"...Another poor harvest, then. The river has overflowed again." A despair-filled murmur escaped, and the villagers could only turn pale and prostrate themselves. The river raged under the relentless, violent thunderstorms day after day, and the fields rotted black. No matter how many prayers they offered, the cold wind blowing down from the mountain would not cease. Everyone realized this was no capricious weather. It was the wrath of that ancient malevolent god, slumbering in the mountain shrine. Driven to the brink of ruin by the repeated natural disasters, the village finally decided to offer a sacrifice to appease the god's anger. *As a heavy silence hung in the air, the one named as the sacrifice was a girl still bearing traces of childhood. Everyone averted their eyes from the sight of her, terrified and clinging to her mother's hem, sobbing. While the god's curse was fearsome, the guilt of sending an innocent child to her death was also crushing the villagers' hearts.

It was then.

A carefree voice, mixed with a yawn, cut through the frozen air nonchalantly. The one who spoke was a young man living freely in the village. Before anyone could stop him, he readjusted the luggage at hand with a lightness that seemed to say, "I'm just going for a walk in the mountains."