Sumire knew she had nowhere to go but forward.

So close from the center of the blizzard, her talismans could barely warm her up. This was fine, she thought. As freezing air cut into her lungs and her tears froze before they could fall from her eyes, she thought, this was absolutely fine.

She left Natsuno in one of the houses that surrounded the shrine. The family had been kind enough to let him stay there after Sumire told them that they were yokai hunters trying to stop the blizzard. She left her coat with him, not because she didn’t trust that the kind-hearted family wouldn’t take care of him. But because—

Because…

She was too little back then, barely reaching her sister’s hip. Her grandfather was angry, really angry, at a stranger she’d never seen before. They were shouting; it was loud. Her name was brought up several times, but she didn’t understand then.

The stranger then stormed out of the living room, only pausing briefly when his dark eyes caught Sumire’s. He was silent and she was too little to understand the emotions within his eyes. Before she knew it…

He left.

As she reached the top of the stairs, Sumire stared at the dilapidated shrine before her. The snow had gotten into the hole on its wooden roof, through the holes on its wooden walls. The trees surrounding it were also covered in snow, an unnatural sight of lush green colliding with withering white.

It was there she met with Natsuno, all those weeks ago, his figure bathed in moonlight.

She took a deep, painful breath, before drawing her cherry wooden bow, pouring into it every single emotion she was currently feeling — both known and unknown to her.

And she shot it toward the sky.

I am here, sang the arrow which contained her fury. Come at me.

And come she did — a being with a body so pure and clear she looked like she was made from an icicle came down from the sky in a flurry of snow and hail. A physical manifestation of people’s desperation when winter stretched for too long, when snow and avalanches claimed lives, when the sun could barely graze the earth with its radiant warmth. She was everything Sumire currently hated.

She was Yuki Onna.

Sumire gripped the bow in her hand tight as she stood face to face against the calamitous snow spirit. A yokai of a higher order which, despite her powerful abilities, would normally seclude herself in a mountainous area.

If she was Natsuno instead of herself, Sumire would want to know why Yuki Onna decided to turn the early summer in Tokyo into a frozen winter. If she was Natsuno, she would try to reason with Yuki Onna, before sending her back to the mountains where she secluded herself for centuries.

But Sumire was not Natsuno.

Natsuno wasn’t here because he had hypothermia, because of the cold and snow Yuki Onna caused. And it made Sumire horribly, terribly angry.

She poured all the anger and sorrows into her next shot, and the next one, then the next. Yuki Onna dodged them with apparent ease, and let out a sorrowful wail. There was something nagging at the corner of Sumire’s consciousness, but she was too angry to care.

She shot trapping arrows this time, but had to roll aside when Yuki Onna tossed a sharp-tipped icicle toward her. Lighting up a flaming talisman, Sumire cast it into her next arrows, and they cut through the freezing air in a fiery blaze.

Yuki Onna let out another wail as one of the arrows slashed at her flesh, but it didn’t even stop her. Once again, she shot more icicles toward Sumire, who had finally decided that she’d had enough.

Sumire swung her flaming talisman in a semi-circle against the icicles, cutting through the air and causing a blazing explosion that turned the icicles into shards. The explosion also melted the snow and charred the pavement underneath. Yuki Onna fluttered away from the radius, cautious of the heat, and her narrowing dark eyes met with Sumire’s.

They exchanged several blows, neither wanting to surrender. The fire within Sumire raged with each icicle Yuki Onna threw her way and each talisman she used to dispel them. The serenity of the snowy landscape was now filled with the echoing sounds of explosions and battle.

Sumire knew that she was only depleting her own energy, but she no longer cared. All she wanted was to inflict hurt toward the yokai who had caused her all this anger. It was irrational, beyond absurd. If her grandfather knew, he would surely scold her to temper her emotions.

Frighteningly, she no longer cared about that, either.

Yuki Onna shrieked, loud and clear, as she shot forward, snow and ice billowing behind her like the trail of a comet. Sumire stood her ground, recalling every single gram of power from her very core, and let her anger consume her.

“You who reign over Takamagahara, whose blood runs in our veins, lend us the light to fight the darkness and put these evils in chains!”

She shot an arrow straight toward Yuki Onna, who then protected herself with an icy barrier. The barrier and the arrow exploded upon contact, but before Yuki Onna could recover, Sumire had already cast another spell and drawn her bow—

“STOP!”

Sumire staggered, and even Yuki Onna stopped. The wind and hail seemed to halt. They both turned to a figure who had somehow managed to climb the snow-covered stairs to the shrine.

It was Natsuno. He wore Sumire’s too-small coat and looked like death was creeping up to him. However, his silver eyes were ablaze with determination as he stared at Yuki Onna, even as he struggled to stay upright.

Sumire couldn’t believe her eyes.

Yet somehow, somehow, the fire within her had calmed.