“Eh— urk!”
Staring in disbelief at the divine artifact shattered in his own hand, the boy was booted away by Inari and went tumbling across the ground.
“So that was thy scheme. Merely biding thy time for a chance to stab.”
“M-merely!? You’re the crazy one! This—this is a divine artifact, it shouldn’t—!”
As he spoke, the boy’s form cracked and warped into something else: the original woman. Staggering to her feet, she cast a quick glance at the broken divine blade in her hand.
“This thing! If you use it at the very moment everything looks like it’ll end happily, it’s guaranteed to stab! So why didn’t it? Worse yet—!”
“Say what thou wilt—what doth not pierce, doth not pierce. ’Tis all there is to it.”
“Are you mocking me!?”
“Nay, that would be our line, would it not? Right, Mano?”
Put on the spot, Tsukiko nodded, still catching up. Facts first: the woman disguised as the boy had used some shady “divine artifact,” which bounced off Inari’s shrine maiden garb and broke. From there… well, one could infer. One could—and find it all rather farcical.
“Yeah. It was suspicious from the start. I thought it was an urban-legend monster, but I didn’t expect a human.”
“Don’t lie! My acting and transformation were perfect!”
“Oh, come now, that stretches credulity.”
“A normal kid wouldn’t stay alive in a place where making eye contact gets you killed, idiot.”
They hadn’t said so earlier in case of a freak exception, but he’d been a walking red flag from the moment he appeared. In short, the woman—Machida’s—plan had been broken from the outset. She should have shown up as an awakener, not a middle-schooler begging protection; then being uninjured might have had some plausibility. Advertising her helplessness had completely backfired.
“Anyway, bottom line—you’re an idiot. We’re taking you in.”
“You think you can?”
“Hm?”
Machida’s body began to mutate with wet, cracking sounds. From all around, black shadows gathered, streaming into her as if absorbed. They converged from every corner of the village, all merging into Machida.
“You know the skill Leadership? At high levels… you can fuse your subordinates into yourself. It takes an absurd level, of course… but I can do it.”
Machida’s body turned into a mass of shadow—discarding the human form, becoming sheer monstrosity. She grew, and the pressure of her presence swelled with her.
“Cruel, unreasonable, strong, terrifying. I’ve taken in all that power. So—how about now? Still got jokes?”
It was like a horror story dreamed up by a child: a black giant, radiating the kind of dread that meant death on sight.
“Let me see… certain it is only that thou hast quit being human.”
“F… ah-hahahahaha!”
The black giant’s kick pulverized the place where Inari had stood—but Inari had already leapt clear with Shion in her arms. The thick black smoke lingering there was visible malice itself, proof of a curse so dense you could almost touch it. A single hit like that would curse-kill a run-of-the-mill awakener instantly. Tsukiko clicked her tongue and widened the gap.
“She wasn’t bluffing…! We’ll have a very bad time unless we one-shot her.”
Tsukiko reached for her trump card—when Inari alighted beside her, still holding Shion.
“Pardon, but I leave her to thee for a moment.”
“Eh!? Hey—!”
“I shall settle this straightway.”
Tsukiko staggered as Shion was handed off, then braced and held fast. Before she could demand what Inari was planning, Inari raised Kogetsu high.
“Kogetsu—be a bow.”
At that word the blade in her hands reshaped into a bow. Inari drew it—hard, very hard. The black giant laughed at the lack of an arrow.
“What is this!? So dramatic—and with a bow that has no arrow, what are you going to—!”
The giant thundered forward to stomp them flat—when a shaft of light formed in Inari’s grip, already nocked on the fully drawn string.
“I told as much to the Tatari-gami, as well.”
She loosed. The light became a colossal beam.
“If thou hast sunk thyself into malice, then thou shalt be purified. The end is the same.”
The brilliance blew away the giant’s upper body. Light leaked from the remaining lower half, which crumbled—melted—vanished. A pillar of cleansing radiance rose there, and when it faded, neither the black giant nor Machida remained.
【The Formless That Is Spoken Of】 raises a voice of malediction against you.
A “message” from the godlike thing appeared before Inari’s eyes. Tsukiko seemed unable to see it. Inari shifted Kogetsu back to sword form, set her fingers to the blade, and drew them down its length. Blue light clothed the steel in solemn glow.
“Secret Sword: Onikiri.”
She cleaved the “window” clean in half. Though untouchable, it split at Inari’s stroke and vanished.
“What was that? Slashing at empty air all of a sudden?”
“Naught but a trifle.”
Temporarily expelled the interference of 【The Formless That Is Spoken Of】!
Achievement unlocked! 【Achievement: Interference Expelled】
A remarkable achievement has been attained!
You obtained a golden reward chest!
Even present to the naked eye, it could not be sensed—such was the “interference of a godlike being.” Inari felt how troublesome it was… but the mastermind lurking behind the mastermind was gone. “Temporarily” was vague, yet for a while there should be no recurrence of urban-legend chaos. Only one task remained.
Seeing Sarina and Shidou racing toward them, Inari glanced up at the sky of the otherworld—and saw fissures spreading. The widening cracks meant the power sustaining this realm was failing. They would be returned automatically. Now to pray they wouldn’t be dumped somewhere ridiculous.
“Well, that too is but a trifle.”
Barring something extreme, she could manage. With that cheery fatalism, the place that spat them out was the very crosswalk they had used to enter. Looking at Shion—sleeping peacefully in Tsukiko’s arms—Inari smiled gently.
And so, this case of the urban legend—at long last—reached its true conclusion.