Back in the city, the white commercial vehicle circled the winding mountain road several times and took the three people back to Fuyun Shrine.
The huge cedar trees blocked the fading sunlight, and from time to time a few birdsong could be heard in the forest. The tired birds returned to their nests, but Zongya could not go back yet.
The time, place, events that occurred, the people involved, the spirits that appeared, the people who dealt with them, and the methods of dealing with them, together constitute the basic items of the supernatural event information records of Fuun Shrine and even the Kinki local psychic organization;
Noma Minami glanced through it quickly and nodded to the "newcomer" in the passenger seat.
"It's almost done, but in addition to me and Jingzi, your name will also be added to the 'handler'."
"I just made a suggestion."
"Plus."
"..."
plus.
"alright."
Soya once again handed the hard book recording the information to Noma Minami, and she glanced at it and threw it back.
"What are you doing for me? Isn't it Sogu's job to sort out information?"
"Is this the beginning?"
Minami Noma ignored him, got out of the car and walked to the social office, greeting other miko she met along the way.
"Sotani-san."
Kyoko Sugawara stood aside and motioned for him to go to the other side, "Follow me."
Arriving at the ancestral hall behind the main hall, Jingzi opened the door of the wooden house next to the ancestral hall and looked back at him.
"In the past two hundred years, all the information on the activities of spiritual entities within the jurisdiction of Fuyun Shrine is here. The older parts are preserved in Kyoto."
Zonggu shook his head, "There is no need to use that ancient information for the time being."
"Please come in."
He walked into the wooden house, and with every step he took, there was a creaking sound from the floorboards under his feet.
According to Jingzi, this wooden house has a long history, and the time of its establishment is unknown, but it was last repaired more than fifty years ago;
Because important information is stored, the current Palace Administrator is also considering reconstruction, but it has been delayed due to various unexpected circumstances.
"It's very deserted."
"Yes."
Passing through the front hall where the spiritually aware people usually move around, in addition to rows of bookshelves, there is only a work table in the deepest part of the room.
The extremely simple furnishings reminded Zongya of the county library buried deep in his memory, where there was nothing but books...
No, at least there are many kinds of books, which can allow middle school students who like to spend a lot of time in them.
The bookshelves are only marked with years. This is not classified, but simply arranged in chronological order.
Sotani realizes that there is a lot of room for him to perform, or that the work in the future is too much to be measured.
He suddenly realized the origin of the hesitant look on Sugawara Kyoko's face when he said yesterday that he would be responsible for sorting out all the information possessed by Fuun Shrine.
"Does anyone usually look through this information?"
"rare."
Jingzi looked at the rows of bookshelves around her, "The information is complicated, and the really useful information is hidden so deeply that it's hard to start."
"This is natural." Zong Gu said, "You just recorded it and didn't even conduct the most basic classification."
"..."
"Sugawara-senpai, haven't you been to the library?"
"I understand what Soya-kun means. But spiritual bodies are different from books. We only know their appearance but not their insides. What is the basis for classification?"
Kyoko went on to say: "When a spirit body is alive, it can be classified into men and women, old people and young people, Japanese and foreigners based on certain distinctive characteristics, but after becoming a spirit body, any factors may change the appearance and interior of the spirit body.
Unpredictable mutations have occurred, and they have become various forms of 'ghosts' or 'monsters' among ordinary people... In other words, the number of spirit bodies is almost equal to the type of spirit bodies."
"The number of spiritually aware people is always limited, and they are already stretched thin when it comes to dealing with spiritual bodies head-on. There is no way to find people to conduct theoretical research related to spiritual bodies..."
"——So we fell into a vicious cycle."
Zongya took over her words, "The less you know, the more dangers you will encounter; and such dangers will not only reduce your personnel, but also reduce the number of spiritual awakeners willing to join shrines or temples, and there will be no one to carry out spiritual body training."
Study it.”
Jingzi nodded, "Yes."
"Actually, some of the basic theories we have mastered are summarized from the information given by spirits that can communicate. However, the content is too detailed and one-sided, making it difficult to form a systematic theory."
She looked at Sotani, "Maybe Sotani-san has already mastered such knowledge?"
"You think highly of me."
Soya shook his head and took the initiative to lower Kyoko's expectations.
"I've just seen a lot of spirit entities, so in order to facilitate my memory, I distinguished them in my own way."
"In what way?"
"Forget what they are."
Sugawara Kyoko frowned.
"Don't delve into their nature and the reasons why they mutated into their current appearance. I only care about one thing: what they plan to do now."
Zonggu turned on the light, and the dark intelligence room suddenly became much brighter.
"I am a pragmatist, and the way to distinguish between spiritual bodies is very straightforward: first, whether the spiritual body is aggressive, and secondly, the intensity of its consciousness.
Based on these two points, I divided the spiritual bodies transformed from human souls into four major categories.
Wandering Spirit: Non-aggressive. Weak consciousness and about to be destroyed.
Wraith: non-aggressive. Conscious and may have some obsession without hatred.
Evil spirits: Aggressive. They are conscious and hate certain existences, so they attack.
Evil spirits: highly aggressive and destructive. They may be conscious, but most of them are chaotic and crazy.”
Zonggu took a breath and finally said:
"Although the boundaries of this distinction are not particularly clear, it is very practical for me."
"..."
Sugawara Kyoko was silent for a long time, staring at one place, while her words swirled in her mind.
"Don't care about the nature of the spirits, but focus on what they are going to do..."
Zongya let her digest what she just said, while he followed the time on the bookshelf and found the most recent intelligence records.
It is human nature to be greedy for life and afraid of death. He was forced to understand the above-mentioned distinction while in exile in the dangerous underworld.
Even if a spiritually awakened person in the human world joins a shrine and deals with spiritual beings all day long, he will still be in a different situation - no matter how many spiritual beings he encounters in the human world, they will only be a drop in the ocean of hell.
Living in hell and escaping, no matter how much luck was involved, he is now the most experienced person in the world when it comes to dealing with spirit bodies.
"Considering practicality, I will sort out the information from now forward. The initial plan is to sort out the data from now to five years ago.
Information that is too old has no practical meaning, but I will try my best to read it."
Kyoko Sugawara came to her senses and stared at his back for a while.
“Practicality comes first.”
"That's right."
"Sotani-san, did you actually escape from the underworld?"
Zonggu paused and looked back at her.
"That's right."
Kyoko Sugawara is not an ignorant Akane Kirino. Faced with many prompts from him, whether intentional or unintentional, it is a matter of course to deduce the correct conclusion.
"Are you still alive?"
"As you can see."
...
After taking down the information from November of the following year, Soya put the folder aside and continued to organize the texts in his hands.
The paper was thin and the information, which was three to four centimeters thick, was enough to show that this month was not peaceful, and this was nothing among the monthly information that he had already compiled.
He also understood the reason: most of these spirit entities that were causing trouble when passing by were heading for Kyoto, where Izanami was.
"Kinki is really not a good place..."
"A slip of the tongue."
Soya raised his head. Kyoko Sugawara, who had been gone for a long time, returned here again at some point.
Just as he was about to say something, a short figure suddenly emerged from behind her.
"What are you doing?"
"work to earn a living."
Soya looked at the elementary school student lying down in front of the desk, then looked at Kyoko behind her, "What's the matter?"
"Today's business has ended and the shrine will be closed."
"Yeah."
Deep inside, he couldn't feel the passage of time outside. He looked at his phone and realized that it was already seven o'clock in the evening.
He stood up and said, "It's time for me to go back."
Kyoko Sugawara looked at the information divided into several piles on the table, "I want to take a look first."
"Look. It was originally compiled for you people to see."
She sat down where he had just been and picked up the reversed information.
"Don't mess up the order." Zongya reminded, "After classifying, I arranged them according to time."
"I see."
Jingzi glanced at the information, "This one has the largest number, is it a resentful spirit?"
"Ah, that's right. You remember it all."
"If you don't agree with it, there is no need for Soya-san to sort it out."
She turned a few pages and suddenly saw a red comment.
"'The entangled spirit. The obsession is so deep that it is useless to expel it, or it can be killed.' Was this written by Soya-san?"
"Um."
"Linghuangling?"
"I chose the name myself for the convenience of understanding."
Zonggu pointed out, "I saw that this happened last month, so I gave you a reminder. Even if this kind of resentful spirit is expelled, it will still come back here and entangle the client again."
"So would it be better to kill him?" Jingzi looked up at him.
"From the perspective of the client and the shrine, this is the best way." Zongya said without any expression on his face, "It was originally a spirit body."
The spirit body means that life has passed away.
Kyoko was silent for a few seconds, "I believe in Soya-san's judgment, but I cannot agree with it."
"Killing is an irreversible choice. Soya-san differentiates between resentful spirits and evil spirits, which also recognizes the characteristic that the former will not hurt people..."
She talked a lot, but Zonggu said nothing and only picked up his schoolbag at the end.