Chapter 36
1. The God Holding Down the Lid
You shouldn't go around telling lies.
After living twenty years, what I arrived at was a simple truth, the kind they drill into you in elementary school.
It didn't help that I could barely attend that elementary school after a point.
My old man left behind debts and hanged himself, and my straight-laced mom and older brother worked themselves to death coughing up blood—that's part of the problem too.
I figured if I was going to make money, it was better to do it dishonestly.
I also thought I could pull it off better than most.
But the worst part was running into this kind of detective.
"Sadahito Uyuu. Looks like you illegally sold your family registry. Born in 1989... that makes you twenty. You're an adult now, huh?"
The detective in front of me lifted his already sharp eyes even higher.
With sun-darkened skin like tanned leather and a height you could tell even while sitting, he struck me as a hardened, sharp-witted detective.
Guys like him don't fall for sob stories or smooth talk.
"Spiritual scam, huh? Happens all the time. You worm your way in saying someone close to them recently died, then squeeze them for money with exorcisms and the like. Real scumbag move."
The detective pulled a glass ashtray toward him. It made a heavy sound.
One hit from that, and your skull would crack open. Even if it didn't come to that, I bet those black gloves hide calluses from beating suspects.
I didn't argue—I just looked away.
"If you threaten him that much, he won't be able to say anything."
The woman in glasses sitting next to the detective gave a wry smile.
Her gesture was so out of place in this situation that I blurted it out.
"Sorry, but who the hell are you two? Is this really the police?"
The detective lit a cigarette, frowning deeply. Even when I waited for an answer, only smoke came out from his lips.
"I get that you're a cop, but that lady in glasses next to you? No way she's a detective. At best, she's an elementary school teacher."
The woman just looked at me with her eyebrows drawn down.
"Yeah, I scammed people. I'm not trying to deny it. So why hasn't the interrogation started? Where are my buddies? I saw Hiromi, Tsubaki, and Komai get hauled in too. Why was I the only one brought here? Even the way I got here was sketchy. Blindfolded like some political prisoner..."
"What a noisy brat."
The detective crushed his cigarette into the ashtray.
He scattered ash as he stood up, lowered the blinds on the window, and walked toward the door. I heard the cold sound of a lock clicking.
I screwed up, I thought.
Maybe there was a way to settle this quietly, but I blew it myself.
"Alright then, let's get started."
The detective sat back down, crossed his arms, and looked down at me. I glared back, trying not to show my nerves.
He threw a stack of documents onto the desk.
"You committed the fraud in this village, right?"
The fingertip of his glove pointed at a red circle marked on the map. I nodded. I didn't bother adding that it was the most recent one.
"You told the local rich folks something like 'I see many children's hands with halos behind them,' didn't you? Why?"
"It's a scam. I just made it up."
His sharp gaze pinned me down.
"If you were just making it up, there were easier things you could've said. But you even asked if the village had a shrine for culled children or water babies, didn't you?"
"I did some research."
"Don't lie."
It felt like a knife was pressed to my throat.
"Documents on that village's faith were deliberately destroyed. Even experts couldn't find anything. There's no way a scammer like you could've dug it up."
"That would be me, the expert."
The woman in glasses raised her hand with a smile.
"Ryoko."
The woman in glasses ignored the detective's attempt to stop her and spoke.
"You were right that I'm not a detective. Teacher was close, though. I'm an associate professor of folklore."
"Folklore?"
Why the hell is someone like that working with the police, interrogating me?
"This is Kiruma. He's a former homicide detective."
"Homicide?"
I instinctively rose from my seat.
"What are you talking about? I've never killed anyone, alright?"
Thud. A heavy sound froze me in place.
The detective named Kiruma slammed a sheet of washi paper onto the desk along with his fist.
What was drawn on it made me gasp.
"The 'arms' you saw—weren't they like this?"
On the surface, sun-bleached like cellophane tape, were dry traces of ink.
Countless arms, drawn with crude, curving brushstrokes, looked like refracted light underwater. Short, soft-jointed—children's arms.
All I could let out from my throat as I searched for words was a groan, like I was about to puke.
That alone made Kiruma nod knowingly.
"So I was right."
"Told you so."
The woman called Ryoko raised the corners of her mouth in satisfaction.
"The God of the Glowing Arm has gone completely silent. We've cut off all information and applied Human Measures. The risk of leaks outside the village is virtually zero. So how did you see it?"
"You think a scammer's gonna tell you the truth?"
It was too late to start mouthing off now. My screw-up was obvious.
Kiruma ran his fingers through his slicked-back bangs, messing them up.
He stood up and loomed over me menacingly. With his towering height and piercing eyes, a weaker guy would spill everything.
"Sadahito Uyuu, what are you hiding?"
I clammed up. Some guys got screwed over for being too honest, others for trying to lie halfway.
Silence isn't a great tactic, but I had no better option.
"What if I told you there's a chance you won't end up in prison?"
"...What are you trying to make me do?"
Kiruma lit another cigarette while still standing and exhaled smoke like a blast. The purple haze stung my eyes.
"I used to be a homicide detective. Even now, I fight things that, broadly speaking, could kill humans. But they're not human."
Ryoko took out several Polaroid photos from the manila envelope on her lap.
A massive arm stretching across an old, abandoned school pool. Flames outlining a mountain ridge. A black silhouette standing in the center of a dam lake. A steel door standing upright on a stairwell in a half-demolished apartment building.
The photos spread out like scenes from a horror movie.
"Sadahito, there are things in this world that you wouldn't believe exist if you lived a normal life. Things so far beyond human understanding that we have no choice but to call them gods."
Ryoko spoke in a calm voice, like a teacher explaining to a slow student.
"We call those bizarre, untouchable, horrifying gods and their miracles—who neither act for good nor evil but tear cracks into human daily life—Territorial Divine Offenses."
"Territorial Divine Offenses..."
I repeated it like an idiot. I really was an idiot. I should've just dismissed it all as fake.
But ever since I saw those photos, my fingers and throat trembled—I couldn't even twitch.
"As the word 'offenses' implies, Territorial Divine Offenses tend to have long-term, terrible effects on humanity. Sometimes people die. If a body's left behind, that's actually a mercy."
Kiruma tapped the edge of the ashtray with his cigarette.
"That's why a homicide detective like me was called in."
"What the hell is this place... cops using tax money to play horror movie?"
The detective twisted his lips to show his canine teeth.
"This is the Territorial Divine Offenses Countermeasure Headquarters. It's under official police jurisdiction. Sadahito Uyuu, we're about to test your true worth."
That's when I noticed, buried under the pile of documents, the handcuffs and black blindfold they'd used when transporting me.
You shouldn't go around telling lies.
Most of the time, reality's way more than you can handle compared to any lie.