Seeing Anko on the pillow, Zonggu thought he was still in a dream.
Just seeing her shivering and huddled up, he quickly woke up.
"バカ..."
(ba ka)
Zonggu sat up, covered her with the thin quilt, and looked at the alarm clock next to her. It was still three or four minutes before six o'clock.
Turning off the alarm clock, he sat and watched her for a while, wondering when she sneaked over.
Get up, go downstairs, and wash up.
After preparing breakfast, he returned to the room upstairs. Hongzi was lying on the tatami, seemingly still in the same posture as before.
After changing into the clothes he was going to wear when going out, Soya walked over to Hongzi and squatted down, touching her cheek with the back of his hand.
She closed her eyes, her eyelashes trembled slightly, and her breathing was soft and inaudible.
After looking at it for a few times, his hand dropped again, his fingertips picked up the shoulder strap of the black tank top, and pulled it down a little.
"..."
Her breathing quickened for a moment, and no matter how hard she tried to control it, she could no longer maintain her calmness.
His fingertips brushed across his smooth shoulders, "Can you do that?"
Hongzi opened his eyes and knocked his hand away.
"……satyr."
Lifting up the shoulder strap, she turned over and faced away from him. After two seconds, she pulled up the quilt and covered her head completely.
"Breakfast is ready." Zong Gu stood up, "If you want to continue sleeping, you should go back to your room. She will wake up at any time."
When he walked to the door, Hongzi pulled down the quilt, his face turned red from holding back.
"I want to have breakfast."
Returning to the restaurant downstairs, Zonggu sat down and took a few bites, and she came over quickly.
Breakfast was simpler than usual, consisting of a piece of fried salmon, a boiled egg, a plate of vegetable salad, and a few pieces of steamed pumpkin left over from last night.
"When did you come here?"
"...I don't know, I didn't check the time."
"It's really suspicious. He didn't do anything to me."
"No!"
Tuk-tuk, knocking twice on the table, Zonggu peeled the boiled eggs.
Starting from the broken point, the eggshell disintegrated piece by piece, and soon only the nearly perfect-shaped egg white remained.
Hongzi watched from across the dining table, chewing a vegetable salad, and he peeled the eggs and handed them over directly.
"Thanks……"
He hooked his fingers and she handed him another egg.
"Don't come to me today." Zonggu continued to peel the eggs, "And don't let her come here."
"oh……"
"The weather is very hot and I am very busy."
"I understand." Hongzi nodded, biting down half of the egg in one bite.
Breakfast continues.
Sogu was in a hurry and finished his meal quickly before heading out.
"See you tonight."
"Um……"
Hongzi came to the entrance and sent him out, "Be careful on the road."
After putting on her shoes, Zonggu turned around and smiled at her.
"I'm going out."
When we arrived at the station, an eastbound tram pulled into the station.
Soya got on the train and got off at Notogawa Station after two stops.
Although the distance was very close, this was his first time here. He opened the map and checked the location of the local police station, and hurried towards it.
More than ten minutes later, Soya successfully found Notogawa Kouban, and then found that he was the first spiritual awakener to arrive.
But the police in Jiaoban arrived early.
In other words, the police on duty here last night haven't changed their shift yet.
"Need help?" One of the policemen noticed him and yawned as he came out, "Did you lose something? Or..."
"No, I was sent by the agency."
Zongya took out the agency's black card and proved his identity to the other party.
"Oh, it turns out they are from 'over there'... I thought they were all witches." The policeman looked at him and said, "Come in, you came early enough."
Soya followed him in, "This is my first time coming to the Noto River. I'm not familiar with it, so I came here early."
Another police officer inside asked: "So you are the one on duty here today?"
"No, I'm standing guard on the street."
"That's really hard work..."
After chatting with the two listless policemen for a while, Soya's colleagues came over one after another as the morning sun gradually rose, and they were all miko.
The spiritual person in charge of the interrogation today is a miko named Ayumi Moriyama. She is very young and looks like a high school student, no more than the second grade at most.
"Please give me more advice..."
More than a dozen spiritual awakeners got to know each other, and as the only male, Zong Gu received too much attention.
"Yoshiaki Sotani...that's a really nice name, just like your face. I seem to have seen you somewhere before, no, I must have seen you. You were sent by Rurikoin Headquarters, right?"
"It's a pity..."
"Hey...then which shrine do you belong to? You can't be a monk, right?"
"Fuun Shrine in Nosu Town."
"Fuyun Shrine? This name sounds a bit familiar..."
Another young miko next to her thought about it, "Last month at Mount Ibuki, it was the eldest lady of Fuyun Shrine who killed the evil spirit, right? His name was Sugawara... Sugawara..."
"Sugawara Kyoko." Soya added, not mentioning that he was also present at the time, or even personally killed the "evil spirit" person.
"Yes, it's Sugawara Kyoko! I remember that in April, she seemed to be the one who killed that peerless evil spirit with one arrow..."
"That's right."
He smiled and said, "The eldest lady of our shrine is amazing."
After chatting for a while, after everyone arrived, Moriyama Ayumi stumblingly explained some scheduled matters to her colleagues, and then asked them to deploy in their respective areas of responsibility.
The area Soya was assigned to was in the Noto River Central Park area, opposite Noto River Middle School, and on the other side of the middle school was the local city branch office. There were not many residential buildings nearby, which was a good thing for him.
At least that seems to be the case for now.
After walking two blocks and arriving at Central Park, Soya found a bench and sat down.
Some people were walking their dogs, some were jogging, and there was also a primary school student who came to the park early in the morning to catch beetles. He was wearing his own clothes and looked no different from ordinary citizens.
If it is a miko with very distinctive appearance, it will be different. It will attract some people's attention...
Zong Gu thought, and soon received the first dispatch of the day, from the agency.
"Mr. Sotani, there is a spirit entity in the Notogawa Museum that destroyed the facilities in the museum and then escaped. Based on the direction in which it escaped, it is speculated that it may be fleeing towards your area. Please help intercept it."
"I understand. Any more specific location information?"
"No."
Zonggu stood up, took a breath, "Copy that."
Hang up the phone and walk out of the park. According to the map, the Noto River Museum is at the other end of the main road between the park and the middle school. If the fleeing spirit does not change direction midway, it is indeed most likely to escape to his side.
.
Arriving at the intersection, Zonggu scanned the pedestrians, looking for spirits that might be mixed in among them.
Without other information, he couldn't even be sure whether the spirit body would escape here, so that was all he could do.
Not long after I took my seat, another call came in, from Ayumi Moriyama who was in charge of Notogawa Kyoban.
"Sotani-san, there is a spirit entity causing trouble in Lingen Building. The situation is urgent. Please go over there now."
Lingen Building is to the west of the park, and Zonggu is to the north. It takes about ten minutes to get there. "I received an order from the agency to help intercept another spirit body."
"But there seems to be a lot of chaos over there at Lingen Building..."
Ayumi Moriyama was also in a dilemma, not knowing what to do.
The other party was a pure newcomer, and Zonggu quickly realized that she shouldn't let her make the decision, so he said he would make the decision himself.
"Okay... then I'll trouble you."
After hanging up the phone, Zong Gu weighed it for a while and felt that solving the issues in the building would be a higher priority.
When he arrived at the Lingen Building, before he could enter, a figure suddenly fell from the sky and fell straight to the grass in front of the building.
After lying down for a few seconds, the figure got up again, moving without any hindrance.
"..."
Anyone who can jump from a ten-story building without any injuries, except Superman, is dead.
And Soya's job is to make him die more completely.
After confirming the target, he chased him to the grass and before the other party could react, he used the plastic ruler he carried to separate his head.
"ha!"
Zonggu turned his head, and there was a teenage boy standing outside on the grass, imitating the action he had just made with a ruler and cutting off his head.
"Shuichiro..."
Another middle-aged woman hurried over and took the child away.
Before more people noticed him, Soya walked out of the grass and called Moriyama Ayumi to report the situation here.
The witch on the other side was very surprised, "It was solved so quickly?"
"Well, it's a coincidence..."
He looked back and saw that the spirit body that had lost its head had completely dissipated.
"I understand. Thank you for your hard work, Soya-san."
Just as he was about to hang up the phone, Moriyama Ayumi suddenly said, "Please wait a moment."
Soya listened with bated breath, and a faint voice came from the other side, which was soon repeated more clearly by Moriyama Ayumi.
"Sotani-san, please go to the Moriya car dealership next to Notogawa Junior High School. The employees of the repair shop called the police and reported that there are 'ghosts' who are destroying everywhere with wrenches and have already damaged several cars."
He took a deep breath and said, "I'll go there now."
After crossing the park and rushing to Moriya's car dealership, he smashed the head of the troubled ghost for the tearful auto repair shop manager. Before Soya could take a sip of water, he received another notification from the agency.
"Two spirits broke into the city branch..."
After running around four or five times, Soya rented a sports bike from a bicycle shop he passed by, but he still didn't have much time to stop.
"North of the park..."
"The izakaya on the east side of the middle school..."
"Please help..."
The busy day passed quickly.
In the evening, when he dragged his extremely tired body back to Notogawa Kaoban, he saw Moriyama Ayumi greeting him at the door. Soya suddenly understood how his colleagues who had returned one after another when they were on duty two days ago felt about him.
"Thanks for your hard work……"
The only good thing is that you can leave directly after handing over the work, without having to wait for other tasks at the same time.
I declined the invitation of another miko who was riding the train together. After two stops, Soya got off first.
When we walked out of the station, it was getting dark, and the smell of fireworks was in the air.
"Has it started here too?"
It's the smell of burning hemp branches.
When he was still on the Noto River, he had already seen the "Yinghun Huo" that got up early on the roadside or by the river.
It’s Obon Festival, and today is the first day of the Bon festival.
As dusk deepened, I walked past someone else's yard, and the white smoke rising from the burning hemp branches became invisible. Smelling the increasingly obvious smell of fireworks, Soya went straight back to Kirino's old house without stopping.
"Sogu is back."
Mr. and Mrs. Kirino are here, and since it is the day of the baptism ceremony, the izakaya will also have a night's rest.
A pottery pot for the soul fire has been placed in the yard, piled with hemp branches, and a newspaper placed underneath to light the fire.
"Sotani doesn't look very good." Kirino Keiko called Sotani over, "Is the work at the shrine very hard?"
He forced a smile and said, "It's not easy."
"Sogu, let's go over there and rest first." She pointed to the edge where several girls were sitting, and then asked her husband to light the fire.
Soya sat over and watched Kirino Hiroyuki light the match, and suddenly understood: "Are you waiting for me?"
Asagiri Suzu looked at him, Kirino Akane and Anko both nodded.
He opened his mouth, but finally said nothing.
The newspaper was flammable, so when a match was brought close to it, the flame instantly rose up, engulfing the hemp branches piled above and igniting it, causing the flames to dance.
"Nowadays, only in rural areas like ours, we light soul fires." Kirino Keiko crossed her arms and stared at the fire that gradually dimmed after the newspapers were burned. "In order to prevent fires in the city, people always put a fire at home.
There’s an Obon lantern.”
"I still prefer this traditional way." Kirino Akane murmured.
Kirino Keiko looked back at her daughter and laughed again.
"It only needs to be liked by the ancestors."
According to legend, Obon Festival is a ceremony for the souls of ancestors to return to the human world. The fire to welcome the souls is lit to prevent the ancestors from getting lost when they return home.
The hemp branches burned for a while, and the open flame became smaller and smaller, gradually disappearing. A thin and long wisp of white smoke floated into the night sky, becoming part of the smell of fireworks that filled the air.
"alright."
Kirino Keiko turned back to the house and bowed before the Buddhist altar set up in the living room, "The ancestors have come back, it's time for us to have dinner."
Looking at the pottery pot with only a few embers left, Kirino Hiroyuki picked up the shoes that his wife had taken off and walked towards the entrance.
Soya stood up, while Kirino Akane was still sitting on the edge, looking up at the starry sky connected by white smoke.
"Have the ancestors come back..."
She looked at him again.
Zonggu shook his head.
"Sure enough...it's just a legend after all."
Back in the living room, Akane Kirino pointed to the Buddhist altar filled with vegetables, fruits and flowers, "I helped prepare this in the morning."
"Yeah."
"Mom said the time to set up the pot shed should not be later than noon."
She bowed to the spiritual throne in the middle of the altar, knocked the copper plate again, and then pointed to the eggplant and cucumber next to it, "I also strung the elf horse and elf cow together, so they're not bad."
Zonggu looked at it, then nodded.
"It's quite similar."
There are four thin wooden branches stuck under each of the two melons and fruits. Because they resemble cows and horses, they have become the sustenance of the ancestors' souls.
The elf horse is a cucumber, hoping that the souls of the ancestors will speed up and return early to reunite with their relatives;
Eggplant is an elf cow, and its steps are slow, and it also expresses the hope of walking more slowly when parting from the ancestors. The cow can also carry more sacrifices for the ancestors to return to the other side to enjoy.
The incense in the incense burner was about to burn out. Kirino Akane picked up a few incense sticks and was about to put them on the candles to light them. After thinking about it, she turned back and said, "Do you want to put on some incense?"
The three of them nodded one after another, and each received a stick of incense.
After offering the incense, Zonggu also paid his respects.
"If Soya has any wish, my ancestors might help make it come true," Akane Kirino said.
He smiled a little, and after a while he bowed a few times to the tombs of the ancestors of the Kirino family, and then rang the bell.
bite--
"Hey, what did Sogu wish for?"
"I hope that after my duty ends tomorrow, the next shift schedule can arrange for me to stand guard at the intersection of the county road at night."
"Ah, it's so realistic."
"By tomorrow night, we will know whether this wish has been fulfilled."
Arriving at the restaurant, Kirino and his wife prepared dinner.
Soya sat down next to Asagiri Suzu, glanced around, and found that Tsukuyomi was still upstairs, so he went upstairs to ask him to come down.
Kirino Keiko looked at her husband, "Would you like some wine?"
Kirino Hiroyuki nodded.
Taking the juice from Kirino Akane, Soya poured it into the cup and gave it to Tsukuyomi, Anko and Asagiri Suzu.
"I'm starting."
"I'm starting..."
After dinner, Sogu stayed in the kitchen to help clean up.
"I'll be fine if I come. Zonggu must have had a hard day today. When he got home, he looked numb."
"It doesn't matter, it's just a little thing."
Kirino Keiko was washing the dishes, and after a while she tilted her head slightly, "I went back to Tohoku a few days ago. Did Soya go visit his parents?"
He wiped the dining table, nodded, and then spoke.
"Been there."
"It's been ten years."
"Yes."
She didn't ask any more questions, just sighed.
"Sendai...it's really far away."
Zonggu remained silent and nodded again.
After clearing the table, he prepared to help wash the dishes, but Kirino Keiko refused.
"No, I'll just come. Souya, go take a bath."
"OK."
When leaving the kitchen and passing by the living room, Soya saw Kirino Hiroyuki sitting alone on the edge with his back to the inside, while Kirino Akane was looking at the spiritual tablet on the Buddhist altar in a daze.
She didn't find him, and he didn't go over to disturb her. He turned around and went upstairs.
Asagiri Suzu and Tsukuyomi came up after eating, while Anko was sitting in his room.
"Why are you staying upstairs alone?"
She looked at him for a while, then shook her head.
Zong Gu went to find some clothes, "Do you still want to stay with your family?"
Hongzi turned to look at him and didn't deny it, "I used to spend the day with my family on the day of having a baby... It's the first time I'm having a baby at someone else's house, so I'm a little unaccustomed to it."
"I'm about the same." Zonggu closed the closet, "Especially since you waited for me to come back before lighting the soul fire."
"Because Akane's mother said that Soya is also part of their family."
Holding the clothes in his hands, he stood in front of the closet for a while.
"...I went to take a shower."
Hongzi looked at him and then looked away, pretending not to notice anything strange about him.