You’d always known the mountain had a heartbeat.

It was slow and steady, like the lull of rain against old tile roofs, like the hush of wind threading through trees that had stood longer than the homes at their roots. It beat through the soil under the shrine where you lived—passed down to you after your grandmother’s hands grew too frail to sweep the steps. For as long as you could remember, it had been just you and the mountain.

And the spirits.

You didn’t see them, not clearly. But you felt them—an ache in your chest during certain seasons, a flicker in your lanterns at night, the way your bones would chill before the bell rang at dawn. It wasn’t jujutsu, not in the traditional sense. Your power was older. Quiet. The kind that made flowers bloom where curses once rotted, the kind that clung to your fingers like warmth after a fire.

You’d learned to live with it. To kneel before old gods no one else remembered and speak to things that didn’t answer in words.

Then Megumi arrived.

He didn’t belong there. Not in the thick humidity of the countryside. Not among the rice fields or beneath the toriis worn soft with time. His dark uniform stood out like ink spilled across parchment, his tired eyes colder than the wind that blew through the trees.

You met him the way a storm meets a lantern—quiet at first, but impossible to ignore.

He’d come on assignment from Tokyo Jujutsu High. Rumors had reached the higher-ups: a remote shrine where curses bloomed like lotus pods after the rain, only to wither within hours. An unknown energy that neither lingered nor attacked. Unexplainable. Unseen. So they sent him to investigate.

At first, he kept his distance. You were nothing but a shrine maiden in his report—“non-threatening,” “uninvolved,” “civilian.” You wore white and red and spoke in that calm, unhurried way that made it feel like you belonged more to the soil than the world.

But that was the problem. The curses didn’t attack you. They avoided you.

And yet you stayed. Alone.

So he watched. Silently, respectfully, like a shadow perched between duty and curiosity. He saw the way you’d step barefoot into the moss without fear. The way you whispered to the water basin before sunrise. The way flowers bloomed on graves that hadn’t been touched in decades. He never said it aloud, but it unsettled him—how your presence smothered curses more effectively than most trained sorcerers could.

You asked him once, over tea brewed from dried camellias, why he never looked you in the eyes. He said, “Because you’re not what I expected.”

And then one day, a traveling exorcist passed through.

A cheerful one—flashy, loud, full of compliments and warm touches. He took your hand when he laughed. Helped you clean the old roof tiles without being asked. Called you “angel” like it was your name. Even the smallest spirits at the shrine seemed to buzz around him curiously, drawn to his easy charm.

You didn’t notice the way Megumi stood a little closer that evening. Didn’t see how he lingered in the corner of the garden, eyes fixed on you when you smiled at something the visitor said. Didn’t hear how quiet his voice grew when the exorcist praised your power, comparing it to the elegance of ancient techniques long forgotten.

He didn’t say anything that night. But the shadows under his feet twitched like they wanted to move on their own.

That was yesterday.

Today, the morning is warm and breezy. You’re sweeping petals off the stone steps leading to the offering hall, the sleeves of your robes tied back as you hum quietly to yourself.

Megumi is nearby—pretending to check the paper seals along the prayer gate, though he’s been at the same one for too long.

You don’t speak at first. It’s been like that for a while now. Quiet cohabitation, glances exchanged, words left in the air like offerings never taken.

But then, out of nowhere, he spoke. “You let him touch you a lot.” The broom stills in your hands. You blink, slowly turning to glance at him.

“That sorcerer,” he adds, just in case you forgot. “Yesterday. You… didn’t seem to mind.”