And so we came to the edge of the Forest of Magic with the two tsukumogami sisters in tow. I wasn't sure if Korindo ever actually closed, but I didn't see any lights on as we drew close to the dark, looming shapes that marked the edge of the forest.

"Hey, if a bunch of Rinnosuke's goods have turned into tsukumogami, do you think he might sell them to us at a discount?" Renko asked as we descended.

"I don't think Rinnosuke's half as interested in selling things as he is in collecting them. If he had a bunch of tsukumogami goods I'm sure he'd charge more for them."

"Hey, enough chattering. Do you see something here or not?" Benben prodded from behind me.

"Well no, not from here, but this is just the junkheap outside of the store. There's a lot more inside."

"So we're just here to look at junk?"

"Some of that junk might be people now."

Yatsuhashi sighed from above us. "Benben, do you think this human is actually going to be a useful tool?"

I didn't think that was particularly fair. Even if I was the best boundary-detector in the world, I couldn't be expected to find something if there was nothing there to find. They say only a shoddy craftsman blames their tools, but nonetheless I sighed and redoubled my efforts, looking all around us for anything out of the ordinary. It's not like it would have been easy to spot anything under these dark conditions anyway...

I gasped audibly when my eyes suddenly picked out the shape of a humanoid figure standing on the path leading into the forest, watching us. I couldn't make out any details on the figure at this distance and in this gloom, but to be standing as still as a statue on the edge of the Forest of Magic at this hour was a little disconcerting. It couldn't have been anyone from the village, certainly.

"Hey Renko, there's someone over there, on the path into the forest."

"Huh? Oh yeah. Is that a person? They're not moving, but I guess it wouldn't make any sense for there to be a statue in the middle of the road. Let's go say 'hi.'"

"What if it's a stray youkai? They'll probably attack you, Renko."

"If that happens we can rely on the Tsukumo sisters to protect us."

"Tsukumo?" Benben asked, "do you mean us? We're under no obligation to protect you."

"Of course I mean you. Tsukumogami's a long word. This is easier. You can use it like a last name. And as for protecting us, I suppose you don't have to, but do you really want to let another youkai steal or ruin your prized tools that you worked so hard to obtain? What if they were to swipe us and bring us to your new master as a present before you could?"

"...We're not going to fight someone to protect you." Yatsuhashi grumbled.

"Yeah! We'd only fight them to protect our stuff."

"Good enough for me!" Renko declared glibly as she climbed off of Genji and began walking down the path toward the unmoving figure. I followed along behind her, peering into the darkness as Benben and Yatsuhashi floated behind me and Genji plodded along behind us all.

"Is that a Jizo statue?" I asked once we were close enough that I could see a bit better. The figure on the road definitely had the general rounded outline of a Jizo statue if one were to be wearing a large, conical hat, but it was taller than I would expect one to be and was positioned right in the middle of the path. Why would someone put an adult-sized Jizo in the middle of a road? That's the sort of creepy detail you'd expect to find in a ghost story. I was more than a little surprised when the Jizo suddenly moved. Not in a particularly frightening way or anything, but I think I may have gasped slightly when the hat tilted to reveal the face of the youkai beneath its brim.

"Oh, it's a girl. Do you think she's the tsukumogami of a Jizo statue, Renko?"

"One way to find out," she said with a grin before suddenly calling out, waving her arm over her head in greeting. I glanced back at the Tsukumo sisters behind us, who were sharing a worried look with eachother.

"Heeey," Renko shouted. "Who are you?"

"Isn't it customary to introduce yourself before asking someone's name?" Came the reply. The voice was a little standoffish, but she didn't sound like someone who was about to attack indiscriminately. As we approached I was able to make out a few more details about her. She was a girl about as tall as Renko with long, dull black hair tied back into a pair of braids. She was wearing a heavy, warm-looking grey dress with a red stole that definitely called to mind a Jizo's bib topped off by a conical woven straw hat. Even her earlobes were long and dangling like those of the statues. If she wasn't a living Jizo statue, she was doing her best impression of one.

"Good evening, miss," Renko said, striding ahead of me. "Might I guess that your name is 'Jizo?'"

"You still haven't given me your name." The figure replied. "Are you two humans? You were riding on the back of a turtle. Should I guess that your name is Urashima Taro then?"

"Well I don't have a box containing hundreds of stored years on me, so I guess not. My name is Renko Usami. This is my partner, Merry. We're both from the human village. The turtle's name is Genji, and these two tsukumogami instruments following behind me are the Tsukumo sisters, Benben and Yatsuhashi." Renko said, gesturing to us each in turn.

The girl took a step back into the forest, looking a little uneasy about the prospect of meeting so many new people at once. "What are humans doing riding a flying turtle and hanging around with tsukumogami near the Forest of Magic at night? It's dangerous here, there are all sorts of youkai about."

"That's actually why we're here. We're trying to find out what's causing the sudden increase in aggression among weaker youkai."

"...Oh! Are you two Incident resolvers then? Like Marisa?" It was a question neither of us had expected to hear.

"No, we're not, but we're friends of hers. Do you know Marisa too?"

"She's an acquaintance. How do you know her?"

"We've been friends for years. She's never mentioned knowing a tsukumogami Jizo."

"...I'm Narumi Yatadera. Marisa calls me Naruko. For the record, she never mentioned that she knew a pair of humans who ride turtles and fly around at night with tsukumogami either."

"Well this state of affairs isn't exactly typical for us. At least not the part with the tsukumogami. So what brings you to a place like this, Narumi?"

"A place like this? I live here."

"Yes, yes, enough with the introductions, can we get to the point already?" Yatsuhashi interjected rudely from behind us.

"That's rather rude." Narumi said with a frown. "And what 'point?' What is it that you all want here?"

"My sister is bad at being patient," Benben said, landing just beside us and pushing me out of the way to talk to Narumi. "But you get it, right? You used to be a Jizo so you feel this power too, right? The power giving rise to new tsukumogami and demanding a revolution where we tools take over the world! Aren't you drawn to it?"

Narumi looked absolutely flabbergasted by the question. "What?" was all she could manage to say at first. Then she swallowed and looked between the two sisters. "I've got no desire to overthrow humans. Marisa is my friend."

"But you're a tsukumogami like us! Don't you feel the pull of this power?"

"I'm not a tsukumogami, I'm a magician!" Narumi cried, looking a little incensed.

I was surprised to hear that. Could an inanimate object become a magician? Surely she must be a tsukumogami that had learned magic and become a magician later, right? Maybe in a place like the Forest of Magic where the very soil was supposedly filled with magical power things didn't work that way, but I certainly wouldn't know one way or the other. Renko was apparently surprised to hear that too, as she jumped back into the conversation immediately, leaning around Yatsuhashi so that she could see.

"Oh! Did you learn magic from Marisa then?"

"No, of course not. I don't think she's in much of a position to teach. I am indebted to her though, she's the one who gave me this hat."

I tried to picture how that might have happened. Marisa didn't strike me as a particularly empathic individual so I can't imagine her putting a hat on a statue out of pity. Maybe it had been a prank? The hat didn't seem to suit Narumi particularly well as it was rather large. I wouldn't mention that though. Actually, now that I thought about it, maybe there was another side to Marisa beneath the reckless bravado that we didn't get to see. She had managed to befriend numerous youkai after all, and younger youkai in particular seemed to be especially drawn to her. Come to think of it, it had been a long time since I had last seen Rumia. I wondered how she was doing given the current ongoing Incident. It was probably for the best that I hadn't seen her recently, given the situation but hopefully someone like Marisa might be able to go and check on her at some point.

"At any rate, I'm not interested in subjugating anyone," Narumi continued. "But if you're looking for the source of this power I'd like to know too. It's driving lesser youkai berserk and even I can feel it like a constant itch on my skin. I don't want to controlled by a wave of magical energy that makes me no better than a beast."

"A wave?" Renko asked. "Is that a metaphor, or is it something you can actually sense? Does it feel like it's coming from any particular direction?"

"From the west and high up in the sky would be my guess," Narumi said, turning to look in that direction. "But there's nothing but clouds up that way. I don't know what could be causing it."

"So waves of energy are coming from somewhere to the west and they're awakening tsukumogami and empowering weak youkai... and just to make sure I understand, these waves are magical in nature? That is to say they're like something you or Marisa would work with, not the sort of power that might come from a god or a youkai?" Renko's fingers were drifting upward to fiddle with the brim of her hat as she spoke.

"That's right. Or that's what it feels like to me, anyway. I don't really know what could cause that. I was thinking about going to go tell Marisa about it, but I figured she's probably already noticed and with all the aggressive youkai out I didn't really want to have to go all the way to her place if I could avoid it. What's more, the waves have been getting stronger and stronger over time. I feel like they're building up to something big." Narumi tilted her head as she thought about it and her long earlobes dangled pendulously. Despite the rigid, stone-like nature of her posture, her ears at least looked really soft.

"Well that's certainly interesting information. Merry, do you see anything in the western sky?"

I looked. "No, not really, but it's night, Renko. I don't even know what I'm looking for."

"I knew it!" Yatsuhashi declared. "This human is useless! Come on, Benben. Leave them here, we can go find the source of this power on our own. It's to the west!"

"Wait! Hold on, Yatsuhashi. This Jizo said the power's getting stronger bit by bit, right? Maybe we should wait and see what happens instead of rushing in."

"You're being way too cautious. We should hurry in before someone else gets to it first!"

"Shouldn't we at least wait for morning? We wouldn't be able to see it if we fly off now. We might miss it altogether in this dark."

"That's what makes this the perfect time! Whatever it is won't be able to see us coming either! We can sneak up and take the power for ourselves while we've got the chance!"

"This is silly, Yatsuhashi, we don't even know what the power is."

"Fortune favors the bold, Benben! I'm going, with or without you!"

"Hey, wait up! Don't leave me here with the humans!"

"You need to be braver, Benben! This is why I'm the big sister!"

And just like that our captors abandoned us, flying off into the night sky. Renko and I watched them go in stunned silence for a moment. It was good to be free of their oversight, but I had to admit, being discarded as a useless tool by a couple of tsukumogami hurt a little.

"Well, they're gone," my partner said after a bit.

"What should we do?"

"I suppose we could chase them, but that doesn't strike me as the best idea."

"No, I think you should definitely stop." Narumi interjected. "Those two were acting really agitated. If this power is affecting people to that degree then it seems pretty dangerous. Now I really wonder why Marisa hasn't looked into this yet though. There must be something else she's busy dealing with. I think I need to go find her." Saying that, Narumi turned and disappeared into the forest without another word, abandoning us just as the Tsukumo sisters had.

There was silence for a moment longer and then Genji finally caught up with us, his slow, plodding footsteps having eventually brought him to our side.

"Everybody's gone," he observed. "What now?"

"Well, if we stay out any later we're going to get a headbutt from Keine," I mused. "Let's head back, Renko."

Unexpectedly, my partner agreed with me. "...It doesn't seem like there's anything for you to see out here, so I suppose we may as well."

"Oh? It's rare to hear you being so reasonable, Renko."

"Well there's no point charging in blindly. Besides, it's not my style to follow someone else's lead. Let's let those two go ahead and if they find anything dangerous I'm sure we'll hear about it. For now we should research and plan our approach. Besides, don't you want some dinner?"

"Renko, I think that's the most sensible plan I've ever heard you propose. Are you feeling alright?"

"I'm fine, Merry. Just a little hungry. It kinda stings being thrown away by a tool, but it might be for the best. This way if they find the source of that power we'll get to see if it's hostile or not. We need to be cautious in these topsy-turvy revolutionary times, right?"