Editing City Series:Volume4a Chapter 1 (section)

===Part 3===

'''5:39 PM

In south Nara Prefecture, a hill existed on the border between the cities of Nara and Koriyama.

It was a small hill.

Just an hour before, the setting sun had washed over the slope and trees, but it was now dyed in the pale color of the moonlight.

The most moonlight reached the top of the hill which contained a large one-story estate and a single large shrine colored by vermilion lacquer.

It was a large shrine with sanctuaries on either side.

An old wooden panel was nailed to the eaves of the shrine.

The panel had fallen into darkness and had grown dark from the rain and dew, but the stickily shining lacquered writing was still visible.

It said Nandaimon Shrine.

Nandaimon referred to the Suzakumon and the Rashoumon.

During the Nara period, a city had existed on the plain visible from this hill.

Heijou-kyo, Nagaoka-kyo, and Heian-kyo.

The great gate built to protect those cities from the south was known as Nandaimon.

Nandaimon Shrine was the shrine that worshiped Nandaimon.

As time passed, the city had transformed and Nandaimon had been remade several times, so Nandaimon Shrine had been moved to the hill where the gate would be visible no matter where it moved. Over a thousand years were said to have passed since.

Needless to say, Nandaimon itself had vanished during that long time and the shrine had been remade a few times.

Only the cherry and pine trees on the hilltop accurately recorded the passage of time.

A silent winter chill surrounded those trees as a slight breeze and produced a lonely rustling from the leaves.

Called by the rustling, the chill sitting in the shrine’s grounds began to move.

That chill called someone in.

A single figure used the path to the shrine to climb into the winter wind.

It was a girl whose long black hair shined in the moonlight.

Hidden below that black hair was a blazer red enough to be seen even in the moonlight.

The uniform had a feminine yet weighty outline and the wearer held a large staff in her right hand.

The right arm wielding the staff had large writing stitched into the blouse’s shoulder.

The golden stitching that shined in the moonlight said “Koto Guardian”.

That title belonged to the individual who put to rest the spirits in the grounds of the Koto region to prevent natural disasters.

She silently finished climbing the shrine path and stepped onto the gravel of the shrine grounds.

The wind blew gently as if stirred up by her refreshing footsteps.

It cut across the shrine grounds, past the main temple, and to the side of the estate.

The footsteps on gravel soon stopped as they followed the wind. The girl had stopped walking.

She looked up to the moon and the moonlight covered her face.

The bespectacled features were those of a girl with hint of sharpness.

A single color could be seen in the pale moonlight on her face: red.

It was the color of her right eye.

In the shadows, a faint red light filled that eye like a fire opposing the moon.

It was a false eye.

She used that eye to view a point in the sky, as if searching for something.

She spent a few seconds like that.

“One hour until the Suzaku reaches its standard position.”

Her lips barely moved to form the words and she lowered her gaze once more.

Instead of the sky, she looked to the Nandaimon estate where she lived.

Light filled the one-story vermilion estate that measured more than thirty meters across.

She had family there.

But the girl’s face still showed no hint of an expression.

Her thoughts were a complete mystery.

And…

“…”

After a moment, she turned around without speaking a word.

She turned left and her footsteps on the gravel took her to the estate’s detached room.

She walked over to the small detached room placed alongside one of Nandaimon’s sanctuaries.

She heard a sudden metallic sound from her left.

It was a bell.

Her left hand held a key attached to a small keyring.

At the same time, the footsteps on gravel stopped.

But she had not stopped. There was simply no more gravel on the ground.

There was a five square meter area of exposed dirt in front of the detached room.

Even in just the moonlight, it was obvious that ground was oddly hard.

That dirt ground had been packed down so much that not a single weed was allowed to grow through and it smoothly reflected the moonlight.

As she crossed the dirt, she saw a single wooden pillar standing up from the center of the small clearing.

It was thirty centimeters thick and about two meters tall, it contained several shallow mortar-like indentations, and the top was badly broken.

Her left hand touched one of the many indentations driven into the pillar.

A bell rang and her hand stroked across the gentle curves of the indentation.

The curves were identical to the ones that formed a human fist.

“…”

The bell rang again and she walked forward.

A few steps were all it took to arrive in front of the detached room’s main entrance.

She did not hesitate to stick her key into the sliding door’s lock.