Karmatic

A New Sun Chapter 129

A New Sun Chapter 128

A New Sun Chapter 127

A New Sun Chapter 126

A New Sun Chapter 125

No Chapter This Week

A New Sun Chapter 124

A New Sun Chapter 123

No Chapter This Week

A New Sun Chapter 122

Chapter 122 Small Delay

A New Sun Chapter 121

A New Sun Chapter 120

Chapter 120

< A New Sun >

“T-This, t-this!” The little Ama clone stretched prone across my lap, sniffles and stutters out, “This wasn’t h-how this was supposed to go!”

I pat her on the head, soothingly, shaking my left hand out as it buzzes with faux pain, “Should have thought of that before you got yourself stuffed in my soul.” I reply, giving her half a smirk and a side eye.

“N-Not in your soul!” She stresses and whines for the umpteenth time.

“Same difference.” I huff back to her, also for the umpteenth time, prompting a whine from her as she finally gives up.

“Good girl.” I nod, only causing her to pout, “Now, what did we learn?”

It took her a moment, but eventually, she responded, lowly, “...Not to be attached to someone’s soul without their consent.”

I nod, continuing, “Or?”

“Or…” she lets out a low whine, as if remembering it was the same as experiencing it all over again, “Spanking.”

I nod once more, this time fully pleased, “Excellent. You may sit up now.”

She sniffles, before doing exactly that, sliding off my legs and sitting up on her knees.

Only, as she went to sit, she yelped and suddenly shot upright.

She looked at me, all teary-eyed, the accusation clear in her gaze.

I just shrugged. “I’m not healing you. For one, you’re not actually wounded; two, this is your punishment. Won’t mean much if you didn’t have to deal with the consequences.”

Her eye twitched at that, guilt crossing her face before, without another word, she moved once again.

In short order, she was no longer on her knees but instead sat on her side. Despite how careful she was, I could see the wince as she lowered herself done, and her shaky breath out as her body settled.

All in all, she’s very lucky that’s all she got.

And that’s only because she’s right; she’s attached to my soul, but she isn’t really a part of it.

I’m not sure if that’s due to the Sacred Beast Inheritance Ritual, or the modified form of it, Ama made specifically for this, but in either case, the result is the same.

Attachment, not embedding. There is a very important difference.

If she were embedded within my soul like a proper Sacred Gear, she’d be attached to my literal everything.

Most importantly, that would include my memories.

For obvious reasons, I can’t have that.

Second to that, getting her out wouldn’t be pleasant if she were properly nested within my soul.

Sacred Gears kill a person for a reason when they are pulled out. It’s spiritual mutilation. Not fun. That would most likely kill me, even for all my regeneration; I can’t heal my very soul.

I think. I haven’t really needed to try.

Hopefully, I won’t ever have to.

So, yeah, she should count herself very lucky in that respect.

Now, on the flipside, her merely being attached to my soul does have its own host of issues.

For one, she’s significantly looser spiritually, our connection isn’t so concrete, and this means that it can be severed pretty easily.

Hell, I get the feeling I could eject her myself, right now, if I wanted to. Someone with mastery over Senjutsu, like say Kuroka, could probably easily steal her away.

It also means I can’t use the powers of the sword fully, whatever those may be. If there is something like a Balance Breaker here, a super state of some kind, I can’t access it.

I should be able to use the base powers at the very least, though. Good enough to show off the idea I’m building towards here.

Speaking of!

“Now that’s all taken care of,” I make a show of brushing my hands together, “what can you do, hmm, Wa-tan?”

“Please don’t call me that,” she weakly whines out, before sighing, “and, um, don’t be mad more, but I…” she slowly looks away in sheer embarrassment, “I don’t actually know?”

I blink at that, “Really?” before tilting my head in consideration, “I’m not mad, but I thought the sword would just have your powers, like your natural abilities, nothing else?”

She shook her head, before looking back at me, “I can’t really do much beyond some light manipulation, although I am pretty good a changing the color of my light and such, that’s really it.”

Huh. Yeah, when I was making my way down here, the sword didn’t look like a lightsaber, did it?

It was covered in cloth and thread. More so than when Inari wrapped it, and the thread specifically just came out of nowhere.

I tap my chin, letting out a low hum, before deciding, “Oh, well!”

Wa-tan blinks at that, “...Oh, well?”

I nod, reaching over and petting her on the head, “Yup. Oh well. We’ll just have to figure it out through trial and error.”

She perked up at that, before steadily leaning into my hand, “R-Really? I thought that…” she trailed off.

“Eh. Whatever you thought?” I look her straight in the eyes, “Throw it away. I’m not going to toss you out, call you a failure, whatever, because this didn’t turn out exactly how we probably expected it to.”

In fact, this is a far more interesting outcome, if anything!

“I-I…Right! Okay!” She nods, resolutely, a single tear or two gliding down her cheeks before she smiles, “Mother and Lady Uzume left you to rest, while they went about their day. To be honest, we didn’t expect you’d wake up as soon as you did, so they probably won’t be back to check on you until tonight.”

I scoff at that, “They should know by now, I’m just built differently.”

Wa-tan giggles back, a hand coming up to cover her mouth as she does so.

“Though,” I continue, “that also means we have plenty of time to figure this out without being interrupted, yeah? And, say we do, then…” I trail off, a smirk slowly growing across my face.

The girl across from me blinked, before her eyes widened, and she gasped, “You mean to suggest to interrupt the court!?”

“Mhmm~!” I hum out, “See, what better way to absolutely humiliate our older brother, then by showing you and the concept for, hmm, Sacred Treasures off, then have him march on in after the fact spouting the same old bullshit as before?”

Wa-tan pursed her lips at that, considering, “Well, that would certainly make him look like quite the fool…”

Oh yeah, it’s all coming together.

“But, if you interrupt the court, that would also be proving his point, too, wouldn’t it?” She brought up.

Eh, how so?

I think back on that day, and immediately figure out what she means.

If I break into the court and be all like, ‘hey ya’ll, want some soul weapon candy?’ that’d be eschewing tradition and procedure, and all that.

I could do it, too. Because really, who is going to stop me?

But that’d be throwing around my power, so…

Aw, fuck.

I slump, crossing my arms and sighing, “Oh, fine. I’ll wait in line like everyone else.” I grumble out, almost painfully.

“Good.” Wa-tan giggled at me, her hand reaching over to gently pat my head, “There, there~!”

I sit there, letting her do so, because it’s that cute, and also somehow making me feel better about my future loss of sanity and free time.

Of course, if we’re going to do this, we can’t sit here forever, so after only a little while of doing so, I let out a huff and waved her hand away.

“Alright, Wa-tan!” I stretch, before standing up, “Let’s get this show on the road!”

“Right!” She nods resolutely, pumping her fists in front of her chest, only for her to stop and blink midway through and look at me again, “Hey! What did I say about calling me Wa-tan!?”

Her sputtering whines and my chuckling filled the space where the last things I heard as I pulled out, and my focus returned purely onto the physical world.

[Mmmm!] Wa-tan whined in the back of my head, [You’re mean! Just like the rest of our brothers!]

I shook my head at that.

No, for you see, they’re dicks. I’m a competitive dick. Very big difference.

[Same difference!] She tries to clap back at me, using my words back at me.

I snort at her adorable attempt, as I hold a hand out to the side.

Ready?

[No!] She immediately shot back, I could feel the pout even if I couldn’t see her.

With a shake of my head and light smirk, I snap my fingers anyway, and in a multicolored flash, the sword appears in my hand.

Let’s get to work!

< A New Sun >

Amaterasu sat upon her throne and tried her best not to lean back and slide down the entire thing.

Truthfully, the only thing keeping her back straight and posture correct is the little bits here and there of worry still in her heart over Nori.

It’s irrational, she knows all too well, but she can’t help herself.

Even as some random kami from somewhere: look, she doesn’t know, okay!? Omoikane announced their arrival, their name, place of residence, reason for being here, and all that, but she didn’t pay attention!

Most of the time, these random mob characters that show up never want anything actually important.

Most of them live here, in Takamagahara. They do not need anything at all!

So, that results in them coming here for a stupid and downright deranged list of reasons instead.

‘This tree is hanging slightly over my yard!’ ‘The grass on the sidewalk is a fraction too long!’ ‘My neighbor is this, my neighbor said that, I hate my neighbor!’

Her personal favorite, and reminder that this is why her Mother and Father gave her life, is that time a Kami came in complaining that the color of their hair was not to their liking.

Yeah, Amaterasu considered the cave again that day. Dying to the seal put before it would be far better than suffering here.

So, even as Amaterasu is physically looking forward, she doesn’t truly see the Kami waving his arms and hands around in an exaggerated motion; his mouth is moving alongside it, but she doesn’t even hear the words.

No, her senses are focused elsewhere, on her son.

She can feel him there, still in the room where they had left him.

For a moment, she had thought she felt him awaken, as his power spiked and fluctuated oddly for a brief moment.

But then it returned to normal, and stagnated, before going back to rest.

It took everything in her power not to abandon this place and go check on him, but ultimately, she knew he’d be fine.

At this rate, though, if she keeps on worrying so much, she’s going to end up with gray hair. Somehow.

To her right, Omoikane stepped forward at her right side, clearing his throat, “Alright, alright. I believe that is enough, Mr…well, I believe that is enough.”

It took everything Amaterasu had not to snort. Even Omoikane forgot this guy's name. It’s all coming full circle!

“This court has heard your pleas, and proper action will be decided upon.” Omoikane droned on, the same old practiced lines, “You may go.”

The no-name kami cleared his throat, gave a completely overdramatic bow, and waxed upon her glory and Omoikane’s wisdom, before turning and strutting out of the palace.

At least Amaterasu thinks he did; her mind sort of stuttered there for a moment, and every single other time that had happened sort of blurred together into one dull memory.

“Right, then. The next Kami may present themselves.” Omoikane called out, though the court was so quiet he didn’t even need to raise his voice.’

The doors slipped open and shut as they always do.

Amaterasu’s gaze began to unfocus almost immediately, the silence replaced by a droning white noise in the back of her head.

She didn’t notice Omoikane stiffening in shock next to her, right as he was about to take a step back, as he usually did.

“Yo.”

Amaterasu’s attention snapped back into place.

Because she knows that voice.

That voice should be in bed.

Not right in front of her.

And yet, as her vision sharpens?

Nori. Noriaki, about to be grounded for the rest of his fucking immortal lifespan, Kusanagi, is standing there before the whole court.

Over his shoulder? The sword sat lazily, still clad in the thread and cloth that appeared around it when Wakahirume went inside it.

He gave her a look, and almost immediately, she understood why he was here.

‘You decided to surprise me, so I’m surprising you.’

He smiled and gave her a wink before snapping his fingers.

The him she felt in her room? Gone.

At the same time, his presence filled the throne room, where there was once nothing at all.

Ohoh, this petty brat!

Her whole body tenses, ready to stand up and say some choice words, but then she promptly remembers where she is.

Her gaze sweeps across the room, finding everyone in similar shocked states, all like fish out of water.

Even Uzume, who was sitting before the steps to the throne, roleplaying a concubine, seemed completely caught off guard.

So, with a huff under her breath, Amaterasu remains seated. Under the shade granted by the curtains wrapping the edges of the throne, she makes sure her golden eyes shine as she makes a show of leaning forward.

“Son.”

In one word, one acknowledgement, the entirety of her court seems to wake up, their focus sharpening, their minds actually awake.

“Mother.” He replies smoothly, his smile becoming a smirk as he bows, “It was a pretty long line.”

“About as long as it usually is.” She replies, a hint of tiredness coming through, but nothing more.

She turns her head and nods toward Omoikane.

The God of Wisdom coughs into his hand, before his composure returns and he speaks aloud, “Akaruihiruotoko. Our Prince, is there a grievance you have to bring before the court?”

For a second, Amaterasu catches the confusion that enters Nori’s eyes before swiftly being replaced by realization.

Yeah, the court is absurdly formal. Even to that degree.

With his freehand, Noriki waves Omoikane off, “No, no, nothing like that. Instead, I’ve come to show you all something. Something, which I believe, will revolutionize our Pantheon with enough support.”

Omoikane blinked at that, “In what way?” He naturally asked.

Noriaki smiled, “I could tell you, but wouldn’t a demonstration be more practical?”

Omoikane looked toward her, and Amaterasu nodded, giving him a simple, “Proceed.”

Inwardly, for a second, Amaterasu refused to believe Noriaki had already figured out what that sword could do.

Then she reminded herself of what he had already done and decided that was a stupid thought to have in the first place.

Of course, he already figured it out.

Noriaki stepped forward and held up a hand sign with one hand.

Two puffs of smoke burst from either side of him, as two identical copies of himself flung out from them.

She wanted to compare what she just saw to her manga and anime, she really did, but if she started doing that, she’d have a geek out in the throne room.

Bad idea.

So, she sat, patient and still, as the clones landed equal distance away from his sides, before immediately springing back toward him.

At last, he took the sword off his shoulder and swung it.

The cloth around the sword immediately lashed out, almost like a whip, in a wide arc that would fool most, considering its size plastered around the sword didn’t seem that large.

The clones of Nori, however, weren’t such fools; one jumped over the cloth, the other slid under, and continued their advance.

As the cloth fell, Amaterasu could finally see the sword's blade, and what she saw legitimately shocked her.

The sword no longer resembled a normal Japanese straight sword, and instead, its blade held a closer resemblance to a European rapier.

No, maybe, a needle? A sewing needle!

With a flick of his wrist, the thread along the hilt of the blade shot down the needle-like point of the sword, light bursting from the tip as the thread reached the end, and vanished.

Only to reappear on the cloth, near instantly changing its shape and design. What was once a straight sheet of white cloth was now a red tasseled banner, strips of cloth sewn suddenly onto the ends, creating something akin to rays or axe blades.

Noriaki took a big step back as both clones lashed out with punches and kicks where he was standing, and with it, pulled the sword and thus cloth back, as the cloth was still attached to the sword by the hilt.

He raised his arm, dragging the cloth to the sky, before flicking it back down.

Amaterasu could hear the air crack as the cloth whipped back toward the ground, the clones forced back as the banner slapped against the ground harshly.

Noriaki stepped forward and, at the same time, twirled the sword around in his hand, gathering the cloth around the blade, before stabbing forward.

Light flashed under the cloth, and the entire banner flashed before abruptly whipping out again.

Except it wasn’t whole this time. The banner had fragmented into several strips of red cloth, each coiled up like a spear or lance point, and with a few having run through both clones before they could really react.

The clones vanished into smoke as the cloth slowly retracted back to the sword.

As it did so, Noriaki smiled and held it up, letting everyone watch as the blade coiled with thread, and the cloth shifted.

He showed off more designs, the cloth shifting into strips shaped like kama, before combining into a ball, then popping out and combining into a sheet once again, and wrapping around the blade like a sheath.

That done, he set the sword back on his shoulder and bowed.

A simple, yet somehow also elaborate display.

Likely due to the weapon itself, which looks rather complicated to use truly effectively.

Then again, as Amaterasu thinks about it, Wakahirume manifesting something like this makes sense to her.

It isn’t her power, but rather her passion, something she loves doing, something she does even to this day because of that fact, even if no one needs her to do it anymore.

As Noriaki raises his head, one of the courtiers speaks up for the first time.

“That was certainly unique, Prince.” An older-looking Kami spoke, stroking his long gray beard.

That was her general, Futsunushi, and honestly? Amatearsu can’t remember the last time she heard him speak at one of these things.

“Usually, I’d write it off as the weapon itself being a unique piece.” Futsunushi continued, “But that sword, it’s not just another Holy Spirit Sword, is it?”

Noriaki smiled and nodded, “You’d be correct, Lord Futsunushi. You see, it isn’t because the sword is unique that it is the way it is; it’s what was put inside it. Or rather, who was.”

The older kami’s eyes widened, “I thought I recognized that whiff of holy spirit power in the air…”

Several other courtiers began murmuring.

Noriki nodded once again, holding the sword within both his hands, “I crafted the sword used as a base myself. It wasn’t special at all; it was a vessel meant to be filled. And when it was, it became this.” He holds the sword up, aura rippling throughout the cloth, “And let me tell you, this can be just the start!”

Amaterasu couldn’t let it slip, not until she was sure no one was looking her way.

She was sure then, as all the courtiers looked toward Noriaki, waiting with bated breath and rapt attention, she smiled, wide and proud, all other feelings temporarily forgotten.

< A New Sun >

Chapter 120 End

Sup ya'll! I think I recovered mostly, and quite nicely! Didn't even get an ear infection or something this time, always great. Hope ya'll had a good turkey time, to boot!

Now, next time, the older brother shows back up. Dude's done, really. From there, Takamagahara is mostly wrapped up, I believe!

As for what's next, well...we'll see.

Happy Thanksgiving + No Chapter This Week

Almost didn't get to write this the day of, but I'll get to that a little later.

First things first. Happy Thanksgiving ya'll! Ngl, I sort of forgot that was this week! If there's one thing I'm for sure grateful for this year, it's all of you! Seriously, I sometimes feel I don't say it enough.

I wanna write more. I wanna say more. I wanna do more. Funnily enough, this week especially, I finally had some time, time enough that I thought I could give back at last.

Then right as the temp dropped 20 degrees, I woke up Tuesday sick as fuck. Bedridden, absolutely out.

Life certainly has a way of kicking ya straight in the nuts last minute, huh?

That, along with Thanksgiving, is why the next chapter isn't coming this week. There was supposed to be other stuff, but ya...

I don't wanna get too rambly. When I'm sick, my mind tends to wonder easily and all that, so..

Let's leave it at this: Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Even if you don't celebrate, at the very least, don't forget to cherish your friends and family! Do something fun! Hopefully, it's not as cold wherever you lot are, ya?

We'll return to our regular schedule next week.

Peace, ya'll.

A New Sun Chapter 119

Chapter 119

<A New Sun>

He's so lucky to be him and not anybody else right now!

Amaterasu would be screaming that sentiment so loud even the Distinguished Ones would hear it right about now.

If she weren't so busy anxiously pacing back and forth around her bed, where her youngest child lay absolutely still, save for the small rising of his abdomen with his breath.

He felt so small to her senses right now. So small, it physically hurt.

At either side of the bed, her daughter and Uzume sat, the latter for once legitimately looking serious.

It's telling, not only because of that, but because both goddesses shine brighter to her senses individually than he does at present. 

It's jarring. Her breath starts racing, and her heart pounds, even considering the notion, the very idea that her boy could be less than the weight of the gigantic star that usually radiates off him.

Truthfully, she knows, understands even, deep down that he'll be okay.

She did the divine equivalent of a jumpstart on his holy spirit powers. All that he needs is time to recover naturally.

Even then, even if she wasn't there, she doesn't think he'd croak. It'd just be an exceptionally long rest until he got back on his feet again.

Still, none of that changes this one simple fact.

If it were anyone else in Nori's state right now? They'd be dead.

Death by steer exhaustion.

A normal Kami, a normal divine being in general, can't spend an entire day breaking their body physically and eating through their entire divine power reserves to forge a single artifact.

Their bodies and spirits would give out. They would die. It's as simple as that.

Yet here Nori is! Still breathing. Still present. 

Stupid. Reckless. Over the top. So many things she wants to scream, so many things she needs to say, but can't, because it'd all fall on deaf ears.

By the time he wakes up? She imagines she won't even be mad at him anymore.

At present, her darling daughter and Uzume are only really to watch if his condition takes an unexpected dive, or if he wakes up.

In which case, she ordered them to wake him over the head with this weird pink bat she found.

Honestly, she's not sure what it is.

Uzume chuckled when she saw it, but remained tight-lipped about what it actually did, infuriatingly so.

Which means it's likely not a normal bat in some way.

Since Uzume decided to hush up, she can at least be sure the thing won't harm him somehow; she knows Uzume would have said otherwise, and that's the only reason why she lets Uzume keep her lips closed.

Knowing her, it's probably something stupid or embarrassing.

Which she deems acceptable. Her brat of a son deserves it for almost turning her hair stark white!

All for, well…

At last, she stops her pacing, right in front of the sword. The sword that was on the anvil her boy was leaning up against.

Set on the table where Uzume's impromptu desktop setup was cleared off, just by looking at it now, one probably wouldn't think it'd be possible for it to leave anyone in such a state.

Oh sure, it's immaculately crafted, if rather plain and bare, but it felt like nothing.

Less than nothing, even. Empty. 

But it didn't want to be that way.

Okay, she's being a tad dramatic, the sword isn't alive or anything, its function right now is just to take in a Kami.

So, seeing Uzume nearly get sucked into it like water being flushed away by accidentally brushing her hand along it was pretty funny.

It also at least confirmed that it should work. At least that part of it.

As for when the Kami actually gets in there? Well, that's something they'll have to test. 

“It'll be alright, Mother…” She froze stiff, caught completely off guard as a hand intertwined with her own, along with a voice.

Wakahirume's voice.

Huh. She must have been really deep in her thoughts this time.

Silently, she apologizes to Noriaki for passing along this particular of hers to him, before managing to thaw enough to turn and look at her daughter.

Her girl was smaller than her and was looking up at her now with this gentle, easygoing smile. 

“You know it will.” She finished, knowingly.

Amaterasu couldn't help but sigh, “Knowing and feeling are two very different things, Waka.”

Her daughter grips her hand tighter at that, “Still doesn't change the outcome, does it?”

Unfortunately, Amaterasu can't really argue with that logic.

As much as she'd naturally like to be more dramatic, with Wakahirume here…she just can't really bring herself to.

Slowly, she let out a long, shaky breath. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Wakahirume nod, pleased.

“Good.” Her daughter states, pleased.

She couldn't help herself, at least a little bit, “Aren't you supposed to be watching him still?” It wasn't really an accusation; her words held no anger behind them.

Her face not even changing a bit, Wakahirume shook her head.

“Lady Uzume seemed to have it taken care of all by herself.” She replied, much to Amaterasu's doubt.

Without hesitation, Wakahirume tilted her head, looking past her with the bob of her head.

Naturally, Amaterasu followed her gaze in that direction as well.

Only to deadpan, as she bore witness to Uzume half hidden behind the side of the bed, a smirk ripped straight from an American Looney Tunes skit on her face as she held that strange pink pat, tapping it over and over again in an open palm as she watched Noriaki intensely.

So intensely, she hasn't even noticed Wakahirume left.

And if she focuses, she's sure she could hear Uzume cackle here and there.

“...Yeah. She does.” Amaterasu eventually answered, deciding to leave Noriaki to his fate as she faced her head back toward the sword.

A fate that he deserves for not being able to take a break, mind you!

Wakahirume pats her side and gives her this pouty frown, as if trying to admonish her.

She doesn't even react to it. This time, she's sure, he deserves this one at least.

With a sigh, Wakahirume eventually follows her mother's gaze in return.

“So,” she began again, voice far more curious than before, “this is the thing you were talking about, right?”

Ah, right. She sort of got so caught up in Noriaki being himself that she hadn’t thought to really show her the sword he made.

Sheepishly, Amaterasu nodded, “That it is, what do you think so far?”

“Shiny~...” Wakahirume trailed off with stars in her eyes, causing Amaterasu to chuckle lightly.

“To be frank, Waka,” she continued, squeezing her daughter's hand back to snap her into the present, “I’m not really sure what will happen when you get in there, how it will be, how…you know.” She huffed, the words that could even begin to explain the full scope of the undertaking before them evading her, “Just everything. This is all new.”

“I know.” Wakahirume states, without even a shred of hesitation or doubt, before asking with the biggest smile, “Isn’t it exciting?”

It admittedly took Amaterasu a moment to answer that, “A bit.” She settled on saying.

Even to the gods, the unknown can be a terrifying, stressful thing. Maybe especially for the gods who live so much longer, see so much more, in fact.

“I believe it’s more than a bit.” Her daughter responded in kind, wangling a finger her way, “A new day is finally approaching for everyone. If this works, everything changes. Things are already changing, with my adorable little brother here.”

Amaterasu wanted to groan at all that.

It’s not that she hates change; she’s glad it's happening, really! 

It’s more so the stress and paperwork she’s groaning about.

That, and how her son keeps putting himself into dangerous situations, or at death's door.

Seriously, the entire point of him being here wasn’t for all this! He wasn’t supposed to fight one of the Distinquished Ones, win, then go on to try and make the Shinto’s versions of Sacred Gears!

She just wanted to cuddle him for a while and pamper him! Try and make up for at least a fraction of the time where she could have been there for him!

How did things turn up this way again!?

“Mother.” A tighter squeeze, and a sharper word, pulled her from her thoughts once again.

“...Huh?” She blinked, dumbly.

Wakahirume sighed, “You were spiraling again.”

Oh. That seemed about right for her, huh?

“You can’t keep going on like this, you know that, Mother?” Wakahirume added, letting go of her head.

“W-Wha!? I totally can!” Amaterasu tried to reject.

Only for her daughter to give her the most doubtful side eye she’s ever seen.

“R-Really!” She tried again, the stutter making her sound very sure.

Wakahirume merely shook her head, letting out a soft huff. “Let’s relieve you of some worry, yes?”

Huh? How does she plan on doing that?

Wakahirume held her out to the sword.

Wait.

Before she could move her hand any closer, she had Wakahirume’s wrist in her hand.

“Don’t.” She stated, “Don’t do that all of a sudden.” She almost ground out through gritted teeth, “Not without warning. I will ground you. For eternity.”

“E-Eheh,” Wakahirume chuckled, a sheepish look crossing her face, “sorry, Mother.”

Damn right you better be sorry! She almost had a heart attack!

“Also.” Amaterasu huffed before adding, “Shouldn’t we wait until Nori is awake before doing anything more?”

Wakahirume tilted her head at that and asked, “Does he need to do anything more?”

That gave Amaterasu pause for a moment.

“Technically? No.” She gave her back, “But at the same time, he should still be awake to see whether his work actually works or not. That’s only right.”

Wakahirume looked back toward her brother before looking back at Amaterasu, this small smile stretching across her face.

She’d seen that smile before. On Uzume. On Noriaki.

She doesn’t like that smile.

“While that may be true, if it does work,” Wakahirume leaned closer to her, having to rise onto her tippy toes to get closer to her ear, “wouldn’t it be nice to surprise him?”

Wakahirume mumbled and mumbled her idea.

Slowly, ever so slowly, her eyes began to widen.

Then, she smiled back, a real small smile.

Well, now, maybe there’s something to that smile after all?

<A New Sun>

My entire body felt heavy.

That was my first real conscious thought.

Consciousness returning to me was both a blessing and a curse. On one hand, I felt like someone had strapped several tons of that accursed crimson metal around my limbs and left me to lie there with it pressing against me on all sides.

On the other hand, I was dreaming for once and could actually remember it all perfectly.

And by dreaming, I mean I was having nightmares.

That fucking metal. Everywhere. The whole damn world was made of that metal!

Do you want to open the door? Better cut through the locks, that’ll only take you around half an hour.

Want to eat food? The usual plastic sheet on top of a bowl of ramen is replaced by crimson sheet metal. That’ll take you fifteen minutes of nonstop pulling to peel off.

Getting the sheets off the bed. Opening a drawer. Flipping a light switch. Everything. Everything. Everything.

Hmm. On second thought? I prefer consciousness. I much prefer consciousness.

Slowly, I sat up, my whole body sagging in rebellion and protest.

I could feel the mattress beneath me, and the sheets lay atop, pooling down to my lap now.

My eyes were next, cracking open into thin lines, refusing to budge much more. 

I didn't need perfect vision to tell that I was put in my mother's room.

If it wasn't the lack of any sort of windows that clued me in, then it was the obscene amount of memorabilia lining the walls that sealed it.

[It is a bit much, isn't it?]

Yeah, it really is.

I reach up and scratch my cheek.

My nails grind to a halt against my flesh like a scratched record.

I freeze. My eyes shoot entirely upon. Every ounce of weakness. Every once of resistance, I ignore it, completely and utterly.

“...Who the fuck was that?” I utterly, hoarsely, into the silence around me. 

No Uzume. No Ama. Nobody is here. Right?

[Wrong~!]

My head twists to the side, nothing. I ignore the crack. The buzz. Nothing. No one.

Yet it sounded like a…girl? Kind of like Ama, but younger? Cuter? In a way?

But I can't pinpoint where it's coming from!

[In your head, silly~!]

I slowly blink at the wall.

What.

[Your head!]

What.

[Yeah! Your head! Well, technically, according to what Mother said, your soul, not your head.]

What in the fuck.

My eyes slam shut, and I turn my senses inward.

[Uh? Wait, what are you…?]

Shockingly, it didn't take long to find. It's just that I wasn't looking for it until now.

In my mind's eye, I can see it. 

The sword. But it's behind my sun, dwarfed by it, even in its immensely drained state. Another reason I couldn't feel it until now. 

Yet, it looks a bit different compared to when I last saw it.

The straw rope that was wrapped around the hilt? It's not straw anymore. Instead, it looks more like a rope of threads, almost like silk. 

The cloth hasn't changed in appearance, but instead, it's grown, wrapping around the blade like a makeshift sheath.

With a mere thought, and for lack of a better term, I zoom in. 

[Uhm? Wait, are you? Oh! Oh gosh, you're coming here!? Waitwaitwait!!!]

As soon as I ‘touched’ the sword, the world around me seemed to shift, and I felt elsewhere.

I opened my eyes.

“A-Ah…Um. Hi?”

I immediately deadpanned.

My sight was greeted by a plain reddish pink space, which didn't have anything within it, save a single girl.

A very familiar girl, yet definitely not who she looks like.

Obsidian black stretching down the length of her back, big golden eyes, and now that I'm here? I can sense a whiff of holy spirit power similar to my own.

By all accounts, she looks like Ama.

But she's not. For one, she looks smaller and younger, too. 

Two?

Her chest is way bigger than Ama's. Like, it's not even funny how outclassed this girl makes her look.

Finally? Said chest is currently out, and I'm being flashed, because the gold and white yukata she's wearing isn't being the most cooperative right now.

Following that distraction, my memory finally catches up with me.

I've seen this girl before. Vaguely. She was with Ama, wasn't she? 

Then, I was so delirious from exhaustion that I started to think there were two of her!

Right. Guess not. In a sense, anyhow, they do look eerily alike. Sister, maybe? Do I have an aunt?

“Sup.” I finally answer back, waving to her.

The girl just kneels there, sweet forming across her face as she's frozen still.

“...You can pull up your robe the rest of the way, you know.” I slowly add, causing her to perk.

“Oh! Right, um! Mmm~!!” With a struggling tug, she manages to cover up, “So, I…didn't exactly expect to be meeting you quite like this.” She began with a nervous chuckle.

“Neither did I,” I pointed out, “though, judging by the fact I saw the sword on the way here, I can only conclude that you were the Kami my mother got to volunteer for this…and that it works.”

She nodded while holding up a finger to add herself, “Our Mother.”

My following blink was slowed and slightly out of sync between each eye. 

“...Seriously?” I ask, just to make sure.

She nods, more than a few times.

Me dammit. Seriously? I have a sister? And this is how we meet!? 

Damn titty world!

It's bad enough I didn't think it was awkward when she was my aunt, but now I'm feeling it!

Shaking my head of all those thoughts, I decide to simply power on through, as usual.

“Well, alright then!” I accept the news as graciously as one can at the moment, before walking my way toward her, “What's your name?” 

“Oh! Um, Wakahirume!” She perked up as I sat down, right in front of her.

I gave her name some consideration before nodding.

“Gotcha.” I snapped my fingers, pointing at her, “Wa-tan!”

Her eyes widened dramatically as she flinched, as though I swung at her, “W-Wa-tan!? Why!?” She sounded almost like she was about to cry.

I shrug, “Because you're clearly younger than me. So, little sister, Wa-tan.”

Wa-tan rapidly shook her head, back and forth, “C-Clearly!? No, no! I'm older than you!” She pouted. 

I gave her a lopsided grin, “Think that matters? Looks like a little sister. Is a little sister. Done deal.”

The poor girl gaped at my impeccable and perfect logic with no counter whatsoever.

“Anyhow!” I continue, not even giving her a chance to try and rebuke me, “Wa-tan. Which one, Mother, or Uzume, do I need to spank for doing this?”

“S-Spank!?” Wa-chan gasped, scandalized, “Why would you need to spank anyone!?”

“Uh, duh?” I point at her, “For stuffing you in here, in my soul, without telling me? That's pretty spank worthy to me.”

“W-Well.” Wa-tan steadily looks away, “First, I'm not technically in your soul, just connected to it. Mother used a modified form of the Sacred Beast inheritance ritual to implant me.”

Neat. So.

I raise an eyebrow, “So, Ama needs a spanking?”

“Nonono!” She quickly waves her hands at me, “Not her, not her! She isn't the one who had the idea for this!”

I lean forward slightly, ”Then…Uzume?” I guessed plainly.

I mean, who else could it really be?

Wa-tan shook her head.

My eyes narrowed.

Wa-tan immediately started to sweat.

I stood up.

“EEEP!” The girl squeaked and immediately began to scramble away.

“Get over hereeeee!!” I faux roared as I began stalking after her.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorrryyy!!!”

Meanwhile, on my real body, my face twitched upwards with a smile.

<A New Sun>

Chapter 119 End

Court next time. We're going to get to see what this thing can do now. I almost feel bad for his brothers with what's about to happen.

A New Sun Chapter 118

Chapter 118

< A New Sun >

It’s perfection.

Every single one of my tools, every single implement or piece needed, fixed up and given a fancy coat of paint, all packed into this private little corner of Heaven.

Even better? Despite the privacy, despite being practically boxed in physically and by magical barriers, there’s still plenty of space to move around, to breathe!

As I said, it’s the perfect forge. Made just for me, all my tools from below have been gathered, so I'll be all set. They went above and beyond putting it all together, truly.

I put down what looks like a half-glowing crimson-red railroad spike pulled freshly from the ground on the table. The table immediately caved inward, yielding to the divine slab of metal like ice to hot water.

My eyes slowly trail down to the wreckage at my feet, as I let out this painfully low hissing sigh.

That perfectly sums up my experience with this so far.

Behind me, a light, airy chuckle fills the air.

My head whips around so hard that an audible crack vibrates throughout the space as I glare several suns at the cheeky little fox that thinks it's a good idea to enjoy my suffering right now.

Inari stands there, smiling lightly with a hand just before her lips, completely unbothered by my seeming willingness to almost break my own neck.

“What?” She muses slyly, “You kept me waiting, you know? I may as well take some amusement now that you’re finally here…”

I roll my eyes at that, the rest of my body turning to finally catch up with my head.

A soft sizzle crackles beneath the skin around the left of my neck. Healing something.

Oh. Shit, wait, I did break something!?

Oh well.

“As if that’s a problem.” I finally respond, “After all, I see you took the time to make yourself comfortable.”

A white dress shirt looking damn near the point of bursting, tucked neatly into a slim black short skirt, with black leggings trailing all the way down to a pair of haughty high heels.

If she didn’t own several companies, I’d legitimately be more inclined to believe she was someone else’s secretary. She rocks the sexy secretary look way better than Uzume does, hilariously enough.

The fox goddess smirks at me, “Well, I was in the middle of a board meeting, and I wasn’t sure how long you were going to take, so I couldn’t get too comfortable.” Her smirk grows, almost exactly like Yasaka’s in a way, a sly fox, “Of course, now that you’re here, and apparently stronger than the Distinguished Ones, should I get more comfortable for you, hmm~?” As she says that, she hooks a finger under the fold holding together her dress shirt.

With a single tug, that thing could easily come off.

I deadpan at her and hold my hand out to the side.

In a sputter of light, a pink bat seemed to materialize in my hand, instantly confusing the fox goddess before me.

“This?” I raise the bat, “It's a Horny Bat. If you keep this up, I will literally smack the horny out of you. It will not be pleasant.” My deadpan deepens into an annoyed frown, “Seriously. I am not in the mood.” 

Inari blinked at me, slowly, before pouting in an almost perfect mirror of Uzume, her arms wrapping around herself under her chest.

“Oh, fine.” She huffs, as her pout softens, “...It was really that bad then, hmm?”

Oh, Inari, you don’t understand the half of it.

With a sigh, I drop the bat before turning back to the broken table and lump of rapidly cooling metal at my feet.

Truly, I wish I could grab a metaphor that would make even the tiniest bit of sense to the fox goddess, but I only really have one, and I doubt Inari would understand it.

Basically, that one Star Wars scene from the prequel trilogy, where Obi-Wan and his master are trying to use their lightsabers to cut a way through a set of blast doors.

That. But it’s seventeen times as long, slow, draining, and only one of them.

If I were in that universe, I would have fallen to the Dark Side from this alone. The sheer fucking hatred of this single activity would have done me in.

Not even Gabriel Ultrakill, the Apostate of Hate himself, can begin to understand how much I loathe a piece of metal right now!

The only reason I haven’t become an Evil God right this second is that I’m that drained from getting this railroad spike reject out of that damn arena.

I can’t even crave violence right now. Or sex. That’s how fucking out of it I am.

“Yes.” I answer, plain and simply, and as dead as the sun in my chest, “So, can you please come over here and tell me my work was worth it?” I wave her on over.

The click of her heels alerts me to her following my order, though her putting a hand on my back gently as she stopped beside me wasn’t part of it.

Stray thought. Does Inari have tails? Like Kunou, or Yasaka? She totally should, right?

That train of thought is halted as Inari hums, appraising the slab of crimson metal on the ground with a calculating gleam.

“That’s a trick question, Nori.” She kneels, her fingers tracing along the broad side of the metal, careful not to even touch the sheer edge, “Technically? Anything can act as a core for a shrine. Anything really can be a Shintai.”

The image of that rock set in the shrine randomly flashes through my mind.

“From mortal-made objects, to things of nature, whole mountains and waterfalls even.” Inari explains, even though that only makes me think of more questions like how, “In spirit, however?” Her hand pulls away, and she looks up at me with a small apologetic smile, “We won’t truly know until you're done.”

My face and mind blanked out.

“Huh?” That was all I could manage to stay, numbly.

Inari simply gave a small nod, “Yes, I understand how that might sound, so…let me put it like this. From what your mother explained to me, what you’re trying to make here isn’t just a shrine, but basically a Sacred Gear.”

I nodded to that, slightly, still a tad numb.

“Sacred Gears are more than just objects with a thing stuffed in them, that then grants them powers.” Inari tries to explain, “There’s so much more complicated chunk going on behind the scenes, it’s almost like trying to explain modern-day corporate bureaucracy…” She trails off, giving her own metaphor an aggravated huff.

Even I couldn’t help but shiver at that, though. Seriously, in Japan, that stuff's got to be hell.

“So, I can’t promise anything right now.” Inari pats me on the back, “We theoretically have all the pieces, according to your mother, but putting them together into something that works isn’t going to be easy.”

“Oh. I am, well, aware.” I grumble out.

Inari once again chuckles lightly at my pain.

I would smack her across the ass for that, but I simply don’t give a shit right now.

“So, basically.” I start, picking up my trusty magical hammer, giving it a spin in my palm, “Fake it, and pray that I make it?”

Inari beams a smile toward me, “Confidently. The art of the deal in one. Don’t worry,” her free hand comes up, a soft aurora of divine power gently radiating from it, “I’ll keep watch, and make sure to tell you if you start making something that probably won’t work. I’ll nudge things along so that whatever you make can be the best vessel it can be. The rest? That’s up to you, and your mother.”

Finally, I send her a small smile back, “...Thank you.” That fades, however, once my eyes lock onto the metal slab once again.

With a drawn-out, pained sigh, I reach down to pick up the metal slab.

My finger brushes the edge.

My finger promptly falls off.

Inari lets out a half gasp, half stuttered and held back laugh at my side.

I lifted my hand back up, watching with a brand expression as my finger slowly regenerated.

Painfully slowly.

Yeah, I’m that out of it already.

Seriously, fucking super divine metal bathed in the power of primordial creator gods. All of my hate, ALL of it!

Once I finish and streamline this process, I will find a way to automate all this with clone slave labor.

Yeah, that’s right, I’m willing to risk a clone rebellion over this shit!

I know, I know, technically my clones are absolutely loyal to me, but they are me, and if I hate this shit now, imagine a dozen plus mes all forced to work on this at the same time.

Yeah, I’d break a fundamental rule of a technique to get back at the asshole who made me have to do this shit. I know myself that well.

I also know I will one-hundred percent take that risk, it is that worth it!

My hand whole once again, I say nothing as I start up the forge, and immediately put the thing on full blast.

The roaring of the heat, of the divine and magical flames, immediately turns the place from serene and quiet into the ground zero of a jet engine firing up.

I don’t think I could have grabbed the largest pair of tongs I had faster.

Even though I wanted to pitch the whole thing of metal straight into the chamber like a baseball star, for the sake of the rest of my equipment, I gently latched onto it using the tongs and lowered it in, broadside down, into the chamber.

Without further ado, I slapped the lid shut over it and kneeled before it, watching intently on the inside.

The glow and haze of heat around the metal continued to build.

The metal itself was still cooling.

In real time, I was watching something submerged in divine fire cool.

The novelty still doesn’t make it almost like watching paint dry.

My aura surrounded my hand, which I promptly jammed into the forge coals, feeding and fanning the flames directly.

The sun in my chest did a double-take, throbbing in something akin to pain as it strained itself to accommodate my will.

Thankfully, in this case, I think mostly due to inheriting Hinokagutsuchi’s divine power of blacksmithing, powering up the heat and flames of the forge specifically are far easier than everything that happened on that arena for the past…

Huh. It feels like days I was standing and cutting up there on the arena, but I know really that’s just me being mellow dramatic at this point.

Hours. It was a long time. It was a really long time.

This? Way easier, even in my incredibly drained state.

Still going to take a very long time, though.

Inari, after watching for a moment longer, whistles and begins stepping away, “Well, send me a prayer, when it's about time, alri-”

I cut her off by grabbing her wrist with my free hand.

Inari whimpers.

Something I honestly didn’t expect from the very professional and mature fox goddess, so much so that it nearly made me push a bit too much into the forge all at once.

Almost. Thankfully, I caught it.

Regardless.

Without even sparing her a glance, I state, “There is no escape.”

< A New Sun >

And so there was none, although Inari may have wished it otherwise.

Once again, I didn’t count the hours.

I was too busy focusing on pushing down my hatred and annoyance of the task at hand to do that.

Because for this part, keeping those kinds of emotions out is sort of important.

It’s sort of hard to explain, but this goes for all things art and art adjacent, really. No matter what it is, music, painting, writing, what have you, the creator's feelings and emotions can always be felt in some sense within whatever their working on.

A rather plain but direct example in my case? The Horny Bat was made while I was horny, to stop the horny. Simple, right?

Kind of. When it comes to divine artifact creation, it can be a little more esoterically bullshit.

Thankfully, in this specific case, my work this time isn’t supposed to feel like anything in particular, which is far easier to explain.

In this case? I’m making basically an empty vessel. It’s not for me to fill the words in, paint the walls, or echo my music throughout the halls, not here.

That’s for whoever is going to take up residence.

Therefore, during the entire forging process, I smashed how I felt throughout the entire thing down.

I was a machine in motion, whose sole directive was to basically make a simple shape.

And oh boy, what a shape it is.

A slab, turned into a gleaming, straight crimson Tsurugi.

Yet, despite the shine and polish, if someone were to look at the blade, they’d think it rather dull.

A slab of metal in a different shape is still a slab of metal. There’s no ornate adorning the blade, technically no proper hilt to hold the sword, just pure, shaped metal.

Empty shaped metal. That’s its purpose. 

I run my fingers along the side of the blade before sliding and tracing them along the edge.

Not even a scratch.

Excellent.

Breaking me out of my hyper focus, Inari’s hands come into view, draping something down where the hilt of the sword would be.

A length of cloth with an empty embroidery, and a similar length of hemp rope, a shimenawa, usually used to mark sacred spaces and repel evil.

I take the blade on both ends and lift it, allowing Inari to wrap the cloth and rope around where the sword's hilt would be.

Now, it’s perfect. Now, it’s ready.

At my side, Inari lets out a long sigh as she ties the cloth and rope taut, and I set the sword down.

The first words out of her mouth were, “...I’m not sure what time it is anymore.”

I snorted at that, because honestly, me neither.

Takamagahara doesn’t really do night to begin with anyway. Why count the days in Heaven when everyone up here will live an eternity, right?

There is technically a way to tell the passage of time up here, but…

My head tilts upwards.

Same old sky.

I really don’t feel like flying up and checking.

Hell, I may not have enough energy to even fly right now in the first place.

I look to my side, finding Inari wiping a hand across her brow, her semi-professional getup now messy and unkempt.

We didn’t even do anything. She especially didn’t do anything physical besides watch very intently.

All that's up with her outfit? Purely from the heat. Not even a joke.

“I take it you’re going to take it easy for a bit?” I ask, suspecting the answer.

“Oh, absolutely.” She smirks, tiredly yet triumphantly, “I heard Uzume wasn’t using her room, I’m sure she won’t mind me...borrowing it, for a while.”

Now it’s my turn to chuckle.

Somehow, someway, despite her not ever using it to my knowledge, Uzume would be annoyed by that, wouldn’t she?

“Have fun, then.” I give her a strained smile, not because it’s fake, but because I’ve never felt so weak in my life, “And thank you for the help.”

Inari smiles, reaching over and rubbing my cheek, “Oh, I will, and really, there’s no need for that. I didn’t do that much, all things told.”

“Still did something.” I shot back immediately.

Inari merely huffed at that before turning around and heading off.

I didn’t watch her go, as my gaze settled on the forge sitting before me.

I could remember it, as clear as day, how it looked before I started.

Now?

It was the opposite.

Clean polish is replaced by blackened burn scars.

Precise angles and curves are now warped and bent out of shape.

There’s a faint crackling of coals still not cooled in the background. The water that was supposed to be used to cool the metal down? Gone. Evaporated instantly.

The backup oil met the same fate.

Apparently, those were divine water and oils. I don’t know how, but they were. Everything here was.

I had to use my sheer will to forcibly strangle the flames and heat.

Most of my tools are gone. The only stuff that survived was the further magically enhanced ones or straight artifacts, like my hammer, but even then, they looked warped slightly from the sheer damage of the immense heat.

I smell the heat in the air, and I can taste the melted and evaporated metals in the air.

My gaze settles back on the end product.

I’m happy with this, really. Even if it doesn’t work out.

But I can’t make another like this. I need better tools, way better.

The only reason this forge is still standing upright instead of slagging over is because my sheer fucking will contained the heat and flames more than the chambers of metal and rock ever could.

I let out a long, low breath as I finally noticed the strained quivering in my legs.

“H-Huh…” I stuttered aloud, breath catching, as my legs then promptly gave out beneath me, and my face nearly slammed into the anvil where the sword sat.

As it was, I managed to catch myself on the big metal block, albeit just barely.

Slowly twisting my body around with a grunt, I managed to instead turn into falling on my ass, my back leaning against the anvil.

It’s not comfortable, not one bit. But somehow, it’s Heaven regardless.

“Holy fuck…” I groaned out, raising my now shaking hands with active strain, “I d-didn’t even, damn…”

I didn’t even notice I was this out of it.

Everything’s numb. Not buzzing, like pain, I mean, I can’t even feel that.

Honestly, I really should have seen this one coming. I was hammering away at that damn metal like I was trying to get deep stains out of a bathtub without bleach, only water.

I’m more shocked my arms haven’t fallen off at this point.

“Heh, thought if a blade did take me out, it wouldn’t be quite like this…” I joked weakly to myself.

It took more than a little effort than I’d like to admit, but I finally managed to clasp my hands together in probably the world's weakest clap.

The second time was far better in my opinion, but that was only because the work of getting my arms up was already done by that point.

So. I thought, with all the sheer exhaustion in my heart, I may have miscalculated. A little bit…

I barely had time to finish my prayer before a beam of light shot straight down into the space of the forge.

No shock there, the forge is on the Palace ground, wrapped around by its walls but not inside.

What was a shock? I wasn’t expecting two of my mother to walk out of the light.

…And for one of them to be shorter, while having a far larger chest as well.

Yet, both still locked their gazes onto me with extreme concern, regardless, so hey, who cares if I hallucinate here or there now?

My hands fall onto my lap, and my vision narrows as the numbness begins washing over my consciousness.

I heard noise. Sound. What could have been words. Yet it sounded muddled, as though someone was trying to talk to me while underwater.

For the first time in a real long time, a nap sounds so unbelievably good right now…

Huh, yeah, you know what?

I think I deserve one.

Goodnight. Or, day, whatever time it is.

< A New Sun >

Chapter 118 End

Don't worry, Nori isn't dead. Also, don't worry, we won't be at this for much longer. I just need to really hammer home how hard this stuff is supposed to be to make.

Also also don't worry, I know, I remember the omakes. I'll start pumping them out once I finally scrounge up the time to make them. Just been really busy, even today. Had a doctor's appointment take up my early evening today, that's why I'm here a little later than usual tonight.

I'm fine by the way, lol. It wasn't for anything too serious.

A New Sun Chapter 117

Chapter 117

< A New Sun >

“No, Nori, there isn’t a Kami like that.” Ama huffed in response to my next question, basically all tension draining from her.

Which only caused me to pout, much of the wind manically blowing through my sails dashed in an instant.

“Seriously?” I huffed back equally, “Eight million kami, but not one of them focuses on the shrines themselves?”

Ama visibly rolls her eyes, “For one, that phrase isn’t literal. Two, why would there be? All Kami uses the shrine system in some manner!”

I level a stare at her, “Then, shouldn’t there be someone to manage said system?”

“No, no, no,” she waves me off, “it’s not a system like that. The shrines aren’t interconnected; every kami has their own shrine, managed by them, their priests, what have you. There’s no need for some big manager.”

Okay, when you put it like that, I can kind of see it.

No real need to introduce some massive bureaucracy for something so simple.

Unless you’re Inari, but she is a special case, isn’t she?

…Ah? Idea!

Oh, wait, damn it, no. That’d just give her more work to do. Poor goddess, think that’s the last thing she needs.

Right, if there’s no real overarching authority regarding the shrines, then I guess I’ll have to go to the next best thing!

I click my tongue, before taking a breath, putting my hands together, and looking pointedly at Ama, “In that case, do you think a bunch of kami will accept being stuffed full into objects, and then stuffed into people's souls?”

Ama opened her mouth, like she was about to answer a normal question.

But then slowly shut it as my words seeped in through her ears.

“...What?” She made a noise, more than speaking a word, but I still heard it under her breath.

“So. The Shrine’s, right?” I begin explaining without prompt, “They can hold a kami’s divine power, said kami can use their power through it, or automate it, all that jazz, right?”

Ama nodded slowly, face still and gaze distant, as if not understanding what was standing in front of her.

Or what she was hearing.

Fair really. In hindsight, I’m proposing basically Sacred Gear. There has to be a reason why only the big guy up way more stairs is the only one around to have done that.

“Well. What if we take whatever part makes that work, and stuff more than just a bit of power into them?” I continue, “With the right materials, holding a full-on Kami should theoretically be possible, no?”

“...Technically,” Ama answered, very noncommittal.

That isn’t a no, however! 

So I press on, and this next part, I’ll admit, will likely require a bit of workshopping even if the logic is sound, “Then, considering the fact the Five Clans, human’s whose only distinguishing quality from normal people is their blessings that give them elemental affinities, can hold Sacred Beasts within their souls, said objects holding Kami should theoretically also be able to be embedded within people?”

Whew, bit of a mouthful there.

Ama slowly blinked at me once I finished. It was so slow, in fact, that I almost started getting a little scared for her. It was almost like a chameleon.

For precious few moments, she just stared at me before finally letting out a long, almost shuddering breath.

“I can see what you’re going for, Nori. Really.” She began, “I can see the logic, the train of thought, it’s certainly an…idea.” She crosses her arms, her face moving into deep thought, “Attaching a living being to someone’s soul and enabling them to use their powers isn’t an easy thing, but then again, if you use a modified version of the inheritance ritual from the Five Clans, then maybe…”

Her voice just kind of trails off into a low mumble, which I couldn’t parse anymore.

I blinked down at her.

After a moment, I wave my hand in front of her face.

Nothing. Not even a twitch. Just focused on incoherent rambling.

I sigh, about to pick her up and rattle her to literally shake her out of it, but right as I was about to do so-

“You know this won’t be one-to-one with Sacred Gears, right?” She suddenly states, causing me to pause.

All of a sudden, she’s looking up, directly at me. I don’t get to say anything before she elaborates further on what she means, “There’s no System, so each one handed out would need to be intentional, by us. Additionally, no Balance Breakers. No evolving…whatever this is, by desire or something. The powers of each item would be specific to the kami residing within.”

I raise an eyebrow at that, “Even despite that, it’s still a kami, right? At base, everyone should be able to at least enhance themselves with their Holy Spirit Power. That’s a big amp.”

“That depends on the kami.” Ama points out, “If it were me stuck in a sword? Sure, my power would easily vaporize even the strongest of devils, barring obvious exceptions.” She shakes her head, “But I’m not going to be in one.”

Well, duh?

“See,” she continues, “let’s circle back, you asked if a bunch of kami would accept being stuffed into these things. The answer? Yes, I know of quite a fair few who would gladly jump at this chance, actually. Even without being ordered.”

“Ah.” I hum in realization, “It’s going to be a whole lot of minor and, for lack of a less rude descriptive term in this regard, weak kami, isn’t it?”

Ama let’s out a sad sigh, “Right. But not just that. Most of these would be kami who have been forgotten about. Left without any shrines as the years ebbed on. Or were so minor, so few even knew they existed. Those types.”

Huh. I guess I never really considered that. Eight million by phrase, an uncountable amount of kami in truth. By all accounts, so many gods, minor gods, sure, real minor, but still gods nonetheless.

Not everyone would be remembered. Not everyone would have their place.

That’s why they’re uncountable. Who knows who’s out there, really?

For a second, I consider bringing this as an angle against Oshi when I pitch what I will now call ‘Shinto Sacred Gears’ in my head until I think of a better name.

Surely, this has got to be a general sentiment. Everyone can agree that not being remembered, not having a place, can suck massively.

Even if the kami at court are the real snotty noble types, who look down on the ‘dregs’ as they’d probably call them.

Yeah, yeah…that could be an angle.

Yet. Thinking of doing that, of using these guys like that, proudly, showing them off and all that, beating my chest over it?

It leaves a rotten taste in my mouth.

Such an easy PR win, too.

I bet Oshi would flaunt it.

Hah, guess I’m really not that cut out for court. I got a little bit of a softie in me yet.

“Ah, well.” I smile, “I’m fine with all that. Don’t know why you're phrasing it like I wouldn’t be?”

Ama’s face flushes, just a tad, “It’s not that! Well, okay, I didn’t think you’d have a problem with the candidates, but their power? This might not be as big of a boost in strength for us as you might have first thought…” she trails off into a pause, before fixing me with a very concerned look, “Nori. Why are you smiling like that?”

Ah, my smile did grow while she was saying that, didn’t it?

“Just…ideas.” I answer her, very noncommittally, “More ideas.”

Relating to studying a certain spear, I mean.

It’s not a guarantee, but the True Longinus is the Sacred Gear after all, if not the first in general, at least the first of the set of gears with which it gives its name, with a Balance Breaker I’m pretty certain was intended by Him.

Surely, I should be able to figure out how a Balance Breaker works by taking a peek around!

Even if that Balance Breaker is named in such that it implies it’s meant to kill gods specifically.

Ah. There goes my smile.

Ama nods, almost proud, “I see whatever you’re thinking of, you realized it was a bad idea on your own. Good.”

Damn it. Though, say, I wonder if anything of Azazel’s stuff is lying around anywhere?

That thought is abruptly halted, as Ama reaches over and takes my hands with a chuckle, “Alright, alright! Enough thinking, you need to start doing!” She states, snapping my attention completely on her, “Before you even think of pitching this, you need something to show everyone. Not just words. A prototype, basically.”

I nod, seeing where she was going with this.

She nods back and smiles, “I’ll find a volunteer. You get something made, then we’ll see if you have something doable, alright?”

“Right.” I nod, far more resolute, “Let’s do this!”

Ama pulls me out of the room by my hands with a smirk, as we leave Uzume tied up there on the bed.

She started muffled screaming something, but we didn’t catch it.

Honestly, I think Ama forgot about her.

I didn’t, but I just know if Uzume really wanted to, she could get out at any time.

She’s just lazy like that.

< A New Sun >

Of course, in order to even start making a working prototype, I’m going to need materials to make it with.

“Can’t say I expected to be up here again so soon,” I murmur to myself, “or ever again, really?”

To be fair, I didn’t expect the giant floating arena made up of some of the strongest material in the Shinto Pantheon to just be left floating here.

Above the Palace.

Well, it was floating above the Palace, and Ama wanted to see if I could move it somewhere more convenient.

So I pushed it further up into the sky!

She facepalmed, but it’s not my fault she didn’t specify.

Besides, at least up here, it’s not such an eyesore covering the entire Palace in shadow.

That, and it lets me do what I need to do without being bothered.

Hopefully. I’m going to need to let off a fair bit of power to get a chunk of this stuff off.

Hell, I’m going to have to let out a fair bit of power forging it.

I draw my sword from a sheath of golden light and hold it up, blade pointed down at the shiny metal surface.

Right now, I’m standing in the formerly melted dip I had left Umashi after dropping a flaming dragon on him.

Yeah, formerly melted. I don’t know when, but that stuff solidified at some point.

Still, I hope that at least in this spot, I won’t have to exert myself so much getting what I need.

Now. How much will I need?

That depends entirely upon what exactly I’m going to make.

As a prototype, as a pitch, it should be basic enough to understand while still showing off what I want to go for.

With that in mind, what could be better than making a sword?

If the point is a way to power up everyone else, showcasing a sword is the most straightforward way of going about it.

Ah, but it can’t just be any sword, now, can it?

It has to be one that can make a statement, something like…hmm.

My foot taps against the ground as I think, the soft metallic clang echoing out around me at a steady pace.

To impress a bunch of old gods, huh.

Tradition?

My brow arcs at that. A traditional sword.

Or, more specifically, a Totsuka-no-Tsurugi.

It sounds really grand, but really, it’s just a straight longsword with a bit more flair. No curve like the katana in the blade.

By itself, the type of sword wouldn’t be special if it weren’t for all the well-known swords within it.

The sword Susanoo used against me is one of them. The sword in Tobio’s Sacred Gear is another. Most importantly, the Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi, one of the Three Sacred Treasures, is one of them.

Wait a minute. Sacred Treasures? Oho, I will put a pin in that name for later.

Though this train of thought also reminds me I should get around to reforging that sword again.

So, putting a pin in that as well, my eyes focus on the metal beneath me.

Enough for a Totsuka at the very least. Probably a bit more, to account for any errors I make.

For simplicity's sake, the sword is also going to be pretty standard-looking, nothing fancy or unique to a select kami.

Not as though I know who Ama is going to get to volunteer for this little project, anyhow.

Hah, just now realizing this, but if this all works out, custom orders are going to be a nightmare.

For my clones.

…At this point, really, I’m just stalling because I know cutting anything out of this is going to be a bitch and a half.

Hnngh, alright, no more of that!

“Here,” my aura booms out around me, turning a pure molten honey, “we,” my foot slams against the metal, bracing my entire upper body as my sun pounds in my chest, “GO!”

I let out a shout as I drive my blade downward, with my full force, full focus, but not quite full power.

That takes a little bit to build up.

Regardless, the tip of my now gleaming golden blade impacts the metal with a thunderous clang, the entire arena jerking down slightly at the force of my blow.

The tip of my blade? It punctures only a fraction, just barely enough to catch, but nowhere near enough to start getting anything out.

I let out an annoyed growl as flames erupt around me, their source my blade, bellowing out with fire like a blowtorch on all the flammable gases in the known universe.

Not even a lick of glow from heat.

Granted, I just started, so I’m not surprised.

All the while, I steadily keep pushing down with my sword. As my power thrums higher, the sun in my chest beats bigger, and the flames around me grow hotter, I can feel the blade ever so slowly sink deeper and deeper through the metal.

I take a deep breath. Not for any breathing technique, but for patience.

At the rate this is going, I might have something out of her by the time Inari shows up.

Oh, right, I also asked Ama if she could call up Inari for me.

For one, I just wanted to see her again. It has been a while. And two, out of anyone, she’s the one with the most experience using the shrine ‘system.’

If there’s anyone who could help me make this work right, it’d be her.

Also, if I am pitching this whole thing like a business prospect or project to the court, I figure Inari could help out with that too.

Plus, an official summons from Ama is a pretty good excuse to avoid work, no?

Sorry, not avoid, deal with other far more important matters first, or something PR speak like that.

I shook my head, before my eyes could start glazing over, and refocused back on the task at hand.

Barely half my blade had sunk into the metal.

I resisted the very manly urge to cry, as I began the incredibly strenuous process of dragging my damn sword to the side, trying to slice through more of the metal.

Even with the blade's edge, it didn’t feel like it made much of a difference.

…I’m already regretting all my life choices!

< A New Sun >

She could see it from here.

His light. 

Despite how far he pushed it away, the Weaving Hall of the Palace was positioned just right so she could see.

It looked almost like a rising sun, in fact!

Which was ironic, because well. 

Wakahirume. She of the Rising Sun. That’s her.

But she was never really important. She made clothes. That was her job, her purpose.

Even now, she couldn’t say she hated it.

Even if Lord Uncle Susanoo threw a pony at her that one time, and destroyed the entire hall.

On accident! Of course! He probably wouldn’t have done it if he knew she was in there!

Ah…probably.

Behind her, the doors to the hall closed, and she looked down at her head.

Thread upon thread, almost a whole roll of it, stretched between her hands and fingers. A rainbow of colors, dull and bright, all sitting amongst each other, all the same.

Mother had just left. She was here to ask something of her.

A project, relating to her newest brother, to counteract her eldest brother's throwing a fit.

She couldn’t help but giggle at the thought.

Family drama! How fun!

Hopefully, not as fun as when Lord Uncle Susanoo gets mad, but from what she’s seen of her new brother, she has no reason to suspect he’s got that tempestuous an attitude.

She stood up, allowing the threads in her hand to fall.

The Weaving Hall is empty, besides herself. Nowadays, it usually is, even after they rebuilt it.

She turns away from her loom and walks away from all the looms and workstations, taking up the entire center of the hall from front to back, walking up to the window.

In his light, reflecting against the glass of the window, she catches a glimpse of herself.

Small. Smaller than even her mother. With the same long obsidian black hair and golden eyes that shine like the distant sun. Every one of her children shares those features.

Her hand comes up, resting upon her chest, and she smiles.

She is Mother’s only daughter, by technicality anyway, yet they look so much alike that Lady Uzume once joked they could be sisters, twins even.

Well, besides their chests, apparently?

Mother didn’t really like it when Lady Uzume mused very loudly about how her only daughter has a far bigger chest than her mother.

Personally, she doesn’t see what the big deal is.

In fact, it’s kind of annoying, actually. Her chest makes weaving far more difficult. She has to sit further away from the loom to actually see what she’s doing, she has to hold her arms up higher when bringing a garment closer to inspect it, and so much more…

She giggled lightly. Enough of that down talk now.

She isn’t sure what to expect, but she hopes all will go well!

And when her little brother is ready for her, she needs to make sure she makes a good first impression!

Ah! Maybe Lady Uzume could help with that!?

< A New Sun >

Chapter 117 End

Oh, Waka, I'm sure that decision isn't going to have lasting consequences. Anyhow, remember the teaser image for the black haired, golden-eyed girl I posted waaaaayyy back?

This is her.

Also, something did end up happening. But I powered through enough where I could get this out today.

Not having a repeat of a couple of weeks back, no thank you.

Chapter 117 Small Delay

Yeah I'm not going to lie, I'm on the fringes of changing the release schedule again.

Not yet though. If this happens again, I will, but for right now...ya. you're boy got busy, not enough time to get it all finished, as a couple weeks back.

Unlike then though, it should actually come tomorrow. Hopefully, not another big interruption. Regardless, to make up for all this, I'm thinking of starting to write out and post a series of omakes starting sometime next week.

These omakes would be based around a reboot concept I had of the story, that I ultimately decided not to go through with in favor of, ya know, seeing this one through to the end.

Who knows? Could be a fun little what if, or maybe everyone will like it enough it becomes something more.

Until then though, I apologize for the delay, and I'll see you lot tomorrow, for real.

A New Sun Chapter 116

Chapter 116

< A New Sun >

I woke up to silence and solitude.

In a way, it was sort of surreal. I’m only just now realizing that when I deign to actual sleep, I usually wake up with or to someone next to me.

Usually, that’s Kuroka’s soft purring in my ear…or her tits in my face, something like that.

It’s uncanny now. It’s deafening. I sit up from my prone position and sweep my gaze back and forth, looking at both sides of the bed.

No half-naked Goddess of Revelry. Who I know physically can’t wake up before me to save her life.

No Goddess of the Sun either. Who I suspect would also rather sleep in and find any excuse to stay put in her woman cave.

I flip over onto my back in a smooth motion, my gaze sweeping across the other side of the room, only to find, once more, nothing.

Uzume isn’t at her impromptu gaming setup. Ama hasn’t stolen the beanbag chair.

Perfect. Quiet.

I hate it. Even the click and clack of Uzume typing incessantly away at the keyboard would be far more welcome than this.

How the hell does my mother stay in here all the time? By herself?

With a shiver, I scramble my way off the bed, nearly getting tangled up in the blanket and smashing my face into the floor in my haste.

What saves me is the fact that I’m far stronger than the blanket, and so rather than get caught on it, my body pulls it along with me, tearing it from the bed instead.

“...Oops.” I pause briefly to bundle up the blanket and toss it back onto the bed before quickly resuming my grand escape.

By opening the door and power walking out.

Truly, the most difficult of tasks.

The door shut firmly behind me, and I took a moment, standing there and sighing out.

My hand reaches up, pinching the bridge of my nose between my eyes so hard I start to feel the beginning of a buzz.

I hum at that. Good. So I’m not dreaming then, all of a sudden. I don’t think I ever have before, so starting now, right after yesterday, would probably mean something is up, right?

Yet. I can’t help shake the feeling that something is up, anyhow.

And I don’t mean the good kind of up, as in everyone is busy planning a party.

My vision stretches down the hall, sweeping from left to right, much like the room I was in before.

Still, nothing.

However, it’s not entirely silent, unlike the room behind me.

In the distance, I could hear voices.

I can’t tell what exactly is being said, as far away as they are, but I can tell they aren’t exactly happy.

Already, I could feel a frown slipping onto my face, as my senses hone in on the direction of the voices.

I recognize a fair few, like Ama, Uzume, and glasses, along with a few other kami that I paid sparse notice to last night.

But there’s another out there now, whose power feels…familiar.

It’s like Ama’s. It’s almost like mine, but only in shades, and of course, far weaker.

My frown deepens. Who the hell is this new guy?

My feet were carrying me down the hall before I even realized it.

I was paying attention to my surroundings no longer. Instead, I pulled my power inward and held onto it tight, focusing on remaining as stealthy as possible while listening intently.

My hearing isn’t as great as my eyes, unfortunately, but it doesn’t take long for me to start catching what’s being said.

“...Oshi.” I hear Ama, as a quieter moment comes up, addressing someone, “I understand where you’re coming from, truly, but-”

“I care NOT for your understanding, mother!” A new voice, far deeper and gravely, washes over the quiet like a tidal wave.

I freeze. Mother? Oshi? Who?

“No buts! There shouldn’t be any confusion in this manner!” He continues, his rage obvious, voice bouncing across the halls, “So what of his power!? That does not grant him pardon over tradition and custom!”

His? Wait, is he talking about me!?

“Some would say,” another voice, who I instantly recognized as glasses, interjects curtly yet calmly, “that your attitude toward your mother and ruler right now does just that.”

“My words and actions today come not from sheer arrogance, pride in my power, or anything like!” The man spats, outrage growing, “No, I am here out of a sense of duty! My words derive from such! We are no demons! Nor barbarious youkai, bending to the demands of the strongest and fucking them to create stronger ilk!”

Rage, white hot, spiked through me and bristled within my chest.

I know it wasn’t targeted. At least, this guy better pray it wasn’t, but his words reminded me of my girls.

Someone snorted a chuckle, probably Uzume, considering how short-lived and cut off it sounded, probably because Ama gave her a look or something.

…She’s getting her ass beat for that one later.

“Well!?” The man continues, “Tell me my words aren’t false! Did we not wage war on the Earthly Kami, on the Youkai, for such vile propagation!? Did we not civilize the material plane, bring it order, peace, laws, tradition, and more to stop such inept and chaotic governance?!”

“Correction.” Ama answered, her voice far stiffer, devoid of most emotion, almost like when she was dealing with Odin, “You did no such thing. I sent two to pacify the world. I originally wanted you to rule them, to bring that order, but you refused. Your son did not.”

Holy fuck, I can feel that burn from here.

Though that story…

“And where is he now, hmm!?” The man bit back, quieter, yet beyond bitter.

“That was his own mistake!”

I nearly fell over as the entire palace rumbled at Ama’s voice. I heard the startled cries that followed, as several within the throne room fell.

Ama continued, the power in her voice withheld, but the fury behind it still present, “You can’t, won’t, continue blaming me for his death!” She hissed, “Blame your cowardice instead for not going when you were intended! Blame his poor decision-making for letting himself get cursed! Blame the one who cursed him in the first place! But do not blame me for giving him the choice to step up where his father failed!”

My mouth hung open, while my head lay devoid of thoughts. I had never heard her talk like this before; I never even thought she could.

And she wasn’t even done.

“Let’s stop beating around the bush. I know what this is, in truth.” She continued, voice dangerously low, “You’re jealous of your youngest brother, aren’t you? Don’t be.” It wasn’t a recommendation, it was an order. “As my son, you were given privileges. The ability to choose, for one. He is much the same. If he chooses to eschew tradition, he can suffer the consequences.”

What’s left unspoken, of course, is how much I’ll actually suffer from those consequences.

The answer? Not at all.

“He is not.” To my shock, the other guy still has a voice to bite back with, “He is not one of us!” He hisses back, “The way he treated you, everyone around him, that is not our way!”

“He was not raised here, like you, that is true, but he is one of us.” She states, “And this is final. Do you understand?” 

For a moment after her words, silence reigned.

But only a moment.

“...No.” Was the eventual reply, almost like a snarl, “I will gather my brothers, we will make you understand, you must see, mother! The way forward doesn’t lie with him! It can’t!”

Before any more words could be exchanged, I felt divine power and light pulse, and his power vanished into the wind.

All in all?

I really want to punch that guy in the face.

But the infuriating thing is that it would kind of prove his point, wouldn’t it?

I let out a low click of my tongue as the throne room explodes into several voices once again.

But before I could filter them through my senses and put those who agreed or disagreed with that guy's stance to their powers, Uzume’s voice cut through it all.

“Say!” She began, more than a touch uneasy, “Don’t you think that whole shaking the palace thing woke him up?”

My eyes widened. Oh fuck.

Wait a minute. I don’t care if I get caught. This is kind of important stuff to know.

And if they were planning on trying to hide all this drama from me, I’ll spank them both!

I relaxed significantly at this realization.

“Oh no.” Unlike a certain other goddess, who heard Uzume’s words and immediately let out a panicked squeak.

I didn’t need to see her tumble off her throne; I heard it, along with Uzume’s barked laugh at it.

By the time the doors leading from the throne room into the halls swung open, I had already positioned myself perfectly.

So, instead of an empty hall, the two goddesses met with me, leaning against the wall, a nice little smile stretching across my face.

For additional dramatic effect, I even made my eyes active, so they spin and glow slightly!

Uzume and Ama froze in place like a couple of doe caught in the headlights of an oncoming truck driven by seven bears deep deadbeat.

The kami behind the two, those who were watching them scramble to leave, also saw me.

They paled and stiffened instantly.

I tilted my head slightly to the side, “Hey, girls.” I began, my voice as easygoing and melodic as I could make it, “What’d I miss?”

Uzume was, unfortunately, the first to manage speech.

“...Please don’t fuck my ass too hard?” She causally asks and or begs.

Ama promptly started choking on Uzume’s sheer, well, there isn’t a word to describe whatever the hell just graced our ears.

Uzumeness? Yeah. Ama started choking on Uzume’s Uzumeness.

It didn’t take long for Ama to decide that Uzume should join in, as she swiftly turned and grabbed said Goddess of Revelry by the throat.

“UZUME!!” Ama cried in sheer and utter outrage.

I sighed, seeing Uzume’s face immediately start flashing through the colors of the dawn, my mother’s grip so vice around her throat that she can’t even let out a choked sputter.

This is going to be a long, long morning, isn’t it?

< A New Sun >

“Right. So.” I clasp my hands together as I stand before the beanbag, as though praying, because in a manner I am.

Maybe that’s a bit presumptuous, considering we just got back, but still. It’s for a good cause!

For Uzume to miraculously remain tied up and gagged via blankets, as she is right now.

Currently, she’s wriggling around on the bed like a worm, trying and failing to escape or free herself.

Not sure how long that’ll last, though.

Not even sure how strong that blanket actually is, damn.

Peak Maou Class blanket?

Anyhow, sitting in said beanbag chair, has been since we got back, almost like a child about to be scolded, was Ama. Her face was twisted in a pained frown, like she could decide whether to be ashamed, angry, or depressed, all at once.

It went like that almost as soon as she got done tying up Uzume over there.

“...Let's start at the beginning.” I finally settle on saying after a moment.

It takes even longer than a moment for her to finally begin, but when she does, her voice just sounds broken.

“It was just supposed to be a normal court meeting.” Uzume’s struggles behind me cease at once as soon as Ama spoke up, “That’s all it was. Oshihomimi, Oshi, he’s my first son, and after so long, he has returned home.” She shook her head, “I should’ve known it wouldn’t have been normal. With him, it never could have been.”

I kneel to her, placing my hand on her knee with a sigh.

“Yeah, I could sort of tell,” I say, tactfully not mentioning his son. Seriously, you’d need to be denser than the arena that’s still probably floating overhead not to figure that out.

Ama cringes, almost painfully so, “Y-You were there for even that?”

I nod, “A little bit before that, too, yeah.” I confirm, causing the goddess to slump into her chair even more.

Of course, I also know the story. It pertains to the human half of my lineage, after all. The son of Oshihomimi, Ama’s grandson, Ninigi. The great-grandfather of Japan's first Emperor, Jimmu.

Like Ama said, he’s the one she sent down to rule Japan. And though she didn’t mention it back then, not like she’d have needed to, he’s also the one she gave the Three Sacred Treasures. The sword, mirror, and bead.

This guy, this kami, is basically the connection to Amaterasu that lets the Imperial House of today claim descent from the Goddess of the Sun.

Still, though, something is bugging me.

Ama mentioned he got cursed. In myth, from what I know, he does get cursed. He loses his immortality; basically, he was cursed to have a limited lifespan.

But he’s still a kami, right? He shouldn’t stay dead. And the way they were talking about him makes me think he did.

A powerful curse like that being around would be way bigger news; it and spells derived from it could be used as a tool against all the gods, not just the kami.

Ama curls up slightly in the beanbag chair, “N-Ninigi,” she pauses, almost choking up on the name, “we aren’t sure why he hasn’t returned. Nobody knows. Not even mother, or father, or the Amatsukami. Iwanaga,” she hisses, “the bitch who cursed him, not even she knows! Only the Amatsukami have the authority to revoke divine powers and turn a kami mortal. When he ‘died’ he should have come home, not-”

I squeezed her knee, just a tad, causing her to stifle herself before she ranted out of control.

Well. Good to see that’s a mystery I’m going to pray I never have to solve.

“So he blames you,” I cap off that entire mess for her, “even though Ninigi chose to go down.”

Ama gave me a stiff nod at that, “He never got over it,” she let out a shuddering breath, “none of us got over it. Everybody loved Nini; he was, hmm…” for just a brief moment, a reminiscing smile washed over her face, and her eyes glowed fondly.

I know the myth of how he got cursed, so I’m going to personally reserve judgment on his character based on the girl he picked.

No, seriously. This is the World of DxD. It made the Yuki Onna into Bigfoot. It wouldn’t shock me if the only difference between the girls he was given was chest sizes or something stupid like that, and he picked the biggest or smallest of two, and that’s what did him in.

Tactfully, I kept such thoughts internalized.

Ama sways from side to side in the beanbag chair until she abruptly snaps out of her thoughts, perking up. A single tear flowed down her cheek.

“...Ah. Yes, right, we were,” she gives a sad little huff, “honestly, Nori, I’m not entirely sure why he has it out for you now. That whole thing about traditions, and customs,” she waves off with her hand lazily, “we used to be super duper strict on that stuff in the past, true. Not so much anymore.”

Uzume tried to say something at that moment. Thankfully, her gag prevented it. So, Ama continued on unabated, “It would only become a problem if you actively started abusing your power to get what you want, at the cost of the whole Pantheon in general. He might stir up fears of you doing that, bring up your, uh…” Ama looks away slowly, “taste, in women.”

I gagged, visibly, at that, before quickly bringing up, “H-Hey! Hey now, let’s not be too hasty. I keep Uzume around because I was ordered to!”

Outraged and indignant cries could be briefly heard behind me, before both of us cracked a small smile and started chuckling.

Wiping away the tears that were threatening to spill from her eyes, Ama continued, “No, no, you know what I mean, Nori.”

My expression stiffened, just a tad, “Yeah, yeah. I know.” I pause a second before adding with a deadpan, “You know, you mentioned this in the context of the Amatsukami not being pleased about plowing cat and fox girls. Not like this.”

At that, Ama flushed and looked away again, “W-Well, that’s because I thought they would! I don’t know why they didn’t even mention it! They normally don’t accept that kind of thing!”

My blank stare buries itself in her soul.

She starts squirming around in her chair, “S-Stop looking at me like that!”

“You can’t even see me right now.” I point out.

“I know!” She cries, her squirming picking up speed, “But I can still feel it!”

Heh, this is good fun.

Also, anything’s better than the sheer depression from before.

I really do wonder why the big guys upstairs didn’t say anything about my tastes in women.

Right now, I guess I’ll stick with them, not deeming it a big enough issue to press when I can clearly kick their asses.

Well, one of their asses, still something.

After settling that in my mind, and boring into Ama with my stare a little while longer, I chuckle and rise to my full height, releasing her from my sight.

“Righto. I think I know exactly how to deal with this!” I announce grandly.

“Ah!?” Ama sits up in her chair suddenly, “Nori, wait, you can’t just-”

“Do! Nothing!”

“-go up and punch him in the…wait, what?” She stops, her head tilting in confusion as what I said settles.

Heh! Lucky I had time to think that through a little, my first instinct was to punch him in the face.

I shrug, “Beating him up would just prove his point. And I can be…very petty, in other ways.” A devilish smirk crosses my face, “Let me guess, he’s going to gather up the rest of your kids, then push the court to do something about me, right?”

“They’re, uh, your siblings too, Nori.” She adds weakly, but nods, “But, yes, you’re probably right. I’m not going to do anything to you. So, they’ll push the court instead to try to force my hand.”

I cackle, just a bit, “Then if the court loves me?”

Ama blinks at me, “Well then, they can’t use that avenue anymore, and going against you from then on out would be… ill-advised, socially, anyway.”

“Not like they could come at me power-wise already,” I add, to which Ama easily nods in agreement.

“True, which would leave them with…” She blinks in thought, “Huh. I, can’t really think of anything else. Well, anything else that wouldn’t leave them woefully open to severe punishment and strangulation by you.”

My smirk only grows.

A plan rapidly forms within the back of my mind.

My hammer arm starts itching.

I’m no master politician, but I do understand one thing.

People love power. Sure, it may not run Takamagahara like it does the Underworld, but surely, increasing the power of a place, or faction, in general, would win more than a little support, no?

A ghost of an idea I didn’t really start thinking up, not until right now at least.

Of course, to pull something like this off, I’m going to need a ton of raw resources and input from people who know more about this kind of stuff than me.

Ah. Hold on. Resources?

“Tell me,” my gaze turns back onto Ama intently, causing her to flinch and nearly fall back into the chair, “the arena. It’s still floating up above, right?”

“Um…yes? Why???” Ama answered, a bit too quickly despite how hesitant she sounded to do so.

Is my face really that scary right now?

Whatever. Resources, secure.

Next, I need to find someone who can answer a fair few questions.

Like, for instance, how viable is it really to stuff a full-blown kami in something, then jam said item into a person in turn?

< A New Sun >

Chapter 116

A little later than I usually would like, but ngl, I completely forgot Halloween was coming up, had to deal with that. Still, I wasn't about to leave everyone hanging a second week in a row, so here I am!

Also, ya, over 8 million kami. And they already stuff parts of themselves in shrines. At least a few might be fine with being stuffed into totally not Sacred Gears, right?

No Chapter This Week

Follow up from last notice. Something came up. Physically, I'm fine. But mentally, not so much anymore. Next post will be next Friday.

I'm not sure how I'll make this up, but I will eventually. I'm so so sorry guys.

Chapter 116 Likely Small Delay

Oh boy. Okay. This is a...bit embarrassing.

So, your boy had a doctor's appointment the other day. Conclusion? Basically, go out and touch grass, or your body is gonna start having some problems.

I may or may not have touched grass too hard these past few days. Now, I'm laying here, limbs in sore agony, and feeling sick to my stomach. Granted, its not crippling, I actually am writing, bit by bit, it's just a real bad distraction.

But uh, yeah, if it doesn't get done today, I should be fine to wrap it up tomorrow, max.

Can't even be mad here, this one's all on me. So, heads up, and sorry for the likely delay here guys.

A New Sun Chapter 115

Chapter 115

< A New Sun >

He won.

Even as they feel the Kotoamatsukami’s presence leave, even as the barrier surrounding their arena comes down, it’s still processing.

Amaterasu doesn’t suspect it will for a while longer.

Right. She didn’t doubt him at all! It’s just, you know…she didn’t expect it?

Okay, that sounds bad, but really it’s nothing like that!

“M-My, um, m-my lady?” Omoikane stuttured out in a hush whisper at her side as he continued staring up the arena, his next practically locked in place, even as his glasses were halfway down her face, “Forget the explanation, what are we…supposed to do now?”

For one, her advisor, the actual God of Intelligence and Wisdom, was stumped.

Even in his most ridiculous moments, he usually had something to offer, even if it wasn’t the greatest idea.

But now? Nothing.

Yeah, that tracks. She has no idea what to do about this either.

Uzume, at her other side, looked just as gobsmacked.

Around her, the other high-ranking Kami of her court stared with similar sets of expressions.

Even the masses that had gathered beneath the area were completely shocked and utterly still and silent.

Something like this has never happened before.

The Kotoamatsukami don’t even fight, or at least, before her son turned up and got into it with one, she didn’t think they did!

Even when the Primordials of other Mythological Systems would hit the battlefields during the Great War like a natural disaster, they never stirred.

Granted, it’s not like Japan and the Shinto were ever attacked by an outside Primordial God before, but the threat there was never zero.

Yet they stirred not even a little bit.

She barely understands why the Kotoamatsukami are being a bit more active than usual now.

Sure, as he just proved, Nori is in a league of his own amongst them now.

Even when he’s not accessing that power, he’s still a force to be reckoned with against some of the stronger gods!

But that can’t be all right? 

Well. Whatever plans they may have had for him, she wishes them the best in trying to force him to do anything now.

Her mind sharpens as a golden light steps off the edge of the arena.

Like a dewdrop falling off a serene leaf, the point of golden light gently descends from the arena, heading down for them.

As it falls, that golden light rapidly begins to grow smaller and dimmer.

Until he touches the ground before them, not a lick of golden light left, no aura or anything, just the regular old Nori.

“I think I did pretty well.” Nori muses with a smile in general.

Ama had to resist the urge to smack him over the head and tell him not to be a cheeky little brat after pulling off something like that.

Or maybe he deserves being able to talk like that, because he did pull it off. She supposes that’s something to be smug and prideful about.

In the modern day, gods are rarely truly threatened. The only thing that could really kill Primordial Gods was other Primordials, or the scarce few monstrously strong gods, like Thor or Lugh.

In the modern day, that number has grown, and it would appear her son has joined their number.

Huh. Now she just wants to cuddle him and tell him how proud she is, damn it!

Fortunately, her gridlock on deciding just what they were supposed to do now is shared by everyone else around her.

Even Uzume. They all heard what he said, and yet, not a single peep.

After a moment of that, Nori rubs the back of his head, this small, almost awkward smile stretching across his face. At the same time, his sword just abruptly vanished from his other hand in a small flash of light.

“Tough crowd. Oh, well.” He sighs, waving them all off.

She isn’t the one who starts what happens next.

No, to her shock, it’s Uzume.

Nori perks, his gaze drifting to her, as she suddenly drops onto her hands and knees and bows deeply into a full-on kowtow.

“Uh…?” Nori starts letting only, only to be silenced in turn, as Uzume seems to have started a chain reaction.

The other gods around her began following her lead. It started as a trickle, one at a time, and another kami would join the bow.

But very quickly, it became more than that.

In seconds, all the kami around her were bowing.

The masses surrounding the palace fell to their knees in tidal waves, following along even more fervently.

Not a word had been uttered, yet Nori couldn’t have appeared more gobsmacked.

Well now.

It would be rude of her not to follow suit, wouldn’t it?

As their Chief Goddess, kowtowing isn’t something she can do, but…

She met his eyes and smiled.

Seeming to sense what she was about to do, he gave her a look which practically begged her not to.

Too bad~!

She clasped her hands in front of her waist, one over the other, straightened her back, and bowed.

Her smile never left, even as Nori let out a strangled breath, likely trying to comprehend what exactly he was seeing.

Though now that they got this far, she started wondering…

When are they supposed to stop?

Huh.

She doesn’t know.

…Clearly, Uzume is the one to blame for this! Damn it!

< A New Sun >

How the hell is one supposed to react when you’ve got basically an entire realm full of gods bowing for you?

I’d look it up on Google, but somehow, I don’t think I’d get an answer.

No, seriously, I have no fucking idea what to know right now.

I look back and forth, seeing every kami besides my mother on their hands and knees, kowtowing. Beyond the sole exception, they’re all doing it.

Without even so much as a twitch or spasm, too. They’re all so eerily still.

It’s hitting a certain uncanny valley effect for me right now.

Which isn’t helped by the sheer non-answer my head is giving me about what I’m supposed to do in this situation.

Well! Uzume started it! So I can safely blame her for this, at least!

She probably did it knowing I’d have know clue how to react to this.

Which, good guess, she’d be absolutely right.

Truth be told, I wasn’t really sure what to do after Umashia fell either.

I just immediately started aura farming for the hell of it.

I also wasn’t sure how the other kami would react to me beating up what amounts to one of everyone’s grandparents.

Thankfully, they weren’t mad. Truthfully, though, I sort of expected it.

Definitely didn’t expect this.

My hand comes up, pinching the bridge of my nose as my mind races.

I can…actually feel my face heating up.

Out of embarrassment. Wow.

I can’t say when the last time I felt that was.

After taking a moment to just breathe, I finally figured that a good place to start would be getting everybody off the ground first.

I approach my mother and the few kami gathered around her, and hold a hand out to them.

“Rise. Please.” I speak, my voice low and quiet, but not utterly a whisper, “This might be a little bit much.”

It took a moment, but for that moment, my stomach was twisted into a knot.

Then, Ama spoke, and that knot eased away, “Maybe so,” she said, voice light yet proud as she eased out of her bow, “but to be fair, it’s not like anything like this has ever happened before.” Her smile strained slightly before she then admitted, “So, we really don’t know where to go from here either.”

Thank. Me! I’m not the only one!

Omoikane, or glasses, as I am considering renaming him in my head, rises not long after she does, also speaking up, “Admittedly, if you hadn’t won, my Lord - and I mean no offense - this wouldn’t be so difficult.” He practically sighed out.

Fair enough, glasses, fair enough.

Uzume rose with a cheeky grin, but didn’t say anything; she merely gave me a shrug.

As though a string of reverse dominoes, when the others sat back up, so too did the others, one by one, chaining down the line to the masses.

“It really is.” Ama huffs, almost pouting as she crosses her arms, “If we hold a big feast or something now, honoring your victory, that would be disrespectful to the Kotoamatsukami.”

“On the other hand, a feast celebrating your mere survival would have been fine, my Lord.” Glasses chimes in to clarify before I could even ask.

Something’s bugging me about that, though.

“How would it be disrespectful to them when they agreed to the fight in the first place?” I asked, eyebrow raising, “A match that they then lost?”

Glasses looked like he was about to answer, but Uzume got to it before him.

“It’s because they’re old.” She stated, to which glasses suddenly looked at her in absolute appall, his glasses nearly flying off his face at the force with which he turned.

Ah. Respect your elders. Taken to the literal max.

No shock there.

“That,” Uzume kept going, “plus, when Mikaboshi thought-”

She was abruptly cut off by a long, silent wheeze as Ama suddenly jammed her elbow straight into her side.

Without even looking.

Her smile seemed far stiffer.

Glasses looked paler.

It was like, for just a brief moment, the atmosphere of the area flipped on its head.

Then, right as Ama removed her elbow from Uzume’s side, it was back, and her smile seemed to lighten up.

“The point is,” Ama continued for her, “it’s all about respect. For them, and you. Both of you deserve respect, them for their position, you for what you just accomplished, it’s just…we need to think of something, alright?”

Okay.

I see how it is.

We’re just going to brush off that name drop, then? The guy who I never heard of whose name literally translates to either August Star or Dread Star.

Do we have a kami Lucifer? Is he dead? Do I need to worry about this guy showing up at my door, alive, because he heard that I beat a Kotoamatsukami and wants me to ‘rebel’ with him?

If just the mention of this guy makes everyone freak out a little bit, he can’t be good news, at least.

…Honestly, I probably am thinking a little too much into this.

The guy is probably dead, and since I’ve never heard about him, likely he never got enough faith to revive.

Especially if his thing is rebellion. Can’t see Japan being into that as much, fortunately.

Well, in this case, it’s fortunate. In some cases, they could definitely use a little more rebellion. Or at least a willingness to do so.

Still, something to keep an eye on, I suppose.

And something to ask Uzume about when we’re not surrounded by a bunch of people who really don’t want to talk about him.

Ah, well. For now, I should focus on dealing with this.

So I let Ama’s very blunt shift of topic go, and rather plainly ask, “Do we need to think of something right now?”

Ama hums, before eventually replying slowly, “No…but, it would be better if we figure it out sooner rather than later.” She scratches the back of her head and cringes slightly, “The longer we wait, the more kami are going to start getting antsy, and then they’re going to start arguing about what should be done, and…” she trails off with a shiver.

Glasses fixes his glasses at long last, and nods, “That is correct. The masses tend to get…rowdy when it comes to matters of respect and honor.”

My memory briefly flashes to when what basically amounts to a drunken rage barfight erupted right on the streets of Takamagahara.

That’s putting it lightly, glasses, that’s putting it really lightly.

I cross my arms and nearly grumble out, “Even if I say I don’t want anything?”

Which I totally do want a party by the way!

Glasses gives me a small, pitying smile, “Unfortunately, they still would, my Lord.”

Well, I would like one, but if everyone’s just going to be annoying about it, then it may not even really be worth it!

Yeah, you know what? Fuck it, we can decide on this later.

“Of course.” I huff, “Right, well, for right now, I think I earned some rest! We can figure this all out later.”

My piece said, I lean down, and reach out with both arms.

“Huh?” “Eh?”

Ama and Uzume both blink as both my arms wrap around them.

“WOAH!? HEY!” “WEHH!?”

They then cry out as I pick them both up, bringing them up with me as I stand up straight, carrying them over either of my shoulders.

Light as a pair of feathers.

Unless we count Uzume’s ass anyway.

Now then!

“If you need us, we’ll be in her room.” I tilt my head toward Ama, “So, unless you do, don’t bother us, alright?”

Poor glasses just stood there, staring at me, almost like he was before everyone started bowing.

Completely and utterly gobsmacked.

It took me another word to smack him out of it, “Well?”

He perked up at my far sharper tone, before finally squeezing out, “Yes, L-Lord!”

I nod before walking off without another word.

On my way back into the palace, I spot a good few of the other kami conversing amongst themselves, although not all.

From what little I hear, they seem to be brainstorming ideas for what to do next.

For example, Takemikazuchi was talking to this far older, far plumper, old man; the guy actually kind of reminded me of Iroh, from Avatar the Last Airbender.

The old man was talking about some kind of parade, but Takemikazuchi simply gave an aggravated sigh and shook his head, causing the old man to look sad.

Everyone who wasn’t engrossed in planning was looking toward me, similar expressions to the ones glasses just had on their face plastered across their’s.

As I entered the palace proper, however, I barely took notice of one particular man, whose fists were clenched at his sides, and whose expression was far more miffed.

< A New Sun >

I threw both goddesses onto the bed as soon as I entered the room.

“Oof!”

“Ah! Oh my, Nori, so rough-”

I jumped in soon after.

Except, as Uzume started opening her mouth, Ama turned and brought her hand down.

And, as it would just so happen, I was also bringing my hand down as it came falling in.

It was perfection. 

At the same time, Ama’s hand and mine came down, right onto Uzume’s ass, one for each cheek.

The sound that rippled out from the super unison spank felt like it echoed across the room, utterly silencing Uzume, her mouth wide open as though she was stuck in the middle of a silent scream.

All Uzume could do was twitch in pain before her face hit the bed, and she went limp.

Dead.

Heh. Drama queen.

Ama huffed, shaking her head, before looking my way.

“You really shouldn’t do that in front of everyone, you know?” She admonishes me lightly.

“Is it a respect thing?” I ask, pretty much already expecting the answer.

She nods back, but adds, “That, but it’s also an appearances thing. I’m the Chief Goddess, I can’t be seen being carried around like that.” She grumbles further, blushing a bit, “If you’re going to do it at all, at least do it right. Don’t throw me over your shoulder like a sack.”

Here, I would quote something about her who calls herself the Chief Goddess is no true Chief Goddess, but really, it doesn’t roll off the tongue. At all.

So, I decide to simply say, “I just beat a Kotoamatsukami, the hell is anyone going to do about it?”

Ama raised a finger at that, like she wanted to object, but found words failing to leave her mouth.

No, because really, what could they do? 

Socially shun me? Like that will do anything when I already sit at the top of that ladder?

Fight me? HAH!

Now I know, I know. Traditions, customs, ceremony, respect, bleh~.

Here’s the thing: if they want my respect? They’re going to have to earn it.

If Ama doesn’t want me to do it? Fine. But if someone else has a problem, they can stuff it.

They aren’t Ama. They aren’t even Uzume. Their opinion means less than nothing to me.

Maybe my ego is just getting to me after I basically cut a Kotoamatsukami in half, but hey, I’m allowed at least a little divine pride now and again, right?

“Y-You,” Uzume speaks up, a finger slowly, shakily being held up, “should really take N-Nori’s stance sometimes, A-Ama,” the drama queen goddess fake croaks out, “it’s useful, n-not giving a fuck sometimes…”

Although what she says does hold some truth.

To that end, Ama simply huffs and crosses her arms.

Silence ensues. But it’s not awkward. It’s nice.

It’s also not the silence I had to deal with in that damn cave. That was oppressive. It was stillness.

I don’t see how Ama slept in that place at all.

This bed, though? Real nice.

Really, the main reason I wanted to get away so much was because I am very out of it internally here.

I used up everything sustaining that power of mine, and I’ve run dry.

Physically, sure, I’m fine. But I’m so dry on energy that I couldn’t even heal a scratch right now.

And that’s not even talking about using any of my other powers, like my fire or light. 

Even my ki is depleted, I can’t even summon an aura of fighting spirit right now.

That’s the toll using that for too long will dole me.

So, I’m going to enjoy recharging on a proper bed rather than in a gorge now.

As for tomorrow, well, maybe someone will figure something out? Or I might have to?

Either way, it’ll get figured out somehow!

< A New Sun >

Chapter 115 End

Just a heads up, angee buddy isn't Mikaboshi. He's somebody else. Someone who really doesn't like the way Nori here is being so casual with Ama.

Hmm. Wonder who that could be?

A New Sun Chapter 114

Chapter 114

A New Sun

“It has been arranged.”

An announcement wrung out from beyond the heavens.

From the highest peak of Takamagahara to the lowest base, every single Kami within the Heavenly Realm heard it with perfect clarity.

To most, they’d have not the slightest clue what it meant, or what was even going on.

But for those who thought squirreled away at the mountain's base?

The Goddess of Revelry looked up, a strained and uneven smile across her face, “That’s just…freaky, isn’t it?” She crossed her arms under her chest, “I mean, were they seriously watching us the entire time, just so they could pull this right as we finished up here!?”

Her attitude had passed with the days.

The Goddess of the Sun, on the other hand, looked far calmer, if still a tad uneasy. “Well, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Still?” Her gaze diverted from the sky, toward her son, “How’s it feeling?”

Her son, who currently resembled a sun.

The markings across his collar had grown, rising like fanned flames up his neck and stretching up his face, turning golden just as they met below his eyes.

His normally still obsidian black hair had turned a familiar shade of deep purple, as it waves around wildly in the throes of his aura.

From head to toe, he was covered in a thick layer of what one could easily assume to be liquified molten metal.

Yet, despite the appearance, his mere presence didn’t ignite a firestorm around him, even beneath his feet; not a single blade of grass within Heaven burned.

His eyes looked skyward.

A strange sunlike pattern spun in his eyes as he beheld the Heaven above.

“Good.” Her son uttered in response at last, a dissonance in his voice, but not quite booming despite the power he’s holding onto at the moment, as his eyes search, and search…

“How long do you think you can hold this?” His mother asked in turn, to which the son simply shrugged.

“Long enough.” His answer was quiet, his focus clearly elsewhere.

The Goddess of Revelery shot the son with a quizzical look, her eyebrow raising, “Nori, are you okay, because,” a smirk slowly slides across her face, so natural as though she was created for such purposes, “if not, we can always give you one last shove for the road~!”

He ignored her, this time.

His pupils abruptly dilated, the patterns within his eyes stilling as he beholds…

Ah.

It has been a long time since another has gazed this far beyond.

The son twitched as his eyes went wide.

But now you see, there is a reason why we hide ourselves away.

The son does not shake, not even an inch. He is perfect still.

For once, whether in fear and fright or lack of? It cannot be told.

Perhaps, he does not need to fear? For he holds a power that puts him within the realm of us.

This makes sense.

Respect is due.

The High Creator nods its head in respect.

The Divine Creator nods its head in respect.

Energy nods his head in respect.

Heaven nods her head in respect.

The son gulps as his hold on his power begins to slip.

We look forward to seeing how it holds up in the coming test.

Not even the Central Master himself could have predicted everything that has happened with your existence.

A new day is upon us all.

Energy rises.

“It is time.”

“Wah!?” The Goddess of Revelry falls onto her back in startled fright, “C’mon! Again!?”

The Goddess of the Sun perks up, her gaze looking up before sliding back down to her sun, beholding him standing so perfectly and utterly still, “...Nori?” She starts, concern growing in her voice.

The son takes a labored, short breath.

He forgot to breathe since he began his search.

“I await, atop the Heavenly Realm.”

Energy leaves.

The four are three now, but no less distinguished.

The aura around the son flickers as he tries desperately to hold onto that power for a spare moment longer.

We smile.

And shut the door from the beyond-

A New Sun

I gasp, a deep, heavy heave, my hand flying up to my chest on instinct, grabbing at my robe as I breathed as though I was trying to fill a damn vacuum!

The sun in my chest sputters out, turning from a red giant, bursting with divine power…into something like a white dwarf, barely felt, barely seen, surrounded by cold and an empty void.

I don’t need to see my body to know that with the waning of my inner sun, my appearance has returned to normal.

All in all?

I’m planning on never doing that shit again!

I spent, what, a couple of weeks down here? All to use this power, to control it, at will, and I got to see that!?

Well, not really see so much as feel them. At the power I was at, I could finally fucking sense the merry band of voyeurs and track the signal, so to speak, right back to them!

Now my mouth tastes like TV static.

Now my stomach feels full of colors.

I don’t know how I know its colors specifically, I just do.

I vaguely got the sense of Ama rushing to my side, and Uzume, my other.

I had fallen to my knees, at some point, I’m not sure when.

Even now, they’re voices sound distant, like they’re being spoken through a broken microphone.

Thankfully, it’s slowly clearing up, but yeah.

Never doing that again.

I’m fairly certain those guys are bumming it right up against the Dimensional Gap. That’s the feeling I got from them, anyhow.

Or, if there’s anything that conveys tasting TV static and drinking colors, it’s probably the Gap.

Not like I’m going to go there intentionally to find out.

Not like I’m ever going to try looking back up there ever again in the first place.

I would sooner bury my cock in Uzume’s ass than try that shit again, nope!

“...-nori, Nori! Hey! Hey!? You there!?”

Speaking of. There’s at least one of their voices.

I shot her a glare, “Yeah.” I practically strangled out, “Though I wish I wasn’t.”

Uzume huffed and poked my cheek, before humming out, “Could always throw you back in the cave~...”

I shivered at that, “Would really rather not go there again, either.”

Uzume shrugs before waving me off with a smirk.

The hell is that look for, though?

Oh yeah, two goddesses are clinging to me, and the other has been oddly silent.

I swivel my head to the other side, only to be met by Ama glaring at me with a steady frown.

I don’t even get a chance to open my mouth again before she can state, not ask.

“You saw them, didn’t you?”

Uzume perked up at my other side, but I couldn’t see exactly how she reacted.

For my part, I just nodded at her.

Her frown deepened.

“You’re not going to try doing that ever again. Understand.”

Again, I got the sense she wasn’t asking.

Thankfully, I wholeheartedly agreed.

With another nod, I managed to get out a, “Wasn’t planning on it,” without completely choking on it.

A flash of surprise crossed Ama’s face for a moment.

I was about to take offense, truth be told. How dare she think I’m that suicidal!

I’m only that suicidal when it comes to fighting an extremely strong foe!

Speaking of once more, one of those is kind of waiting for me, at the top of the Heavenly Realm?

I have a feeling that was meant almost literally, but I guess we’re going to have to go up there to actually see.

So, putting behind my offense, I manage to stand back up on my own two feet, with Ama and Uzume moving to help me just a bit.

“Well.” I continue, voice getting better by the second, “We shouldn’t keep the big guys waiting, should we?” I look between the two.

Uzume crosses her arms and looks away, unease. But Ama? She bites her lip and grips my arm just a bit tighter.

“We…probably shouldn’t,” she speaks up, “but I don’t want you to go just yet.” She pouts.

I give her an amused smile before setting my chin atop her head. 

“I know, I know…you want me all to yourself, and I’ve still got to meet the whole family, all that.” I chuckle, “Don’t worry, alright?”

The sun in my chest beats, white flashing golden.

I know Ama could feel it because at the same time, her power beats back, like a drum echoing, and she flinches.

My smile grows.

“I’ll try to keep it quick, alright?”

A New Sun

Fortunately, Ama didn’t try and hold me back any longer.

Doubly so, reaching the peak of the realm was simply just a flash of light away.

There’s always a but when it comes to so much fortune, though, isn’t there?

That being when we did appear, we appeared under the shade.

Something that normally shouldn’t have happened, considering we appeared outside the Palace.

The answer became clear fairly quickly; all we had to do was look up.

“Yeah,” Uzume whistled at our side, “they certainly arranged something, that’s for sure.”

Ama just gaped, but I couldn’t help but huff.

They had all that time, I figured they’d make some other dimension for us to duke it out in, but this?

I’d almost call it lazy.

Above the palace was, quite plainly, an arena.

A massive crimson square intricately carved into a flying stadium, gleaming and freshly polished as though made of metal, with edges ornately depicting what I could only guess were scenes of mythology wrapping all the way around.

Or I assume they wrap all the way, I couldn’t exactly see the entire thing after all.

“M-My Lady!”

Huh, that’s a new voice. Male, but distinctly lighter, and what I could best describe as somewhat nerdy.

My head tilts, looking toward the source, finding a guy with glasses, in an ancient Japanese robe, quickly marching his way over to us.

I’ve seen him before. In the palace, when Ama had her freakout.

But uh, I don’t think I ever got his name?

He’s somewhat strong, not as strong as the sword god I’ve met, but stronger than Uzume, at least from what I feel.

But not by much.

He stops, once his eyes lay upon me as well, “M-My Lord!?” He stutters and chokes out.

…Is he going to be okay?

Ama finally realized he was there just as he was catching his breath, giving the poor nerd a nod, “Omoikane. I’ll…explain on the way?” She slowly decides, somehow already becoming tired.

Ah. Name to face. He’s the Wisdom God, right?

Checks out.

Omoikane coughs, adjusting his glasses before they fall off, and straightens himself back up, “The court awaits an explanation then, my lady!”

Ama lets out a low whine, before stomping her foot, almost like an agitated rabbit, “Ngh! No, I’m not explaining this to everybody right now! Just, Nori?” She turns to me.

“Hmm?” I hum, my gaze shifting to her.

“Go.” She finally says, almost pleading, “They’re waiting.”

“...M-My Lady, such a thing-” Omoikane begins to explain, only for Ama to silence him with a raise of her hand without even looking at him.

Her face twitches, even as she continues to look at me,  “This should be all the explanation everybody needs.”

I actually think this is going to prompt several more lines of questioning, but hey, chief gods plus mother’s orders!

Before I head up, though.

I take a moment, stepping forward and kissing her right on the forehead.

Ama yelps.

I chuckle before uttering, “Thank you.”

I don’t wait to see her reaction before turning and grabbing Uzume by the wrist.

“E-Eh!? Hey-WEH!?”

I smack a kiss against her forehead, too, because she did help.

You have to reward good behavior when it happens. That’s how I heard you’re supposed to train pets, anyhow.

I smirk before uttering, “You as well.”

Without further ado, I turn, light flickering around me.

My destination? Up.

As quickly as it flashes around me, that light fades, my feet hitting the ‘ground’ beneath me now with a metallic tang.

It didn’t take long for my surroundings to register, that being the true lack of them.

A flat, polished space with nothing more to it. My best comparison would be a tournament arena pulled straight from Dragon Ball, or any sort of ring in general, just supersized.

Although such a ring wouldn’t mean much without my opponent, would it?

“You came swiftly.” There, in what likely constitutes the center of the ring, sat Umashia on his knees.

If he were anyone else, I’d wince for his poor knees. It feels like metal, and sitting on that, on your knees, without a cushion?

I can’t even feel true pain, and that’s giving me phantom sensations just thinking about it.

“Well,” I muse, holding up my hand, “I wasn’t going to keep you waiting for much longer.”

Light flashes from my hand, the nimbus stilling, coalescing into a shape within my grasp.

I clench my hand, and the light disperses, replaced by my sword.

It's so much more convenient to be able to summon it whenever I want rather than having to carry it everywhere!

Umashia nodded his head, “And we appreciate the swiftness,” he responded, with what sounded like true gratitude, as he rose onto his feet without even a twitch of pain, “yet, you come here not at your full power.”

My free hand comes up behind my head, scratching it, “Well, yeah?” I admit, “I just got done training, after all.”

Granted, it was more mental and spiritual stuff over the physical, a whole lot of dealing with shenanigans in my head.

Umashia shook his head as he approached, “That won’t be.”

“Uh, okay, so then-” I was cut off, as Umashia reached down his hand.

All he did was poke me on the forehead.

My aura exploded.

In an instant, all I saw was gold, as every single energy source I had within me was brought to full power in an instant.

My sun? It beat furiously in my chest, ready and rearing to go in an instant.

I heaved a breath, momentarily stunned, trying to contain the energy suddenly boiling under my skin.

“What in the!?” I ground out, rather dumbly.

Umashia simply chuckled as he stepped away from me.

“It is about time you learned who I am exactly, isn’t it?” He mused, still as good-naturedly as always, yet there was an undertone of anticipation under it all.

Despite how far away he walked, despite how soft and gentle he sounded, his voice carried with an almost eerie ease, “Reed Shoot Prince Elderly Kami.”

My surging energy stabilizes, just as pressure begins building in the arena around us.

“That is Umashiashikabihikoji. That is me. I am the fourth kami to exist. I am the first male kami to exist. That is all my essence, my purpose, my power.”

…Wait, so he’s like, the Kami version of the First Man!?

He stopped walking, although he wasn’t done, “Therefore, my power is power. Energy. Drive.”

The air had begun to steam.

I don’t know how best to describe it otherwise.

A white airy flame was manifesting throughout the air. The pressure made manifest.

All coming from him.

And for the first time, I could sense it.

It wasn’t divine power, not exactly, no, it was lifeforce. Raw, insurmountable, lifeforce.

I don’t have a comparison point for this. It felt damn near limitless.

“This place,” Umashia continued, his voice growing heavier and deeper, “this arena, was constructed out of Hihi’irokane. It has been imbued with the power of the others; it will hold. Only an attack that could destroy a country would hope to damage it.” He turned around, facing me once again.

His eyes were gone, left as an empty white glowing void, flickering with flames like the air around us.

“The barrier is also in place.” He added, and with a glance around, I saw that too.

A translucent red sheen, shaped like another square, rises around the arena on all sides.

“So.” Umashia raised his arms out to either side, wide, “Hold nothing back!”

The pressure around me turned into a physical weight.

Before I even knew it, my knee had slammed into the ground below, sending a buzz straight up my thigh and spine.

All around me, the very air appeared to vibrate and burn, life force igniting into a mere fraction of fighting spirit.

Umashia’s fighting spirit.

Ever so slowly, despite the buzz beginning to spread across my body, down my shoulder and back, I began smiling.

The Power of a Primordial God.

How…exhilarating.

The sun in my chest beat like a second heart, a second heart about to go through a heart attack.

With every single beat, a sound like a drum bounced around my body, throughout my veins, rattling my bones and echoing throughout my mind.

I can’t go max power all the way, not yet. It takes time to heat a house or pick up speed in a car.

But as it turns out, that power was always within me. I had just been using the sun like a pair of juice of jumper cables the entire time.

Treating me as another side, rather than just me, something that needed to be coaxed out.

I was always here. I am who I am. Heh.

The sun pulsed and swelled. Liquid magma ignited throughout my veins, and I felt fire crawl up my neck.

The weight, lessened.

See, the problem is, though, just like any star, any reactor, any power plant, the fuel has to come from somewhere.

Before it was the sun.

Now it’s all me.

I raised my head, as the sun in my chest swelled further, its color shifting from yellow to an orangish red.

I no longer so white, only gold, as my aura rippled out into the air around me.

I rose into my full height, pushing past the weight, trying to bring my shoulders down.

As my aura bellowed out around me, I caught a whiff of my slightly lighter black hair as it passed over my eyes.

Umashia grinned, lowering his arm.

He didn’t take a stance, but I could tell he was ready regardless.

Let’s do this.

I breathe, my sword in my hand glowing as red-hot as the day I reforged it.

I step, and I’m upon him.

A simple opener. 

Dance.

Flames of red and gold ignite across the edge of my blade as it streaks down in an arc.

Umashia barely moves, only raising a single arm. The thick corded muscles lacing his forearm tense as the entire thing glows with a white flame.

Concentrated fighting spirit.

My blade slams down on his arm like a hammer upon an anvil.

The entire arena rings at the strike, but neither my sword nor his arm suffers any damage.

My eyes spin, and I feel the next move right before it materializes.

His other arm lashed out in a furious uppercut, right for where my chin was.

Fake Rainbow.

The afterimage he strikes doesn’t just fade; it explodes, as a pure white tornado cranes out from his fist and smashes into the barrier above.

I don’t waste time creating several dozen afterimages to try and confuse his senses. He can watch me from another realm; he’ll perceive me here easily.

I appear at his back, sword already craned back, fire igniting around it as though in a mirror to his own attack.

Sunflower Thrust.

The tip of my blade slams straight into his lower back, right where his spine would be.

Fire screams out around me as it spins and churns like a drill before blasting me back.

I’m sent skidding across the ground, far back across the arena, nearly slamming into the barrier myself.

As I look forward, I see Umashia just standing there, completely unharmed, not even a nick in his robe where my blade could have pierced.

He looks back, smiles, and turns to face me.

My grip on my blade tightens, my aura flaring as I do the spiritual equivalent of shoving more coal in the engine.

Or this case, dropping water onto a sun.

Dozens to hundreds to thousands and more gallons of water.

Umashia reels his hand back, his palm open, a cyclone of raw lifeforce swirled into his palm in an instant.

It was only thanks to my eyes that I caught the spark of blue in the first place.

My sword swung out on raw instinct, intercepting the deep blue aura blast before it could blow straight through my chest.

The moment my sword’s edge made contact with the aura blow, the entire thing unraveled.

That cyclone burst free from the aura sphere, slamming me against and pinning me to the barrier at my back for barely a second.

But that’s all it took.

A wave of pure force slammed into me as Umashia punched straight and forward, keeping my back pressed against the barrier, my arms forced back and pinned as my entire body buzzed.

Another punch, another wave of white, another dash of buzzing lacing my form.

And then another, and another, and another.

It was like getting hit over and over again by a beam of light that had mass.

The sun in my chest swelled once more.

Fire erupts from my form, red slowly giving more and more way to gold.

Another wave hits, slamming my flames back against me.

I breathe deep, taking them all back in.

As another wave comes, I breathe out in a roar.

Force and fire meet halfway, and the two explode, igniting nearly half of the arena in a firestorm.

That wave never reaches me.

My legs hit the ground right as I regain control of my arms, and I move, this step blinking through the firestorm with enough force to carve a hole straight through the center of it.

No fancy tricks, no sneaky angles.

I’m upon him.

Umashia lowers his arm to meet me, another cyclone gathering in his palm.

Rather than my sword, my other arm reels back in response.

A cyclone of fire swirls into my palm, gathering into a sphere of flames that condense and pull inward.

Light flashes and burns around the super condensed sphere as it turns black, and all of a sudden, it’s as though I’m holding a solar eclipse in the palm of my hand.

His blue aura sphere rises as my solar eclipse falls.

As soon as the spheres impact each other, the entire arena shudders. White and red pushing against each other, force and heat, contesting as our spheres unravel in each other's hands.

Flames explode out from under the soles of my feet as I hold and push back. 

For a second, the entire arena becomes a firestorm as a result of our clash.

Until I see Umashia take a very deep breath, aura building around his throat…

The next time he opens his mouth, it’s not another breath, it’s a roar.

Ripples upon ripples of white radiate from his entire body, crashing over my fire like tidal waves and blowing them out.

At the same time, he forced me back up into the air, my body spinning.

I right myself as my ears ring and buzz. Sound returns immediately as they heal, but it’s my eyes that catch him again as he appears.

Right above me, arms raised, hands overlapping and clenched.

With a single seal with one hand, smoke explodes between me and him, sending me, and several dozen other me’s, flying in various directions.

The me stuck where I was, though? He looks around, rapidly, before realizing where exactly he was.

“Oh…you DICK!” He cries.

Before getting sledgehammered back into nonexistence and smoke.

Sorry. Your sacrifice will be worth it.

Flames ignite beneath my feet once more, yet as my aura shines brighter and brighter, I do not race toward battle.

My once black hair flutters across my sight, now a deep purple.

Finally.

All my clones do the same, launching themselves at Umashia from various directions.

Umashia turns, his arm raised and fist clenched, twisting and swinging it around midair.

A whirlwind emanates, and all my clones are slammed into it.

All of whom promptly explode. Violently.

The whirlwind he created becomes a vortex of my holy spirit fire in an instant.

With another, the flames at my feet burst once again, flinging me straight into the inferno.

I see him falling, the flames licking across his glowing form, and he seems unbothered.

I will change that.

More fire. More flames. More power.

Gold etches across my blade as it ignites this time.

He turns right as I lash down upon him again, his forearm blocking. Gold strikes white, the ring shuddering in the inferno around us.

With a grunt, he flings me back.

I make a single sign, both hands still clasped on my blade.

A clone poofs into existence behind me, his feet already lashing out.

As one, flames erupt from both our feet, and I’m sent flying right back into the fray.

The sheer force of the power pushing from my feet poofs the clone almost immediately after it’s summoned, but it's more than enough.

I come spiraling back in, already arching into another slash.

Sun-

My sword comes down like a beam of sunlight, slamming into a metal wall that is his arm once again.

I’m flung back.

Another clone, and a big explosion of jets of flames, and I’m back upon him.

-Halo-

The gold in my blade spreads like an infection across it, another slash for his neck blocked by his wrist.

He sends me away with a wave of his arm.

-Dragon-

I come back even faster.

Fire and metal slam against force and flesh, the inferno around us growing larger.

The fire begins taking shape, images of something forming within the heat.

I’m knocked away, again and again.

Yet I keep coming back.

-Head-

There is no time to think, there is no time to plan, to fight back.

There is only us, the fire, and my blade.

My clones send me flying back, fire my tail like a comet, each time I’m sent away.

Each entrance is a new angle, each swing coming from a different position, aiming for a different limb now.

It’s all one-

-Dance.

Into.

Solar Heat Haze.

My next strike comes to a halt right before it can actually reach him.

My sword passes down through the air right in front of him.

He raises his forearm, but nothing meets his flesh.

For the first time since I’ve met him, his brow creases in confusion.

The fire roars in greeting.

Umashia abruptly faces up, his fist rising skyward, to meet the massive dragon head made of pure golden flame.

A white wave of force crashes into its maw. 

It eats it, not even slowed a single bit as it crashed right on top of the Primordial God.

The inferno around us turns inwards, condensing, drawing in all upon him, as though itself was one supermassive flaming blade.

The resulting explosion wasn’t one of flames or heat; it was one of pure golden light, a pillar shooting straight up into the barrier at our heads.

I stand up straight, my back perfectly straight, as light purple hair wafts into my eyesight.

The sun in my chest beats with the fury of a red giant, sparking with gold and light unchallenged.

I am whole. I am one. But not for long.

The light finally clears, and I behold the Primordial God, kneeling, in a small pool of molten metal straight from the arena.

His body smoking, his robe at last singed and glowing at the hems, parts of his body glow an angry pink.

“...Haha. Hahahaha!” He laughs, boisterously, as he rises back onto his feet, the pink in his skin fades with white rushing over it, “There he is!” he holds out his hands, “The new sun!”

My blade burned gold, light, and fire, igniting into being around it at the same time.

Umashia grinned, his foot thundering against the arena as he finally took a stance.

Both of his hands, gathered at his side.

This time, when the vortex of white came, and blue sparked, it didn’t just end there.

The white continued, gathering more and more power, until it was subsumed by a gathering of pure blue light, gathering and bursting between his palms.

The molten metal churning beneath his feet blew out around him as the lifeforce burst, rays of light and sparks of blue flying this way and that.

I smiled, the resemblance to a certain technique comes to mind. Almost uncannily so. 

Then again, I suppose such a technique, and who it is used by, would be a good indicator of peak masculine power, no?

I hold my sword out to the side. The golden fire doesn’t explode out in a rage; rather, I focus it.

The light and fire seemingly die down until the blade itself seems to become one with my aura, wrapped in a bellowing haze of heat.

I barely register him thrusting his hands out, himself roaring as a blinding beam of pure blue power rockets from his palms.

Not because I can’t see him. I can. 

My focus is elsewhere.

I swing out my sword, as though drawing a horizontal line across a page with a pen.

Where my sword goes, a line of my divine power draws across the world, painting a ray of still golden radiance against a backdrop of blue.

But like every good sunset sky?

The blue vanishes with the setting of the golden light.

“Divine Sword. “ I intone for the first and only time here.

His beam of blue power unravels into nothing, not even wind. Umashia stands there, his hands still outstretched as it happens, his mouth slightly agape.

A golden line etches across his torso.

A golden line etches out behind him, across either side of the barrier.

The golden line before me vanishes in a haze of heat.

I breathe out, at long last.

Rays of light burst out from the line across his chest and barrier, before it all promptly erupts.

In one second, there was light, and the next, a flash of flames before it all abruptly ceased.

A straight section across the barrier was simply gone.

The straight section of Umashia’s torso was simply gone, only held together by a burning white force.

Umashia looked down, slowly, as though he hadn’t realized fully what had happened.

Then it clicked, and he slowly looked back up at me.

“...Well done.” He said, genuinely.

Before promptly falling over onto his side, clutching his torso.

I feel a familiar set of pressures wash over the field, and I look up to greet them, but not all the way up.

Umashia vanishes, his presence joining theirs.

They offer a bow.

Which I return, wordlessly.

They leave as quickly as they come, not out of fear or anything; it’s just how they are.

As the barrier begins to fall apart around me, releasing me, I can’t help but smile.

And really wish there was a sun or something in the sky to look at. Isn’t it a bit too bland up here?

A New Sun

Chapter 114 End

Hit over 5k here. No wonder I couldn't finish this yesterday, holllly. Ima just let it speak for itself. Damn.

Chapter 114 Small Delay

At this rate, I'm seriously starting to consider just changing the damn release date at this point.

Right. So. Chapter 114, around halfway complete, got stopped in the middle and was busy the rest of the day, and into tonight, going to half to push it back to tomorrow, Saturday.

Yeah, still busy, that's why this message seems a little clipped, my bad.

Sorry guys, I know this has been happening a lot lately. Don't like that it does, I'm just glad they only cause small delays rather than knock me back another week. See ya lot tomorrow.

A New Sun Chapter 113

Chapter 113

<A New Sun>

“I think I know just the place to go for this!”

My mother’s voice was distant as she led me, and a for once fully clothed Uzume, out of her room and elsewhere.

I wasn’t particularly paying attention to my surroundings at this point, and for good reason, I feel.

It’s just so strange, isn’t it?

I never particularly cared about what exactly I am, at least not before.

Demigod with an asterisk next to it was enough for me.

But now? After all that talk about a power that I would consider very intrinsic to myself…

I suppose I’m just not entirely sure how to feel at the moment.

Which is stupid, right? I mean, it’s not like it truly matters in the long run, and I know how that saying goes.

Keep it simple, stupid.

I’m me. That’s it. Even if that me is technically some weird esoteric mix of divine and human that people and gods don’t truly understand, fundamentally.

Well, the fundamentals don’t matter. I’ve got people who love me already, not for that esoteric bullshit, but for me.

That’s all that matters.

I know that.

But I can’t help but think otherwise now.

I feel like I’m beating a dead horse saying this over and over again, hearing it over and over again, but it bears repeating.

I am both human and divine. If that power isn’t my Ara-Mitama, but is truly just more of me, then what does that mean for the me right now?

If that power is more of my divine side, does that make me right now just…the more human side?

The balancing point between the two?

I’m not sure, and the thought makes my head buzz, like it hasn’t in a long, long time…

“Hey.”

I perk up abruptly, with such force that it momentarily felt like I was flying, my surroundings thrusting into place around me all at once, and it nearly made my head spin.

To my side, Uzume looked at me oddly. In front of me, Ama was still leading, her hand clasping mine gently as she led us along.

When did she…?

The scent hit me first, due to just how lacking it was originally.

It smelled like earth. Fresh earth, ancient trees, pure and untouched running water.

The sounds struck after, the water moving, not so rapid, but quick enough to glide across the ground and leave a relaxing hum in its wake.

Then, at last, came the proper sight.

It was a gorge, or at least it looked like one, bathed in the intense glow of Takamagahara itself, a step above even the magnifying effects the Shinkai has normally.

We were in the process of walking down the groges wall, down an older than ancient stone carved walkway, mere feet from a drop that would plunge you hundreds of feet into the river below.

A quick look up revealed the same sky as Takamaghara, but somehow, dulled? 

Along with trees, trees which I’ve never seen before, massive towering obelisks of wood, covered in what looked almost like pine, lining the mouth of the gorge, mixed with far smaller, far slimmer tree that looks like bare shrubs in comparison, topped sparsely with light colored leaves, protruding out from the walls of the gorge.

I don’t recognize this place at all. From neither metaknowledge nor myth.

I didn’t even know where exactly we were, until I turned my head to look a Uzume one more time, and the corner of my eye caught the path behind us.

Leading up, and up, and up…to a mountain, up into Takamagahara. Where the same old buildings, roads, and gardens appear to be copied and pasted, forever going up and up to the point I can’t see the top anymore.

Huh. The mountain of Takamagahara has a base?

Technically, shouldn’t that be Earth, or the Shinkai?

Ugh, what’s the point of musing on all of that? I’ll probably end up with the answer by the end of this anyway!

So, my focus falls squarely on Uzume, finally.

Who snorts.

Which immediately washes away the small amount of guilt that had built up by my forcing her to wait for a response.

I frown back at her, causing her to snicker.

“It’s been a long while since anyone’s been down here,” Uzume starts, almost reminiscing, “so, keep yourself out of your mind, alright, Nori? Trust me, it’ll be worth it!”

Well, the view…isn’t bad, I suppose. She’s at least somewhat right there.

 “Besides!” Uzume continues, “I know you were in a hurry to get to training as soon as possible, so I’ve been meaning to ask, but uh…how long do we have until your fight?”

My mouth opens, but no words come out.

Because I immediately realized there isn’t an actual answer to that question.

My eyes damn near bulged out of my head once those dots started slotting into place.

The guy just said ‘that can be arranged’ then vanished! He didn’t give a time! Neither of us did!

“There likely wasn’t a time given, Uzu.” At last, Ama speaks up, but before either of us could ask the obvious, she continues, “When the time is right, it’ll happen. As for when or what needs to happen first for them to consider it as the right time?” Ama shrugs her shoulders as she explains, “Who can say?”

Uzume grumbles something about nonsensical and mysterious old gods, and I for once agree with her.

Just give a time, damn it! This isn’t ancient times! There are no prophecies, no destined end time!

Well, right now. The next scheduled end time is in thirty years or so, but nobody besides me knows about it yet, so my point still stands!

Uzume and I continued to grumble on and on like a pair of children being escorted back home after a trip to the doctors without a stop at McDonald's on the way.

As we made our way further and further down, the gorge began to narrow and narrow, ever so slightly.

The far more noticeable change, however, was the river. Beneath us, it began to thin and thin, going from easily one of the large rivers that would require a massive bridge made of stone and steel to cross over safely, into one of stone, then wood, and by the time we at last reached the bottom of the gorge?

The river was more like a creek, although the water flowed just the same as it did in the river, albeit there was far less of it due to its far smaller size.

However, the river wasn’t the thing I was focused on once we reached the bottom, and as it would happen, end of the gorge.

No, that would be the cave.

Hold on, actually, no, that doesn’t work either.

It was as though a god came down the mountainside with a hammer and smashed a hole at the base.

Then went in said hole, and just kept on wildly swinging, carving straight through the rock and soil forever onwards.

I couldn’t see deeper within, up to a certain point. A few dozen feet, and the light from outside seemed to abruptly vanish without a trace, becoming a curtain of black hiding gods know what.

It could even be the entrance to a whole other realm, for all I know!

Ama gave a wistful sigh and let go of my hand slowly.

Uzume, though, grinned and practically skipped right over to the edge of the river turned creek, jumping right on top of a rock jutting out from the ground, using it like a makeshift stage.

“Ah! Ama, doesn’t this bring back memories?” She purred out, twirling around on the rock, grabbing at the folds of her kimono like she was preparing to tear the thing open.

Thankfully, the goddess she was addressing raised a hand, stopping her before she could do so.

“No. Uzui. Bad.” She grumbled out, with the smallest of blushes on her cheeks.

Uzume giggled impishly before sliding down and sitting on the rock, one leg crossed over the other.

That dealt with, for now, Ama turned to me and sighed lightly.

“Well, Nori, here we are. Amano-Iwato.” Now my eyes are practically bulging out of their skull, prompting Ama to give me an amused smile, “I don’t think I need to explain the significance of this place, right?”

The cave where she hid from the other gods in mythology? No! That, I got!

What I want to know is why she hid in a place that looks like a second pit straight to hell!

Uzume hummed and chimed in with, “What you need to explain is why you decided to pick this place instead of, oh, I don’t know…anywhere else?”

You tell her!

Ama twitched, turning back toward her with a look of legitimate offense, “Hey! You take that back!” She points, hand shaking. “I’ll have you know, I built a pretty good place for myself in there! It was beautiful! I was going to work on the entrance when you all had Taji break in my door and you started flashing your tits!”

Uzume gave Ama the smugest look I think I’ve ever seen from her thus far, “Mhmm. And you loved these titties so much that you stepped right on out, and didn’t even realize you couldn’t go back until it was too late. Hah!”

Ama was full-body shaking by the time Uzume had finished speaking, her face completely and utterly red, as she turned away from the goddess and kicked at the ground, giving an annoyed and enraged shout as she did.

“Ugh!”

A chunk of rock went flying straight toward the cave.

But just as it was about to pass the mouth of it?

It stopped, smacking against a hazy golden barrier that wasn’t there a second ago-

My arm lurched before my eyes caught up with what happened.

Crack.

Ah.

The rock flopped onto the ground behind me.

My hand was bent backwards, almost completely flat against my arm, fingers mangled, and arm itself curved at a strange angle…yet still, it held right next to Ama’s head, where I had thrust it out.

The rock hit the barrier, then shot off it like some sort of divine cannonball.

Right back at Ama, right for her face.

It would have struck smack in the middle of her forehead, had I not thrust my arm out, trying to catch it.

I didn’t think it’d hit with enough force to fuck me up before bouncing off me, though.

Uzume sat there, eyes wide and expression frozen stiff, though she quickly blinked it off, her smirk with all its smug returning.

Ama though?

She blinked.

Then her expression morphed into one of pure and utter horror and guilt.

“I, N-Nori, are, are, you, I’m, um-” I wasn’t sure what she was stuttering out, as her hands came up from her sides, shaking and twitching like they didn’t know where exactly to go.

Crack.

My arm straightened itself, and I sighed, pulling it back, out of her sight, before her brain could catch up and she could get any ideas.

Holy Spirit Power thrummed up my arm, into my hands, and a stream of cracking sounds and hissing filled the air as all the damage repaired itself in record time.

“Don’t worry about it.” I waved her off, literally, with my other nondamaged hand, “It’ll be fine in a second.”

Also, guess I know why she couldn’t get back in now, huh?

I couldn’t sense it, still can’t in fact, but there’s definitely some kind of barrier put up repelling her from entering there.

Quite violently, might I add.

“That seal was put in place by all the other gods in Takamagahara, including your’s truly,” Uzume put a hand to her chest, like her inclusion was somehow impressive or mattered, “it was the only way to stop her from trying something like that again, you know? Without just getting those guys to decree something.”

Wait, all as in literally all?

Sheesh, the power of a Chief God, huh?

Ama let out a shaky sigh, before clearing her throat loudly and turning back to me, “R-Right! Putting that aside.”

I have a feeling that isn’t the seal, but alright.

“Training, right? We’re here to train you!”

Girl, please, the subject change was already set up. Stop making it more awkward than it needs to be.

She claps her hands together and continues, “So, you’re probably asking how we’re going to go about doing that, right?”

Seriously, it’s fine, I’m fine. My arm and hand are already fixed up!

“Well, I was about to, yes.” I throw in, but Ama keeps going without pause.

“Right! Well, here’s how!” Ama promptly holds up a hand.

Just as quickly as her hand went up, it got covered in pure liquid light, like molten glowing honey.

But that was it.

The light flowed around her hand, not doing anything else.

I looked between her hands, and then her face, and slowly raised an eyebrow.

It took her a second, but eventually she realized what she was, or wasn’t, doing.

“Oh, uh, right, eheh…” without further prompt, Ama jogged up to me, and put her glowing hand on my shoulder-

I let out a shuddering breath, as it felt as though the sun itself put a hand on me.

All at once, those feelings I get from the sun hit me like a freight train. That warmth, that nice feeling, it was like a nostalgia trip.

My own sun, the one beating in my chest like a second heart, suddenly throbbed against the back of my throat, as though longing to burst out and join with it.

The desire to take in that light, like I had so many times before, was nigh overwhelming.

But I restrained it. My will is like an iron trap on that desire.

Not. Now.

“Get it?” Ama looked up at me, a strained and uneasy smile.

My hand, the one that was injured but long since healed, comes up and folds back over her hand. 

Ama flinches, her eyes shaking as they dart to our now overlapping hands.

I give her hand a curt squeeze and smile down at her with a nod.

“Yeah, I think I got it.” I begin gently, “You juice me up, I try and control it. I had very minimal progress trying it last time, though.” I continue to warn her, “If I do lose it, how are you two going to stop me?”

“Throw you in the cave, duh.” Uzume speaks up, “Ama may not be able to enter, but everyone else, including you, should be fine. Once you pass the boundary, your divine power gets suppressed, you should be fine then!”

Huh? Wait, how? Why, even?

Is this how the cave apparently suppressed Ama’s light?

Ama nods, her gaze growing steadier, “That’s right. It sounds unpleasant, but don’t knock it till you try it!” Her smile grows slightly less strained.

I’m not sure about that, personally, but alright?

Also, why the hell can this random cave at the base of the mountain of heaven nullify divine powers?

Was this place built by someone with a purpose that got lost, or…?

Eh, you know what? None of that matters right now.

I give both goddesses a huff, “I’m not going in there of my own free will.”

Uzume smirked, “I’m going to enjoy pushing you in there when you’ll need it, then!”

Cheeky brat.

Ama gave an apologetic smile, the light from her hand fading as she did so, “Sorry, I’d do it myself, but, well, you saw the…the rock.” Her face strained for a second at the end.

But otherwise, it didn’t stick.

Good! Progress!

For good measure, I squeezed her hand just a touch harder and nodded back at Ama, before looking at Uzume.

“Will you even be able to throw me without getting torched?” I ask, very pointedly.

Seriously, just powering up heats the area around me. Ama would be fine, I think, but Uzume?

Goddess of the Dawn or no, I don’t think I’ve ever seen her use or imply to have fire powers.

Uzume, though, waves me off, unbothered, “I have a few tricks.”

Those tricks are promptly revealed as Ama leans in a little closer.

“I’ll protect her with my aura, don’t worry.” She says with a sigh.

Ah, I see, Uzume’s trick is being a leech? Nothing new there. Also, effective.

With what feels like everything taken care of for now, I let go of Ama’s hand and walk to the entrance of the cave.

I only stop right before the boundary. Right where I remember that rock smacking against that invisible golden curtain.

Even so close, I still can’t feel anything of the sort.

Thinking about it now, knowing that it can suppress divine powers, maybe that’s why?

But then, if it can do that, why is the seal they put up still apparently active?

The easy answer, that being that the seal is basically the door to the cave, but not necessarily within the cave's affect area, springs to mind.

That still doesn’t explain how I can’t feel a seal supposedly empowered by every divine being in Takamagahara, barring Ama herself, when it’s sitting right in front of me, though.

I click my tongue, letting that mystery leave my mind for me.

“Ready when you girls are.” I say allowed.

“...Oh wait, we're starting now!?” Uzume cries out, almost whining, as I hear her scramble off her rock.

“Duh.” I huff out right back to her, in the same tone she did to me earlier.

“I was, uh, actually kind of hoping we could wait a minute, too?” Ama says, slowly and tentatively.

My stare into the black nothingness blanks.

I say nothing.

A moment stretches on, awkwardly long, painfully so of silence…

Until I hear a distressed huff, and more footsteps approach my back.

“Oh, alright, fine!” Ama caves almost immediately, “But I’m no training maniac, we will have breaks, understand, mister!”

“Hmm, alright, that’s reasonable.” I hum out, much to Uzume’s relief.

She’s lucky I don’t quite catch what she’s mumbling about me under her breath. Or I’d drag her bratty ass in that cave with me and correct it. 

A hand gently presses against my back, and I hear Ama let out a nervous breath.

“Alright. Ready?”

I nod, and that glow envelops me once more.

<A New Sun>

Chapter 113 End

Minor timeskip, then we're going to see what that primordial is the god of firsthand.

The training after here? That's either going to be in an interlude, or I'll spread it throughout the upcoming fight. Haven't quite decided yet.

A New Sun Interlewd 4

As promised! And hey, I figured I may as well make it part of the Interlewds. Why not?

Though we're going to have to use a link straight to the docs for this one.

Why?

It's Izanami and Ama.

Yeah, so, if that kinda stuff ain't you're thing, feel free to skip this one.

Otherwise, here you lot go!

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MvpbxGgXJdSUoKjDFgaec6J63A-t3SXjYC1sbYf4_II/edit?usp=sharing

Remember! This one is non-canon!

A New Sun Chapter 112

Chapter 112

<A New Sun>

She understands what’s going through her son’s mind right now.

Really, she does.

Which is why.

“No.”

Her response came unbidden, without even a second thought given.

She saw as he seemed to deflate, the wind struck from his sails, his eyes losing their focus in the moment to be replaced by sheer bafflement.

It only lasted for a fleeting moment; however, embers of that fire kicked back in swiftly.

“Why not?” He huffed back in response, crossing his arms.

She sighed deeply, “Because I didn’t want you up here so you could go on another training binge just to fight someone else you didn’t even need to fight.”

“To be fair,” Uzume, of all goddesses, spoke up, “it has been a little while since the last one, you know?”

She turned toward her and glared.

Not. Helping.

Like a vampire before the full wrath of the sun, Uzume wilted and stepped back.

“It isn’t even about the thrill of the fight this time,” her son stressed back, “it’s about dealing with these chains that I never knew I had, until now!”

Her sigh this time was far more subdued, tired.

“You get used to it.” That was the only real response she had to that.

Though that only managed to make Nori grow a dark frown.

“Besides,” she continued before he could follow up on that, “I…don’t think it’s something you really need to worry about.” Though her uncertainty clearly crept into her words at the end.

His eyebrow raised as he latched onto her last words almost immediately, “Why not? Is it because of what I am, or…?”

She shook her head, grumbling as she recalled…

Her boy when he got smashed by a glacier into the ocean by a certain exorcist.

It’s especially bad because that wasn’t too long ago!

But the minute details aren’t what she needs to recall.

Simply, that battle as a whole.

There, over the oceans surrounding Japan, her son had temporarily fought at a level that far surpassed her own.

Yomi, that exorcist, Dulio wasn’t it? He was stronger than her, of that she was sure.

It does twinge at her pride, admitting that to herself. She was born the strongest of her siblings, and back in the day, she took pride in the fact that she could easily hand her brother’s ass back to them on a platter if the need arose.

Especially Susanoo’s.

Yet wars, and a whole lot of time, put everything in a strange sort of perspective.

Sure, she was incredibly strong for her pond, but the world was bigger than just her pond. It was filled with them, some bigger, some smaller.

She was forced to realize that across the world, gods of her strength existed, gods that surpassed her, existed.

Zeus and Odin, for instance. Old men they may be, but rivals in power and influence all the same.

And don’t even let her get started on the monsters right across the water from them!

All that’s to say, with the advantage of immortal time, she got used to the idea of beings stronger than her. That has power over her, in some manner. Both inside and outside, her pond.

The wars the Shinto fought in were never offensive in nature - although she damn well made sure they gave as good as they got, if not more so! - but the point is, she wasn’t like the other divines from the west.

She didn’t envy the Greeks, the Celts, or whoever else’s resources. Their power. She was content.

And lazy.

She knows that now, too.

She was content.

Just as she was, and still is, content with the Kotoamatsukami, and their power and control.

But if Nori could assume the power that he did during his fight with that exorcist, she could honestly say he might even surpass the Kotoamatsukami.

And to be honest, she isn’t exactly sure how to feel about that.

She isn’t sure how they’d react to that!

It isn’t just the one they’d need to worry about; even if the one doesn’t take slight notice, there are still four more!

Well, technically three, but who knows! Something like this may drive the Central Master from wherever they’re lounging!

Something fell on her shoulder, jolting her out of her rapidly spiraling thoughts.

Nori had, at some point, gotten closer. Close enough to be standing right in front of her, close enough to lay a hand on her shoulder.

She didn’t even notice him move, didn’t even see or hear it! Was she really that zoned out!?

“I recognize that look on your face,” he began, the fire and intensity in his eyes replaced with this softer, gentler look, “the only thing I can think of that would make you start looking like that again would be…ah,” he sighs, shaking his head, “that battle, right?”

His emphasis was appreciated, but not needed.

“Your fight against the exorcist, yes.” She huffed.

He shrugged listlessly at that, “What I did there isn’t something I can just do whenever.” He explains, “I need the sun to be up for it; otherwise, nothing.”

That gives Ama pause.

“...Why would you need the sun up?” She asks, immediately confused.

From her point of view and her assumptions, he was drawing out more of his divine power from his physical body. Thus, the shifting in his hair color and a difference in his voice.

Due to the way he was “conceived,” the hair color shift isn’t really that shocking. He might look closer to Uzume when getting closer to his divine spirit, but at its roots, his powers and such were inherited from her.

But that’s besides the point. 

He shouldn’t need the sun to do that. It’s not like his divine half and human half are separate; they’re always together. It’s just him, after all.

“I, uh,” Nori began, slowly looking away again, like he was unsure how to go about explaining it exactly, “eat it. I eat the sunlight, basically, to bring that power out.”

What.

“Yeah, that’s also my Ara-Mitama too, apparently, so even if I could bring it out at will,” he pauses to grimace, “might not be the best idea, ya know?”

What.

Every word that comes out of his mouth is making her want to hit something, yet she can’t quite place why.

Who would tell him any of that!? She’s going to hold off on the whole ‘tasting the sun’ thing for now, because she actually has a couple of theories about that.

But that being his Ara-Mitama? Who gave him that idea!?

A loud creaking noise echoes throughout the room.

Almost as though possessed by a robot, she turns, her whole body mechanically moving so she can see the source.

Uzume stares back at her, her eyes wide, body frozen, still as a statue, as though frozen in time.

Right at the moment, she was trying to crawl underneath the computer desk and ‘escape.’

Well.

She felt divine power begin to flow towards her eyes, but before she could do anything, rather than begging like she normally would, Uzume’s gaze flung toward Nori, and with her eyes alone, she desperately pleaded.

Nori grunted, “Seriously? I didn’t think you could pray that loud…” he grumbled behind her.

And prayed too. Apparently.

“Alright, alright…it actually wasn’t Uzume this time.” Nori gave an amused sigh, patting her other shoulder.

Oh?

She turned back around, her power settling.

“That’d be a first.” She quipped plainly, as she heard the goddess now at her back slump to the floor and give a shivering groan of relief.

“I know, right?” Nori quipped right back.

“Heeeeyyy…” Uzume gave a half-hearted complaint, still basking in her relief.

It was ignored as usual, however.

Nori gave an amused snort before continuing, “I’m not entirely sure which of that made you glare at Uzume, though?”

“That part about that power you drew out being your Ara-Mitama.” She stated clearly, “That doesn’t make any sense. Whatsoever.”

Nori blinked, “Ah.” So completely caught off guard was he that he didn’t even look flabbergasted, just blank, before coughing up an actual answer, “It was actually Inari that told me everything about the Ara-Mitama, said that’s what it was and all.”

Ah? Really? Inari said all that?

“Although Uzume was there.” Nori tacked on at the end all of a sudden.

It took but a moment.

“...Oh come on!” Uzume cried out in pure and utter fear.

She waved her off rather swiftly, however, “She wouldn’t have known either, so it's fine.”

“Yayyy!” Uzume cried out once again, her tone completely flipped, “I know nothing!”

“Mhmm.” She hummed, resisting the urge to smack Uzume upside the head for calling herself dumb.

She almost didn’t succeed. Almost.

Right now, she needed to think about why and how Inari got to the conclusions she did.

With her son watching on, she sat down on her bed and thought.

Admittedly, and right off the bat, the way Nori acts during that power is odd. It’s definitely more violent, definitely more wild.

That would fit with it being related to the Ara-Mitama.

But see, it can’t just be the Ara-Mitama, that wouldn’t make sense, especially if the trigger is just ‘eat sunlight.’

The Ara-Mitama is merely a part of the whole spirit of the kami, of the Mitama, one of four parts actually.

Each part of the Mitama is connected, existing as one, and although they can have their own character and function, that’s only what the Kami themselves make of it.

Really, the ‘sub-spirits,’ so to speak, of a Mitama aren’t actually all that important when it comes to the kami themselves, only usually when dealing with shrines, and setting up that whole system does it-

Her thoughts pause, right there.

Ah. So that’s the way Inari took it.

Looking at it in that direction, it isn’t completely nonsensical then, she could see how Inari would come to that conclusion.

Putting her hands together, she took a breath and brought her gaze back to Nori.

“Right, so, I think I understand what she was thinking, but it's most likely not the case.” She tentatively.

Nori shot her the blankest of looks.

She quickly held up her hands, “I know, I know…just, listen, alright?”

It took him a moment, but soon enough, he huffed and sat beside her, nodding for her to get on with it.

So she did.

“Essentially, what Inari was thinking when she tried to explain that, or rather, what she assumed, is that your body was more like a shintai than just a body.”

Nori furrowed his brow at that, “A Body of the Kami?” He translated, allowed, for some reason, “Isn’t that one of those things used in shrines?”

She nodded back, “Right! Another term used for one of those is Mitama Representation, a mitamashiro. Essentially, what Inari was assuming is that your body is like a shrine, a literal shrine. Not a metaphorical one.”

Nori blinked down at her, “Huh.”

“Honestly,” She continued unabated, “it’s not a terrible analogy, but I feel as though it doesn’t really encapsulate all of you.” She pauses briefly, a thought crossing her, “Not even a living shrine really does it, though that would be closer. But it still falls short, because your body isn’t a shrine, it’s not a shintai, it’s still you. The you that’s alive.”

“That’s…confusing.” Nori frowns deeply, “Why say it like that? It makes it sound like you, Uzume, Inari, all the Kami in general aren’t alive.”

Ah. How is she supposed to explain this?

“A different kind of alive.” Was her ingenious response.

That made her son just look gobsmacked.

Great.

“... there are different kinds of alive?” Nori stressed, and she already felt like she was losing him here.

“Plants are alive.” Then, shockingly, Uzume of all people piped up once more…from under the desk, her hand poking out as she does so.

He tilts his head her way, “I guess? Technically? But they aren’t really conscious, I suppose?”

“Not our kind of conscious.” Uzume corrects, “But they still do…stuff. They respond to situations, like to damage or stress, and do what they need to survive. How is that not living, even if only smaller?”

Nori looked down, digesting that, and as he did so, she saw an opportunity.

“Think about it like this,” she began again, “if there was a scale of being ‘alive,’ in a sense, plants would rank at the bottom, humans somewhere in the middle, and kami would be a step above. All divine beings would be.”

She’d really rather not get into the specifics of each god, though.

Kami are complicated enough as is.

Nori pursed his lips, “So then, nature, beings living in nature, extensions and forces of nature?” He simplifies somewhat.

“Huh.” It was her turn to make a noise now, “Yeah, that…that fits pretty well.”

At that, she holds up a hand.

A star ignites above her palm.

Well, not a literal star. A light shaped like one. Pure white, with rays and sparkles flying off it every which way.

Still, if she threw this down from Heaven? Japan, the Korean Peninsula, and a good chunk of China would be wiped from the map.

If there’s one way to quantify a force of nature like the sun, it’s through destructive power.

“Deities aren’t so much physical as forces of nature. Though they most certainly can and often do affect the physical.” With a clench of her hand, the star snuffs out.

“But,” Nori reaches out, his hand taking her one held out, “you look like everyone else, so much so that you can breed with humans, you can bleed, you can die…”

The moment he says that last word, he perks up, as if realization just struck him all at once.

And she’s glad for it, because she’d really rather not explain how he was made.

She’s still a virgin, after all.

She nods, “But we come back, right. We don’t have to bleed, we don’t have to look how we do; most divine beings are shapeshifters naturally. Some are known for it.”

She had to suppress a shiver at that.

The Greek Gods are especially known for that.

Especially Zeus.

But even the Egyptians, going between bird and human forms, the Norse, particularly Odin, took on disguises all the time in his younger years.

Even amongst them, they have Inari who often roleplays as a fox!

Sure, most divine beings have a ‘true form’ which is just what they looked like when they were first formed.

As for why they come out usually looking like humans?

Eh. She doesn’t know. She never really tried to find out, either.

It was simply never her interest, and she was never curious enough to know about those things!

…Well, okay, she might have started wondering over the years why she came out with a smaller chest compared to Uzume, her mother, her…

But that’s not relevant to any of this!

Ever so slowly now, Nori lets go of her hand and looks at his own.

“Living, in two different ways,” he pauses, muttering to himself, “no, the combination of two different ways, and yet…” He trails off, before slowly looking toward her, once again, “If this is all the case, then that's not just my Ara-Mitama, I’ve been looking at it from the completely wrong direction. What is it, then?”

Now, at that, she had to give a sheepish smirk, “Honestly? I’m not completely sure.”

The blank stare he gave her could level Japan flat against the ocean floor with how it bore down upon her.

“Well! Hey! I don’t have all the answers!” She waves her arms, placatingly, “Especially about you! Not even they do, remember how this all started?”

Nori blinked at that, “Oh, right.” He rubbed the back of his head, “Though, if you don’t know…”

“I said I wasn’t sure.” She interjected, before Nori could get lost in his own thought again, just like her, “I do have an idea, though.”

He shrugged, “I have a concept of an idea, going off what you told me, but let's hear yours first.”

She took a breath, man, she really isn’t used to this much talking…

Even in her meetings, she mostly just sits there and looks majestic, only really barking out orders and commands and listening.

Sometimes napping.

She prefers writing stuff out and making others read it for her, or, back when Uzume was around all the time, making her do it instead.

Delegation! Definitely just that.

“You mentioned that to coax that power out, you needed the sun, right? That you ate it?” Nori hummed and nodded for her to continue, “Well, when I first saw it, I assumed it was you drawing out your full divine power or something, like a super form!”

His flat look is back.

And it’s judging.

She does not care!

“What?!” She challenges, glaring back at him, “It sounds cool and makes sense to me! You should have been born a lot stronger than you were, you know? You should have also been much stronger than a normal human on that mountain, too! You should even be stronger than you are now, considering all the training I know you did!”

With every sentence, he flinches a bit, as if slapped.

Before finally letting out a deep sigh as she stopped, “I swear to me, if the answer all along was, ‘it’s you, but letting your divine power go brrrr’ I will drown myself.”

On instinct, she reaches up, grabs his cheek, and pulls.

…Even if it doesn’t seem to even sting him in the slightest, it’s the gesture that counts!

“None of that you.” She grumbles right back.

“Though, say?” He asks, completely ignoring his pulled cheek, “What’s that got to do with eating the sunlight, like I mentioned?”

Oh, yeah, she almost forgot to mention.

She smiled, “You know how the Earth has leylines filled with leylines running through it? The sun has something similar, in a sense. It’s a kind of ki!”

“Didn’t know about that…” Nori grumbles, mostly to himself, “It just felt nice.”

She nods, “That’s why! Well, remember where your power comes from? So, I’m thinking, you're taking in a bunch of that, basically jumpstarts your divine powers, and forces them out!”

Slowly but surely, Nori starts to cringe.

“I actually hate how much sense that makes.” He admits, “And how I can’t really think of anything else that makes sense. Or refutes that.” Another pause, “Though, that doesn’t really explain the frankly violent personality shift.”

That’s a fair point, a very fair point, actually.

An idea strikes her all of a sudden.

It would certainly help with figuring out what exactly that power of his is.

And since she did deny letting him train against a bunch of other kami, due in large part to her own selfishness…

Well, it’s not exactly the training he was originally looking for, but it is still training!

Plus, she gets to spend time with her son!

She smirks and leans toward him, “There might be a way to figure that out, and more~...” she hummed.

At first, Nori blinked, but it didn’t take long for him to figure out what exactly she was implying.

And immediately start smirking alongside her.

< A New Sun>

Chapter 112 End

Back. Going to see about those omakes for this weekend.

Chapter entirely in Ama's POV, been a little while since I wrote one of those. Also, Nori thought he was getting a raw power training arc, but nah, this is something he needs to revisit more...

Who better to do that with than the literal Goddess of the Sun? It can't be worse than when he tried around the fox!

Primordial fight starts next chapter.

No Chapter This Week

I've been debating how much I should say, because you guys definitely deserve something other than just "nope, can't today, sorry!"

At the same time. In this case? It's...very personal, and I don't want to use it like an excuse.

So, I guess I'll go with a middle path. I was told, today, that something pretty awful happened. It's been kept from me for a while, and learning about it now, tore me apart.

I've been trying to deal with it. It hasn't been enough.

I'll be fine. I just need time.

So, no chapter today. I'll be back next week. As compensation, I'll pump out an omake or two as well. Either the non-canon lewd ones I've briefly mentioned before, or something else. Haven't quite decided yet.

It's gonna be a long weekend. I love you guys, thanks for putting up with the frankly absurd bullshit I got going on behind the scenes here.

A New Sun Chapter 111

Chapter 111

<A New Sun>

My thought after was far more concise.

Could I take him?

My mind filtered through what I knew about primordial gods in general in an instant.

Unfortunately, that’s not a lot.

Nyx and Erebus are the only two primordials that I could recall from the light novels, and both could basically be described as simply supped-up versions of your normal god.

Stronger divine aura, stronger powers based upon whatever they’re the gods of, the usual.

Nyx also had her virgin killer clothes, but somehow, I doubt I’ll have to worry about anything like that popping up against me.

So then, what does that mean for Umashiashiku - hnn, nope.

…Umashiashie - ugh, damn it!

Umashiashiskabab - FUCK.

Yeah, okay, nope, never mind, fuck that. Umashia, it is!

So then, what does that mean for Umashia, here?

I have absolutely no idea.

It’s not like the guy is talked about all that much! Nowadays, it’s Inari and my mother! When it comes to Shinto, it’s them they talk about!

These guys? Sure, they made everything, but even in mythology, that’s basically all they do! Hell, they didn’t even make Japan; they made people - Izanagi and Izanami - to do that for them!

I didn’t even know the names of the guys up top, much less when they were the gods of or even what they do! They just aren’t that popular!

But, judging by the build on this guy, I don’t think I need to be able to sense his energy to tell he’s strong.

Just from looks alone, he’s giving me Vasco Strada vibes. The guy is quite possibly a whole head or three taller than me, and looks like he could pick me up with one hand and use me as a sword.

On instinct, I found myself taking a single step back, an arm coming to wrap around my mother and hold her tight as my other tensed.

Ready to draw. Ready to fight.

Umashia gave a rumbling chuckle and held up his hands, placatingly, “Please, peace, young sun.” His smile never faltered, not even for a second, “I have not come to fight, nor pass judgment from the upper heavens. Merely converse. That is all.”

My head tilted slightly, doubt clear across my face, as I began slowly, “Converse about…what?”

The god's arms dropped back to his sides. “A few things.” He replied plainly, yet vaguely.

My eyes narrowed pointedly up at him.

He merely gave me a ‘what-can-ya-do?’ shrug back.

Well, if there’s one thing I can say about this guy with almost utmost certainty, it’s that this is either the chillest primordial god in creation, or he’s trying far too hard to portray himself as such.

Either way…I probably won’t get abruptly punched in the face.

Probably. Unless I start something.

Which I might, if I don’t particularly like what he has to say.

“Is this,” I huff, pausing to look down at Ama for a second, “supposed to be a private conversation, or no?”

His eyes glance down at her for a moment, and at last, his smile shifts.

It was still a smile, and it was only for a moment, but it became more consoling. Almost pitying.

After a moment of that, it returned to normal, and his eyes met mine once again, “We would rather it be, but it is not required.”

We? There, that is again. That’s not the first time he’s talked like that.

Which is odd, especially because he’s referred to himself alone before, on more than one occasion.

Hmm, is this guy speaking for the other big guys upstairs, or am I dealing with some sort of divine hive mind right now?

Please, me, don’t let it be a divine hive mind!

Putting that terrifying thought aside, I caress Ama’s back and think carefully about where I want to go from here.

If a fight does break out, I know she’d help in a heartbeat. Despite her current stillness, if there’s anything that’d get her moving again, it’d be someone close to her being in danger.

Can’t say the odds would increase, if at all, with her around, though.

Not that she’s deadweight or anything, but there’s a difference between a primordial god and a chief god, a gap I can’t even fathom she’d have a chance of crossing.

For a second, Vidar, with his artificial World Tree-backed Sacred Gear, flashes through my mind.

…A gap I can’t fathom she’d have a chance of crossing, right now.

But that’s food for later.

For right now?

My hand moves from her back, up to her head, where I lay it.

“I’ll be back in your room in a bit, okay?” I inform her softly.

She doesn’t move her head or even say anything, because I don’t give her the chance to.

A golden pillar of light flashes from my hand, and said statue of a goddess clinging to me is abruptly gone, vanished into the fading light.

Ah, I’m definitely going to get a mouthful about that later, aren’t I?

Oh well.

Umashia nods, looking pleased as he begins again, “Not that we have anything against her, of course. But we know all we need to know about her.” He leans forward, toward me, his eyes flickering with a pure white glow, “Yet…we know nothing about you, Akaruhiruotoko Okami.”

So that’s what they want, huh?

“Noriaki,” I respond on instinct, my spine tingling with discomfort all the while.

The primordial god blinks, his head tilting in what looks like genuine confusion, “...Pardon?”

“Noriaki,” I grunt again, whilst starting to walk around him: all the while, his eyes never left me, his head following me as I moved in an almost robotic-like manner, “that’s my name,” I pushed on, resisting the urge to give even the slightest inclination that I’m unnerved, “Noriaki Kusanagi. You can call me Kusanagi-san, Lord Kusanagi, Noriaki, or just Nori, or anything really, as long as it comes from that. I don’t particularly care.”

By the time I had walked around him and into the throne room proper, he had completely turned around.

He hummed and nodded his head, “Noted…Noriaki Kusanagi.”

I almost bristled at that. Almost.

Instead, I waved him to follow before heading deeper into the throne room.

I know I didn’t technically need it, but having a cushion to sit down on rather than standing in a doorway would make any conversation far comfortable and easier to bear.

Thankfully, despite my not being here for long, I already had an inkling of an idea as to where I could find some!

Behind the Throne.

Yeah, I know my mother. I know Uzume. I can almost hear the ‘just toss ‘em behind the throne, we’ll deal with them later’ command she’d order whoever’s job it is to pick them up.

Or just Uzume tossed them back there. Either works.

Surprisingly enough, as I stepped onto the raised platform holding the Takamagahara’s version, or rather, it’d perhaps be more accurate to call it the original, Chrysanthemum Throne, I didn’t feel any special power or something emanating.

Nope, just a throne. A big chair. A pretty big fancy chair.

It was nice, bright scarlet red, embroidered with gold like any proper throne should, and was wide enough that small people - like my mother - could probably lie across it head to feet and use it as a makeshift bed.

Pitch black curtains and sliding doors are in place along the edge of the raised dais, though at present they were all left open.

I didn’t snoop any more than I had to, only long enough to find the fancy sitting cushions piled behind the throne, and snatch a pair up before darting out of there.

I promptly tossed them to the ground before the dais and took a seat without any fanfare.

Without mentioning it at all, Umashia did the same across from me, settling onto the cushion on his knees.

“Alright then, Umashia,” I waved to him, “what’d you, or I guess the Kotoamatsukami, want to know about me specifically?”

“Much.” He gave the simplest reply, “But, let’s start with what's of the most vital importance.” He pointed toward me, lackadaisically, his hand upside down, “What do you plan on doing, Noriaki Kusanagi?”

…Out of everything that he could have asked, that’s what it is? Seriously?

I bite the inside of my cheek, suppressing showing my annoyance, before carefully replying, “I’m pretty sure you don’t mean to ask what I’m going to do normally. As in, go back home, screw my girls, train, all that jazz…” I pause, but not even seeing him flinch from my words, I continue, “So, what? You guys think I’ve got some big project I’m working on that’s going to shake up the Shinto? The other pantheons?”

Umashia tilts his head, “Do you?” He asks, clearly.

“Not at the moment, no.” I deny, “Right now? I’m just kind of going with the flow of time. Seeing where it takes me next. No plans.”

No preparations for what could possibly come next.

Well, not like I need to prepare anything specific for the ExE. Thirty years, I can handle it, all that.

Surprisingly, Umashia nods his head, “I see. It is as we expected, then.”

Wha?

“You have been very reactive to events happening around you as of late.” He continues without prompting, “This is what we have observed. Hearing that you have no plans, that you ‘go with the flow’ as it were, lines up. Excellent, for us.” All of a sudden, his smile turns almost sad, “Although I must admonish the waste of youthful energy.”

Am I lowkey being told by a primordial god to go touch grass?

What in the fuck is my life right now?

I didn’t know how exactly to respond to that, so I ended up just sort of staring at the guy, mouth halfway open like I was trying to form a reply and stopped in the middle of it.

Umashia waved me off with an amused smile, “Worry not. This is not a judgment, merely an observation. Now, as for the next article of conversation…” He continued, unabated, asking, “You are Arahitogami, are you not?”

I blinked, bewildered, “I, yes?” I answered, not unsure of myself, but at that entire question.

“Fascinating.” Was his response, a genuine wonder creeping into his tone as he spoke, “I’m not sure if you’re aware, Noriaki Kusanagi, but there haven’t been many like you within the history of us. In fact, there’s only been one other.” He inclined his head toward me, waiting for an answer to the obvious unasked question.

“I’m aware, yeah. The guy you all sent down to unite Japan, right?” I answer surely, recalling Inari’s words from months ago.

Umashia nodded, satisfied, “Correct. Jimmu. Though through the Omikami, he was far more removed from her than you are now.”

Right, he was born from her grandson.

Hmm. My mother has grandkids. I have brothers and sisters. I’m an uncle.

Technically. Through my mother’s very convoluted side of the family.

Huh. That’s not a revelation I thought I’d make today.

Still, though, this is nice and all…

“I know all of this,” I wave him off in turn, “where are you going with this, exactly?”

Somehow, someway, the god’s smile grew wider.

“Originally, an existence like yours was considered impossible.” He went on explaining, “It takes a peculiar type of human to breed with a god, or any divine being. This especially applies to kami.”

Unless you’re Greek, in which case, if you have a booty at all, you better watch out.

Holy me, I wish I could say that out loud right now.

“Purity is of the utmost value.” Umashia continues, unaware of my frankly impure thoughts, “In a physical and spiritual sense. Such things were rare back then, and they still are now. Jimmu…was a miracle. You may as well be an impossibility.”

I don’t like the way he said that.

“As such, if not even the Central Master could predict the potential and power Jimmu could hold, then what hope could we have to know you?” Umashia finishes with a tilt of his head.

Ah.

Honestly, I was half expecting him to ask for a brawl right at the end there.

I’m kind of glad he didn’t, but, at the same time…

Do I want to box a primordial god?

If said god couldn’t kill me, then why yes. Yes, I would.

…Man, I might really be a bit hopeless, aren’t I?

“Well,” I start, shrugging my shoulders a bit, “there is one way of figuring that out.”

Umashia raised an eyebrow, “Truly? Is it so simple?”

“Yes, actually.” I confirm, a bit of a smile creeping onto my face, “That’s assuming we have a place we can fight in that one tear at the seam from our power being shown.”

Umashia blinked, and at long last, his nigh ever-present gentle and soft facial expression cracked at long last.

Shocking a primordial god in one sentence wasn’t on my bingo card of things I expected to happen so soon after arriving here.

What’s more? Even that didn’t last long.

Being the overachiever I am apparently, he didn’t just go back to his face from before.

No. Umashia grinned. Grinned so wide it easily looked like it’d hurt. It was stretchy and unnatural, as though the guy wearing it didn’t know how to properly do the expression.

“Such a field,” he began anew, an undertone of trepidation and borderline excitement underneath every word, “can be arranged.”

I blinked, taken aback, but before I could open my mouth again to speak…

He was gone.

Not a whisper of light, a flicker of anything, a trace of life. Nothing. Zero.

It was like I was talking to a ghost.

He didn’t even leave an impression on the cushion he was sitting on, despite the guy being way too large for it!

I sat there for a moment before looking back and forth, around the now empty throne room, sans myself.

“Uh. Okay.” I uttered, yet despite the whisper, it felt like it echoed. “Good talk then.”

I can’t say I’m looking forward to the next one, though.

<A New Sun>

You know, for being so small, I’m actually pretty shocked at how well Ama can shake someone a head or two over her.

“WHY. WOULD. YOU. DO. THAT!?!” She shouts in pure and utter exasperation, each word punctuated by a rapid shake of my body.

Yeah, she’s got me by the collar with both her hands.

Huh. So this is how it feels?

At least I’m not making a stupid face or something, and there’s no point in trying to speak like this anyway, any words I try will just be jumbled by the movement, or cut off by her regardless.

Besides us, Uzume, still very much underdressed for this, is looking between us, her hand occasionally coming out, but it's quickly pulled back each time in indecision.

She looks like she wants to say something, but can’t even begin to decide what that something should be.

Ah, well. I think I’ve let Ama have her fun, anyhow.

My hands come up, grasping her wrists amidst another jolt, stopping me midway through it.

I send her the blankest of stares, before at last answering, “Because it was the best way to answer him…them? Something like that.”

“That’s! Hnnn!” Ama groaned, like she just caught the greatest migraine in the world, “No, no! Just because they don’t know how powerful you are, doesn’t mean you should fight them to show them! You don’t do that! Nobody just does that! You’ll die!”

“Nah, I’d win,” I reply, definitely and totally serious.

“NORI,” Ama exclaimed, dangerously quiet.

“What?” I continued, before admitting, “Sure, I probably won’t win…maybe. Though I hope I do. The point is, I doubt they’d try to kill me or something. I suggested it, and he agreed. It’s not like I challenged him to a duel to the death or something.”

Finally, yet slowly, Ama let me go, weakly stepping back as I let go of her wrists in turn.

“See, it’s more, just…” She groaned again, this time more pained, “It’s more complicated than that.” She grasped her head, “It’s not what they’ll do during it that I’m worried about too much, it’s the after.”

“What are they gonna do after? Render, ‘judgement’ or whatever?” I rub my chin, “The guy kept bringing that up, that he wasn’t there to do so.”

Ama shivered at that.

At last, Uzume entered the conversation.

“Should they will it,” she began, “anything can be made possible, or impossible. That’s what their judgment is.”

Well. That’s not cryptic as hell.

“I’m going to need more specifics here, Uzume.” I sigh.

Uzume actually pouts at that, “Anything under the purview,” she continues once again, this time slightly more sassy, “is theirs to control. Our power, the divine power we all have? It originates from them. They have the ultimate authority over us all.”

Okay, I really don’t like the way that sounds.

My eyes narrow at that, and a frown stretches across my face, “They can order me around all they want, that doesn’t-”

Uzume put a hand on my shoulder, stopping me, “I know what you’re going to say. It does. Their judgment isn’t something you can ignore. It’s a binding within your being, your power, itself.” She puts a hand to her chest, “Ama can order me away all she wants, but there isn’t anything stopping me from coming back. If they do it? I can’t. Physically. Spiritually. However. It’s absolute.”

What the fuck.

“T-They don’t,” Ama chimed in, voice soft, “use it very often. And it requires most of the Kotoamatsukami to enforce, so it’s not like one of them can just do it.”

“But there’s no resisting it.” Uzume shrugs, more than a little nonchalant. “I was one of the lucky ones, ya know? Due to being a bit of both Earthly and Heavenly Kami, when the realms were divided by their judgment, I got to be able to go between both.”

By their…?

My head immediately turned toward Ama, who instantly wilted under my gaze.

“Hey now!” Uzume called, patting me on the back, “I dunno what you’re thinking, but while they order it from her…Ama definitely fumbled the bag there.”

Ama’s gaze snapped toward Uzume in sheer and utter betrayal as she cried out, “Excuse me!?”

Uzume, slowly, stepped behind me, before continuing unabated, “Well, it’s true! How many times did you have to send Heavenly Kami down to quell,” she paused, dramatically clearing her throat, “unreeest~?”

Despite Uzume’s way of saying that, Ama flinches like she just got slapped.

Meanwhile, all the while, I watch on, expression blank.

Internally? Susan would be awed by the storm brewing.

I just learned I have a hook in my soul to a bunch of primordials who could literally agree, ‘hey, you can’t go have sex with cat girls anymore,’ and I’d have to obey.

Apparently, without resistance. Apparently, it’s absolute. Nothing can be done.

I call bullshit.

I’m going to punch them. I’m going to cut them into ribbons if they even try to utter the words ‘you may not!’

I refuse to be chained! In any way! Fuck that!

Ama goes to open her mouth again-

I step forward, more in the center, between the two goddesses. Both my arms raised, and both hands darting out, landing on either goddess's shoulders.

“Now now,” I begin, tone clipped, seething underneath, “you’re both very pretty-”

“Aww~! I know!” Uzume chimes in with a sexy little smirk.

“R~Really?” Ama chimes in, uncertain, but blushing.

“But.” I push through them both, “I have something important to do now. So, we can talk about who fucked up what and how bad later. If it matters. At all. Because the past is in the past and I don’t care about it right now.” I grit my teeth, “I care more about a bunch of pricks above the clouds deciding what I can and can’t do. So.” I roll my shoulders and take a breath, my hands sliding off both goddesses' shoulders.

Generally speaking, in this world, hax-related abilities have a very simple counter.

Hell, it’s a counter that works on most sorts of abilities that don’t just damage you.

That counter? Power. Simply be stronger than whoever is trying to trap, ensnare, or order you around.

I’m thinking I might need a few new, stronger punching bags.

“Your strongest Kami. I don’t care who they are - besides you, mother.” I look at her, pointedly, before concluding, “Bring them all to me.”

<A New Sun >

Chapter 111 End

Here we are! Sorry for the delay!

Uzume is gonna need to horny bat real soon, lemme tell ya what.

Chapter 111 Small Delay

Not going to lie, if I knew it wasn't just cuz of stuff going on recently, I might honestly consider changing the release day to Saturday permanently.

Right, so, 111. It's almost done, but I can't finish it tonight. Had a real late start due to a bunch of family drama getting in the way that I had to deal with, then recover from.

No worries, I'm fine, I got most of the chapter done, it's just going to be released tomorrow instead of tonight.

I'm sorry shit like this keeps happening, I'm truly not sure when the end will come, and I can get these (and other stuff I wanna work on) out cleanly.