The samurai, along with his squad, left the village to report what had happened. I stayed behind, knowing my chances of surviving this life were slim. Before they left, one of them told me that they could not guarantee my survival and that I could leave with them.
I didn't know how to refuse.
Could I withstand it? No.
Had I ever fought a yokai before? No, I was not a warrior, and I had never held a sword.
Had I seen someone fight a yokai? No.
Did I know who the yokai were? No, I thought they were just myths.
Did I have any ability to harm them? No.
I was just a person afraid of blood, carrying swords to hand to warriors. I was a person so despicable that even scoundrels turned away from looking at me. I was a person who wrote his diary, recording his suffering — a coward who had rejected survival.
Yet I decided to stay, just to be a mere distraction for those crazy yokai.
With the delegation, the villagers left their homes, abandoning their lives. Leaving wasn't a choice but a flight from terror that had shattered their hearts and twisted their minds, making them forget how to make decisions. Once the yokai disappeared, their return confirmed madness, leading to death. To them, this land had become corrupted, unfit for life. Staying would cost their children dearly. They headed into the unknown, for even the unknown was kinder than cursed land that refused to live.
Before leaving, I turned back. Seeing them depart made me feel a tightness I had never felt in my life. I felt as though I was a fragile patchwork about to unravel, and that what would happen today would become an unforgettable hell.
My body trembled, anxiety consumed me, and I went to the inn where I was staying. Alone in this village, the inn felt like a sanctuary surrounded by monsters. In my imagination, it became a barrier preventing chaos; once it broke, escape would no longer save me from what awaited.
I tried to calm myself but could not. How could I calm down? I was constantly anxious; nothing guaranteed that what happened before wouldn't repeat itself. Miracles don't happen every time.
So, quickly, I made a cup of tea, trying not to think about the yokai.
After taking a sip, I don't know what happened — I ran to the same forest from which it had appeared. I found nothing. I couldn't suppress my emotions — anger at being left alone, tension over what I could do, and fear of confrontation.
I waited until four in the afternoon. Nothing happened, so I ventured deeper into the forest. Still, I found nothing. Yet the forest was quiet — so quiet that I sat down, unable to express anything, and I burst into tears.
Why all this happened to me when I had dared to make a bold decision? Left alone with no help? Why had I taken on something I wasn't qualified for?
I sat under the shade of a tree for two full hours, trying to relax and regain my composure. Night fell, and I decided to return. I ran fast — scared, not knowing what would happen if I didn't hurry. It was trivial, like a child running to bed, afraid a monster would appear and eat him. But that child wouldn't know — if a monster came, he would be devoured.
I ran through the forest and entered the darkened village, feeling it so empty that even ghosts had abandoned it. I opened the inn door and closed it behind me.
I placed salt by the door and locked it. As they had said, salt is the only thing that repels raging spirits but does not stop them entirely. If the door opens, they will strike.
I decided to go to my room to sleep. Yet the distance felt longer than usual. I felt it was an illusion. Looking down, I saw a small eye staring at me from the ground — a black eye, fixed on my head. It expressed no sadness or joy, no fear or worry. Why?
Because it was a single eye. I considered two possibilities: had dementia begun to appear, or was it the stress I was under? Then I heard the creak of the inn door — like a lightning strike hitting my spine. Fear and anxiety overtook me, and a strong tremor ran through my body, as if I had been struck from within. My heartbeat accelerated; I swear I felt every hair stand on end from the sound.
With this sound, new questions emerged: Was the eye watching me? Was it an illusion? A yokai?
Enough questions. I slowly turned and received another shock.
The door wasn't open at all.
And when I looked at the ground, the eye was gone. Then I heard knocking at the door. I ran to the window. The inn's owner arrived, frightened, saying:
"I apologize for scaring you, Hisamori. I forgot my belongings. Be careful, Hisamori, I saw a large shadow. I hope you open the door quickly."
The samurai told me before I left,
"Yokai can change shapes. Do not trust what you see. If you open for them, your fate will be worse than you can imagine. Unlike monsters, yokai can act easily and have no deformity in their disguise."
So I didn't open the door. Then I saw the innkeeper pounding the window, shouting at me:
"Hisamori, can you hear me? Please open the door! The shadow is approaching!"
I didn't care; almost overtaken by his illusion, I said to him seriously:
"I'm sorry. This trick won't work on me, you damn yokai."
He screamed in terror:
"What trick? Hisamori, I swear I'm not lying. I swear with all I have that I am not an illusion."
I looked at him asking for help. I truly thought it was an illusion. But he screamed, screaming with all his strength:
"Hisamori, it's near!"
Then I saw a giant hand behind me. I shivered, feeling I had failed.
"What's wrong, Hisamori? Why don't you listen to me?"
I saw an eye behind me holding a massive hand, twisting his body.
"What is this?"
His eyes turned red, and the hand gnawed at his body.
"Please!" he screamed in my face, on the verge of death. I was terrified. The eyes multiplied. The hand tore his body apart, scattering pieces. I began to cry. I heard the usual sound:
"Bon… Bon… Bon… Bon."
Blood poured onto the ground and flowed through the door. The monster was gone, but my eyes still cried. I had caused his death. I thought it was an illusion — it wasn't. The eye wasn't an illusion. The innkeeper wasn't an illusion.
The eye watched, and the terror grew. I ran — what I had done left an innocent soul perish because of my petty fear and my doubt in the illusion. But what a joke — I opened the door, and the yokai entered.
Wasn't the salt supposed to protect me? Looking down, I saw the blood had tainted it. Was there any chance of survival?
I grabbed the sword they had given me, ran to its feet, and struck. She didn't care, only looking at me, smiling with terrifying lips — a smile no one could wish for. In that moment, I felt my fate, my destiny, determined from the darkened sky, telling me that what awaited me was darker than what I was seeing.
I ran through the forest, blindly, not looking back. During my escape, I glanced to the side — I wish I hadn't. I wish I hadn't thought to look. The villagers hadn't fled because they had eaten — while leaving, they had eaten with their children.
The eye stared at me, and the yokai appeared before me. Did the eye belong to her? My assumption was wrong. The yokai approached, its form changing — skin melting, lips gone, hair vanished, hands grew, teeth sharpened. What I saw was not a yokai, but a monster — a hellspawn. It didn't have just eyes, but hundreds, plunging the world into darkness. Everything unfolded like a stage play.
There were no yokai in that area — it was a monster that projected its victims as illusions, displaying their crimes. It disguised itself as a yokai, but it was deadlier than any yokai.
I realized it was a demon breed — not a monster in name, yet a monster that would devour me.
The ground leveled, debris scattered, wind howled, and the monster retreated from a force too great to comprehend. I heard the clang of steel beside me. Someone appeared — an unexpected arrival, one of the great leaders, not an ordinary samurai. The commander Ryota appeared before me.
He drew his katana. I felt the pressure — my head nearly hit the ground. With a few precise strikes, Commander Ryota cut off the monster's arm.
He looked at me:
"I sensed the immense energy from this monster's appearance. Surviving it is a miracle. Now, Hisamori, my advice — run if you can."
When I tried to stand, the monster had regenerated its severed arm with unnatural ability.
Though I recount this from years ago, I will never forget this day.
I fled, moving away from the commander and the monster. Their powerful clash — had I stayed — would have been fatal.
I was terrified. If it were real, I would have gone insane. Moments ago, I asked Commander Ryota about the villagers, the samurai, and the forest. He replied,
"What villagers? What forest? There's no such thing."
If there were no villagers, no samurai, how had it found me? Where was I? The questions didn't last long before I discovered the shocking truth: there were no yokai. I hadn't taken leave. I hadn't gone to any village. I was still on the battlefield. What had happened lasted only two hours. There had been no child, and the innkeeper wasn't real.
I was still in the Hundred Years' War. The forest vanished, revealing a dead land filled with countless dismembered and devoured bodies. I had been walking to become food for the monster. When I turned, the monster appeared before me — Commander Ryota wasn't there.
It was imagination. Yet at that moment, the sky turned red. The monster remained, a massive shadow with twisted limbs like sharp branches, and a pure white eye, devoid of any darkness.
Its face never appeared. It had no shadow. Only the monster's gaze. The smiling monster began to cry, its body tearing apart.
During its screams, I felt time itself as the monster was savagely torn and disappeared. The entity that had surrounded it — its shadow — seemed not of this world, not from this place. Yet it looked at me and said:
"Farewell."