The next afternoon, Li Wu carried the wrapped crowbar and came to the front of the hot spring hotel mentioned by Akabane Yuki.
"This place is really remote."
He took the bus for about three hours before arriving at his destination.
This is already a suburban village that is about to leave the limits of Chiyo City. Following the rolling mountains, the streets reveal a quaint atmosphere that is very different from the city.
The hotel is a three-story wooden building with a black roof paved with bricks and tiles that unfolds like a flying swallow.
The door is open, and a blue cloth hangs above the door, with the name of the hotel written on it:
Edelweiss Hot Spring Hotel.
As I approached the door, I saw Aoi Hoshikawa standing under the eaves of the hotel with a bored look on her face.
She was wearing a sweatshirt with a beige collar and a pink rabbit pattern on the chest, and she was carrying a travel bag behind her.
They look like tourists from the city.
"When did you come back?"
Li Wu approached and asked.
"I sent you this message on the train coming back last night."
As if she had thought of something, she raised a finger and pointed at Li Wu: "Ah, classmate Li Wu, you are so unloyal, you actually stole the show by yourself!"
"It's not because you're not here - by the way, where is the miko?"
Li Wu looked around and couldn't find Yuxi.
"Sister Yuki said that last time the shikigami was destroyed, she wanted to complete the repair as soon as possible, so she gave me a lot of talismans."
She took off her backpack and unzipped it, and she could vaguely see a stack of papers stuffed inside.
"The shikigami didn't have any effect at all last time."
It really matched her evaluation of his own fighting ability when they first met, but Li Wu still missed the supporting role played by the miko lady.
"Don't say that in front of Yuki-sama."
When the two stepped into the hotel door, the first thing they saw was the proprietress sitting at the front desk.
She was a beauty who gave off a cold impression. She was wearing a bathrobe embroidered with cherry blossoms. Her long, beautiful hair was tied into a bundle and hung down from her left shoulder, still slightly moist.
Although he has an attractive appearance, his temperament has a closed-off feeling that excludes people from thousands of miles away.
She asked: "Accommodation, or just a bath?"
The voice also contained an inorganic coldness, as if he had arrived on a snowy mountain in the spring of mid-April.
"stay."
Xingchuan Aoi rushed to answer, and Li Wu looked at the boss's head in surprise.
"Are you planning to arrange a room?"
"Hey? What should I do? One room would be more convenient, but..."
She nervously tugged on Li Wu's clothes: "Classmate Li Wu, what do you think?"
"Oh, just one room then."
Li Wu stared closely at the face of the landlady and replied casually.
The magical girl's face darkened visibly.
After registering, she pulled Li Wu away rather roughly.
Their room was on the second floor of the hotel. After the landlady pointed out the location, they decided to go and have a look inside the room first.
There didn't seem to be many guests in the hotel. Quite a few rooms on the second floor were unused, and only a few of them had their sliding doors locked.
"The proprietress of this store is so beautiful. She has snow-white skin and looks like a flower on the high mountain."
"Well, she's too beautiful to be human."
"Uh huh, I knew it! Classmate Li Wu, you keep staring at me! You must have been fascinated by me!"
"No, I mean that literally."
"Eh?"
Xingchuan Aoi's eyes widened in shock, but she quickly reacted: "You mean, not a human being?"
"Well, my psychic ability tells me that she should be a snow girl."
Li Wu recalled the word "Snow Girl" above the landlady's head and asserted.
Yuki-onna is one of the most well-known monsters in Sakurajima. According to legend, this kind of woman who often lives in the mountains and appears in the wind and snow has a stunningly beautiful appearance. Sometimes she will marry a human, but once her husband discovers or If you reveal your secret, you will leave or even kill your husband.
"Really? But even if it's a snow girl, she probably doesn't have the same goal as us."
Hoshikawa Aoi sat on the made bed, hugging the pillow and said.
Last night, the miko lady had already sent the most likely ghost stories about the hot spring hotel to the "Partners of Justice" group.
The outline is roughly a black shadow that can kill people and is witnessed by guests taking a bath at the hot springs at night. It has green-faced fangs, a nose shaped like a bird's beak, and a pair of wings.
Compared to the previous Fusangshen and Prajna Ghost, this appearance is so iconic.
"The Crow Tengu or the Nose Tengu... no matter which one it is, it looks very different from the Yuki-onna."
Li Wu agreed with the magical girl.
"But, remember that Mr. Fujiwara from last time also knew about the existence of Hannya ghosts. What about Miss Yuki-onna, who is on the side of the extraordinary? Could she also know something?"
Aoi Hoshikawa rolled around with her pillow in distress: "Then do you want to ask the landlady directly?"
Li Wu shook his head: "Forget it, we don't know how she reacted after her identity was revealed, so let's not make things more complicated."
Their plan was to wait until night to see if the rumored dark shadow would appear.
"If you really can't see me, let's think of a solution from the landlady's side."
He has seen Yinba, Mr. Bo, and Ruonyo who are not created but can still do evil, and he has also seen kind-hearted earthbound spirits like Fujiwara. Naturally, he would not first assume that the landlady is a monster that can hurt people.
After reaching a consensus, Hoshikawa Aoi took out a deck of playing cards from her travel bag.
"Let's play double UNO before dinner!"
"Are you here for a trip?!"
The sky quickly darkened.
Aoi Hoshikawa pulled the note off her face: "No more fun, no more fun, let's go have dinner."
Li Wu still wanted to persuade her to try again.
Just then, a scream came from downstairs.
The two looked at each other and rushed out.
The sound came from deep in the corridor on the first floor.
They were probably the first people to rush to the scene after hearing the news. The first thing they saw was a woman in her thirties sitting slumped in front of the door of the deepest room with a look of horror.
Inside the room were a corpse and a living person.
The head of the corpse was like a walnut that had been struck by a heavy hammer, showing a horribly deformed state. Blood and other unknown liquids splashed all over the wall like a fountain, and a fishy smell gushes out of the room like an evil ghost.
If Li Wu's new vampire friends see this scene, they might be able to stop bleeding from now on.
However, next to this miserable scene, there stood another woman out of place.
It's the boss lady.
Her expression remained unchanged, and her cherry-colored bathrobe was spotless. It was as if she saw a pile of buns instead of a human with a hideous dead look.
The other residents seemed to be alerted by the scream, and two or three people had already rushed over.
The increase in the number of people seemed to give the woman who was paralyzed on the ground courage. She pointed at the proprietress and shouted: "She is the murderer! She killed someone!"
The few people who came behind also saw the murder scene, and they were so weak that they immediately started retching.
"Hey, hey, are you kidding me?" "Did someone call the police?"
"I want to check out! What are you doing here?!"
In the midst of this noise, a petite-looking figure squeezed out from among the residents.
She raised a black ID card and shouted: "Everyone, please be quiet. I am a member of the police. This is obviously a murder case. No one can leave until the investigation and evidence collection are completed!"
"Can children also be police officers?" "Is Public Security Section 9 a police agency? Why have I never heard of it?"
"This is going to be troublesome."
The magical girl whispered in his ear.
Li Wu showed a subtle expression and looked at the head of the girl who claimed to be a police officer:
【Superpower Detective】
She pointed at everyone: "The murderer may be among you!"
