Digital Devil Story: Reincarnation of the Goddess by Aya Nishitani Page A

a Mayan temple, it evaporated when coming into contact with their mercuric-sulfide based paint. In other words, this tomb was designed specifically to keep demons out. Getting up his courage with this realization, Nakajima picked up Yumiko's body and walked toward the depths of the red valley. However, Nakajima never had that much in the way of stamina in the first place. In less than ten minutes, his legs were exhausted. He would have liked to have Kerberos' help, but he didn't want to put any more stress on the already terribly-injured demon. Besides, one could hardly say this path would be the most appropriate place for him, with the walls literally painted with demon repellent.
    Breathing heavily with exhaustion, Nakajima proceeded along the path to the burial chamber, the stone walls towering up into the air alongside him. The sweat dripping off of his forehead into his eyes blurred his vision, and each step took every ounce of effort he had. Nakajima shook his head back and forth to get rid of the built-up perspiration, and when his vision cleared, he noticed a white silhouette in his peripheral vision.
    "Who's there!?"
    Looking closer, he could tell that there was more than just one silhouette--in fact there were quite a few of them. But none of them displayed any indication of movement, and simply stood or squatted there. Gingerly approaching one, Nakajima could see that it was a bleached mummy, its head tilted to the side and its black eye sockets staring up into space. Whether it was the power of the mercuric sulfide or the cold of the underground chamber, the corpse had been preserved from natural decay. Its chest area had what looked like a deliberately drilled large hole in it. Looking around, it appeared that the dozen or so mummies here were scattered about without any order to them. Judging by their clothing, they appeared to be the bones of people from many different time periods. One wore primitive robes, another appeared to be wearing the eboshi hat of a Kamakura-era samurai, and yet another looked like an Edo-period peasant. Many of them had signs of their bones being crushed by large jaws or having their throats torn out. Few people would come into a place like this by accident; these were most likely grave robbers here to plunder the Kofun tomb. Who was it that did this to them?
    All of a sudden, the sound of a bizarre cry assaulted Nakajima's ears.
    "YAAH! GLULULU!"
    It sounded like the voice was coming from far away, but the unusual reverberations produced from the walls of the burial pathway made it difficult to judge the distance of sounds. Nakajima cast a sidelong glance at the butchered corpses of the mummies. If the grave guardian that mercilessly slaughtered these would-be grave robbers was still patrolling this path to the burial chamber now...
    As Nakajima shuddered, that very same guardian lept out in front of his eyes from the shadow of a great rock.
    "Yomotsu-Shikome!" Nakajima cried.
    The fierce image of the monster woman from his vision was burned into Nakajima's memory. But the Yomotsu-Shikome standing before him was far more grotesque in real life than he had imagined. She was almost exactly twice his height. Her purple-flecked squat legs glistened white with slime, and bloated lower stomach of the torso held up by them stuck out like that of a pregnant woman. The robe she wore seemed almost comical it was so small, and it did not even extend down far enough to cover her breasts, which drooped all the way down to her navel. Her webbed hands shuddered, thick with blubber. Her face was almost exactly that of a green frog, and as she exhaled, two gill-like slits on the side of her throat expanded, exposing the pink fleshy walls within. Her long, shimmering black hair made her look only all the more disgusting.
    Yomotsu-Shikome took a step forward. As Nakajima met her gaze, he carefully laid Yumiko down, wiped the cold sweat off his hands onto his slacks, and picked up his handheld