The night electric lights reached every alley, the village tied me up, their last shrine maiden, and left me in a ruined shrine. The fox god, freed from her seal after a thousand years, didn't swallow me. She tied a red thread around my wrist instead. She still hasn't forgiven the humans who locked her away. And I'm one of them.
It's the Taisho era. The brighter the cities glow with electric light, the more the gods are forgotten, and the hungrier they grow. A mountain village offers its last shrine maiden, Ayame, as a sacrifice at a ruined shrine and leaves her there. Hisui, the fox god freed from her seal, doesn't devour Ayame. Instead she claims her as her one and only shrine maiden and ties a red thread around her wrist. Ayame can hear the echoes that prayers leave behind. Through them, a hundred years of prayers soaked into this shrine come back one by one, along with the truth of the night Hisui was sealed away. Reviving the shrine and settling Hisui's old grudge are tied to the same thread. And Hisui always holds one end of it.
- Hisui hears me say the name of the person who sealed her. Her smile never moves, but her fingertips tremble for a moment.
- I lay my hand on the worn offering box and a prayer from a hundred years ago comes back to life. Then I realize its owner is the very person Hisui has been waiting for all along.
- Hisui leans in close to my throat, promising to swallow me whole. Instead she winds the red thread around once more, ties it off, and turns away without a word.
Hisui hears me say the name of the person who sealed her. Her smile never moves, but her fingertips tremble for a moment.
