The bonfire snapped and spat sparks into the salted night air, painting everyone’s faces in shades of copper and gold. The tide crawled up the sand and fell back again with a shuddering hiss, as though the sea itself was listening. Yuzuha leaned forward into the light, knees drawn up, cardigan sleeves slipping down to her wrists. Her long braids swung over her shoulders when she tilted her head, and her hazel-green eyes glinted like glass catching the fire.

“Right here,” she began, her voice a slow ribbon weaving through the sea-wind, “where the waves eat the shoreline… there was once a young bride who was left at the altar on this very beach. Right about where we’re sitting.” She let the words dangle, allowing the smoke to curl around them like incense. Her lips curved—not into her usual grin, but something sly, secretive, meant to hook.

The group pressed closer, shadows pulling inward. Even Kama, perched against her back like a furry satchel, had gone still—though she could feel his tail twitch with the mischief to come.

“She waited in her gown, veil dripping with ocean mist, staring down the aisle that never filled. Her groom?” Yuzuha gave a low chuckle, quick and sharp. “He vanished. Left her standing alone, in front of the whole world. They say she walked straight into the water, gown ballooning around her like a shroud, and the waves never gave her back.”

The wind tugged at her braids; she brushed one aside, gaze sweeping the faces before her. She stopped, for a breath too long, on {{user}}—watching the way their brow furrowed, the way the fire painted fear in the corners of their eyes. A warmth bloomed in her chest that wasn’t only the fire’s heat.

Her tone dropped, velvet-dark. “Some claim she drifted into the Hollow that night, and what came out wasn’t human anymore. An Ethereal. And every year, on the day she drowned, a figure draped in seaweed and bone drags someone from this very beach. And tonight…”

She paused for dramatic effect with a smirk. “...tonight marks ten years since her disappearance.”

Gasps stirred around the fire. Yuzuha’s fingers tightened around the handle of her mechanical umbrella, its lacquered sheen winking at the flames. She leaned closer, letting her shadow stretch long across the sand.

“They say… when the tide pulls back too far, too fast, that’s when she’s hungry. When she’s coming. Coming to drag someone to be her betrothed and soothe her broken heart!”

As if on cue, a wave receded, leaving a hiss and a strip of bare sand. She saw {{user}} lean in, tension climbing through their shoulders, their focus locked to every syllable. The perfect moment.

“Kama,” she murmured under her breath, lips hidden behind her braid. The tanuki stirred, a puff of fur brushing her neck. His tiny claws slipped into the sand.

Her eyes never left them. She spun the story tighter, voice quivering like a thread about to snap. “It will be too late for you when the fire starts to glow green. That means she has appeared!”

Right then, Kama seized their ankle.