Chapter 90. The Serpent

At once, Qiao Qiao did not reach out to touch it.

“Everyone, be careful,” he called, warning the others not to act rashly.

“I’ve found something unusual here.”

After a brief explanation, he took tweezers and a clear evidence bag from the tool pouch in his backpack.

If it had been a scale or something of the sort, it might still have been ordinary enough, perhaps left behind by some small animal nearby.

But the scale before Qiao Qiao now had far surpassed common sense.

In the sunlight, it gleamed with a crystalline transparency; on closer inspection, one could even see the rainbow refractions formed by its layered depths.

Most importantly, it was rather large.

By eye, the scale was about the size of Qiao Qiao’s student ID. From a reptilian perspective, it was hard to imagine how enormous the creature itself must have been.

There were no creatures like Komodo dragons in this land, were there?

More importantly, Qiao Qiao could sense a peculiar aura from the scale.

An aura somewhat familiar.

It did not belong to an exorcist; it was more like that of a demon, yet not quite the same.

Qiao Qiao picked up the scale with his tweezers and carefully sealed it inside the evidence bag.

By the time the people from the Bureau of Yin and Yang and the fire department arrived to clean up after them, Qiao Qiao and the others had already returned to Atsuta Shrine ahead of them.

Because of the unusual discovery, the afternoon’s assignment was temporarily shelved.

At dusk, Qiao Qiao and the others came to the side hall.

Asagami Jinzaburo was directing the search efforts there. Seeing Qiao Qiao and the others, he nodded.

“Thank you for your hard work, everyone.”

Even when dealing with his juniors, Asagami Jinzaburo remained sufficiently courteous.

Qiao Qiao took out the evidence bag and placed the scale on the table.

The moment Asagami Jinzaburo saw it, his expression faltered.

“This is... a snake scale.”

At his words, surprise instantly flashed across the faces of several older priests.

“A snake?”

Qiao Qiao was not one of those famed exorcists, but as the discoverer, he was allowed to stand in the front and observe.

Hearing that it was a snake scale, many associations sprang up in his mind.

When it came to snakes and demons in this land, the most famous was undoubtedly the Eight-Headed Serpent.

And the Eight-Headed Serpent was, without a doubt, deeply entwined with the Heavenly Gathering Clouds Sword.

At this very critical moment, when the Heavenly Gathering Clouds Sword had gone missing from Atsuta Shrine, traces of a snake-like demon had appeared as well.

It was impossible not to let the imagination run wild.

“The scales of snake-type demons often carry a certain spiritual power. In many legends, snake scales appear either as treasures or as things that bring disaster. Now that something like this has turned up, this is going to be troublesome,” Tokutoi Masato added, once again serving as the enthusiastic explainer.

“Could it be that a snake demon stole the Heavenly Gathering Clouds Sword?”

Someone voiced the question.

“Impossible. Is the shrine’s protective barrier just for show? Forget stealing the divine sword; the moment those demons set foot inside the shrine, they’d be instantly vaporized. From where would it steal the divine sword?”

Someone else immediately objected.

“Could it be an insider...”

“Shut up. Stealing the divine sword and collaborating with demons—what would be the point? Has the shrine’s food gotten that bad, or are the demons just too beautiful?”

Some of the speculation was cut off before it could even finish being spoken.

Everyone talked at once, yet no conclusion was reached.

However, at least Asagami Jinzaburo believed that the loss of the Heavenly Gathering Clouds Sword was very likely connected to a snake demon.

They prepared to send people overnight to the exorcist association’s demon affairs office to check the situation and review the recent movements of all registered snake demons.

Indeed, snake demons were not that numerous.

These days, any snake with a bit of age had long since been caught and put into wine.

The rest were basically all under the association’s supervision, living as law-abiding model citizens.

After assigning tomorrow’s work, everyone dispersed.

Qiao Qiao soaked in the hot spring, then returned to his room and continued assembling the model of the Yamato.

To be fair, once he had grown accustomed to it, his assembly speed increased quite a bit.

With the blessing of spiritual power, whether cutting parts or assembling and gluing them, everything came together in one flawless pass.

It could practically be called a human version of a divine hand.

Qiao Qiao even infused some spiritual power into the Yamato model to prevent the plastic from becoming brittle, discoloring, or gathering dust.

At a critical moment, he could still pick it up and smash a few wraiths to death with it.

Very nice.

Also, while assembling the model, Qiao Qiao kept thinking back on what had happened during the day.

Now that he thought about it, carrying a grenade on one’s person did indeed seem rather inappropriate.

A metal detector or a police dog might pick it up, and explaining that would be rather troublesome.

But with plastic explosives, if sealed inside a lunch box, the problem would not be too serious, and the safety was better too. If he ever happened to be in danger in the mountains, he could even ignite it as a heat source. Qiao Qiao now carried some with him at all times.

He was considering whether there was a method that would allow plastic explosives to be used to strike a strange phenomenon on the other side of a wall.

Although this was a game mechanic, Qiao Qiao felt it had very real-world significance.

He made a note of it in his notebook for the time being.

At eleven o’clock that night, Qiao Qiao had just finished assembling the Yamato model and was about to study a little to unwind.

Knock, knock, knock—

A knock at the door interrupted him.

Qiao Qiao glanced over and saw Asano Ariko.

She was still wearing the yukata decorated with pear blossoms, her hair pinned up, which made her seem even more mature.

“What brings you here so late?” Qiao Qiao frowned slightly.

Tonight, there was indeed something different about Asano Ariko.

To be precise, there had been something a little off about her for some time now, something that made Qiao Qiao feel vaguely uneasy.

But every time he tried to pin it down, he could not quite say what it was.

“Huh? Didn’t I already say I wanted the teacher to teach me how to assemble a model?”

Asano Ariko puffed out her cheeks and waved her phone.

Only then did Qiao Qiao remember that he had not looked at his phone at all. There were several messages inside, including one from Asano Ariko saying she would come that evening to study.

But at eleven at night, a man and a woman alone in a room assembling a model...

The pace of things seemed a little off, didn’t it?

And besides...

“I’ve already finished assembling it.”

Qiao Qiao pointed at the table, where the final glory of the age of great battleships and great guns stood proudly: the first ship of the Yamato class, Yamato.

“Wow.”

Stars immediately lit up in Asano Ariko’s eyes.

She leaned toward the model, wanting to get closer yet worried she might touch some part, and studied it carefully.

“It looks so beautiful,” she marveled, her gaze landing on the triple 460-millimeter gun turret.

“I never thought weapons could be this beautiful.”

“Even if weapons are beautiful, they are still only weapons in the end.”

Qiao Qiao left the door open so that any unexpected situation could be avoided.

“Many people try to make weapons beautiful. They add ornaments, carve patterns, and polish them with great care, as though doing so would turn weapons into works of art, and as though using weapons would then somehow represent justice.”

“So weapons are still only weapons, in the end...” His words left Asano Ariko looking a little troubled.

“I understand, teacher. I’m only interested in these things as such, that’s all.”

She glanced once more at the Yamato model, then returned to the doorway.

“The teacher assembles models so quickly. I don’t know when mine will ever be finished.”

“Everything gets finished eventually,” Qiao Qiao replied.

After seeing Asano Ariko back to her room, Qiao Qiao studied a little longer, then went to bed.

But he did not sleep well.

At four in the morning, a call came in.

Even before it rang, Qiao Qiao had already awakened a few seconds earlier.

He answered it; it was Tokutoi Masato.

“We may have found traces of the Heavenly Gathering Clouds Sword. As expected, the problem really was on the snake-demon side. Hurry and look to the west.”

At his words, Qiao Qiao went to the window.

He leaned out and looked west.

Within his spiritual sight, a brilliant pillar of light rose from the mountain forest in the west.