In the early hours of dawn, just as the sun had risen.
At the border of Musashi Province, in a village built against the mountains.
Aotabō of the Nura Clan walked along the central dirt path of the village, under the wary gazes of the villagers, heading towards his temporary lodgings.
Along the way, a few brave villagers tried to overcome their fear and look directly at Aotabō. However, upon seeing his towering, muscular frame and his unmistakably intimidating face, they quickly averted their eyes again.
Noticing this, Aotabō remained silent, merely quickening his pace towards the borrowed house.
Given his height, Aotabō's strides were naturally long, and soon he arrived at an old thatched cottage in the middle of the village. He pushed open the door and entered.
As soon as he stepped inside, a somewhat naive-sounding female voice greeted him:
"Mr. Aotabō, what did the village chief say?"
"He claims the village is completely safe at the moment, with no issues whatsoever."
Aotabō spoke while looking at the brown-haired girl with a traditional hime-cut hairstyle sitting inside the room.
She was Sun Seto, the eldest daughter of the Seto Group's leader, a yokai faction from the Seto Inland Sea.
She was also an acquaintance Aotabō had coincidentally encountered in the same location after descending into the Abyss.
Although the various factions in Japan were competitors when it came to the treasures of the Abyss, they still cooperated tacitly during the initial entry into the Abyss.
While there were plenty of instances of backstabbing, working together remained the consensus.
After all, compared to the Abyss, these outsiders would be in even greater danger if they didn't stick together.
So, upon discovering that the two of them had coincidentally landed in the same location, Aotabō and Sun Seto joined forces. After briefly assessing the situation, they presented themselves as partnered exorcists investigating this Abyss.
"No problems at all?" Sun Seto frowned, murmuring to herself, "But I definitely sensed a strange power in this village."
Hearing this, Aotabō nodded and said,
"The village head is suspicious. He lied to my face."
"So the village does have issues, but the villagers might be coerced... or accomplices?"
Kneeling in the room, Sun Seto spoke while holding up a bento box containing rice balls wrapped in seaweed with pickled plum centres.
Noticing Aotabō's entrance, she raised the crudely made wooden bento box and asked, "Want some?"
"No thanks, I'm not hungry. You eat."
Though curious about the bento's origin, Aotabō shook his head and glanced at the open door behind him. His yokai physique allowed him to detect the figures watching them from various corners of the village. At least five people were monitoring them from different locations.
Without a word, Aotabō closed the door, removed his shoes, stepped onto the floor elevated about ten centimetres above the entryway, and sat opposite Sun Seto.
Meanwhile, after finishing a rice ball in small bites, Sun Seto remarked casually, "Are we being watched?"
"Ah! Yes." Aotabō nodded, unsurprised she'd noticed. As the daughter of a regional yokai lord, detecting abnormalities came naturally.
Sun Seto quietly picked up another rice ball while explaining, "The village head's wife brought these earlier. They were laced with sedatives, but I washed them off." She added regretfully, "Such a waste of good food."
Aotabō remained silent, knowing what she wanted to ask. "There are few men here—mostly women, children and elders. Though there are fields nearby, crops are sparse. The handful of able-bodied men reek of blood, and those elderly women automatically took up surveillance positions."
As he shared his observations, Aotabō sighed. Opposite him, realisation dawned on Sun Seto. "I see! So Aotabō suspects this is a bandit village!"
"Correct." Aotabō nodded. Being no young yokai but an Edo-period veteran, he recognised such setups. In contrast, fifteen-year-old Sun Seto, born in modern times, only knew of bandits through hearsay.
"Mr. Masao mentioned in class how ancient bandit villages posed as common folk when officials came hunting. This place seems similar." She pondered further, "Given the strange energy here, could they be capturing humans for barbaric blood rituals?"
"Highly likely."
Aotabō elaborated, "Our wandering ascetics' cover story clearly isn't deterring these villagers anymore."
"So we're withdrawing?" After brief consideration, Sun Seto agreed, "Makes sense. With suspicious motives but unclear circumstances, leaving preemptively is wise."
Storing the remaining rice balls in her sleeve and discarding the potentially tracked box, she stood. "Shall we go now, Aotabō?"
"Mm." He nodded quietly. "On three, we'll split—you head towards the village front, I'll take the rear. Meet at our landing mountain east of here."
"Alright!" Sun Seto nodded, walking barefoot to the window ledge and peering outside.
At that moment, Aotabō also stood up, counting down in a low voice:
"3, 2, 1, go!!"
The instant the words left his mouth.
Sun Seto flipped out of the window, her figure blurring into afterimages as she charged towards the village entrance.
Meanwhile, Aotabō sprinted straight ahead, crashing through the thin earthen wall of the thatched hut. Amidst the deafening collapse of the wall, he dashed towards the village's rear.
This sudden disturbance threw the entire village into chaos.
In an instant, screams erupted throughout the settlement.
"Damn it, they're trying to escape!!"
"Stop those sacrifices, or the Celestial Maiden will be furious!!"
"Bloody hell, don't let them get away!!"
Sun Seto, who was nearly out of the village, turned her head upon hearing these shouts, glancing at the villagers.
'Celestial Maiden?'
Her suspicions rising, Sun Seto's sharp eyes caught sight of a village girl around eleven or twelve years old. With a casual sidestep, she dodged a lunging villager and charged straight at the girl, scooping her up before she could react:
"Sorry, but there are some things I need to ask you."
"Xiaocui!!"
A mix of shock and rage echoed through the village.
By then, Sun Seto had already hoisted the girl over her shoulder, vaulted the village fence, and disappeared into the forest beyond.
Just as the village descended into pandemonium.
High above the nearby mountains, a massive Dog Demon rode the cloud, soaring towards the village.