Ayanokoji in Kexue World

(27) Why do you look at me like that

Nanako Shiraishi, who took the initiative to say hello, is the talker of the hot spring village.

She took us all the way to the front of her hotel, and she was so enthusiastic that Amuro couldn't refuse.However, he still looked at me and Edogawa Ranpo.

"Suddenly changing the hot spring hotel, you still have to ask my companion's advice, right?"

I myself am the go-anywhere type.

If you are not satisfied with this, the task of making opposing suggestions should fall on Edogawa Ranpo.So, I looked at Edogawa Ranpo.However, Ranpo was attracted by the dessert "University Potato" brought over by the uncles in blue.

"The university taro we make is free for customers." Shiraishi Nanako said with a smile, "The opening of the hot spring village is not about profit, but about human relations, so we don't spend too much money on publicity. It is also in Kusatsu , The quality of the hot springs will definitely not be bad.”

The proprietress Shiraishi said this, firstly, to let us stay at ease, and secondly, to let us go down the stairs. After all, in a blink of an eye, Edogawa Ranpo wanted to enter the hotel with the strange uncle.

If I hadn't grabbed Edogawa's arm first, he would have slipped in with him.

"You have to carry your own luggage."

"Amuro will get it for me."

"You have to take it yourself."

Edogawa Ranpo was stared at by me for a while, so I had to wait for Toru Amuro to park the car and follow us to pick up the backpack. Then he dragged his own orange backpack, didn't carry it, just carried it by hand, and whispered to Toru Amuro : "Ayanokōji is super fierce, not obedient at all."

I think his complaint voice could be a little softer.

Toru Amuro noticed my gaze and asked, "Did you see the name when you entered the village just now?"

I just looked away from Edogawa Ranpo who was hiding behind Toru Amuro: ""Pole Star", a village that has not been heard of on the map. "

However, there are hundreds of villages in Japan, and it is not surprising to occasionally encounter a village where an old man stays behind.

The strange thing is that this is not the same as Baishi's proprietress's rhetoric.

According to her, the hot spring hotel was built because of human feelings, so according to the village planning, the hotel should be extended to the outside in order not to occupy the residential area and farming area.But at a glance, it is obvious that this Jixing Village has been developed with the focus on "hot spring hotels" - the houses in the whole village are scattered, and the largest building is the Zangxing Hotel, which is located in the center of the flat ground, like a Go board Tianyuan position on .

In addition, very special, it is a cave hotel.

But the quality of hot springs should not be fake.In fact, you can smell the unique rotten egg smell of natural sulfur hot springs from a long distance.

"Then shall we spend the long vacation here?" Amuro Toru confirmed again.

In view of the consequences that I was the first to promise to participate in the small long vacation that day, I want to wait for others to answer this time.

Edogawa stared at the delicious food in disorder, and his heart was already flying. He nodded and said, "I can."

Since he said it's ok, then I think it's ok.

I followed suit and nodded.

The door sign of the hot spring hotel is a quaint wooden structure, engraved with a faded color relief called "Trowel Painting" - a pattern of 28 constellations, and a pattern of star dots is also painted in the middle of the main entrance, but it is not a rule.If it is barely recognizable, it seems that the inverted quadruple stars are connected by dotted lines.

Although I felt that the cave was narrow and depressing before entering the door, I relied on enough artificial lights to dispel the gloomy atmosphere, but after entering the door, I can find that the hotel is wide and deep, with a unique cave.The interior of the cave is exquisitely decorated, paying special attention to the details. In addition to planting plants adapted to the environment, the part of the red rock exposed one inch above the ground is also carved with the hell scene narrated in the Buddhist scriptures.There are no repeated characters and scenes in this picture, and it goes all the way into the depths of the unseen cave, which is a test of the sculptor's imagination and endurance.

The proprietress Baishi took out the registration book and asked us to sign in. She said that it was because she was not used to registering with a computer and was not good at electronic products, so she still used pen and paper to record.

"It's a coincidence that you came here. We have activities for the past two days. There will be a party in the restaurant at six o'clock tonight. Tomorrow night, we will officially hold a fire festival, please come and participate!"

"Fire Festival? Is that what we just watched?" Toru Amuro raised his head and asked.

The proprietress Baishi explained with a smile on her face: "Yes, we were still rehearsing just now, and you came here. This is a big project in our village, and all the villagers are looking forward to it."

While Toru Amuro was in charge of talking to Mrs. Shiraishi, Ranpo Edogawa handed me his signed register book and pen.

I thought his handwriting would be round, but it turned out that his strokes were rough and dense, even more beautiful than the handwriting of Toru Amuro's teaching style.If you just read the words, you can't tell that he is a childish person at all.

Maybe after the detective is out of work, he can make money by writing calligraphy.

On top of Amuro Toru's name, I saw three more names: "Gojo Satoru", "Otoko Yuta" and "Dog Scroll".If I remember correctly, Gojo Satoru should be the conjurer I met before.

Is it a coincidence to meet here?

"We have single rooms here."

Shiraishi had finished chatting at this time, and introduced the hotel, including the map of the hotel, the location of the open-air hot spring and the canteen, and the dining time.

The key card I took said "Li Ding" on it.

Edogawa Ranpo is holding "Li Wu".

Amuro Toru took "Kun Mo".

There are also hiragana phonetic notations on it. According to people nowadays, these Chinese characters are no longer commonly used, and it is difficult to identify the meaning.But if you have read the "Nihon Shoki" chapter of the Age of God, you should be able to recognize these characters, because the eleven gods in the story are arranged according to the Yin and Yang gossip.If so inferred, this hotel was built based on Shintoism.

However, according to Shintoism, the murals are painted with Buddhist characteristics, which are random collages without knowing the teachings, or based on these two religions, a new religion derived from the core of other religions.

Seeing that we were studying the names on the door card, the proprietress Baishi said: "You don't need to study the meaning, you go to the right along the main entrance, the first room, the second room, and the third room are there."

Toru Amuro is the first, I am the second, and Edogawa Ranpo is the third.

"Thank you for showing me the way."

Amuro put the key card in the palm of his hand.

We thanked and went to the room.

The proprietress Shiraishi reminded us one more thing: "Yukatas are already prepared in the room, and you can start changing as soon as you arrive in the room. You also get a copy of the design drawing of the hotel. This hotel is deeper than you imagined. Look at the signs, you can see our hot springs in the cave, just soak in it directly. In addition, there are some books in the room, you can read them if you are interested."

"Okay, thank you."

Toru Amuro said thank you on our behalf.

The rooms are not far apart.

We simply said a few words and put things in the room.

After all, this is a cave hotel. Even if there are windows in the room, you can't see the outside of the cave, but the wind in the cave is endless, and it is not as oppressive and suffocating as imagined.

After the window is opened, there is a five-inch wide window sill with a guardrail. You can sit and watch the warm spring flowing under the guardrail, and you can also see the black wall illuminated by warm artificial lamps at a glance.

As soon as I opened the window, the two windows next to me also opened "唰", "唰", "唰", probably all to let the room breathe first.But inexplicably gave me a feeling, I just bubbled up in a chat group, and other people also bubbled up one by one.

"The inside of the house is better than expected."

Toru Amuro shook hands with me.

Correct.

Although the room is small, it has all internal organs.

For the part that lacks natural light, various indoor lights are used to make up the light, as if the sunlight is directly shining into the room.The room is clean and generous, well-equipped, and the small snacks prepared for the guests are neatly stacked on the table, which looks extremely comfortable.

Edogawa Ranpo also emerged from the window sill, holding a half-bitten chestnut glutinous rice cake in his hand and said: "This is delicious, if you don't want to eat it, give it to me."

After Amuro finished listening, he disappeared from the window.

After a while, he appeared from the window, just to pass me the glutinous rice cake.Because the hotel is designed as a regular octagon, Toru Amuro happens to be at an oblique corner, and the distance is longer than the distance between the windows connecting me and Edogawa Ranpo in a straight line, but it is not out of reach.

Just reach out and do it.

After I took it, I also added the glutinous rice cakes from my house, and handed it to Edogawa Ranpo.Edogawa Ranpo smiled very coaxingly.

"By the way, do we have to give it like this?"

I have a doubt.

Amuro said: "It feels more interesting this way."

It seemed to be a whim.

"What if you fall into the water?"

I don't think it will be easy to scoop it up.

Edogawa Ranpo, who had already stocked up the goods, said with peace of mind: "Then pretend you don't know."

You take it for granted.

Before Edogawa Ranpo finished speaking, he continued: "Wait a minute, let's borrow a shovel to dig the soil, shall we?"

At the same time, Toru Amuro and I fell silent, and stood up straight, as if we were about to get off the assembly line.Toru Amuro said, "Then let's change into bathrobes first. It's still raining outside, so let's use the hot spring pool in the cave first."

I focused on looking in his direction and nodded.

Edogawa Ranpo made a trumpet shape with his hands, and said, "I'm talking! Listen to it! When I came out of the zelkova forest just now, I saw strange plastic stuck in the bushes reflecting light. Is there anyone with me? Go? I don't want to go alone."

If he stopped when he said "Is there anyone to accompany me", I think that according to Amuro Toru's personality, he would probably accompany him to the forest that was as dark as the night to see the situation in order to protect his safety.But now I added the sentence "I don't want to go alone", which means "just ignore him".

So I started changing my yukata inside the house.

In other words, when I was taking off my clothes, I suddenly thought that if this is a horror game, Toru Amuro and I are trying to avoid triggering the branch copy, only Edogawa Ranpo is enthusiastically collecting the whole plot, the only shortcoming "He might get lost."

As soon as I took off my shirt, I heard the rustling sound of climbing up the window, which should be Edogawa Ranpo.As a result, when I turned around, I saw Ranpo Edogawa opening the window.

Seeing me staring at him, Edogawa Ranpo wasn't embarrassed either.

"Li" has three rooms on one side of the regular octagon, the windows are common, and a long anti-fall railing is used for each other.And "Kun" as one side, also has three rooms, and an independent anti-fall railing.

The length between the two window sills is at least 1.8 meters long according to "the arm span is equal to the height" and considering the bevel factor.

"Talk to me." Edogawa Ranpo couldn't climb the window of Toru Amuro's room, and said to me in a negotiating tone, "If you don't go today, you can go tomorrow? Anyway, I just want to know. "

Speaking of which, Edogawa Ranpo often gives people a sense of déjà vu of a child who is arrogant, unreasonable, and spoiled.Generally speaking, people with this personality should be extraordinarily difficult.But after getting along, you will find that he is actually very talkative, so he is also very easy to bully, there is a small contrast.

I thought, it will be sunny tomorrow.

"it is good."

"Then it's done, I'm going to change clothes now!!!"

Edogawa wandered back along the road along the window.The guardrail of the window sill is actually not high, and the arched back that crawled over in disorder is also much higher than the railing.

I watched him go back to his room before continuing to change clothes.

After I put on my bathrobe, I heard the sound of the window being pulled open, so I opened it too, and what emerged was the head of a familiar yet unfamiliar white-haired young man.He didn't look at my face at first, but still glanced at the position above my shoulder, then lowered his round sunglasses and greeted me.

"Hey, is it a former classmate who came here to soak in the hot spring with his parents?"

The gurgling sound of the water below was like an invisible water beast hiding, breathing steadily at its own rhythm.

"Mr. Gojo, hello."

"Do you still remember me? You have a good memory." His praise was full of smiles, but he also seemed careless.

"what about you?"

The names of the other two people under his name are written in thin strokes, one of which looks weak, and they are all in student fonts.

I remember they were called Yigu Youtai and Goujuji.

"Let's take a long vacation and bring the students to relax."

"What school are you?"

I checked Wujo Wu's information before, and this man is a real magician.And Xia Youjie became a "curse master" because he used curses to kill innocent ordinary people.The reason I asked was just to test the extent to which he would lie to people.

"Conjuration Higher Specialized School." After Gojo Satoru finished speaking, he jokingly provoked a smile, "Do you want to come to our school? We are short of students, only the tuition fees of students cannot support the operation of the school at all. Even relying on students Keeping repeating grades and paying tuition fees won't save Jugao!"

Ignoring his exaggerated performance, I said, "So, the last time you were at HAPiNA shopping street, you were doing work?"

"Yes." Gojo Satoru nodded.

"Then do I still have a curse spirit on me?"

Because of what they said last time, I still somewhat cared.If people are cursed to death without knowing why, it seems to me as absurd as being choked to death while drinking water.So, I have been investigating Xia Youjie's whereabouts.

I don't expect a conjurer who sees a curse spirit on someone else to leave it alone, he might as well solve it by his own means.

"Yes." Gojo Satoru continued to laugh, "But don't worry. You didn't need to worry before. Now you meet me, so you don't have to worry."

If it wasn't for me not being able to see it, I wouldn't be talking to him to gather information.

"By the way, is there a way to see the curse spirit? I want to see what the curse spirit you see looks like."

I haven't had any contact with this strange power yet.

"I can tell you..." Gojo Satoru said halfway, and suddenly smiled to himself, "Don't look at me like a liar from the beginning, I will be embarrassed." Cover your face.

"........."

This person is quite familiar and easygoing.

Being a teacher by example is not as reliable as a teacher's example.

After Gojo Satoru finished his one-man show, he snapped his fingers and turned the scene, and said, "Well, student, if you want to watch it, you can do it. Ordinary people can't see it, but at this moment , we've come to a wonderful place."

"Place?"

"When you came here just now, did you see the villagers still burning the shrine made of grass when it rained?"

"I saw it."

"The real shrine should be burned tomorrow. If you want to see it now, you have to go around the back of this hotel to see it."

Although I don't understand why "burning the shrine" is a fire festival project, can it still be to go to the old and welcome the new?I have too many questions, but now I just wait for Gojo Satoru to finish.

Gojo Satoru said: "Do you know that there are caves next to some shrines? For example, there is a huge cave at the "Udo Shrine" in Nichinan City, Miyazaki Prefecture. "

I have heard of this.

That is a famous energy spot.

The so-called energy actually sounds very mysterious. If you want to give it a specific name, it is probably cosmic energy, or the flow of electromagnetic energy.And energy attractions, to give the simplest example, are pyramids.You should have heard such a story by now, "Scientists put animal carcasses in the pyramid and found that the animal carcasses just dried out and did not rot."

As for Udo Shrine, it is very famous for praying for marriage.

"There is also a cave next to the Gewaraoka Shrine in Genji Mountain, Kamakura, but it is now a tourist attraction."

I think he's a bit slow to get into the subject.Did he want to express that the caves of different shrines have different functions?

"In the past, most of the caves in the shrines were used to store the dead souls. The dead souls used the caves of the shrines as their mother's womb, and they would automatically crawl into the caves after death, waiting for the opportunity of reincarnation." Gojo Wu looked faintly at the sky Direction, "You know, the wind flowing here is actually cold undead."

"Is this the content of Shintoism?" I said blankly. "When I entered the cave hotel, I saw the murals at the bottom of the cave were the blood pond hell of Buddhism. And the book in the room was "Ji Shuo Tian Yuan Shen Xiang" "" "A Brief Account of the Chronicle of the Time Device", "The Beginning of the Panxing Sect", maybe it is the Panxing Sect?

In addition, the definitions of undead and cursed spirits are also different.

Undead are the souls of people after death.

Mantra, last time you said it was people's negative emotions?

This is different from what you said.

I don't need to see undead, I want to see cursed spirits. "

"Oh, you are so serious." Gojo Satoru said without any sense of shame about being exposed, "This is not interesting."

"..."

I regret talking to him.

He speaks half-truths and half-truths and is not to be trusted.

I was about to close the window when Ranpo Edogawa opened the window and went online.

"What are you talking about?"

I thought to myself, talk about loneliness.

"Is the painting of people being boiled in a pot on the mural under the hotel the Blood Pool Hell?"

Edogawa fastened his belt while talking, but his upper body was not closed properly, and when he bent over, a white patch appeared from his collarbone to his chest.

"What is the pattern on the ceiling that looks like a star map?"

I suspect that Edogawa Ranpo's ability should be "compound eyes". It has tens of thousands of single eyes with independent imaging, and can see the entire range of 360 degrees at once.Not to mention that I didn't see the ceiling, and the plastic card he mentioned just now. The zelkova tree that was painted with whitening agent has actually faded to the root, and the tree hasn't grown on the side where he is sitting.

I don't know what Toru Amuro thinks.

Anyway, I was thinking at the time, how did Edogawa Ranpo find out.

Gojo Satoru's voice revealed a little imperceptible caution: "The pattern is the symbol of the Panxing Sect."

Edogawa Ranpo was thinking, and said: "Oh, the Panxing Cult is the cult that was banned ten years ago for sacrificing young girls in the church, right? It believes in the immortal "Master Tianyuan"? "

Edogawa's tone was the same as drinking milk tea and commenting on the taste, without the slightest panic and anxiety of staying in the remnants of a cult.

Speaking of immortality, it somewhat reminds me of Gin and Shirley, Vodka once visited a small island called "Mermaid Island", which also has similar legends of immortality.However, the follow-up content is heard from Mao Lilan, because they have also been to that island.

According to Mao Lilan, the rumored "Longevity Woman" is actually a disguise technique used by three generations of grandparents.The so-called Longevity Woman has long since died, and her daughter pretended to be her and continued to deceive the islanders. Not surprisingly, the granddaughter of the Longevity Woman should continue to play the role in the future.In order to maintain this mysterious rumor, the witch paid a bloody price, and finally found out that the older generation on the island had long known that the longevity woman was a disguise of the witch herself.

This story is embarrassing.

Mermaid Island no longer has any tourists who are "longevity women".That is to say, the former register and transaction book is useless.After I regained my memory, I asked someone to bring out all the registers of the past few decades.

Because, those who leave their names on the register will write their "real names" in order to make their so-called wishes come true.If there is a real name, it is easy to check a lot of biographical information.

……

"You're not afraid." Gojo Satoru seemed to find it interesting to chat with Edogawa Ranpo, so he raised his voice.

Edogawa Ranpo asked back: "What should I be afraid of?"

"Afraid of cults, afraid of being arrested and sacrificed, there are too many." Gojo Satoru said.

Edogawa Ranpo thought for a while and said: "Ten years ago, the people they sacrificed had a specific physique called "star plasma body".Apart from "knowing everything and being invincible in reasoning", I don't have any special physique. After Edogawa Ranpo finished speaking, he patted the hem of his clothes, saying that he had nothing to covet except his brain full of wisdom.

This is quite natural and cheeky.

Wujo Wu put his palms together and laughed, and said, "By the way, do you want to see what the curse spirit looks like? If you have time at night, we can play games here. I have a bunch of special snacks from Gunma County that I bought on the train—— Konjac jelly, there are all kinds of flavors!"

"Is there anything else besides the basic fruit? Coffee, soda or pudding?"

"Of course! Don't underestimate me Gojo Satoru, these special models will never be missed!"

"Then I want it!"

Edogawa raised his hand in disorder.

After raising his hand, he urged me to raise my hand.

"The coffee tastes super delicious, please raise your hand."

Not elementary school students.

"..."

I don't know why I really want to see the curse spirit with my own eyes, but now I'm not interested.

In any case, I was forced to join their conversation.Even, the three of us took a bath with the three of them, the teacher and the students afterwards.Edogawa Ranpo and Gojo Satoru couldn't stop when it came to sweets and pastries, they were simply two lovers of sweets.

After taking a bath, they started snapping up food at the hot spring specialty food stall next to the soup pool.All four of us stood behind them, with a sense of helplessness in our eyes.

The store manager is an uncle with a crew cut. It is estimated that he has been working hard for a long time. He was originally tall and stout, and his skin was tanned.When I sat on the edge of the chair, I didn't feel any special feeling yet, but when I stood up to greet us, the store manager was very oppressive, and could swallow any of us directly like a big bear.

But his smile is quite friendly.

"Don't you even look at it?"

"..."

Me, Amuro Toru, Otoko Yuta, and Gomakiji exchanged glances with each other.Although we knew that the companion/teacher who was cleaning up the snacks like crazy would definitely buy them all, but because of this sentence, we still scattered around to look around.

I walked past the store manager Shun Nikaido.He also sells toy water guns behind his back.Seeing that other people bought unnecessary things to express their gratitude, I also picked up a water gun.

"Are you sure you want to buy it?" The store manager Nikaido said with a smile.

"Ah."

"350 yen, thank you for your patronage."

"Ah."

When I was taking out the money, Uncle Nikaido asked me: "Are you afraid of fire? You can also protect yourself by filling a water gun with water."

What he said was inexplicable, and I hadn't had time to think about it.

Uncle Nikaido continued: "By the way, Mrs. Shiraishi said that you will participate in a blind date in our village at night." As he spoke, the smile on his face became even stronger, "You can all meet some good women!"

Blind date?

The average age of people in this village is over 50 years old.If you need a blind date at this age, you will either get divorced or your wife will die.In other words, if I marry them, it means that I will have a stable and remote residence in the future, and at the same time I don’t need to worry about income, and I may have a three-piece life of “sons, daughters-in-law and grandchildren who will not take the initiative to bother”.

That is, early retirement, retirement life, full of children and grandchildren...

When I thought about it, I was shocked.

Is this the so-called completion of adulthood, and the completion of life in one step?

I cleared my throat and put on a serious expression.

"...Can you tell me, what are the preferences of the women in your village who are participating in the blind date meeting?"

As soon as I finished speaking, I received suspicious looks from others.

Why are they looking at me like that?

The author has something to say:

Thank you [Sweet Plum] for your long comment, 32+1-1=32 more!

Everyone go to bed early! ! !

Change perspective tomorrow.