Kyoto in November was cold in that graceful, picture-perfect way old cities possess—temples adorned in tea-colored light, a sky the hue of pale ash, and an air damp with promise yet holding back the rain.
I had maybe thirty seconds to appreciate that before I got to work.
I’d spent the last two days putting together seven constructs in the east wing, each about the size of a big moth.
Their sole purpose was simple: find.
Not just anything—specifically, the soul-resonance signature of a high-class Sacred Gear.
That sharp, distinct frequency a Longinus gave off after recent use.
They had no awareness, no extra functions—just trackers, given just enough form to move.
I let them drift into the city’s aether, watching through AM’s passive sense as they dispersed.
Silent.
Invisible.
No magical signature I could detect, which likely meant no one else could either.
Four minutes later, three of them locked onto something in the northern hills.
The signal had that specific bright, brittle feel—Christian-adjacent power trying to work inside frameworks that weren’t built for it.
There we go.
I tracked it the way you’d follow a scent—never heading straight for it, but looping around, gauging the way it faded more than where it peaked.
Three hours passed.
Four neighborhoods.
Twice over the same bridge.
I finally wound up in a shrine district in the northern hills, where the tourists thinned and the supernatural presence thickened until the air felt like it was holding its breath.
I stopped outside a temple gate.
Behind it, sitting on a stone step, was a young woman with dark hair.
Exorcist clothes that’d seen better days.
And that faint luminous outline of a Sacred Gear that hadn’t quite settled down after being used.
She was doing a really bad job of not crying.
I stood there.
She noticed me.
“You’re not a tourist,” she said in Japanese.
Her tone said she was deciding whether to stand up and fight.
“No,” I said.
My Japanese was careful, not native.
“My name is Lucian Marbas.
I’m a Devil.
I’m not here to fight you.” I paused.
“Are you alright?”
Momiji Nakiri blinked at me as she’d prepared for a lot of possible greetings, and that wasn’t one of them.
“…Define alright,” she said.
She didn’t invite me in, which was fair.
But after a pause—I let it linger—she stepped from the threshold into the secondary hall of the shrine.
Empty.
Slightly warmer.
She didn’t protest when I followed.
I revised my impression of her.
She wasn’t as old as I’d first assumed—seventeen, maybe eighteen—right around my age.
She carried a worn-out look.
“Devil,” she said, not sitting.
“What does a Devil want with me?”
“Two things,” I said.
“I want to talk about your Sacred Gear.
And I want to offer you a choice.
In that order.”
Her hand moved—not quite to a weapon, but toward one.
“My Sacred Gear is—”
“I know it’s been tough to work with,” I said, keeping my tone steady.
“It doesn’t fit neatly into your clan’s ways.
It’s caused some tension.” I chose my words with care.
“I’m not here because of what it does.
I’m here because of how it’s been affecting your standing in your family.”
Silence.
She looked at me.
Her expression went through surprise and landed somewhere more complicated.
“Who told you that?” she said.
Not how do you know—she’d already accepted the fact and jumped straight to the implications.
“No one told me.
I just pay attention.” I knew it wasn’t the best answer, but saying I read about you in a light novel from another dimension wasn’t much better.
“I’m not here to use this against you.
I’m telling you because I want you to understand I’m not guessing.
I know it’s hard—harder than it should be—for something that isn’t your fault.”
Something in her face shifted.
Not resolved—but less guarded.
She sat down.
That felt like a small concession.
“What choice,” she said.
Reviews and stones keep the story alive.
See you next chapter.