Spindle: Needless to say, the first thing that caught my eye when we landed on Miyajima was not the shrine, but the deer. They are old inhabitants of this place and maintain friendly relations with visiting ponies, even though the latter are in far greater numbers; they follow them, chat with them and run some of the shops. One such deer, Hiyaka, bumped into Parcly while the alicorn turned her head…

Hiyaka: Seeing her fine wings and the ring around her horn, I’d assume Parcly was into fashion, but her simple voice dispelled those myths. Our selection of food was her first attraction, whereupon I presented barbequed oysters and fishcakes shaped like the local plant (maple). Voracious as I knew her companion windigo was, she devoured them in one bite.

It was low tide when we arrived at the main torii, with many ponies and deer taking selfies and photographs for each other. On its six wooden legs a high-tide line was clear as a colour transition from painted orange to natural black. Small coins were scattered around those legs and some were picking them up wherever their hooves took them (we have cloven hooves and ponies have uncloven hooves). I don’t know, is that OK?

Parcly: I don’t think so, doe.

Hiyaka: Oh! I forgot to talk about the shrine itself, which requires an entry fee. It’s pretty simple in structure, one long path from left to right with a pier, with souvenir shops and divination spots along the way. From its centre we could see the subtle channels that direct incoming water to specific places around the shrine, but we did not see any motive.

On our return trip, we passed by a giant wooden rice scoop, Miyajima’s own invention, and had a glance at higher-altitude attractions that were less trodden. Parcly introduced me to Bramble, a prince from a herd of deer closer to her home in Canterlot, and I squished my cheeks.

Parcly: By the time we’d reached the pier, half of the sun was behind mountains while the other half’s rays diffused through clouds. In the composite, warmth felt close and distant, fleeting and ever-present across multiple dimensions. I said goodbye to Hiyaka as she ran back to her herd, the return ferry starting up its engines.

Once on the mainland, I had early dinner at an unagi restaurant operating for over a century. Unagi and rice, that was all, but it tasted better than some “fusion” or “new-style” dishes around. The express train back to Hiroshima proper signalled the effective end of my day.

Hiyaka: The more creatures Parcly sensed around her, the less stable and graceful her gait became. Spindle’s influence as the spirit of the snowy mountains was evident; I was told how Luna helped her overcome this stutter to an extent through solace in science. Overall, I found her a strange blend of personalities she didn’t recognise as a whole, but whose individual aspects showed in different contexts – the complicated life of a princess.