“What… should I do?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper. The glowing interface before me pulsed like a heartbeat, waiting for my and, but my hands remained frozen at my sides. The weight of the decision pressed against my chest, each option radiating an unspoken sequence. I wasn’t ready for this. I had no experieno knowledge of purification rituals, a, somehow, the shrine had chosen me.

  Yuzu tilted her head, her golden eyes flickering with uainty. She shrugged lightly, the motion causing her bck cloak to shift around her small frame. “Yuzu notto sure,” she admitted. “Yuzu bery used to talking with Miko-sama, shrine priestess in home. She bery talk about how exorg bery dangerous, and Yuzu bery o go to her if Yuzu bery see pain yuzu stuff.”

  I frowned, her words lingering in my mind. Miko…? There was something oddly familiar about that name. Almost without thinking, I murmured, “The pink-haired girl with the sakura hairpin?”

  Yuzu’s ears perked up, her tails swaying slightly behind her. “Nnai,” she blinked, curiosity flickering across her face. “Mashiro bery know about her?”

  A lump formed in my throat. For a brief moment, my mind raced through scattered fragments of memory—not of this world, but of another. Luminous Dream. The game I had spent tless hours pying. The game where Mashiro was nothing more than an idol, a character on a s, where Miko was the third member to join the band. She had always carried an air of mystery, a quiet grace that set her apart from the others. Her presence had been a calming one, her melodies soft yet filled with meaning.

  But this wasn’t a game. This was reality, or at least, something close to it. I forced myself to remain posed, averting my gaze as I muttered, “Something like that.”

  My words felt hollow even to my own ears. The implications were staggering. Natsumi, Yuzu, Yuki, and now Miko. One by ohe band members of Luminous Dream were appearing in this world, as if drawn together by an unseen force. At this rate… would I meet all thirty five of them?

  A cold shiver ran down my spi was too much to be mere ce. The more I traveled, the more I entered people I shouldn’t know, people who shouldn’t eve outside the game. Was this world merely a refle of Luminous Dream, or was there something deeper at py? Some grand design pulling the strings behind the ses?

  I ched my fists, my nails digging into my palms as I struggled to steady my thoughts. Focus. No matter how many questions I had, this wasn’t the time to dwell on them. Right now, the shrine was in danger. It was g out for help, and I was the only one who could answer.

  I turned back to Yuzu, who was still watg me with her usual curiosity, her golden eyes refleg the soft glow of the interface. She tilted her head slightly, her bck ears twitg as if sensing my hesitation.

  “If exorcism is dangerous,” I said slowly, gng at the options before me, “then we should probably avoid the first optiht?”

  Yuzu’s tails swished behihe motion almost hypnotic. “Bery maybe,” she admitted. “Miko-sama bery always careful. She say exorg bery big pain, so she always bery use help from spirits.”

  Her words made me pause. Help from spirits…? I returned my gaze to the floating menu, sing over the choices once more. The third option caught my eye:

  ? Invoke Spiritual Guardian (???)

  If Miko relied on spirits for purification, then maybe this was the safest path. I didn’t kly what would happen, but at the very least, I wouldn’t be recklessly throwing myself into an unknown danger without backup. Still, the question remained. Spiritual Guardian? I didn’t have o least, I didn’t think I did. It wasn’t like I was some seasoned exorcist or shrine maiden. I had barely been in this world long enough to uand its rules. If I attempted to summon a guardian and failed, what then? Would I just be wasting time?

  I chewed on my lip, my eyes drifting down to the option.

  ? Gradual sing (Low Risk - Slow Efficy)

  It was the safest choice. It carried the lowest risk, which meant it should be the obvious answer. A slow but steady approach, minimizing any immediate dangers. That was the logical thing to do, wasn’t it? The shrine had warned us that the corruption was nearly plete and would reach its tipping point in two weeks. If I started gradual sing now, I could at least dey it, maybe even push back against the corruptioirely. I just had to be patient, careful.

  It made se should work.

  Taking a deep breath, I reached forward, h my hand over the gradual sing option. The floating interface shimmered beh my fiips as I prepared to select it. But just before I could touch the s, a sudden blur of movement caught my attention.

  With an urgent yip, Ai leaped up and cmped her tih around my hand, not hard enough to hurt, but firm enough to stop me in my tracks. My breath caught as she tugged my hand sideways, away from the gradual sing option, guiding it ioward Invoke Spiritual Guardian.

  “Ouch!” I yelped, wing at the sharp bite. Ai’s small frame belied her surprising strength. Her jaws cmped onto my hand with enough forake me flinch. Before I could even think to pull away, she twisted her head, smming my hand down against the glowing interface.

  A sharp ping echoed through the shrine.

  The moment my fiips brushed against the Invoke Spiritual Guardian option, the eerface pulsed, sending out a ripple of golden light. The air grew thick with an unseen pressure, like a storm about to break. The surrounding shrine walls groahe a wood creaking as if something deep withiructure had just awakened.

  Yuzu’s ears shot up, her fur standing on end. “Bery, Bery bad feeling!” she stammered, her tails fluffing out like startled pom-poms.

  Ai let go of my hand, quickly retreating behind me, her small body trembling. I ched my fingers, still feeling the lingering sting of her bite, but there was no time to dwell on it.

  Because the shrine was ging.

  The floating symbols from the interface shattered into motes of gold, scattering like fireflies. The altar at the ter of the shrine fred with an eerie light, its stone surface splitting open as a deep, resonant hum filled the air. Then, from within the fractured altar, something began to emerge. Something old, powerful, and undeniably aware of our presence.

  A lifeless young girl emerged from the altar, her small frame suspended in midair as if weightless. She wore a simple yellow cardigan, her blonde hair gently swayie the ck of wind. At first gnce, she appeared to be no older than aary schooler, fragile, delicate. Yet, something was terribly wrong.

  There was no warmth in her expression. No rise and fall of her chest. No flicker nition in her vat, gssy eyes. She wasn’t standing, wasn’t breathing, just floating above the cracked stoar, an unmoving doll trapped in time. Then, without warning, her form began to waver.

  Like mist caught in the m light, her body flickered, shifting from solid to translut. The edges of her figure blurred, unraveling like threads of golden silk until she was no lirl at all, but a pulsing orb of radiant energy. A gentle hum resohrough the shrine as the orb trembled in pce, h above the altar for the briefest of moments before darting forward.

  Straight toward Ai.

  Ai’s body jerked the instant the light ected. Her fur bristled, her tiny frame tensing as if gripped by an unseen force. Her eyes, once suddenly fred into a rich, luminous gold, burning with an iy far beyond anything I’d ever seen from her before. The golden aura coiled around her like a sed skin, ing her in a delicate, shimmering glow.

  For a heartbeat, everything was still.

  Then, Ai opened her mouth, and a voiot her own, spoke.

  “…Mashiro.”

  “Ai…” I said softly, then raised my voi disbelief. “Do people!”

  The golden glow surrounding Ai pulsed faintly, almost as if startled by my outburst. She remained rigid, her tiny ailed body still, golden eyes unblinking as she stared straight ahead.

  “Bery shog,” Yuzu muttered, ing slightly behind me. Her bck ears flicked in arm, her tails fluffing up defensively. “Ai bery eat people now?”

  “I-I don’t know!” I stammered, my gaze dartiween the small fox and the altar where the girl had been. “I don’t think she ate her, but,” I jabbed a fioward Ai, “she totally just absorbed that girl like a power-up in a video game!”

  Ai, or whatever had taken hold of her, finally reacted. Her many tails flicked in perfeison, the motion eerily trolled. Tilting her head slightly, she studied me. Too smooth, too precise, not at all like the pyful little fox I khen, she blinked, and the golden aura surrounding her dimmed just a little.

  “…ption was not the iion,” the voice spoke again, yered and eg, carrying a maturity far beyond Ai’s usual childish yips. “Merging was necessary.”

  I swallowed hard. “Merging…?”

  Ai, or the entity within her, closed her eyes for a brief moment. The golden light wavered, flickering like dlelight caught in a breeze. Her fur shimmered as if dusted with stardust, her tiny form outlined by a faihereal glow. When she opened her eyes again, the tension in her small body eased ever so slightly.

  “My name… is Lumi.”

  The moment she uttered that name, a gust of warm air swept through the shrihe wooden beams groaned softly, and for the first time since we had ehe oppressive weight in the air lifted ever so slightly. The suffog, inescapable sense of corruption that had g to the atmosphere felt weaker, even if only by a fra.

  Yuzu’s ears twitched, her tails curling around her like a shield. “Bery ghost fox…?”

  I exhaled, running a hand through my hair as I tried to process everything. “Okay, okay, wait. Let’s just… take a sed here.” I focused on the small ailed fox before me. Ai still looked like Ai, same soft fur, same little frame, but those glowing eyes held something much older within them. “Ai is still Ai, right? You are just… sharing a body now?”

  Lumi or Ai, I still was not sure whiame I should use, nodded once. “Correct. My spirit has fused with hers. A vessel was necessary for maion.”

  I shot a g Yuzu, who looked equally baffled.

  “…This is way weirder than a normal exorcism, right?”

  “Bery, bery much,” Yuzu firmed, ears drooping slightly.