Otto slowly carried Sakura's body back to their room, still unconscious. He wiped the water from her body and covered her with a blanket.
[Influence 44%]
Otto looked at the system panel; the timeline change was within the acceptable range. As long as it didn't reach 75%, there wouldn't be any problems.
Otto sat next to Sakura, gently running his fingertips through her hair.
From the moment he awoke from his coma, he hadn't given up. He continued to absorb Honkai energy, but in all his time here, he'd only managed to accumulate enough energy to leap forward an hour.
There is too little honkai energy in this era.
He silently stroked Sakura's long hair, and his jade eyes glowed with a strange and eerie light in the dark night, making them seem even more gloomy and deep.
He sat silently next to Sakura all night.
As the first rays of sun fell on the Sanctuary, Sakura opened her eyes to see Otto sitting next to her with a bright smile on his face.
They looked at each other, pressing their lips to each other, and thus a new day began.
After Sakura helped Kallen clean her body and reapply the medicine, she headed back to Yae Village to prepare for the festival, leaving Kallen and Otto at the shrine.
Otto didn't talk to Kallen, he took a small bucket with him, came to the river near the village, made a simple fishing rod from a thin thread and a branch, and without using any bait, began to catch fish.
He sat for two hours looking at the turbulent water without catching a single fish.
"Lord God, do you want to catch some fish?" a voice called from behind. Kallen, dressed in Sakura's yukata, approached Otto, swaying slightly. Her face was still a little pale, but she already looked much better.
"Yes." Otto didn't turn around, he continued to stare at the water. Occasionally, a fish swam across the surface, but none of them seemed inclined to bite Otto's hook.
"Aren't you going to rest some more?" he asked, noticing that Kallen hadn't left.
"I'm one of those people who can't stay still for long," she answered a little embarrassedly, "I can't waste my time lying on the bed."
"I see." Seeing that Otto had fallen silent, Kallen asked again, "Lord God, why do you call yourself a god?"
She didn't think that there were gods who would sit for hours unsuccessfully fishing in such a turbulent river.
Otto replied, "You probably know how I ended up here from Sakura. The people in this village are quite xenophobic, so I stayed at the shrine, pretending to be a god."
Otto told her bluntly that he was simply pretending to be a god. He wanted Kallen to know this. In her eyes, he must be an ordinary man, and his so-called "miracle" was simply blind faith.
"You tricked the people of the village?" Kallen immediately understood what Otto meant. "You're staying here for Sakura?"
This time he didn't answer. He pulled the line out of the water and looked at the empty bucket next to him. He'd sat there for two hours without catching a single fish.
"I'll go further upstream. There are a lot of animals here. You better return to the sanctuary. I can escape if I meet one." Otto picked up the bucket and walked upstream.
As Kallen left, Otto looked at the swirling water, pointed his index finger towards the river, and a dozen fish flew out of the water straight into Otto's bucket.
"We'll eat fish today," Otto said with a smile, looking at the now full bucket, and went deeper into the mountain.
Today, three hunters from the village died at the claws of a brown bear on the mountain.
It's common for novice hunters to die at the hands of their prey while hunting on the mountain. In the village of Yae, where the festival is soon to take place, the news wasn't even worth mentioning.
When night fell, Otto prepared a veritable fish feast for Sakura and Kallen. Kallen looked at all the fish dishes in bewilderment. How did he manage to catch so many fish?
So delicious!
After taking a bite of the tender fish, Kallen and Yae Sakura closed their eyes and savored the taste of the food.
Otto wasn't at the table. He sat in the main hall of the sanctuary, a mask on his face, looking at the statue before him.
There were no candles burning around, the only source of light was the moonlight, which penetrated inside and illuminated Otto with its bright light, making it seem as if he was dressed in a white robe.
His body didn't need nourishment. Otto picked up Sakura's katana and stroked its cherry-colored blade with the fingers of his right hand.
"It's time to give the signal for the finale of this play. I've been in this village long enough," he muttered to himself.
The blade pierced his thumb, and his own blood ran down the blade, turning the katana Sakura was using red.
...
In the middle of the night, a dead brown bear fell to the ground in the forest. A figure in a black robe stood next to its corpse, and next to it, a gagged girl was tied to a large tree.
She cried, and the ropes that tied her tightly to the tree did not allow her to break free.
She was the granddaughter of the village chief of Yae. She clearly remembered sleeping soundly in her bed, but when she woke up, she found herself tied to a tree.
A crescent moon emerged from behind the clouds, and the dim moonlight illuminated a black-robed figure. The frightened girl saw the mask of the god Inari.
Otto didn't look at the girl tied to the tree. His fingers dug into the body of the brown bear lying on the ground, a huge amount of Honkai energy flowing into it. The dead brown bear stood up.
His body continued to grow and deform, and he even grew horns and wings.
"You've taken quite a while," Otto said quietly, the figure of the miko appearing behind him, her red eyes looking at the girl tied to the tree.
"Because of your existence, Sakura's hatred for the villagers has weakened. It's becoming more and more difficult for me to control this body."
Rin, who was in control of Sakura's body, responded. Soon, she nodded and turned back to Otto: "I've ruined the girl."
Now the girl was looking at the ground with lifeless eyes, she looked like a walking corpse.
"It's really amazing." Otto couldn't help but admire the fact that she could corrupt a person without touching them, which made him want to get Jizo Mitama even more.
"You really are ruthless." Rin asked, "Is there anything you won't destroy?"
Otto did not answer her question.
These people were destined to die at Sakura's hands, and he wouldn't risk his chance to return to his own time by trying to save them. They were simply dead people from the past.