The Goddess Miko! Ch.2: Karaage sticks, spirit photographs, and warmth for the first time in 800 years

The iron door was heavy. With a clank, the door to the rooftop swung open. Evening's amber light came flooding in all at once. "Oh... someone's sitting there." What appeared was a young man, just out of high school by the look of him. He had a backpack on his shoulders, a convenience store chicken stick in one hand, another one clamped in his mouth, and he was studying Honoka with the expression of someone who'd just noticed an interesting pebble on the side of the road. Honoka, still hugging her knees, glared up at him with golden eyes. An eight-hundred-year-old divinity had just been described as "someone sitting there" by a kid with a fried chicken stick in his mouth. "...You. You can see me?" She put force behind her golden gaze as she asked. The man answered while chewing. "I can. You're see-through, though." See-through, though. That was not the point. See-through, though, was not an acceptable response. The situation—an eight-hundred-year-old deity sitting half-transparent on a rooftop—should not be dismissed with a single offhand remark. Inwardly, Honoka took a spectacular pratfall. That she couldn't physically pratfall, being half-transparent, only made it more infuriating. "Is that cosplay?" "It is not!" "Projection mapping?" "No, no!" The man tilted his head with a hmm. He took another bite of his chicken stick and spoke as casually as if discussing the weather. "AR, then?" "I am a GOD!" The instant she exploded at full force, an extra 0.3 units of divine energy were consumed. Honoka's outline grew faintly, barely perceptibly, thinner. "Oh, you got more transparent." "Don't point that out right now!!" "Sorry," the man said, with a face that conveyed absolutely no remorse, and kept chewing the chicken stick in his mouth. He seemed to have just finished a shift at the Daily Port Mikageoka branch—the convenience store on the first floor of Sunveil—because a name tag still hung on his polo shirt. Sakakibara Kazuma, it read. Humanity's first contact with an eight-hundred-year-old deity, and it began with AR. There was a limit to how far one could fall in the annals of history. Honoka took a deep breath. Well, technically, being half-transparent, the air didn't move much. "I will say it once more. I am a god. The venerable Honokusa deity, ruler of bountiful harvests. Eight hundred years ago, twelve hundred parishioners of this land—" "Then may I offer a prayer?" Honoka froze. Kazuma set his backpack down on the spot and stood before the small shrine as if it were the most natural thing in the world. He pressed his palms together. Closed his eyes. Honoka remained motionless, a faint "Huh?" escaping her lips. ＊ The moment Kazuma pressed his hands together, he murmured something, as if a memory had surfaced. "...My grandma used to say it. That I should ask the god of that little shrine for help." His voice was quiet. Almost to himself. It seemed less directed at Honoka and more like words that had simply fallen out of his mouth. A reflexive recollection of his grandmother's words, a reflexive press of the palms—nothing more than an unconscious gesture. But it was enough. Honoka's outline flickered sharply into focus, just for an instant. Her faint silver hair grew vivid, the embroidery on her white robes regained its golden shimmer. It lasted only two seconds or so, but Honoka stared hard at her own palms. She had fingertips. The air-conditioning unit wasn't showing through them. "...Why?" Her voice wavered slightly. Noticing it, she hurriedly tried to cover with, "Well... it's much the same as miso soup, I suppose." It was a retort that made no sense whatsoever, but her mouth had moved before she could work out what she was even saying. "What does miso soup have to do with anything?" "Nothing! Forget it!" Kazuma finished his prayer and pulled out his phone. He tapped at the screen and spoke offhandedly. "Since we're here, how about a photo? For your profile. If you promote yourself as a god on social media, you might gain more believers... I mean, parishioners." "Hoh." Honoka considered this. A strategy for gathering faith—that was indeed what she needed most right now. She had eighty units of divine energy. It was draining at roughly two units a day. If she did nothing, eventually it would hit zero, and she would scatter—her divinity would vanish. That was the law of this world. "...Very well. Take it." "Okay, let me adjust your position a bit." Kazuma raised his phone and reached out to adjust Honoka's right shoulder. And then his hand touched her shoulder. The instant his fingertips brushed the thin fabric of her white robe at her right shoulder, only that spot softly materialized. What traveled through his palm was warmth—distinctly cooler than a human's body heat, yet undeniably present. Through the thin cloth, he could feel the smooth curve of her shoulder. The evening sun was sinking in the west. Orange light poured into Honoka's half-transparent skin and passed straight through to the other side—silver hair that seemed to have dissolved the light into itself. A form balanced on the boundary between appearing and vanishing. "...Ah." A small sound escaped her. Her silver hair swayed. The two of them froze. Three seconds. "I touched your shoulder." "...I am aware." "I'm sorry." "Don't apologize, that makes it worse." She spoke in a low voice and looked away. Toward the far reaches of the evening sky. Something was spreading slowly in her chest. A quiet ripple, one she couldn't put into words. Was this what it felt like to be touched by someone? She tried to recall eight hundred years ago, but the memories were hazy. Yet the warmth that had just traveled through his fingertips was not hazy. It was being carved clearly, deep into her chest. (...Why does it feel like this?) Unable to grasp her own emotions, Honoka gave a small shake of her head. Meanwhile, Kazuma cleared his throat and pretended to look at his phone screen, averting his gaze. Just then, Honoka sneezed—a tiny kushun. "............" Honoka's outline vanished. Completely transparent. She was there, but invisible. "I can only hear your voice!?" "I—I am right here!!" Only her voice came from somewhere. Kazuma looked around, turning this way and that. "Where are you, Goddess?" "In front of the shrine! I am invisible right now, but I am certainly here!!" "...I mean, right or left?" "A little more right! No, left! Not there!!" Kazuma scrambled back and forth. Honoka's shouting echoed across the rooftop. Three crows fled from the power lines. But the warmth from that touch—it remained quietly within Honoka, unchanged. ＊ Several minutes later, once her divine energy had recovered enough for her to appear faintly again, Kazuma made a declaration. "If we gather believers on social media, your divine energy will increase! Let's attack with photos and videos." "Indeed! I leave it to you!!" Thus began their social media campaign. First, the profile photo operation. Honoka recalled the festivals of eight hundred years past and struck the most godlike pose she could muster. Both hands raised to the heavens, golden eyes opened wide and resolute, white sleeves flowing in the wind. To put it plainly, "majestic" was the only word for it. "Got it." "How is it!" Kazuma showed her the phone screen. The shrine and the evening sky were beautifully captured. Honoka was not in it. A perfect no-show. "...I am a god, you know? I am a god??" "But you're not in it." "...I'm not in it." A quiet despair flowed for three seconds. They tried again. This time Kazuma stepped closer, changed the angle, searched for a position where Honoka's outline would barely register. The shutter clicked again and again. It was on the thirteenth shot that Kazuma said, "Oh, this one." "How about this!!" "It's divine, I'll give you that." He showed her the screen. Only her upper body appeared as a white haze. A perfect ghost photo. The kind that would make someone scream if they saw it on a dark street. "Divine, is it not!!" "It's a ghost photo." "I absolutely deny it!!" "But it's a ghost photo." "I absolutely—absolutely—!!" Honoka ran out of words and pressed her temples. She pulled herself together. Next, the video operation. Kazuma raised his phone and started recording. Honoka took a deep breath—this time. This time she would show him true divine power. The Honoka of the Kamakura era could summon torrential rain. Her blessing of bounty could ripen the rice of five districts overnight. The current Honoka couldn't manage that, but she should at least be able to make a single dandelion glow. She concentrated her divine energy. Toward that one earnest dandelion in front of the shrine. "...Manifest, light of bounty!" The dandelion before the shrine blazed golden. "Whoa!?" It really did shine. A divine manifestation—a supernatural phenomenon brought about by consuming divine energy—had succeeded for the first time in a long while. Each petal of the dandelion carried light, glowing a gold clearly visible even in the orange sunset. It lasted only half a second, but it had certainly shone. The next moment, Honoka slowly pitched forward. She had used up her divine energy. Just like that, she toppled gently forward toward the stone steps of the shrine—or so it seemed, but she landed softly on the steps and then, with a soft thump-thump, lay down on her side with a small, endearing sound. Her eyes closed. Silver hair spread across the stone. Honoka began to breathe softly in sleep. "...Huh?" Kazuma froze. The recording kept running. He glanced at the top right of his phone screen. Battery: three percent. He thought for a moment, then set the phone down where it was. "Well... the charger's in my backpack anyway," he muttered. The Goddess's Nap Livestream had quietly begun. Real-time viewers: two. Someone commented, "Is that a cat?" For twenty-six minutes, no one stopped it. ＊ By the time the sun had sunk lower and the sky was tinged with purple. Honoka was asleep. On the stone steps, knees slightly bent, silver hair spread out, utterly defenseless. Kazuma sat beside her, confirmed that his phone had died, and leaned back against the wall with his backpack as a cushion. Then he looked at Honoka's profile. The orange of the sunset melted into her half-transparent cheek. Her skin was so softly translucent it looked as though she were made of light itself. Silver hair spread quietly across the stone, its tips stirring faintly in the breeze. Her sleeping face, eyes closed, looked less like a god and more like just a sleeping girl—no, more than "just a girl," there was something far more achingly fragile about it. Kazuma couldn't move for a while. "...She's beautiful." The words left his mouth, and then he snapped back to himself. (What am I even saying to a god?) He shook his head hurriedly. But on his dead phone, the twenty-six-minute recording still remained—and he didn't yet know that one of those two viewers had, at that very moment, taken a screenshot. ＊ Thirty minutes later. Honoka slowly opened her eyes. The pale purple sky. The hum of the air-conditioning unit. And Kazuma's face, still there. "...You're still here?" "I can't get to my stuff, so I figured I'd wait till you woke up." Honoka sat up and gave a small "I see." No better words came to her. For some reason, something stirred deep in her chest. Pulling herself together, Honoka checked her divine energy. This morning's reading had been eighty units. Calculating today's consumption— "...It's gone up by one unit." "Wait, really?" "Truly." Eighty-one units. It had increased. The social media campaign had been a complete disaster. A ghost photo had been produced, the Goddess's Nap Livestream had run for twenty-six minutes, and there had been two viewers. And yet her divine energy had increased. Honoka looked at Kazuma. Kazuma looked at Honoka. "...Was it my

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The Goddess Miko! Episode 2: Karaage sticks, spirit photographs, and warmth for the first time in 800 years