"Old lady, are you a... um, shrine maiden of Miyamizu Shrine?"
Komachi asked, sounding somewhat uncertain.
The elderly person gave no answer, and did not even pay any attention to her, merely restarting the work of braiding cords in her hands.
This couldn't help but make the girl feel a bit discouraged: clearly, this old lady was able to converse normally with Asakura-nii...
"No matter how you look at it, she obviously isn't." Hachiman couldn't stand watching any longer and began speaking sarcastically from the side. "How could a normal person manage to stay all alone in a godforsaken place like this forever... Even Robinson Crusoe still had Friday."
Asakura glanced at him.
This guy wasn't actually the type to truly spout malice at random; saying this kind of thing was eighty percent likely just because he felt dissatisfied that his younger sister was being ignored, combined with an attempt to use reverse psychology to get the elderly woman to open her mouth.
Unfortunately, the old woman still paid no heed, merely doing her own thing in silence.
Watching the sky gradually darken, Hachiman couldn't help but grow a bit anxious.
They had spent far too much time on the road from the station to the shrine; if things kept going on like this, it wouldn't be long before the meteor reappeared and plummeted again.
"Asakura..." In the end, Hachiman could only look toward Asakura, hoping he could think of a way.
"Hikigaya, just like I said before, miracles require paying a price." Asakura's eyes remained fixed on the elderly woman, but his mouth spoke to Hachiman: "If the shrine maiden who received the 'oracle', the officials who guided the masses on the eve of the disaster, and even the companions who intentionally manufactured a panic just so the masses would be guided to the evacuation locations are all living normal, happy lives without having paid a price... then here comes the question."
He asked in a deep voice: "The one who paid the price, who exactly is it?"
Hachiman fell into silence. Previously, this question had failed to yield an answer because of Asakura's joking around and banter, but now that the other party brought it up again, it meant it was closely bound to the current situation.
After pondering carefully for a brief moment, he suddenly seemed to realize something, looking at the old woman with a look of surprise and disbelief.
"Could it be... the 'god' who provided the oracle?"
"I myself can't be a hundred percent certain—rather, the definition of a deity within Shintoism itself is quite ambiguous and unclear—so there's no way to be completely sure..." Asakura shrugged. "But looking at it currently, it seems to be exactly that kind of situation. I'm right, aren't I?"
His final words were naturally addressed to that elderly woman.
"...Old body is not such a lofty existence. I am merely a mere Musubi born and sustained by the transition between ignorance and reality, relying on the connections between person and person in Itomori." The old woman raised her head, looking toward Asakura with her slightly dim, elderly eyes, speaking softly.
"Musubi?"
Komachi was completely bewildered, clearly having never heard of this concept before.
"Don't care too much about the specific meaning; just treat it as a proper noun specifically referring to a certain entity."
Asakura shook his head at her and said.
And so Komachi no longer bothered about the meaning of this word either, merely asking the elderly woman: "In other words, old lady, you were trapped in this space and forced to repeat the loop of that day over and over again solely to save the residents of Itomori Town, right?"
The elderly woman ignored her.
The girl: "..."
So it turns out this old lady truly only responds to Asakura-nii's words...
"Don't mind it. It's not that she's unwilling to pay attention to you, but rather she has already grown so weak that she can no longer hear your voices."
Asakura explained to Komachi and Hachiman: "I'm afraid that within this space, she has already looped an unimaginable number of times."
"So that's how it is..."
Komachi instantly looked at the old woman with sympathy, and that bit of dissatisfaction and complaint vanished to the back of her mind in an instant.
"So that's why you asked her at the very beginning whether she was satisfied."
Hachiman also finally caught on, looking at the old woman with a complex gaze: "Will this loop only stop once she reaches her absolute limit?"
"It's not that simple." Asakura shook his head. "Unlike humans, who are creatures whose memories are easily smoothed over by time, the thinking of extraordinary existences is often far more pure, but simultaneously far more extreme because of it."
"Because she loved Itomori Town, she chose to save it and paid the price for it. Yet the price turned out to be watching the town she loved get continuously destroyed under the meteor over and over again. A Musubi born because of Itomori won't become numb like a human after experiencing too many loops; they will only accumulate that sadness, unwillingness, and resentment even further. I'm afraid the final outcome won't be very good."
"I see," Hikigaya nodded with a look of 'I get it, I get it' on his face, and then asked: "So will the loop stop?"
Asakura: "..."
"No," he let out a sigh. "Not only will it not stop, but I'm afraid some rather bad things will also occur."
"What?" Hachiman couldn't help but have an ominous premonition in his heart.
"Boom~"
Asakura vocalized a sound effect while making a 'going out with a bang' hand gesture.
Hikigaya: "..."
Asakura walked toward the elderly woman.
"It's already enough, you have already fulfilled your responsibility..." Speaking up to this point, Asakura paused for a moment—considering the doctrines within the Shinto system that held almost zero binding force over deities themselves, he could even be certain that this didn't even count as the other party's 'responsibility'. Her making this choice was purely because she loved this land of Itomori, and by extension, loved the residents upon it.
"The repayment of the price is already sufficient. You do not need to continue suffering unnecessary punishment here. Let everything return to tranquility."
"Ah..."
The old woman stopped the movements of her hands, staring blankly at Asakura.
Following that, her gaze crossed past Asakura for the very first time, falling upon the Hikigaya siblings standing behind him.
"Children of humanity..." the old woman murmured, "why have you manifested here..."
"I guess if you trace their siblings' lineage upward, there's probably someone from Itomori in it," Asakura said.
The old woman stared fixedly at Hachiman.
To be precise, she was looking at his casual clothes.
To be even more precise, she was looking at a tiny embroidered pattern on the casual clothes that almost blended into one with the style, making it impossible to notice without looking closely.
"Where did that embroidery come from? Did you learn it from your parents?" Seeing this, Asakura asked Hachiman.
"No, a while back I was dragged by Komachi to a highly fashionable dessert shop, and my clothes ended up getting a tear from a raw edge on a chair. A male waiter in that shop embroidered it on for me when he was helping me stitch it up, mainly to cover up the trace of the stitching." Hachiman revealed a somewhat instinctively resistant expression on his face: "That guy is absolutely a normie. I literally saw him and a waitress with 'big sister' attributes casting flirtatious glances at each other over there..."
Komachi blinked her eyes at Asakura, making an expression that said, 'Don't mind it, this is just my big brother acting up again.'
Asakura nodded his head understandingly.
"That child... is dreaming, right?"
The old woman said softly, her expression gentle as if she were looking at the descendant of an old friend: "This is also a 'musubi'."
"Musubi?" Komachi was puzzled.
"Don't mind it. Existences like this always speak in a highly mysterious manner."
Asakura explained.
"No, that can't be counted as an explanation at all, can it?" Hachiman complained.
The old woman put down the colored cords that were only halfway braided in her hands, saying softly: "Drawing the children of humanity into this world was by no means the original intention of this old body..."
She gazed longingly at the scenery outside the window, and then slowly stood up: "This old body should also face... the final outcome."
"Old lady... Master Musubi, what do you want to do?"
Komachi hurriedly went up to support her—after all, her appearance was just a trembling old lady—asking with a hint of hesitation.
"Although it is still insufficient... this old body can make up for the lacking portion... it is pretty much time to end all of this..." The elderly person said slowly: "The mechanism of this world, the sacred body of this old body... is within the wilderness dozens of kilometers away... yet as long as this old body commits suicide right here, there will be no need for the shintai, and the loop of this world can be stopped..."
"Su-suicide?" Komachi stammered for a moment: "Um, if I didn't misinterpret it, does that mean ending one's own life?"
"Yes." Asakura nodded: "You didn't misinterpret it."
"Going by what this... um, Musubi means, the crucial quest item is her shintai, right?" Hachiman's face looked grim, "Damn it, dozens of kilometers... that's too far. It's completely impossible to rush over there before the meteor falls..."
"No, there must be another way!"
Komachi said earnestly: "On the way to the shrine, weren't there a lot of cars that looked rather old? There might be one that works inside! When the next loop begins, as long as we can find a working car before the meteor crashes, we can fetch Grandma's shintai!"
"Setting aside for a moment whether there actually is a car that can operate normally..." Hachiman shook his head: "But we are just students, Komachi. No one knows how to drive."
"Brother, that sentence scores very low with Komachi! Incredibly low!"
Komachi said crossly.
"Children of humanity... there is no need to grieve over the passing of this old body... this old body was originally a Musubi born because of karmic ties... even though I have constantly watched Itomori, watching it gradually prosper and gradually decline, generations of people being born, generations of people dying, and generations of people leaving... it is very difficult for this old body to interfere with reality, as if I do not exist at all, only able to watch all of this."
The old woman's spirits seemed to improve slightly. She gently patted Komachi's hand that was supporting her, which was currently trembling slightly, and said softly: "Although the meteor destroyed Itomori, it also affected this old body, granting this old body the power to interfere with dreams and knots. Like a lantern in a dream, it guides the people of Itomori toward survival... this old body is already very satisfied..."
"Old lady..." Komachi was somewhat moved.
Although Hachiman remained expressionless as always, if one looked closely, emotions could still be found flowing through his dead-fish eyes.
"...Um," Asakura raised his hand and spoke up: "Actually, I happen to know how to drive."
The Hikigaya siblings: "..."
Then you should have said so earlier!
"But even so, the roads leading to that so-called wilderness are mostly mountain paths, so cars have no way of traveling on them." Asakura then spread his hands.
The Hikigaya siblings couldn't help but fall back into silence, looking a bit dejected.
At this moment, a brilliant radiance appeared once more within the sky.
The meteor emerged yet again, slicing through the ink-black night sky.
"Tsk, is it about to restart the loop again..." Hachiman clicked his tongue.
"Speaking of which, the shrine is within the destruction range of the meteor, right? I hope it can hurt a little less, Komachi is actually quite afraid of pain..." The girl's hand holding the elderly person tightened subconsciously.
A magnificent glow fell from the sky.
Compared to the scenery witnessed at the school earlier, because their location was different this time, the meteor in the sky looked far more brilliant and far more magnificent, to the point where it wouldn't be an exaggeration to call it a sublime view.
Even if only for a split second, a thought suddenly emerged in Hachiman's heart: 'Being able to witness such a spectacular sight makes undergoing a bit of torment feel rather worth it.'
"Furthermore, those cars don't look like they can be repaired within a short period of time..." Asakura continued to speak in a highly unromantic manner.
"No-no-no, things have already reached this point, so no matter how you look at it, this isn't a situation for talking about that kind of topic, is it?" Hachiman couldn't resist complaining.
"You misunderstand. Although there are still a lot of things I want to say, my main point is..."
Asakura quickly stepped out of the room, looking at the spectacular sight in the sky: "Wanting to terminate the loop doesn't require running off to find some shintai according to the main storyline process like in a JRPG, and it naturally doesn't require letting the Musubi commit suicide either."
"But the meteor is already about to drop down! No matter what you want to do, it's too late!" Hachiman shouted.
"What on earth are you talking about?"
Asakura turned his head to look at him with utter nonchalance: "It's merely a mere rock, that's all. Isn't it fine to just blast it to pieces directly?"
After saying that, Asakura raised his hand toward the meteor that was currently blanketing the entire sky with aurora-like brilliant colors due to friction with the atmosphere, and made a hand-gun gesture.
Composite Spell: [Scale]
Glints of deep blue light danced at his fingertips, and immediately afterward, they fizzled out like a singular, wondrous spark, vanishing into the night sky.
Hachiman—who had originally been full of anticipation, believing he would get to see some ultra-spectacular scene, like a Gundam popping out to push the meteor back or something along those lines—revealed a look that said, 'That's it?'
In the very next split second.
Up in the sky, the meteor that was originally falling at a terrifying speed—seeming as though it would shake the mountain ranges and pierce the earth's crust at any moment—shattered apart just like that, without any warning whatsoever.
Immediately following that, the broken fragments of the meteor failed to land on the ground either; one after another, they were ignited in midair by a mystery-like fire, exploding across the sky.
The originally grand and magnificent aurora vanished from sight, and what took its place was a sky full of fireworks.
Both Komachi and Hachiman were thoroughly stunned by that sky full of blazing fire, and even the old woman stared blankly at this unspeakable sight, revealing an expression of utter disbelief.
"Well, speaking of which, today was originally the third day of the fireworks festival anyway," Asakura only then pulled his hand back, blowing a breath toward his fingertips like the protagonist in a cowboy movie, and smiled at the Hikigaya siblings: "Isn't it pretty nice like this too?"