At some point during the evening patrol, it started to rain lightly again. It hardly troubled her, but Sumire still went and bought an umbrella at a nearby convenience store so she could continue patrolling without getting wet.

She was just walking out of the store when she sensed a spiritual disturbance. It was weak, but she still went to check just to be sure. She followed it to its source and found that she was right; she found an amefurikozo not far from her position, which skittered away as she came close.

Amefurikozo was a rain-bringing low level yokai. It took the shape of a small, malnourished child with a pair of horns on the top of its head. It wasn’t dangerous nor was it particularly strong, but the rain it brought would also bring bad luck. It wouldn’t do to leave it unattended like this. She summoned her bow and readied herself to seal it, when someone walked past her.

It was Asagiri Aoi.

“Let’s not do something unnecessary”, Aoi said, and in that moment, Sumire realized that it was the first time she heard the other girl speak. Her voice was light, like summer rain that fell gently over dewy soil.

Sumire raised her eyebrows.

“What do you mean?” she asked, confused.

“This little one has been following me around all day. It means us no harm”, Aoi answered as she approached the amefurikozo. She kneeled before it, and it leaped into her arms happily — as if a spirit as low-level as amefurikozo had the capacity for happiness.

“You’ve been followed by a yokai?” Sumire asked again.

Aoi made a small shrug with her shoulders, while still holding the amefurikozo like it was a doll. Like it wasn’t some ugly thing that came from Yomi.

“Water yokai often follow me”, Aoi answered easily. “They are much friendlier than humans.”

Being followed by yokai was usually a sign of a curse, Sumire thought, alarmed. She was about to voice her concern, but Aoi beat her to it.

“It’s alright. They never harm me or everyone around me”, she said. “Most of the times, I can coax them back into the crack in Yomi from where they fell through.”

There were several things in Aoi’s statement that alarmed Sumire. Her head spun in confusion as she tried to parse the information one by one. Firstly, she had no idea that Aoi was a yokai hunter too. Otherwise, it would be impossible for her to ‘coax’ a yokai back into Yomi.

Secondly, what crack in Yomi?

“I’m not a yokai hunter”, Aoi said, as if she could read Sumire’s thought. She lowered the amefurikozo in her arms into her lap, and it stared at her face adoringly. Aoi lowered her gaze to it, her expression fond. “You know that student from 2-A, right? Tamamo no Mae’s son? I’m half-yokai like him.”

Ah. Suddenly, everything made perfect sense.

“Your mother is an Ame Onna”, Sumire guessed. That would explain Aoi’s affinity with water spirits and the rain that often followed her.

The amefurikozo made a babbling noise to Aoi, making her smile. Sumire had never seen someone see a yokai with such fond expression before. Sumire could even say that Aoi’s expression was almost motherly.

“Can you understand what it said?” Sumire asked, suddenly feeling curious.

Aoi raised her gaze from it and met Sumire’s eyes. Under the warm street lamp, her eyes appeared lilac, like hydrangeas that grew on the abandoned shrine up on the hill. Sumire had never seen an Ame Onna before, but she knew that they somewhat had an affinity for hydrangeas, which bloomed beautifully in rainy season.

“It asked if you liked the rain”, Aoi said to Sumire, breaking her out of her thought.

Liked the rain? The rain amefurikozo brought would bring bad luck, this Sumire knew from the Yokai Codex. An opposite to Ame Onna’s rain, which was said to bring good luck. Perhaps that was why the amefurikozo was attracted to Aoi — they were polar opposites, canceling each other’s fortune-making abilities and thus, creating a balance in the nature.

Sumire raised her head to the darkening sky. It was still raining lightly, but it wasn’t really a bother to her. Really, the rain felt just like any normal summer rain, calming and refreshing.

“The rain is nice”, Sumire told Aoi, and somehow, amefurikozo’s little face brightened like it could understand her.

“See? I told you it was nice”, Aoi tutted at the amefurikozo. She placed it on the ground and stood up, picking up her frog umbrella from her side. “Alright, now show me where you came from.”

The amefurikozo hopped excitedly and hopped away. Aoi walked a few steps to follow it but stopped to tilt her head, as if telling Sumire to follow her. Sumire did as she was asked, and followed the odd pair into a familiar neighborhood.

The abandoned shrine.

As it always were, the forest surrounding the shrine was dark. Aoi took her phone out and turned its flashlight on so that they wouldn’t lose the amefurikozo. Hydrangeas of various colors bloomed among the tall grasses, but their colors looked pale, unhealthy.

Among it was a pulsing ball of darkness, miasma spilling out of it like polluted water coming out from a rusted tap. Sumire could feel the hairs on her nape stood from the evil aura emanating out of it, but she tried to shrug the feeling off. The amefurikozo stopped under it and pointed at it excitedly.

“You fell from here? Good job”, Aoi praised it. “Come on, it’s time to go home.”

The amefurikozo hopped into Aoi’s arms again, and she helped it go through the crack in the reality. The small yokai disappeared into it, and the crack followed after it — leaving nothing behind as if it was never there before. Sumire was stunned.

She had never read something like this in books about Yomi before. Was this the reason why there was seemingly an endless amount of yokai roaming the land? They fell through these cracks? Why did no one know about this before?

“This is getting worrisome”, Aoi muttered as she stared at the empty spot where the amefurikozo disappeared.

“What do you mean?” Sumire asked.

“These cracks appear more and more often than before”, Aoi answered, turning to Sumire. An indescribable expression etched on her face, making her look like the cold and scary Asagiri Aoi that people knew. “They’re small now. But can you imagine once they grow bigger?”

Sumire couldn’t answer that question, and she thought the answer was rather scary to think about too.