Chapter 207: The Aya Tengu Young Lady: (Questionably) Upright and Honest

Ba Yun Zi is absolutely brilliant at courier delivery — by someone unwilling to reveal their name.

Splash! Splash!

Continuous sounds of water echoed endlessly beside their ears.

Thick smoke rose from the peaks of distant mountains; the distant sky held a faint gray-black hue, and upon careful sniffing, a faint scent of sulfur lingered in the air.

Indeed, Hachinohe is an active volcano, and after careful sensing, one could detect its towering streams of spiritual and vital water vapor, infused with a trace of scorching heat — a perfect harmony of water and fire.

"So beautiful, family!"

Compared to Daijyama, a place brimming with demonic energy and crawling with wild primitives, Hachinohe was several orders of magnitude more beautiful — countless towering trees thrived in lush greenery, and the ground was carpeted with a riot of fallen blossoms in every hue.

Beside them flowed a waterfall like a silken ribbon plunging straight down, its torrents pouring into a pool, churning ceaseless spray.

The depth of the pool's center was unknown — any shattered rocks or broken branches swept down by the waterfall vanished into a froth of water.

Along its outermost edge, near their feet, the water was calm and transparent, revealing the bottom: rocks shaped like turtle shells, cracked and uneven.

Formed from hexagonal basalt blocks cooled after volcanic eruption, this vast pool stretched over a mile in every direction.

The surrounding cliffs, too, appeared carved into hexagonal pillars as if shaped by divine hands.

"Isn't this Xuanwu Marsh? Is River Child Heavy Industry doing something here?"

Though tengu, like oni, were scattered across the nation, their presence and legends were mostly confined to remote mountain wilds.

They had their own codes of conduct and behavioral norms, forming a strict social hierarchy with clear divisions — more civilized than humans and other savage yokai.

Yet since this place was inherently a "closed mountain," outsiders could not verify whether any of this was true, leaving only rumors circulating beyond its borders.

The more civilized the tengu became, the more arrogant they grew, the less willing to interact with the mortal folk below, preserving their solitary nobility.

Traditionalist tengu who advocated seclusion primarily dwelled in great mountains and rivers — such as Atago, Kurodani, Koya, and Asama — and now standing before Jia Qi was Hachinohe, Japan's tallest peak, the sacred ground of all tengu!

Excuse me, but to answer certain questions — isn't Japan's tallest peak Mount Fuji? How did it become Hachinohe?

— It's the doing of the Fuji God, the Cherry God, Ye Ji.

The mountain deity of Hachinohe is Shi Zhangji, sister to Kaiye Ji — though "sisterhood" among gods is pure plastic; perhaps they were once close, but…

…not for long.

Soon as expected, one day the two sisters quarreled over which mountain was taller — Fuji or Hachinohe — and proposed connecting them with bamboo tubes filled with water. The water flowed from Hachinohe toward Fuji.

Defeated, Kaiye Ji flew into a rage and struck Hachinohe, lowering its elevation below Fuji's.

"This woman seems a bit too extreme."

Yet mentioning her now isn't without reason — the mastermind behind the postscript of the Taketori Monogatari was Kaiye Ji!

Centuries ago, the Moon Princess, Hōrai-san Kiyohime, left behind an elixir of immortality. Under various pressures, the Emperor was forced to decide to destroy it at the place closest to the Moon — to rid himself of this hot potato…

The malicious goddess Kaiye Ji refused the Emperor's request, incited the samurai escorting the elixir to kill each other, and through a twist of fate, created an immortal Hōrai man at the cost of an upright man's death.

By bloodline, that Hōrai man — now unknown, hunting yokai in some forgotten corner — was the distant ancestor, generations removed, of Yuyu Zi: Fuwari Mihong!

The complexity rivaled a six-nation grand alliance drama.

"Not sisters? Why didn't you call me when the Taketori Monogatari happened?!"

Jia Qi, heartbroken over missing Kiyohime's iconic scene and the fragile Mihong, accused the Yokai Sage beside him.

"It's my fault?" Ba Yun Zi pointed incredulously at her own face, then immediately prepared to unleash the "Realm of Wave and Particle" on this unreasonable fool, ready to blind him with danmaku.

"Wait…"

Jia Qi raised a hand to stop her, his expression shifting — he had sensed something.

The wind's sound and air currents carried a slight dissonance — faint, almost blended into the breeze — yet it escaped none of his senses. A flicker of black vanished from the corner of his eye, gone in an instant.

"Was that crow feather?"

Ba Yun Zi asked uncertainly; the thing had moved too fast, leaving her only a fleeting afterimage.

"Wrong! It's an Aya Tengu!"

Jia Qi's face split into a wicked grin.

Ba Yun Zi suddenly felt a chill — as if some yokai were about to meet misfortune.

Above the myriad low-tier tengu — Yamabushi Tengu, White Wolf Tengu, Leaf Tengu, Cunning Tengu (bushi)… numbering in the tens of thousands — stood the Great Tengu.

The Aya Tengu ranked below the Great Tengu but above the low-tier, forming the mid-to-high echelon of their kind — notable for… exceptional flight ability!

As legends of speed, their strongest could break the sound barrier with a single wingbeat — and the one that had just appeared before them was faster than any other.

"Hey, Aya Tengu Young Lady, wait—!"

The moment "wait" left his lips, Jia Qi vanished from his spot.

"Boom!" "Boom!"

Though Jia Qi was tall and muscular — appearing slow and clumsy — under the power of Thunder God Steps, his speed surged beyond supersonic, his body streaking like a meteor, leaving a faint white trail in the air.

"One!" As he spoke the second word, his legs swelled violently; immense power exploded midair, a gale so fierce it seemed to blot out vision, erupting from his toes with overwhelming force.

Perhaps lacking finesse or endurance, in short-range, full-speed dashes, he would not lose to any yokai.

"—Down!!"

A hand like iron tongs pierced through the wind pressure, fingers curling into claws.

Loud crashes echoed behind him; the subtle sensation of fingertips brushing wings reached his brain. If time slowed, one could clearly see a girl's mouth slowly opening, her pupils contracting, gasping in terror as she let out a shrill, piercing scream:

"Eeeeeeey?! I'm gonna get caught!"

(End of Chapter)