Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Unknown location

Unknown date

Unknown time

Ikeda Kurumi

When I opened my eyes, I saw a thatched roof supported by a big central pillar with a handful of smaller ones surrounding it.

After blinking a few times, I sat up and looked around me.

The first thing I noticed were the pots. Lots of red colored, round bottomed pots of various sizes with leather coverings tied over the openings were placed at the sides of the dwelling I was in. The next thing I noticed was the scent and sound of the sea in the air, quickly followed by the door opening to my left, where sunlight was coming through.

The last thing I remembered was the mysterious woman’s voice advising me to close my eyes, and the sight of that gun aimed straight at me.

‘Where am I?’

“I’m outside the house, dear!” the woman’s voice suddenly chimed out from outside, over the sound of the waves.

I didn’t answer.

I was unsure of what to do. On one hand, I wasn’t sure who this woman works for. She might be working with Krauncha and those inari. She might also be a third party that was an enemy of the Lighteaters and the Skinchanger. On the other hand she did help me save my family, so I owe her my deepest gratitude. And Mama taught me to always reciprocate kindness of any sort with more kindness.

I finally stood up from my bed, a leather mattress that contained leaves from the feel and sound of it, and walked outside.

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I stood on the grassy and nut strewn border of a dull yellow colored beach and a forest of broad leaved trees that smelled like nuts, looking out onto a small bay while being gently caressed by the sea breeze. The bay, in turn, was bordered by gentle looking hills full of lush, green trees. Beyond the sea, in the distance, was a hazy landmass composed of steep mountains.

To my growing despair, there were no boats, no roads, no piers or utility poles or any other sign of human civilization in sight other than the house I just went out of.

The only positive thing that I could find in that moment was that I could see the sun rising at my right. That meant I now had a bearing to the four directions, just in case I had to escape from here.

“What do you think of this place? Is it beautiful?”

I turned right and saw…

“…pardon me for asking this. Are you doing something to affect my mind?”

The speaker, who wasn't there when I was looking around before, shook her head and replied with a confused look on her face.

“No. Why should I?”

“...I’m sorry. It’s just a silly thought,” I lied with a smile.

‘Because normally the first thing I would do right now is to scream in terror, quickly followed by running away from you.’

The first things I noticed about the European looking woman was that maggots crawled all over her hair and skin, and parts of her arms, legs, and her neck had gaping animal bites where I could see muscle and bones that were also being crawled on by maggots.

The next thing I noticed was that despite the maggots and the animal bites, she was beautiful. Her luxuriant, waist length hair was the kind that would take thousands of yen and several hours in a beauty salon to get at the level of. Her pale and shiny skin put the most popular J-Pop idols to shame. And her face needed no makeup whatsoever.

The final thing I noticed was her primitive attire and jewelry.

She wore a knee length, loose fitting red tunic. The belt was a simple red colored rope. Her footwear only animal skin with padding inside it. And her jewelry was composed of a crudely shaped jade pendant and two red colored earrings that were simply big rings that you squeeze your earlobe through.

"I…I apologize for how I look like," the woman said as she looked away from me with a downcast expression.

I blinked.

For several moments I was puzzled as to why she would apologize for her looks. And then I realized I must have somehow said my thought about screaming and running away out loud.

Shame flooded my entire being, at reciprocating the woman’s kindness with insult.

“I deeply apologize for what I had said,” I said as I deeply bowed towards her. “There are no excuses for what I just did.”

“No, it’s alright,” the woman responded with a more depressed tone of voice. “Even my husband…”

Her words trailed off at the end. It was quickly followed by a sob.

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“I’m sorry about that,” the woman sniffed beside me. “I – I thought I’m already over my husband's death.”

“No, no. It’s my fault Ma’am,” I apologized as I rubbed her back and pretended there were no maggots on her.

As I understood from her rambling, she became estranged from her husband when this appearance was forced on her. After a few years, she reconciled with her husband with the help of their children. But when they were about to meet again for the first time since the estrangement, the husband tragically died in a fight, alongside some of the woman’s sons.

“No, it’s not. You didn’t even have the same kind of reaction Izanagi had when he saw me in Yomi.”

I blinked, and immediately stopped rubbing her back.

“By Izanagi,” I asked with trepidation and uncertainty, “are you referring to the myth of Izanagi and Izanami? One of the two gods involved with the creation of Onogoro and the islands of Japan?”

“…did I introduce myself to you earlier?” the woman asked as her face heated up in embarrassment.

“No you didn’t.”

“Oh,” the woman squeaked. She then quickly hid her face in her palms and tried to curl up into a ball.

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“My name is Izanami no Mikoto - wait. I'm sorry, that's my title. I mean my name is Izanami, just Izanami. Please call me that instead of the earlier one. And I deeply apologize for not realizing that I never introduced myself to you,” Izanami said as she bowed down to me.

I stood up from my seat and bowed back.

"And my name is Ikeda Kurumi, soon to be Ohta Kurumi. I'm extremely, extremely grateful for the help that you gave me earlier, Izanami. If there’s – "

"I only did what was right dear,” Izanami suddenly interrupted. “There's no need to be more than thankful."

I was surprised by the interruption. Usually the one who was being complimented would let the person finish their compliment, not rudely interrupt someone in the middle of their compliment. Thus, I stopped bowing and looked at Izanami from a need to know if I had made some kind of mistake somewhere.

Instead of a frown, I saw a nervous smile on her face. In place of a glare, she shyly looked down at the ground. She was even holding her left elbow with her right hand, as I do when I felt the need to reassure myself.

"I apologize but I don’t want you to finish saying those words Kurumi," she said softly. "That phrase had been the seed of so many bitter arguments between gods or magical beings and humans regarding agreements created by debts of gratitude. I don't want that to happen to us."

The only thing I could do in reply to that was to stare at her. And I did so for a few more moments until she muttered something else to herself.

"Really don't want that to happen."

The air around felt awkward all of a sudden. On my part, I can't express the feelings of utter gratitude I have because of Izanami's...reasonable reluctance. And my guess was that Izanami for her part was still embarrassed at doing something too rude for Japan.

In an effort to try and move things along, I asked what happened after I was...if I remember correctly, 'given mortal wounds.'

Izanami grabbed the opportunity as if it was a lifeline that I gave her.

"Your husband killed the Lighteater, at the cost of having half his right ear shot away - wait, wait, wait! Calm down Kurumi, calm down. His ear was healed back to normal by the Indian."

I sat back down on the log, my face planted in my hands. A moment later I felt someone sit next to me.

"How about my daughter? My parents in law and the twins?"

"Your daughter is fine. She only had cracked ribs, so the doctor just ordered her to take a bed rest, imbibe some painkilling drugs and wait for a few weeks to completely heal up. And your parents in law were also fine. Your mother in law was keeping a vigil in the hospital room that you and your daughter were brought to, alongside your husband. Your father in law, when he wasn't sleeping in the hospital room, was busy doing his job. And..."

Izanami trailed off into an ominous silence, one that gave me a sense of…unease. Thus, I lifted my head up to see her looking down at her feet.

“And?” I asked to restart the conversation.

“Do you remember the twins who were guarding the two of you? The two half inari?”

‘Half inari?I...see?’

"What happened to them?"

"They are currently in the same hospital as you and your daughter but…"

"What happened?" I prompted again as the sense of unease grew within me.

"Their mother died during the battle."

…

"Kurumi?”

...!

I blinked out of the shock I was in when all of a sudden Izanami pinched my arm. An instant later I saw the worried look Izanami was wearing on her face.

“I apologize for pinching you,” she softly said.

“No. I…I needed that. Thank you,” I answered while shaking my head. “Has any relative come forward to take care of them?”

My heart sank when she shook her head.

"None, for a variety of reasons which includes the two half inari being considered wards of the state. I suspect that they will be placed in an orphanage as soon as they completely heal."

Amidst the confusion I felt at hearing her answer, a memory came unbidden into my mind when Izanami said the word ‘orphanage’. It was something Mother said to Mama the night Ichigo and I revealed my pregnancy to our parents. And it was so shocking that I still remember it word for word.

'You're considering putting the baby in an orphanage? Hah! Considering the perennial state of the Japanese orphanage system and its products, I would rather abort your slutty daughter's baby as an act of mercy!’

"Don’t they have other relatives who can take them in?” I asked. “Like their father?”

Izanami looked up at me with a sad frown.

“The twins used to live in Miyagi prefecture's Minamisanriku, one of the towns ravaged by the tsunami two years ago. Their father, paternal grandparents and uncle died that day."

"How about more distantly related relatives?"

"…I think one of the twins said their paternal once removed first cousins are living in Brazil."

I instantly gave up on the paternal side when she said that. Obviously differing nationalities would complicate things for Ran and Moe.

"How about their maternal relatives? Their mother is an inari so surely their relatives on that side are immortal."

"That's precisely the problem. They are immortal until someone kills them, so that means they have to manipulate and fake several documents if they want to live with humans. For example, their mother is on her third koseki when she died."

"And with lots of fake documentation…"

I trailed off as I slowly realized the Japanese government, famous for its bureaucracy, would definitely have problems with Moe and Ran’s maternal relatives for that practice. Therefore, it would be wise to assume that Ran and Moe won’t be released to their custody any time soon.

'It's even possible they will never get released into the custody of the inari and would spend all their childhood in the orphanage if the government starts insisting on penalizing the inari for faking documentation.'

"Correct," Izanami said in a sad manner.

'...are you reading my mind, Izanami?'

"...I'm sorry. I won't go into details, but you're shouting your thoughts at me. Again, I'm sorry."

I spent around a second or two pondering about that. And then I shrugged and went back to thinking about the twins and how I could help them in their moment of need, since the problem about mind reading might be because of this place.

‘Moe and Ran helped keep me and my family alive, suffering injuries and getting orphaned in the process. But can we afford to help them, now that we lost our home and belongings...can we?’

"Kurumi, if I may?" Izanami asked me.

"Go ahead."

"You don't have to make a decision about the twins right now, not when I can control time in this place."

I pondered on what Izanami said, and moments later I realized she was right.

Making a decision that would affect both my family and their family was not something to be made in an instant. It would require time to think about it, and consultation with others.

"You're right Izanami. Thank you for the advice…come to think of it, where is this place?"

All I knew about this place was that it couldn't be on Earth, not only because of the lack of humans but because we had just been talking about another 'me' being placed in a hospital and watched over by my parents and parents in law.

Obviously, that meant the 'me' presently here in this place was my soul and the 'me' that was in the hospital was my body.

"This is my home nowadays. A reproduction of how Onogoro used to be when I was still worshipped as the Mother of all creatures by the pot makers, hundreds of years before my husband and his worshippers came to these islands."

I blinked. Then I started looking around, burning the sounds, smells and sights of Japan's legendary first island into my mind. In the meantime, Izanami started to show off her home with a smile.

"Mind you, it's not a perfect reproduction of Onogoro since the island changed over hundreds of years and I don't want to decide on which Onogoro I liked the most. So I used the current shorelines and hills for ease of mind. I also had problems keeping the plants and the animals I had created alive in a limited and enclosed space, when naturally they should be interacting with the world's ecosystem and climate. I not only had to be the Mother of all creatures, I also had to be the goddess of every weather phenomenon…"

I knew that it wasn't right, what with Izanami having the ability to read minds, but I started to blank out at her explanation. As a wife I was expecting her to show the location of things and explain why she decided on this or that color, size or shape. Not a technical explanation of what it took to make the home.

I think Izanami noticed what was happening because she stopped explaining about striking a balance between the seasons in her realm.

"And finally I anchored this reproduction to the shrine dedicated to me and my husband on the real island of Onogoro, or Nu as it called nowadays. So whenever I get out of here, I would appear near the place. And that's that.”

Izanami then looked at me with a smile that was as awkward as the situation just became.

“Where is Nu island?” I asked, trying to make the awkwardness go away. Izanami quickly seized the lifeline I gave her.

“It’s a small, thinly populated island just off the coast of Awaji.”

I instantly remembered the relevant lessons from Social Studies classes. Awaji was in the Inland sea, serves as the bridge between Shikoku and Honshu and home of Japan's longest bridge. It's also a long way southwest from Matsumoto or Yokohama.

I felt relieved now that I knew my location. The only thing that remained now was to know when I could go home…

‘This is an opportunity to gain information from another source, right? Yeah, I should ask some questions now.’

"Izanami, what’s happening on the side of the gods? What are they doing regarding this war by these…aliens?"

The awkward smile returned, accompanied by a blush and eyes that suddenly couldn’t look straight at me.

“...Izanami?”

"I'll send a request for news right now."

She stretched her right hand. Moments later, a crane flew out from behind us and landed on it.

Izanami quickly whispered something to the bird, followed by the bird repeatedly nodding its head and then flying up into the sky until it disappeared. After that, she looked down again and started twiddling her thumbs on top her lap.

“Izanami?” I asked again, after a several moments of staring at Izanami’s finger twiddling.

"Kurumi," Izanami started to explain in a guilty manner. "I had never been back to Takamagahara ever since I died giving birth to Kagutsuchi."

My eyebrows rose at this strange revelation. If I remembered correctly, Takamagahara was the home of the gods here in Japan, which included Izanami last I read about her.

"I'm telling the truth Kurumi. I…I'm not welcome there. Please don't ask. It's personal."

"Go on," I conceded after seeing the grief on her face.

Izanami gulped and plunged ahead with her explanation.

"That meant I was never involved in whatever happened in Matsumoto, and…no one has asked me to help with anything for a long, long time now."

"Then what were you doing in Matsumoto that night?"

"SUN TV interrupted the show I was watching and suddenly showed breaking news live from your city. I got curious about the magical barrier seen on TV, so I went there."

"…you watch TV?"

Izanami lost the grief stricken look and replaced it with a bewildered one.

“Yes I do. I watch it alongside the family members of my kannushi at Nu island."

I was so intrigued by the image that Izanami had just painted in my mind, that I almost asked how that kind of arrangement came about. A moment later I pinched my arm in an effort to refocus my attention.

Izanami’s daily habits were none my business.

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After quite some time, which Izanami and I spent by talking about each other’s experiences with motherhood, the crane returned with news from whoever Izanami sent the crane to.

Izanami listened to the sounds the crane made, and then she relayed what the crane reported to me.

“So...apparently the omnipotents and the gods of prophecies and fates insisted to everyone else that the next step after what happened in Matsumoto is that everyone should act as co-belligerents who are only sure of what their neighbors or friends were planning instead of a united front where everyone knows what’s happening everywhere,” Izanami said with a frown.

“What about me? And everything that happened in Matsumoto? What role did we have to play?” I asked, while still not knowing how I should feel about the news.

“Well...I have an idea, but to confirm it may I ask a question regarding your recollection of what happened in Matsumoto?”

“Go ahead Izanami.”

“Have you ever heard the people from outside of this world mention anything regarding seeing the future?”

I went through my memories of that night, and found one instance. From the fight that brought me to Izanami’s Onogoro reproduction.

“Yes. I believe the exact words were ‘And ignore a seer? Multiple seers that forecasted...’ I’m sorry. I can’t recall more than that Izanami.”

“Ah!” the goddess suddenly exclaimed in a happy manner. “Then my speculation is most likely correct. Do you want to hear it?”

Izanami continued after I nodded to give my consent.

“Matsumoto was...both an experiment and a distraction."

My eyebrows rose at the statement, and it stayed that way as I listened further without saying anything.

"I say that the affair at Matsumoto was a distraction because of the sudden insistence of my future seeing peers on disunited co-belligerence. See, there’s a huge difference between omnipotent gods and gods of prophecies and fates on one side and mortals with the power to see the future on the other, in regards to how clearly they can read the future.”

“So the disunited response is to mess with the ability of the alien seers to forecast future events?” I guessed.

“Correct.”

“And would the aliens have any countermeasures for this?”

“...I apologize, but I have no idea,” Izanami confessed.

“Oh.”

Moments passed before Izanami continued her explanation, this time focusing on the experiment side of her speculation.

“And as for my speculation that the Matsumoto affair is also an experiment..."

In the minutes that followed, I learned about the history of Earth’s interactions with its magical neighbors.

In the year 1147 the Christian Germans and their non-Christian neighbors, who were called the Slavs, of Northern Germany were fighting each other in one of those wars of religion commonly categorized under the name Crusades. The goal of the Christians during this particular Crusade was the forced conversion of all Slavs in Northern Germany to Christianity, and the seizure of fertile farmland, lush grazing pastures and healthy fishing grounds by the Christians from the Slavic landlords. At the same time the Slavic gods, headed by the chief god of the time named Perun, were stymied by the God of the Christians, Jews and Muslims from attacking the Christian Germans with magic.

It was in this milieu that First Contact by Earth’s trans-universal, magic wielding neighbors happened.

The explorers of one magical kingdom first introduced themselves to the nearest magical beings around in that area, the gods who were involved in that Crusade. The Christian God forbade them from contacting any of his worshippers, while Perun gave his permission under the condition that the explorers and their people don’t teach the Slavs any of their magic and that they don't abuse the Slavs in any way.

Happy with the agreement with the Slavic pantheon, the explorers came back to their home to report on their discovery. News then spread around what is called Known Area, the universes whose locations had been mapped by the collective of known political entities with the ability to travel to other universes, that a new universe has been discovered. That led to a rush by scholars to Earth.

The scholars performed legitimate research, and discovered several things about us humans.

First, Humans are the only people in Known Area that had members who are unable to naturally manipulate magic. The ratio between the number of those who are unable to naturally manipulate magic compared to those who could naturally manipulate magic if they had only the knowledge is around half a million magically incapable people for every magic capable person.

Second, the Humans who could naturally perform magic, which us Humans on Earth call psychics, are so magically weak that the Known Area scholars had to add a new category under what used to be the bottom most level of their magical standard just to include the psychics in their tables.

Third, all human beings could perform magic through non-natural means by Known Areas standards, which is called Non-Natural Magic. Non-Natural Magic, in the parlance of Known Area, is magic that is performed with the use of Paraphernalia or is what is classified as Non-User Being Sourced Magic or is of both types at the same time. Paraphernalia refers to objects like wands and rings and weapons that stored magic, while Non-User Being Sourced Magic refers to magic where people other than the person who is trying to perform magic such as gods and spirits and even ordinary people living in Known Areas are donating their magic to the performer through various means.

And most important of all...

“Please correct me if there is a mistake in how I understood that last part,” I asked Izanami.

“I shall do so. Please start.”

“So all magical users in Known Area are generally classified into two categories, Low Magic and High Magic, with subcategories in the two of them. Correct?”

“Yes. Go on.”

“The Low Magic category is where magic users who can continuously only run one spell at all times with limited amounts of magic are placed into, while those who belong to the High Magic category are those who can perform or run multiple spells at all times with unlimited amounts of magic. And the category that people in Known Area belong to is determined at birth.”

Seeing that Izanami nodded I continued.

“The scholars discovered that Humans, whether they are the magically incapable ones or the psychics, are able to break the barrier between Low Magic and High Magic whenever they perform Non-Natural Magic.”

“Go on.”

“For everyone else in Known Area, whether they belong to the High or Low Magic categories, the only level of magic that they can pull off using Non-Natural Magic is Low Magic. This is because of several factors rooted in their biology. However, Humans are different. When Humans perform Non-Natural Magic, they can push unlimited amounts of magic into the one spell that they can use at one time. This factor, combined with the fact that the Known Space inhabitants can turn off the Paraphernalia that they would give to the Humans any time they wanted, made Humans desirable as expendable soldiers."

"Correct. Kurumi, is there anything else you didn't understand before I resume with explaining the history of Known Area's interaction with our world?”

"No, please continue."

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After the scholars discovered the traits that made humans excellent expendable soldiers, and then reported it to the educational institutions they were part of, a flood of morally defunct merchants from all parts of Known Area quickly arrived in Northern Germany to find a way to get Human soldiers.

They found one in the slave trade of Northern Europe, where the most famous pirates of Medieval Europe, the Vikings of the Norse people, were the main suppliers of slaves taken in raids all over Northern Europe to be sold to markets in Norse controlled areas in Northern Europe, to Russia in the East, and to various major cities like Venice, Malta and Constantinople in the South.

Giving lip service to the agreement with Perun, the Known Area people disguised themselves as ordinary humans when they contacted the nearest Vikings that lived inside Slav majority and Slavic gods worshipping areas, the Norse trading post of Ralswiek on the island of Rugen. There they started buying, of all things, children aged nine to eleven years old. And the reasoning for this was that children haven't fully developed their morality and as a result were vulnerable to pressure from adults.

After buying the children, the Known Area people would walk with the children away from Ralswiek, and taking measures to hide themselves from the Slavic gods they would suddenly reveal their true appearances and take the terrified young slaves back to their worlds. There the children would be...trained as far as the Known Area people were comfortable with before being let loose on the battlefields against their various enemies.

The results on the battlefields were apparently quite stunning. All the children, trained for only a few months, killed around ten to twenty High Magic level warriors before being killed in battle. All for monetary values that were the equivalent of...

"A hundred go of rice?“ I asked skeptically. "As in, converted to kilograms, 18 kg. of rice?”

I quickly performed some mental calculations based on the price of the 5kg. bag of rice Mother and I bought last week.

“Nine thousand three hundred plus yen at current prices?”

Izanami shrugged.

“If you say so. I'm unfamiliar with the prices of food, since I collect them from the sea and the trees to share them with my Kannushi on Nu island and his family.”

“...those heartless monsters.”

"My Kannushi and his family?" Izanami asked in a stunned manner.

"What? No! The Known Area people. They're heartless monsters for buying children and then using them as suicide attackers."

“Oh. Sorry. Uhmm...no matter our feelings, we must unfortunately recognize that spending nine thousand yen to kill ten to twenty warriors whose costs of training and weapons are so much higher than nine thousand yen is a logical, cost effective decision. But I do agree with your sentiment.”

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Once news of the battlefield results spread throughout Known Area, the demand for Human child soldiers skyrocketed, which brought negative economic effects to Northern Germany in only twelve months after the death of the last child in the first batch of purchased child slaves, and several months after the end of the 1147 Northern European Crusade.

The inflation rate in Northern Germany spiked to a level that was only surpassed by the hyperinflation that helped destroy the Roman Empire in its final days, and the direct cause of this spike was the huge amount of gold and silver dumped into the economy by the Known Area merchants trying to outbid each other for entire lots of child slaves.

The inflation of the prices, in turn, made life harder for the two sides who had just warred with each other in Northern Germany. The German Christians and the Norse people were able to cope because they already had strong finances and good trade connections with the wealthier Christian and Muslim parts of Europe. On the other hand the Slavs in Northern Germany were unable to cope with the inflation rate because their lands had been recently devastated by war with the German Christians, and because of the differences in religion they can’t have good trade connections with the wealthier parts of Europe.

Slave raids by both sides also became more frequent because of the inflation, which resulted in additional burdens on the recovery of the Northern German Slavs.

As a result of these factors the Northern German Slavs were less able to fight the German Christians during the 1160 Crusade, and were finally conquered and promptly forcibly converted to Christianity during the 1168 Crusade.

The outcome of the 1168 Crusade brought a lot of headaches to the Known Area merchants, who were already having headaches from the increasing number of Christian converts among the Vikings. In one sweep Ralswiek was suddenly Christian territory, and they were promptly told by the God of the Christians, Jews and Muslims to vacate the area and rebase themselves in the east, where there are more Slavic gods worshippers around.

The merchants did so because they weren't looking for a fight with a god. But when they entered Slavic god territory they received a surprise when Perun suddenly showed up, along with the entire Slavic pantheon and representatives from every other religion in the world.

After a brief exchange of greetings, Perun started to talk to them regarding several things.

The Slavic pantheon condones the institution of slavery. That was why they don’t react when their worshippers are sold into slavery. But the slavery practiced by the Known Area people earned not only the ire of the Slavic gods, but of all the gods of Earth because of unprecedented interference with Divine affairs.

The interference in question was stopping the souls of the dead from journeying to the afterlife.

Apparently the souls of all the enslaved children who died were stuck in the worlds where they died, left at the mercy of the alien deities and spirits of those worlds.

Many of the dead children became either pets or toys of malevolent alien gods and demons because they were exotic curiosities. Others became the guests of benevolent gods who exerted effort to make contact with the Slavic gods so as to return the dead children to their rightful afterlife.

A less numerous amount than the first two were captured and then continuously tortured for revenge by the Known Area people they were fighting, and the remaining became vagrant ghosts rejected and driven away upon sight by every being in the world they are stuck in for the crime of being an alien to their world.

Fortunately Veles, the Slavic god of the afterlife went on a very productive trip throughout Known Area. He spent several years fetching and saving all of these lost souls from their circumstances and sending them back to the Slavic land of the dead called Vyraj, along with liberating all the children who were still alive from their slavery and returning them home to Northern Germany.

Unfortunately many of those who ended up as the pets, toys and torture victims were insane by the time Veles saved them from their owners and captors. And not even reincarnation was able to fix the insanity, because they were also still insane people during their next reincarnation.

Perun also added that he pins the majority of the blame for the result of the 1168 Crusade on the Known Area merchants, for the economic damage inflicted upon Slavs by all the gold and silver the merchants dumped into the economy and for the physical damage caused by all the slave raids that were organized to tap the money of the Known Area merchants.

Those were the reasons why entrance to the territory of the Slavic pantheon worshippers by anyone from Known Area who is not a scholar or a diplomat was forbidden from that point onwards.

Perun’s declaration was followed up by the representatives from all the other religions on Earth also giving declarations that do the same for their own religions. Thus, at the end of that day every Known Area merchant present on Earth was deported by the spirits and gods of Earth and the proclamation was backed by magical beings performing the job of customs officers on the borders of Earth’s universe.

This action had drastic repercussions on Known Area because Known Space warfare had changed with the introduction of the Human child slave soldiers.

Post 1147 armies had become smaller, had become entirely composed of High Magic people, had become over-reliant on enslaved Human child soldiers and all the battles had turned into ritualized affairs that served to minimize the amount of dead Known Area people at the expense of the lives of the enslaved Human children.

The sudden end of the supply of enslaved Human children, and the chaos that Veles’ trip through Known Area…

“May I ask another question regarding the past?” I asked.

“Alright. Which topic confused you?”

“It’s not confusion, but a lack of information. What exactly did Veles do in his fetching and saving and liberating that chaos would result from it?”

“...for the dead Human children that had become the pets and toys of evil gods and demons, he openly attacked said magical beings inside their own domains while demanding that the souls of the Human children be handed over to him. The ensuing battles damaged the worlds and universes that many Known Area polities were located in.”

I stared at Izanami in disbelief when she said that a simple fight between gods or a god and a demon was able to do damage to a universe, but I didn’t say anything because I wanted to hear the rest of Izanami’s answer.

“For those dead children who were being tortured by Known Space polities, he would first negotiate a ransom for their freedom. If the polity rejected the ransom and sent him away, he would attack the location where the souls were being tortured some time later, grab the children’s souls while killing all opposition he encountered, and then run away before he could get overwhelmed by reinforcements.”

I had mixed feelings at hearing this part of Veles’ trip through Known Area. On one hand I felt happy that he delivered divine punishment on the torturers, but on the other hand I disapprove of his payments of ransom money. It felt too much like rewarding the torturers for their crime against the children.

“For the dead children who were guests, he visited the pantheons involved, engaged in very productive diplomatic dialogue, and then left with the children with smiles on both sides. For the vagrants, he bribed and cajoled the local pantheons into helping him find them."

I listened with no problems at this part, because I approve of said actions.

"And for the living children he liberated…he went to the places where they were held, killed the Known Area people who attacked him while he was shouting his identity to the Slav children who are enslaved, freed them all and then led the children in fighting their way out of that universe and returning to ours."

"That's good," I muttered in approval at Veles' actions when it came to the living children.

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The sudden end of the supply of enslaved Human children, and the chaos that Veles’ trip through Known Area created, became the end of the prologue to the greatest war in Known Space's history.

The dozens of merchants who became Known Area's counterparts to the likes of Bill Gates and the other top billionaires of Earth purely through the trade of enslaved Human child soldiers went berserk at the idea of being cut off from the trade that made them filthy rich.

The Known Area polities who invested in Human child soldiers were suddenly pushed to the brink of defeat in their wars with their neighbors by the sudden lack of Human children and the devastation that Veles inflicted on them.

Half the Known Area polities who were being waged war upon on by the Known Space polities who invested in Human child soldiers were unable to capitalize on the setback suffered by their enemies because Veles also raided them for the Human children.

A lot of demons and malevolent gods were screaming for war at the insult that Veles had done to them, because apparently attacking them inside their domains was a perversion of the natural order where it is the demons and malevolent alien gods who attack the benevolent alien gods in their domain. And to the surprise and bewilderment of even the demons and malevolent gods, the majority of a few pantheons from all parts of Known Area, mainly those from universes of the Known Area polities that approved torturing the Human children's souls, were screaming for war for the insult of having one god from a newcomer universe to Known Space trample all over their territories and their worshippers for something that they had approved of.

All these disparate factions coalesced together into a coalition whose aim was revenge on the gods of Earth, or Earth, or both in whatever manner they wanted. Fortunately for Earth, the process of coalescing was slow because all these factions had issues of various kinds with each other.

The pantheons of Earth were not blind to this threat, what with all the beings who can see into the future or had something to do with fate or destiny. Earth's pantheons, and their worshippers, also formed a coalition to defend what is theirs from the Known Area people.

Unfortunately the coalition of the Pantheons from Earth also suffered from internal strife in the same manner as the Known Area coalition. The Slavic pantheon, along with the Greek, the Celtic, the Norse and many others are antagonistic with the God of the Christians, Jews and Muslims, whose worshippers had displaced or converted their own. The majority of the gods and spirits of Japan, China, Korea, Mongolia, and Central Asia were still unhappy with how Buddhism syncretized with their religions and relegated them to the sidelines or made them out to belong to the world of the Buddhas. The gods of Hinduism were unhappy with the Buddhas and the God of the Muslims, Christians and Jews for being competitors while the Southeast Asian gods and spirits were unhappy with both Hinduism and Buddhism and Islam for syncretizing with their worshippers and so on and so forth.

The only saving grace was that there were beings and pantheons who could honestly serve as impartial third parties between all the conflicting factions, including the Buddhas who just never bore grudges.

The preparations on both sides continued until the year 1171 came along.

On the first day of that year, millions of High Magic mercenaries, soldiers and warriors led by chieftains, generals and monarchs from all corners of Known Area formed up into battle formations in front of thousands of free standing torii-like structures that would serve as structural frameworks for the portals to Earth. And accompanying them all, in places of honor accorded to them by the leaders of the armies, were the dozens of gods and demons who had sworn revenge on Veles.

The magical portals were all opened at the same time by all these eager people bent on greed and revenge. All the armies started to march...only to stop as they saw the hosts of all the pantheons of Earth on the other side, where they aren’t supposed to be.

It was at this point that Izanami stopped her exposition, with her eyes closed.

“Izanami?” I asked her, wondering what this was about.

“On that day, I was in Yami. Beside me was my daughter in law Kushinada hime, and we were watching my son, Susanoo, lead everyone in Yami with fighting and hunting experience through a portal...a portal shaped like a gate that is as wide as Mt. Fuji was tall. The portal lead to a custom-made universe that all the head gods created just outside of this universe we are in to prevent this planet from being damaged. You should have seen it Kurumi,” Izanami said as she looked at me with this wistful look on her face.

“It was glorious. Hundreds of thousands of departed ancestors marching off to the greatest fight and hunt they had ever seen in their existence, armored in quilted hemp jackets and pants twenty layers strong and dyed completely in blessed cinnabar, wielding wooden shields or wooden bows completely lacquered in more blessed cinnabar, and armed with spears and arrows tipped with obsidian that we gods had put curses into.”

“What happened next?” I asked.

“The hosts of Earth attacked through the portals.”

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Izanami didn’t bother to describe the battle itself. She said that she can’t do justice to the battle because her knowledge of the battle was purely secondhand information from her son Ebisu and the departed ancestors in Yami who fought there. So she went straight to the results of the battle.

After three weeks of fighting, the remnants of the Known Area coalition finally made the Earth pantheons retreat back to Earth. Fortunately, they didn’t purse the retreating forces.

Unfortunately, it was because of all the damage that the Earth coalition did on the Known Space coalition.

The statistics that Izanami recited next made me shiver in fear.

“Seventeen universes were ripped into nonexistence. Twenty planets smashed into a gigantic cloud of multikilometer sized rocks speeding across their planetary systems like a gigantic grenade. Sixty One planets had multiple tsunamis the size of Mt. Fuji racing across their oceans. Thirty Two planets had their entire surface burned into molten rock. One Hundred Ninety Two planets had all their volcanoes exploding at the same time. Two Thousand Thirty cities were destroyed. Two Hundred Two gods and demons were permanently killed. Two Hundred One gods and demons were temporarily killed. And Three Million...Five Million something High Magic mortal combatants dead.”

“And the civilians? How many died?”

“...no one counted.”

The losses that the Earth coalition suffered were only slightly less horrible in comparison.

Except for the spirits of the dead in whatever form they were in, who were a special case of their own, half of the entire Earth coalition died. Gods and demons and supernatural beings alike.

The spirits of the dead were all just sent back to the afterlife that they belong to at the moment they were exorcised, both those already in their heavens or hells and those who were stuck on Earth as restless ghosts and derivative monsters. None of them got destroyed because apparently destroying a soul requires a god with their full attention on it, something that won't happen when they are fighting other gods and demons and very powerful supernatural creatures at the same time.

A few days after that a meeting was set up, between the surviving and traumatized members of the Known Area coalition and representatives of all the pantheons of Earth.

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Izanami stopped explaining for some time after that, while looking downwards at her feet with a sad expression.

I let her be, because I remember what she said earlier. That her husband had died.

Izanagi, one of the two mythical creators of the land of Japan, had died in 1171.

It…was hard. But I managed to not think more about Izanami's possible losses from that war, what with her earlier statement that I was shouting my thoughts. And it was thanks to me murmuring the "May Peace prevail on Earth" prayer repeatedly, in an attempt to...give the goddess positive energy.

I was on my eleventh repeat of "May Peace prevail on Earth" that Izanami looked up at me with a smile and thanked me for the positive thoughts, and for the experience with one of the new religious movements of Japan.

She then resumed her history lecture.

The death of half the Earth coalition was the main reason why the remaining members of the Known Area coalition had the courage to arrogantly dictate demands to the representatives of the Earth coalition, during the first minutes of the peace conference organized by the most powerful neutral polities in Known Area a month after the war ended.

Negotiations almost broke down at that moment if it were not for the neutral polities collectively putting their foot down and forcing the Known Area coalition members to tone their demands down, in exchange for support in making the Earth coalition stick to the terms that would be agreed upon.

"So we lost?" I asked all of a sudden, feeling...lost, for lack of any better word to use.

"...I believe the word that your generation would use is 'technically.' The main purpose of attacking the numerically superior forces of the Known Area coalition from a custom made universe outside of our own was to take the fighting away Earth, to prevent Earth from getting damaged in the same way that the Earth coalition did to so many others. When the Earth coalition was forced to retreat back to Earth, that meant the next battle would be waged on Earth. And...you now know what could happen when gods and demons and supernatural beings at the highest High Magic levels seriously fight with each other."

I was unable to help the shiver that went through me as I remembered what happened to those other places Izanami had just told me about.

'Cities and continents and planets and universes blown up into pieces. Good heavens these people...oh. I'm sorry Izanami.'

"It's alright Kurumi. I, and every other former and current Mother goddess, understand those sentiments you and most mortals have in a way that...that very few mortals could ever understand."

"What do you mean?"

Izanami coughed, and shyly muttered the following words while looking away from me.

"I…am opposed to the idea of feeling the sensation of exploding from the inside out."

"Oh. Oh…so…so Mother goddess is the same as being Earth itself. And if Earth blows up…"

The shiver that went through Izanami's body served as the answer to my question.

It was silent for several seconds after that, presumably because the part about blowing up from the inside out was a really discomforting thought for Izanami.

I felt responsible, because I was the one who started this with a stray thought. So I tried to move past the entire blowing up from the inside thing.

"So, I would like to make my guess on what kind of experiment Matsumoto was about."

"Alright Kurumi. Let's hear it. But I must warn you that there are still more information that I haven't told you, so you would most likely be more wrong than right."

"I'll take that chance. Ok, starting now. Matsumoto was an experiment in seeing how well the Earth pantheons could help adult humans perform Non-natural Magic to allow them to fight here on Earth in the place of gods and demons."

I knew I was wrong when Izanami shook her head and said the following with a smile.

"That was somewhat close to what I was thinking, but its wrong because of the information I still haven't told you about."

"Alright. What's the correct answer?"

"The correct answer is the following. Matsumoto was an experiment in seeing how well can the Earth pantheons help human mortals perform Non-natural magic in a manner that won't break the terms of the Chains of 1171, and in seeing how well can beings from different pantheons work alongside each other."

I didn't ask what the Chains of 1171 was, since it was obvious it was the peace conference that was being referred to. Neither did I ask what were the terms laid down at that peace conference that would give it such a disturbing name.

What I asked suddenly came out from the depths of my heart.

"Then what was the result of the experiment and distraction that cost me and my family our home? Was it worth us losing our home?"

I realized a moment later that I was being unfair to Izanami, who had already said earlier she was an outcast from the wider supernatural community. She didn't have a role in the decision making process that led to the loss of my home.

"I'm sorry Izanami. That was so unfair of me."

"It's alright. I understand and I forgive you, especially because I experienced a similar situation in the past due to my husband. Do you want to talk about your home, to lessen the pain?"

I instantly took the opportunity Izanami gave me, because don't think I can't fade away this particular hurt.

"Our home…that was supposed to be our permanent residence. Mother and I would live there with Ao and any other child we would give birth to while our husbands were at work. And…and that rickety, lovable, fifty year old house…me and Ichigo thought of that house as both our Jisan Kin and Yui Nou, my dowry and his bride price, no matter the technicalities."

I paused for a moment and took a deep breath before continuing to explain the main reason why losing that house hurts.

"That house was bought with what was supposed to be my college tuition and all the Ohta family had in the bank! What do we do now? We're still partly dependent on regular deposits from Papa and both sets of Ichigo's grandparents for utility bills and everyday expenses four years after buying the house!"

As my face sank down onto my hands, my mind finally started to wander around for solutions to this family crisis.

I had just rejected the first thing to come to mind, asking Papa for more money, and started to entertain me dropping out of school to start working when Izanami broke my train of thought.

"Kurumi, all you need is a new home right? Maybe...I can help?"

I looked up from my palms to see Izanami looking at me with the hopefulness of a puppy that wanted to play.

"How?"

Izanami coughed.

"My home over there was made by me and some of my remaining children with our own hands. So, how about if we help you build new dwellings? I'm sure we can use material from the wreckage of your former house."

My gaze switched back and forth from Izanami to her pit house at my rear left. After several moments of this, I started to imagine the end result of her proposition, based on what I saw of her pit dwelling.

It would have to be two separate pit houses; one for me, Ichigo and Ao and the other for Mother and Father.

For cooking, heating and lighting, we would use either a fireplace or a portable gas stove. For storing foodstuff and water...coolers, jars and pots, lots of salt, and water containers. For the floor…a rug over a layer of compacted soil, I think. And for a door, a sheet of cloth and a clothes stand.

For bathing, we would have to go to a public bath. Toilet…oh dear heavens we would have to use a chamber pot. And then there's the laundry. We would have to wash them outside the house, in full view of pedestrians on the sidewalk.

And worst of all for a pit house…

'The walls aren't thick and I'm a screamer. I don't want to gag myself every time I have sex with my husband to be for the rest of my life.'

Izanami suddenly giggled, her face flushed as red as an angry pimple. It was at that moment that I remembered Izanami can hear my thoughts.

"I…I'm sorry Izanami. My family would become an object of pity if we settled down for a pit house."

I tried my best to keep my face straight, when all I wanted was to sink it into my hands and curl into a ball of embarrassment.

Izanami responded by switching from giggles to outright, heartfelt laughter.

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By the time Izanami had completely calmed down, the sun of Izanami’s reproduced Onogoro was already halfway hidden by the orange tinted horizon.

“Kurumi, thank you,” she said while wiping tears away from her eyes. “I haven’t laughed like that in a very, long time.”

“You’re welcome…I think.”

“Alright, back to the matter at hand. Are you sure you don’t want my family’s help in building a new house? I could ask my children to lower their fees.”

“Yes, I’m sure. I acknowledge that a pit house such as yours is cozy and warm but we live in a city. Certain minimum standards must be met.”

While the house that we lived in was old, it was connected to the electric, water and sewage systems and had interior partitions. Those were things that Izanami's pit house didn't have.

“Oh. I see…”

Izanami lost the smile that was on her face. What replaced it was a thoughtful frown that lasted for some time.

She finally said something when I started to ruminate again on the housing crisis we were in.

“Kurumi, would you accept charity?”

I blinked.

“Charity? Well…I’m alright with it but my parents in law and Ichigo have pride. They won’t easily accept charity.”

“I see…Kurumi, what if I tell you I’m willing to help you out by making you precious stones to sell?”

At the words ‘precious stones,’ my mind conjured up memories of all the diamond and pearl jewelry that I saw on TV.

“Would your parents in law and your husband have any problem with that? I don’t think it’s charity if you have to exert the effort to sell what I’m about to give to you.”

After a few seconds of thinking, I shook my head.

It was likely that selling enough precious stones to pay for the reconstruction of our home would bring an equal amount of headaches for our family. However, we must go through with that if we were to have a house as soon as possible.

“Good. As soon as we get back to your body and find a space big enough for it, I’m going to make so many uncut obsidian, jade and amber that their prices in Japan will drop by half.”

Izanami then extended her hand towards me.

“Shall we?”