WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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Chapter 68: Kyoto Night Parade of One Hundred Demons (2)

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【Kieeeeeeeek!!】

The taxi driver evil spirit screamed as its face twisted.

Sure, anyone would be startled if a monster was running alongside a car going eighty kilometers per hour, but shouldn't you, an evil spirit, be a little less shocked?

【Kyaaaaaaaaaaah!】

The taxi driver let out another shriek and stomped on the accelerator. Full throttle.

Vrooooom!

The taxi shot forward like mad, its engine roaring.

The numbers on the dashboard climbed by the second.

Eighty. One hundred. One hundred twenty.

This wasn't a speed you took on a winding mountain road.

"You crazy bastard!"

I gripped my seat belt. Eight-Foot Sister and Gari couldn't easily touch a taxi that had suddenly gone full throttle.

They probably figured forcing it to stop would hurt me too.

"Don't do anything stupid! The moment you slow down at a curve, you're dead anyway!"

Screeeeeech!

A sharp curve.

The taxi barely slowed as it whipped around the bend, its body sliding sideways.

The tires screamed and threw sparks. The car skimmed past the mountain road's guardrail by a hair.

"Jesus! This is the first time I've seen a drift like this in real life!"

So it was possible!

I'd thought it was just movie magic from the Fast and Furious franchise!

【Kiiiiiiiii!】

Even while the taxi driver evil spirit pulled off possessed-level drifts, I couldn't touch it.

The speed had already passed one hundred fifty kilometers per hour.

Banishment with holy water would only take one hit, but then this runaway taxi with no driver would plunge off a cliff with me inside it.

"Ano! Sumimasen! Ogenki desu ka! Stop! Wait a minute! Stop desu! I said stop!"

【Kieeeeeeeeeee!!】

This bastard had completely lost it.

Terror had driven it fully out of its mind.

I pulled out the Gutenberg holy paper I kept tucked inside my clothes.

I carried it as an emergency measure in case I couldn't connect to the inside of Gari's mouth.

Crinkle!

The Gutenberg holy paper transformed into a sword when I gripped it, settling perfectly into my hand.

Good. From here on, it was a battle of timing.

I waited for its next drift through a curve.

Screeeeeech!

The taxi brushed past the guardrail and tried to straighten out again.

"Rest in peace in the next life!"

【...!】

The Gutenberg holy sword I drove into the back of its neck pierced straight through the taxi driver evil spirit.

At the same time, just as the driverless taxi began to slide away.

Vrooooom!

I used spatial movement to reach the middle of the road, then rolled into a breakfall the instant I saw the pavement.

"Whew!"

That was close!

The taxi that had carried me moments ago crashed through the guardrail and fell over the edge.

Boom!

It exploded too.

Clack clack!

【Devour...!】

The two of them approached me.

I brushed at my slightly dirtied coat and said, "You did well not attacking recklessly. I hadn't considered teleporting while going that fast either."

The taxi driver evil spirit seemed to have vanished, its spiritual power absorbed by the bronze ring.

There was one problem, though.

"Why hasn't the smell gone away?"

Getting back was going to be rough too.

* * *

Since ancient times, foxes had been passed down in legend as wicked, cunning beasts that brought ruin upon nations.

The phrase "beauty that topples a kingdom" had originated with Daji, who appeared at the end of China's Shang dynasty. That Daji was the infamous fox yōkai, the Kyoto White-Faced Golden-Furred Nine-Tailed Fox.

Alongside the oni Otakemaru and Shuten-doji, it was counted among Japan's Three Great Evil Spirits, a great yōkai among great yōkai.

The nine-tailed, golden-furred fox yōkai had been sealed at enormous cost, but its immense yōkai power meant the seal frequently broke.

The last time it had been sealed was over twenty years ago, during a joint operation by the thirty-seventh head of the Tsuchimikado Clan, a descendant of Abe no Seimei, and Pastor Park.

"Sister, Park Taejin has entered the country."

"...So he's set foot on this land again."

She was a golden-haired enchantress of dazzling beauty.

She was an alluring beauty so stunning that the phrase "beauty that topples a kingdom" did not feel wasted on her.

She was Tsukiyo, one of the daughters of the great yōkai Kyoto White-Faced Golden-Furred Nine-Tailed Fox.

The seven-tailed fox asked the six-tailed fox, "Ayame. Who else came with him?"

"According to the Japan Self-Defense Forces soldier we charmed, Go Jincheol and one unidentified man."

"A man?"

"Yes. His name doesn't seem well known, so he can't be anyone special..."

"Ayame."

"...!"

Ayame, the six-tailed fox, flinched at the yōkai power pouring from Tsukiyo.

Something about what she had said had offended her sister.

"I-I'm sorry, Sister Tsukiyo."

"Don't forget. That day, the person who contributed most to stopping Mother's procession was a rookie pastor who had been a complete nobody. That spiritual sight of his, which saw their colors... If it hadn't seen through every one of Mother's spells!"

Tsukiyo trembled as she recalled the memory from twenty years ago.

That man had seen through every sister who had transformed, and they had suffered terrible losses because of it.

"Damn spiritual sight. Because of that absurd ability, all our outstanding sisters died! Since that day, our foxkin clan has fallen into ruin, and we've even had to accept half-baked things like that as sisters!"

"Eek...!"

A small squeak came from the direction of Tsukiyo's sharp gaze.

A little three-tailed fox was crouching there, pale-faced.

Her body was small to the point of being squat, and unlike her sisters' gorgeous golden fur, hers was yellowish and closer to dirty blond.

It was proof that she couldn't properly use transformation magic.

"Kohaku."

"Y-yes! Yes, Sister!"

"I have a task for you."

"A-a task? What kind of..."

Tsukiyo gave the anxious Kohaku an alluring smile and covered her mouth with her fan.

"It's not a task beyond your abilities. Find out who the brat Park Taejin brought along is. You can manage that much, can't you?"

'...Bitch. You said he probably wasn't ordinary.'

Twenty years ago, the rookie pastor Pastor Park had brought with him had become a legendary monster in the field.

Who could this new person be, then?

Pastor Park was infamous for training rookies harshly, but he wouldn't even take someone as a disciple unless they showed real promise.

Either way, that meant this person wasn't ordinary, yet she was being told to investigate him as a three-tailed fox.

'May your tail catch fire!'

Naturally, she didn't say that aloud.

Kohaku could only bow her head deeply and nod.

* * *

I knew Japan had a lot of yōkai, but I never imagined there would be this many.

To these yōkai, I apparently looked like a highly nutritious Michelin three-star special sushi.

I had Gari, Eight-Foot Sister, and even a barrier out. Where did they keep crawling out from?

Riiip!

【Kyaaaaaaaaaah!】

Crunch crunch!

Still, I had to praise their courage.

Gari's vicious washbasin was floating overhead, yet they kept rushing in, hoping to get one bite of me...

"They're like moths flying into a flame."

Pastor Go watched the end of the yōkai that had become a bite-sized snack for Gari.

"Futakuchi-onna... It's a dangerous, fairly high-ranking yōkai, but to Gari-nim, it's only a mouthful."

It had been a bizarre woman yōkai with another face on the back of its head. Apparently, it had been fairly well known.

"By the way, even when a yōkai that strong charges in on a suicide run, nobody stops it?"

"Huh? Does someone need to stop them?"

"Well... the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons is about to begin."

"???"

"...Right, Pastor Park told me to explain it, but I forgot."

Pastor Go pressed a hand to his forehead as if he had only just remembered.

"Yōkai have been attacking us all morning, so it's been chaos. A Night Parade of One Hundred Demons is a procession of yōkai. We came to stop the Night Parade that the great yōkai about to resurrect will lead."

"Uh... what great yōkai are we talking about?"

"The Kyoto White-Faced Golden-Furred Nine-Tailed Fox. You could call it the most infamous of Japan's Three Great Evil Spirits among the gumiho."

Daji, who had destroyed the ancient Chinese Shang dynasty, was supposedly that Kyoto White-Faced Golden-Furred Nine-Tailed Fox.

A major figure from history books had suddenly entered the picture.

"Kyoto's head priest, Tsuchimikado, and the Kyoto White-Faced Golden-Furred Nine-Tailed Fox have been locked in conflict over seals and breaking them for a long time. If it gets completely free, it'll become a calamity for all of East Asia, so we've helped seal it again."

"It's resurrected several times? Is it impossible to kill it for good?"

"A great yōkai on the level of the Kyoto White-Faced Golden-Furred Nine-Tailed Fox comes with immortality as a basic feature. Like the Kraken in the Bermuda Triangle or the Count in Romania, it's an existence that doesn't die even when killed."

So it was some ridiculously powerful anomaly.

It didn't die even when killed. But would it not die even if Gari ate it?

I had never tried it, so I had no idea.

"Why does the seal keep breaking?"

"To seal something old, you need something just as old. You have to match the standing of the Killing Stone that will serve as the seal's core, but that yōkai has lived since ancient China. It was hard to prepare a Killing Stone worthy of it."

Pastor Go said this time would be different.

"You know we came to return the Ama-no-Murakumo-no-Tsurugi, right?"

"Yes. It's one of Japan's greatest national treasures, but Pastor Kim had the genuine article."

Japan had kept a replica until now, apparently.

Even though it was a replica, I had heard it was still a treasure in its own right, a sword with centuries of history behind it.

"The Xuanyuan Sword, the Sajin Sword, and the Ama-no-Murakumo-no-Tsurugi. They're all ancient weapons that symbolize the myths and royal authority of past eras. For holy relics like these, the time and symbolism they have accumulated become power."

In the occult world, old things were more important than I had realized.

Modern powerful weapons might guarantee a baseline of strength, but to fight true monsters, you needed ancient weapons.

"The Ama-no-Murakumo-no-Tsurugi is a divine weapon from Japan's creation myth, standing at the peak of Japanese history. Even the Kyoto White-Faced Golden-Furred Nine-Tailed Fox can be sealed completely if we use something like this as the Killing Stone."

"Ooh..."

This had turned into something huge, on a national scale.

Then Pastor Go said something ominous.

"This time, 'we' have to make it work. Every time the seal breaks, what a pain."

"...'We'?"

"Of course, 'we.'"

"..."

What was this?

Why did it sound like I was included in that?

"Pastor Go, don't tell me..."

Pastor Go grinned and put a hand on my shoulder.

"Anyone who comes to Kyoto for sushi goes through this. Grit your teeth and endure it."

Pastor Paaaaark!!

"Anyway, we need to clear out as many of the surrounding great yōkai as we can before the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons..."

Just then, a woman approached us.

She was beautiful enough to give Eight-Foot Sister a fair challenge.

A beautiful woman in a kimono with dark blond hair bumped into me, then bowed demurely.

"Sumimasen."

"Ah, it's fine... Ogenki desu ka."

"Huh? Ah, ah... You're Korean?"

Oh, her Korean was pretty fluent.

"Your Korean is good."

"Hehe, I'm very interested in the Korean Wave..."

The woman in the kimono smiled with her eyes and edged closer to me.

"Since this is fate, perhaps we could go sightseeing together..."

"Oops, my hand slipped!"

Splash!

I soaked the woman's face with water.

I pretended it was an accident and poured holy water from the label-free bottle I kept it in.

"Huh? You're not melting?"

"W-what is this?!"

"Gari, eat her!"

Clack?

As Gari tilted its head, Eight-Foot Sister took the lead.

She snatched up the woman in the kimono and threw her straight into Gari's mouth.

"Kyaaaaaaaaaah!"

The kimono beauty's scream echoed hollowly.

"Huh? What was that? Just now, there was a huge woman..."

"Where? I don't see anyone. Are you sure you didn't imagine it?"

Eight-Foot Sister had thrown the kimono woman into Gari's mouth, then immediately undone her own materialization.

Eight-Foot Sister was really on a roll today.

"Y-Yohan... What was that? She didn't even react to holy water, so why did you do that..."

Pastor Go stared at me as if he couldn't believe it.

But I had a perfectly valid reason.

"Come on, Pastor. A beauty like that suddenly comes up and tries to get my number?"

That made no sense.

There were only two possible explanations.

"Is there anything besides an organ-harvesting dealer or a yōkai after my liver?"

"...That's a very logical and very sad line of reasoning."

"...Sob!"

I wasn't going to let the wicked yōkai that reminded me of that sad reality get away with it.

Footnotes:

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