Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma is a 2025 role-playing simulation game developed and published by Marvelous. It is spin-off in the Rune Factory series and released for Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, and Windows on June 5, 2025. The game received generally positive reviews from critics.

Guardians of Azuma blends elements of farming, dungeon crawling, and life simulation. Players assume the role of an "Earth Dancer," utilizing the power of dance, sacred treasures, and weapons like bows and talismans to combat a corruption known as the Blight. The game introduces a guardian spirit system, where elemental spirits assist the player in both combat and farming activities.^{[non-primary source needed]}

Players can engage in activities such as cultivating crops, raising monsters, crafting, and developing relationships with local NPCs. The game features expanded social interactions, allowing players to befriend or romance any of the eligible candidates in fully voiced scenarios. Additionally, players can recruit these characters to aid in battles.^{[non-primary source needed]}

The game is set in the fantasy region of Azuma, a mountainous territory inspired by traditional Japanese aesthetics. Azuma is divided into seasonal zones, each with its own unique environment and festivals. The story centers around restoring balance to the region by forming bonds with guardian spirits and uncovering the mysteries of the past, following a calamity known as the Celestial Collapse, when an unknown object fell from the sky and threw Azuma into chaos.^{[non-primary source needed]}

The player, as one of the two main characters: Subaru or Kaguya (their names can be changed), rides a white dragon to engage a black dragon that the other main character is riding on. Following the fight, the player falls and crash-lands in Spring Village, one of the villages of Azuma. They reside in the village for half a month, having lost their memory. The player experiences a dream where a mysterious woman reveals that they are an Earth Dancer (an alternative name for Earthmate), and gifts them with a Sacred Treasure, a drum, to help save her. They later meets Mokoshiro, a flying Wooly who is a descendant of a legendary dragon god Mihoshi Habaki, who is nicknamed Woolby by the player. The same Black Dragon from before attacks the village, but an airship piloted by a treasure hunter named Mauro and an archeologist named Hina repels it with the player's help. The woman appears again and reveals herself to be Ulalaka, one of Azuma's gods. The player helps restore her powers and is instructed to repair a shrine by Woolby. After repairing the dragon shrine, the player performs a ritual to help Woolby regain his true form; the white dragon from the start of the story. At Ulalaka's request, the player travels to the other three villages to revive the other gods and save Azuma.

In the Summer Village, the player locates the shrine where the summer god's weapon is, but discovers that it is stolen and searches for the thief, revealed to be a phantom. After recovering and repairing the weapon, the player succeeds in reviving the summer god, Matsuri. In the Autumn Village, the player looks for the autumn god's missing mikoshi and takes part in a fighting festival to revive him, but this results in the autumn god, Kurama, turning into a monster (due to him disapproving of the festival) that the player must fight to pacify him. In the Winter Village, the player must defeat the winter god, Fubuki, who has transformed into a wolf monster, to return him to normal. During their time there, they also encounter a mysterious woman with blond hair who attempts to kill Fubuki, but the player stops her. The player also becomes mayor of all four towns.

Once the four gods are revived, they remove the first barrier around the Epicenter, the area where the Celestial Collapse occurred, to lure out the Black Dragon and its rider so the player can confront them. After defeating the Black Dragon and the other main character, the player recognizes the other main character before they retreat. The player must then help the gods fully regain their powers to prepare for the next confrontation with the Black Dragon. During this time, the player has a dream of their past where they learn of locations called Astral Shrines that they and the other main character (revealed to be their childhood friend) were sent to find and offer magical amulets at to save Azuma. The player asks the warrior Murasame to help them locate one of the shrines, where they learn that the shrines were built to honor Mihoshi Habaki. The player continues their search for the other shrines across Azuma to recover their memories. The memory recovered at the final shrine reveals that they formed a pact with Woolby, who sacrificed the player’s memory and half of their soul to make them an Earth Dancer while forming a pact between them. The player deduces that their friend did the same with the Black Dragon.

Learning that killing the Black Dragon will also kill their childhood friend due to their pact, the player travels to the Underworld with the help of Kai, the Underworld god, to find out more about the Black Dragon to save their friend. They learn that the Black Dragon took Mihoshi Habaki's body to the Underworld and it was given the power to absorb runes to destroy and recreate the lands, while Woolby guards Mihoshi Habaki’s heart to give runes to the lands. Kai leads the player to get help from Kanata, the god who rules over the Heavenly Realm and the leader of the six gods of Azuma, to help defeat the Black Dragon and free their childhood friend. However, she refuses to help after revealing that it was she who caused the Celestial Collapse. The player throws a party with the help of the other gods to summon Kanata and bring her out of her depression. She explains that the reason she caused the Celestial Collapse was to revive Mihoshi Habaki and save Azuma, which was dying even before the incident occurred. Kanata reveals the object that crashed into Azuma is Mihoshi Habaki's heart. After some convincing, Kanata agrees to help remove the second barrier.