Chapter 27
1. The Unknown God
Spray burst from a rusted red pipe.
"Whoa, hot! It's practically a hot spring source!"
Izawa, hands dripping wet, yelped in a high voice and jumped back. Even her hair, tied with a black ribboned barrette, was wet and steaming.
"Well, of course you'll get burned if you stick your hand in there."
Miwasaki narrowed his eyes behind his glasses and smiled.
"But it says 'hot spring' on the sign."
"There's a footbath over here, you know."
"You could've said that earlier."
Splashing each other with drops of hot water gushing from a pipe jutting out of a stone wall halfway up a gently sloping hill, the two looked like college students having fun.
"Senpai, we're not here to play, you know."
I sighed as I felt the gravel of the unpaved road crunching under my soles.
Izawa and Miwasaki looked at me.
"Sorry, Katagishi-kun. Izawa-san's always like this."
Izawa stuck out her tongue slightly.
I shook my head and looked up at the distant blue sky framed by thick leaves.
It was the quintessential midsummer landscape of Japan.
The lush green trees deepened in color under the sunlight, almost as if they were glowing.
Beyond the trees was a reddish-brown fence, broken in places, and an abandoned railway track beyond that.
There must have once been a station building. The simple roof, just slanted wooden boards on iron pillars, might have been a waiting spot for a train that came only every few hours. Directly below it was a square wooden-framed footbath, from which muddy-colored water bubbled up.
"Katagishi-kun, you're too serious. The main investigation's already over, right? You should enjoy it like it's a half-day off."
Before I or Miwasaki could look away, Izawa crouched down and triumphantly held up her removed stockings and shoes like a caught fish.
She stepped into the mud with her pale, untanned toes, sat on the wooden frame, and plunged her feet into the water with a splash.
"How can you put your feet in that? There could be weird bacteria in there."
"This place has definitely been abandoned for years."
Izawa cheerfully beckoned us with a carefree smile.
"I'm absolutely not getting in."
I said it, but yelling from a distance was tiring. Reluctantly, I walked over and looked down at the footbath, where something—maybe ochre-colored dust or the original water—was bubbling up.
"Even though we just finished work, they told me to check out another case since it's on the way. I really didn't know what to say..."
Izawa stretched.
"There's nothing here at all. It's basically just sightseeing."
"Yeah, well, it's just a missing persons case that happens every few years. We don't even know if it's related to the Territorial Divine Offenses."
Miwasaki rolled up his shirt sleeves and tested the water with his fingertips.
"Apparently, our team's come out here a few times before, but none of those investigations turned up anything. Wouldn't it be better to just leave this to the regular police? Katagishi-kun, have you ever heard of this place being a suicide spot?"
"No, I haven't. But it's way too many to be just a coincidence."
I gave a short reply and looked away.
A makeshift sign swayed on the chain-link fence, a sheet of drawing paper covered in plastic for rain protection, tied with decorative tape. The smeared marker writing read, "Due to track disconnection, this station is a temporary terminus."
Looking past the platform beyond the fence, I saw mounds of dirt and rocks piled high on the tracks. Further ahead were a yellow bulldozer and stacked logs. Probably a landslide or something had made the tracks unusable, and with no budget for repairs, it had been abandoned.
In the dirt mound, something like a red pillar was sticking out. I thought it might be a torii gate.
"Ah, look. Isn't there something up there?"
Izawa leaned forward and pointed toward the top of the mountain ahead.
"What is it?"
I squinted at the tip of her finger and saw a huge white oval shape protruding between the green mountains. Looking closer, I noticed indentations resembling eyes, a nose, and lips carved into it. It was a giant face.
"A giant..."
Miwasaki laughed at my small murmur.
"That's a huge Kannon statue. No, not quite. Looks more like a statue of the Virgin Mary."
"So it's man-made, huh."
Izawa sat back deeply on the wooden frame, looking bored. Her legs shimmered in the water, reflecting the light.
"There used to be a New Religion facility here, right? The locals were strongly opposed, and it caused a lot of trouble."
"The Silent Voice, right? All the leaders were arrested on fraud charges, I think."
"Yeah, since it was suddenly shut down, I bet statues and stuff like that are still left behind."
Looking closely, I could tell that, while huge, the features were crudely carved and clearly artificial.
It was a statue of a dummy draped in white cloth from the head down, resembling neither Kannon nor the Virgin Mary.
"When you bring fake stuff into a place that originally had its own faith, it usually ends badly..."
As I muttered to myself, Miwasaki pushed up his glasses and laughed.
"Yeah, that's the essence of the Territorial Divine Offenses. Listen, Izawa-san. When the seniors slack off, the juniors grow up properly in their place."
Izawa raised an eyebrow and chuckled, saying, "What the heck."
Being around these two drained the poison from me—I couldn't help but laugh too.
Miwasaki took a cigarette from his chest pocket, and I followed suit. After lighting it with the lighter he handed me, I thanked him, returned it, and exhaled smoke. A white mist hung over the verdant mountains.
"Feeling a little more relaxed now?"
Surprised by Miwasaki's words, I looked up.
"You seemed tense ever since we got here."
I rubbed the frown lines between my brows, which I hadn't even noticed until now, and sighed.
"Sorry."
"Rokuhara-san works people hard. Even though you're new, it's been job after job—no time to rest."
"Yeah..."
"Did Rokuhara-san say something to you?"
Miwasaki said, still staring at the abandoned tracks.
"It was the first time he suddenly said, 'Check out one more village.' And then he kept talking about something. That guy's not really cold, but the way he talks makes him seem that way."
"He's always been like that."
His eyes behind the glasses turned slightly toward me.
A bird chirped softly overhead. The sound of bubbling water and rustling leaves soaked into the summer air.
"Someone connected to Rokuhara-san and me went missing here."
What Rokuhara had told me wasn't something I needed to share with them. But Miwasaki's strong-accented way of speaking made me feel like I might end up saying more than I should.
"I see."
The reply was short, but the voice was kind and considerate. We silently bit down on our cigarette filters.
"Me too."
A voice came from the footbath.
"My younger brother. Though we're years apart and have different last names because our parents divorced. He disappeared here earlier this year."
Izawa stretched out both legs and rested them on the opposite edge of the wooden frame.
"He was a college student. Said, 'Everyone else is going home for the holidays, but I don't have a home to go back to, so I'll do some fieldwork during winter break.' I told him to come home to my place, and he said, 'I already bought a night bus ticket, so I'll come back during spring break.' But that was the last I heard. I thought we were close enough that he'd talk to me if something was bothering him."
Miwasaki and I fell silent.
I recalled the list of missing persons in the report. Usuzumi Mahito, twenty-one years old.
I had never heard her talk about anything dark before—not even while she untied her black ribbon barrette and wrung out her wet hair.
But people who take on dangerous jobs like this usually have their reasons. Just like me. The only difference is that they don't show it.
I don't remember laughing once after Misaki disappeared. But after I started working with Izawa and Miwasaki, I naturally began to remember how.
The pale blue bench leaning against the fence beside me was faded white, and the letters of what must have once been a pharmaceutical ad were nearly unreadable.
Next to it, I twisted my cigarette into a tilted red tin ashtray stand, then looked up at the sky. The god statue, towering high, looked close enough to touch the white clouds. Somehow, it seemed even closer than before.
Noticing my gaze, Miwasaki looked up too.
"The Silent Voice guys were doing some pretty shady stuff, but the more shady they are, the more they obsess over the details. I heard they gathered all sorts of spiritually gifted people from all over."
Miwasaki said, lighting a second cigarette. The smoke bent as it hit the frame of his glasses and drifted away.
"Apparently, they didn't just gather shrine priests and monks with special bloodlines from all over Japan, but also people possessed by fox spirits or Misaki spirits and such."
"Where'd you hear that?"
"From my mom."
Miwasaki said it casually, smiling.
"She was a follower. Once, she even dragged me to a meeting all the way from the west on an express bus. That was when rumors started flying. People said they were cursed by something bad and came seeking help. The guru would place a hand on their head and say, 'My body feels lighter now.' Probably just a staged act with planted participants."
After speaking calmly, he blew smoke into the sky to cover it up.
"Everyone's got their own circumstances, huh..."
To my murmured comment, Izawa replied, "Of course."
"Otherwise, we wouldn't be doing a job where we're sent all over the place and get wrapped up in all kinds of crazy stuff every time."
Izawa wiped her feet with a towel she took out of her bag.
She bent her knees into a triangle and began rolling down her stockings, so Miwasaki and I looked away.
"Do other countries have organizations like ours too?"
"Of course they do. America, China, even the Soviet Union have them. I wonder if Germany has separate ones for East and West."
"Who knows."
"...Hey, doesn't that statue look closer?"
Miwasaki, who was looking off into the distance, glanced at the mountain and muttered. It seemed I hadn't imagined it.
"Let me see."
Izawa, slipping her pumps back on as steam rose from her feet, stood beside me and looked.
"Rather than closer, doesn't it look bigger? Look, the head part."
The blurred outline of the god statue had nearly doubled in size. That shouldn't be possible.
Thinking it might be a shadow caused by the sunlight, I stared intently and saw something like a black haze covering the statue's head. Within the haze were a pair of eyes, more distinct than those carved into the statue.
"What is that... a human face...?"
A black human face. It looked like a baby clinging to the statue's neck, staring at us. The haze formed multiple layers, etching deep, elderly wrinkles into the face.
"What the hell is that? Should we tell Rokuhara-san?"
"Yeah... maybe it's the god of this place..."
Izawa tightened her expression.
The black haze in my line of sight didn't move an inch.
"Is there a local god legend here too?"
"Yeah. There's no detailed legend or anything, just a guardian god like you'd find anywhere. If I remember right, its name was—"
Izawa said, bringing her hand to her chin.
"The Unseen God."
The eyes within the black haze blinked. I couldn't believe it.
It definitely looked at us, its wrinkled eyelids closing, then opening.
It looked at the two of us.
"Katagishi-kun, what's wrong?"
When I turned toward the voice, Miwasaki was looking at me with concern.
I looked back, but there was nothing there.
Only the crudely made white statue from earlier remained.
"No, it's nothing..."
"You must be really tired."
Miwasaki chuckled, pressing his cigarette butt into a red tin standing ashtray.
"In the end, nothing happened. I guess that's all we can tell Rokuhara-san."
"Yeah."
A blue sky with white clouds. Aside from the ruins of the collapsed railway, it was an ordinary summer day in the Japanese countryside.
From a footbath enclosed in a two-meter square wooden frame—perhaps once part of a plaza in front of the station—mud-colored water bubbled up.
"How long has this been left like this? No one would get in, right?"
"There's definitely some weird bacteria in there."
When I casually looked down, I saw two streaks of moisture on part of the wooden frame, as if someone had rested wet legs there. Beside them lay a still-clean barrette with a black ribbon.
"Do the locals still use this?"
"You'd probably get sick if you went in."
I had to agree.
"Well, shall we head back?"
I turned on my heel and began descending the slope with Miwasaki.
I looked up at the sound of cicadas.
Part of the distant mountain's greenery had turned white, as if it had been scraped away, and the decaying god statue stood there in silence.