Аннотация: Rinko is talking to her Parents. Kasuri and Hisuzu seal the cursed monoliths.
Interlude 35. Takamiya City [Part 1 - Kuzaki Rinko]
"Daughter, give your parents a couple of minutes!"
His father's voice caught Rinko in the middle of a magnificent yawn - he couldn't sleep properly because of the negotiations with Tengu and his students. They arrived at the bus stop at six in the morning (walking along wet mountain paths in the dark is still a pleasure). Hot coffee - and off to school, it's good that we habitually managed to snatch an hour of sleep in transport on Yuto's shoulder. And Shizuka lost their unspoken "take a seat next to Amakawa" competition again, but only smiled condescendingly-yokai was generally outrageously cheerful and in a good moo-o-o-od uu-a-uh. A creeping snake! So, what do her parents want from her?
"Rinko, we need to talk." Her father said softly and seriously, taking a seat at the table.
The girl winced involuntarily. "We need to talk," of course. Every parent believes that this magical phrase sets the child up in a serious way. We would have talked with Hiroe - the bitchy, short-haired girl explained in great detail and intelligibly how such "hackneyed" phrases immediately give the conversation a negative connotation. And then they don't even let you sleep!
"I'm listening to you, Dad." Rinko also landed on a chair: there was every chance of falling asleep impolitely in the chair.
"Lately, my mom and I have started to notice that you are spending less and less time at home. On the one hand, we are happy for you, but on the other, you are still a very young girl to be so recklessly independent... without consulting us..."
"U-a-a-f! Dad! What are you talking about? I always try to consult with you! Isn't that right, Mom?"
Tsukiro Kuzaki, who was quietly making her way into the living room, was caught off guard by this question. In fact, she also encouraged the father of the family to have a "serious conversation" with her daughter, knowing for herself that she would not be able to blame Rinko for regime violations. Gentle and non-confrontational by nature, the woman has long recovered from her fear for the future of her once-sick daughter... but to force herself to reproach the child with what she fought so desperately for was beyond her strength.
"Yes, you're right." Tsukiro carefully sat down on a chair, smoothing her skirt over her knees. "But these trips of yours lately... and so often..."
"Often? Mom! I've only been away twice: to the seaside with the school Journalism club and to Yuto-kun's parents' house. You and Dad let me go both ways."
"They didn't let me go today..." the mother spoke almost in a whisper.
"Well, I called! I have half of my girlfriends staying the night with friends. And then you let Hiroe in without talking. And I wasn't alone, you know."
"Anyway, we were a little worried," the father intervened.
"Dad! You were happy that I joined the Kendo club. And he was rooting for me at the competitions."
"So what?" The baffled parent asked.
"The fact that if I pass the city level (and I will pass it!), then I will have to travel around the country, and a lot. The junior kendo class is not so easy to get. Twelve to twenty competitions per year... And mind you, I won't be with my girlfriends, or even Yuto: the team and the coach. And that's it!"
"Yes, I've convinced you by all accounts, daughter. Well, I'm glad for you! I see you're being quite reasonable about your life. Besides, we're going to your aunt's in three weeks, and there's nothing to stop us from boring each other properly-for the year ahead!"
"Dear!"
"Take a break! I wanted to say take a break!"
Rinko yawned heartbreakingly again and nodded.
"By the way, Dad, Mom, do you think if I invite my friends to the springs with us, my aunt will be happy with the free work hands?"
"Friends?" Kuzaki-san asked cautiously.
"Yes. Three girlfriends and Yuto."
"I'll call and ask, but I don't think my sister will mind. Are your friends sure they want to go on these terms?"
"Yeah. I already asked."
"Mm-hmm. Tsukiro tried to form the question that was on the tip of her tongue as gently as possible. "And Yuto won't be with us... Sad? He's alone, and you're going to talk to the girls? Maybe then I should call his friend, Taizo, I think?.."
"It won't be boring, it's Yuto-kun." Kuzaki Jr. "explained" very clearly, heading for the stairs. "I'm sure we'll definitely find something to do together."
"Dear?" when her daughter's footsteps stopped on the second floor, Tsukiro called her husband uncertainly. "Don't you think that sounded weird? What is so interesting that a boy and four girls can do at the springs? And don't look at me like that! I didn't mean what you thought at all!"
Interlude 35. Takamiya City [Part 2 - Ginko and Dofu]
The room allocated for yokai in the Amakawa town house was good for everyone - bright and warm... but the habit of one toothy creature to fall asleep across the futon, and even naked, spoiled the whole blissful picture! If nature has given you a good gift, that's no reason to flaunt it. And the damn wolf was also whimpering in her sleep, trying to run, lying on her side, or even drooling. The horror! In Noihara, the rooms of the Amakawa clan's evil spirits were separate and, most importantly, they isolated the sound well. And here... What an attack! Dofu mentally figured out what she had inside, what she could spit at big-eared, so that she would finally shut up. I persistently wanted to use a portable electric generator for this - in addition to the weight, this device also smelled of fuel, which is just the thing for some nosy ones! Yokai the mailer rolled her eyes and once again restrained herself. After all, sitting in Amakawa's house in Takamiya is her own choice. I could have safely gone to the mountains to Kaya... brr, it's better to be patient with Ginko.
"I'm sorry! To feed! The food-ah..."
Well, who would doubt that you're dreaming, Ginko! Who's talking about what, and the wolf is talking about meat... The insatiable womb! The tailed one!
It would probably seem very funny from the outside if you told me about your complexes... But the spirit was terribly jealous of her werewolf neighbor! The tail! Fluffy! Which can do all sorts of things! Even turn into a ring! Eh-huh... Once again, she looked up from her computer and pulled her sleeping neighbor back to her normal sleeping position.: strictly along the futon and under the blanket. But she didn't even flinch... considering that the wolf woke up at the slightest extraneous rustle - we won't mention the smell or the aura of power at all, this whole afternoon's fuss looked especially mocking...
The cell phone on the table beeped, and the white-dressed yokai winced again, not that she was particularly burdened by this duty... But it's distracting! During the day, Amakawa's house is usually empty and quiet - his master and owner are at school or running errands, and Mizuchi is with him. Yeah, M-mizuchi! The cold gaze of the girl, who looked like the weather of the suzerain, made the girl frankly shudder. Strong, very strong, and wet to boot! Paper is afraid of water... even though it hasn't been paper for a long time. However, it was her own fault: after more than two years of not being too careful with her words, the mailer yokai, who had just settled into a house in Takamiya, blurted out something like "mediocrity" towards Yuto in a conversation with Shizuka, meaning that the head of the clan had not been trained and in general does not remove the concealing amulet... and then she froze, twisting her neck uncomfortably. Well, what else can you do when an ice blade is pressed to your neck in the hands of an enraged snake?
"I've hear-rd someth-thing like that from you more than once... And Amakawa will find another way to deliver sadness-z!"
She wanted to hide from the hissing sounds of the Goddess of Rivers' voice... Anywhere. But here, Dofu was sure that even her proprietary spatial technique would not help her - Mizuchi was extremely dangerous! Especially in this state: cold rage, "empty" spiritual eyes, and a pressing, overwhelming aura of power.
"Sorry..." the girl managed to say. "I didn't mean to make you angry"...
"Fool." Shizuka very quickly returned to her usual, quite human appearance, only her expression remained contemptuously cold.
"Yuto Amakawa has done so much so that people like you might not feel like a reasonable thing... or a full-length target. He poked into your Noihara for you - no matter what you think, for Yuto, the sensible, especially those for whom he is responsible, are more important than stupid ambitions. Be happy... because if something happens to you, it will upset him. But I'll keep an eye on you, Envelope. Now get out of my sight... Here, feed the hamsters."
Her had to take over the feeding of these thick fur balls with paws - the funny warm animals did not cause her rejection. And in general, find yourself a couple more housework: yes, at least pick up the same mail from the mailbox. And just a few days later, the girl found out why Amakawa-dono was wearing an amulet... and what his loving relatives actually hung around his neck, he himself told when he gave out a separate hiding amulet for the girl, laughing at the "funny modification" of his grandfather's product. She got into it. And she promised herself to bite her tongue, simply because she could appreciate the scale of the event organized by the suzerain. Against the background of the young head, Gennosuke-sama began to seem to her just a slightly eccentric scientist and magician. With the new order, judging a person or a yokai by their appearance or perceived aura of power has become really dangerous.
...And the lazy and cynical Dofu, oh horror, decided to really become useful! Because anyone can really carry mail and cargo. Even if Yuto needs to do it really fast, oh yes, he can figure out how to solve this problem. A worthy successor to the "mad explorer" Gennosuke Amakawa. And to be left out of a new life? Well, the pipes! She's no worse than a snake mutt or a wandering Himari!
She returned to the room and shook her head. Of course: a blanket to the side, and across the futon in the pose of a star! Oh, Ginko, Ginko. I got to my favorite job - jumping around the rooftops like a crazy squirrel every night and sniffing out and catching up with all sorts of dirty tricks as part of the patrol on duty. And then eat breakfast and dinner at a completely "family" meal at Amakawa's house, under the condescending grunts of Mizuchi, who voluntarily assumed the duties of cook and servant. Had someone told such a story to Dof a month ago, that an A-class spirit would take care of a crowd of weaklings and people without abilities in general... Oh, come on. Here she is... too. She is engaged in a very "spiritual" business. Envelope snorted softly and opened a collapsed text window on the monitor of the laptop on duty. "Fundamentals of system administration in local area networks".
Interlude 36. Shiraki Bay. Hisuzu and Kasurin Kagamimori
"Well, what do you say, great spirit slayer?" Kasurin dragged over another stack of mirror-polished rectangular metal plates. The fragments contained in the stones were too dangerous to transfer to glass. Mostly not by force, but by unpredictable behavior.
"I wish I had stayed to revenge the court." Hisuzu said gloomily, taking another storage from a fresh stack and applying it to the stone. "What does Mom say?"
"Mom's talking... if not very verbatim, then the situation is unclear."
"And if it is literally?"
"I promised my parents that you wouldn't swear..."
"Oh, I scared the hedgehog with her bare as.. hand!" the younger Kagamimori has already cheered up from a fit of curiosity! "So what's not clear? How did Gavriki and the barge pull out the cursed monoliths and not bother with a едрене фене?"
"Sister!"
"It wasn't swearing! Did I guess right?"
"I didn't guess right. They didn't "bother" because the "Sphere of Catastrophes" above the jar was discharged." The older sister waved towards the sunken island. "The spell hadn't been discharged for a long time, and when triggered, it took away some of the energy from the monoliths around it."
"Ha! In any case, the ghosts of these losers must be somewhere nearby! Has Mom found it yet?"
"They survived..."
"What, it's not ours yet... WHA-a-aT?!"
"Don't yell, sister, your head already hurts."
"Why is that all of a sudden?"
"From that! Who read the information from the stones, what do you think?"
"Yes, everyone should have... Wait, wait, wait! The "Eye of the beast"? Have you read from the damn monoliths?! But that's it!!!"
"Calm down at last! And sit down, I'll rest too. Yes, I read it. As mother allowed it, otherwise we would have been stuck with just reading for three days... the minimum. You know the standard procedure, the operating mirror, the candles... surely a couple of them would have broken out of the reflection into the real world... and there is no one to put up a barrier."
"Ha! What can they do, these fragments? For one hit!"
"I see you've already rested..."
"Siste-e-e-ers! Well, don't be mean! So why did they survive? Magicians?"
"Amulets."
"Holy cow! What kind of amulets are these that keep a charge against the "sphere" for several years? The mythical Amakawa?"
"They were Chinese temple amulets. Apparently, Lee... or the Phoenix Temple."
"Suzaku?! Our contes..!"
"Hush! You don't have to yell! You don't have a brain, Hisuzu. You can't seal all the ears."
"Well, little sister! Don't swear, please! Tell me what you saw."
Kasuri glared at her younger sister for a while, but the "eye of the beast", capable of temporarily tearing souls out of seals, whether clan or natural, could do nothing with the restless nature of the flighty girl.
"Apparently, this was their "flickering channel". The scoundrels had found a place where their forces could not be detected... but our forces can be easily found here. The ancestors did a good job... What they brought here is the question... And at the exit, the "sphere" worked on them. The jerks didn't have a single magician... The amulets were kept for two days, apparently, then the "waterway" went out of order and it dawned on everyone that the rest would soon "fall out"... the engine has failed..."
"Did you pick it all out with a "beast", sister? Oh, my God!"
"Don't exaggerate my powers. Everything is simpler." Kasuri opened her phone and showed the younger one an open note: "Chinese smugglers were caught red-handed by the Russian research naval warship Marshal Krylov during tests of new weapons of the Far Eastern Fleet."
"Here are the bugs!" Hisuzu marveled.
"Rather, it was just luck. A cloud of curses spread over the entire ship..."
"At least they didn't drown?"
"It's a warship, Sister."
"So what?"
Instead of answering, the eldest of the sisters showed a photo posted by one of the sailors on the Net - a view from the stern, an Orthodox prayer service is taking place on the helipad. The blood-red bracers on the sleeves of the priest and deacon are clearly visible.
""St. Vladimir's Monastery of the Russian Orthodox Church."" at a glance, the girl identified another "competitor". In the "mirror" clan, it was too often necessary to deal with the closest "neighbors" in the water area - and the clan children were taught conscientiously.
"I'm sure the special commissar of the NKVD clan was there too. However, they have a different profile..."
"Now it's clear why Mom is swearing. What about this one?" Miko waved her hands at the makeshift pyramids of monolith stones rising on the sand of the beach.
"Nothing. The fragments didn't remember anything. There is a response across the earth... but after the stones were stacked in this form, all the faint traces were mixed up."
"You can contact the contractor according to the documents!"
"...Absolutely not. We have nothing to do with it - "officially". They did not participate in the lifting of the monoliths, they did not hide their tracks... and we didn't know anything at all until we were asked to defuse the curse."
"But that's the truth!"
"Even more so. Without Yakoin, we still can't unwind this tangle: for sure, the contractor doesn't even know who put them up to arranging a dump of stone debris pulled out of the water in the form of a concept art object. And if we turn to Yakoin, our clan's small, honest business will be under supervision... You know in whose ears their lips are whispering."
"As if no one knows that!"
"Clans don't pry into each other's personal affairs unless they're given a reason, my naive little sister. And the contractors... Mom has already given the go-ahead to the Environmental Commission on Waters, they earned their money honestly. Whoever wants to, let them honestly find out from these worthy citizens everything they need... and Kagamimori just did their job - no less honestly and with dignity."
"But you can't just leave it like that..."
Don't you get it? The topic is closed. And stop messing around - there's still work to do!