~~~
AKEMI
The doors to the temporary base closed and Akemi falls back behind a bit with the other male students. They were all quiet as they followed the steps to Yasuhara's and his classmates classroom. The hallways were oddly empty as they left the temporry base and there was this air that made the whole atmosphere quiet— a bit uncomfortable like a wet sock but none that is unavoidable and can go unnoticed for a while.
Yasuhara continued speaking with Mai and Bou-san up front, leading the way for the SPR crew, who didn't know the whole place, to release the kind of atmosphere soaking in the air and the two SPR crew, Mai and Bou-san seemed to get the same idea and entertained Yasuhara's words with theirs while the students behind Akemi were muttering towards themselves until they finally had the courage to say: "Ano... You look familiar..." they said, pertaining to the girl walking not far from them yet not close either.
Akemi lets out a small chiming laugh, her bell-like voice filled with lightness. "That's usually how a pick up line starts." She teases and the boys blushed from her 'subtle' words.
"No— no really! You just look like The heiress!"
"Ara~ the heiress?" She coyly wonders, lifting a finger to her chin in deep thought— a small smirk dancing on her lips. The baseball cap still tight on her head made it difficult for others to fully see her face.
The boys nodded, "Yeah the total beauty! So we were wondering are you—?" before they could finish Akemi handed them off pieces of paper with her own signature. With a finger on her lips, a shushing gesture with one eye winked, she whispers: "Keep this between us, okay~?"
The boys paused, stunned. Frozen in their places as they wrap around their heads of the events that just happened and seeing how they remained paralyze let Akemi walk further away from them as she continued her pace. "No... No way!" Was all Akemi heard of them last, and bunches of squealing after.
Akemi chuckles, slowly shaking her head and leaving them behind to catch up to Naru and the others— just in time for them to open the classroom door. Yasuhara glanced at each of the SPR crew, confused when he didn't saw his classmate but shrugged it off before he held the doors, "This is it. I'm going to open the door."
— SHOON!
Bou-san, Mai and Akemi turned green. Not out of envy or jealousy but from the sudden hit of the most overwhelming smell they have ever inhaled. 'What the—?!' Mai belched.
"What do you think?" Yasuhara asks while he stepped inside his classroom, unaffected— already used to the smell. The room only being occupied by a few of his classmates, most are the cleaners for the day.
"How to describe it?" Bou-san tried to take just a slight inhale but grimaced at the wrong idea while Akemi took out a handkerchief to block her nose yet the perfume plastered on the cloth didn't do anything to relieve her of this smelly torture. "It smells like the fish you left sitting in the kitchen sink for three days in the summertime by mistake..."
"It also smells like a fish tank with frogs..." Mai helps place in. "A perfect harmony of the smell of something that's gone bad and a drainage ditch that's starting to dry out."
Akemi gives a warm smile throughout the smell, already smelling nothing else but the stench as though it was inside her very nostrils. Nothing she could do about it. "Basically, it reeks in here." The heiress says before she turns to Bou-san with a glint in her eyes, knowing they were pinching their nose.
Hearing Akemi say: "I suggest you don't inhale from your mouths." towards Bou-san and Mai made Naru glance towards the three with interest. Yasuhara remained listening,
While the two whom Akemi placed her attention to furrowed their brows, one raised in curiosity. "Why?"
"Cause then you will actually be eating the drainage ditch that drying out~" They turned even more green and sprint towards the windows. Not knowing how such an elegant woman was able to say such a disturbing idea with a cute angelic smile on her face.
Akemi placed a hand over her lips at the sound of Mai and Bou-san barfing up air, blinking worried whether they would use the window to breathe out or to puke out. She hoped it wasn't the latter, she was only teasing.
Yasuhara sighs, yet amused at Akemi's teasing. "As expected."
"There aren't any areas of the room that smell stronger than others..." Naru says while he skimmed over desks, a soft frown on his face when he checked the smell around the room but all of them are equally given with no signs of something causing such smell.
"Exactly. we've looked for the source of the smell for a while but the entire classroom smells." Yasuhara nods, both boys turning to stare at Akemi when the heiress herself hums with a hand on her chin.
"Hmm... That smells fishy." She says with the out most seriousness on her angelic face.
Yasuhara lets out a light laugh from her pun while Naru didn't even bother to sigh anymore and goes back to inspect the room.
"Argh! It doesn't make any difference even if you open the window!!!" Mai yells with tears in her eyes at the moment she and Bou-san lean out the window they forced open.
"Stick your head out the window and breathe in!" Bou-san says, engulfing much oxygen as he can; trying anything just to get some fresh air at a room that didn't smell as fresh. Due to their actions the duo were unaware of the gazes from the room,
Yasuhara-san along with a few of his classmates watched the SPR crew, a bead of sweat dropping down their heads as they thought of the same thing. 'They sure are a unique bunch...'
Although Yasuhara thought of it more positively compared to his classmates.
Naru walks around the room, his fingers grazing the desks in deep thought with Akemi standing by her place, sensing around without the need to touch. "Did you do anything abnormal here?"
"Something abnormal?"
Akemi stepped forward, lifting her legs till she got to where she wanted to be— lifting an embroidered handkerchief to cover both her nose and mouth without a thought as to why since the smell still waft around her nostrils. Though it could be a way for Akemi to show off her embroidery in a subtle way towards Naru.
"Like summoning a spirit?" Naru continued to ask, not bothering to gaze anywhere else but the students present in the room.
"Summoning..."
Akemi heard the girls murmur under their breath at the same moment the heiress took out a paper on a vacant desk she intuitively decided to raid.
"Perhaps they're talking about Orikiri-sama?"
"Orikiri-sama? What is that?"
The girl perks up, a bit shy yet continued anyways. " It's very popular at school right now, it became popular since the second semester."
Akemi lifts the paper in her hand, turning it around to gain someone else's attention from the SPR knowing she couldn't see any written pages. "Is this it?"
Bou-san steps forward, reaching out to take the paper and gaped at the writings. "Huh?! this is— this is kokkuri-san!" The monk yells out, even Akemi darkened on what this meant.
The girls felt their lips tug to a frown, knowing that wasn't the case at all. "That's not right! doesn't Kokkuri-san summon a fox spirit?"
The girl beside her nods in agreement both and everyone not seeing the problem at hand, "Orikiri-sama summons a god and it can guide us in relationships!"
Akemi wryly smiles, 'Relationship guidance, huh?'
— KRUMPLE!
With a dark tired expression on his face, Bou-san crumpled the piece of paper in his hand. Already unable to hide such an expression after realizing what everything meant. "Gongen-sama, Hanako-san, Cupid-san, Angel-san— these are all simply different names to call Kokkuri-san!"
Akemi nods in agreement, realizing the predicament they are in. "Whatever the name may be, you're basically doing the same thing..." 'It became popular in this school... There are atleast hundreds of students in this building and some must have used Kokkuri-san twice or thrice in just two days for further more fun— doing the math, this could explain the hundreds or even more wisps covering her sight— but how could they summon so many and so easily?' Akemi internally sighs.
"You're just playing with the spirit out of curiosity." Bou-san says with a reprimanding tone that Mai and the others rarely hear.
"That's not true!" One of the female student barks. Trying her best not to feel at fault for what was happening in the school. "I was told that Orikiri-sama is good so it's risk free-"
"That is misinformation." Bou-san sighs, trying to calm down as best as he could, Akemi sensing his emotions via aura placed a hand on his arm helping ease some of his tension. "-Even an amateur can summon a spirit but you need to be trained to be able to send them back to where they came from. Don't ever try this by yourself!"
Naru takes a step, "You said it's really popular. How popular is it?"
"Well..." The two girls thought to themselves. "It's definitely all over school..." The other girl beside her friend adds, "I'd bet there are more students who practice it than those who don't."
Akemi sighed. She just knew it. Bou-san sighs as he knew it too.
'This would be something Naru would ask them to clear, immediately as they can.' Bou-san and Akemi shuddered at the upcoming pile of work.
"I'm back." The door to the base opens and Mai steps inside with her clipboard perched on her chest. "Just as those girls said, most of the students here have done Kokkuri-san... I guess it'd be faster to count those who haven't done it compared to those who did." Mai wryly smiles towards Bou-san and Akemi— the former already blanching from his position.
"I came up with the same results." Yasuhara chimes in, following after Mai went inside the room.
"Yasuhara-san, we're taking full advantage of you, aren't we?" Akemi weakly smiles, a bead of sweat dropping over her head when she took note of how much the student has done for them in the mean time.
"It's no problem." Yasuhara widely smiles. Handing, them his own list while Mai handed hers to Naru. "Here you go."
"Most of the students have been practicing Kokkuri-san!? Do you know how many evil spirits must be floating around here?!" Bou-san whines after he took a slight glimpse over Akemi's shoulder. The heiress awkwardly chuckles at the papers on her hand, knowing her predicament she hands the papers over to the monk.
Mai curiously wonders, blinking in question. "How many?"
"Imagine the smallest taxi you can think of, and fill it with all the commuters in Japan." Akemi easily breathes out.
"Or the public train every Monday morning..." Bou-san shivers at the mention. He never did like Mondays— 'I mean, who does?'
Mai was quiet for a while, Yasuhara listening behind her until Mai's skin pales. Fully understanding. "Oh..."
"Naru-chan, are we really going to do this?" The monk turns to look at the most passive person in the room. Naru quietly keeping to himself as he read each of the person's name on Mai's list. "Kokkuri-san can invite some of the worst of the evil spirits, you know...?"
Akemi sheepishly smiles next to the monk, 'I know...'
"Please help us out—" Yasuhara tried to plead but Bou-san suddenly turns to him with bright excited eyes. An idea filled in his expression.
"That's it! I'll teach you how to perform an exorcism so you can do it! Right! let's try that! Brilliant idea!"
"Bou-san!" Mai hits monk on his shoulder, looking back he saw the only two females in the room, looking at him with disappointment.
"What?! are you motivated to work on this case after seeing Matsuyama's attitude?"
Akemi lightly tilts her head, "I'm actually more perturbed at the idea you are placing on a student with no spiritual background whatsoever." The heiress berates, clasping both of her candle like hands in front. 'I mean it took me four years at most to learn exorcism— these things take time, talent and experience after all.'
"I apologize for him." Yasuhara says pertaining to his Gym teacher, his words gaining the attention of everybody in the room. "Matsuyama treats everyone poorly that even the students gave up on him. He won't listen to what other people have to say so we have to be the mature ones and be patient with him."
The SPR crew chagrined to themselves, when teenagers are the ones thinking so maturely then it is not a good situation at all.
"Ah, then Matsuyama must have given you a hard time, Yasuhara-kun? Since you're the one who came to consult with us on this whole case." Bou-san asks,
Yasuhara brightens a familiar glow and Akemi smiles. The heiress speaking simultaneously with the current top student. "It's okay, I'm sure its because he does well in school." "— I'm okay since because I do well in school." The current Student Council President and Former Student Council President beams at Bou-san and Mai, their smile exudes a bright glow that awfully presented their skill of being a top student. The untouchable ones in school.
Both the monk and high schooler thought to themselves,
"You're pretty cool guy, you know?" Yasuhara thanks Bou-san. Mai was glad he took it as a compliment considering Bou-san's wry expression.
"How many schools do you think practice Kokkuri-san in Japan?" Naru asks by the window,
"At least ninety-three percent." Akemi chimes in while Naru stayed looking out the school window. "But I do get the point of your question, why only this school is being affected so much since spirits are not things people can easily summon..."
Naru nods, humming in agreement. "Hypothetically speaking, if someone were able to summon floating spirits by Kokkuri-san I would assume that some of these spirits would be powerful enough to do harm to humans." He says before turning his head towards Akemi who was already making her way to blend tea. "-and I find it unusual that there are so many spirits inhabiting one place."
Mai raises her hand, getting curious over the topic. "I have a basic question, can you really summon spirits by Kokkuri-san?"
Bou-san, clicks his tongue. Pondering over, "Well yes, if you were a psychic..."
"Oh! Because I also did Kokkuri-san when I was in Junior High, you know? The version where you place a finger on a 10-yen coin... and surprisingly enough, the coin did move a lot and it gave us a lot of correct information. How did it do that?"
Akemi brightened as she hands Naru his cup of tea— hugging the floral tray tight to her chest as she leans forward with shining purple eyes. Her hand shots up to the air like an excited student,
"I volunteer as tribute!" Her eyes moving to glance over Naru with pleading, "Please, Professor..."
Naru lets out a short huff, his indigo eyes narrowed at her call for him. Nevertheless, he remained silent and only lifting the cup to occupy his mouth. Akemi took that as her 'go ahead' cue.
Stopping a squeal, Akemi leans forward towards Mai. "Mai, place your finger on the desk as if you're practicing Kokkuri-san~!"
"Huh? like this?" Mai did as she was told.
"Well how is it? Is your finger shaking?" The heiress asks, lowering her hold on the tray from her chest to her stomach.
Yasuhara and Bou-san peeks over and observes Mai's finger. "It's very subtle but your finger is shaking." Yasuhara says, noticing the slight shake of Mai's index.
"Huh?" Mai glances over the two shadowing over her shoulders and back to her finger. "-I'm not... I mean I don't mean too..."
Akemi elegantly smiles, kindly portraying Mai did nothing wrong. "That's a normal human body reaction. Now if Mai also had other people's fingers on the same spot then the shaking would ignite the coin to move— none of you are intentionally moving the coin but it would seem strange when it happens to move."
Yasuhara hums, asking. "Then how does Kokkuri-san give out correct information?"
"The kind of people who would try performing Kokkuri-san thinks that it would be entertaining if Kokkuri-san provided correct information. That kind of expectation would make people move the coin unintentionally." Akemi lifts a finger up, as though she was teaching— which she seems to be right now. "-For example, what is on Mai's pocket?"
"Your friends would start guessing the answer unconsciously and would think about different things and might get a letter you don't expect— such as the letter 'K' then they would think what goes next to 'K'? Which would give them the letter 'E' so on and so forth giving out the complete word which is 'Keychain'~" Akemi winningly smiles when she heard Mai screech after taking out her keychain out of her pocket.
"Uwah! you're right! how did you—?!"
"She could hear the keys in your pocket, idiot." Naru says, placing his tea cup down the table.
"..Ahh.." Mai blushed in embarrassment.
"After performing the Kokkuri-san a few times you won't probably get the right answers." Akemi continues her lecture, "It just seem majestic because the correct answers leaves a stronger impression compared to when they got it wrong. Let's say someone asks 24 questions and you get 3 of them right then people tend to feel you got a lot of answers correctly. If you guys test it, you'll get what I mean."
"Only 3 out of 24 questions, huh... huh..." Yasuhara mumbles, snapping his fingers as he says the words. "I see..."
Seeing them back to minding their own thoughts or chatting with each other, Akemi stepped back to line up with Naru's and jutting her hips back a bit to lean herself down forward, aligning her head to Naru's currently sitting height. Akemi moves closer and smiled, "Did I pass?"
Naru lightly shrugs at her question: "With flying colors."
Despite his casual outlook, Akemi could feel his slight amusement and lets out a small laugh that only he could hear.
"Going by what you said," Bou-san speaks out as he glanced over Akemi and Naru with a slight frown, "...it sounds as if you guys don't believe in Kokkuri-san?" 'Were the two always this close?'
"Well I actually don't believe it." Naru speaks, "Many people think that spirits know everything but I wonder if that's really the case? If Mai were to become a spirit, do you think you'd know the future or be able to read people's mind?"
"Uwah! not...not at all." The person in question blushed.
Naru continues his stride, "Right, basically I think the only things that spirits know better than humans are about death and the world after death."
"I see... I'd love to read what's going on your mind one day..." Mai mutters under her breath while she observed Naru's neutral features.
"Well enough of that," Bou-san sighs when Naru went back to the problem at hand, the monk lifting both his arms to lay his head back on as he half listened and half observed. Subtly glancing over Akemi and Naru's way.
"-There are so many spirits here that I don't know where to start with the exorcisms." Naru admits as he leaned away from the window after standing up to gaze at the current time outside. "Probably the best thing for us to do is to wait until all of us are here then start performing them at various locations."
The people inside the room at the moment nodded at the Boss' words.
~~~
"We're not staying at a hotel?!" Ayako screamed as soon as Mai told her of their sleeping schedule. "I traveled three freakin' hours for you and now you're telling me I have to stay in the Janitor's room with a heater that doesn't work?!"
"Ayako... stop yelling..." Mai weakly smiles, a bead of sweat falling over her as she faced the blazing Miko.
Hearing Mai, Ayako felt something snap. "You might be too insensitive to understand... but it was seriously tough getting here..."
Akemi and Mai both tilt their head, not understanding a statement with lacking foundation. "Eh?"
Ayako sobs towards Akemi, "Imagine being left alone with Lin in a small space— FOR THREE FREAKIN' HOURS!! It truly was an impossible battle! Let me go with you!" Ayako sobs harder, clutching the heiress tighter in her grasp as Akemi would be leaving to sleep in a hotel after her shift, which starts now since Masako would be coming later.
"Gomen Ayako~ but they need you here..." Akemi weakly smiles in hopes to cheer up the Miko even for a bit.
Mai chimes in, already feeling tired. "Okay, I get it! but I'd say we have a better room arrangement. Including Masako, it's only the three of us staying in our room. On the other hand, the boys will have to share a six-mat room with four people including John."
Ayako dropped her hands in exasperation. "Arghhhh."
"Anyway we don't have enough equipment to monitor every area we need to." Naru spoke, gaining the attention of every people in the room. "Tomorrow I'll have Hara-san inspect the school and she could compare with Akemi's confirmation on the existence of the spirits. Once we confirm their existence, Monk-san, Matsuzaki-san, John and Akemi will start performing exorcisms." The people mentioned, nods at his orders. "Things that are still uncertain as to what they are, Lin and I will continue to investigate."
The Boss then calls over Mai, letting her stay in the office and organize any information that will be given through the comms. Naru also added that if she ever get information of any kind that connects the case, let them know.
"Like what?" Mai blinked. Not knowing what she could actually give on this case.
Akemi sweat dropped on her forgetfulness,
"Jeez, you're the other female assistant with the sixth sense, right?" Bou-san sighs, patting Mai's head like a noogie. "Weren't you told the other day that you could potentially have ESP?"
Mai brightens in realization, sheepishly laughing at herself for forgetting such thing. "Ah! That's right, I forgot about that. My bad, ahaha!"
The others then conversed and teased about Mai that even Yasuhara was interested when they mentioned about Mai's psychic ability and asked about Akemi's abilities as well.
"Yasuhara-san, I appreciate you offering to stay and help us but I don't recommend you spending the night." Naru says, placing his focus on Yasuhara who turned to him. "I'd rather not put you in danger."
"Whoa~ how manly!" Akemi gushes over her covered mouth when she heard Naru's words. Her fingertips touching and hands lifted infront of her lips as she gazed at Naru in awe.
Naru remained quiet and ignored such a comment as though nothing was said.
Yasuhara respectfully smiles, "Of course, if you think I'll be in your way, let me know. I'll be happy to leave."
Naru pauses, considering the idea but when his eyes connected with Akemi's, "He could help us set up the cameras..." The heiress suggested.
Naru sighs. "Then, I can use some help."