>>5808105>>5808108>>5808113>>5808137>>5808362>>5808567>>5808662You heave out a grieved sigh. “Look, Masami, I just got completely exhausted doing battle with a demon in the spirit realm. I’m not sure I can continue. But I’d like to try. Please.”
She gives you an odd stare. Like she actually understands what you’re talking about, to a degree. Maybe she had been in some kind of spiritual plane before, maybe as part of gaining her contract with spirit crabs?
Naoki gets within earshot, wading clumsily through the water, muttering to himself. “Hey. Hotaru wants to know what the problem over here is?”
“He encountered a demonic spirit and exorcized it. He’s low on chakra, but he’s fine. That’s it. No big deal. He’ll need to take it easy for a while, but it’s fine. I’ll summon a crab and let him ride it for an hour.” Masami says, forming the hand seals for the summoning jutsu, slamming her hand onto the surface of the water.
A crab bubbles out of the surface slowly like it’s growing like a root. It’s about the size of an ox. Masami puts her hands together for you to step on and leverages you into a seated position on top of it. When you’re up she gives your ankle a light slap.
“Thanks.” Is all you have to offer.
Your new crab mount and Naoki slowly scuttle through the water back to Hotaru and Kenji.
“She said, I mean he said, well-” Naoki starts, but you just finish it for him.
“I spent most of my chakra exorcizing a demon that I came across in the fields, I’m a little worn out. I need to take it easy.”
Kenji has a starry look in his eyes like what you just said was really badass, but Hotaru just stares at you like a bird of prey. Eventually she relaxes.
“What kind of demon?” She inquires.
“It started out as some kind of rice kami. Apparently there was a major battle here before the village was founded, the spirit fed on the blood and death and became confused and hostile, transformed into something evil and dangerous. I think I got pulled into its spiritual realm, where it transformed into some kind of flying monster and chased me around in some kind of liminal zone between worlds until I found its core and slew it.”
“What the fuck?” Is all Naoki has to offer. “Is that a thing that can happen?”
Hotaru shuts her eyes and thinks. “It’s outside my sphere of expertise, but there are ninjas who specialize in things like this. Alarming to think that such a thing was lurking so close to the village, but apparently perceiving demons is nigh impossible until they gain the strength to manifest into the world. How did you detect it?”
“Uh… I just saw it? It was just hovering there. Masami couldn’t see it.”
“... That’s not something anyone is able to do. It’s unheard of to just ‘see’ them. They’re borderline impossible to sense without the coordinated efforts of high level sensing nin, let alone interact with. But you just walked right up to it and entered its domain?”
“I suppose?”
