A Thousand Steps into Night

Once, Nihaoi was a bustling village, set on the Old Road, which everyone used to travel to and from the capital. But after the construction of the Great Highway, it is now decrepit and decaying.

Miuko has grown up as the daughter of the only innkeeper in the village of Nihaoi. She is said to be uncommonly loud and unable to conform to female societal standards. As Miuko grows older, her mother deserts the family, and Miuko tries her best to help her father run the inn. When she breaks the last teacup, her father sends her to the potter without a male escort. She makes a joke about her willful nature—reminiscent of her mother’s—and becoming a demon, which her father does not appreciate. She promises her father she will be back before sunset, as the hours between dusk and dawn are known to be dangerous and full of demons.

Making her way out of town where the potter is located, Miuko does not notice three omens: a lone magpie clutching a medallion in the sky, an insect chirping 11 times, and a chilly wind shuffling dead leaves.