22
Masanori
Ryoka didn’t question why Masanori chose to stay, nor did he share his experience with the kawama or his growing interest in learning more about the creatures and the Nightmare. For a jun longer, they trained together. And, at last, she agreed to take him yōkai hunting.
About an hour after venturing from the Seika Shrine, they stopped at a mossy ridge deep in the forest to let Einu drink from the stream.
Masanori rinsed ichor from his palms and Seishinito’s blade. “Told you we’d be fine.”
With Ryoka near, there was no haze in the woods at all. It hadn’t surfaced during the ten or so battles they’d fought since leaving the shrine that night so far. Still, the normalcy set Masanori on edge. They’d travelled far from the point where he met the kawama, and still he’d never enc
