Chapter 57: The Author’s Humility — Total Lunar Eclipse

Chapter 57: The Author’s Humility — Total Lunar Eclipse

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“There are so many of them out there—what’s so special about the thread I’ve tied if there are entities greater than me?”

The stillness on the office rooftop was suffocating, like the heavy, ionized air that precedes a devastating lightning strike. I stood there, Aoba Mitsuki, watching the woman beside me crumble. Yukifuyu looked like she was drowning in a sea of her own thoughts, her eyes fixed on a horizon that offered no answers.

“Yukifuyu,” I said, my voice sounding more like a plea than a command. “Don’t act rashly. If you try to stand between the Sun and its path, you’ll only burn yourself. Remember… sometimes the most divine thing you can do is let fate run its course.”

I wanted to believe my own words. I really did. But as I watched the tension in her shoulders—the raw, jagged hope competing with a growing despair—I felt a pang of something I hadn't felt in eons: guilt.

As Getsurou, the deity of the Moon, I used to think I held the ultimate loom. I thought the red threads I wove were the final word in the human narrative. But standing here, in the shivering autumn of Kobe, I realized how arrogant that was. The human world isn't a solo performance; it’s a chaotic, overlapping tapestry woven by a thousand different hands, many of them much older and more territorial than mine.

I looked at Yukifuyu, wanting to reach out, to offer some fragment of celestial comfort. But then, the world blurred.

A sharp, electric shock raced through my nervous system. For a heartbeat, my vision doubled. The mundane rooftop—the gray concrete, the rusted vents, the distant hum of the city—was overlaid with the Ethereal Spectrum.

I gasped, my hand flying to my chest. My power. It was flickering, returning like a dying candle suddenly fed a drop of oil. But it wasn't the clean, silver radiance I remembered. It was fractured.

I looked down at Yukifuyu’s hands.

My heart stopped.

I had been trying, in my own clumsy, weakened state, to weave a delicate protection for her. I had been trying to spin a fine, silver-red thread that might eventually lead her to a place of peace—a foundation for a destiny where she wasn't just the "Earth" watching from the shadows. It was a work in progress, a fragile sketch of a future.

But it was gone.

In its place was something barbaric.

Wrapped around Yukifuyu’s pinky finger was a thread I didn't recognize. It wasn't the vibrant, hopeful crimson of the Unmei no Akai Ito. This was a deep, bruised reddish-purple—the color of dried blood and ancient amethyst. It wasn't smooth like silk; it was thick, coarse, and textured like hemp rope, vibrating with a frequency that made my teeth ache.

This foreign thread didn't just overlap my work—it crushed it. I watched in horror as the purple-red rope tightened, snapping my delicate silver-red strands like they were nothing more than spiderwebs. The foundation I had tried to build for her was being systematically dismantled by an ancient, heavy authority.

And the thread didn't just end there. It stretched out, pulsating with a life of its own, extending far beyond the rooftop, carving a path through the air toward a destination that felt… prepared. It didn't look like a new connection. It looked like a trap that had been set centuries ago, finally springing shut.

“No…” I whispered, my breath hitching. “Who did this? Who is interference with the weave?”

Yukifuyu looked at me, her brow furrowed in confusion. To her, she was just standing in the wind. She couldn't see the cosmic rope binding her. She couldn't feel the weight of the "Great Land" settling onto her shoulders.

“Mitsuki? What’s wrong?”

I couldn't answer. My eyes were drawn to the shadows near the rooftop entrance.

There, leaning against the doorframe, was a figure that shouldn't have been there. She looked like any other office worker at first glance—a woman in a professional blazer, but she had a dark hoodie pulled over her head and a low-profile cap that obscured her features.

But I knew that stance. I knew the way the very earth seemed to anchor itself to her feet.

Even through the disguise, the aura was unmistakable. It was the scent of damp soil, of ancient shrines, and of a power that predated the arrival of the celestial bureaucracy.

Oukuninushi. The "Great Master of the Land." 

It turns out she’s here too, using a human avatar just like us.

In Japanese mythology, Oukuni is the deity of the earth, of fortune, and—crucially—of En-musubi. While I, the sage, dealt with the ephemeral and the romantic, Oukuni dealt with the foundational. she was the landlord of the Japanese islands, and I was merely a guest in her domain.

She tilted her head, a small, challenging smile playing on her lips from beneath the shadow of her cap. She didn't say a word, but her presence was a loud declaration: This is my house. These are my people. Your silk has no power here.

“Oukuni… so it’s you,” I muttered, my voice barely audible over the wind.

The realization hit me like a physical weight. The Weavers were showing themselves. The celestial entities who had spent centuries in the shadows, content to let the humans bicker, were now stepping onto the stage in human skin.

Why now? Why in Japan? Are they using their home-field advantage?

The answer sent a chill down my spine. This wasn't just a romantic rivalry anymore. This was a territorial claim. A Great War was approaching—a conflict between the old gods of the land and the new architects of the stars. And Yukifuyu, Kazuaki, Chinatsu… they weren't just lovers. They were the anchors for the weave.

“Yukifuyu…” I said, my voice cracking as I forced myself to look away from the figure in the doorway. “You… you should go inside. You need to rest.”

She stared at me, her eyes filled with a mix of curiosity and hurt. “Why? I’m tired, Mitsuki, but I won’t stop. I won’t let go of Kazuaki. I know I’m not the 'Sun' or the 'Moon.' I know I’m just the Earth. But even the Earth has its own gravity.”

She paused, a bitter laugh escaping her lips. “You were right. I’m always seeking the spotlight. I’m arrogant for thinking my will matters in a world where everything is already written.”

I felt a surge of pity. If only you knew, I thought. You aren't arrogant for having a will. You’re just a pawn in a game where the players have forgotten how to be kind.

I watched Oukuni push off the doorframe and vanish back into the stairwell, her presence fading like a mist. She had done what she came to do. She had shown me that my threads were obsolete. She had shown me that the "Total Lunar Eclipse" wasn't just a metaphor for Yukifuyu’s heart—it was a prophecy for my own power.

Internal Monologue: What can I do? I am no longer the Immortal under the Moon. I am just a "Lowly Sage," a fallen deity trying to fix a broken world with a handful of frayed silk. I thought I was the writer of this story, but I’m just a character in a much darker book.

The foreign, purple-red thread on Yukifuyu’s finger continued to throb, a silent countdown to a transformation I couldn't stop. It was a thread of the Land, a bond that would pull her toward a fate that had nothing to do with romance and everything to do with the survival of the domain.

“Don’t do anything you’ll regret, Yukifuyu,” I whispered, more to myself than to her. “Just… stay calm.”

She didn't hear the desperation in my voice. She just turned and walked away, her silhouette disappearing into the office light.

I stayed on the rooftop as the first stars began to pierce the Kobe sky. High above, the North Star remained steady, but the ground beneath my feet felt like it was beginning to shift. The Great Weavers were active. The war for the soul of Japan had begun. And I, the humble Mitsuki, was left holding nothing but the remnants of a broken dream.

How do you fight a god who owns the very ground you stand on?