101. A New Encounter

The story of the Snow-Rabbit Youth is, in the end, quite simple.
His name was Xuan, and his body was once a stone statue that Kurama and Natsume had seen in a clearing inside the woodland called Shihara.

Xuan was a deity dwelling in that statue, with power to purify the forest and drive out evil. He and Cui, another deity enshrined in a different stone image, had long stood over Shihara, guarding that stretch of forest. Though life tied to their statues made years of solitude inevitable, they still passed their days simply and happily together—watching flowers in spring, snow in winter, breeze in summer, and rain in autumn.

One day, however, the nearby village land suddenly grew barren, and the crops planted there almost yielded nothing.
The villagers came crying to the statues of Xuan and Cui, begging for divine aid and pleading for the earth to be fertile again.

The two, who genuinely loved humans, could not bear to see them suffer. Yet their duty was only to protect the forest and the neighboring village from malign influences and demons, and they had no strength to satisfy the desperate wish for a good harvest. In the end, they sought help from every odd yokai that passed by and, at last, even weakened their own life-light, scattering as much of it onto the earth as possible.

But nothing changed.
Even though the guardian deities offered up their own life-force, they still could not summon the divine power needed to enrich the soil.

This was not Xuan and Cui’s fault; it was the limit of their station. Yet villagers, driven insane by famine and stripped of reverence, blamed everything on them at last. They denounced the two as useless gods, as divine protectors no longer needed, and in their rage beat the statues with whatever sharp tools they could find—hoe, shovel, anything at hand.

“They said we were useless, that we were gods no one needed, that it would be better to destroy us,” the rabbit-eared youth murmured, his ice-blue eyes brimming with pain and dread, his head lowered.

“Cui wept and begged them, saying, ‘We love you! We prayed for your happiness every single day, day after day!’”
“But our words never reached those people.”

“That one time, I was badly damaged beyond recognition. I can’t even be called a lion anymore. And Cui…”

Cui was pushed to the bottom of a ravine and shattered, her body breaking into scattered stone.
“Because of all the love in us and the life-light we sacrificed to help, the end result was only ruthless blame and destruction. Cui’s broken statue crumbled, and from the debris she sprang out, becoming an evil spirit in grief and hatred.”

Tears gathered in the corners of his eyes. Even the rabbit ears atop Xuan’s head drooped visibly.
“The Cui who became an evil spirit attacked the village, and then… was sealed.”

“I couldn’t protect her.”
“Her body was ruined, and her heart was taken by malice and resentment.”

He threw aside the broom he held, covered his face, and sank to the ground, making tiny, broken sounds of sobbing and crying.
Natsume watched him in silence. His expression remained calm and detached, revealing nothing of his own thoughts. Even Mokana, who had briefly looked mournful upon hearing Xuan’s story, could not quite read the fox’s feelings. Yet Shirodango, knowing him better than anyone, still reached out and tugged at Kurama’s sleeve.

“Kurama…”

She had no clear reason, only faith: faith that Kurama would find a way. She believed that though he seemed unmoved by Xuan’s story, deep down he had already decided to help.

Kurama looked down into the child’s trust-filled eyes, paused for an instant, then—unexpectedly—tapped her temple.
“All right. I understand.”
He spoke softly, then looked back at Xuan, who was still weeping quietly.
“So… do you need my help?”

“...Huh?”

At once Xuan fell silent. When he lifted his head, astonishment and confusion filled his delicate face.
“But I already asked Master Natsume,” he said.

Kurama gave a small smile.
“And do you think that is enough?”

“――To destroy Cui as an evil spirit, and then, because your own statue-form was ruined so you can no longer be called a god, to fall into a yokai and be unable to resist years of loneliness and regret—so you planned to clear Cui’s karmic stain and then go with her, at least to die cleanly?”

……
Kurama had somehow seen through his whole plan. Xuan suddenly widened his eyes in complete shock.

Just then, as if to confirm it, Kurama, now fully informed by what he had heard, smiled calmly once more in Natsume’s stunned gaze:
“What if I told you I could offer a better choice?”
“A choice in which neither you nor Cui need disappear, and neither of you need fear becoming evil spirits.”

“—Is that true?!”

This time Xuan was no longer just startled; Kurama’s sudden “gift” left him stunned into a silent daze.

***
Natsume walked home after school in a listless mood.
What he had heard from Xuan the day before had been unbearably heavy. He still could not understand why a benevolent god, one who had only thought of people, could be betrayed and cast out, until he lost his place and fell from divinity into an evil spirit.

“If I had thought Xuan came to hate people, I probably wouldn’t be surprised at all,” he whispered, unconsciously petting Cat-Teacher’s ear.

Cat-Teacher, lulled by the scratching and suddenly delighted, opened one eye and gave him a quiet look.
“Not just hate or resentment. If this isn’t resolved soon, you could be in danger, too.”

“What?”
“Hey, aho—don’t you see? Xuan may become an evil spirit very soon!”

After losing Cui, some years had passed. Without the protection of divine status, prolonged loneliness, remorse, guilt, and hatred had been gnawing at Xuan’s spirit. Without the slight shield of his remaining divinity, he might already have turned into an evil spirit and joined Cui.

Cat-Teacher squinted at the dazed tea-haired boy, full of frustrated scorn.
“Honestly! When will you finally have a little sense?”
“All this trouble on your own head, and you still always meddle in everyone else’s business!”
“Even a good-natured person has limits, aho!”
“You’re not an aho—you’re a cat-teacher! Why are you so overbearing?”

Out of habit, they snapped back and forth like this, and suddenly Natsume came fully to himself.
“Wait—Teacher, you just said Xuan might become an evil spirit?!”

“Oh no, Tazo-auntie and Kurama…”
He bolted home without another thought. He didn’t notice Cat-Teacher’s last whispered warning.
“Don’t treat Kurama like you—like a weakling, aho. He’s…”

――Kurama was on his way.

***
When Natsume reached the doorway, still breathing hard, he saw that Kurama seemed to have just returned.

Kurama’s tailored, long coat clung to his slim yet firm body, tracing an alluring line that could make any casual glance drift into fantasy.
But Natsume’s attention was elsewhere.

He planted both hands on his knees, drew great breaths, and stared in shock at the two patches of white atop Kurama’s shoulder.

They were two snow rabbits—familiar beyond doubt to him.
Long green leaves had been shaped into ears; stones of red, like agate or jade, served as eyes. Their tiny x-shaped mouths looked as if casually doodled at first glance, but on closer inspection seemed to have been cut from fine obsidian and then set with deliberate precision.
In any case, he knew the shape well: the snow-rabbit form he had once molded for Xuan was exactly like this.

And he also knew his own materials had never been as luxurious as those on Kurama’s shoulders, so that now, noticing closely, even those green leaves looked anything but ordinary.

“Kurama, what is this…?”
After his breathing steadied, Natsume stood and asked immediately.

Kurama followed his line of sight and glanced at the pair on his shoulder.
“Oh, this?”
He gave his mouth a slight upward tilt.
“They are the new shikigami I’ve taken in. Their names are Xuan and Cui. You should have already met one of them, shouldn’t you?”

Seeing Natsume’s astonished eyes widen as he listened, Kurama’s smile grew a little deeper.

***
Kurama’s own yokai power naturally leaned toward wood and life.
With reinforcement from his mind-force, that trait grew even stronger.
So, even if another terrifying S-rank yokai stronger than Kurama himself had come today, it is doubtful they could guarantee saving Cui, already an evil spirit, or Xuan, whose life-light had faded almost to extinction. Yet Kurama could do it.

Using excellent materials, he reshaped their bodies and selected leaves from the most precious demon-world tree—Evergreen Wood—for the rabbit ears, to grant them purer and greater life-force. He worked through most of the afternoon and, just before Natsume returned home, had finished new bodies for both and settled them in as residents.

Bringing home the two who had freely become his shikigami, he met Natsume arriving around the same time as expected. Seeing the boy’s naked shock and puzzlement, Kurama’s lips curved into a quiet, slightly proud smile.

He did not help these former gods, who were no longer gods, from pity alone.
To do so cost him real effort and thought for two reasons. One: Kurama genuinely liked the rabbit-eared youth concept, and it had simply amused him. Two: he truly did need two capable shikigami to stay by his side.

His servant pandas could handle most of the chores and keep him comfortably cared for wherever he went, but in truth they had no personality or self.
And as Mokana once said, after long journeys even a fox can feel lonely.
He did not demand a travel companion exactly, but one or two shikigami...
That, after all, is something one can have.

So for many reasons, Kurama stepped in to save those two former gods whose original ending had been to vanish together, then used the original concept to forge new bodies for them.
Now, as the pair of rabbit-eared figures stood behind him, receiving the full, clear gaze of Natsume and Cat-Teacher, Kurama touched his chin and suddenly felt this sudden impulse had been well timed after all.

From that day forward, Xuan and Cui, the two snow-rabbit shikigami, settled in Kurama’s house. They all lived together in cheerful companionship, doing chores, and sometimes—if the master wished—both would take their rabbit forms and play to everyone’s delight, even with Shirodango Mokana. For once, Kurama’s home no longer felt so hollow and cold.

That afternoon, while Kurama went out with three of the young ones from the house to run errands, he happened to pass a café in town. In its window he saw a familiar figure and froze.

“Natsume?”

This child did not seem like the type to wander into a café on his own for a snack.
Kurama kept wondering, and in the instant he made out the two people across from Natsume, he was rattled.
He could understand Natori Shunichi—after all, they were old friends. But who was that black-haired youth beside him?

“I know they’re friends in school, that I can accept. But I have never heard that Ren Toga and Natsume were ever close!”

For a moment, Kurama felt that the thought he once had—that he would no longer be surprised by this world’s messiness—had perhaps come far too early.

Author’s note: So the snow rabbit was prepared as a shikigami for Kurama. I had already said a fox who travels alone for too long can grow lonely. The question of a partner remains undecided, and it may seem redundant, but a shikigami can stay with you at all times. They also help with daily life, and if you meet a fifth-grade trashy opponent, the fox need not fight personally. *swoons happily at his own cleverness*

So the “new encounter,” in fact, refers to Great Deity Ren Toga.
If it were not for Ren Toga’s overwhelming supernatural traits, he would still make an excellent companion pairing, too.
The author is, as always, a firm Toga loyalist… quietly covering her face.

The chapter’s bonus image shows Kurama’s new shikigami: Xuan, the rabbit-eared youth.
*Ruff!* A rabbit-eared setup really is such a wonderful concept—adorably excellent!

As usual, the regular preview for next chapter: Hot Spring Trip.
Natori invites Natsume on a hot spring trip, and somehow Kurama, merely passing by, is somehow included as well. What exactly is the relationship between Ren Toga and Natori? How did they end up together, and why are they both coming to find Natsume? In the confusion of that trip, there seems to be a “surprise” the fox has not yet anticipated. Please look forward to next chapter, “Kurama the Fox: Hot Spring Trip”!

Roll on and keep writing—very well-behaved, very easy to raise and take care of.