"Len. As of today... I will have you abandon this city... Along with your life."
Ese Len is an Ordinary High-School Student living in Kyoto with an extraordinary power to detect other peoples presence which she finds to be completely useless. One day, Len's mother orders her to go meet her long lost childhood friend, Sarume Shinonome, in the local shopping mall. Upon meeting, Shino soon tells Len to consider herself dead from that moment on for the sake of humanity. She takes Len to a secret village near Kyoto and Len finds out that Sarume is working for a secret organization called Kunai who are tasked with defending the world against the supernatural forces of Ayakashi. As it turns out, Kunai Organization is very interested in utilizing Len's seemingly useless powers in their fight and Len reluctantly decides to join them on a trial basis and she is given a Divine Sword, a powerful weapon from the Age of Gods only certain individuals are capable of wielding. Len is soon thrown in the middle of a war she never wanted to be part of, questioning if the Ayakashi she's fighting are as evil as everyone says them to be.
Ne no Kami: The Two Princess Knights of Kyoto is a two part Yuri Visual Novel by Japanese independent developer, Kuro Irodoru Yomiji. Both parts have been localized by Sekai Project with a censored version available through Steam as well as an uncensored version and a +18 patch available through Denpasoft website.
Ne no Kami also has a prequel called Sacrament of the Zodiac: The Confused Sheep and The Tamed Wolf which tells the story of Len's friend, Suou Hitsuji.
Ne no Kami provides examples of:
- Ancient Conspiracy: The Kunai Organization. While it originally started out as a Benevolent Conspiracy, it eventually turned into a malevolent one and has been controlling the world governments from the shadows for an untold number of years.
- Apocalypse How: A type 1 scenario happens at the end of Part 2. The world economy falls down and large scale riots begin to happen across the globe as people panic after the existence of Ayakashi has become common knowledge and they have begun to change the natural order of things to their liking. The Kunai Organization uses this disruption to consolidate power and ends up taking over the whole planet.
- Artistic License – Religion: Albeit self-admittedly in this case. A disclaimer when opening the game states that this is in full effect when it comes to depictions of Shinto and Japanese Mythology.
- Beach Episode: Parodied in Part 2 when the girls head for the pool and we get to see them all in swim suits... only to turn out that everyone is Super-Deformed for the duration of the scene.
- Church Militant: Subverted by The Kunai Organization. Despite what it might look like at first glance, the organization is actually secular and believes that the gods were humanity's precursors, rather than divine beings.
- Conspiracy Thriller: The story becomes one by the end of Part 2 as the main characters begin to uncover the massive global conspiracy that is Kunai Organization
- Cool Sword: While most of them aren't actually swords, the Divine Swords certainly still count.
- Crapsaccharine World: The world, at first glance, looks like regular Modern day Japan with fantastical elements added in, only for it to turn out that there is a very real possibility for an end of the world scenario that is near impossible to stop for good. We also learn that there is a very real case of systematic racism practiced by the Japanese and presumably other governments around the world where people have to suffer for crimes their ancestors committed thousands of years ago. Things only get worse in part 2 as we find out that much of the world is ruled by an Ancient Conspiracy that has orchestrated the Ayakashi-Kunai war for thousands of years in order to hide their plans and take over the planet. And if that wasn't bad enough, the Downer Ending has the world turning into a genuine Crapsack World with The Kunai Organization ruling a post-apocalyptic world with an iron fist.
- Crossover Cosmology: All religions are stated to be different interpretations of The Age of Gods with Norse Mythology used as an example of alternate interpretation of it several times. The evil god of the underworld that the Ayakashi are trying to bring back to the visible world ultimately turns out to be Yggdrasil that is protected by eleven angels.
- Cue the Rain: As the Darkest Hour comes around at the end of Chapter Six, it suddenly starts raining.
- Darker and Edgier: Part 2 significantly ramps up from the first one in blood, gore and dark themes.
- Darkest Hour: The ending of Chapter Six. All sealing stones have been broken and Ayakashi victory is almost certain, Tsuchimikado and Mitsurugi have turned out to be traitors, Morita, Yoshimura, Miyata and most of the Capital branch's members are dead, Ruka will have to abandon Shino after killing Tsuchimikado and betraying the organization and Uzume is preparing to do her ritual without Len being able to do anything to stop her thanks to her broken leg.
- Dysfunction Junction: Let's just say that all of the main characters have either traumatic pasts or go through a hellish Trauma Conga Line over the events of the game, if not both.
- Len is forced to suddenly end her normal life and join the war against the Ayakashi and her parents dissapear in the meantime. she also has to come to grips the fact that she's actually a homunculus.
- Shinonome ends up as the most well adjusted of the bunch, but she still has to come in grips with the fact that almost everything she has been taught since childhood has been a lie.
- Uzume has spent most of her life isolated and alone in the sanctuary. According to Shino, she used to just cry most of the time until she met Len which was the only bright spot in her childhood and convinced her that she should sacrifice herself and go through with the ritual to protect her.
- Ruka gets the worst of it all. She was born to the chieftain of one of the Tsuchigumo tribes and she spent most of her early life in absolute poverty and medieval conditions. When she grew up, she was recruited by Tsuchimikado who promised to help her tribe if she did what she was told to do. Under Tsucimikado's orders, Ruka was forced to do absolutely monstrous acts ranging from torture to outright genocide and one of the populations she killed was lead by Mitsurugi. Unsurprisingly by the time Shino for the first time, she's a barely functioning mess of a human being.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: Downplayed; all the main characters are ultimately survive and are able to resolve their personal issues, but the rest of the planet doesn't fair so well.
- Erotic Dream: Len has one featuring Ruka that Ruka sent using an orb. Uzume is less than thrilled.
- Genre Shift: The story starts out as an Urban Fantasy Slice of Life work, but eventually transforms into a Conspiracy Thriller in Part 2.
- Good Parents: Shino's and Uzume's parents who treat Len as if she was their third daughter. They have no problem with housing Len for the immediate future, are open minded about both their daughters being in lesbian relationships and after Len finds out that her parents have vanished, their mother tries to do the best she can to help Len find out what happened to them. Their dad on the other hand has joined the front lines to protect Uzume from having to sacrifice herself.
- Guns Are Worthless: Downplayed; firearms are unable to harm more powerful Ayakashi such as Foxes, which can only be harmed by Divine Swords, but they are still highly effective against weaker types like Onis and Crows.
- Homosexual Reproduction: The Sarume line is descended from the goddesses Amaterasu and Uzume.
- Late-Arrival Spoiler: Much of the marketing material for Part 2 prominently featured one of the major plot-twists of Part 1, more specifically when Len decides to escape the village and temporarily join Ayakashi and ends up fighting Shino during the first moments of Part 2.
- Living Weapon: Divine Swords possess a certain degree of sentience as they can select their owner.
- Lovecraft Lite: Themes of hopelessness, inability to fight fate and an unstoppable cosmic force are there, but the main characters ultimately don't give in to the hopelessness and despair, even after the world around them collapses. It's also implied that Len might still be able to save the world later on.
- Mental Affair: Downplayed. While Len did have an Erotic Dream featuring her and Ruka that Ruka created and sent, Ruka wasn't actually participating (probably, though she does have an internal monologue in the dream...) and her involvement wasn't revealed. Uzume didn't take it well, though.
- Rag Tag Bunch Of Misfits: Len lampshades how weird their group's become in the "Little Resistance" part 2 bonus chapter. You have an Artificial Human, two descendants of gods, a Tsuchigumo, and a fox.
- "Ray of Hope" Ending: Part 2 ends with the Kunai Organization taking over the planet and the complete collapse of global economy and infrastructure after the Ayakashi change the nature of the visible world to their liking, but the main characters have survived it and we also learn that Len is capable of changing fate and thus maybe able to bring down the Kunai Organization in the future.
- Real Event, Fictional Cause: 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake
is explained to have been the result of one of the regalia breaking during the Great Taisho Calamity. - Senseless Sacrifice: The heroes are furious to learn of the Kunai Organization's betrayal since it means that Miyata and the others sacrificed themselves for an ideal their employer was actively working against.
- Sequel Hook: Part 2 ends with a promise that the story will be continued.
- Shout-Out:
- Early on Len talks about a character called Professor Kokido in a popular game series known as Pocket Youkai.
- Len compares the satellite phones used by Kunai Organization to the ones used by Jack Bauer.
- When driving to the Imperial Palace, Tsuchimikado showcases Len his ultimate racer theory.
- Ruka calls her special attack in beach volleyball Cure Guillotine.
- Superdickery: The part 2 advertisements really played up a traitorous Len fighting Shino even though that scene barely lasted a chapter.
- Theme Music Powerup: During Len's last battle against Mitsurugi, the intro theme starts playing after Len activates her 11th-Hour Superpower.
- The Time of Myths: The Age of Gods when humanity coexisted with gods on earth. This came to an end when the gods voluntarily left the visible world.
- Tokyo Is the Center of the Universe: Done with Kyoto rather than Tokyo and the trope name is to be taken literally in this case. Kyoto used to be the center of the entire humanity during the age of gods and Yggdrasil was located there.
- Unsettling Gender-Reveal: Subverted. Uzume spent five minutes muttering in shock when she found out Len was a girl, but she doesn't actually care after the initial shock wares off.
- Unwitting Pawn: Just about every named human character is being manipulated by Tsuchimikado to play their role in the events exactly as he wants to.
- Urban Fantasy: Story is set on modern day Kyoto with a secret organization and the government attempting to fight against various entities from Japanese Mythology.
- World Tree: The identity of the god Ayakashi are trying to bring back ultimately turns out to be Yggdrasil from Norse Mythology.
- You Can't Fight Fate: A running theme throughout the story is the inability for the characters to change an inevitable outcome.
- Yuri Genre: An example combining elements Yuri with Urban Fantasy, Slice of Life and Conspiracy Thriller works.
