Another tree came toppling in my direction and I jumped up on its trunk in an attempt to launch off of it to get closer to the berserk tree that Onigitsune was currently clinging to. However, as soon as I got close to it, it lurched around and swung a branch at me, swatting me away and into the trunk of another tree.

From the ground, Oniuma growled and cracked his knuckles. "If I had my naginata, I'd make short work of that piece of wood. But for now..." He propelled himself forward with his cloud, slamming into the base of Onigitsune's tree and wrapping his arms around the trunk. He puffed out his cheeks, and with a strained roar, squeezed his arms tightly around it until the trunk shattered in half in his grasp. Remind me never to ask for a hug from that guy.

Its roots severed, the tree that Onigitsune clung to began to fall. Onigitsune sensed this, though, and panicked, scraping his claws over the wood and causing additional branches to spring forth from it like the legs of a centipede, catching the tree horizontally and lifting it in the air on long, spindly limbs. The tree spun around, its greater radius causing it to knock over even more of the surrounding forest, forcing Oniuma to retreat a ways.

However, this had effectively created a clearing where the tree stood, and the removal of the surrounding growth let the sun shine down uninhibited. Onigitsune suddenly stopped, then looked up at the sky in awe and longing, reaching a gnarled hand up towards the sun and making a plaintive moan. I remembered he'd had a similar reaction to Wakage's sun stone. A stone which originally belonged to Kougyoku, Onigitsune's mother. If sunlight was what it took to calm him, then just as well.

I took the opportunity from his lapse in panic to fly down from the tree I'd been in and land on the trunk behind Onigitsune. Holding my hands up as a benign gesture, I coaxed, "Hey, you're okay, no one here is going to hurt you."

Onigitsune whirled around with an alarmed expression and tendrils of small branches suddenly erupted from the trunk under my feet, wrapping around me and pulling me onto my chest against the trunk, crushing me against it. I tried to resist against it enough to breathe, choking out, "Onigitsune... stop... you're not in danger..."

But it did no good. He wasn't even receptive to verbal reassurances in this state. I began to wonder if he even understood the spoken word beyond the few orders that Souzou Tennou gave him.

The tree began barrelling through the forest in the direction of the mountain, as though he was desperately seeking something familiar. Oh no... If Onigitsune drove us out into the Killing Field, there was no way I was going to be able to reliably keep him close enough to me to stop him from getting himself killed. As much as I didn't want to use excessive force against him, if it was between that and him getting devoured by the spirit, I'd rather risk traumatizing him myself.

I transformed into my larger dog form in order to easily break through the branches that bound me to the trunk. Once free, I grasped the trunk of the tree in my mouth and wrenched it to the side, digging my claws into the ground to force it to stop. Onigitsune meekly cowered at the sight of a giant white dog, halting the motion of the tree and instead growing a mass of branches around himself in which to hide. Dammit, I hated having to scare him, but it was still better than the alternative. At least I'd finally gotten him to stop.

I was suddenly hit in the face by a blast of fire, causing me to drop the tree from my mouth. "That evil dog has left the field and come to claim the rest of our forest for himself! Buuuurn the invader!" It was apparent that the commotion caused by Onigitsune's rampage had alerted the attention of the native forest guardians.

Kuran and a pack of cat youkai sprang down from the surrounding trees onto my back. The cats dug their claws into me and starting stabbing me with knives and short swords, which at my size was more of a nuisance than anything, but it still hurt.

But the pain wasn't my biggest concern right now. Since Kuran was the closest thing to a leader this pack of cats had, I projected to her, "Stop attacking right now! You're scaring him!"

Kuran spun around at the disembodied voice and flung a fireball into the forest. "Another invader?!"

Becoming increasingly frustrated at the futility of my words no matter who they were directed at, I barked, "No, it's me, the dog you're standing on! Look!" With a poof of youki I shrank back to my human form, the pack of cats suddenly finding themselves latched onto nothing, but nevertheless falling and landing gracefully around me as I stood to face them sternly.

Kuran pointed at me in recognition, her mouth gaping. "Aah! It's you! ... I knew you were up to know good." She pointed at her eyes and then back at me, mimicking the gesture she gave me the first time we met.

I gave her a flat look, not having time for these games. "Is your sister around?" I asked. I'd had much better luck reasoning with Seiran, and Kuran at least seemed to follow her lead.

A chill mist floated from the forest behind me, and Seiran appeared within it, her expression as vacant as ever. With a bored monotone, she said, "Actually, I'm probably going to side with Kuran on this. Some of those culinary tourists you've brought here have been causing problems, too. So I'm kind of thinking that they're not actually tourists."

I sighed and turned to her. "And you deserve a full explanation of what's going on. You're right, we haven't been very good guests in your land. The women I've brought here are actually--"

"Oh heeeey, giant ruckus in the forest, lots of trees destroyed, and here I was thinking, 'Gee, who do I know who makes a mess wherever he goes?', and lo and behold, here you are," came Wakage's voice from up on the trunk of the tree that Onigitsune had taken on a rampage. Crouching and glaring down at me, she accused, "You know, I have a good thing going here now, and I would really, really appreciate it if you didn't mess this up, too."

"And I have things I need to do, too, and I'm sorry if they're getting in your way of hanging around in trees!" I shouted back up at her. If I was in a logical state of mind, I'd recognize that this wasn't really a fair accusation to make considering she bore no responsibility for the mountain and owed me no favors, but right now my stress levels were hitting a breaking point and it was becoming more difficult to keep my emotions in check.

She leapt down in front of me and straightened up to scowl at me eye to eye. "I am a forest guardian, and that means it is my job to protect the forest and its inhabitants from invaders that would seek to do it harm. Things like THAT," she emphasized, indicating Oniuma, the disrupted undergrowth, and Onigitsune's mutated tree trunk. "Seriously, dumping off a prison full of traumatized women on us was one thing, but now you're bringing the oni out here?! Do you WANT me as an enemy?!"

"It wasn't my intent to cause you or this forest any harm--" I began.

"And that's supposed to make everything better?" she wondered in bewilderment. "I'm already well aware that you're not a malicious person. Hell, the depth of your lack of malice and its habit of preventing you from efficiently dealing with problems frustrates me in and of itself. But 'intent' is meaningless in the face of 'results'. There's 'accidents' and then there's 'you brought oni into a forest and honestly what did you expect to happen?'"

I breathed through my teeth and clenched my fists. "Look, I didn't even realize Oniuma still had Onigitsune with him, and he got scared being in an unfamiliar place. And just like you, I'm trying to prevent him from causing any further damage, but standing here arguing is only going to scare him more!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," she paused, waving her hands in front of me. Slowly pointing towards the fallen tree, she confirmed, "You're saying... you got Onigitsune off the mountain? And brought him here?"

"It hadn't been my intent, but like you said, intent doesn't matter, and he's here now and I have to deal with it. Which is what I've been trying to do if you'd stop getting in my way!"

Wakage raised her eyebrow, then lifted her chin and shook her finger. "Ohhh no. He's not your responsibility. You've already tried and failed with him multiple times. I know you really want to fix everything yourself, but like with that spirit in the field, you need to understand where your limits are and keep your hands off."

"I feel like I have to fix everything myself because no one else is stepping up to the task!" I retorted. "If I see a problem, I'm not going to wait around for someone else to do something about it! I may not be the most qualified person to help, but I'd rather it be me than no one!"

"And why do you think that is?" Wakage wondered, folding her arms. "You may brush off my time out here as just 'hanging around in trees', but you know what else I've been doing while you've been flailing about aimlessly? Making friends. Kuran, Seiran and I have been sharing knowledge with each other about our different skillsets and forest stewardship methodologies. And just about our personal lives in general. And so now, their forest was in danger, and I came to help them. They didn't even have to ask. Meanwhile, the only person you've managed to keep on your side is the one too brainwashed to refuse."

My chest burned and my eyes began to water. It was like she somehow knew I'd been deposed, with even Kijin turning on me, and was just rubbing it in my face what a horrible, ineffective leader I was. All while haughtily suggesting that I ought to be trying the things I was already trying to do when she'd burst in and interrupted me. I'd already been trying to stop Onigitsune from causing damage. I'd already come out here to work on a plan to help meet the hybrids' need for security to win them back over to my side. And yet she just assumed I was out here making a mess with no plan.

I raised a finger and took in a sharp breath, but stopped myself. If I went off on her, what exactly would that help? It might be cathartic, but even if I totally demolished her and proved that I was right and she was wrong and kept my pride intact... then what? The reason I was mad at her in the first place was because we had the exact same goal, she'd just beaten me to the punch in expressing it.

Swallowing the bile I had been about to launch at her, I instead firmly stated, "You're absolutely right. I'd been having the same thoughts, so I'm glad you're here to help."

"Help?" she wondered, taken aback by my sudden change in tone. "You're letting destructive oni run free in the forest. What do you think I'd 'help' you with there?"

"Onigitsune is only being destructive because he doesn't understand what's going on," I said. "As his blood relative and a fellow forest guardian, you're correct in that you're much more qualified to rehabilitate him than I am. He's reacted positively to your sister's sun stone before, and to the actual sun just now. The forest is in his blood, and I think it's best to nurture that."

Wakage blew air through her hair and looked away. "He rejected me before. Souzou Tennou probably damaged him too badly to salvage."

I raised an eyebrow at her. "But your entire goal up until now was to beat Souzou Tennou and salvage whatever you could of your sister. Wouldn't healing him from Souzou Tennou's influence accomplish both? Besides, you're absolutely right that the most important thing we need to be doing right now is making friends."

Her lip curled a little. "I kind of don't like it when you agree with me so readily. It's easier when we're arguing." With a sigh, she looked up at the fallen trunk with the cluster of branches encasing a frightened kitsune hybrid. "But the reason it's easier is that arguing keeps me from having to take action. The same kind of stalling technique I've been griping at you about."

She looked down at the sun stone hanging from her waist. "He does react to this... but I don't want to rely on this as a lure. If we keep just trying to trick him into coming out, he's eventually going to catch on and come to associate both this and the actual sun with things that are trying to capture him."

"Well, we do have one other thing here that he likes," I said, looking over at my shoulder. "Oniuma, could you go up on that trunk and sit with Onigitsune?"

"Sure...?" he replied in confusion, using his cloud to float up to the fallen tree and sit next to the clump of branches.

"Him?!" Wakage sputtered. "What happened to nurturing the forest in him?! Putting him with an oni will only bring out his oni side, which is expressly what we're trying to avoid!"

"But like it or not, he is half oni," I retorted. "And oni doesn't necessarily have to mean 'destructive'. Oniuma didn't cause any of the damage here, it was all Onigitsune and his plant-manipulation powers. But from what I've seen, Oniuma's presence calms him down, because he doesn't consider Oniuma a threat. So I think we need to use that to our advantage and not worry about what Oniuma is."

Turning my head up to address him, I said, "Oniuma, I want you to stay there and keep watch over Onigitsune. If he comes out, just let him do what makes him comfortable, but if he gets scared again, call for me immediately."

"Call for you?" Wakage repeated. "Where are you going, then?"

"To do what you suggested," I said, stepping around her and facing Kuran, Seiran, and the rest of the pack of cats they'd brought. "Hyounekozoku of the forest, I deeply apologize for the trouble I've brought you. I'm offering myself to assist with cleanup and repair, and if any of the women I have left with you are causing you problems, I will also deal with them. I only ask that you allow Wakage to watch over the oni that I brought with me, but otherwise leave them in peace. If they cause any further trouble, I will take responsibility for it as well. But my hope is that we can be friends and work together."

Kuran scowled. "I don't like it. You're from that mountain, you're a dog, and you brought oni and strange women into the forest who ended up destroying parts of it. I know you're an invader in league with the dog of the field and are just trying to wipe out even more of our trees."

"You are correct that I'm a dog who came from the mountain and have unintentionally brought harm to this place. And while I am not in league with the dog of the field, I am familiar with it and know what it is. I unfortunately don't have the power on my own to subdue it, however I hope if we share our knowledge and work together, we will be able to come up with solutions to both our problems."

Seiran shrugged passively. "Works for me."

"Nee-chan!" Kuran protested with a pout. "When do I get to burn him, though?!"

I bowed deeply to the two of them. "Thank you for giving me another chance. I'll do everything in my power to help set things right."

"Okay but if you mess up again I'm not going to stop my sister from burning you down to ashes," Seiran responded calmly.

"Yessss!" Kuran hissed, fixating a critical glare on me. No pressure or anything.

Turning to Wakage, I confirmed, "Are you okay looking after Onigitsune for a while? I do agree that you're more qualified than I am."

She waved me off. "Don't worry about me. I trust those two will deal with you promptly if you cause any more trouble, so it's yourself you should be worrying about." ... Right.

Approaching the two cats, I requested, "Now then, show me where I can be of assistance to you to rectify what I've done."

The two of them looked at each other. Kuran gave a slight sneer while Seiran remained expressionless as usual. "I suppose there's one thing he could try," Seiran said.

"Great! Lead the way!" My eagerness to please had been causing me to rush headlong into things I wasn't prepared or qualified for up until now, which had led to disasterous results. But this time would be different. Probably.