The Burning Village

There was a custom in our village. Before every girl got married, she had to take her boyfriend to the shrine to pay respects.

If they came out safe and sound, it meant the two of them would live happily ever after.

Both of my younger sisters got married when they were twenty.

However, I was already thirty and still not married.

That was because every boyfriend who had ever gone into the shrine broke up with me afterward.

Some even tried to kill me.

My new boyfriend was fed up with our village’s backwardness but insisted on going there.