Utsu no Miko

During the turmoil of the Jinshin-no-Ran civil war in 762, a baby boy was born with a small horn on his forehead. His mother, believing him to be an oni, abandoned him. An old shūgenja woman took him in and named him Utsunomiko, meaning "Divine Child of the Heavens," explaining that his horn represented the bond between heaven and earth. Raised in the wild, Miko studied Shugendō and eventually began visiting nearby villages, drawn by curiosity. There, he saw the harsh lives of the poor and used his spiritual abilities to aid them. Over time, his frustration with the greedy rulers and their endless squabbles turned to rage, leading him to openly defy the Imperial Court. This marked the start of Miko’s lifelong fight for the downtrodden.