Chapter 78: A Master Before Family
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 78: A Master Before Family
The small village was in an unprecedented uproar. The members of the Fox Clan, who had been eavesdropping with their ears perked, began to whisper amongst themselves.
“He said we’re going to die? What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You believe a human? It’s obviously nonsense.”
“But all these terrible things have been happening lately…”
“It’s because the Calamity Fox is gone, and now we’re stuck with all her misfortune.”
The Fox Clan’s reaction to their impending doom was split down the middle.
Some believed the world was truly conspiring to kill them, while others were convinced that the Gumiho’s absence had simply transferred her misfortune onto them.
Their reactions were mixed. Even they, the ones directly affected, didn’t know the full story. Only the fox elder knew the truth, for he had intentionally restricted the flow of information.
Long ago, back when it was common knowledge that Rin was the Gumiho, conflict had been a daily occurrence.
Half the clan argued they couldn’t live like Heaven’s dogs, bound by the Mandate of Heaven. They called for breaking the Gumiho’s seal and staging another rebellion.
The other half vehemently opposed them, insisting they could never defeat Heaven and that it would only be a foolish repetition of history.
For a clan trapped in a small village with nowhere to go, such division was a recipe for disaster when they should have been uniting their strength.
After much deliberation, the elder of that era chose a path: to pin all the blame on the Gumiho.
Over generations, the Mandate of Heaven was erased from the foxes’ minds, and the Pink Fox was branded as a yokai who brought curses.
They were taught that the Pink Fox was the reason they had to live in White Cloud Valley.
And so, the only one left was the Pink Fox, a criminal from the moment she awoke from her seal. By using the young, powerless Gumiho as a shield, peace had come to the village.
Karami clicked his tongue in his mind.
I really don’t like them.
A fox like the Third Hokage.
Walking with a staff like it was some kind of ninjutsu.
Since he’s a fox, I guess it’s yokai magic? Whatever.
Unlike Harold, who had his reasons, the Fox Clan of White Cloud Valley were simply trash, undeserving of any consideration.
If it were up to him, Karami would have left them to die, but one couldn’t always live life exactly as one pleased.
“What’s it going to be? We’re busy people and have to leave soon. If you keep stalling, we’ll just go.”
“…What do you want?” the elder asked, his voice cautious as he tried to sound Karami out. But Karami shook his head with an exaggerated motion as if to say, that’s not it.
“You still don’t get it, do you? You know full well that if we leave, you’ll all become yokai food. The question isn’t ‘What do you want?’ You should be begging, ‘Please, save us.’”
“……”
He was right. Ever since the Gumiho had disappeared from White Cloud Valley, the Fox Clan had faced mortal threats almost daily.
Worse, now that she had returned as a five-tailed fox, they had no way to stop her from leaving. If Rin left, they would surely die.
They simply lacked the ability to escape the yokai lurking outside. To save their clan, they had no other choice.
After a long, agonizing moment of deliberation, the fox elder finally bowed his head.
“I beg you. We don’t want to die. We never wanted this. Why must we, who have done nothing wrong, bear the karma of our distant ancestors?”
If only they hadn’t rebelled against Heaven. If only they had lived in contentment without being greedy, they wouldn’t have been trapped in White Cloud Valley.
The elder lamented his ancestors and begged for sympathy, but Karami just scoffed at the pathetic excuse. For foxes, they were damn good at playing the victim.
“Don’t play the victim now. Didn’t you pin everything on an innocent Rin?”
“We had no choice. If we hadn’t, we would have all perished together.”
“A disgusting rationalization. I would have produced a much better result.”
“That’s because you weren’t there at the time—”
“Enough with the excuses. Let’s get to the point.”
The elder could do little as the much younger human treated him with such disrespect. He clamped his mouth shut and listened to Karami.
“The threat to the Fox Clan. It’s the Ghost Bear outside, correct?”
“That is correct.”
Ghost Bear.
The name meant exactly that: the ghost of a bear.
It was a being regarded as the guardian deity of White Cloud Valley since ancient times, and it was the fundamental reason the Fox Clan could not leave.
Feeding on the mountain’s spiritual energy, the Ghost Bear stood a staggering forty meters tall. The breath it exhaled was imbued with a strange power, causing it to linger in the air instead of dissipating.
That very breath became the fog that blanketed White Cloud Valley.
Somehow, this is unpleasant.
The thought of inhaling a bear’s breath with every single inhale suddenly disgusted Karami.
In any case, the objective was simple: Rin had to kill the Ghost Bear. Doing so would free the Fox Clan from their deadly fate.
Of course, he had no intention of providing his services for free.
“We’ll take care of the Ghost Bear. But on two conditions.”
So, this is the real negotiation.
The elder swallowed hard, unable to guess what demands would be made.
“First, reveal the truth about what Rin is to everyone here. Including the Mandate of Heaven they carry.”
“…And the second?”
“I know there’s a shrine in the basement that only the fox elder knows the location of.”
“How in the world do you…?!”
The elder looked as if he might faint from shock. It was bizarre. An outsider knew of a shrine that, by his own admission, only the fox elder was supposed to know about.
There was indeed a secret shrine in the caverns beneath the fox den. It was a place whose existence was passed down only from one elder to the next.
“Letting Rin enter the shrine. That is my second condition.”
It was as if he knew everything, even the very reason for the shrine’s existence.
How?
The man before him had gone from someone to be wary of to someone to be feared. The elder was certain that if he accepted this proposal, something irreversible would happen.
“Are you going to do it or not? We don’t have time.”
But the elder wanted to live.
He was, above all, faithful to his survival instinct.
“I will accept the first condition. But the second…”
“Why? You can’t?”
“I judge that the Gumiho’s power is still insufficient. If she enters the shrine in her current state, she won’t be able to make the power her own and might go berserk instead. If that happens, accepting your proposal would be meaningless.”
“So you’re saying you won’t show us?”
“I’m not saying I won’t. Defeat the Ghost Bear first. If she is strong enough to do that, it will serve as proof that she has met the minimum qualification.”
The elder’s expression was firm. Even though he had just been cowering for his life, it was clear he would not bend on this point.
So it comes to this.
The elder’s refusal was something Karami had anticipated.
In the original story, Rin had to return to White Cloud Valley to become a proper Gumiho. It was a time-attack mission that had to be completed before the clan died for failing to uphold the Mandate of Heaven.
She had to grow stronger before then.
When her growth as a five-tailed fox stalled, she had to return to White Cloud Valley, accept the elder’s request, and defeat the Ghost Bear. Only then would she be granted access to the shrine as a reward.
But he had information. And his freedom of action was incomparably greater than in the game. This meant new options were available.
He had hoped to obtain the boon from the shrine beforehand to make the fight against the Ghost Bear much easier, but it was a no-go.
“Hmm, if you’re going to be so stubborn, I have no choice. Understood. We’ll take the first condition now, and the second after everything is finished.”
*
The fox elder gathered all the members of the Fox Clan in the small village square and revealed the truth.
Rin’s identity.
Why they were in White Cloud Valley.
The reason for the recent string of misfortunes.
And what would happen if Rin left.
Their very lives were in Rin’s hands. The realization sent the Fox Clan into a vortex of shock.
“It’s a lie, right…?”
One of the foxes who had been at the forefront of tormenting Rin stared at the elder, his lips trembling. The elder merely lowered his gaze, avoiding his eyes.
It was the truth. And so, the Fox Clan’s gazes naturally turned to Rin.
“Calamity Fox… no, Rin? You’re not going to abandon us, are you?”
“C-Come on! We’re family. You’d never do that. Right? Let’s eat meat together from now on! I hear animal liver is delicious.”
“He said you’d kill the Ghost Bear, right? That means you’re going to get us out of here.”
The foxes approached Rin, their faces plastered with the oily smiles of treacherous vassals fawning over a king.
Watching them grovel, Rin felt her heart sink. A whirlwind of chaotic emotions churned deep within her chest, an uncontrollable vortex.
The very ones who had treated her like a disaster were now acting as if she were their savior. All because she had grown a few more tails.
Could people’s perceptions change so easily, like flipping one’s hand?
It was disgusting.
She wanted nothing to do with them.
With a flick of her body, Rin leaped away and vanished somewhere into the village.
“What? Where are you going? You’re not leaving, are you? You have to kill the bear first!”
“No way she would. Sure, we die if the Calamity Fox leaves, but she only survived this long because we didn’t kick her out and gave her potatoes, right? If she has a conscience, we should help each other.”
“Right? We’re practically family. She wouldn’t forsake the bonds of kinship, would she?”
Watching them congratulate each other, Karami sighed. Having lived so long in this tiny village, associating only with each other, it seemed they had never learned to read the room.
Karami headed in the direction Rin had disappeared. He found her crouched in a deserted corner of the village.
“What’s wrong? Is something not to your liking?”
Even as Karami approached, Rin’s gaze remained fixed on the cold ground.
“The ones who ignored you and tried to cast you out now need you. You hold the lives of your tormentors in your hands. Aren't you happy?”
“This isn’t what Rin wanted. Rin wanted to be treated as a fellow fox, as family…”
Rin had always watched from a few steps away, observing the other foxes as they laughed and played together. She had been envious, dreaming that one day they would treat her the same.
But their attitude now wasn’t how one treated family. They simply saw her as a tool to be sacrificed for their own sake.
Rin, who had genuinely hoped they would finally see her for who she was, felt an indescribable disappointment.
“Hmm, it seems you’re fixated on the idea of family, Rin.”
“Well…”
“Rin, family isn’t all that special, you know?”
“Huh?”
Rin’s ears perked up.
Karami’s lips curled into a sly, scheming smile, one that perfectly suited a slave trader.
“Did you choose to live with them, Rin? No. You just found yourself with them when you came to your senses. It’s the same for them. Family is a relationship where no one’s will is involved. Just like the Mandate of Heaven.”
A child cannot choose their parents. The same is true for parents. Even if they give birth to a child, they didn’t specifically choose that child; it’s just the one they happened to have.
“We call such relationships inescapable. You have to stick with them even if you didn’t choose them, even if you don’t like them. Just imagining it sounds unpleasant, doesn’t it?”
“……”
“But the people we meet in our lives are different. I choose with my own hands the people I want to be with, and the people who want to be with me choose me. All with the thought, ‘Ah, I want to be with that person.’ Just like how I chose you.”
Rin lifted her head slightly.
“A relationship that cannot be formed if even one of the two doesn’t choose it. A bond created not by fate, but by our own will. Isn’t it beautiful? I believe this is a relationship closer than family. What do you think, Rin?”
Rin thought for a moment.
Karami, a stranger, cared for her.
The Fox Clan, her family, only cared for themselves.
It wasn’t even a choice worth considering.
“Rin feels the same as Master. I like Master more than those people. I want to be with Master.”
“In that case, is there any need to seek their approval as family? You just need to look good for me. Because you are my slave. A slave only needs to look good for their master.”
It was a perfectly logical statement.
She only needed to live up to the expectations of the master who had taken her in that day. The well-being of the Fox Clan had never been a consideration to begin with.
The master-servant relationship was more important than family ties.
Having sorted out her thoughts, Rin dusted herself off and stood up.
“Rin will kill the bear.”
Everything for her master.