The problem with reflexes was that by definition they happened before conscious thought. I was moving by the time my brain acknowledged that I was awake, at the door to my bedroom by the time I realized the noises I'd heard hadn't been from fighting, and out in the living room by the time I remembered that I was buck naked apart from the bandages on my chest.

I skidded to a halt in front of four familiar women, dick swinging in the breeze. The bang of my door being thrown open drew their startled attention. Maki's mother and cousin were in my apartment, here, judging from her new outfit and the smell of egg fried rice, to drop off clothes and supplies. Maki herself had been in the middle of scolding her younger cousin, Susy Sunada, who had knocked over a decorative bronze bowl off the half-wall countertop next to the kitchen. The bowl had been filled with jade Ben Wa eggs and golden balls, now rolling across the floor noisily; the hollows of the toys were filled with ball bearings meant to roll around and stimulate a woman as she moved, making them not dissimilar to a bell. The apartment reverberated with the sounds.

Having sex toys for decorations was embarrassing but not surprising. What was embarrassing and surprising, was the presence of Marianne Greene in her nurse scrubs. The single mother of three, with her reasonable job and reasonable problems grounded firmly in the ordinary struggles of ordinary human beings, was a living reminder of how deeply absurd my own life had become. I gave her a stiff nod but her gaze was elsewhere.

There was a mix of reactions to me bursting onto the scene in the buff. Maki was embarrassed and smoothing her eyebrows to cover her face. One look told me that she'd lied about how platonic our interactions had been last night. Ishida Ai, her mother, was the image of class, eyes locked onto my face exclusively, pretending for all the world like I was fully clothed. Susy meanwhile had turned a worrying shade of apoplectic purple and entered a state of pre-death rigor mortis, stuck staring at my dick like it was a basilisk.

Marianne was too horrified by my bandages to react to the nudity, which reminded me.

"Hey!" I said with a wave. "I'm uhhhh, gonna put on some pants."

I shot the room double finger guns, regretting it instantly, and darted back into my bedroom for a pair of boxers. While there I started my Circular Breathing, hoping to repeat some of the fire rolls I'd gotten when fighting the Hungry Ghost. It was one Success to heal two points of normal Damage, two Successes to convert Murderous Damage to normal, and you always healed at least two points of normal Damage on a Recovery check, regardless of what you got. The game had clearly been going for anime recovery times, the kind where a character could have every bone in his body broken and only be waylaid in traction for a few weeks at most. As someone committed to living the anime lifestyle, I appreciated it.

Lady Luck had enough of my bullshit it seemed, because it took eight of my potential ten Circular Breathing charges to heal my remaining nine Murderous Damage. Perhaps it was her way of telling me to pump the brakes on said lifestyle.

"Woo!" I shouted, returning to the living room, chest bare. I'd slashed myself free of the wraps with my Eagle's Talon. Balling up the soiled gauze, I threw it from behind my back into the kitchen trash bin. "Kobe! Check it out ladies, I'm back," I said, turning around to emphasize the word, "in action! How's the new scars? Sexy, scary, scary sexy, or sexy scary?"

I flexed and pointed with both thumbs at my back. Maki gifted me an exasperated sigh at the display.

"Good God, y'all were not lying…A ghost did those?" Marianne said, half-stunned. "You didn't have those scars last Friday so—" She looked nauseous, but it passed quickly, replaced by stoic acceptance of the new reality. "Ghosts are real, and they have claws. Well, shit."

"Oh, cool, you guys filled her in? Nice. What's up, Marianne? How you holding up?"

"You know me, living the dream." She broke into a little manic giggle. "Oh, fuck me, ghosts are real. Sorry, sorry, I might, I might need a minute. Am I going to have to start taking the kids to church? There goes my Sundays…"

Ai rubbed the nurse's back comfortingly and gently guided her to a stool. "Bring them to the Shrine, dear, much more fun. Hello, James. Thank you for looking after my daughter. I knew from the second you walked through our doors that I could count on you."

"No problem! Sorry for conspiring with her to exorcise a ghost against your wishes."

Ishida Ai practically floated across the room to me. The plump, middle-aged woman still had the same serene grace I'd seen from her at the Shrine, but seemed lighter, as though a warm breeze was carrying her along. Her smile, like the little priestess herself, was small and subtle but shown on me like a spotlight. She took both my hands in hers and held them together over her heart. They were cold in comparison to mine, and it brought me a special joy to warm them with my body heat.

"Don't apologize. You have blessed me a thousand times over with your defiance. I was being a frightened, foolish old hen by trying to keep Maki from her righteous cause. There was a veil of grief, I think, blinding me to our mutual suffering."

I laughed. "Get out of here, are you kidding? You were totally in the right. I nearly died like five or six times, maybe more, and Maki at least twice. I threw a fire tornado at that thing and all it did was piss it off and embroil me deeeeeeep into a gang war."

Maki rubbed the back of her neck. "Yes, sorry, okaasan. I've been very unfair to you and to everyone at the Shrine these past few years."

"Hush, both of you. All has been made right." Ai twinkled her eyes at me. "Tell me, James – or, should I say, Kenji, have you told your sister the good news."

"Kenji?" asked Maki, confused.

"Huh? Wait, Maki, Ken didn't tell you his plan?" She looked at me blankly, brow furrowed. I groaned. "Oh my god, of course he didn't. Your brother might own the record for posthumous pranks played on me, right up there with my paternal granddad." I paused. "Our brother, I guess."

"What?"

Ai's laughs were like little chimes. "He did say your face would be funny when you learned of it, Maki. I communed with Ken's spirit when I heard the news of your success, dear. He had much to say."

"Great," I cut in, "that means you can explain while I eat breakfast."

"Of course, my son. Eat, eat."

"What?" repeated a confused Maki. Her mother led her to the couch and they began a quiet conversation in Japanese.

I made myself a bowl of fried rice and settled in between Marianne and Susy, giving my neighbor a friendly shoulder bump. Susy had put almost all of the jade eggs she'd knocked over back into the bronze bowl they'd sat in, but my arrival made her freeze with the last two in each hand.

"Weird morning?" I asked Marianne.

"You could say that. Love what you've done with the place, by the way."

"You do?" I asked skeptically. I was neutral at best now that I wasn't overwhelmingly horny anymore.

"It's not what I would have done, but it's a hell of an improvement. Honestly, it looks like you hired a very expensive interior designer who was trying to fuck you."

Fuck with me, more like, I mentally grumbled towards the Producers. "Thanks. Not that I'm not glad to see you, but what made you stop by?"

She chuckled. "I woke up this morning and saw your post, 'Broke my new phone lol, totally chill, swing by if we had plans, I guess.' And I thought, James broke his phone at three thirty in the morning on a Wednesday; what are the chances he got himself into trouble? Lo and behold."

"Yeah, well, what are you going to do, right? Couldn't let a ghost menace the old neighborhood."

"Yeah…" Marianne sighed and shook her head. "God, some days I just want to lock the kids inside and never let them out. Makes me think back to the last messages I got from my ex-husband before he died. I thought he was going mad talking about witches and devils."

I bumped her elbow. "Don't beat yourself up about it; I don't think it's a coincidence that no one believes in magic despite seeing martial artists do wild shit all the time. Something's up with that – I can practically taste the conspiracy. Plus, I mean, what would you have done differently if you believed him? You didn't know me back then, and it doesn't sound like you had anyone else to turn to either."

"Started saving up to move to the suburbs, probably." She quirked her head and raised an eyebrow at me. "Wait, you would have stepped up for my ex-husband if I asked you to?"

"Of course. Come on, I'm James Li, badass youxia hero. I'm like, contractually obligated to help single mothers with their problems."

Marianne fluttered her eyelashes dramatically and rested her chin on her palm. "And here I thought was special."

I spun on my stool towards her, conveniently blocking Susy's view, and put my hand on her inner thigh, giving it a gentle squeeze. "Just 'cause I'm a staunch defender of moms, doesn't mean you aren't special. You're very special to me, Marianne Greene."

Marianne smirked and dropped her voice to a whisper. "I don't believe you. Maybe if you showed me how special I am…" She craned her neck to look past me and gave Susy an apologetic smile. "Sorry, sugar, did you want to say something?"

Susy was clutching her phone to her chest, watching us with a wide-eyed, dreamy expression. She did have the air of a student right before raising her hand, I thought. The teen stuttered into life as we waited patiently for her to respond. "Um, you two look really cute. Could I take a picture of you?"

"Aww, that's so sweet," said Marianne beaming. "Only if you send it to me! Come here, James."

"Should I put a shirt on?"

"Boy, don't even play. Like you ain't the biggest ho on the block."

I leaned back into Marianne's embrace, my shoulder blades resting on her chest as she hugged me from behind. Susy jumped into action, turning it into a mini photoshoot, even directing us a bit. There was zero doubt in my mind that these were ending up on a fan page somewhere by the end of the day, but being seen in my boxers with a hot nurse draped over me could only be a positive. I insisted on taking some selfies with Susy as well. These, outside of the one or two where she wasn't bright crimson, I suspected would be saved for her private collection.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Thankfully, a few pics with Susy were all it took to break through her starstruck silence. She must have been fairly gregarious when not around a crush; Marianne asked a few questions about the Shrine, and it was off to the races. I got to focus on eating a second and third bowl of rice while Susy explained her duties, her family structure, how she was going about her magical training compared to her cousins and siblings, and all about the wild morning the Shrine had as the news slowly filtered through about the Bell Street exorcism and my new status as an adopted member of the Ishida Clan.

She even excitedly bragged about how she'd driven Ishida Ai here after helping make the rice with her mother, adding very, very conspicuously that she had only gotten her license after turning eighteen but how that was still faster than basically all of her friends. Marianne and I shared an amused glance at that.

"And then I knocked over the bowl right after Auntie told us to not disturb your rest, haha. Sorry about that, James. Um, doesn't look damaged to me though."

Marianne sipped her teeth. "About that bowl, James, that I have to say, is a very interesting design choice on your end."

I immediately decided to play stupid. "What do you mean? Jade eggs and golden cherries are way better kitchen decorations than wax fruits. Check it out," I said, pulling a pair of rin-no-tama out of the bowl, the Japanese equivalent to Ben Wa eggs. "Silk stems too – not sure why they're so long, but hey, more silk, more impressive in my book. Don't think it's real gold though."

Marianne looked skeptical of my three-Success-lie but graciously didn't call me out on the matter. Susy was holding back laughter but did appear to believe that I believed I was telling the truth. The Producers helpfully fed the information to my subconscious that the bowl was meant to contain party favors and that its position had more to do with it being on the way out of the apartment, rather than because of its proximity to the kitchen. I also felt assured that the bowl would replenish any contents given as gifts, though not any I sold off.

I was firmly of the opinion that offering sex toys as parting gifts was completely insane, slimy, and weird, but, I did think the idea of accidentally giving out sex toys as gifts was pretty funny.

"You're free to take a few by the way. The bowl came with a ton, I think they were intended as, like, party favors."

"R-really?"

"Sure." I shrugged. "You'd be doing me a favor. Like I said, got plenty more taking up space in storage. Grab as many as you like."

Susy picked up the largest of the eggs which sat heavy in her palm, staring at it with a mix of fear and awe. Marianne quickly rushed around to her side and put a hand on her shoulder. "Oh honey, no. Let's talk this out, yeah? James, go do pushups or meditate or some other martial artist thing. We need a girls' chat."

"That's right! Thanks for reminding me. I'll be in my meditation chamber; knock if you need anything."

Maki and her mother were on the couch, having a hushed emotional heart-to-heart. I slipped around them and into the Viewer selected Base Upgrade.

Sunlight, bright, hot, and wonderful greeted me on the other side of an otherwise unremarkable door. It was good that I had only opened it wide enough to enter; this would certainly have interrupted the ladies' conversations.

I was standing on the covered narrow wooden patio that bordered an elaborate and beautiful Zen garden. The interior of the meditation chamber was very reminiscent of that of the Little Tokyo Shrine, if smaller than their large central chamber, in that it was expertly designed to appear as the outdoors. The large grass mounds that sat like islands amongst the freshly raked gravel, were bright green and very much alive, as were the bamboo and other trees that were used to mask the boundary walls, making the room seem larger than it was. Above it all was panel lighting mimicking a clear blue sky. I couldn't wait to see what it looked like at night.

Fully impossible without serious magical effort, were the two flowering trees in full bloom despite the season. On one side of the room was a large cherry blossom, its petals occasionally dancing down on some ephemeral wind. On the other, behind a torii, was a plum blossom; from a large branch, hung a bell on a rope over a small altar that had been swallowed by the tree's roots. I imagined that was so I could say a prayer and converse with Funikugami, should I ever find a need to. I was curious to see what became of the place once I reunited with Mars, who had built a shaman. Would the room expand? Would the altar grow more elaborate so that she could entreat her spirits the way that Maki might her Kami?

I hopped over the gravel, leaving the neat lines undisturbed, and sat cross-legged on a grass mound. Traditional meditation had never been my bag. James had preferred losing himself in the movements of a form, and Alan had liked long hikes alone to clear his head. But the atmosphere of the room did more than lend itself towards meditation, it almost demanded it of visitors.

I contemplated Corruption. Between the Hakkotsu no Ha and becoming the Champion of Funikugami, I'd earned myself two Permanent Points. Filling my Willpower track with either Temp or Permanent points would mean character retirement without outside help. I'd been counting on Nasim to delve into the Corruption mechanic so I wasn't as well acquainted as I should have been, but I knew from in-world knowledge that a fully corrupted martial artist was basically a raging demon. My mother had warned me that pursuing power above all else opened a martial artist to, little-c, corruption. It was why, she told me as a child, we took the time to spend some days not working out or studying, but simply enjoying the company of family and friends. She'd said that this was as important, if not more so, than forms or sparring.

I didn't feel any different with my two points of Corruption, but then, I hadn't felt all that different after stabilizing myself last night either. Or, I should say, I felt hornier, but I hadn't felt like my decision-making had been grossly affected, and yet I had in retrospect, been a total maniac. Ken too, told me that he hadn't felt the sword's corruptive effects until it was too late, and he was already rushing headfirst into a fight he wasn't prepared for.

As I sat, it became clearer and clearer that I wasn't going to be able to find the differences in my cognition, at least not without spending Experience points and expanding my build considerably. An answer did come to me though, one for how to prevent corruption, and/or Corruption, when you couldn't personally feel the difference between levels of it.

"Friends," I said to myself, "AKA, get someone else to do it."

It was simple, but the best epiphanies felt obvious after the fact. I was sure that I could have dug through the catalog of feats and invested heavily in relevant skills like Meditation and Insight to find some way of objectively measuring my mental and emotional changes. But I was equally sure that I could more than get by with people like Maki and Marianne around to cuff me on the side of the head if I ever got too out-of-pocket.

"The real enlightenment was the friends we made along the way?" I asked myself, stroking my chin in thought. It was cliché and embarrassingly saccharine but for the purpose of defending against Ego Death, it seemed sound and practical. "Yeah, I'll stand by that."

I did worry about how the others would manage it. Thankfully, only Nasim and Mars had started the game with Corruption-powered abilities. Mars would have her tribe to look out for her, and I could trust Nasim to manage on his own. The man was a veteran exploiter and min-maxer. Hopefully, the rest would be a bit more cautious than I'd been; maybe sign one fewer deals with spirits than I had or be a little more sensible about it all at the least.

There was one looming, massive problem with my plan to form and rely on a tight-knit, close social circle around me. I'd been ignoring it since I visited Ma last week, then some more that night after getting to know Marianne better, and I'd all but locked it out of my thoughts after taking Annie as a student. At the end of this, after I'd got the crew back together, we'd found or earned a way back home, how was I going to leave them behind? Was I going to leave them behind? Was I going to leave?

This world had all the many problems of my old world. Global warming, corporate greed, corrupt politicians, extremist psychopaths, etc., except it also had the literal Devil. It had ghosts that would crawl through your window and drown your infant and ghosts that would beat the shit out of you on the street and eat you. There really were shadowy cabals of warlocks running things in the background, and the only news that wasn't fake cost tens of thousands of dollars to get access to. It would be insane to stay.

Although, to its credit, this world was maybe a little less racist and sexist than my old one, the result of anyone being theoretically capable of training to the point where they could reliably bring their fists to a gun fight. I had to hand it to the place, that was very cool. And as much as I internally griped – I think justifiably – about being forced into porn by interdimensional perverts, their chosen location was naturally much more sex positive. How that weighed up against all the great and ancient evils populating the land, I couldn't yet say.

The door opened behind me.

"Kami-sama! This, this is—"

"Holy shit, James. Are we sure we have the same landlord?"