Prologue

  The sound of rain soaked the shrine grounds.

  Upon the slick stones, a lone girl knelt, offering a prayer into the weeping sky.

  "Please—return the sound to me."

  It was the first wish she had ever dared to offer the divine.

  She had long since lost track of how many nights she had spent,

  praying alone beneath the cold and silent heavens.

  "I want to hear." —a plea whispered over and over, yet never answered.

  The gods remained silent.

  No voice, no trembling of the air answered her calls.

  Instead, something else seeped into her heart—

  a whisper without sound, weaving through the rain, threading into the depths of her soul.

  What had been granted was not the warm voices she longed to hear,

  but the faint echoes of lives already faded away.

  Whispers of the dead, drifting unseen, unheard by any living soul.

  Memories of sorrow, abandoned and forgotten, lingering in the hollow spaces left behind.

  The pain of others—anger, sorrow, desperate wishes, relentless obsessions—

  a chorus of fierce emotions, resounded only within her.

  Amidst the endless rainfall, those silent voices became the only "sound" she was given.

  Whether it was a trial or a salvation—

  she could not yet tell.

  -Each Fragment is a piece of her silent prayer-

  First Fragment — Return to a Fading Home

  The scenery flowing past the window gradually shifted in color.

  Each time the steam locomotive rattled, the seat back against which I leaned creaked softly.

  The steady rhythm of the wheels echoed like a repetitive beat,

  almost like a lullaby weaving into the air.

  The sound, repeating like a cradle song, slowly lulled me toward sleepiness.

  In that hazy state, I blankly watched the cedar forests flowing past outside the window.

  No—if I’m being honest, I was running.

  Running away from my own thoughts.

  As I idly fiddled with the arms of the glasses resting atop my head, a thought floated up.

  The bustling days I had spent in Tokyo—

  The clamor, the smoke, and the never-ending parade of new knowledge, goods, and ideas, changing day by day.

  And now, here I was.

  Riding a one-way ticket, as if traveling backward in time.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  The sky over the city had always been stained a smoky gray.

  Factory chimneys lined the horizon, and the air was perpetually wrapped in a mist of soot.

  The familiar cityscape had quietly disappeared at some point,

  replaced by endless fields and cedar forests stretching out into the distance.

  Only the coughing hisses of steam and the heavy groans of wheels remained.

  Before I knew it, we had plunged deep into the mountains.

  "Urashima Taro... his story was about returning to the surface and finding the world had moved into the future, right?"

  "...In my case, it feels more like I'm diving backward into the past."

  I let out a sigh mixed with a mutter,

  but the old man sitting next to me was completely absorbed in his newspaper.

  No one was going to quip back at me.

  The leather case on my lap felt strangely heavy.

  No, the weight wasn’t the problem—the problem was its contents.

  A letter.

  From Mom.

  If that thing hadn’t come,

  I wouldn’t be stuck riding this locomotive with such a gloomy look on my face.

  I mean, I wanted to ride the steam locomotive.

  The symbol of cutting-edge civilization!

  What a joke—what a tragedy—

  that my very first ride had to be about dragging my weary self back home.

  Give it back.

  Give me back my ticket to youth and the three yen I paid for it.

  Three yen.

  You believe that?

  You could buy thirty kilos of white rice with that.

  Or cover half a year's salary for an elementary school teacher.

  ...And yet I spent it.

  Spent it for you, my darling ticket.

  I spent months scraping together savings in Tokyo,

  only to blow almost all of it for this.

  Yeah... I know.

  In the end, it was my choice.

  Still stings, though.

  It had been three days since I opened the envelope.

  But the words were burned into my mind.

  "Your father has collapsed. The inn’s business is not going well."

  "Please... if you can, come home, even if just once."

  Ah…

  Yeah.

  It’s heavy.

  Honestly, it was a pain.

  After spending a few years in Tokyo—

  eating whatever I wanted, sleeping whenever I wanted, studying, laughing—

  I'd been living pretty comfortably.

  And yet, after selfishly running away from home,

  I'd hardly contacted my family for years.

  They hadn't reached out either.

  Not once had they come to see me in Tokyo.

  Dad maybe I could understand, but…

  Mom.

  And now, the first letter she ever sent me... was this.

  "No way I can just ignore this."

  As much as I hated to admit it,

  it seemed like my parents had held back, saving this one desperate card until now.

  Well…

  I did want to ride the steam locomotive.

  Honestly, the ticket price had always been too much,

  but that letter... it pushed me over the edge.

  The whistle of the steam locomotive let out a long, mournful cry.

  I exhaled deeply, nudging the glasses resting atop my head,

  and turned my back on the distant town of civilization.

  The everyday scenes I'd been looking at until yesterday blurred with the train’s vibrations,

  slowly fading into the looming shadows of the mountains.

  Sixteen years had passed since the samurai disappeared from Japan, ushering in the Meiji era.

  No matter how much the times had changed, the atmosphere of the town where I stepped off still felt like the Edo period.

  It had been a long journey.

  After transferring between trains for thirty hours, the moment I stepped out of the station building, the first thing that hit my nose was—

  The smell of soil, grass, and... miso.

  No, to be precise, a feeling of "nostalgia" and "bitterness" hit me at the same time.

  It was the kind that gently tickled deep inside my chest.

  Let's just say that's why my breathing turned shallow.

  The townscape stretching before me hadn’t changed much from the memories of my childhood.

  Rows of one-story wooden houses lined the streets, and soot clung stubbornly to the stone pavement.

  A sake shop, a tofu shop, a dried fish vendor—their old-fashioned signs swung gently at the eaves.

  But before I could savor the nostalgia, I felt the sting of countless eyes.

  Old Man: "...What's that supposed to be?"

  Several villagers stood at a distance, wearing kimono and straw sandals,

  huddling together, whispering behind their shoulders.

  Am I carrying something weird? My bag? No, it’s just a normal one.

  My glasses? They’re just resting on my head—it’s not like I’m being disrespectful.

  It’s fashion. It’s the latest trend in Tokyo, you know.

  "...Still, aren't there a lot of eyes on me?"

  A shirt, a vest, leather shoes... I mean, this is standard issue in Tokyo!

  What, in the countryside I'm some kind of suspicious character?

  Am I about to get reported just for existing?

  In this town, I’m like a reverse Urashima Taro.

  Except one thing... Unlike the original, no one’s welcoming me back.

  I knew it would be like this, but isn't it a little too blatant?

  Where’s the banquet?

  Where’s the beautiful women to greet me, or the sea bream and flounder dancing in welcome?

  I haven’t even opened a treasure box, and yet, it’s just old men and women whispering around like some sad, grim welcome party.

  When I tried walking a little further, their eyes followed me, moving precisely in sync.

  ...Creepy. Their tracking abilities are way too good.

  High-spec grandpas and grandmas, seriously.

  At least try to be a little less obvious…

  The way they’re openly staring feels more like they're picking a fight than anything.

  A true egalitarian wouldn’t spare the elderly.

  My Liberty Rights Punch would’ve been unleashed by now—

  ...Well, only in my head.

  Something inside me itched.

  Probably the realization that “I'm the one who's changed.”

  In the few years I spent in Tokyo, the way I saw the world, the way I thought—

  all of it had been overwritten without me even noticing.

  And this town rejected all of it, hurling its unchanging air straight at me.

  In this town, I was like a foreign object stuck in someone's body.

  Or maybe... I was a rebel against civilization itself.

  Even though here I was, clutching the latest civilization-certified train ticket,

  the welcome party was exactly zero.

  As I grumbled internally and kept walking,

  the only thing that greeted me was the musty smell of damp earth and old wood.

  As I walked down the path, a little kid passing by pointed at my feet and shouted,

  "Hey, mister! Your shoes are super shiny!"

  Another kid chimed in, laughing,

  "Mister, you’re dressed all funny! Are you some kind of priest doing a ritual?"

  Their brutally honest comments pierced straight through my ears without mercy.

  I sighed and played along.

  "This," I said, tapping my chest dramatically,

  "is a civilization battle suit.

  It’s essential gear for fighting against the forces of civilization, straight from Edo."

  The kids blinked at me, then one asked bluntly,

  "Then why did you come back here from Edo?"

  "Aah... well, you see—" I stammered.

  Before I could finish, another kid cut me off with a loud, triumphant yell.

  "I know! You lost! You got beaten by civilization!"

  The first kid chimed in too, chanting,

  "Loser! Loser!"

  "Hey! Whoa, hold up! Don’t go shouting ‘loser’ at the top of your lungs!!"

  Seriously, what kind of education were these kids getting?

  ...Next time I catch them, I’m gonna bait them with candy,

  shove them into ridiculous Halloween costumes,

  and make them cry.

  Of course, that’s just in my head.

  Still muttering empty threats under my breath,

  I kept walking without stopping.

  After climbing the slope for a while,

  I turned the corner—and there it was.

  The smell of wood smoke and damp earth grew stronger.

  A familiar silhouette floated through the mist.

  A large two-story inn, with white plaster walls that had started to crack with age.

  The tiled roof sagged here and there, yet it still stood dignified, blending naturally into the mountain backdrop.

  A battered wooden sign swayed at the entrance—

  "Tsukinoya."

  The wooden pillars, worn by years of wind and rain, seemed to quietly say:

  "Welcome home."

  I stopped walking and looked up.

  Without meaning to, a small smile tugged at the corners of my mouth.

  ...Yeah.

  I really did come home.