[Comprehensive] Manna's Summer

48# In the dark soil

Erika Futekoji knelt upright on the mat and let the housekeeper adjust the obi of her kimono.The Okisode kimono knitted by Nishijin is extravagant and gorgeous, and the color scheme is so coquettish that it is almost charming.The fabric of the clothes was flowing with the light, reflecting a beautiful charm on her originally immature face.

Different from the prevailing way of incense, what the Dixiaolu family has been pursuing for more than 300 years is the way of beauty.

Ultimate beauty.Heterogeneous beauty.Indulging in beauty.

The housekeeper adjusted the last ornament for Erica, stepped aside respectfully, and bent down deeply, waiting for Erica to get up.

But Erica said to her, "Go down."

"Miss……"

"I said—" The wine-red eyes were against the light, dark and almost cold, "Go down."

"……Yes."

The housekeeper stepped back on her knees.

Not long after, the door of the Japanese room was pulled open.

Akashi Seijuro stared at Erika with strange-colored pupils.The girl looked back, and after a while, a delicate smile appeared on her face.

"Is everything done, Zhengjiang?"

"The Metropolitan Police Department's test results have just come out. The Akashi Zaibatsu has also completely sold off the stocks of the two incense companies of the Chubukoji family."

He took out his mobile phone and stared at Erika Futekoji indifferently.

"I haven't made this call yet. Let me ask you one last time, classmate Dixiaolu... Erika, do you really not regret it?"

Erika stared at Akashi Seijuro, and after a while, a pair of sweet dimples sank deeply.

"Zhengjiang, have you regretted anything?"

There was a slight smile in her voice, and the end sound rose playfully.

"Erica regretted it... When Mana-chan died, Erica really regretted it very, very, very much. Almost immediately." The dimples on her cheeks deepened, "So Erica You know, the emotion that surges in my heart right now is definitely not regret.”

She raised her eyes, and showed Akashi Seijuro a smile that was more delicate and sweet than a blooming oleander.

"Now, the feeling that fills my heart is called joy."

She poked her dimple, tilted her head, and blinked playfully.

"So, you must remember to call, Zheng-chan~"

***

Erika Futekoji prepared an incense for the Kaiden ceremony that she named "Manatsu".

Rose, jasmine, gardenia, white orchid, orange blossom, lily, lily-of-the-valley, lilac... the fragrance of countless flowers blooming in summer diffuses quietly when the incense wood is burning, as if ten thousand flowers are in front of you Slowly and sequentially bloom.

The dazzling scene of hundreds of flowers in summer emerges in front of everyone's eyes - that is the fragrance that can awaken all good memories in the depths of the mind - the phantom fragrance that even slightly paralyzes the mind.

Erika suddenly remembered Mana.

This is... the incense she once gave Mana.

Now she wants to use this incense to bid farewell to everything that binds her.

The girl raised her wine-red eyes and looked at Akashi Seijuro. The moment their eyes met, she understood that he had done everything he had promised her——

A smile appeared on her face at this moment.

"24 years ago, there was a murder here."

Erika Futekoji broke the silence in the room.In such a disrespectful and reckless way, in front of all the celebrities in Kansai and Kanto, he destroyed his Kaichuan ceremony without hesitation, revealing the biggest secret of the generation of the Dikoji family——

——It is also the tip of the iceberg of countless crimes hidden in this old house for 300 years.

"You guy..."

Probably wanting to get up to refute...or beat Erica, the Patriarch of the Dixiaolu family suddenly stood up, but in the next second his knees softened and he fell to his knees. He tried to say something, but his muscles stiffened quickly , There was a heck sound in the throat, but the paralyzed tongue could not speak.

Beside him, his wife also collapsed stiffly.

Erica stood up lightly, smiling at the crowd who took out their mobile phones and started making calls, the dimples on her cheeks were extremely sweet.

"The police are coming here, and it won't be long before they arrive. As for the ambulance, there is no need for it. It's just a kind of muscle paralyzing powder placed in the middle of the fragrant wood. I calculated the time correctly, and it happened to reach my father. You can rest assured that you will not accidentally injure anyone else when you are in the hands of my mother and my lord."

Erika looked at the faces of everyone, and knew very clearly that after this time, she would be permanently deprived of the right to gain a foothold in the incense path - using incense wood to use this method in the Kaichuan ceremony would undoubtedly be regarded as the greatest contempt and insult to the incense path ——These incense-dao authorities will never allow her to participate in the "incense-dao" again.

But so what?

She doesn't care.

After Mana died, nothing frightened her anymore.

Not when I ruined my throat, and not now.

Erica could only feel a kind of cold happiness burning in her spine, flowing to her whole body and making her fingertips slightly numb.

What a joy to be destroyed.she thinks.

So the dimples on her cheeks became sweeter, and Erika continued to laugh and talk like this.

"24 years ago, my lord father strangled his younger brother and buried him in the ground here. 12 years ago, the second murder took place here—"

Erika stared at the woman on the ground, twitching from trying to struggle, with her eyes crooked with laughter - the woman who gave birth to her.

"12 years ago, my mother killed my father's lover here. I used this piece of incense wood enshrined behind me to hit that woman on the head. After seeing her fall, she hit her again 31 strokes."

A gust of wind lifted the curtain behind Erika, and a piece of ancient fragrant wood revealed its shape.

——Todaiji Temple.

——Agarwood "Lannaidai" enshrined in Dixiaolu's family for more than 300 years.

——A monster that once turned into a monster and killed hundreds of people, and was later beheaded by an unknown person.

Erica giggled.

"She and him...they are here now."

The air, changed.

After a cold silence, a terrified scream tore the silence! ! !

People were scrambling to run out the door, and Erica's voice sounded leisurely amidst the screaming and clamoring.

"Then, I let them out."

Under the incredulous eyes of those who escaped and those who did not escape, Erica took out a lighter from her sleeve and opened it with a snap.

Then, he cast the burning flames towards the curtain behind him.

—Hula——

"Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"

***

When Ichinose Qiao arrived, he only saw the soaring flames engulfing the high pavilion.The raging fire engulfed the 300-year-old pavilion, the tongue of fire gnawed the wooden beams, and after a miserable crackling sound, it collapsed earth-shatteringly, bringing a burst of chaotic sparks.

Fantastic and strange aroma permeates the entire courtyard. The Todaiji Temple, which Futekoji's family has treasured for more than 300 years, is ignited in the fire, and the fragrance is overflowing, filling the place like poison.

In front of the burning pavilion, Erika was laughing as she spun around. The wooden clogs had been kicked to nowhere by her, the white sock bag was stepping on the dirty ground, and her sleeves were flying like butterflies.Laughing and singing in a hoarse voice.

That was the first time Ichinose Takumi heard her sing after she ruined her voice.

Erika's voice is literally ruined.The female voice that used to be able to sing mellow bass and sweet high notes is now only hoarse and not melodious.He couldn't even hear what she was singing until he got closer.

"my?mother?has?killed?me,?

(my mom killed me)

my?father?is?eating?me,?

(my dad is eating me)

my?brothers?and?rs?sit?under?the?table,

(my brother and sister sit at the bottom of the table)

?picking?up?my?bones,?

(pick up my bones)

and?they?bury?them?under?the?cold?marble?s.

(Bury them under the cold stone tablet)"

A cold chill climbed up Ichinose Takumi's back, he glanced at Futekoji and his wife who were taken away by the police in handcuffs, and walked behind Erica expressionlessly.

Erica stopped her dance steps, but still hummed the song softly, over and over again, and then stopped, staring at the Huolou in front of her with blurred eyes.Heat waves floated her hair, and she suddenly laughed out loud.

"When I was young, if I was disobedient, my father and my mother would lock me here. Every time I stayed here, I would hear the skeleton singing."

"In the beginning, there was only the voice of a child, in the room where I was the only one, singing under the ground. Later, my mother beat and killed the maid who slept with my father here, and she forgot that I was still locked here , so one click...a total of 32 strokes."

"She buried her maid here. She didn't see it when she buried it, but I saw it. The baby's skeleton was singing in the dark soil. Later, when I was imprisoned here again, there was a woman with me. Sing along with that kid."

"The singing of the skeletons, I can't hear it when I grow up."

Ichinose Qiao's heart clenched in pain.

He could imagine such a scene—in a dark room, singing from underground, day after day, year after year, in this room where the corpses were buried, how did the young Erika feel... I grew up little by little.

And how was it driven crazy little by little.

"What song did they sing? After all these years, I can't remember."

Erica tilted her head, showing a playful smile.

"That day, I suddenly wanted to know, are they still singing now? So I quietly dug up the altar, and found, ah, although I couldn't hear them, they were still singing. - so I They took two phalanxes from them, please ask a friend to bring them to the police for testing."

She put her hands behind her back and smiled at Ichinose Takumi with a pair of cute dimples.

"I handed over the evidence of their drug production and drug trafficking to the police. Di Xiaolu's family has their own farm and is responsible for growing the flowers they need. My father planted poppies on that land ten years ago and collected evidence. It's not that hard."

"In addition to the two murders with convincing evidence...the possibility of father and mother being released from prison is very low. It's a pity that I won't be the one who died this time."

Erika jumped up and down on the spot, the white sock bag was covered with mud, she jumped forward, hugged Ichinose Qiao's waist, and rubbed affectionately.

"Hey, Qiao Jiang, now I have nothing but you..."

Her eyes were extremely oppressive and dim to bright.The arms around Ichinose Takumi slowly tightened, so hard that Takumi felt pain.

"I only have you."

--so.

——It’s just you.

Erika smiled and looked at the burning land.

Do you know how many bones are buried here?

Well, she doesn't know either.

The only thing Erika Futekoji clearly remembers is that in this house, no matter where, no matter where, there are skeletons singing.

***

later.

When the police dug up the scorched earth, they found countless bones buried deep in the courtyard.

The chilling thing is——

In the pitch-black soil, all the skeletons had their mouths gaping open.

——It seems to be singing all the time.