More than three hundred years ago, humans lived on the earth completely unprotected from the demons hunting them down for their flesh, blood and spirits. Thousands of human souls were taken before the year came to an end. One man named Jigoku Unmei altered the history of the humans in his village of Heiwa on a war campaign through the southern regions of the capital. A great battle within the forests raged on for a year, and within that year half of the foliage had been burned down. Amongst that foliage, however, Unmei discovered that the demons in the region that normally feasted on the fallen warriors' flesh and bone ran from the battlefield. Burials of the fallen warriors were able to be conducted without interruption. There was something amongst the burnt remains of the forest that drew them away.

Unmei sent a group of men to retrieve every variation of plant that was burned in the forest and to bring it to him, but the group was sent to their doom when the stronger demons came to devour them. With great courage, Unmei marched into the forest himself and collected several plants. A smaller demon that seemed rather harmless followed Unmei into the forest as he was rummaging through the ashes, and Unmei discovered after picking up a branch still burning from a smoldering flame that the demon was weak against this single plant and ran from him. The samurai went to the emperor with his discovery and created the first anti-demon incense. All throughout the kingdom and its borders, the incense was burned until waves of smoke filled the land. Many demons were drawn away from Heiwa and attacked the warring nation, decimating their numbers until they had to surrender.

The king of the warring nation was curious. Why were the demons running from Heiwa and into his kingdom? Why were only the stronger demons remaining in place? In a desperate attempt to save his people, the king met with Heiwa's emperor and asked what protected them from demons. The emperor called Unmei from his home and had him explain his discovery. Unmei's incense was distributed widely over the land to protect man from these demons, but the samurai was not satisfied with just the incense. The stronger demons still ravaged the land and needed to be stopped somehow. Thus, Unmei's search for stronger weapons and repellants began. Finally, a messenger from the heavens gave Unmei the Kaishi Novum, a spear crafted from the tears of a deity and the hope of man.

Unmei used this spear to battle the stronger demons and found new plants to make stronger incense that could repel demons. He decided to use this new weapon for good and protect the people of Heiwa from malicious forces. When his life was coming to an end, he passed this power down to his son who was worthy enough to continue finding ways to tame or repel the demons. This weapon now falls in the hands of my strongest warrior, Jigoku Meioshi...

"Lady Meioshi!" a young male voice called.

A woman with dark hair pinned atop her head into a bun turned slightly to the creature approaching her. Her shoulders were covered in a thick fur shawl as the snowy winds passed over her neck. Her hands were only half-gloved as she pulled down her scowl to reveal red-painted lips. She blew air onto her palms in an attempt to warm them, but it was impossible to find warmth in this part of hell. She only rubbed her fingers together and shook her head at the futile gesture. The creature hovered into her line of vision and blinked its large green eyes at her in curiosity. He hummed in response when the woman looked at him as he floated there.

"Yes, Caritas?" she asked.

"You can't go very far in Koridetudi," Caritas said, moving to Meioshi's left. His red and white robes fluttered about like a dream as he flew quietly. You couldn't even hear the wind behind him. He then continued, "Your mianyi isn't strong enough."

"Pity. I have a mission near that pond over there," she said, pointing at her target.

Caritas hummed in disapproval but shook his head lightly before twirling around and drawing a bright light from his chest. He placed the light in Meioshi's chest and led the way down the cliff. Closing her eyes, Meioshi ran off the cliff to follow Caritas and leapt down to feel the icy winds along her cheeks. The snowflakes were becoming sharper and more dangerous as she swooped down the cliff. The powers of hell now becoming angrier. Fairly soon, the demons here would awaken and force her to remain in the world of ice. Seeing a large rock protruding from the cliff, Meioshi flipped her body around and landed on the stone only to awaken a trapped mortal from its tomb. It burst out of the stone and grabbed at Meioshi's ankle, but she flipped around quickly to run the rest of her way down. The vengeful spirit crawled on its hands to chase her down the cliff in response, waking other spirits from their tombs of ice. Meioshi grunted at this and removed a silver spear from its holster on her back.

She ran even faster down the cliff until she reached the bottom and sharply pivoted on one foot before leaping high into the air. Twirling the spear around to generate power, Meioshi dove down onto the spirits and unleashed a blast of power that took the form of several spears to destroy the spirits. Only a handful were left and they had begun to cower, but Meioshi couldn't let them live. They could call on stronger demons, which would disrupt her mission, or group together to kill her. The latter seemed to be their choice as they were beginning to fuse together.

Caritas took this chance to appear next to her and said, "Don't let them join together!"

"Yes, Caritas, I can see them," Meioshi responded, getting into a fighting position.

"No, I mean don't let them join with the spirits still trapped in ice. They're stronger at the bottom!"

Meioshi gasped at this and began striking the demons with her spear. Only two spirits were able to fuse with a stone at the base of the cliff, and they used this power to strike Meioshi in her stomach and send her flying. Though the pain was great, the wound was small enough for her to keep going. She regained her footing quickly and struck back with equal ferocity. The battle went on like this for a while until Meioshi won. Her first wound was beginning to grow a bit in pain. She staggered back to feel it sending a burning sensation along the front of her body. Her arm was trembling a bit as she brought a hand up to hold herself together. Caritas floated next to her and used some of his power to heal her. He couldn't fully help her until she was out of this level of hell.

"We have to hurry," he said with some worry. "These wounds will continue to grow here. Your mianyi has weakened."

"Can you restore some of it?" Meioshi asked, turning to walk away from the cliff.

"Not right now. If I use more power, more demons will come to fight you and stronger ones at that," Caritas explained, flying faster.

Meioshi began to run lightly to keep up with Caritas. As they trekked their way through the icy plains, she could feel the snowflakes cutting her skin like small fragments of glass. She raised her scowl over her mouth to protect her face and ran at a faster pace to hurry the mission along. Even the trees in Koridetudi sprung to life and grabbed at her shoulders to make her one with the vengeful spirits. She detached the sticky branches from her shawl and body by twirling her spear about and continued running. A large demon emerged from the snow to her left and ran next to her in big, pounding footsteps, making the ground beneath her gyrate and lift her up to the point where she was close to galloping across the plains. This demon was far too strong her to combat with just the spear.

She got into a fighting position anyway and ran faster to get a good look at it. It was furry and skeletal like a malnourished dog, but it could easily disguise itself in the snow. Both its fur and bones were white enough. When she approached the pond, the demon leapt from her side and in front of her. The impact of its land, however, caused the earth to crumble and Meioshi fell through a hole.

"Lady Meioshi!" Caritas cried.

Meioshi only screamed as she descended. Her heart felt like it was leaving her body as she fell into darkness, but the light of Caritas in her chest lit her voyage down and collapsed onto a bridge made of slippery ice. Water was dripping down in places under the pond. The demon that was chasing her before looked down into the ice, sensing the light, and punched the pond's layer of thick ice to get to her. Her spear was lost from the impact of the strike as it fell to the bottom, and Meioshi was soon sliding down the spiral of ice surrounding the pond's layers. Shielding herself from another strike the creature lay, she recovered quickly and repositioned herself to skate down the spiral until she grabbed onto a protruding spike from the layered bottom and readied herself for another attack. The demon above jumped onto the pond until the entire structure of ice cracked from impact and began its descent to the darkened pits.

From the light above, Meioshi was able to spot a glimmering piece of silver below. She took a deep breath, released the spike, and wall jumped from wet mud and stone to ice until she reached the silvery object. It was the hilt of a sword jammed into something. Seeing the ice structure and the demon coming down from above her, she unjammed the sword from its hearth, wall jumped again to reach a hole in the dirt wall, and barrel rolled onto walkable surface. She hid in the shadows as the ice and monster fell all the way down to the bottom. When all was silent, she breathed in relief and took a look at the sword. A large warm orange gemstone was embedded in the blade, and its hilt was covered in fine leather. A soft noise disturbed her as she admired the weapon and she quickly positioned herself to fight. When she saw it was only Caritas flying rapidly towards her, she sighed in relief and then held an arm to capture the creature in a brief hug.

"Lady Meioshi!" Caritas cried. "I thought you were dead!"

"So did I," she said, walking to the cave's opening. At least she thought it was a cave. She continued, "Can't say the same for my Kaishi Novum. It is at the bottom."

"You just have to call for it, silly goose," Caritas said, smiling gently at the woman.

"Hm?"

"Call it," Caritas said.

"Kaishi Novum, return to me!" With that, a strong light began to appear in Meioshi's hand and the silver spear returned to her side. She then looked at both weapons and then to the creature next to her. She asked, "Caritas, what is this sword?"

"Looks like Baohu qi Voluptitas," he said, flipping his white hair to the right to see the sword's full length. "The sword wielded by the protector of paradise and forged from the fires of heaven above. That's very strange for it to be here."

"It has a single stone embedded in it," Meioshi informed, holding the sword up. "Maybe that means it can help me travel through the first level of hell easier."

"Let's go home and see," Caritas said, embracing Meioshi and engulfing her in light.