Chapter 4 Chapter 4 Shrine
"This fortune means that you will meet your ideal partner soon. If you seize the opportunity, good things will happen..."
Dressed like a classic shrine maiden, Saionji Gyoon sat on a cushion, answering questions from the women who came to ask for a marriage amulet. After a long explanation, she bowed and said, "Thank you for the 1,000 yen."
The young woman received an encouraging answer and didn't care at all that the amulet of this small shrine was 500 more expensive than other places. She happily paid the bill and left hand in hand with her best friend.
As soon as the guests left, Saionji Gyoin's image was completely ruined. She casually slumped over the low table, rubbing her shoulder with one hand and sighing, "Finally, the last group of guests have left..."
An elderly man, Chitose Saionji, also dressed as a shrine staff member, wiped his tears with a handkerchief and said with emotion, "Wow, you are worthy of being my grandfather's little Yuyin. As long as you are here, the business income has increased tenfold compared to usual. There is hope for the shrine to be saved!"
"Grandpa!" Yuyin said helplessly, "It's because you said I'd be here today, otherwise all the guests wouldn't have come today."
She had originally planned to stay at home for two days over the weekend, carefully reviewing the game she had completed last week and looking for side quest easter eggs. Anyway, the manuscript had been submitted and she had nothing to do recently, so it was best to lie down and play games comfortably.
Unexpectedly, my grandfather called me last night and cried, saying that people who came to the shrine were asking about her whereabouts. He had no choice but to tell them that she would be there on Sunday.
When she was young and ignorant, Saionji Gyoon was coaxed by her grandfather to participate in a full set of shrine maiden etiquette training including archery and Kagura dance. It was also at that time that she met Kanda Rei. Later, when she was a little older, she worked as a shrine maiden at the ancestral shrine as a receptionist, and earned the title of the so-called "beautiful shrine maiden".
Many young people from the surrounding areas came to the family shrine to pray for her and ask for amulets. At first, most of them were young men, but later when they found that the love amulets were particularly effective when she was around, the number of women who came exceeded that. This is why the shrine's visitors still missed her even after she went to Tokyo to attend junior high school.
So every time her grandfather called to cry, although Yuyin knew in her heart that the old man was deliberately playing the victim, she still couldn't bear it. The next morning, she took the Shinkansen back to Kyoto to visit him and work part-time as a laborer.
"Wow, isn't it just that I haven't seen you, Tamane, for ages," the old man continued crying, covering his face. "Tamane, you didn't tell me what happened. If I hadn't been drinking tea with the old man from the Kanda family, I wouldn't have known you joined the school's Kyudo Club and were going to compete in the national tournament."
The crying was so heartbreaking that it made anyone who heard it cry, but for Saionji Gyoon, who knew her grandfather's style very well, she would not be fooled by him again.
"I was dragged along to help out," Yuyin said, pressing her solar plexus with a headache. "It's a team competition, not an individual one."
As soon as the conversation got down to business, Grandpa dropped his pretense: "What's the big deal? You can increase your popularity by participating in team competitions. If you perform well in the competition and get recognition from the high-ranking referees, you can get a recommendation letter to take the dan placement exam."
"No." Yuyin made an X sign and refused decisively.
Saionji Chitose sighed helplessly: "Alas, kid, you are obviously very powerful, why do you always dislike showing off?"
Why?
Saionji Tamon looked up at the cherry tree next to her. Pink petals fluttered down in the breeze, and little winged fairies were flying among the flowers. Occasionally, when they met her sight, they would shyly hide behind the flowers.
You read that right, a goblin, specifically, a flower spirit.
Saionji Shrine boasts a rich history, and the late cherry blossoms here are over a century old, giving rise to spirits. These spirits are born during the blooming season, falling into a deep sleep once the flowers have fallen, only awakening the following year to protect the blossoms.
As a child, Saionji Tamon, able to see little goblins, convinced her grandfather that her family was a shrine maiden. She even pointed them out to adults, who laughed and remarked on her remarkable abilities. At the time, Tamon assumed everyone could see them. Only as she grew older did she realize it was a unique talent. The adults, believing her to be a child joking, were happy to play along.
After understanding this, Yuyin never showed her abnormality in public again. Even after she was able to "dream" and even participate in things in the other world in the fifth grade of elementary school, she did not tell anyone about it after waking up from the hospital. Instead, she became more and more reclusive.
With the experience in the other world, Saionji Gyomone's understanding of the world has become more and more profound. Compared with the previous world where there were many monsters and the world before that where there were cursed creatures like cursed spirits, the spiritual power of this world has generally declined during this period of time. The big monsters in the past traditions have disappeared or left, and only small creatures like elves that have no impact on reality still exist.
Without monsters, people with special spiritual powers like her naturally have no room to display their abilities. Of course, after experiencing the chaos of several worlds, Saionji Gyoon prefers such a peaceful and tranquil world.
In a peaceful world, of course she has to be a lazy person. She has already made plans. After graduating from college, she will return to her hometown to inherit the shrine. Then she will go to work and receive guests during the day, and stay in the kotatsu at night to watch TV and play games. Wouldn't that be wonderful?
Of course, there is no need to tell grandpa about this future plan first, Saionji Tamane thought as she listened to her grandpa's mumbling.
"Xiaolan, let me tell you, I've already heard about it. The love amulet at this shrine is very effective!"
Hearing the sound coming from the stairs, Saionji Tamon immediately sat up straight and put on a business smile.
"Welcome to Saionji Shrine."
*
Ran Mouri was in Kyoto with her father, who was working there. After hearing about this, Sonoko, who was struggling with her weekend plans, naturally came along. They were originally strolling through the downtown shopping street with Conan when Sonoko suddenly pulled her over and promised not to let her down.
Sonoko took her to a shrine. It was not a famous big shrine, but was hidden in a residential area, giving her a feeling of a hermit hidden in the city.
Before asking for the amulet, the three of them wandered around the shrine.
"What a beautiful cherry tree~" Mao Lilan walked to a corner of the yard and couldn't help but look up and sigh. There were not many cherry blossoms that had not yet withered at this time of year.
"This is a late cherry tree, a hundred years old. Compared with young cherry trees, its life is more vigorous and long-lasting."
Ran Mouri turned her head and saw that it was the shrine maiden who had just received them who explained things to them. The shrine was very small and there were only two staff members. Apart from the shrine maiden, they only saw an old man.
The shrine maiden was a very beautiful girl. Unlike traditional shrine maidens, her long black hair was tied into a high ponytail, revealing her beautiful face and delicate features. She had a unique sense of heroism. When facing her, Sonoko couldn't help blushing and spoke in a lower voice.
Perhaps noticing their awkwardness, the other person smiled and introduced himself: "Excuse me, I'm Saionji Yuon, the shrine maiden of this shrine."
Mao Lilan bowed quickly: "Ah, I am Mao Lilan."
Sonoko beside him also said, "I am Suzuki Sonoko."
The young girls instantly became closer as soon as they exchanged names and started talking to each other.
"Ms. Saionji is so amazing that she became an official shrine maiden at such a young age," said Ran Mouri with emotion.
Saionji Tamane covered her mouth and laughed: "No, I'm not a formal shrine maiden yet, I'm just a part-time one, because..."
"Because Sister Saionji has to go back to Tokyo to study, right?"
The little boy who had been holding onto the corner of Mao Lilan's clothes and remained silent suddenly interrupted.
"Conan!" Interrupting other people's conversation is very impolite, Ran Mouri shouted.
"I'm sorry." Conan quickly acted cute.
"It's okay," Saionji Yuyin crouched down and moved closer to the little boy, blinking, "You guessed it right, kid. How did you know that?"
The little boy took a step back, his face flushed. "It's because of the accent."
Sonoko was surprised: "What's so strange about the accent?"
When it comes to reasoning, Conan's expression becomes normal: "Because the elder sister's accent is not a pure Kyoto accent, but is obviously a mixture of Kyoto and Kanto accents such as Tokyo and Yokohama. This shows that the elder sister has lived in both Kyoto and Kanto for a long time."
Mao Lilan also raised her own doubts: "Then Miss Saionji could have lived in Tokyo in the past and is now living in Kyoto."
Saionji Gyoin thought thoughtfully: "It's because of the name of the shrine."
"That's right," Conan nodded. "This shrine is called Saionji, and the eldest sister's surname is also Saionji. This should be a family shrine, so the eldest sister should be from Kyoto. Later, when she grew up, she left the shrine and went to Tokyo to study, which affected her accent. She only returned to Kyoto on weekends to work as a shrine maiden, so she claimed to be a part-time worker."
When Sonoko heard this, she suddenly realized, "So that's how it is."
"You're so amazing, little brother," Saionji Tamane patted Conan's head and whispered, "You don't look like an ordinary kid at all."
Conan felt a chill down his spine when he heard that. Oh no, he had gotten too carried away with his reasoning.
He quickly acted childish in an attempt to get away with it: "Ha, ha, actually I learned all this from Shinichi-nii. He once taught me how to distinguish the differences in accents from different places."
"That great detective actually taught such boring things to children."
When Sonoko heard this, she couldn't help but roll her eyes. That mystery geek had time to teach the kids but didn't even contact Xiaolan. Really?
*
While talking with Xiaolan and Sonoko, Saionji Gyoen inadvertently observed a little boy named "Edogawa Conan".
After the reasoning just now, she became more and more certain of her guess.
The reason why she approached these three people was because of this strange child.
As early as when they met at the shrine entrance, she could see that his soul's appearance did not match his physical age.
At first, Yuyin guessed that he was possessed by someone else. If this was such a hateful situation, she naturally had no choice but to take action to resolve it.
But after a closer observation, she overturned her previous conclusion, because although the appearance of the soul was inconsistent with the age of the body, that kind of match could only be that of the real person.
Then there are only two possibilities, either his soul possessed another body in the future and replaced his younger self, or his body age shrunk and is not as big as it actually appears.
Judging from the absolute matching degree of souls, Saionji Gyokuon judged that it should be the latter.
But this guy was able to identify her mixed accent from the Kanto region, which is not easy... She looked at Conan meaningfully.
Her accent was certainly not simply influenced by the two years she spent in junior high school, but rather the result of more than ten or twenty years of influence. In the other world she "dreamt of", she had lived in Tokyo and Yokohama for a long time, and her accent had changed imperceptibly.
Being able to infer the truth from such details (although he did not deduce his experience in another world) shows that his true identity must be extraordinary.
And it wasn't just the soul itself. What initially drew her to scrutinize the other person's soul was the wisps of black energy emanating from him, and the golden light of Buddhist morality shrouding it. The former nearly made her mistakenly believe that a demon had invaded her territory, while the latter made her wonder if he was some reincarnated Buddhist master.
But this has nothing to do with her. As long as she is sure that the other party is not a villain who has taken over someone else's body and will not actively harm the world, Saionji Tamane has no intention of investigating further.
*
In the end, Saionji Gyoon still has to perform her job diligently.
She glanced at the fortune in her hand and said with a smile, "Congratulations, Yuanzi, you will meet your true love soon~"
"Really? That's great!" Suzuki Sonoko cheered excitedly.
While Mao Lilan was happy for her friend, she was also nervously waiting for her next answer.
"As for Xiaolan," Yuyin pondered, "your fortune says that the person you love will always be by your side."
It can't be that accurate. Conan, who originally disdained these mysterious things, stiffened his back when he heard it. He heard Sonoko raise his fist and say, "No way, no way, could it be that the mystery geek has been hiding nearby and watching you worry about him? How abominable!"
Seeing Conan's abnormal reaction, Yuyin guessed his true identity.
The author has something to say:
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This world is actually a comprehensive anime world, but it has not shown too much power before. There are small fairies but the big monsters have disappeared (doesn't science and killing tennis count as super?)
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