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The Goddess Miko! Episode 1: God, today I'm also on the verge of vanishing—but I do have dignity (probably)

The Goddess Miko! Episode 1: God, today I'm also on the verge of vanishing—but I do have dignity (probably)
My hand—it's transparent. Honoka held her right hand up against the twilight sky. Orange light bled through her fingers. Not shining through—literally passing through. Her silver-white hair danced in the wind, and the setting sun melted into her golden eyes. Her small body, barely four feet tall, was wrapped in a pale violet silk dress styled like a kimono, cinched at her slender waist by a thin silver sash. By any measure, she was an adorable young girl—if not for the fact that the scenery behind her showed faintly through her body. "...Eighty units of divine energy." No one was listening. There was no one to listen. In her prime—that golden age of the early Kamakura period—1,200 parishioners had pressed their palms together every morning, golden rice stalks had swayed in the wind, and voices of prayer had reached the heavens. Her divine energy had exceeded 100,000 units. Honoka understood exactly what the numbers meant. Eighty units was 0.08% of her peak. Less than a thousandth. Even summoning a single passing shower required 100 units, and the current Honoka couldn't manage even that. Sunveil Mikageoka—the rooftop of a four-story shopping mall. A small shrine, its vermilion paint long since peeled away to gray, sat beside six roaring air-conditioning units. Ninety centimeters tall, sixty wide. Thirty-seven years had passed since it was relocated from the southern foot of Mikage Hill, where the original main shrine had once stood. Spiderwebs stretched across the eaves, weeds crowded the front—and a dandelion, of all things, was growing out of a crack in the offering box. The bottom panel had rotted through; drop a coin in, and it would probably fall straight to the ground. This was where Honoka currently resided. "...I must sweep." Muttering to herself, Honoka reached toward the eaves of the shrine. She tried to brush away the spiderweb—and her hand passed through it. Physically passed through. Her entire hand went straight through the web and grasped at empty air. "..." Silence. Honoka reached out again, this time carefully, slowly. It passed through again. "I cannot sweep it?" Her voice was quiet. Astonishingly quiet. Not the calm of suppressed agitation, nor true composure. It was simply that when something too far beyond expectation occurs, human emotions halt processing altogether—and gods, it seemed, were no different. Once more. It passed through. "I cannot sweep it!!" This time she shouted. Loud enough to reach the edge of the rooftop—though the roar of the AC units swallowed most of it, Honoka screamed with all her might. The spiderweb didn't so much as tremble. Naturally. She couldn't physically interact with it. An 850-year-old divinity, unable to brush away a single spiderweb. Honoka lowered her hand. She gazed past the rusted fence at the twilight cityscape of Mikageoka. This land, once a grain belt, was now buried under housing and commercial buildings. The Mikage Branch Vein that ran from the southern foot of Mikage Hill—a thin ley line running north-south beneath this ground—was barely keeping Honoka in existence. Natural recovery from the ley line amounted to 0.01 units per day. That alone sustained her. "What... is dignity..." Her murmur dissolved into the roar. --- That was when a visitor arrived. From a corner away from the rooftop entrance—roughly midway between the pet cemetery "Seiroen" and Honoka's shrine—a cat appeared. A calico. About three years old, female judging by her build. Perhaps she'd wandered in from some building, or perhaps this rooftop was her territory. The cat strolled leisurely across the rooftop and, without a trace of hesitation, climbed onto the stone steps of Honoka's shrine and sat down. With complete composure. As though it were unquestionably her rightful place. "...Stand down." Honoka spoke. "Stand down, you lowly creature! This is my sacred seat! Is that any attitude to take before an 800-year divinity!" The cat didn't move. "Can you hear me?" The cat began scratching behind her ear with great deliberation. With a hind leg. Rhythmically. "...You cannot hear me? Or are you ignoring me? Which is it!" Having finished scratching, the cat began licking her front paw. Honoka brought her face closer. She tried to peer into the cat's yellow eyes with her own golden ones—and in that instant, the cat yawned enormously. Mouth opened to its limit, fangs bared, tongue curling into an M. "...Just now." Honoka's voice stopped. "Just now, at me... you yawned..." The words trailed off into nothing. It was the moment 850 years of divine dignity was shattered by a single yawn from a calico cat. "F-Fine! I shall drive you off! I will show you my divine might!" Honoka thrust both hands forward. She gathered her divine energy. All eighty units, at full force, into a single point. Toward a single weed growing before the stone steps— Sss. One weed swayed, just barely. It was the level of a faint breeze. The airflow from the AC units could do the same. The cat reacted to the movement for just a moment. Her yellow eyes widened slightly, and her front paw stopped. Honoka's hopes surged. She clenched her fist internally—"She's scared! She's scared! I still have divine energy after all!"—and in the next instant, the cat turned her back on Honoka as if to say "how boring," and curled into a ball. She closed her eyes. She began to sleep. "..." Honoka couldn't move. "...By a lowly creature." Her voice trembled. "A goddess of fertility. An 800-year divinity. Bored of by a calico cat..." Those words reached no one. They vanished into the roar. The cat breathed peacefully in her sleep. Honoka looked up at the sky. The orange sky was beautiful—and that only made it more pathetic. --- Then the wind shifted. From the south, up to the rooftop. The breeze flowing from the ventilation duct of the convenience store on the first floor's east end—"Daily Port Mikageoka Branch"—rose all the way up. Honoka's nose twitched faintly. "...Hm?" She sniffed again. "This is..." Fried chicken stick. One hundred forty yen apiece, the convenience store's flagship item. The scent of deep-fried chicken drifted across the twilight rooftop. An average of eighty sold per day—and that freshly fried aroma issued a direct challenge to Honoka's 850 years of divine dignity. "Th-This is bad." Honoka turned her face away. "A god, succumbing to something as base as appetite... this is bad..." Her nose twitched. "This is bad, and yet..." She tried to compose her expression. For half a second, she achieved a dignified look. Her nose twitched again. "...I am a god." She nodded firmly to herself. "Gods do not hunger. Gods transcend material desire. Faith is the source of my power—there is no way a single fried morsel called a chicken stick could disturb my—" The wind carried it again. "...I want... a chicken stick..." She crumbled. All of it crumbled. Her 850 years of dignity shattered once more. Second time today. The fertility goddess who had lost to a cat now lost to a chicken stick, and she stumbled one step toward the scent— Her legs wouldn't hold her. Naturally. Eighty units of divine energy. Almost nothing left for walking. Honoka's small body crumpled on the spot. She plopped down on the stone steps beside the cat. The cat shifted irritably and closed her eyes again. "...I am." Honoka said. "I am simply... resting for a moment. No one is watching, so... it hardly matters." No one was watching. On the twilight rooftop, there was only a fertility goddess on the verge of vanishing and a sleeping calico cat. The pale violet kimono touched the cold stone steps, but whether Honoka could even feel it, she didn't know. Her translucent body didn't convey cold accurately. The times she had substance and the times she didn't alternated like waves. Honoka looked up at the sky. The orange of the sunset melted into her translucent cheeks. Her silver eyelashes, letting light through, swayed in the wind. Her golden eyes were deep, gazing at something far away. Should she laugh? Should she grieve? After 850 years, neither seemed to suit her. --- "What... is faith?" The murmur this time dissolved into the sky with nowhere to go. "No one remembers who I once was. The Mikageoka Akio Festival—it seems that festival still continues, but not a single person knows it was originally a rite for me. Unknowing, they celebrate it as the shopping district's autumn festival." Only on the second Sunday of October each year did her divine energy recover slightly on its own. A mere 0.5 units per year. That was the autumn pleasure left to Honoka. "Lady Kesano too... is gone now." Honoka still remembered that morning three years ago with perfect clarity. Sakakibara Kesano—79 years old at her passing, Honoka's last official parishioner. Every morning at six, she would come to the rooftop, carefully tread the dew-dampened stone steps, and press her palms together before the offering box. Her voice was small, but her prayers were certain. "Good weather again today." "May everyone be well."—Such simple words had replenished Honoka's divine energy little by little. Less than one unit per day, a thin, thin trickle of sustenance, but still. Then one morning, Kesano stopped coming. The next morning too. And the morning after that. Honoka knew. Human lives are finite. Having lived 850 years, she had seen countless people off. But each time, she never grew used to it. The silence that accumulated on the stone steps weighed heavier than anything. After Kesano died, Honoka's divine energy plummeted. At the speed of a bucket with its bottom punched out. What had been 100 units was now 80. If no one acknowledged her—if her divine energy hit zero, Honoka would disappear. "An 800-year life. That is all I have." It wasn't resolve, nor resignation. It was simply a statement of fact. For a god whose power source is faith, the cessation of faith meant death. The faint natural recovery from the ley line alone couldn't stop the dissipation. When divine energy reached zero, complete annihilation followed—this was a rule Honoka knew well. And knowing it made it all the more hopeless. The cold of the stone steps—there, and not there. The cat's sleeping breath—audible. The scent of chicken sticks—still drifting. Honoka's eyes began to close— Then. Creeeak. The sound of iron grinding. Honoka's eyes snapped open. Her golden gaze turned toward the sound. The rooftop's iron door. The door connecting the convenience store's back room to the rooftop—was open. Footsteps. Unmistakable human footsteps. The sound of feet on stone steps, one step, then another, approaching. Honoka sat frozen on the stone steps. Whether she couldn't stand from lack of divine energy, or whether hope and fear mixed together and held her down, she couldn't tell herself. "...It can't be." Her voice trembled. "It can't be—a worshipper, at this hour?" The footsteps didn't stop. One step. Another. Honoka's golden eyes slowly regained their light. The flame that had been about to die flickered—just barely, just barely, wavered. The scent of chicken sticks drifted again on the wind. On the twilight rooftop, only the footsteps drew nearer.