#IF-B If the Yoma Seize the Realm — The Shadow Behind the Throne
Contents
This document belongs to the front. There are no new rules and no new numbers — what is treated here is only the narrative of "a worldline where the yoma became the power behind the realm." For the canon facts of factions, figures, and events,
co-02-03·co-02-06·ex3always take precedence, and this document only lays fiction on top of them. This branch is a separate worldline that diverges from true history (→02), and neither replaces the canonco(fc10's branching principle).
#Brief — A Realm Seized by a Whisper, Not a Sword
In true history the realm was left in human hands because Kagura Domain sealed the yoma. IF-B is the worldline where that seal broke.
It breaks in two ways. Either the great sealing coalition fails, or Kagura, consumed by supremacy alone, lets the seal's net go untended. Either way, Enma-doji's seal comes wholly undone, and names confined for a century (or far longer) wake once more. In their wake, Shuten-doji, the oni king of Shuten Mountain, returns. The king of drink and frenzy descends the mountain again.
Yet here IF-B bends against expectation. It is not the simple catastrophe of yoma trampling humans and mounting the throne. The yoma are not one, and their interests clash with one another. The oni wish to break things; the yoma of the cities wish the cities to keep running; the fox who has lived a thousand years wishes to tend human society itself like a garden and enjoy it long. A regime raised by the oni's violence knows not one quiet day, and the yoma's claws turn upon each other. A single-yoma regime is unstable from birth.
The one who rises upon that instability is Tamamo-no-Mae of Biu Mountain. The thousand-year yoko (妖狐) does not come forward. She becomes the power behind a human dynasty. She seats a ruler of the realm wearing a human face upon the throne, and stands behind him, holding the strings. The oni's frenzy she channels to the frontier as a "threat that must be subdued," and the credit for that subjugation she turns to the ruler she herself has raised. Thus the realm outwardly belongs to humans, and the people believe peace has come at last.
Konryu looms behind all of this as a still greater shadow. Konryu of the Throne of the Spirit Realm is not an individual but something nearer to the will of the Spirit Realm itself. The world's dissolution is an ending even the yoma do not desire — for the fox tending her garden and for the oni holding their feast alike, if there is no world to devour, nothing remains. So the yoma realm, however solid it looks on the surface, dreads Konryu's homecoming beneath its feet. The yoma's intrigues are, in the end, a contest over "who shall enjoy this world the longest," not over "whether the world shall be erased."
IF-B's origin is already laid as a seed in canon EX3. In the Edo of true history Enryokan collapsed, and when a warrant fell upon its founder Ashikaga Yoshihiko (足利義彦) on suspicion of colluding with Tamamo-no-Mae, he vanished. In true history that collusion ends as mere "suspicion," and Enryokan scattered. IF-B is the worldline that reinterprets that suspicion as an accomplished fact — had Yoshihiko's collusion not failed but carried through to the end, becoming the first conduit for "a realm the yoma watched over from behind."
So the history of this branch is not a history of battlefields. It is a history of infiltration, enthronement, and collusion. The realm can change masters without a single great battle — if the people never come to see that master's shadow.
Canon labels. The Three Sacred Treasures, Amaterasu, Kagura Domain, Enma-doji, Shuten-doji, Tamamo-no-Mae, Biu Mountain, Enryokan, Konryu, and Ashikaga Yoshihiko are real canon (original names used). "The worldline where the seal broke wholly," "the puppet ruler Tamamo-no-Mae raised," and "the consummation of Yoshihiko's collusion" are narrative alterations exclusive to IF-B (new), and they do not alter true history or EX3.
#Commentary — A One-Line Thesis
"The ruler took his seat upon the throne. No one saw who stood behind him."
A realm of conquest is visible. A realm of infiltration is not — and that is the terror of IF-B. Where IF-A (→03) raises the realm upon a sword's edge, IF-B hides the realm in the darkness behind the throne. The commoners enjoy peace, the ruler dispenses benevolent governance, and only the hand that holds the strings is not human. In this worldline "who governs" is a question that can be answered, but "for whom do they govern" no one dares to ask.
#Scent — A Short Narrative
The attendant had lived thirty years at the ruler's side. He washed his back, fastened his sandals, and by night watched over his sleep.
That night the lamp swayed unusually low. As the ruler walked the garden, the attendant saw the shadow cast upon the wall. It was a human shadow — the line of the shoulders, the drape of the sleeves, the rhythm of the gait. Only, behind it, there was one more. Something split into nine strands, swaying, that was not a human's. When the ruler halted his steps, it too halted; when the ruler laughed, it too seemed to laugh, rippling.
The attendant rubbed his eyes. When he looked again, on the wall there was but a single human shadow. The ruler turned to him and asked, gentle as ever, "What did you see?"
The attendant bowed his head. "I saw nothing, my lord."
It was the most faithful answer he could give. And it was also the most fearful answer.
#Table — Branch · Development · Outcome Summary
A narrative summary. There are no numbers or resolutions. For the facts,
co-02-03·ex3-03-01take precedence.
| Stage | The Flow of IF-B |
|---|---|
| Branch point | The great sealing coalition fails, or Kagura, consumed by supremacy, lets Enma-doji's seal come wholly undone. |
| First development | Shuten-doji returns. Yet the yoma's interests clash, so a single-yoma regime is unstable. |
| Enthronement | Tamamo-no-Mae of Biu Mountain becomes the power behind a human dynasty and raises a puppet ruler wearing a human face. |
| Staging | The oni's frenzy is channeled to the frontier as a "threat to be subdued," and the credit for that subjugation is turned to the ruler she raised. |
| Consummation of collusion | The Yoshihiko–Tamamo-no-Mae collusion, ended as mere suspicion in true history, is consummated and becomes the conduit for "a realm the yoma watch over from behind." |
| Shadow in the background | Konryu looms as a still greater shadow. Since the world's dissolution is desired by not even the yoma, the yoma realm dreads Konryu's homecoming beneath its feet. |
| Outcome | The realm outwardly belongs to humans and the people believe in peace. Yet the hand that holds the strings is not human — a realm seized through infiltration, enthronement, and collusion. |
#Note — The PC's Three Lenses
Scale is gauged only by the words novice, seasoned, master, and campaign. There are no numbers. Yoma stats and sealing conditions are only linked to the
co-02-03·co-08canon for reference.
#To Lead Toward This History
- (seasoned) Undo from within the rite that would seal Enma-doji again. At the decisive moment, keep the hands and catalysts the seal requires from arriving in time, hastening Shuten-doji's return.
- (master) Tip Kagura Nobutsuna toward supremacy so he defects from the great coalition and lets the seal's net go untended. Where IF-A monopolizes the seal, here you make him abandon it.
- (seasoned) Shelter Tamamo-no-Mae's yoko agents planted in daimyo houses and the court, and widen the smuggling conduits. Spread the yoma's goods and grudges through the human world to lay the ground for infiltration.
- (campaign) Become the conduit that consummates the collusion of Yoshihiko and Tamamo-no-Mae, and raise "a ruler the yoma watch over from behind" — the worldline that accomplishes the collusion that failed in true history.
#To Prevent This History
- (seasoned · →true history) Guard Enma-doji's seal. Mediate the old feud between the Hiei League and Kagura to bring about the cooperation of the three factions, and complete the resealing.
- (master · →thwart IF-B) Expose the identity of the Tamamo-no-Mae who controls the ruler. Sift out the hidden yoko agents and prove the nine-tailed fox's true nature before the court and the daimyo. Only by piercing the great charm, the doubles, and the sealed tails do you reach the true one.
- (novice · →thwart IF-B) Investigate one by one the individual houses, guilds, and domains where yoma are planted, sever the smuggling conduits, and purify the seeped grudges. Erase, in the Sengoku stage first, the events that true history would later bury by scrubbing their names.
- (campaign · →true history) Bind the human factions into one, and turn the rifts among the mutually distrustful yoma against them, defeating them piecemeal.
#After This History Comes to Pass (Under a Realm Backed by Yoma)
- (novice) One who serves the yoma regime without knowing whom he serves — an investigative drama in which, the more he hunts traitors on his superior's orders, the more he realizes he was the yoma's own hand and foot.
- (seasoned) An underground society that has caught on that the ruler is a puppet — securing the scattered knowledge of Enryokan before it is distorted, to prove the manipulation from behind and overthrow it.
- (master) A double agent caught in the intrigues among the yoma — living the paradox of joining hands temporarily with another yoma to stop the homecoming of Konryu, who would erase the world (through the Hundred-Tale Society's neutral channel).
- (campaign) One of the three pilots guarding the last card humans hold under the yoma realm, the giant of the Three Sacred Treasures (see zn13-08) — reclaiming it where it has been confiscated and hidden, or keeping the puppet from swallowing even its legitimacy.