I teach kendo in Tokyo

Kazuma took a closer look at the girl in front of him. She had a pretty good face and an average figure - this was generally a conclusion drawn from the girls in his family who often had flat-model figures.

"What you said is interesting," Kazuma said. "Did you always think that your friend Watanabe-kun committed suicide?"

The girl hesitated for a moment, then nodded with great determination: "Yes. It's not convenient to talk here. Can we talk somewhere else?"

As she spoke, the girl glanced at the whitish water marks on Bai Feng Qingliu's clothes, and then said, "Ah, I'm waiting in the room, you two can deal with your own affairs first."

After saying that, she started to back away.

"Then I'll leave first. I live in room 217."

Before Kazuma and Haruyu could say a word, the girl ran away.

Qingliu looked confused: "Why did she run so fast? This shouldn't be the reaction of ordinary people when they meet a 'detective' who can ask for help, right?"

Kazuma glanced at Seiryu and understood: "Seiryu, take a paper and wipe it here, yes, this is it."

As he spoke, he used his hands to mark the positions on his body.

Qingliu looked down doubtfully.

"Damn it, I just spilled this milk!"

"Yes, but obviously Akanishi-san didn't see the scene where you spilled the milk. She must have thought..." Kazuma closed his mouth and smiled at Haruyu without saying a word.

"It's okay if others misunderstand. What do you mean? Bastard! Pervert!" Haruyu uttered a curse that would excite tsundere lovers, while taking out a tissue to wipe the stains on her yukata.

Kazuma: "Want to help?"

"Get away from me, you pervert!" Qingliu raised his foot to kick Kazuma's calf bone, but he quickly dodged it.

Kazuma: "Okay, I'll stay away. Miss Akanishi just happened to invite me to her room, so I'm leaving!"

"Wait a minute, I'll go too!" Qingliu threw the tissue into the trash can and ran to catch up with Kazuma.

**

When Akanishi Kaede opened the door, he glanced at Haruyu who was following Kazuma with a surprised look on his face.

"This is my apprentice, now a guest assistant." Kazuma explained, "And the white marks you saw just now were actually from when you drank milk..."

"Wouldn't your special explanation make people more suspicious?" Seiryu interrupted Kazuma. It seemed that if Akanishi hadn't been right in front of him, he would have kicked Kazuma directly.

"Anyway, Qingliu and I don't have that kind of relationship."

Akanishi Kaede glanced at Qingliu, said "Oh" and took a step back: "Please come in."

Kazuma entered the room and looked around: "Miss Akanishi, does she live in such a big house alone?"

"This is already the smallest room in the hotel." Miss Akanishi smiled, "There are no other girls in our fantasy biology research club. The boys share a guest room, and I sleep in one by myself. I also want to sleep with other girls. One room, so we can chat and stuff."

Kazuma was shocked, this woman naturally used the technique of "Versailles Literature"!

Miss Akanishi pointed to the small coffee table placed by the window: "Sit over there. I have just boiled the water. I will make tea and bring it over when the water boils."

Kazuma nodded, came to the coffee table, and sat cross-legged on the cushion.

According to etiquette, you should sit upright when you come to a room with a woman you just met, but Kazuma particularly hates sitting upright in the Japanese style, thinking it is a kind of torture. He will sit cross-legged whenever he is not forced to sit upright.

Haruyu was going to sit upright, but when she saw Kazuma crossing his legs, she thought for a moment and sat down cross-legged on Kazuma's left side. As soon as her butt touched the cushion, she felt something was wrong, so she changed to a duck sitting position.

Kazuma: "You're not a rock girl. It's okay to sit cross-legged like a man."

"That's me before." Qingliu replied.

Kazuma glanced at Miss Akanishi who was still guarding the kettle and preparing to make tea. He felt that it would take some time to get down to business, so he continued chatting with Seiryu: "Then what are you now?"

"An ordinary adolescent girl." Qingliu answered.

"Really? It doesn't look like it."

"Even if you explicitly move your eyes to my chest, I won't be angry because of this."

You are lying and you are obviously angry. Even a fool can see that you are angry!

At this time, Miss Akanishi came over with a tray: "I just made some tea. I hope Mr. Kiryu doesn't mind."

"Thank you." Kazuma took the tea, took a polite sip, and put the cup down.

Qingliu didn't even take a sip and put down the tea cup. Judging from her appearance, the tea cup must have been too hot.

Miss Akanishi sat across from Kazuma: "Although Mr. Kiryu already knows my name, let me introduce myself formally. My name is Akanishi Kaede, a sophomore at Meiji University, and a member of the Fantasy Creature Research Society."

"Kazuma Kiryu." Kazuma introduced himself simply and clearly, it was just a formality anyway.

Seiryu: "I am Kiryu's apprentice, Shiramine Seiryu."

"I know, Miss Bai Fengfeng, newspapers and magazines have published many stories about you and Mr. Kiryu."

Qingliu: "Then you should also know that most of the news is fake, right?"

Kazuma: "Don't kill all news with one stick. There are still reporters who insist on reporting the truth."

"Have it?"

"Yes." Kazuma was not sure, "I digress. Our matters are not important, what is important is your matters, Miss Akanishi. Do you always think that Mr. Watanabe committed suicide? What's the reason?"

Miss Akanishi's eyes were lowered, and her hands on the coffee table tightly covered the cup filled with hot tea.

That tea cup must be very hot. He Ma naturally knew this as he took the tea cup himself just now.

But Akanishi-san didn't seem to notice that the tea cup was very hot.

She stared at the tea stems floating in the teacup, as if looking for the upright tea stems that represented good luck - in Japan, standing upright tea stems in tea means good things will happen.

Kazuma: "Miss Akanishi?"

"It was the shrine's god who killed Watanabe-kun." Akanishi suddenly whispered.

"Oh?" Kazuma expressed his feelings at the moment with a long 90-degree turn, "Why do you think so? Don't talk about women's intuition, we have to talk about evidence."

"Because Watanabe-kun discovered that the Lord of God is not normal." Miss Akanishi continued.

"What's abnormal?" Kazuma leaned forward and pressed his elbows on the coffee table.

Miss Akanishi thought for a while and said, "I'd better start from the beginning.

"We are a fantasy creature research association. Outsiders think we are a group of idiots who focus on finding hammer snakes, but in fact we mainly study the realistic origins and evolution of various fantasy creatures. For example, we previously studied the formation and evolution of the Tamamo-mae legend. ."

When Kazuma heard this, he suddenly wanted to tell the girl: "Your work is in vain because Tamamo Mae is not a legend, she really exists..."

But he didn't speak. After all, it wasn't good to interrupt someone else's confession.

Miss Akanishi continued: "Last year, Watanabe-kun, Oda-kun, I, and I were all new members of the seminar. We are from the same high school..."

"Three Meiji University high schools graduated in the same year?" Haruyu interrupted Miss Akanishi.

Logically speaking, as a female member of Kazuma's side, she couldn't interrupt at this time, but rock girls don't follow Japan's rules and regulations.

Miss Akanishi tilted her head: "Yeah, what's the problem?"

"Isn't that a very difficult university to get into?"

"It is indeed difficult to take the exam, but I am studying in a prestigious private school with a very high admission rate. Every year in our school there are people who go to six prestigious schools in Tokyo."

Kazuma: "It's like this in private elite schools. For example, the high school I attended in high school, Hokkaido High School, is an ordinary public high school. In the same class, two Todai, one from Keio, and one from Sochi were born. That's a miracle. Miss Akanishi, please continue."

Akanishi Kaede nodded: "Okay. We went to Meiji University from the same private high school. When we were in high school, we were the supernatural department, keen on discovering the causes of urban legends..."

Um? Why does the activity content of this supernatural department feel a bit familiar?

“...So after arriving at Meiji University, we were very interested when we saw the recruitment of the Fantasy Creature Research Society.

"Of course we went to Meiji University's paranormal department first, and found that there were real paranormal enthusiasts there, the kind who were keen on sharing information on various urban legends.

"After we decided that the Meiji University Supernatural Department was not suitable for us, we went to the Fantasy Creature Research Society and have stayed there until now."

Kazuma: "It's you who stayed here until now."

"No, Minister Takei said that Watanabe-kun and Oda-kun will never be removed from the membership roster. It's not important. Last summer, we saw a report in a tabloid about the discovery of a mallet snake near here. .

"Director Takei immediately ran to book a hotel room. Unexpectedly, the hotels at the 'discovery site' were all booked by enthusiasts looking for hammer snakes.

"At this time, the minister saw the advertising flyer for this hot spring street and thought that the geographical difference is only a dozen kilometers away. If there is a mallet snake, its habitat must also include this hot spring street.

"If there is no hammer snake, we might be able to investigate folk customs related to it here."

Kazuma: "Only when you came here did you realize that there are only demon foxes here who like to eat the hearts and livers of children."

Miss Akanishi smiled: "Yes, and it is a common legend in rural areas to scare children into going home early. On the first day here, we knew that this time we would definitely miss the mark.

"But Director Takei said that all the money was spent and something had to be done, otherwise we would look like bastards who cheated the money to go out to eat, drink and have fun, so we started going up the mountain every day to look for hammer snakes as a way to exercise."

Qingliu: "Your background is quite long."

"Uh, this..."

Kazuma: "It doesn't matter, this kind of detail is a very important part of understanding the truth."

In fact, he really wanted to know about the discovery of the hammer snake last year, but there was no Internet in 1981, so he couldn't easily find a lot of information by typing a few keywords in a search engine.

He could only ask Miss Akanishi: "Have you kept any details on the reports about hammer snakes that led you to this hot spring trip last year?"

"Yes. Ever since I suspected that Mr. Watanabe committed homicide, I have been collecting relevant evidence. I cut out this report and pasted it in my newspaper clipping book."

Miss Akanishi stood up, rummaged through her luggage by the door, came over with a newspaper clipping book wrapped in a plain cover, opened one page and put it in front of Kazuma.

"This is the report."

Kazuma glanced at it and nodded: "Okay, I don't know what the use is yet, but please keep this clipping book safe, Miss Akanishi. Let's return to the topic just now, how did Watanabe-kun find that the Lord of God is abnormal, and what aspect of it is abnormal ?”

Miss Akanishi nodded: "The three of us were keen on investigating the origins of various legends when we were in high school. The story about the demon fox told by the old ladies in the hot spring street seemed ordinary, but we still conducted the investigation. Then we found out An interesting thing.”

"What's something interesting?" He Ma asked in this place very cooperatively.

"The legend of the demon fox in the hot spring town seems to have been formed after the Great Kanto Earthquake during the Taisho period."

Kazuma: "We heard that there used to be a tradition in this area of ​​sending children who couldn't afford to be raised and abandoning them in the mountains and forests, but it basically disappeared after the Meiji Restoration, and it didn't recur until the Great Kanto Earthquake entered difficult times again. ”

"That person also warned you not to sing "Passage Song" in the mountains, right?" Miss Akanishi asked.

"Hey, that's right. Are you also a detective?" Kazuma joked.

But Akanishi Kaede was very serious and had no intention of joking at all: "We also heard this statement last year. But we also heard more.

“We visited Granny Noda in the hot spring street many times, helping her clean the house, cook, etc. We used to use this method to win over the elderly when we asked them about ancient legends.

"This method also worked this time. When we asked Granny Noda where she heard the legend of the demon fox, she told us that it was not a legend, but something she saw with her own eyes when she was a child. One day she woke up at night and heard the neighbor There was a noise in my house, so I got up and leaned on the window to look out.

"As a result, she saw the white-haired demon fox walking out of the neighbor's house, holding the sleeping neighbor's child in his arms.

"The demon fox also saw her, grinning and showing its fangs. She was so frightened that she yelled and rolled away from the window.

"Then the demon fox started knocking on the window, and at the same time, the shadows of everything in the room seemed to come alive at the same time..."

Miss Akanishi stopped and took a big breath. It seemed that the scene she just described made her a little breathless.

After a while, she said: "When Granny Noda recounted this scene, it was really scary. I can't even reproduce one-tenth of her image."

Kazuma: "I think it's okay."

Akanishi Kaede shook his head repeatedly, then took a few deep breaths before continuing: "Grandma Noda's words made us very excited, because we felt that we found something 'different' this time. When we investigated supernatural legends before, we had never seen anything like this before. This is a situation that is told directly to us by 'those who have experienced it'."

Kazuma thought to himself, I will introduce you to the real Tamamo Mae later. She can tell you many stories about her personal experiences.

"Watanabe-kun followed our previous practice of organizing club activities and went to the shrine to inquire about the situation. Because shrines often record local legends and other things, this is one of the priests' responsibilities. In some places, the shrine is also responsible for writing local chronicles."

This situation seems to be quite common outside of China.

In most areas, writing is basically in the hands of nobles and priests. It is rare in the world for a poor family like China to be able to read, read, and even pass the exams for official positions and become prime ministers.

Japan has been learning from China for hundreds of years, but it has not learned many great things at all. In a rural area like this in Japan, before the Meiji Restoration, perhaps only the priests could read, so of course the priests wrote everything in the local chronicles.

Kazuma: "So Watanabe-kun saw something at the shrine, right?"

"Yes. He came back from the shrine that day with an ugly expression. When I asked him what happened, he wouldn't tell me. He just said he was tired and wanted to take a bath and sleep, so he entered the men's bath.

"I was very worried about him, so I asked Xiaotian to take the opportunity to take a bath and ask him what was wrong. Xiaotian agreed, took a change of clothes and entered the men's bath, while I went to the women's bath and listened while bathing. There was movement on their side. In the end, there was no movement at all.

"By the time I came out, they had already finished washing. They were sitting on the bench at the door of the bathhouse. Each of them had a can of milk that was more than half full and looked solemn."

Kazuma and Seiryu looked at each other, and then said in a speculative tone: "Then, I guess something happened to them the next day."

Miss Akanishi nodded seriously: "Yes. Before entering the mountain that day, Watanabe and Oda were talking seriously and avoiding me. As soon as I passed by, they started chatting about pornographic jokes. They would never be like this.

"Later I made up my mind and shouted to them: 'Don't exclude me!'

"In the end, Mr. Watanabe came over and patted me on the shoulder and said, 'Don't worry, it's nothing serious.'

"Then they..."

Miss Akanishi lay on the table and started to cry.

Kazuma suddenly asked: "I heard that when you came down from the mountain that day, you vomited it out while waiting for news from the search and rescue team. Was it because you were nervous?"

Miss Akanishi cried and said: "Of course! I had a very bad premonition at the time, and my stomach felt like it was cramping. And I was very thirsty at that time, so I kept drinking water, and ended up vomiting."

"Was it also very hot last year?" Kazuma asked.

"It should be...not as hot as this year. Why are you asking?" Miss Akanishi raised her head and looked at Kazuma in confusion.

"You said you were thirsty, maybe it was the heat?"

Miss Akanishi shook her head: "I don't know. It may be that she is so nervous that she wants to drink water. Many people eat when they are nervous. It may be that kind of reaction."

Kazuma nodded: "I understand. So you have always suspected that Mr. Watanabe saw something at the shrine, and then was silenced by the god."

"That's it."

Kazuma thought to himself, this is interesting. The god master also suspected that Mr. Watanabe committed suicide, and judging from the words of the god master, it seemed that he and Mr. Watanabe had a good relationship.

Hmm... Kazuma touched his chin and fell into thought.