At night, the main hall of the temple was lit with candlelight, and the Buddha's golden body, with its half-open, half-closed eyes, seemed to look down at the two people in the hall.
And the two monks, who didn't want outsiders to hear their conversation, were speaking freely.
"Following that Jingxin guy, so many rules, it's annoying." One of them picked up a bottle of soda and drank it, showing a distressed expression.
"No choice, who told him he's still useful. Back then, I ran to the richest man's house a lot for his family." The other, with a younger voice, also chimed in.
"Ultimately, isn't he just for that woman, no, girl is more appropriate, right? Sometimes I really wonder how perverted that sanctimonious thing is."
"That's true. Speaking of which, how's that kid from the Uesugi family? I haven't been to the mountains these past few days. Wasn't he very disobedient before?"
As if unwilling to discuss that topic, one of them changed the subject.
"Oh, him, wasn't he called to take over from Yasuda? He'll probably settle down after a while, hehe, the mountains are really not a place for people."
"Indeed, that place in the mountains is really grueling. Turning those things into feed, they are our kind, I hope the Buddha can forgive us..." The younger man, who initially seemed to have some awe for the Master Jingxin they spoke of, sounded a bit awkward.
"What kind or not kind!" The other person seemed a bit agitated, like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, and he loudly rebuked, interrupting the younger man's words.
"We're already doing this kind of thing, what are you still afraid of? Does your old man eat fewer people? You say it nicely, 'feed, feed'! Aren't those all people?
What are we doing? If you don't want to become like that feed, harden your heart sooner.
If we don't have them, what will we do when we get old?"
Listening to the older man speak, the younger man seemed to catch his breath a few times, then firmed up.
"Yes, Senior Brother, you are right to admonish me. We will all go to the Lotus Pond someday. It's mainly that those sent over in the past ten-odd days have all been domestic people, so I'm a bit..."
"Hmph, domestic people, aren't those all debt slaves or homeless people? You should give up that idea sooner. We are not like them.
When we have enough money, we'll go to Tokyo and live it up for decades. Any woman we want, we'll have, anything good we want, we'll have.
When we're about to die of old age, then we'll go to that Lotus Pond. Lotus Pond, Lotus Pond, sounds nice.
Isn't it just being blindfolded and bitten by that woman to become a corpse ghoul? Old Jingxin's books all call it that. When it comes to us, it becomes 'body sculpting'. If you ask me, those people just want to be ghosts and have a good reputation, taking all the benefits, and not allowing anyone to speak ill of them."
"Watch your words, Senior Brother. This term was set by the richest man, Yamada." The younger man heard him and repeatedly told him to stop.
But the person called Senior Brother did not seem as calm about this matter as he appeared; perhaps he usually held his breath in his heart, which is why he was so agitated now.
Hearing his companion's dissuasion, his anger flared even more.
"What are you afraid of? Will you inform or are you afraid of others hearing?"
"No... I won't!"
"I know you won't, that's why I'm telling you this. Ultimately, what is that old ghost Yamada? What richest man, he just owns a few inns and entertainment establishments. Aren't we dozens of families the ones doing the work?
If we weren't working hard in the mountains growing leaves for him, could his meager profits afford to buy people from outside?
We are the ones who buy people from abroad and connect with the snakeheads. We are the ones who watch those people grow leaves and process them in the mountains. We are the ones who risk being caught to send them nationwide. They eat their fill, turn people into corpse ghouls, and then chop up those monsters to make pig feed—that's still us!
What's the result? Each of our families only gets one quota. The year my mother died, I begged him for a favor, and what did he say? He said there weren't enough people to eat? His entire family, except for his grandson, had already become corpse ghouls, and they ate faster than us!
Now that there's a new source of goods and the number of people can be expanded, what does he do? He uses these quotas to win over the prefectural governor, to hold a memorial service, to promise quotas to high-ranking officials of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, to those councilors. All the money he gets is invested, completely disregarding us who have worked for him for so many years!"
His intense and impassioned words were like a poor laborer, exploited for years, accusing a capitalist.
But the content contained within those words was chilling.
It's hard to imagine how a person could speak of eating people so normally, so casually.
His junior brother, listening to his words, felt some agreement but also trembled, constantly checking if anyone was outside the door, feeling nervous.
But at this moment, someone was trembling even more than him.
On the other side of the Buddha statue, where Gotō Hitori and Keli were.
Bochi-chan trembled like a jelly about to melt at any moment, terrified that her breathing might be too loud and attract outside attention. During this time, she kept shaking her head, her mind a blank.
She had left the shop at dusk. At the time, her whole family didn't know that dinner would be delivered to the shop and were preparing to go downstairs to eat, but they felt the small shop's drinks were expensive and not to their taste, so they told her to go buy some.
But the proprietress of the shop was so enthusiastic; every time she saw her, she would pull her aside to talk and ask questions like whether she had a boyfriend, which made Bochi-chan quite embarrassed. So, when she went out, she hid by the staircase for a while, specifically waiting until the proprietress went into the back kitchen before slipping out.
After coming out, Bochi-chan remembered that Uncle Taguchi might be in the village, and he also talked incessantly every time he saw her, so she thought of taking a detour from the back, but it was this detour that got her lost.
Although it was a trip, her family had only arrived one night earlier than Keli, and Gotō Hitori usually walked with her head down, so she had no idea how to get to the convenience store.
Just then, her Line rang. Gotō Hitori picked up her phone and saw it was from her dad.
[Dad: The proprietress sent curry. We're waiting for you. Come back early, okay? Yili is hungry, so we let her eat first.]
Seeing the message, Bochi-chan was a bit anxious, but she was too embarrassed to tell her dad that she could get lost (this is the pronunciation, meaning 'lost') in such a small village. After circling a few times outside, just as she was about to walk back to the inn following landmarks, Gotō Hitori's phone rang. After answering, she heard content that terrified her to the point of suffocation: her father's low voice trying not to make a sound, and her mother's quiet sobs.
"Yili! Yili! Are you okay!" Her father's cries were extremely anxious. It was the first time in Gotō Hitori's life she had heard her father sound like that.
Only after she replied that she was okay did he sigh in relief.
"Run, you run first! Find a deserted place to hide. I've already called the police. There seems to be something wrong with the food at this shop. Yili fell asleep shortly after eating it. The police said they'll be here soon, you hide first!"
As a result, shortly after she found this place deserted and hid here, someone discovered her. That person was very strange, wearing a Batman cowl, but luckily, that person didn't seem to be with those villagers.
He clapped his hand over her mouth, then also hid inside.
While leaning next to him, Bochi-chan realized that this person seemed to be one of the two travelers from earlier today; she remembered the clothes.
Then... then she heard things like "eating people" and "leaves," which made her extremely panicked.
Her breathing was heavier than ever before. She wanted to cry, wanted to do something, even scream, to vent her inner emotions, but reason, like a taut string, prevented her actions.
Suddenly, something happened. Suddenly, a stranger came and covered her mouth, and she heard those terrifying things.
She would die! She would die! If she made a sound, she would die. Although she didn't understand some of the jargon, she would definitely die! Or even worse than death.
Fear, like a python, coiled around this ordinary shut-in high school student.
Two lines of tears flowed uncontrollably, wetting the hand covering her mouth. Her nose felt increasingly viscous and difficult to breathe, so she could only slightly open her mouth to inhale, yet she was afraid that her intake of breath would be too loud and disturb the person next to her.
Her heart pounded as if it would break through her ample chest, and she could even clearly hear her own accelerated pulse in her ears.
But even so, she couldn't make a sound.
No matter how uncomfortable she was, she didn't even dare to reach out her sleeve to wipe her eyes.
Time dragged on, each second tormenting her soul, making her feel the impulse that it would be better to die and be done with it.
Keli felt the wetness on his hand, but he didn't let go, feeling the girl beside him...
At this moment, anyone who could feel what was beside them would be a god!
Keli didn't care who was beside him. He just turned his head to adjust the direction of his ears, trying to hear as much information as possible, while processing these messages in his mind.
However, at this moment, footsteps approached, causing the conversation to cease.
The door of the temple's main hall was knocked.
"Shunjin! Ichiro! Are you there? Something happened, those outsiders who came yesterday called the police! Really! Luckily, the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department are all our own people and stopped this. Those two from Yasuda's family can't even do such a small thing right!
Those outsiders even blocked the door lock with something so the key won't open it. Uncle Taguchi kicked it a couple of times but couldn't open it. Yasuda's hammer was borrowed by your temple last time, right? Get it!"
"Hey, hey! Does Yasuda's house not even have anything to unlock it? Coming! Coming!"
"Huh? Is it the pink-haired family? I've long advised Master that he should have made his move. Speaking of which, that family's wife is quite good-looking. When we catch her, we must..."
The two inside the hall responded and stood up.
"Senior Brother, I'll get him the hammer. You rest here for a while."