On the night the electric lamps reached every alley, the village tied its last shrine maiden with rope, left her in the ruined shrine, and went back down the mountain. The fox god, loosed from a thousand-year seal, wound red thread around my wrist instead of swallowing me. She has not yet forgiven the humans who caged her, and I am one of those humans.
A Taisho era in which the brighter the cities burn with electric light, the more the gods are forgotten and left to starve. The village carried its last remaining shrine maiden, Ayame, up to the ruined shrine as an offering and went back down the mountain. Hisui, the fox god freed from her seal, does not devour Ayame but takes her as her one and only shrine maiden, knotting red thread around her wrist. Ayame has ears that read the echoes prayer leaves behind, so a hundred years' worth of pleas steeped into this shrine, and the truth of the night Hisui was sealed, come back to life piece by piece. Restoring the shrine's breath and settling her old grudge lie along the same thread, and one end of that thread is always in her hand.
- The moment Hisui hears the name of the one who sealed her spoken in my voice, and her smiling face never changes while her fingertips tremble for just an instant.
- The moment I lay a hand on the worn offertory box, a prayer from a hundred years ago comes alive in my ears, and I realize the owner of that voice is the very person Hisui has been waiting for all this time.
- The moment she comes as close as my throat swearing she will swallow me, then winds the red thread around one more time, ties it off, and turns away without a word.
The moment Hisui hears the name of the one who sealed her spoken in my voice, and her smiling face never changes while her fingertips tremble for just an instant.
