Tokyo Gods Only Want Beautiful Priestesses

"Princess Kaguya? The Kaguya from The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter? A wicked woman who's always faking a smile?"

"Stay calm, don't burn the clothes."

Jingu pressed her head down and pushed her away slightly. "Don't stick it on; she's more energetic now."

Chiyo took two deep breaths and barely managed to suppress the flames, but she still seemed extremely agitated and restless.

"I only just met her, don't overthink it," Jingu comforted Chiyo, then continued to ask:

"So what's your past with her? Do you hate her?"

Although she had expected it, Chiyo was still somewhat confused after receiving the definite information from Jingu. She nodded subconsciously upon hearing Jingu's words, and then shook her head.

"I don't know... I feel like I should hate her, but then again, I feel like I shouldn't resent her..."

"That sounds like a story. Would you like to tell it?" The trees stretched out their branches, supporting the shrine like a chair.

"Ah... let me think, when did this start..."

That was during the Nara period, the last glorious period of the powerful minister Fujiwara no Fuhito.

At that time, Chiyo was just an ordinary little girl. Although she was the daughter of Fujiwara no Fuhito, her birth mother was a nameless maid, so she was not valued.

She was not given the Fujiwara surname by her father, nor did she have a formal name; she was simply called by a condescending name.

Even though she wasn't valued, she still longed for her father's recognition, just like every child longs for their parents' approval.

However, before she could successfully gain her father's approval, she heard another piece of news.

On the night that Prince Kurumachi failed to propose to Princess Kaguya, after the fake Hourai Jade Branch was exposed on the spot, the prince fell ill and never recovered. Watching the man on the sickbed gradually walk towards death, Chiyo had an idea.

I just want to see him, even if it's just a glimpse from afar. What kind of woman bewitched that father who treated his daughter like dust, to the point that he ruined his life?

She wanted to know why, just how beautiful she was, to make her father so obsessed and crazy, to the point that he ended up like this.

"Wait a minute!" Jingu interrupted Chiyo's words.

"Just because of this reason? You've gotten involved with Princess Kaguya?"

"What's wrong? Is it not allowed?"

Chiyo blushed slightly and argued, "I was just a child back then, can't I be young?"

"Hmm... okay, you can continue."

Youth can explain everything; everyone makes mistakes when they're young, and Jingu understands.

After resolving the mystery surrounding the shrine, Chiyo continued to recount her past with Kaguya.

Thank you to reader Feng Haoyu for the 5000 coins!

Thank you to reader Lengmo796 for the 1000 coins!

Chapter 86 Eternal

From then on, Chiyo disguised herself as a boy and wandered around Kaguya's residence every day, just like the men who came for Kaguya's beauty.

She also heard more stories about Princess Kaguya from those people.

It is said that Princess Kaguya was born from bamboo and was the child of the gods. She grew from a small person into a young woman in just one night. It is said that she was more beautiful than the bright moon in the night sky and that the light she emitted could even surpass the moon. She was radiant and dazzling.

But when asked, none of them had actually seen Princess Kaguya. They were all rejected just like themselves, and could only try to attract her attention by wandering around the area every day and reciting poems.

But Chiyo was different. Using the size of a child, she finally discovered a gap in the wall one night, just big enough for her to crawl through.

On a night like this, with a bright moon and few stars, would Princess Kaguya come out to admire the moon?

With this expectation in mind, Chiyo crawled through the hole and finally met the woman who would change her life.

Beneath the bright moon in the night sky, she was more beautiful than the moon itself, as if enveloped in light, a breathtakingly beautiful girl.

But at the same time, a complex emotion rose in Chiyo's heart. Was it resentment? Resentment that she indirectly caused her father's death? But it was her father's own fault.

Perhaps it was jealousy, or perhaps it was resentment, but in any case, after Chiyo, she would often use that loophole to spy on the woman named Princess Kaguya.

Occasionally, she would try to prank, no, to get revenge on that woman by putting insects and frogs in the food, at least that's what Chiyo thought.

But she was eventually caught red-handed by Princess Kaguya during yet another secret prank.

"Ah... what? It's just a little girl."

Chiyo's hand was grabbed by Princess Kaguya, and she was so panicked by being caught that she couldn't move. She could only watch as Princess Kaguya looked her over with her deep, pool-like eyes.

"Although I sometimes incur the resentment of women, it's a bit too early for you at your age."

After carefully examining Chiyo, Princess Kaguya asked:

"Hey kid, what's your name? You're always harassing me like this. I won't let you off easily."

Name? Chiyo wanted to muster the courage to tell her loudly that she was the daughter of Fujiwara no Fuhito, and that her surname was Fujiwara, but what was her given name? Having always been addressed with contempt, she had no name that she could proudly call herself.

Princess Kaguya noticed that fleeting change in her mind, and her tone suddenly softened, the moonlight reflecting in her unfathomable pupils.

"Do you hate me? If you do, why don't you just kill me?"

"Kill you?"

Chiyo was startled by her words. No matter how complicated her feelings were, she had never thought of killing someone.

"That's right, kill me. Since you hate me, why not just kill me? Okay?"

As she spoke, Chiyo watched as Princess Kaguya took a dagger from her clothes and placed it in Chiyo's hand, helping her to grip the hilt.

"Here it is, the heart, here it is."

Guided Chiyo to aim the hilt of the sword

The girl's mind was already in chaos from the sudden action, and she obeyed her hand without any resistance.

"Come on, press down, and then just thrust it in all at once."

"Wait...wait a minute! Why...why do you want me to kill you?"

Just as she was about to stab him, the girl finally came to her senses and trembled, unable to bring herself to do it.

"Why? You'll understand once you stab me."

After a moment's hesitation, guided by Princess Kaguya's hand, the dagger plunged into her heart, blood spilling from her clothes. Her long, ink-black hair now appeared as crimson as if stained with blood in the girl's eyes.

Murder? What... what happened?

The sensation of the dagger piercing her body, the constantly gushing blood, the pungent smell of blood—all her senses told her that this was real.

"No...no! I didn't do it...it was her...I didn't kill her...it wasn't me!"

The girl, disoriented and stunned by the scene before her, screamed in disbelief, only to be suddenly pulled back by someone.

"It's so noisy, it'll wake everyone up."

Princess Kaguya, who should have been dead, reached out and grabbed her clothes, with traces of blood still remaining at the corner of her mouth.

"How could this be? You shouldn't..."

“She’s dead, she really is dead.” Kaguya sat up, a smile on her lips that Chiyo couldn’t understand.

"But I can't die, kid. I am eternal. How could you possibly kill me?"

Unbuttoning her clothes, the wound left by the dagger was still visible on her snow-white body. Kaguya, as if she felt no pain, turned it open with her fingers, revealing the muscle texture and the still-beating, blood-red heart inside to Chiyo.

"Remember this eternal form well..."

Finally, unable to bear the fear any longer, Chiyo burst out of the door.

"So you mean that Kaguya caused you great psychological trauma in this way?"

Jingu couldn't help but interject, "This behavior does indeed resemble what that despicable guy who enjoys toying with others would do."

"That's not the point! Stop interrupting and listen to me continue."

Chiyo grumbled in dissatisfaction, then paused as if to find her footing, before continuing:

"After escaping from there, no matter how I ran, I could never forget that scene. It was like a nightmare. Kaguya's blood-soaked appearance was always etched in my memory. I couldn't forget it even if I wanted to."

"But at the same time, a strange hatred rose within me. If eternity is her source of pride, then what if I also became an eternal being?"

Chiyo closed her eyes, as if reviewing her decision, while Jingu seemed lost in thought.

"So you ended up getting your hands on the elixir of immortality she left behind?"

"I guess so. I don't know if she did it on purpose, but when I followed the group that carried the elixir of immortality up Mount Fuji, I seemed to see her figure, like moonlight."

"When I opened my eyes again, I found myself confusedly mixed into the group burning the elixir of immortality. When the elixir of immortality was finally thrown into the crater, I fell down with it."

At this point, sparks flew from Chiyo's body again, as if she had thought of something.

"I did get the elixir of immortality as I wished, but the price was that I was burned in the crater for nearly three hundred years. Every moment, I was burning, and I would be resurrected after dying, and then die again after being resurrected, repeating the cycle endlessly."

Chiyo stretched out her hand, and flames rose up along her arm. These flames, which burned within her every moment, were proof of her pain.

"From that moment on, I understood that eternal life is eternal purgatory, from which there is no escape."

This chapter contains 2119 words, please note.

The plot here is borrowed from the story of The Eternal Crying Bird; I'd recommend that fan comic.

Chapter 87 Agreement

Jingu remained silent; he had no comment.

It's a miracle that the girl wasn't driven insane by the torment that lasted for three hundred years.

The shrine could not even begin to imagine the pain and feeling it must have been, let alone the fact that when she opened her eyes again, she was already in a world three hundred years in the future.

Her family, friends, and familiar things were all gone, and everything felt so strange. No wonder Chiyo eventually chose to leave human society and hide away in the deep mountains alone.

Rather than reintegrating into a new world, it's better to choose to escape.

"So, should I hate her or not? She led me to this point, but all the decisions I made are my own fault."

Chiyo looked at the shrine with a sense of confusion. She had once used her hatred for Kaguya as the motivation to survive those three hundred years of purgatory, but in the nearly one thousand years of wandering that followed, she increasingly doubted whether she should continue to hate.