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[C.G] Ch 132: Inukimi’s Triumphant Return
🕑 Added 2025-06-07 17:12:47 +0000 UTC— — — — — —
A few minutes later
Inukimi, now in her human form, sat silently across from Veyron.
Beside him, that same fox—Hagoromo Gitsune—was lounging with her hair covering the important bits… and honestly, not doing a very good job of it.
Was… was this normal?
Did I really only spend a little over a month in seclusion? Not a hundred years? Not a thousand?
Inukimi couldn't help but question her entire existence right now.
"This is Hagoromo Gitsune, a fox yokai from Izumi Province. And this is Inukimi, a dog yokai from the western lands," Veyron said, casually introducing the two.
He also took the time to explain why the fox wasn't wearing any clothes, just in case Inukimi got the wrong idea.
Apparently, she'd lived in her beast form ever since she was born, training in the mountains. It wasn't until she followed Veyron to Eientei that she transformed into a human for the first time. So yeah… she wasn't exactly used to clothing or other "restrictive" human customs.
Inukimi hummed thoughtfully and eventually nodded. That kind of thing wasn't unheard of.
Yokai who stayed in their original form for long periods often found it hard to adjust after finally shapeshifting. Fair enough.
The only thing she really wanted to roast was how this fox girl's training path must've been completely bonkers—so much so that she didn't even know the most basic trick of turning her fur into clothes when she transformed.
Still, Inukimi conjured up a simple spell—one containing some insight into her own shapeshifting experience—and passed it over.
"Here, it might help a little."
"Thank you, sis!" Hagoromo accepted it with a grateful smile.
With that little side event wrapped up, Inukimi hesitated for a moment… then finally voiced her real request to Veyron.
She wanted to return to the western lands for a bit.
"Go ahead," Veyron nodded easily. "You've been away for a while, haven't you? Might as well bring some good news back with you—'Hey, I became a Great Yokai!' Know what I mean?"
He smiled and added, "Wanna bring your people some gifts while you're at it?"
"…Gifts?"
Inukimi blinked as Veyron handed her a disposable storage artifact—a temporary dimensional space he whipped up on the fly.
She reached out with her spiritual sense and peeked inside…
It was full of Sea Kings. The smallest ones were over a thousand meters long.
— — —
Western Lands — The Cloud Palace of the Inu Yokai
"Good! Good! Very good!"
The old patriarch of the Dog Yokai clan, who looked like a gust of wind could knock him over, was so excited he was practically pounding his cane into the floor.
Even though he was clearly aging, his voice carried a vibrant strength as he looked over Inukimi, now standing proud as a newly Great Yokai.
"Judging by your aura, you only just broke through, but your vitality and yokai energy are already close to what mine used to be at my peak. If you keep this up, you might even reach a new level of your own."
He laughed heartily, eyes gleaming with joy. "With you here, if anyone dares challenge us again, I'll finally have someone to drag with me when I charge into battle!"
Centuries ago, the Western Lands had been ruled by a powerful Great Yokai—until he pissed off the legendary Flower Master of the Four Seasons. That didn't end well. She crushed him without mercy.
Once their ruler died, and it was clear the Flower Master had no interest in taking the territory for herself, chaos followed. Several powerful yokai fought bitterly over the now "unclaimed" land for months.
In the end, it was this old patriarch who seized victory.
The cost, however, had been enormous. His very essence was damaged during that war. Ever since, he'd been the Dog Yokai clan's silent barrier—too injured to fight unless he burned the last of his life force, and doing that would mean instant death.
"…So, while I was away," Inukimi asked after a moment of silence, "did anyone promising show up in the clan?"
The old patriarch raised his brows, surprised.
"There was, actually."
He smiled fondly and began explaining, "Not long after you left, a young guy reached high-level yokai. He even awakened our royal bloodline. In just a few days, he pushed his power to the peak of the high-level stage."
"We were honestly thinking he might be our next King of the Western Dog Yokai. All of us old timers had our hopes pinned on him… but looks like we were a bit shortsighted, huh?"
He paused, brow suddenly furrowing.
"…Wait. Why do you ask?"
Inukimi exhaled lightly. "During my time away, I… became someone's mount."
She didn't sugarcoat it. "A human's."
Now, the Western Dog Yokai weren't like those radicals who believed humans and yokai should never mix. But even so, their future king—one of their own—becoming a human's ride? That was… a hard pill to swallow for most of the clan.
On her way back, Inukimi had genuinely been worried about this. About how the clan would react.
But now, hearing that there was another rising star in her generation—a real genius—she finally felt relieved.
When it came to bloodline purity, she had the edge. After all, the crescent moon mark on her forehead had appeared not long after she was born. That was a sign of an elite lineage. The other guy didn't awaken his royal bloodline until becoming high-level.
But talent-wise… it wasn't even close.
The way that young dog yokai's power skyrocketed after his bloodline awakened? If what the chief said was true, he wasn't just gifted—he was a monster.
Before meeting Veyron, she'd only had the potential to become a Great Yokai.
But that kid? As long as nothing happened to him, reaching that level within a hundred years was practically guaranteed.
With someone like that back home holding down the fort, Inukimi could stay at Eientei in peace.
She'd only need to fulfill the minimum royal duties—namely, "if the Western Dog Yokai are in trouble, get your butt back here no matter where you are."
"A human, huh…" The old chief frowned at first, but then his expression relaxed.
"Well, being someone's mount doesn't mean you can't be the clan leader. There's no rule saying our leader has to stay in the territory all the time. I only stayed put cause this old bag of bones can't handle much excitement anymore. Not because of any official obligation."
"…Excuse me?" Inukimi blinked.
Chief, are you finally losing it after all these years of being perfectly sober?
Wait—hold up.
"You guys already knew about what happened a few months ago?"
She suddenly remembered that whole mess where she carried Veyron across eastern Japan, chasing down Yukari Yakumo.
Most people wouldn't have known what was really going on—that Veyron had been hunting one of the strongest and most elusive yokai in existence. Some probably didn't even realize who—or what—he'd been chasing.
Still, during that time, a suspiciously large number of dangerous yokai went missing across Japan. Even Inukimi, who was just acting as his mount, ended up getting a few offerings of faith sent her way. Real power, real worship—it wasn't fake.
And since she'd spent that entire mission in her true form, it wasn't surprising that the Dog Yokai in the west eventually connected the dots and recognized her.
"…Ahem. We, uh… only just found out who that mount really was," the old chief said with a sheepish cough.
Inukimi sighed. "Then if you do know it was me, shouldn't you guys be pinning your hopes on that talented kid you just mentioned? Seems like the obvious choice."
"We were just hoping, you know, maybe that person didn't care about that sort of thing…" The chief chuckled again, then waved it off when he saw she wasn't budging.
"Alright, alright. Since you've made your stance clear, we'll shift our focus to grooming him as the next king."
"Yeah, that's fine with me," Inukimi nodded, pulling out a temporary storage artifact—the one Veyron had handed her before she left.
"I'll need you to gather everyone. These are the gifts he asked me to deliver, knowing I'd be returning home…"
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