The smell of burnt wood pierced Sayo's nostrils. Even opening her eyelids felt unbearably heavy. Her entire body ached. A sensation of her lungs burning. Yet something else troubled her more. Smoke. Flames. And—— From the present day to the Warring States period. That realization shot through her brain like lightning. Sayo opened her eyes. What filled her vision was red and black. A village engulfed in flames. Wooden houses collapsed one after another, black smoke rising from their remains. From a distance, desperate screams echoed. The neighing of horses. The voices of warriors. Footsteps. (Why...?) Sayo tried to push herself up. Her hand pressed against scorched earth. It hurt. The sharp pain running across the back of her left hand asserted reality with vivid clarity. That pain was strangely visceral, insisting without question that this was no dream. She was twenty-two years old. Just hours ago, she had been in the library of a Tokyo university. Writing a report on Japanese