The second time at Hoshino was different. Cracks had spider-webbed across the frozen cobblestones of the plaza.
Golden light leaked from the fissures. The name of the single deity he had returned before was now taking root deep beneath the surface. That lone root had branched out, creeping along the seams of the stonework.
Koyoi sat before the stone monument.
He spread the transcript open. This time, he didn't hold it out as an offering. He simply read the names. He gave them a voice.
But his way of calling them had changed. It wasn't "Come here," but rather, "I am here." He simply let the names know that he existed—that a living voice was waiting for them. The light in the earth swayed. It wasn't violent like the last time; it was gentle, like a steady breath.
"He isn't fading."
Kuon observed Koyoi through an artificial eye.
"Density of existence record: stable. He is calling them correctly."
Asahi sat down beside him.
Koyoi read the names from the transcript, and Asahi gave them breath. Every time their voices harmonized, the light beneath the earth expanded. Golden threads began to descend from the sky—not just one this time, but three, then five.
Responding to the names in the transcript, multiple spirits were attempting to return at once. The threads touched the ground, and the light erupted.
Characters began to shimmer onto the surface of the cobblestones. Two. Three. Four. Every time a name returned, the horizontal lines etched into the monument grew faint. The marks of the "Culling" were vanishing.
"Twelve have returned," Kuon announced, counting them off.
Kuon cross-referenced each name with the transcript. Koyoi’s voice was growing hoarse, but his presence remained solid. The transparency in his right hand was slowly receding, color returning to his skin. If called correctly, the process didn't consume the caller.
In a single day, Koyoi had mastered what the first god had taken a thousand years to learn.
Yet, not every name had returned. There were names for which no threads descended. Though they were written in the transcript—names that should have come screaming out of the Sutra Library—they had gone missing somewhere along the way.
"Seven names are not responding," Kuon said, checking the catalog. He traced the lines of a sea chart. "These seven... they are below. They aren't traveling through the sky; they're moving through the earth. They haven't arrived yet. Or perhaps..."
Kuon hesitated.
"Or perhaps?"
"They were caught mid-transit. By the Observers."
The cracks in the ground widened. The golden light intensified. The twelve returned names were illuminating one another beneath the surface. Including the one from before, that made thirteen.
Thirteen out of fifty-one.
"It’s still not enough."
Koyoi stood up, brushing the grit from his knees.
"I have to go meet them—the ones traveling underground."
Asahi looked up at the sky. The golden threads had stopped falling. Every name remaining in the heavens had reached this place. The rest were below. Beyond the rows of stone monuments, the earth trembled ever so slightly.
The names were trying to signal something from the depths. The vibration was heading north.
Toward Hoshifuri Town.
Koyoi tucked the transcript into his robe and turned toward the north. The wind whistled through the monoliths, and the golden cracks beneath his feet flickered like a dying flame.