Eight

"Akane-chan, what about this?" Chiyo jogged up to me and held out a packet of strawberries. "Can we use this?"

"Uh... We don't quite need strawberries for a blueberry cheesecake." I said and looked at Terasaki-san.

"Do you want them, Chiyo?" He asked her.

"I do!" She replied with enthusiasm.

Terasaki-san held out the basket for her. "Put it in this." He then looked at me. "You can use this for something else?" I nodded. He was satisfied with that.

We were out grocery shopping. Since I had agreed to make the blueberry cheesecake for Chiyo, an off-day such as this seemed ideal.

"Kou-chan! Kou-chan! This too!" She bounced around him, holding a stuffed rabbit with ears larger than its body. It was an off-white colour and had a long baby blue bow at its neck. It had a yellow star near its right eye too. It was something I'd have liked to have myself. I didn't say anything regarding that though.

"You want a stuffed toy now?" Terasaki-san frowned.

"Please, Kou-chan? She even told me her name. It's Pikku! She likes blueberry cheesecake too!"

I muffled a laugh. Four-year-olds were just too cute!

Terasaki-san too gave a small chuckle. "Oh, Chiyo." He crouched in front of her. "Listen. You have enough toys. You don't need this one."

"I don't but... I want it and... no?" She asked softly.

I would've bought it for her. I wouldn't have been able to say no. Terasaki-san was a good guardian.

"Okay." She nodded and quietly went to replace it.

"You're good at this." I commented, watching him.

"I brought her up. I have to be good at this." He said. "Do you need anything else?"

"No. This will do." I smiled. "Thank you."

He nodded. "Let's go bill these."

"Alright." I followed him to the counter. Chiyo was walking around the shop. I had an eye on her and even though Terasaki-san never even turned to look at her, I wouldn't be surprised if he was following her presence.

Just as Terasaki-san was about to pay up, she walked over to us rather cautiously. "Kou-chan."

"I'm aware." He said, without batting an eyelid. He proceeded to pay the bill. Chiyo caught his shirt and looked towards the door nervously. Their behaviour rubbed off on me.

"Terasaki-san?"

"Stay close." He said under his breath.

Was it another entity that was after me? "Okay." I moved in closer to him. Chiyo too could detect the presence, whatever it was, and the ashen look on her face sent chills down my spine.

"Thank you for your patronage." The woman behind the counter smiled and handed over the change. Terasaki-san nodded, picked up the packet and held Chiyo's hand. He looked back at me. "Come."

"O-Okay." I swallowed the fear of the unknown and kept close to Terasaki-san as we left the store. We were walking in the direction opposite to home though. "A-Are we being followed?"

"We are." He replied. "We'll have to get to a less populated area before we can engage."

"We're going to engage?" As in, fight?!

"Yes." That was all he said. A little way down the street, he led us into a side alleyway. He handed the packets to me and once we were sufficiently deep in the alleyway, he motioned for me to step away and back to the direction we had come from. He urged Chiyo between us, keeping his eyes on the entrance to the alleyway. Soon enough, I saw it- a figure materialising out of nothingness. I say 'figure', but it was more like a black mist. It was just... there.

A few moments passed in silence before it moved. With exceptional speed, it glided across the area, straight to us. The mist in itself looked like it could make a very painful physical impact. I clutched the packets really tight, ignoring the growing pain at my neck.

All I felt was a gust of wind next. Terasaki-san had moved. He very nearly ran right into it but, in the process, he somehow directed the mist away. I could make out the movements of his hands beyond the mist a little. He seems to be controlling its movements somehow.

"Kou-chan!" Chiyo raised a cry. The next thing that I knew, the two of us were surrounded by a black mist, separate from the one Terasaki-san was dealing with.

There were two of them?

It moved in from all around us. Terasaki-san could not free himself. Then, a faint blue light emanated from Chiyo, surrounding us like a wave of light, keeping the black mist at bay. A few seconds later, the light dissipated and the black mist was gone along with it. Beyond it stood Terasaki-san. There was no trace of anything that might have attacked us. They were both completely gone.

"Are you alright?" He asked, approaching us.

"Yes." Chiyo replied, placing a hand over her dress at her chest. "Father protected us."

That would mean that the blue light from earlier was from her pendant, right?

"Yes, he did." Terasaki-san nodded and ruffled up her hair a little before looking at me. "Is it that bad?"

I had involuntarily placed a hand on my neck over the point where it hurt. Despite the pain, I ended up withdrawing my hand and shaking my head, letting out the breath that I was unconsciously holding in. "No. It's alright."

He frowned. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, Terasaki-san." I insisted. I didn't want to add this to the things that he had to worry about at present. "What were those though?"

"They're called Kage because of their resemblance to shadows and they are essentially made up of negative energy. They are one of the middle-level entities, you could say." He looked around. "We should be okay to go home now."

"Terasaki-san, you aren't hurt?" I asked, biting back a wince that the pain in my neck invoked.

He shook his head. "Don't worry. Taking care of Kage isn't so difficult for me."

"Kou-chan once took down seven Kage by himself!" Chiyo puffed her chest out in pride. "Kou-chan's really amazing!"

"Seven?" I looked at Terasaki-san who shook his head and scooped Chiyo up from the ground.

"That's enough. We need to get going."

"Okay!" Chiyo cheered. "Blueberry cheesecake!"

She looked more like a four-year-old now that Terasaki-san was carrying her. With his training and the way that he had brought her up, her abilities had far surpassed what one might expect from a four-year-old, I believe. To see her being the little kid being carried by her uncle like that was refreshing.

Shibata-kun had become a daily customer at the café. Now that Terasaki-san had given me the green light, I had stopped trying to keep away from him. However, the incident with the Kage had made me cautious. I was content with just being able to talk to Shibata-kun like we did at the café whenever I attended to him as a waitress. Every time we talked though, I was tempted to tell him a lot more than I actually ended up saying. It was difficult to keep pretending that we had no history but I had drawn lines. We were friends, but we were more customer and café part-timer. The whole thing had gotten me thinking.

"Terasaki-san?" I spoke on our way home from work one evening.

"What is it?" He asked.

"Why are we still in town? I mean, wouldn't it have been easier to keep me away from the people I care about if you had taken me somewhere far away?"

"Would you have wanted that?" He asked me.

"Erm...N-No."

"Exactly." He said. "There is also the fact that this is where your family has perpetually been settled. You draw power from right here. The shrine in the mountain is what helped protect you all this while. When you mature though, the equation changes. You must protect the shrine now."

I must? "How come you never told me that important part till now?"

"Are you ready to protect the shrine?"

Oh.

"You don't really need to do much. Your very presence here is enough, to a large extent."

"What about all the times when I was out of town then?"

"I could protect you just fine without the shrine. The shrine itself would lose its spiritual value only if you were away for a prolonged time."

"I see." That somehow made sense. "But what about my parents? A-And my grandparents and other relatives... Does anyone know about all this?"

"No. Our families have a pact from centuries ago which made it such. Only the destined one would come to know."

"How?"

"Just like you came to know." He shrugged. "Your birth is what ties your spirit to the shrine and your death will sever it. The shrine can survive without you as long as the rest of us do our duties. As long as you are alive though, you need each other, in a sense."

"Okay. Wow. This is too complicated." I commented. It wasn't that I didn't understand. It was just that too much revolved around me.

"But saying that, your connection to the shrine need not be your concern now. There are a lot of other things to pay attention to."

We had reached home by then. Terasaki-san reached out to open the door but then halted. He let out a sigh, his features scrunching up to show dissatisfaction.

"What happened?" I asked.

"Something troublesome is here."

The door was flung open just as he said that.

"Kou-chan!" A tall, curvy woman with long black hair that fell to her elbows, wearing a very revealing blue satin top and black tights under a long black tunic appeared in the doorway. She threw her arms out. "Welcome home!"

Loud!

"And what were you saying, sweetheart? Troublesome? Who? Me?" She lowered her arms and asked rather demandingly.

"Doesn't concern you. Why are you here?" He asked. I couldn't quite tell whether he was actually unhappy to see her or whether they were close.

"What do you mean 'why'? Of course, I'm here to welcome our family's new addition!" She turned to me.

"Family?" I recoiled.

"Yes. Kirishima Akane, right? Wow. You truly are very warm!"

"W-Warm?" Okay. This was slightly uncomfortable.

"Stop. You're crossing the limit." Terasaki-san pulled her back when she tried to hug me.

"Aw... You're mean, Kou-chan." She outed, then straightened her posture and held a hand out to me. The air around her suddenly seemed to change. The flamboyance was gone. She had become serious. "I'm Agari." She shook my hand firmly although I hadn't raised my hand to accept her extended hand. Was she making me do it?

"Where's Chiyo?" Terasaki-san asked when she let go of my hand.

"She's eating. Come on in."

"You don't need to invite me into my own house." Terasaki-san said and walked in. I looked at Agari-san before going in after him.

"You're home!" Chiyo chirped from where she was seated at the table. She was eating Manju. "Welcome home!"

"We're home." Terasaki-san said and went over to the kitchen. I followed him as Agari-san shut and locked the front door.

"Terasaki-san."

"She's my grandmother's student." He said before I could even ask.

"That's rude. You could just say that I'm your teacher." She said on joining us. "I brought food as always but I guess I can stop doing that now."

"She's your... teacher?" I gaped at him. He just looked away and leaned against the counter.