Hinata (west of Yokosuka), the Hinata-sō, Saturday 15 July 1995, mid-afternoon…
"Keitarō-chan! Make sure all the boxes are put away!"
"Hai!"
With that, the studious-looking brown-haired boy with the grey eyes behind reading glasses moved to shift the small boxes of old toys into the storage room of the hot springs hotel located near the Sagami Sea coast of the Miura Peninsula, across the slopes of Ōgusu-yama from the great seaport of Yokosuka. He was quite mature for his age, which impressed his parents and other relatives very much. Atop that, he was a very friendly boy, always willing to play with other children who came to the Hinata-sō to stay. He had already made a nice friend in a girl from Okinawa; in fact, they had become such good friends that his mother and grandmother now joked that Otohime Mutsumi might actually make a good wife for him one day. Hearing that sort of talk always made Urashima Keitarō blush. Honestly! Why did adults always care about…?
KK-KLACK!
He jerked on hearing that sound, and then looked around the box he was carrying to see an ornate katana having fallen on the floor nearby, no doubt from atop a nearby stack of boxes that Keitarō accidentally bumped into. Blinking a couple times as he tried to recall what on Earth was such a beautiful sword doing in the storage room of his family villa, he then nodded as he put the box aside. He had seen this sword a couple times before. Mentioning that to his grandma Hina always got him scolded; from what the five year-old Keitarō could understand of the older woman's stern words, there was something very bad inside the sword…and that if it ever got out, a lot of people could be hurt.
But that didn't make sense to him.
After all, it was only a sword!
What could a sword do to anything without a samurai or ninja to hold it?
Putting all the boxes away as he had been told, Keitarō then moved to pick up the sword and put it back where he knew it had been before. Pausing to note that the sheathed weapon had collected some dirt and dust on its black scabbard, he reached into his trouser pocket to pull out a cleaning rag, then he moved to pick up the sword to wipe it down…
Ayah! Who's the nice boy that's cleaning me?!
Keitarō gasped as the sword in his hand began to glow with a strange purple fire…which didn't hurt him whatsoever. "A GHOST!"
No, silly boy! I'm not a ghost! I'm a tokkaebi!
Silence.
"What's a 'to-ka-bi?'" he asked, trying to pronounced the very odd syllables.
No, Keitarō-ya, 'tokkaebi,' that voice gently chided. You would know someone like myself as a tsukumogami. I am T'aeja.
He blinked. He knew about tsukumogami. They were divine spirits that were born within normal objects such as umbrellas and lanterns that had existed for over a hundred years and had become truly alive because of their great age. And while he personally didn't know any sort of tsukumogami that could be born inside a sword of all things, there shouldn't be any reason that such a being could be born of a samurai's primary weapon.
Still…
Placing the sword on the floor, he then sat seiza before prostrating himself before it. "I'm very honoured to meet you, Obā-sama," he ritually declared.
An embarrassed sputter escaped the glowing blade. You're c-c-calling me 'G-g-grandmother?!' T'aeja moaned as if she — the voice sounded female, so Keitarō automatically assumed this particular tsukumogami was a girl — was about to cry.
He giggled in embarrassment. "Well, it wouldn't be right to call you 'Onē-chan' or 'Oba-chan.' You're older than that…!" He then gargled as he waved his hands as if to ward off a curse. "Sorry! Sorry!"
Musical laughter responded. My! You're a respectful one as well as a kind one! T'aeja teased before she breathed out. Don't worry about it, Keitarō-ya. What is age to a being like me? I first came alive within a fireplace poker my owner liked very much when he lived within the ramparts of what would become Namhansan-sŏng overlooking beautiful Hansŏng. That was in the decades before the Imjin War in what you know of as the year 1592.
He gasped. Fifteen-ninety-two?! That made T'aeja WAY older than even his own grandma!
Don't worry about it, Keitarō-ya, T'aeja then gently scolded. Here, finish cleaning me, then put me on the rack to your right.
He blinked before nodding, and then reached for the sword…
Urashima Keitarō would never speak of his many conversations with the spirit of what he would later learn was known to the members of his family as the Yōkatana Hinata.
But deep in his heart, he would never think ill of his "invisible big sister" T'aeja.
And — for the utter life of them all — his relatives would never understand why was it that Keitarō always excelled in Korean language studies in school…
Avalonians at Hinata-sō
by Fred Herriot
A side story to Phoenix From the Ashes
Proofreading done by Rose1948 and Rashaan Butler
Based on Love Hina, created by Akamatsu Ken; Ikkitōsen, created by Shiozaki Yūji; and Urusei Yatsura, created by Takahashi Rumiko.
Also including characters and situations from Mahō Sensei Negima, created by Akamatsu Ken; Koihime Musō, created by BaseSon; Men In Black, created by Lowell Cunningham; Yumemiru Shōjo, created by Fūga; Sanctuary, created by Fumimura Shō and Ikegami Ryōichi; Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, created by Seth Grahame-Smith; Kita-e, created by Hudson Soft; Kōtetsu Tenshi Kurumi, created by Kaishaku (Ōta Hitoshi and Shichinohe Terumasa); Crying Freeman, created by Koike Kazuo and Ikegami Ryōichi; Harry Potter, created by Joanna K. Rowling; Noir, created by Tsukimura Ryōe and Mashimo Kōichi; The Guns of the South, written by Harry Turtledove; Kan, created by Urushihara Satoshi; Buffy the Vampire Slayer, created by Joss Whedon; and Aqua Bless and Tayu Tayu, created by Yamatogawa.
Phoenix From the Ashes was derived from the fanfic The Bet: Crippled, written by Gregg Sharp. This story also contains characters and situations from the fanfic series Urusei Yatsura - The Senior Year, created by Mike Smith and Fred Herriot.
WRITER'S INTRODUCTION
This is a prequel side story to Phoenix From the Ashes, effectively showing what happened elsewhere on Earth during the events of the Liberation of the Avalonians; in the timeline of the series, this occurred a little over four months prior to the start of PFtA. This story crosses over with the universe of Love Hina; in the timeline of that series, this story is set around the start of Volume Four (manga episode #25).
Of course, given the rather interesting relationship dynamics that rule the lives of the residents of the Hinata-sō, it's quite easy for a melodramatic writer like me — with my past problems concerning child abuse and how that influences my reactions concerning tsundere characters — to fall into the "let's bash all the girls of the Hinata-sō" approach some other writers have taken in their stories. In many ways — even more so than in Ranma 1/2 fanfic stories — it's quite easy to depict people such as Narusegawa Naru and Aoyama Motoko as vicious brutes without any redeeming qualities. However, they do have such qualities…not to mention deep fears that drive their actions; I often feel that people who depict Naru as an abusive monster tend to forget that sort of thing. Also, in reflecting on the circumstances that brought Urashima Keitarō to the Hinata-sō at the start of the manga, there are questions I've wanted to ask about the whole background situation that led to his meeting the girls of the Hinata-sō in the way he did. I intend to explore those questions in this story.
Atop that, I intend to explore my theories concerning the Yōkatana Hinata — known more commonly in English as "Hina, the Cursed Blade" — and how it came into being. This will also involve the weapon's appearance in Negima and bring in guest stars from that story…not to mention a character of mine who appears in the Wizards and Avalonians side stories to PFtA I'm also writing and is mentioned in my Icemaidens series of Harry Potter stories. Note that reading all of those stories isn't necessary to understand the events here though I would recommend reading Phoenix From the Ashes and the writer's notes contained within to better understand some of the background elements of this story.
Enjoy!
Hinata, near the Hinata-sō, Wednesday 17 February 2010, after nightfall…
"The Army of Lum…destroyed?!"
The senior Niphentaxian observer of the group based in the spa town close to Yokosuka shakily nodded. "Yes!" he hissed out. "Somehow, the Dragonspeaker mustered an army of warriors — not to mention her thrice be-damned dragon friends — to attack Phentax Twelve to liberate the Avalonians!" As the dozen other people in the room gasped in horror on hearing that — all of them knew how vital the bioroid slaves were to the economy of the Union of Phentax Two — he added, "They were joined in the attack by the Yehisrites; we all know how they feel about any form of slavery!" As the others winced — the Yehisrites had long earned their reputation as the most fearsome warriors in the local cluster; to face THEM in a battle was to face beings who took JOY in combat of any sort! — the leader finished, "The Arch-Heretic himself was able to destroy the controls that kept those damned robots enslaved to us! Millions are dead, killed by their own servants! Phentax Twelve is also gone, all its colonists killed to the last." He shook his head. "What's worse, without the Army of Lum, there's no way that the squadron coming here will be able to seize and hold Earth for the long term to make the Great Evil renounce his dark works concerning the Goddess and those of Her Holy Company from beyond this world…!"
Listening to the passionate tirade his leader was spewing, a sandy-haired man of about twenty-five tried not to shake his head. While he truly believed in the One True Faith and the words passed down to him ultimately from those of his race who lived in and around the Holy City of Tomobiki to learn the sacred words of the Holy Apostles and Holy Company that went into the Book of Lum, there was a small part of him that revelled in acts that could see him instantly declared a heretic by the authorities of the Church of Lum. That rebellious part of Tarash dai-Joranth centred on the beautiful female bioroids whose birthplace — a giant bioroid factory buried in the crust of Phentax Twelve fourteen millennia before — was discovered by the "Arch-Heretic," Ganzo dai-Louc, when he led a geological survey on that world a century ago. Unlike the others in Tarash's group — and unlike the vast majority of his people — he saw the Avalonians not as "robots" no different than androids constructed by the Niphentaxians' allies on Zeiwan. No, he actually saw them as real, living people no different than he. Yes, they weren't born by natural means, but they certainly expressed the full gamut of human emotions…and even more so, unlike the people they had been literally enslaved to thanks to some of Ganzo's friends, they could do that one arcane thing no Niphentaxian — at least in known recent history — could ever do.
They could create.
It had taken Tarash's breath away when his own "sister" — who had been created from a sample of his own DNA, though modified to make her Terran-form and not Niphentaxian-form so she could better fit in amongst the people of Earth — had shown an incredible propensity for designing and modifying her own motorcycles. Like he, the woman known to her friends in Hinata City as Mizote Toshiko had a great passion for riding the sleek two-wheeled machines, even going so far as to win unofficial drag races whenever other motorcycle enthusiasts came to town to challenge her. And while Tarash's co-workers often rode his case to make Toshiko not make a spectacle of herself, he always countered that with the argument that by allowing her to act as human as she wanted, she would better earn the trust and acceptance of her Terran friends, thus allowing the Niphentaxians in Hinata to get more detailed observation data from her and the seventy-seven other Terran-form Avalonians assigned as assistant cultural observers to their group. Other observation groups scattered across Earth which had Avalonian assistants helping them had also gained greater insights into the diverse cultures of this world by letting the bioroids interact with their Terran friends as freely as possible within reason, which benefited the people of Phentax Two immensely despite the current allegiance all nominally had to the One True Faith and the belief that Redet Lum of the planet Uru was the Living Goddess.
But now…
"So what do we do, Karan?" the lone female observer in the group demanded. "Has there been any sign of the Great Evil? Is he involved in all this?! What have our friends in and around the Holy City reported about what happened after the Holy Apostles and the Holy Company were brought back here from Uru after the New Year by the Black-Haired Bandit Slayer and her adopted sister?"
The leader, Karan sudai-Karona, sighed. "That, I can't answer, Jelina. After the incident at the Onishuto Cathedral provoked by the Dragonspeaker and her dragon friend, all communications between the observers in the Holy City and the Homeworld were funnelled directly to the President's office. Try as I might — to say anything of my counterparts across Earth — we can't get any information concerning what really happened from the Holy Writings. As you all know, there hasn't been updates to the Book of Lum since that incident." Which was a VERY scary thought to Karan. Without any new words from the Holy Apostles and Holy Company — even the Sinful Doubters! — how could the One True Faith maintain its relevance to the Faithful? "That means…!"
Everyone then jolted on sensing a slight, sharp tremor rip through the floor under their feet. Instantly, safety drills when it came to the most common environmental living hazard in Japan clicked in; the observers slipped out of the small townhouse Karan owned and shared with a dozen Avalonian assistants. Once they were on the street, they looked around for a moment, noting that the tremor had stopped. As silence fell, people then relaxed. "Minor quake," Tarash quickly concluded.
"What's THAT?!" Jelina dai-Goranda then screamed out.
Everyone stared at her, then — on noting where she was pointing — they looked north. "What in the Goddess' Name…?!" Karan exclaimed on seeing a brilliant bolt of energy rocket into the sky from somewhere beyond the ridge of low mountains that formed the spine of the Miura Peninsula. "The Terrans don't have any energy weapons…!"
Another sharp rumble rocked the ground, which staggering many of the Niphentaxians…not to mention nearby bystanders. As Karan dropped to his knees to ensure he didn't get knocked onto his ass, his cell phone rang. "Yes?!" he answered it.
"It's me!"
Karan gaped. "Hoss?!"
"Yes! Get your people prepared to evacuate your post!" Hoss bedai-Diyasbugh — the senior observer assigned to the Holy City itself — declared. "The Final Solution has been stolen from us! It's been sent into space, right into the middle of the Liberation Squadron! That blast of energy emitting from the Tarōzakura Hill…!"
At that moment, an explosion of blinding light and energy somewhere in space close to Earth turned the twilight of Hinata to brightest noon!
As people around them screamed out at such a sight — much less crouching on the ground as they tried to rub their eyes and restore their vision — a wide-eyed Tarash felt a cold grip of terror seize his heart. He knew — as did his fellow observers — that a squadron of a dozen Kashin-class battlewagons, twice the number of Tsubasa-class destroyers and a full support group was deploying from the Phentax system to seize Earth in a way of forcing the Great Evil to recant his dark words three days ago declaring that Paragraph Ten of the Tag Race Treaty between the United Nations of Earth and the United Tribes of Uru was now in effect concerning all citizens of Uru for the next two hundred years. That particular clause — which gave Moroboshi Ataru the lone right to declare any citizen of Uru persona non grata if he felt such a person to be a threat to Earth, thus having that person effectively forbidden from visiting or living on Earth — had never been revealed to him; no doubt, this was to ensure the Great Evil could not do anything directly against the Goddess. However, given that he had been the guest of the Noukiites for most of the last two months, there was utterly no doubt that Moroboshi DID know of that clause and was now using it to hurt the Urusians in a way they would never recover from. Given that he was being helped by members of a race that didn't care at all for the Urusians as a people, that action would cause untold damage to Uru.
Not to mention Phentax Two.
To counter such a possibility, the "Final Solution" — a hideous name in Tarash's eyes given what had happened to the descendants of Israel during the Second World War — was devised as a last-ditch effort to keep the Great Evil at bay should he actually find some way to bring the Goddess to heel. The Final Solution — an anti-matter bomb with an equivalent explosive yield of five hundred megatons of trinitrotoluene — had been secretly buried in the shopping district of the Holy City two months after the Goddess' Migration to Earth. With Hoss being given the undisputed right to control when to use it, the bomb was intended to help the Niphentaxians take all of Earth hostage in case the Great Evil somehow totally defeated the Goddess and was moving to destroy the Holy Apostles and Holy Company, thus eradicating the foundations of the One True Faith forever. It had been a controversial decision to deploy such a device to Earth; while the needs of nearly fifteen billion of the Faithful was always prominent in the President's mind, the idea of unleashing NUCLEAR WINTER on Earth — the detonation of such a bomb would turn the whole Kantō basin of Japan into a radioactive bay of the Pacific Ocean, not to mention effectively render the island nation lifeless from side effects like earthquakes and volcanoes as the planet's crust was cracked open by such a huge explosion — would make any feeling being wince in horror. Yes, Moroboshi WAS the Great Evil…
But now…
Now…
"The squadron…?" Jelina croaked out.
Karan feebly nodded. As the other observers all seemed to collapse on themselves as the full weight of what was now happening to their countrymen slammed down on their shoulders, Tarash blinked as he then stood up, walking back towards his own residence. The shock of the moment was so great to the others that none reacted to his heading off. As he hurried back home, Tarash ignored the mutterings from people around him as they stared into the evening sky, watching the afterglow of the explosion in cislunar space and wondering what might have caused it. His own mind was racing as the many bits of information he had learned over the last two months began to coalesce, quickly drawing up a conclusion that marked the potential unleashing of virtual Armageddon on the local stellar cluster.
Fact: The Dragonspeaker took the Great Evil from Onishuto just before New Year's Day on Earth to deny the Goddess her final victory over him, most likely transporting him to her adopted home colony of Okusei.
Conclusion: Moroboshi Ataru took the last seven weeks to learn everything he could about the politics, economics and social structures of the local cluster. In doing so, he learned of the value of Earth's own solar system to the Galactic Federation of Planet-states, the alliance of worlds that Uru and Phentax Two were parts of.
Fact: Three days ago, the Imperial Chancellor of the Noukiite Outmarches made a public announcement declaring that an imperial commandery would be established concerning the inner part of the Sol system, effectively placing Earth under Noukiios' direct military protection. Coinciding with that, an announcement was made declaring that as far as the Urusians were concerned, Paragraph Ten of the Tag Race Treaty between Uru and Earth was now in effect for all citizens of Uru for the next two centuries Earth-time.
Conclusion: The Great Evil was moving to permanently keep the Goddess away from her Holy Apostles and Holy Company on Earth…as well as ensure that observers from Phentax Two could no longer send reports on Terran culture to their superiors, thus plunging a dagger right into the heart of Niphentaxian society itself.
Fact: The Noukiites and the Yehisrites just teamed together to liberate the Avalonians from slavery, destroying the Army of Lum along the way.
Conclusion: By wrecking Phentax Two's military power, the Great Evil would ensure the Galactic Federation would be left open and vulnerable to potential invasion by its traditional enemies, the Ipraedies Empire and the Imperial Houses of the Seifukusu Dominion.
Fact: The Final Solution had just been sent into orbit and detonated, no doubt in the midst of the squadron of the Army of Lum sent to Earth to occupy the planet.
Conclusion One: Moroboshi Ataru was moving to make an alliance with the Avalonians — who had probably seized elements of Niphentaxian technology for their own use on fleeing the Phentax system — thus moving to ensure Uru would NEVER have influence over his home planet ever again.
Even worse, the Avalonians — in a perfect show of vengeance against their former masters — wouldn't hesitate in killing the Living Goddess' Holy Apostles and Her Holy Company in the Holy City of Tomobiki if they got the chance; with over seven hundred of the beautiful bioroid women living in the Holy City now, the Holy Apostles and Holy Company were seriously outnumbered!
And in a cosmic twist of irony that would have actually made Tarash laugh in other circumstances, the Niphentaxians' "Great Evil" would also become the Avalonians' "Great Liberator."
To be the man who rescued over TWO BILLION bioroids from SLAVERY…!
Tarash then jolted as something else came to him:
Conclusion Two: The Noukiites were coming to make a clean sweep of it, exposing what had been happening on Earth to the natives of this world as a whole.
I'm either going to die…or face Hichkyech'eng! the observer thought as he stepped into the small apartment block where he and his sister lived along with the fifteen other bioroids under his direct charge, drawing out his keys.
Both options were horrifying to say the least of it.
Death would force Tarash to learn if his faith was true.
Hichkyech'eng — Noukiios' top-tier prison planet, a hidden ice world somewhere in the vast space of the Imperial Dominion — would see him mentally reprogrammed into becoming something that would guarantee he would be killed if he ever returned home:
An apostate.
THAT made Tarash weak in the knees.
No one could ever be an apostate in Niphentaxian society.
Shuddering as he unlocked the door and entered his small apartment, Tarash took a deep breath as he considered what he could do now.
He couldn't forego his allegiance to the One True Faith.
He couldn't face the idea of having his very SOUL twisted around and moulded like silly putty by the wardens of Hichkyech'eng.
What COULD he do…?
He blinked as his eyes fell on a picture of him and Toshiko on a table next to the couch. Save for his tapered ears — which he normally kept hidden under bangs of his hair — they looked like fraternal twins, the perfect image of a loving older brother and a doting younger sister living together.
Toshiko…!
Tears filled his eyes as a wry smile crossed his face.
He would die tonight…
…but she would be free.
That was alright, wasn't it?
Noting that, he walked towards her bedroom. While the others of his group had often been annoyed at the fact that they had to spend money to allow the "robots" a chance to live like real people, Tarash always loved to buy things for Toshiko and the others under his charge. While nothing improper had happened between Tarash and his sister — after all, they were genetic fraternal twins; the problems with inbreeding were well known on Phentax Two…let alone the issues of what giving birth to an Avalonian-Niphentaxian hybrid child would unleash! — he always loved it whenever he got her new clothes and she gladly modelled them for him whenever he brought the packages home for her. Remembering that as he stepped into her bedroom — despite her being a motorcycle petrol-head, she was a neat-freak; the bed was always made and the room kept as spotless as possible — he stopped as the tears in his eyes trickled down his cheeks.
"You'll be free to live your life, Toshiko…eh?!"
He stopped on seeing a picture on the nightstand beside her bed, one that hadn't been there the last time he had been in her room. Walking over to it, he picked it up and stared at it, his eyes going wide. "Keitarō-san…?"
Sure enough, it was the manager of the Hinata-sō on the slopes of Ōgusu-yama, Urashima Keitarō. A lanky fellow of twenty with considerable bad luck yet possessing a heart of pure gold, he had failed the Centre Test to get into university three times since his graduation from high school. Failing to pass the second time saw him tossed out of his family home in nearby Hayama a year ago, which brought him to Hinata to seek lodgings at the Hinata-sō, owned by his paternal grandmother Urashima Hinata. Keitarō was more than happy to come to the Hinata-sō; he had stayed there many times as a child and knew the place like the back of his hand. Unfortunately, he never was warned ahead of time that the hotel had been transformed into a girls-only apartment block…which really made things interesting between him and the residents when he arrived the previous winter. Adding onto that was the fact that Keitarō's grandmother made him the manager/landlord of the Hinata-sō while she was off to enjoy a retirement tour of the world. That, naturally, didn't sit well with many of the people living there. And ever since that time…
"That's right!" Tarash hissed out.
Smiling with delight as he placed the picture back on the nightstand, he walked into his own bedroom. It happened just after Keitarō and the dorm residents returned two weeks ago from a trip down to Kyūshū and the Ryūkyū Islands; he had gone off after the latest Centre Test to recharge the mental batteries after his failure to pass it for a third time and the other residents had gone after him, no doubt to make sure he would come back and do his chores since they were too lazy — save for Maehara Shinobu — to do it themselves. While out shopping, he saw Toshiko driving down the street back to her apartment. She got clipped by a drunk driver, sending her flying off her machine towards a brick wall. Dropping his bags, Keitarō lunged over to catch Toshiko, using his body to absorb the impact…though, thanks to an invulnerability which made him seem a metahuman at times to the Niphentaxians in Hinata, he walked away from it a moment later with just a bruise. Of course, Toshiko was happy to walk him back to the Hinata-sō to make sure he could get back to his current place of residence in one piece; one of her sister Avalonians, Yamamoto Eriko, came by as soon as she could to take care of the damaged bike.
On their arrival at the Hinata-sō, the residents — who, to one extent or another, felt Keitarō was nothing more than a pervert; Honestly! You'd think that girls planning or trying to get into Tōkyō University of all places would be SMARTER than that! Tarash often thought when he contemplated on that weird attitude — all freaked out on seeing their manager with a beautiful girl hanging off his arm. Unfortunately for them — much to Tarash's pride and delight — Mizote Toshiko was WAY tougher than any of the girls living in Hinata. When Narusegawa Naru and Aoyama Motoko moved to attack Keitarō for "molesting" an innocent girl, Toshiko whipped out two wrenches and threw them with the force of runaway Shin-kansen trains at their arms. Both girls suffered broken wrists, which horrified the other residents, not to mention Keitarō's cousin/aunt, the manager of a nearby tea shop. When Urashima Haruka and Konno Mitsune moved to upbraid Toshiko, the former's jaw was dislocated thanks to a backhand punch and the latter got a vicious punch in the stomach that knocked her out for the night. Then — in a move to "play" with Keitarō that was just simple abuse to anyone else — Kaolla Su tried to drop-kick him in the head. Toshiko grabbed her by the leg before she could make contact, dislocated her knee, then nearly crushed the poor girl's nose with a punch to the face.
At the end of it, a clearly-unruffled Toshiko told Keitarō, "You really ought to evict these people, Keitarō-kun. If they treat you like that, they don't deserve to be here."
A whole chorus of heart attacks nearly resulted from those words from the still-conscious tenants.
To them, the "E" word was the most dreaded word of all.
Tarash was often amazed that Keitarō was such a kind-hearted man that he would NEVER contemplate throwing those women out onto the streets even for their appalling disrespect and abuse of him.
Ever since that incident — and brief stays at Hinata General Hospital for Naru, Motoko, Kaolla and Haruka — the people living at the Hinata-sō started to avoid the man as if he was infected with Hifuto…especially since Toshiko and several "friends" of hers such as Eriko came to visit Keitarō and take him out on dates. Fortunately, none of Tarash's co-workers — Jelina dai-Goranda, for example, was Eriko's mistress — saw anything wrong about their charges dating him; Urashima Keitarō was a perfect sociological case study due to his many passions, desire to honour a childhood promise and overwhelming drive to help anyone who needed help regardless of personal cost. Even more, all the observers in Hinata had noted over the last two weeks that most of the residents had come to like the idea of NOT seeing the poor manager of the city's namesake hotel/hot springs spa fly through the skies overhead thanks to a rage-induced punch from Naru or one of the Shinmei-ryū sword attacks Motoko could unleash. While Tarash hadn't talked to people to learn why, Toshiko told him that there had been a long, deep undercurrent of hate towards the Urashima family — Keitarō excepted — felt by many of the residents of Hinata City, especially among people in the city government and many business owners…and that such feelings had, over the last year, come to encompass most of the current residents of the Hinata-sō.
Shaking his head as he dismissed that issue from his mind, Tarash sat down on his own bed to take a moment and think. As that cold chill that seized his heart earlier moved to grip him anew, he gritted his teeth…and then blinked.
He was going to die.
His sister and her friends would be free.
Toshiko clearly was interested in Urashima Keitarō.
He then smiled as he reached for his nightstand.
Well, if Toshiko was to be happy…
…four certain someones had to be shoved out of the way.
Especially two women who believed they were the SOLE arbiters of what was right and proper concerning the Hinata-sō and all those who resided there.
Drawing out the Niphentaxian-built, Urusian-pattern cellular disruptor pistol he had been issued as a means of self-defence in case he was discovered, Tarash smiled as he checked that it was loaded and ready.
It was finally time for the girls of the Hinata-sō to learn how UGLY the wider Universe beyond the borders of their little world could be…
The Hinata-sō, that moment…
"AH-CHOO!"
"AH-CHOO!"
"AH-CHOO!"
"AH-CHOO!"
Maehara Shinobu looked over from the entrance of a small kitchenette set aside to allow servants to prepare tea and snacks for guests in the main banquet hall. "Bless you all! What's wrong?!" she asked.
Moans escaped the women seated around the large table in the middle of the hall. "Someone's talking about me!" Narusegawa Naru moaned as she rubbed her nose.
"All of us," Konno Mitsune groaned before sipping her sake.
The young woman who normally dealt with the cooking and laundry issues at the Hinata-sō sighed before she moved to prepare the special tea set for Urashima Keitarō and Mizote Toshiko. The manager hadn't been seen by any of the tenants since early in the day; that "mean bōsōzoku girl" — as all of Toshiko's victims save Haruka had come to derisively call her — had come by to visit right at breakfast, then took him out to go on a day-long shopping trip. When Mitsune tried to remind Keitarō that the hot springs to the east of the banquet room needed cleaning, Toshiko — with a look that could melt solid lead — scornfully said, "If you're so worried about how filthy the springs YOU use — and block Keitarō-kun from using even if this is his family property! — are, go clean it yourself, Konno! Or is this another thing you'll heap on poor Shinobu-chan's shoulders like you do the cooking and laundry?!" Before Mitsune — who was not used to the idea of people taking Keitarō's side like that when it came to his duties as manager — could say anything in response, they were off…not to be seen again until after supper, when they came back after a long ride around the Miura Peninsula on the former's personally-modified Kawasaki Vulcan 900 Classic motorcycle cruiser.
Much to the shock of the others of the Hinata-sō, their manager came back dressed in form-fitting motorcycle leathers which showed off his thin, muscular frame, jet black overall with red-and-gold trim that matched the shade of Toshiko's favourite riding suit. Before people could say a thing, Keitarō invited Toshiko into the Detached Hall off to one side of the Hinata-sō's main building so they could spend some time alone. Naturally curious as to what was going on — and to ensure he wasn't doing anything improper — the girls scrambled over to eavesdrop on the structure…only to slam into what Aoyama Motoko immediately identified as powerful magical wards set well beyond the main door of the Detached Hall that couldn't be breached by anything known to her. Even worse, since they were magical wards, there was no way that any of Kaolla Su's weapons or machines could penetrate such mystic defences that now sealed off the Hall from all intrusion.
Stunned to realize there was now ONE place on the grounds — though none of them, admittedly, had any cause to enter this part of the Hinata-sō before — they couldn't enter, they ran to the Wafū Chabō Hinata to get Haruka's help. On hearing what had happened and who was now with her cousin/nephew, the tea shop matron refused to do anything. "If you girls don't realize that Keitarō's finally getting tired of you all sticking your noses where they don't belong, I don't know WHAT will have to happen to make you see it," she told them before asking them to leave the café so she could tend to customers.
Hearing that from the former ryōbo who had watched over them during the period between the departure of Keitarō's grandmother from the Hinata-sō until the time he was declared manager via a power of attorney agreement Hina signed with Keitarō's father (as he was then underage) on her grandson's behalf, the girls staggered into the banquet hall, completely stunned by this turn of events. Having begrudgingly accepted Keitarō as their manager, all of the girls — even Shinobu, who was the most sympathetic to him even if she never did anything to help curb Naru's and Motoko's behaviour — believed themselves secure in their relationship vis-à-vis the man, confidant their strength and righteousness would keep him in line.
Two weeks ago, Mizote Toshiko totally shattered that sense of self-confidence.
What was worse, no matter what any of the girls tried to do to reassert their influence over Keitarō, Toshiko, not to mention a group of VERY beautiful women whom she invited over during the last two weeks to meet her new friend, were always there to verbally — and one time, physically! — cut them off at the knees.
That didn't sit well with ANY of them.
And now THIS…!
"Is that tea for us, Shinobu-chan?" Mitsune asked as Shinobu walked out of the kitchenette with the tea tray. "I can use a cup."
"No, this is for Sempai and Toshiko-sempai," Shinobu replied, which made the other girls gape in shock. "I'll just leave it at the edge of the wards, then call out to them and tell them the tea's there." She then glared at Kaolla, who instantly perked at the idea of getting the chance to get close to her "Onii-chan"; ever since the "meanie" had broke her knee and punched her in the face, the young princess of Molmol had not "played" with Keitarō thanks to the meanie's equally-mean friends always butting in the way. "And YOU better not do anything to bother Sempai and Toshiko-sempai, Su-chan! Do you want Toshiko-sempai to do to you what she did to Naru-sempai and Motoko-sempai two weeks ago?!"
Kaolla yelped — she had been horrified to hear what the meanie had done to her friends — as the other girl marched off, ignoring the shocked looks on the faces of the other residents. Once clear of the banquet hall, Shinobu took a deep breath, then walked down the covered walkway to the Detached Hall. Now that she was alone, the raven-haired, grey-eyed middle school freshman took another deep breath as she felt a surge of icy fear rip up her spine. She had been at the back of the crowd when Naru walked face-first into those wards, nearly burning her alive as a result. After hearing Motoko's explanation about what the wards were — and how the Shinmei-ryū kendō-ka could not defeat such wards — Shinobu knew right away that a normal girl like her wouldn't stand a chance against them. But where did they come from?! she wondered as she stopped close to the last overhang supporting posts before the door leading into the Detached Hall; this was where Naru had nearly been fried alive. Hina-obāchan never said anything about them! "Sempai!" she then called out. "I brought some tea for you and Toshiko-sempai!"
Two seconds later — just as Shinobu was about to put the tray onto the walkway — the door opened to reveal Mizote Toshiko. Gazing on the pretty twenty-something motorbike enthusiast, Shinobu felt a rush of both envy and admiration flood her because of the older woman's exceptional good looks. Toshiko was the perfect mix of energetic tomboy and sexy supermodel. She had wavy sandy blonde hair cropped at the bottom of her neck and dark grey eyes that glittered with both playfulness and knowledge. She was quite well-formed though not busty as some of her friends who had visited Keitarō over the last two weeks seemed to be. Right now, she was draped in her normal red-and-gold racing leathers, which fit her body like a snug glove; on seeing Toshiko for the first time after nearly getting her stomach punched into her lungs, Mitsune swore the woman didn't wear a bra and that her nipples were visible under her suit. Shinobu didn't care; Toshiko didn't flaunt her looks or do anything improper around Keitarō even if she was always quick to tear after the other residents of the Hinata-sō when given the chance.
"Ara! Shinobu-chan!" Toshiko said in that warm voice of hers as she came up to take the tray. "You didn't need to do this!"
"I had to," Shinobu confessed. "Given all the awful things the others have done to Sempai since he came here…" She then lowered her eyes. "Not to mention my doing nothing about it, to say anything of Haruka-sempai doing nothing about it…"
Toshiko smirked. "Well, given how domineering Narusegawa and Aoyama are — to say anything of all the times Konno loves to stir up trouble, not to mention the fact that so-called 'princess' is nothing more than a spoiled child who needs a good spanking…" — she smirked on hearing gargled breaths eminate from the direction of the main banquet hall, confirming that yet again, the other residents were eavesdropping on them — "…you are outnumbered in this place." That made Shinobu blush at the older woman's willingness to defend her inaction concerning Keitarō. "C'mon in. Keitarō-kun's showing me something neat."
Before Shinobu could react, Toshiko grabbed her arm with a grip of steel, then dragged her through the doorway. "Sempai! Wait! The…!" she cried out before blinking in shock on noting that nothing happened to her. "…wards?" she eeped.
Behind her, the door closed, leaving behind four gaping people standing like dumbstruck idiots at the doorway leading into the banquet hall. Inside the Detached Hall, now seated at the small table there, Keitarō smirked. "Nuna-ya won't hurt you if you don't have ill-intentions towards me, Shinobu-chan," he said as Toshiko put the tray on the table, beckoning the younger girl over to a chair. "When we came here earlier, Narusegawa-san and Aoyama-san were hell-bent on 'punishing' me for my 'perversions' concerning Toshiko-chan, Konno-san wanted some juicy gossip as a way to try to extort more money from me and Su-san just wanted a chance to beat me up like she normally does. Nuna-ya doesn't like that."
Shinobu sat down as Toshiko moved to serve the tea. "'Nuna-ya?'"
Keitarō smiled as he held up something that made the younger girl gape. "The Lady T'aeja of Chosŏn," he declared with formal dignity, which made Shinobu blink in confusion. "Otherwise known as the Yōkatana Hinata."
If being introduced so formally to a katana was odd…
…what came next made Shinobu faint: Hello, Shinobu-ya! a cheery female voice — echoing with a divine-like boom similar to the voice of God from The Ten Commandments — then said. It's nice to know that one of the girls tricked by that stupid fool Hina is willing to give Keitarō-ya a chance.
After the poor girl passed out, Toshiko sighed. "She took that very well."
Keitarō chuckled…
On the slopes of the Tarōzakura Hill in Tomobiki (forty kilometres west of north from Hinata in Nishitōkyō City), that moment…
"Most Venerable, are you alright?"
Hearing that concerned question from the Noukiite Imperial Marines lieutenant colonel who commanded the battalion of troops now ruthlessly sweeping through Tomobiki and its neighbouring municipalities to flush out the Niphentaxian observers based here, a tomboyish twenty-something woman with dark brown hair and almost black eyes in a black martial arts gi blinked before she turned to gaze on him. "I was just surprised on noting a voice echoing from a location in the city of Hinata south of here," Moroboshi Negako stated. "I never expected to hear that voice."
Walking up to stand beside the first true artificial intelligence to ever arise on Earth, a flame-haired Noukiite free warrior with chestnut eyes blinked as she cast her own metahuman enhanced eyesight in the direction her friend was gazing. "That's a ch'enguop'i," Seu-P'ye Yesu-Re Hechnich'-K'ekhech of Ait'uch Nehech declared, the surprise in her voice apparent to all around her, even the members of the Mendō Clan and their servants who just watched the destruction of their clan's spiritual guardian…which — as they now had just learned — had contributed to the detonation of an ALIEN BOMB that had been buried in Tomobiki beyond the knowledge of anyone in the town. Save for over three hundred members of an alien race NONE of them had ever heard of who had been living amongst them since the end of the previous summer. "What is she doing in Nihon? People such as her should be living in Hanguk, not Nihon, Negako."
"She was brought here against her will during the invasion of Chosŏn by a retainer serving Toyotomi Hideyoshi in the first year of Bunroku, then transformed from the fireplace poker — in whose form she first gained sentience — into a very well-forged katana eventually named the 'Yōkatana Hinata.'" Negako lightly smiled at Kyech. "Naturally, T'aeja did not care for such a thing…and when she gained the chance in the eighth year of Keichō, she expressed her displeasure by burning most of Kyōto to the ground, nearly wiping out all practitioners of the Shinmei-ryū who were active at the time and coming within a hair's breadth of killing off Emperor Katahito and his family. My creator had to step in to stop her."
"Um…Negako-sama?"
"You have a question, Ryōko," Negako stated as she gazed at Mendō Ryōko.
"If I recall correctly, the Yōkatana Hinata has always been kept in the possession of the Urashima Clan of Hayama," the younger heiress of the Mendō of Musashino stated. "Would this have something to do with all the strange things that happen around Urashima Keitarō-san? I know he and your brother are friends."
"Ataru and Keitarō are more passing acquaintances than true friends," Negako modified. "Unfortunately, I cannot answer such a question as I have not had the chance to examine Keitarō since I gained my own body." She then hummed. "Still, now that T'aeja is involved…"
"Such a monster has to be destroyed!"
Negako's eyebrow slightly twitched. "Why do you propose that, Shūtarō?"
Mendō Shūtarō — who had been shocked into a near-catatonic state weeks ago on realizing that his hated rival had for ten years been the host body of Imperial Special Agent #49, the being who had slaughtered the last members of the Black Dragon Society back in 1945 all by herself at the behest of the Shōwa Emperor — shuddered. "If this creature nearly killed the Heavenly Sovereign at the time of that awful incident, it's a…UUURK!"
THAT croak of underwear-soiling horror was thanks to the lethal stares the Dragonspeaker and the other Noukiites who had overheard him were now sent his way. Noting that her brother's rival for the hand of Redet Hensō had been cowed into submission, Negako sighed. "Shūtarō, a word of advice. I realize you have not gained any chance to learn about Noukiite society, but know this: Beings such as tsukumogami and tokkaebi are known on Noukiios as ch'enguop'i. They are seen by normal Noukiites as angels of the Lord of Heaven, deserving of his blessings. To do as was done to T'aeja would — if done on Noukiios — earn the wrath of ALL the angels who serve the Lord of Heaven. I would suggest that before you speak such words, you LISTEN to others and OBSERVE their actions before voicing such conclusions. If I was not here, Kyech would have gladly beheaded you for such comments. Do you comprehend that?"
WHACK!
"Stupid boy!" Mendō's aged grandfather, Mendō Genjurō, snarled after he hit his family's future leader with the business end of his walking stick, knocking the poor man out.
As Ryōko giggled, her mother Haruka shook her head and her father Hajime calmly smoked his pipe, Kyech turned to Negako. "Do you want to see your friend?"
Negako sighed. "I believe I will have to."
"Alright." The Dragonspeaker gazed on the Imperial Marine colonel. "See to it that all the Niphentaxians your battalion captures are taken to Tomobiki High School. The safety of your troops is paramount, but no unnecessary executions. These people need to understand what sort of monsters have been living amongst them during the last half-year. If you find any Avalonians, treat them with kindness. They will not feel the destruction of the genetic lock in their DNA until the factory arrives in this system."
A deep bow and left fist-in-right open palm salute answered her. "I understand, My Lady K'ekhech."
Kyech then gently squeezed Negako's shoulder…and in a flash of magical fire, both people disappeared…
On the Hinata-dōri at the south end of the Hinata-sō property, that moment…
Smiling on noting that his sister had Keitarō — and Maehara Shinobu, who was a good lass with a decent heart even if she allowed herself to be bullied by the other residents here — in a side building, Tarash dai-Joranth nodded as he shut off his portable tricorder, then slipped it into his jacket pocket. Drawing out his pistol, he clicked off the safety, confirming it was set to the highest non-lethal power setting. Of course, it wouldn't kill any of the bitches now inside the banquet hall…but they would feel the effects of the weapon for a long time to come, especially a martial artist like Aoyama Motoko. Too bad.
With that, he began ascending the stairs…
A flash of fire allowed two women to appear on the lawn to the north of the covered walkway connecting the Detached Hall to the Hinata-sō. As Negako shook her head — she didn't care for Kyech's form of teleportation, though she did appreciate the Noukiite's willingness to get her to where she had to go quickly — they stepped onto the walkway and approached the main door. Pausing on sensing the magical wards, Negako reached out to allow them to touch her. Feelings of shock and surprise instantly surged through her hand into her mind…which then melted into delighted acceptance and welcome. She stepped past the ward line, beckoning her companion to follow. Kyech came up, clapping her hands once as she uttered a traditional prayer to request that the Lord of Heaven bestow His Blessings upon the poor angel within this building, and then she moved to step inside…
"YAY! ONII-CHAN! LET'S PLAY!"
…before her hand snare the foot of a young girl with tanned skin who appeared to be about fourteen or so, dressed in a school seifuku even if she had bare feet. As the girl who had tried to kick aside the weird woman with the crimson hair blinked on noting that she had been literally stopped in mid-flight, Kyech sighed as she allowed her arm to bend slightly…and then, with a gentle shove, she sent the poor girl flying like a speeding bullet through the open doorway of the banquet hall to crash face-first into the floor close to the couch where Mitsune and Naru were sitting!
"WHAT THE HELL…?!" both women cried out as they bolted to their feet.
By then, the door to the Detached Hall had been opened and closed. Inside the banquet hall, Motoko was instantly at Kaolla's side, helping the dazed girl into a sitting position. "What the hell happened to her?! Was it Mizote?!" Mitsune demanded.
The kendō-ka reached out with her ki to sense what just struck down the younger girl. After a few minutes' scanning, her face then turned sheet-white as she nearly curled in on herself. "Motoko!" Naru gasped. "What's wrong?!"
"D-d-d-dragon…!" Motoko sputtered out…
…as an alien pistol was aimed at her right shoulder.
Meanwhile, inside the Detached Hall…
"Eh?! You're the Saikō Jinseijutsu?!"
"The same. You may now address me as Moroboshi Negako, Keitarō."
Keitarō — who had been helping Toshiko try to revive Shinobu — blinked several times, and then he pointed at her. "You were in Ataru's subconscious mind for TEN YEARS?!"
"That is correct," Negako affirmed with a nod.
He then blinked as he considered that — T'aeja had told him over the years about her bodiless "sŏnbae-nim" who had first been created a thousand years before and had gained full sentience in 1808 — for a moment before he laughed. "Well, it's an honour to meet you, Negako-sama!" he stated as he bowed politely to her, which she returned with a nod. "Um, so who's your friend here? Is she one of these…Noukiites I heard about?"
"You know of us?" Kyech stated.
He nodded. "Hai. After your friends brought all of Ataru's classmates back, they gave an interview about what happened on Uru." He sighed. "Well, if you did that to help Negako-sama get her own life, Ojō-sama, thank you very much."
Kyech smiled as she moved to give him a proper hand-salute. "I am Seu-P'ye Yesu-Re Hechnich'-K'ekhech of Ait'uch Nehech, born in this life in the city of Ryekkyuk on the planet Noukiios," she stated with a bow of her head. "My childhood name is Kyech. I give my name for you to use, Master Urashima Keitarō, spirit-brother of the Venerable Lady Angel T'aeja of Chosŏn."
Keitarō blushed before bowing to her. "Arigatō, Kyech-sama."
"There is no need for that level of formality with either of us, Keitarō," Negako stated. "I care not for honorifics of any sort…and truthfully, neither does Kyech." She then gazed on the beautiful katana now in his hands. "I see you have been used several times since last we met, T'aeja. Was it voluntary?"
No, it wasn't, Sŏnbae-nim! the tokkaebi within the fireplace poker-turned-bladed weapon huffed. Some stupid girl — who's an even WORSE disgrace to her Art than Motoko-ya can be at times! — came by to snare me from the storage room every once in a while when she 'needed my services.' Thanks to what your father did to me when he stopped me from killing the idiots that brought me to this land in the first place, I couldn't resist her! Thank the Fates that the little girl was compelled by those same bonds to return me back here when she was done with me!
Negako closed her eyes. "T'aeja, is there some strange reason you are calling me 'sŏnbae-nim?'"
Keitarō could sense a knowing smirk in his "sister's" voice as she replied, And WHO'S the one with a THOUSAND years of knowledge crammed into her head?!
Negako groaned as she shook her head…and then she tensed as a faint KK-KRACK! echoed through the closed door of the Detached Hall. Instantly, she spun around as she extended her ki senses out…just as more sharp sounds echoed through the door, that echoed with frightened, angry screams. Kyech was also quick to sense it. Without hesitation, the Dragonspeaker teleported out of the room…
…to appear in the banquet hall beside a sandy-haired fellow — a Niphentaxian, she noted right away — who just nearly shot the head off a defenceless woman with long caramel-shaded hair and dark brown eyes behind glasses! Now laid out on the floor close to a couch were three other women, including the girl she flung away from the Detached Hall minutes earlier. Before he could see what sort of threat had just appeared beside him, her hand squeezed at the corner of his neck and shoulder, causing him to croak as the power of her mind overwhelmed him and sent him crashing to the floor. Sensing that Negako was moving this way, Kyech teleported herself away to summon medical assistance.
Fortunately, the woman who had literally embodied a millennium of knowledge in ninjutsu and other martial arts techniques that eventually became known as "Saikō Jinseijutsu-ryū" was quick to sense what happened once she entered the banquet hall. Noting the assailant — clearly genetically related to Keitarō's Avalonian friend who had been visiting him — and the disruptor pistol set to high stun, she moved to commence ki treatment of the badly bruised Narusegawa Naru. By then, Keitarō and Toshiko charged in, the former carrying the Yōkatana. "Negako-san! What on Earth's…?!" His voice screeched to a halt on seeing the badly hurt and bleeding women on the floor.
"Toshiko's brother came here to permanently disable the tenants of the Hinata-sō, no doubt to ensure she would have a free hand to seek you out romantically," Negako calmly explained as a flash of fire shone through the hall's windows to herald the return of the Dragonspeaker. As a troop of Noukiite medical personnel stormed in, Negako gazed on their leader. "He is the assailant. Place him under suicide watch," she stated as she pointed at the unconscious Tarash dai-Joranth, and then she indicated the unmoving bodies of Narusegawa Naru, Konno Mitsune, Aoyama Motoko and Kaolla Su. "These four women have been struck with disruptor bolts at the highest non-lethal level."
"My thanks, Most Venerable," the healer in charge stated with a smile.
As the medics got to work, Kyech peeked inside. "A platoon's moved to take Tarash's friends into custody, Negako," she stated. "I'll have another platoon find Toshiko's sisters and bring them here for their own safety."
"Excellent."
With that, the Dragonspeaker teleported away. "So he was your master, wasn't he?" Keitarō asked as he gazed with disgust at the unconscious Tarash.
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
And then…
"You knew?!"
That was a white-faced Toshiko. Sensing the fear in her voice on realizing that he had known all along about her being a Terran-form Avalonian, Keitarō chuckled as he held up the Yōkatana. "Nuna-ya told me about you the instant you came close enough to her to sense you out. She also shielded my mind from your telepathy so that you didn't panic on finding out I knew your secret," he stated before leaning over to tenderly kiss her, which instantly made her blush. "Let me tell you this, Toshiko-chan: I — don't — care!" he whispered into her ear.
Toshiko blinked several times as her mind took a chance to absorb that — hastened by her own empathy and telepathy, which told her that Keitarō was telling the truth — and then she smiled as her eyes teared. "Arigatō…"
With that, she allowed herself to sink into his embrace as she began to weep. He moved to hold her close, waving one of the Noukiite medics away when she moved to also give comfort…
Within an hour, a large crowd of confused yet curious women appearing to be between twelve to twenty-four years of age had been gathered in the banquet hall. All had been given field rations by the Noukiite marines who had come here to clear out the small team of Niphentaxians who had hidden themselves inside the city. As the television relayed images from NHK about incidents around the world where warriors of the ancient race who were Earth's immediate extra-system neighbours — they had a colony on the fourth world of Alpha Centauri A called "Tengsei" — crashed into houses to flush out natives of Phentax Two and free their Avalonian slaves, a dazed Maehara Shinobu could only just shake her head in horror at what was being revealed.
That aliens — and of a race that had actually worshipped the would-be wife of Moroboshi Ataru of all people as a living goddess! — had been on Earth spying on the natives for DECADES, totally unnoticed by local authorities, had been horrifying.
That they had buried a BOMB — one powerful enough to wipe out all life in Japan at that! — in Tomobiki in hopes of making poor Ataru ultimately bow to Redet Hensō was even worse.
But the most ghastly thing of all…
"I'm okay, Shinobu! Karan didn't hurt me! Relax!"
Shinobu tried to smile as she gazed on Kashiwamura Moe. A classmate of hers at Hinata Middle School, Moe had the same hair colour as Toshiko, though it was styled in a cute bob-cut. She also had beautiful amber-brown eyes Shinobu just thought were just gorgeous to gaze into. And she had often gazed at the physically youngest of the Avalonian assistant observers living in Hinata; ever since both met back in elementary school — Moe had been created four years ago — Shinobu had come to see the other girl as her best friend. They had even recently begun exploring their sexuality together, though neither had gone past kissing "like big girls do" and touching each other in their private places. "Still, if what Toshiko-sempai told me some of those creeps did to all your friends…!"
"Well, they'll be on their way to Hichkyech'eng once Star Chamber on Tengsei gets finished with them," Moe said as she sipped a bottle of energy juice a Noukiite medic had given her. "Especially Toshiko's brother. I can't believe he came charging in here ready to kill all of your friends just to let her get a chance at Keitarō-sempai! That's wrong!"
Shinobu nodded. From what Negako and Kyech told her about Avalonians, they were the last living remnants of a great race that had lived on a planet OUTSIDE the galaxy itself until it had destroyed itself in a horrible war thirteen thousand years ago. Because of that, people like Moe were genetically programmed to accept certain things as quite normal…just like Terrans and other races were genetically programmed to do certain things. One of those unique factors about the bioroid race was that Avalonians — who were all girls; the bioroid factory that created them was built that way — were functionally bisexual. In fact, it had been seen as quite normal amongst the Avalonians' ancestors on Sagussa for people as young as TWELVE to seek out a person of the same sex who could become a "bond-mate," then forge a life-long deep psychic bond that would be the equal of a marriage bond in every magical society on Earth. Even more so, it was also seen as quite acceptable that once a Sagussan was bonded, s/he and her/his partner would find a compatible "child-mate" to co-parent any children…which Mizote Toshiko and her friends had, in effect, been doing with Urashima Keitarō these last two weeks. Atop that, it was seen as alright for various bond-mate couples to SHARE a potentially good child-mate with each other to promote the birth of strong children…just like many girls on Earth were genetically primed to always view healthy-looking men as potential mates to promulgate the birth of strong children.
And while she knew she was slowly but ever so surely falling in love with Keitarō…
…Shinobu didn't really know if she could accept SHARING him with other people.
«You're too young to think about that sort of thing, Shinobu!»
Shinobu gasped on hearing that voice echo in her mind, and then she giggled as she leaned over to kiss Moe on the lips; now that their "relationship" was effectively in the open — alternate lifestyles had been accepted on Noukiios for over two thousand years — she wasn't so shy now with the other girl in public. She then perked on hearing footsteps, and then she gazed on Yamamoto Eriko. Like Toshiko had been to her "brother," Eriko was a Terran-form Avalonian replica of her "sister" Jelina dai-Goranda. Possessing dark lavender-grey hair that went to mid-back and eyes the same shade as Moe's, Eriko was dressed in form-fitting jeans and a button blouse that left NOTHING to the imagination as to what was underneath. She also had the look of a teacher; she had worked as a private tutor for children in Hinata over the four years she had been alive, earning spending money to use on herself given that her mistress had been hesitant on splurging on any of her "robot" slaves. Thinking on that, Shinobu could only scowl in disgust. Eriko had tutored her in several subjects before her parents broke up; Shinobu personally had no problems with her whatsoever.
"How are you holding out, Shinobu?" Eriko asked as she leaned down to place a warm hand on her shoulder, sending an empathic wave of comfort into the younger girl.
Shinobu sighed. "Still in shock…but now that I understand what you all went through, I can accept how you came to be here, Eriko-sensei." She giggled. "And if they hadn't enslaved you and put that bomb in Tomobiki, I'd think the Niphentaxians weren't so bad either. I just can't imagine how they live, not being able to create things."
Eriko nodded. "Yes, it is sad…and with what Negako-sama, her siblings, the Noukiites and the Yehisrites just did, it's going to bite them all in their collective backsides hard very quickly." She sighed. "Negako-sama has a friend she'll have come here to examine us magically to verify what we are and what we can do, then that evidence will be presented to the Heavenly Sovereign." As Shinobu gasped on hearing the physically older woman refer to Japan's head of state, Eriko added, "Once he understands what's going on, I'm sure he'll suggest to the government that we'd be allowed to stay. While I don't know the exact numbers, a lot of my sisters were moulded in the shape of Japanese women. If we move here, predictions of a 'population implosion' in Japan that doomsayers have always harped on over the last few years will be a thing of the past."
Shinobu nodded. Since Moroboshi Negako was the legendary Imperial Special Agent #49, her loyalty to the Throne was unquestioned. If she had a friend who could confirm what sort of good people Eriko, Moe, Toshiko and their sisters were like for the approval of the Heavenly Sovereign, then their being allowed to move to Japan en masse was guaranteed; even if he had no active political power these days, the Son of Heaven WAS morally responsible for ensuring the peace and harmony of the nation. Since Japan's population had been taking a nose-dive in the last few decades, getting new people into the country was paramount. Since Eriko and her sisters were moulded to be Japanese…!
"Shinobu-chan! Moe-chan! Eriko-san!"
All three turned as Keitarō walked into the banquet hall. "What is it, Sempai?" Shinobu asked as she stood up…
…and then croaked on seeing the severe-looking woman in the traditional robes of a Shintō shrine maiden walk in beside him. Appearing to be about thirty or so, she was exceptionally beautiful in the classical Oriental sense…save for the eyes, which were twin pools of pure onyx black, even in the sclera around the barely-noticeable pupils and irises. She didn't have any of the traditional shrine miko equipment like an azusayumi, tamagushi or haraegushi…but given the aura of overwhelming power and knowledge that billowed from every point on her person, she really didn't seem to need such things. "Um…!"
Keitarō smiled. "This is Yomigawa Tsukiko-sama, also known as the Lady Tsukuyomi-no-Tsukushi," he said as he moved to introduce their guest. "She was the last Mahō-Shōgun in Japan; to magicals worldwide, she's seen as a great freedom fighter."
"Except in the eyes of those backward fools in Europe, Keitarō-kun," Tsukiko said with an amused grin before she gazed intently on Eriko and Moe for a moment. "My, my! I had a few of your masters' countrymen in the village not so far from my shrine in Kyūshū. To believe they were so passionate in learning everything about life here on Earth! Should we be flattered or frightened by such a thing?!" She shook her head. "Well, they'll be gone soon…"
"What about Eriko-san and the others?" he asked.
"Oh, they can stay!" the Dark Lady of the Orient declared without hesitation. "Besides, Negako-chan had to become an Avalonian to be finally free of Ataru-kun's mind, so there's simply no choice in the matter."
Eriko blinked. "Thoughtmistress-prime, please! We don't want to…!"
"'Thoughtmistress-prime?!'" Keitarō, Shinobu and Tsukiko asked in sync.
Moe blinked, and then she laughed…
To be continued…
WRITER'S NOTES
A general note: Given that this is a background story to Phoenix From the Ashes, it would be ultimately advised to read that story — especially the writer's notes contained at the end of each part — to better comprehend some of the people, concepts and other things introduced here. If I made notes on EVERYTHING that was mentioned here which also was mentioned or appeared in PFtA, the writer's notes could potentially equal the story text in and of itself! I will try to cover basic topics, but I don't think a full recounting of things noted elsewhere is necessary.
Also, it should be noted that, concerning the Love Hina cast, the actual time setting of the series was moved up from the late 1990s to 2010. To that end, here are the ages and birthdays of the major characters as of 17 February 2010:
Seta Noriyasu — Age 28 (Birthday: 13 July 1981)
Urashima Haruka — Age 27 (Birthday: 1 June 1982)
Aoyama Tsuruko — Age 24 (Birthday: 12 September 1985)
Amalla Su — Age 24 (Birthday: 12 November 1985)
Otohime Mutsumi — Age 20 (Birthday: 3 March 1989)
Urashima Keitarō — Age 20 (Birthday: 5 January 1990)
Haitani Masayuki — Age 20 (Birthday: 6 February 1990)
Shirai Kimiaki — Age 19 (Birthday: 8 March 1990)
Konno Mitsune — Age 19 (Birthday: 31 August 1990)
Narusegawa Naru — Age 17 (Birthday: 25 March 1992)
Aoyama Motoko — Age 16 (Birthday: 1 December 1993)
Urashima Kanako — Age 16 (Birthday: 1 August 1994)
Kaolla Su — Age 14 (Birthday: 11 January 1996)
Maehara Shinobu — Age 13 (Birthday: 15 November 1996)
Sarah MacDougall — Age 8 (Birthday: 4 December 2001)
In the case of Amalla and Kimiaki, their birthdays were never listed anywhere. I used the birthdays of their Japanese voice actors, Hisakawa Aya and Miyashita Michio respectively.
Please also note that in my stories, Korean words and phrases — including city names and personal names — are written using the McCune-Reischauer system of Romanization. This system was developed in 1937 by George M. McCune (1909-48) and Edwin O. Reischauer (1910-90) and was in effective use in South Korea until 2002 and remains in use in North Korea to this day. In 2002, a new "revised" system was introduced by the South Korean government that got rid of things such as breves over "o" and "u" to distinguish the two distinct type of sounds normally be spelt with those letters (i.e. o [written in han'gŭl as 오] for the close-mid back rounded vowel like in go and ŏ [어] for the open-mid back unrounded vowel like in thought…as well as u [우] for the close back rounded vowel like in boot and ŭ [으] for the close back unrounded vowel like in the Scots Gaelic caol [meaning "thin"]), not to mention apostrophes following certain consonants which distinguished aspirated sounds. In my eyes, the McCune-Reischauer system is the more accurate way of transcribing Korean sounds into Latin letters; the new system used in South Korea can get confusing to people who don't fully understand Korean phonics. Thus, I write the city name "Seoul" as Sŏul and the family name "Park" as Pak.
As an aside, Japanese and Mandarin Chinese names and terms are Romanized using the Hepburn and Hànyǔ Pīnyīn systems respectively.
Now, the notes for this chapter:
1) The actual location of the Hinata-sō has never been given in the Love Hina manga series; all that has ever been indicated is that the dorm and its namesake city is somewhere in Kanagawa Prefecture close to the ocean. I place the city of Hinata on the coast of the Sagami Sea (Sagami-wan) on the western side of Mount Ōgusu (Ōgusu-yama) near the southern tip of the Miura Peninsula, directly opposite the urban part of Yokosuka. In real life, the city of Hinata would actually form part of the total municipal area of Yokosuka.
2) The teaser scene is set around the time Keitarō made the vow with both Otohime Mutsumi and Narusegawa Naru that all three of them would do all they could to get into Tōkyō University (Tōkyō Daigaku, known in short as Tōdai) together.
3) The Yōkatana Hinata (also known as the "Cursed Blade" or the "Ominous Blade") was revealed in the manga to have done two things. First, it was said to have turned the city of Kyōto into a sea of flame. Secondly, it was possessed by someone who had the strength to fight all the warriors of the Shinmei-ryū almost to near-extinction. However, the exact details were never explained in the manga. Thus, falling back on the folklore of Korea which I learned in the nine years I lived there teaching English from 1996-2005, I decided that the only type of enemy that could easily fit the two conditions that made the Yōkatana so deadly in the first place is a tokkaebi. As noted above, tokkaebi are the Korean equivalent of Japanese tsukumogami (literally "kami in the tool"), a type of yōkai — the catch-all term for ghosts, phantoms or other strange apparitions — that appear in old physical objects. Tsukumogami frequently appear in Japanese manga and anime, including Love Hina (as will be introduced in the next chapter) and Urusei Yatsura (note the kasa-obake [one-legged umbrella] that shows up in the manga story "Raindrops Keep Fallin'…" [manga episode #36]). The typical tsukumogami is said to become fully sentient when it reaches a hundred years of age.
A tokkaebi is often depicted in folklore as a humorous, grotesque-looking sprite or goblin; in my first exposure to the stories concerning these creatures, they made me think of beings similar to Japanese oni but with a single large horn-bud at the top of their head. While sometimes viewed as frightening, they are more often depicted as mischief-makers who play mean tricks on evil people yet bestowing good people with wealth and blessings; I will emphasize that with T'aeja. Unlike ghosts, tokkaebi are born from the mystical transformation of an inanimate object; this is the reason people draw connections between tokkaebi and tsukumogami. Like oni, tokkaebi carry a mallet or club-like object called a pangmang'i which serves as a sort of magical wand. However, unlike true magical wands, tokkaebi cannot create things with the pangmang'i; they can only affect things that already exist.
Please note that while T'aeja here will have many aspects of a tokkaebi, much of what she can do and why she does it has been badly warped because of the events that saw her become the Yōkatana Hinata. That will be explained in future chapters.
4) Namhansan-sŏng ("South Han Mountain Fortress") is a series of fortifications which were erected in the mountains to the southeast of Hansŏng (modern-day Sŏul) in the wake of the events of the Imjin War — the invasion of Chosŏn Korea by the forces of Toyotomi Hideyoshi (born in either 1536 or 1537 [depending on source materials], died 1598) during 1592-98 — that ravaged the whole country. While Namhansan-sŏng did not actually exist at the time T'aeja was brought to Japan — the construction of the modern works wasn't launched until 1624 — there had been fortifications in and around the site since the days of Paekche, one of Korea's Three Kingdoms that existed from 18 B.C.E. to 660 C.E. and would be revised briefly from 892-936 as Hubaekche ("Latter Paekche"). These days, what remains of Namhansan-sŏng is preserved inside a provincial park within the borders of the modern city of Sŏngnam.
5) While detailed explanations about the peoples mentioned in this story are noted on in Phoenix From the Ashes, I will say this about the two main races reflected on in this story, which I first created for The Senior Year story "What Price For Love?":
I based the Niphentaxians on the Iotians from the classic Star Trek episode "A Piece of the Action," but gave them a very strong religious bent. Due to their inability to create their own things, they are constantly on the search for people they view as touched by the Divine to act as cultural inspiration; the latest object of that ongoing search was Lum, who saved a Niphentaxian boy named Ōgi from being eaten by a monster when both were children. However, because of the potential power controlling contact with such "divine" beings could bestow, a "church system" developed on Phentax Two (the Niphentaxian home planet). This system allowed those who discover new "living divinities" to unleash a "Great Awakening" and create a new "church" with ease; naturally, the "faith" formed around Lum is called the Church of Lum (and its holy book the Book of Lum). At the same time, to preserve such a system, draconian laws banning anything that might shake up the social order among Ōgi's people came into vogue. This is why Tarash fears becoming an apostate; by doing THAT, he would — by NOT believing in any divinity — be saying the whole "church system" is nothing more than a great lie. Of course, the "powers that be" couldn't tolerate that, stamping down on such outbreaks as quick as they appeared; given that Niphentaxians can't create ANYTHING on their own — including their own indigenous social structures — any support towards decriminalizing apostasy wouldn't gain any sort of steam.
This, of course, heavily contributed to the whole tragic situation surrounding the Niphentaxians' relationship with the Avalonians, who are genetic cousins to the Sagussans that make such an impact in TSY. The Avalonians — I model the race of bioroids (which I see as a portmanteau of "biological androids," meaning artificially-created organic beings no different than pure-born humans) after the citizens of Olympus in Shirō Masamune's 1980s manga Appleseed, though they are all women and could be fashioned as unique beings in lieu of being always cloned from donor DNA — are not restricted genetically like the Niphentaxians are when it comes to creating their own things. Thus, when they were introduced into Niphentaxian society a hundred years before this story began, the first generation of Avalonians literally questioned EVERYTHING…which simply could not be allowed by the "powers that be." The Niphentaxians immediately enforced a genetic "loyalty lock" on the bioroids to ensure they never did anything to upset the society they were effectively being enslaved to. This also led to the policy that forbade the birth of Avalonian-Niphentaxian hybrids as such children would have the ability to create…which flew right in the face of set laws which declared that anyone with ANY amount of Niphentaxian blood was seen as a citizen of Phentax Two; slaves, after all, could not be citizens! Given an ever-growing desire for pretty Avalonians to serve as sex slaves across Niphentaxian society, any drive for abolition — as such would naturally be perceived as a direct attack on the "church system" itself — was quashed; this is the reason Ganzo dai-Louc was eventually declared the "Arch-Heretic" and driven out of his home solar system many years before this story began.
By the time the events of this story happen, the Avalonians had become a vital element of the Niphentaxian economy…hence, the reason the observers in Hinata react so badly to the news of the attack by the Noukiites and Yehisrites to free the Avalonians.
Of course, the actual relations between individual Niphentaxians and Avalonians varies from person to person and from situation to situation, as will be demonstrated throughout this story.
6) Other Urusei Yatsura and The Senior Year character and situation notes:
The Tag Race Treaty concept was introduced in the TSY story "Tag Race Mark Three" to serve as the official diplomatic agreement that allowed the "invasion" of Earth by Uru as depicted in the first Yatsura manga story "A Good Catch" to occur in the first place. Due to Urusian political issues as depicted in TSY, the whole thing about Paragraph Ten was inserted in by "pro-Terran" Urusian negotiators as a way of ensuring that those who wanted to conquer Earth no matter what wouldn't get their way.
Hifuto Syndrome — in effect, the outer space version of Ebola — and its effects were first noted in the TSY side story "Furinkan Spring II." This illness and its effects are described better in the stories A Nice Quiet Place, Let Us Have Peace and The Children of Oki-shima.
For those who haven't read my stories in the past, Moroboshi Negako was once a psionic database of ninjutsu battle knowledge and memories that became a sentient being in the year 1808. I first introduced her in the TSY story "Spirit-War Tomobiki." Her presence in the mind of Moroboshi Ataru was — as was explained in TSY — the primary reason he always chased skirts and acted like an idiot; this was meant to allow Negako the chance to gain enough ki energy to create a body for herself…with Ataru not surviving the experience. Over the years since she first appeared, I've evolved Negako into a being similar to Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation; calling her "Earth's first true artificial intelligence" is a comment I often use to describe her these days. Because of her Taoist-driven personal beliefs and worldview, she has no use for honorifics or posthumous names whatsoever; this is the reason Negako has a problem with T'aeja addressing her as Sŏnbae-nim (the Korean version of "sempai" with the "-nim" honorific that is equal to the Japanese "-sama"). As an aside, the emperor Negako refers to when speaking with Kyech on the Tarōzakura Hill, Katahito, is the Go-Yōzei Emperor (lived 1571-1617, ruled 1586-1611). The term "first year of Bunroku" refers to the year 1592; the term "eighth year of Keichō" refers to the year 1603.
The members of the Mendō Clan of Musashino — especially siblings Shūtarō and Ryōko — are major characters from Yatsura. Shūtarō first appeared in the manga story "Trouble Drops In" (manga episode #23). Ryōko first appeared in the manga storyline "The Mendō Family" (manga episodes #121-122). The names applied to the siblings' parents and grandfather here are my creation. Mendō Haruka first appeared in "The Parents' Day From Hell" (manga episode #51). And her husband Mendō Hajime and father-in-law Mendō Genjurō both first appeared in "New Year's Party at the Mendō Mansion" (manga episode #114). Finally, the Tarōzakura Hill mentioned here appeared in the fourth Yatsura movie Lum The Forever.
Finally, Star Chamber — formally, Her Imperial Majesty's High Court of Star Chamber — is the highest colonial court in the Imperial Dominion of Noukiios. In the reality of The Senior Year, this was the Zephyrites' highest regional religious court. As an aside, Tengsei (known in Noukiite as Teng-ch'ehek) is known in TSY as Jiyū; in the reality of this story, this world is still called that by the Urusians and their allies as it was an Urusian who first explored this world even if the Noukiites later claimed it as one of their colonies (which is a thing the Urusians have long resented).
7) The story behind Kyech (Seu-P'ye Yesu-Re Hechnich'-K'ekhech of Ait'uch-Nehech), also known as the Dragonspeaker — based on the Koihime Musō version of Ryofu Hōsen (Ren) — and her involvement with the Moroboshi family is best described in the flashback scene in Part 8 of Phoenix From the Ashes. The writer's notes of that particular part also contain an explanation of the Korean-to-Noukiite encoding system I devised long ago which allows me to come up with terms used by the latter race such as Ch'enguop'i as their equivalent of a tokkaebi.
As an aside, the "Black-Haired Bandit Slayer" and her sister that Jelina spoke of here were described in Part 17 of PFtA.
8) Hichkyech'eng is inspired by the concept of Rura Penthe from the sixth Star Trek film, The Undiscovered Country. I also mixed into it concepts from the Cryo-Prison that appeared in the 1993 film Demolition Man starring Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes; people will remember that those sentenced to the Cryo-Prison have their very minds changed around to ensure they would never re-offend on release. The name itself means "New Kyech'eng" and is named after the Noukiite analogue to the county of Yodŏk in South Hamgyŏng Province of North Korea. This is the site of Penal Labour Colony #15, one of the locations used by the government of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to imprison lifetime political prisoners.
9) Urushihara Satoshi (born 1966) is one of my favourite manga artists. He specializes in very beautiful character designs and is quite well known for his work in hentai manga. He was the character designer for anime series such as Plastic Little and Legend of Lemnear (he also did manga based on those shows) and he also did the character designs for the Langrisser and Growlanser series of tactical role-playing video games. Kan — released in 2012 — was an adult manga artbook he released that was based on work he did for the Comic Tenma monthly hentai manga anthology. While I personally don't condone some of the storylines often displayed in hentai anime and manga — as people might remember from my own lemon fanfic stories The Galatea Syndrome and A Remarkable Destiny, I prefer the sex to be involved as part of a good plot — the artwork of people like Urushihara-sensei is quite spectacular. All the Hinata Avalonians like Mizote Toshiko, Yamamoto Eriko and Kashiwamura Moe who appear here — outside new members brought into their group during this story — are characters from Kan.
10) Translations: Persona Non Grata — Literally "an unwelcome person," this is the term that is always applied to those who are stripped of diplomatic status and expelled from a nation; Cislunar — Within the orbital sphere of the Moon; Bōsōzoku — Literally "violent running tribe," this is the nickname bestowed on Japanese motorcycle enthusiasts that skirt if not break traffic laws; Ryōbo — House Mother; Chosŏn — Literally "new morning," this is the term applied to the dynasty (and by extension, the kingdom itself) that ruled Korea from 1392-1910; Seu — Taken from the term Seup'uk ("blooming youth"), this is the sub-caste family name prefix for members of Noukiios' Flower Youth; Yesu — Birth order given name prefix for the eldest daughter; Hechnich' — Shortened from Hechnich'kye and meaning "Sacred True Bone Lord/Lady," this is the name prefix honorific placed before a style name; Ait'uch Nehech — Name of Noukiios' first world-wide ruling dynasty, which was founded five thousand years ago and collapsed two millennia later; Hanguk — Literally "country of the Han," this is the modern term applied to Korea (in South Korea; North Koreans still use "Chosŏn"); Dōri — Name suffix for a city street; Seifuku — "Sailor suit" uniform worn by girls attending middle and high school in Japan; Saikō Jinseijutsu — Literally "supreme life path," this is the name of the Moroboshi Clan's in-house school of martial arts; Ryekkyuk — Noukiios' oldest city and the analogue to P'yŏng'yang in North Korea; NHK — Short for Nihon Hōsō Kyōkai ("Japan Broadcasting Corporation"), the national public broadcasting corporation; Mahō-Shōgun — Supreme General of Magic, the traditional Japanese title of what would be seen as a Minister of Magic (in the Harry Potter style) in other nations; Thoughtmistress-prime — The Sagussan/Avalonian term used to addressed a master at a certain educational subject or the headmistress/principal of a school (for men, the term is Thoughtmaster-prime).
11) Koreans — even more so than Japanese — use all sorts of terms to refer to one's relatives. Even more so, different terms are used depending on the gender of the person doing the addressing. The term Nuna is what a man in Korea uses to address his elder sister by; a woman addresses her elder sister by the term Ŏnni. Note than in Korean, the older sibling's name is never applied with the title as is often done in Japanese. As an aside, the suffix honorific -ya is the Korean version of the Japanese "-chan" when applied to words or names ending in a vowel; when applied to a word or name ending in a consonant, it's -a. Thus, Keitarō's addressing T'aeja with "Nuna-ya" would be the equivalent of his addressing an older sister figure by "Onē-chan."
12) As indicated here, azusayumi, tamagushi and haraegushi are standard items used by Shintō shrine maidens (miko) when performing their official duties. An azusayumi ("catalpa bow") is actually a mystical instrument that is played often in certain rituals. A tamagushi ("jewel skewer") is a special type of offering created from the branch of a sakaki evergreen tree that are decorated with paper, silk or cotton and are normally presented to the kami as an offering. A haraegushi — also known as an ōnusa — is a wooden wand decorated with shide (zigzagging paper streamers) that is used in cleansing rituals. Most Shintō miko are always depicted in anime and manga with a haraegushi.
13) Yomigawa Tsukiko, also known by the style name Tsukuyomi-no-Tsukushi (shortened always to "Lady Tsukuyomi" in English), is my own creation; she is first mentioned in The Icemaidens and the Philosopher's Stone. A traditional Eastern sorceress of the same vein as Amagasaki Chigusa from Negima, Tsukiko launched a devastating magical war in the late 1930s — parallel to the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Pacific side of World War Two (also known as the "Greater East Asia War") — to overthrow the domination of the International Confederation of Wizards on traditional Oriental magic. In the Icemaidens universe, she was killed in the Nagasaki atomic bombing of 9 August 1945…though it is believed she ultimately survived and is planning to return to power. In the universe of this story, the American Department of Magic — who had long advocated removing certain restrictions on traditional non-wand magic enforced by the ICW — realized what Tsukiko was ultimately after and managed to get her clear of Nagasaki before Bockscar came on its fateful mission. Because of her efforts to promote traditional forms of magic, Tsukiko was exonerated after the war and officially magically pardoned by the Shōwa Emperor. These days, she is something of a recluse who lives in the mountains of Kyūshū near Nagasaki…but, as shown in Wizards and Avalonians, was more than happy to come teach a bright student like Harry Potter as a way of helping put an end to the threat of Voldemort.
As an aside, Tsukiko's style name is written in the classical style as "月読筑紫," literally meaning "one who reads the moon from Tsukushi." Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto is the Shintō god of the moon. The word Tsukushi — literally meaning "amethyst zither" — is an old name for the island of Kyūshū (literally "Nine Provinces"), the southwest of the Home Islands of Japan where cities like Fukuoka and Nagasaki are found. Note that the "no" part of the style name was never written out in ancient times; only when hiragana was developed in the Ninth Century C.E. that the character "の" came to be used. In modern Japanese, Tsukiko's style name is written "月読の筑紫."