Rising Rays of the New Century: Tale of the Japanese Empire

Part 3: Yokohama Dragon God

Daiyōkai "Ryūjin"

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In the 22nd century, Yokohama... this is a tale about a human girl, a child of the strongest yōkai, and the commotion caused by the demi-humans surrounding them.

- Bokutotsu Zen'u

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April 2, 2112

Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture

"Demi-human" is a generic term for non-human intelligent lifeforms in Japan. There are approximately 120.000 demi-humans in Japan, including immigrants and their blood relatives, and officially 79 demi-human species. There are five grades of demi-humans according to their threat level, and there are three groups that are recognized as Class 1, or "demi-human with the power to turn a nation upside down." Of those, the only one officially recognized as existing in Japan is the Ryūjin, or the "Dragon Gods."

The Ryūjin group in Japan began with the union of a businessman and a female dragonoid demi-human. In the past, when the Japanese archipelago had disappeared to another world, a businessman who had made his fortune through plantations in another world was staying on the demi-human continent when he met a beautiful woman. After some twists and turns, the woman gave birth to a baby boy. Later, when it was announced that Japan would return to Earth, the woman chose to remain in the other world, but she was afraid that her child, who had lost the backing of Japan, would be persecuted by her family, and she gave him to the man to save him.

The businessman returned to Japan with his son, and after the Japanese archipelago returned to Earth, he started a business promoting unmanned large-scale agriculture based in the Koshinetsu region, using the assets he had built in the other world. He has established a massive agricultural enterprise with the support and cooperation of the Japanese government, which is urging the establishment of a food self-sufficiency system on Earth, as well as other corporations.

At the same time he entrusted the business to his son, he established a community based on the aforementioned enterprise. It was a community of long-lived people who were in the same situation as his son, as well as demi-humans who did not fit in with human society. When he thought about his son's destiny to live a long, long time different from that of ordinary humans, he felt the need for "another society" separated from human society, and he created it.

The community is called "Dragon King Village" and is officially recognized by the government and located in Suwa City, Nagano Prefecture. The community is run as a family business by the Hasena family who is related to the Ryūjin by blood to the businessman.

In the village, the members of the Ryūjin are called Ryūjin-sama and are treated like objects of worship as the strongest demi-human in Japan. And Ryuji Hasena... born into such a family, is the grandson of the village head and chairman.

"........."

He was waiting for someone to come out of the school in front of the main gate of the high school in a luxury car, which is not suitable for a 21-year-old college student to drive. Students coming out of the main gate one after another noticed him and his car and glanced at them.

It was April 2nd, the season of new life, with a flurry of cherry blossoms dancing in the air. And at this high school, too, an entrance ceremony was held yesterday, marking the end of the second day of high school life for the new students. The sun was already slanting to the west, and the town's public address system was ringing out, urging the children to return home. Mixed in with this was a strange statement...