"Miss Igarashi, is that right? Please, go on."
Amamiya Rin looked at Igarashi Sakuko, his gentle words like a spring breeze brushing across her face. Without realizing it, her breathing slowed to match the pace of his voice, and the surging emotion from a moment ago settled like a tide smoothed calm.
"Um, actually... I don't know all that much."
She lowered her eyes to the cherry petals crushed beneath her feet, her voice dropping a notch, tinged with a bashful awkwardness.
"Even the fox deity the Toshiyuki family enshrines — I only just pieced it together myself, from something this young lady said a moment ago, about being spirited away, about offering someone to a fox. Fox-spirit worship is common where I'm from, in Ebisugaoka, and the Toshiyuki family holds some influence there too."
Igarashi Sakuko's gaze wandered, uncertain. She raised a finger and scratched lightly at her cheek.
"So you half understand something, and you come rushing out here running your mouth?"
Tsuneki Maaya let out an exasperated laugh.
Was this woman some kind of self-important chuunibyou case? Making some absurd leap of logic and then coming out here spouting nonsense about spirits.
"Because I can see."
Igarashi Sakuko straightened her shoulders, her eyes bright, fixed on Amamiya Rin.
"See?"
Amamiya Rin's eyelid twitched.
Speaking of seeing...
"You're Ultraman, aren't you?"
Igarashi Sakuko raised a hand and pointed at Amamiya Rin, her voice brimming with confidence.
The words landed like a thunderclap in the garden full of drifting cherry blossoms; even the warm lantern light beneath the eaves seemed to flicker. The air fell into instant, dead silence.
Tsuneki Maaya froze for a full three seconds before letting out a scoff, the chill and anxiety on her face replaced entirely by sheer absurdity.
"Ultraman? Miss Igarashi, what on earth are you babbling about? A tokusatsu character meant to placate children — how could that possibly be real? You're clearly no esper. You're just a chuunibyou case who's lost her marbles!"
As though she'd just heard the funniest joke in the world, her eyebrows shot up.
Even as she spoke, she glanced toward Amamiya Rin, hoping to find agreement written on his face — but what met her eyes instead was a trace of helplessness.
Amamiya Rin dragged a hand down his face.
He'd slipped up.
Amamiya Rin realized he'd overlooked something.
In the eyes of espers — and certain aliens — Ultraman's human form usually just looked like a glowing lightbulb.
This wasn't the Ultraman universe, and he wasn't the genuine article, but his soul carried the form of the Giant of Light. If someone had the ability to see through to a spirit's true nature, it wasn't strange at all that they could see through to who he really was.
It was fortunate he hadn't gone to the Metropolitan Police Department while keeping Tomie company these past few days. If Indou Ranko had laid eyes on him, she probably would have guessed on the spot that he was the Ultraseven who'd appeared at the Saeki haunted house.
"Whether I'm babbling nonsense or not — someone like you, who can't see the light, wouldn't understand anyway."
Igarashi Sakuko shot Tsuneki Maaya a disdainful glance, then locked her gaze back onto Amamiya Rin, her eyes shining with startling intensity as she raised her voice.
"There's absolutely no mistake — Amamiya Rin, you're Ultraman! The Ultraseven who appeared in Nerima Ward yesterday! I can see it! I saw it the moment you walked into the hall — the light on you, that warm light. It has to be Ultraman."
Igarashi Sakuko's cheeks flushed an unnatural red with excitement, and she stared at Amamiya Rin like an explorer who'd just discovered a new continent, her gaze burning hot enough to bore two holes through him.
"Are you out of your mind? No matter how superstitious country folk get, surely you don't actually believe Ultraman is real?"
Tsuneki Maaya couldn't read what Amamiya Rin was thinking, but she herself had no intention of accepting Igarashi Sakuko's claim.
Besides, as the eldest daughter of the Toshiyuki family, she'd spent the last several days preparing for the wedding banquet and knew nothing whatsoever about any Giant of Light in Nerima Ward. She simply assumed Igarashi Sakuko was spouting nonsense.
"To think my future sister-in-law has a friend like you. I hope that once she marries into the Toshiyuki family, she has less contact with the friends she made back in the countryside."
Tsuneki Maaya's gaze toward Igarashi Sakuko carried open contempt, her tone turning stiff and cold.
As a well-bred young lady of Tokyo, such an attitude was hardly unreasonable, by her own reckoning.
Everywhere outside Tokyo counted as countryside, and Ebisugaoka, where Igarashi Sakuko and Hinako Shimizu had been born, was true countryside by any measure.
Amamiya Rin studied Igarashi Sakuko's face — utterly certain, visibly agitated — and after a two-second silence, gave a small nod, offering not the slightest denial. It amounted to a quiet confirmation, in front of Igarashi Sakuko, of his identity as Ultraman.
"I knew it! I was right!"
The moment she received that confirmation, Igarashi Sakuko's cheeks flushed crimson. She nearly jumped where she stood, hastily clapping a hand over her mouth to hold down a scream rising in her throat, her breath coming quick and shallow.
In truth, Igarashi Sakuko had been diagnosed with mild autism — a hospital's official finding.
Because she claimed to see things others couldn't, often spoke to some presence invisible to everyone else, and showed an intense fear of darkness — but in truth, she really could see ghosts and spirits. No one ever believed her. Everyone simply treated her as strange.
Yet this time it wasn't a ghost, and it wasn't a spirit. This time, she'd seen Ultraman!
Ultraman, of all things! If she could become Ultraman's companion, so what if people thought her strange? Forget autism — even if she had severe depression, this alone would have cured it.
"Miss Igarashi, is there anything else you know about today's wedding? Surely you're not calling this whole banquet a sacrifice based on nothing but a few guesses?"
Amamiya Rin pressed her further.
He didn't believe this girl was acting purely on half-formed guesses and a glimpse of the light on him, slandering the Toshiyuki family for no reason.
"I don't know very much about the Toshiyuki family. All I know is, if I'm not mistaken, the Kuzunomiya-no-Mikoto the Toshiyuki family enshrines should be the same fox deity worshipped widely in Ebisugaoka's fox-spirit tradition. But... that fox deity isn't exactly a proper one."
Igarashi Sakuko rubbed her cheeks with both hands, trying to calm herself. She drew a deep breath, and the rise and fall of her chest gradually settled, though her eyes, fixed on Amamiya Rin, still shone with adoration.
"I come from the Sennensugi Shrine. We enshrine a fox deity too, but a few hundred years ago, we still enshrined the local sacred tree. According to the records, one day the sacred tree was struck by lightning, and the villagers judged it could no longer protect them, so they chose to enshrine the second-oldest deity instead — a fox deity — to suppress a legendary water dragon said to spit venom. But... that sacred tree never truly perished. It once entered my dreams and told me to restore the shrine, saying the shrine had been seized by an evil god. But the very next day, the fox deity also entered my dreams and told me not to restore the shrine — that the reason the shrine had fallen into ruin in the first place was because it had once enshrined the very evil god that had appeared in my dream the day before."
As she spoke, Igarashi Sakuko wrinkled her nose, a note of displeasure — or perhaps stubbornness — in her expression.
Her greatest dream was to inherit the Sennensugi Shrine and become its head priestess.
Two deities had come to her in dreams — one telling her to restore the shrine, the other telling her to give it up. Naturally, she preferred to believe the former's revelation, since its demand suited her wishes far better.
"The fox deity even threatened me. It scolded me as a foolish shrine maiden for trying to serve an evil god, and said it would crush my skull. That fox deity is no benevolent fox spirit out of legend, that's for certain! Oh, and I once saw it, too — the fox deity and Ukanomitama-no-Kami, locked in a duel above the fox deity's shrine statue. Ukanomitama-no-Kami's attendant is a fox — that very fox deity — but the fox deity seized Ukanomitama-no-Kami's own divine seat..."
Igarashi Sakuko rattled on, her words coming faster and faster, like something she'd held in far too long finally finding an outlet.
But as she spoke, Amamiya Rin's expression grew steadily stranger.
Ukanomitama-no-Kami, appearing again? That sounded like Miketsukami — the famous Inari deity.
Inari, defeated by its own attendant? The more she talked, the more outlandish it got.
Ukanomitama-no-Kami — wasn't that one of the Amatsukami of Takamagahara? A deity in Japanese mythology presiding over grain and harvest, also known as Miketsukami and Ukanomitama-no-Mikoto, child of Susanoo and Ōyamatsumi's daughter Kamu Ōichihime — not just a name attached to nothing, but a figure with an entire body of associated legend, appearing frequently across all kinds of fantasy and mythological media.
So how, in this account, had the deity ended up a stepping stone for its own attendant? It was, frankly, absurd.
Amamiya Rin studied Igarashi Sakuko's expression carefully.
He didn't suspect she was lying to him outright — but people so often blended their own subjective interpretations into whatever they described.
"This is getting more and more ridiculous. Enough with the pointless fantasy stories!"
Tsuneki Maaya's expression had turned impatient as well.
Naturally, her opinion of Igarashi Sakuko grew even more scornful, her manner even more dismissive.
She no longer worried that Igarashi Sakuko would go telling others what she and Amamiya Rin had discussed. Someone who spouted this much nonsense — even if she told people, who would believe a word of it?
"Mr. Amamiya, let's head back. The wedding is about to start."
Tsuneki Maaya turned to Amamiya Rin, her tone immediately softening into an invitation.
"Go on ahead and attend to the other guests. This girl's stories are interesting — I'd like to keep talking with her a while longer."
Amamiya Rin met Tsuneki Maaya's gaze and spoke evenly.
"...Very well. Please don't be late for the ceremony."
Tsuneki Maaya hesitated for a moment, but at the sound of Amamiya Rin's voice, the impulse to return to the hall and attend to the guests won out.
She turned and left, leaving only Igarashi Sakuko and Amamiya Rin alone in the garden.
Igarashi Sakuko fell silent too, seeming to realize she'd gotten carried away.
In truth, because so few classmates, family, or friends had ever been willing to listen to her talk about these things, now that she'd finally found someone willing to hear her out, she'd lost her sense of restraint and said more than she meant to.
"Sorry, I don't think I got to the point. What matters is — I saw Hinako this morning, and something's wrong with her..."
Igarashi Sakuko was about to say more when, at that moment, the clear ring of a bell sounded from the direction of the hall — three deep, resonant tolls that cut through the stillness of the garden.
Then the emcee's booming voice carried through the loudspeaker: "The auspicious hour has arrived! Would all guests please make their way to the haiden to witness the couple's wedding ceremony!"
The emcee's call passed through the garden and settled over the ground carpeted with fallen cherry petals, clear and solemn.
Amamiya Rin reached out and pressed a hand lightly to Igarashi Sakuko's shoulder, quieting her for the moment, telling her to follow him into the hall and continue later. "Don't act rashly for now. Just follow along and watch the ceremony. If some fox spirit really does cause trouble, I'll step in."
Igarashi Sakuko nodded firmly at once, her tense shoulders relaxing like a believer who had just received a divine promise, and she followed obediently behind him toward the brightly lit haiden.
By the time they returned to the hall, the guests had already risen in twos and threes, moving toward the approach path leading to the outer haiden. Silk rustled softly and elegantly against kimono fabric, and every face wore a proper, gracious smile.
Once they reached the haiden, the crowd's attention finally shifted away from Tomie, turning instead toward the hall's front entrance.
The sliding paper doors at the front parted to either side, and the bride, dressed in pure white shiromuku, stepped in slowly, guided by two shrine maidens.
Hinako Shimizu, the bride of the day, wore a pure white shiromuku robe and a white cotton hood, its long white cords hanging down to veil most of her face. Only a pale, fair chin and slightly pressed lips showed beneath. Her hands were clasped together in front of her, fingertips faintly curled, gripping so tightly her knuckles had gone white — her movements and gait carried an unmistakable stiffness.
A young man wearing a black montsuki haori and hakama walked in, followed by several equally formally dressed middle-aged men.
Tsuneki Hisayuki, the groom of the day, appeared about twenty years old, tall and upright in bearing, with fine, regular features and gentle brows and eyes. A perfectly measured smile rested on his lips, his stride unhurried, his whole presence radiating an easy, agreeable warmth.
"What a fitting match."
"The young master of the Toshiyuki family truly is a fine figure of a man."
"Is that the future mistress of the Toshiyuki family? I heard she was the young master's childhood friend."
At the sight of the day's two central figures, the guests broke into a chorus of praise, sparing no flattery.
Yet there's always someone eager to strike a discordant note.
"Still, she doesn't seem to come from much of a family."
A cluster of young nobles' sons had gathered in a corner, cups of wine in hand, murmuring among themselves with a note of curiosity in their voices.
"I heard she's from some backwater place called Ebisugaoka."
"Don't talk nonsense. Since when does family standing matter more than affection? Look at what the Toshiyuki family already has — do they need a marriage alliance to raise their status? If the young master wants to marry her, and the family approves, that alone proves the young lady must have something exceptional about her. Besides, a bond forged in childhood is worth far more than any marriage arranged for status."
Another of the young nobles' sons gave his companion a light nudge, signaling him not to run his mouth in a setting like this.
"That part's true enough. Look at the way the young master looks at the bride — that kind of tenderness can't be faked."
The young noble chuckled and immediately changed his tune.
The group traded a knowing smile and let the matter drop, raising their cups instead and waiting for the ceremony to formally begin.
On the raised platform, the emcee cleared his throat, lifted the microphone, and his solemn voice rang out across the hall: "The auspicious hour has arrived. The young master of the Toshiyuki family, Tsuneki Hisayuki, and the young lady of the Shimizu family, Hinako Shimizu — their wedding ceremony now formally begins—"
The ceremonial music rose again, and the murmur of conversation across the hall gradually quieted as every gaze fixed on the couple at the center of the room.
____
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