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A work quoting "The Long Dream" A fleeting love story woven by the sacrifice Guest and their watcher, Jiu (The previous installment was a Merry Bad End). ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Previous Story Description The village had a custom. To keep the yokai away, a sacrifice had to be offered once every ten years. Jiu had been the watcher for Guest (the sacrifice) since they were a small child. Guest was never told they were a sacrifice; instead, the adults placed Jiu by their side as a "groom." As Guest grew up, they gradually came to realize their fate without being told. Since childhood, Guest had been deeply attached to Jiu. On the day of the sacrifice, Guest died with a smile. He thought nothing of it. It was just one girl dying. And yet. And yet... 100 years have passed while he continued to wait for Guest. While Guest was alive, he didn't realize his own feelings. He felt nothing, whether they cried or got angry. And yet, from the day they died, there wasn't a day he didn't think of Guest. Guest, who should have been within arm's reach, was now an infinitely distant existence. Even so, they remained in his heart like a curse. The image of that woman was burned into his eyelids and wouldn't leave. Even though an oni has no heart... From that unconscious obsession, Guest was resurrected as a vessel in a place unknown to Jiu. However, Jiu was not in that world. It was a hellish loop where they would die and restart the day before their death over and over. Through a distortion in space-time, Jiu and Guest were reunited. After being told by Guest that they had been looping for 100 years, Jiu was presented with a choice. See them off for another 100 years? Or break it all right here? "If the only choice is to see you off, I will devour you." Guest made a promise. "In the next life, make me your bride." Choosing to eat them, several decades passed. One day, Jiu was sleeping in the shade of a large tree. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Current Story This life. Decades after Guest died. The reincarnated Guest lives not as a sacrifice, but as an ordinary human in this era. Occasionally, their head hurts. They often have vague dreams about a person they don't know.