“Daughter of god… What are you saying…”
“You have no power?”
Two of the three people Phyto is talking to respond like they don’t understand what she means, but not the other one.
His expression makes me think he knows something. Phyto is looking directly at this old man.
“Yon… No, Mister Yon, you know. We ‘daughters of god’ don’t have any power.”
Says Phyto with conviction.
This man she called Yon takes a deep breath, and looks back at her.
“Yes, I do.”
“Mister Yon, what do you mean?”
“The daughter of god… Has no power?”
The other two can’t believe it.
“We needed a special being, even if she had no actual power. That is why we daughters of god are treated as special beings, but… That is not necessary anymore, is it Mister Yon?”
“Not necessary you say?”
“…Our way of life is changing. We don’t need a powerless daughter of god.”
Phyto says their way of life is changing, and she looks at the three confused people from her village, and then at us.”
“I want the ones who aren’t here, and Lerunda and the others to hear about our people…”
Says Phyto, and she starts telling us something most of her people don’t know.
Their story, including the truth about the people with no powers that are called the daughters of god.
“Our people… Became confident, because the daughter of god was on our side, and protected us.
The daughter of god sees through everything and can communicate with god, they say… But that isn’t true.
Every so-called daughter of god except the first one, and including me, had no powers at all.”
They say the daughter of god can see through everything and talk to god.
“A long time ago, a girl was born, the first daughter of god… They say she had strange powers. She could hear god’s voice, and her strange powers made it so our people could live well. Our tradition of tattooing also started around this time…
These tattoos started as a way to show adoration for the first… True daughter of god. Because of this, I think what we consider our god is actually the true daughter of god.
A long time ago, there was a girl with weird powers, and they called her the daughter of god.
“It is said… Our people were happy when the true daughter of god was with us, but when she passed away, we were in a lot of trouble.
That’s why it was decided that we would make our own daughter of god… And that was the start of powerless girls like me being made into the daughter of god… That is what we’re taught.”
For some reason, Phyto’s people were in a lot of trouble after the daughter of god was gone. That’s when they decided to turn regular people into ‘the daughter of god’
“Our people became spiritually stable after the position of daughter of god was created… Sometimes this position was used well, and put our people on the right path. Other times… It was treated like a certain country’s chief vassal.
But this wouldn’t last, because we were driven away from that place, and had to move and look for a place where we could live. It was during this time, when we didn’t have a home and could only wander around looking for a place to settle, that I was made the daughter of god.
It’s strange but… I feel like something allowed our people to endure… None of the daughters of god had any powers aside from the true daughter of god… But my predecessor said that maybe the true daughter of god helped us in our time of need.”
They were chased away from their homes, but survived. The way Phyto describes it, it sounds like a miracle.
I get a strange feeling of déjà vu as I listen to her story.
“We… Reached this place, and met you… I think it’s a good opportunity. The daughters of god don’t have any power, but we met someone who does have a strange power… Lerunda.”
Phyto looks my way.
“I don’t have any powers, so I think I should go back to being a regular girl. Our people should change…”
Says Phyto, as she finishes telling us what she had to say.
In the meantime, her people were quietly listening too. It’s a big shock to two of them, because they fully believed that the daughter of god was real. Mister Yon is quiet too.
Much to my surprise, the one to break the silence is Miss Lan.
“This daughter of god… Can see through everything, communicate with god, and has strange powers… I think they are describing the being we know as the miko.”
So that’s why I felt déjà vu. The being they call the daughter of god is just like the miko.
—Girl, the hostage, and her people – Part three
(The miko hears the history of the hostage girl’s people.)
Join my patreon to support me and read ahead.
…they had a bonafide miko in theri village, and back then no country went to take her away. heh.