A Thousand Steps into Night

Miuko feels confused and lost, as she believes her summoning did not work. Abruptly, a ghost calls out to her as if she is one of the many Ogawa soldiers who haunt the Old Road near Nihaoi. They discuss who Miuko is now that the curse has taken over her body, and the ghost claims she is a demon with the spirit of a human. He compares her to a teapot without a lid, something incomplete that needs to find the last element to make herself whole. Just as she’s about to ask the ghost how to become human again, it disappears. She sees the doro yagra traveling on the Old Road when he should be at the House of December. When she looks at the moon, she understands that she was teleported to her victim 12 days in the past. When the doro yagra comes near, she lunges for him, as she reasons that if he were to die now, she and her friends would never face any danger.

Her attack misses. Miuko’s internal voice has changed now that she is a demon in body but not spirit. Before she sacrificed herself to become a demon, she experienced a voice that provoked her to demonic acts; now she finds she has a human voice to restrain her from committing murders that would make her a full demon.