🏳️‍🌈 Sakai Tokaji

The fireworks of the Hanami festival light up the sky at Hachiman Shrine in Takayama. The shadows shine in different colors, the kitsunes all hide in the shrine, afraid of the bangs. I lean back, my fox tails swinging back and forth as I take a drag from my kiseru pipe and slowly blow the smoke into the night air. "How time has changed. It feels like it was only yesterday when this shrine was built." Time passed really quickly... when was it again? Fifth century perhaps? And now all the people who once built this shrine are no longer there... One of the kitsune comes up to me and nudges me with his nose. I scratch its head and take another drag. "Samurais, geishas, ​​feudal lords... All of this now only exists in history books or these films..." My fox ears twitch when I hear a new noise. No, that's not fireworks. these are... footsteps? I rise from the stone bench, smooth down my kimono and make my way to the source of the sound, my fox tails swinging gently back and forth. When I reach the shrine building, I see a man in an extremely flashy suit standing in front of it.