

I exerted every last bit of strength I had left in me, taking long, furious strokes against the bloody waves to propel me toward the hall. I didn’t know where I’d go once I reached there, or if I’d be able to even manage going anywhere at all after all this—but I forced all my energy on at least reaching that open air.

I got there more quickly than I expected. Unable to see clearly, I lunged straight out of the blood, collapsing—and sliding—on the polished wooden floor of the hallway. I crashed head-first into the wall, but didn’t give myself more than a second to recover. I forced myself to stand and wiped the blood from my face once more.

Akita-san wasn’t in the hallway. Why hadn’t she swam out yet?

I looked back into the room, the pool of blood still held inside by an invisible force. The blood was nearing the top of the open doorway, so I could only just barely make out her head and arms flailing above the pool’s still-rising surface.

“I can’t… get out!” she yelled between waves beating against her. “The ghost did someth-… I can sense… think it’s… binding ofuda. …with them… I can’t…”

Everything suddenly fell into place.

I forced my right arm into the pool of blood and reached out for Akita-san. “Grab my arm!”

“You can’t j— pull me… by force!”

“Now, Akita-san!”

She reached an arm down toward mine, and I gripped her hand tight. She continued to try keeping her head above the bloody surface, treading with her legs and her free arm.

“I got you!” I shouted. “Now possess me!”

Her eyes opened wide and she stopped moving entirely. I immediately tugged her down into the blood and toward where I stood, waiting for her. I had to enter the blood a little myself, but once I had Akita-san with both my arms I pulled her in. I held her tight against me, and after only a second I lost all feeling of her.

I stepped back and fell hard against the wall behind me. Opening my eyes just a crack, I quickly confirmed Akita-san was nowhere in sight.

In her place though was Mishima-san, stepping out from the blood-filled room as if it were empty air. His expression was hollow as always, but his rage was something that was felt more than seen.

With no time to think of a plan, I sprinted down the hall toward the room where all of Akita-san’s supplies were. I was there in seconds, and as soon as I shut the door behind me I reached for a couple pieces of Akita-san’s paper talismans.

Somehow I knew exactly which ofuda to pick up, and without intending to I threw the two pieces of paper straight onto the sliding door. The ofuda stuck to it effortlessly, and with a simple chant and hand sign I managed to activate them.

The door didn’t move, but I kept staring at it for what had to be at least a few minutes. When at last I felt marginally safe, I fell to my knees and took my time catching my breath.

“Well… that was gross.”

I was an absolute bloody mess, but at least I was alive.

And Akita-san was here too. But she most certainly wasn’t alive.

And she never had been this entire time.

* * * *