Cursed Spirits and Fox Tails: The Inari Shrine Saga

Death is the silent crescendo of existence, the inevitable finale to life's symphony. It comes in countless forms-a screech of tires, the suffocating grip of flames, the cold sting of betrayal, the crushing weight of despair, or the slow erosion of illness. Some greet death with calm acceptance, others with trembling fear, while many live as though it were a distant myth, blind to their own fragility. Yet death is no myth; it is the great equalizer, indifferent to status or strength, the only certainty in a world of uncertainties. What lies beyond it remains a mystery, a question that haunts the living. Some dream of paradise, others of oblivion, but I know this: death is not an end, but a transformation. Pain precedes it-sharp, unrelenting, the final toll for the privilege of life. And then comes the silence, the stillness, the absence of all things.

"Curses cannot die, but they can be broken," they say. Life itself feels like a curse, a chain of mortality forged by time, binding us all. Yet in death, the chain shatters, and the soul is set free. Whether that freedom is a blessing or a curse, only the dead can say. For the living, death remains the ultimate mystery, a door that opens only once, and only to those who have no choice but to step through. It is both an end and a beginning, a breaking of the curse that binds us, leaving behind the echoes of what once was.

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The amount of cringe tolerance it takes to write this story. >;(

I decided to change and update the story 😭