Sky Cave

Suffering from unbearable heat and lack of oxygen under a hot umbrella, Ami She was lost in her memories for a few moments. It only took a few seconds for her, but they contained a lifetime.

It happened just a couple of days ago. Ami despaired of returning her husband's soul, saved and imprisoned in the bottom of an umbrella. She decided to climb Everest, the highest mountain on Earth. According to Japanese beliefs, when the gods stepped on the earth, just such heights were formed. By the age of 78, the girl, or rather the old woman, had tried everything she could. She diligently studied various sciences at the University of Fukuoka, trained her body in kendo and the mountaineering club, and visited Yomi's grave every year.

But his soul never appeared again. Every year Ami remembered that incident, replaying it in her head over and over again so as not to forget. But even so, doubts about the reality of what happened then didn’t give her peace.

On that fateful day, it was pouring rain. Ami was grieving on her knees at her husband's grave, soaking wet. She didn’t want to "dirty" her umbrella — a precious gift from Yomi. Ami screamed at the sky, cursing the elements themselves. After all, as Yomi's grandmother, Tsukiyami Miya, used to say, from generation to generation, on the day of a funeral, rain falls on the mountain, taking away souls.

Ami didn't want to accept this, although she didn't really believe in this myth. But when the drops suddenly froze in the air and even water began to rise from under the ground, the girl instinctively opened her umbrella, catching the stream of water that burst out of Yomi's grave.

Together with him, she soared into the sky. The umbrella rose higher and higher, Ami's hand shifted along the slippery handle. To prevent slipping, the girl tied her hand to the handle with a torn piece of cloth. And when lightning struck the umbrella, Ami fell to the ground with it, breaking her hand to the bone. As she was losing consciousness, Ami saw Yomi's smoky silhouette appear from the bottom of the umbrella, trying to tell her something.

Science and religion didn’t help the girl cope with either grief or her search. Having given up all the joys of life, Ami selflessly, obsessively went to only one goal. But despair took over and now the old woman was already standing at the very top, raising an umbrella to the clear skies, as if as an offering.

"Here I am, Susanoo!"

She addressed Takehaya Susanoo, the god of storms. And it was he who "commanded" that rain, Ami came to that conclusion. As she grew older, her doubts only grew stronger, and hopelessness coupled with a supernatural event drove her to madness. Ami walked along the edge of reality in search of a ghostly chance to get her husband back.

And although searches in Japan failed to find a trace Susanoo, the old woman decided that perhaps she would be able to meet him at the very top of the world. But here too, only disappointment and silence awaited her.

Although Ami realized her madness, she also believed in what she saw with her own eyes, never ceasing to fight the voice of doubt. Not having met the gods here either, unable to live without Yomi any longer, the old woman threw off all her gear, hugged her umbrella and threw herself from the top of Everest straight into the snowy abyss. Hurrying into the arms of her beloved.

Like a lifeless body, of which there were many at the top of the mountain, Ami rolled down, dragged by death. Suddenly, she crashed into a snowy mound and flew up, losing in midair the umbrella she’d been reaching for all the way to the end. It landed at the edge of a crevice, opened up and stuck in the ground. And Ami fell straight into a cave, hitting the rocks several times and landing on the bottom, cracking her head.

Darkness. The old woman's entire life, her dying visions, flashed through it. The nuclear bombing of Hiroshima predetermined the fate of Ami, who was born just a week later.

"It’s not permissible… it’s not permissible!"

Ami's mother had been repeating this ever since she was born. Later, her daughter learned that her mother had gone half mad after the tragedy. She was an ardent Shinto believer and a priestess at a temple dedicated to Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun. When Ami's mother saw the power of the nuclear bomb, she feared that it was Amaterasu's punishment. Ami's father, a military man with nationalistic and imperialistic views, soon explained that it was an American weapon.

"Sacrilege! Unacceptable! Unacceptable!"

When Japan lost and the Emperor was publicly forced to renounce his godlike descent from Amaterasu, a new hell began in the Ami family with its ardent Shintoism and nationalistic militarism.

While her father, driven by revanchist sentiments, waged a guerrilla war against the occupation, Ami's mother tried with all her might to make her daughter a medium so that the spirit of the goddess would enter her, and she could take revenge.

Raised this way since childhood, Ami considered it normal until she realized the full horror of what was happening when she grew up a little. Sympathy and interest in the characters and kami Shinto changed to hatred and rejection.

When attempts to make her daughter a medium failed, the mother decided to sacrifice her. The girl was tied with magatama beads and was planned to be burned, but she managed to escape into the forest.

For her, this was the most terrible thing after losing her husband, part of the traumatic memories was blocked by her childish mind, but then her faith in the good goddess returned to her. For some reason unknown to the little girl, her pursuers evaporated in an incredibly bright stream of sunlight that pierced the beads all over her body.

It didn’t hurt Ami, but she lost consciousness. Running into the light, six-year-old Yomi met Ami for the first time and later became her beacon in the sea of darkness.

Having lost him, Ami plunged into darkness again. But the moment had come to emerge from her oblivion. Ami opened her eyes and saw a blinding light reflected by the umbrella and refracted by the magatama beads hanging beneath it. The same light melted the ice, which flowed like a waterfall directly onto Ami's head, healing her wounds. The girl felt a long-forgotten strength and waved her hand, throwing away the prosthesis that had replaced the limb for many years. And in its place, a new young hand was growing.

Without any climbing gear, Ami climbed out of the cave and peeled off her old skin. The girl repeated the myth of Amaterasu's exit from the Ame no Iwaya cave and remembered her cursed destiny.

"W-what!?"

Suddenly, it burst out from the lips of a bewildered Miku, who until that moment had been completely immersed in the story being broadcast by Keshita.

"A regrowing limb, goddess, is she really not crazy?"

“I’m equally perplexed, but this surprises me less than the mythical hydra in the sky!”

"Wait. You didn't even say it just now… you're transmitting thoughts to me directly?"

The confirmation wasn’t long in coming, as was the further dialogue. They understood each other half-thought and, in order not to lose the thread, returned to Ami's consciousness.

"What kind of goddess am I?.."

Ami was sweating and breathing heavily.

"Sorry, Amaterasu, it seems I've failed you. Even this body can't go long without oxygen…"

Ami was gradually suffocating, and her consciousness was becoming cloudy. There was very little time left to think of anything.

"Is there anything we can do to help?"

A thought flashed through Keshita and Miku's minds at the same time. But the thick column of lightning gave a clear answer.

"Damn it!" Ami screamed with all her might." It's as hot as an oven… Grandma Miya, I wish I could try your cooking again… and listen to Grandpa Tsutomu's stories about gods, mountains and volcano ah…"

Ami suddenly froze, remembering the pleasant summer evenings on the porch of the Tsukiyama family home, when Yomi's grandfather, Tsutomu, would tell them stories.

"When Susanoo ripped open Yamata no Orochi's belly and the snake's blood flowed, it formed the Hii River in Izumo… that's why it has so much iron sand, and it filled the mountains with it…"

"Exactly! These mountains are full of igneous rocks and groundwater, which means…"

Ami quickly built up a general picture of her plan.

"It must work! No, I haven’t other choice!"

Time to let off some steam!