Kitahara Iori stood motionless.
"What's wrong? Is there a problem?"
Looking at him in such a state, the boy who had come to stay asked with a localized, eerie smile.
"No... it's nothing..."
Seemingly jolted awake by those words, Kitahara Iori hurriedly wrote the other person's name in the registry.
"Does the fee for this inn include lunch?"
At that moment, the pink-haired girl behind the boy spoke up... Wait, why do both of them have pink hair and blue eyes? Could they be twins? However, their appearances were somewhat different, and their temperaments were worlds apart, so it wasn't as if one would mistake them for each other.
Under normal circumstances, Kitahara Iori might have felt a spark of envy toward the boy's good fortune with women, but right now, his heart was gripped by fear and unease; he didn't dare entertain even a single romantic thought.
"For the time being, there is lunch..."
"Great! Are there dumplings? I want to eat fifty!"
"..."
How many?
Fifty?
Is that really an appetite a human can have?
Kitahara Iori quietly sized up the girl, feeling that she didn't exactly look like some kind of competitive eating prodigy.
No, no, no, you must have misunderstood, Iori. She surely meant the three of them combined want fifty dumplings.
"By the way, Asakura-kun, Gotō-san, what do you want for lunch?" the pink-haired girl asked the other two.
So she really was the only one eating them!
Kitahara Iori was shocked.
"Just a regular set meal is fine," the boy replied casually, then glanced at the girl. "More importantly, is it really okay for you to eat that many dumplings for lunch?"
Yes, exactly! This girl clearly has no concept of the quantity of fifty dumplings and is just ordering blindly! Hurry up and tell her off, make her understand common sense!
Kitahara Iori screamed internally.
"Will that be enough to feel full?" the boy named Asakura Takuma continued.
Is that what you're worried about?! Kitahara Iori was completely stunned: Those are fifty dumplings! Let alone a slender, delicate girl, even a grown man might not be able to finish them all, right?
As if seeing through his thoughts, Asakura Takuma said nonchalantly, "Don't worry, this is actually considered a small amount for her. I know another kid who can eat more than twice as much as she does."
"Is the 'kid' you're talking about a piglet from the school's breeding shed?" At this point, even Kitahara Iori couldn't help but retort.
"Of course not," Asakura Takuma said. "A piglet couldn't eat as much as she does."
Kitahara Iori: "..."
Is the person you're talking about really human?
On the other side, Hitori still hadn't fully recovered from the soul-shaking fact that she could see ghosts; even if you leaned in close to her, all you could hear was "aba-aba" noises.
Kitahara Iori felt that this kid might be an alien, sending out signals using some kind of secret code.
In short, he was scared—extremely scared.
"Don't be afraid, we're just ordinary people," the boy said, seemingly seeing through his fear, and offered a loud word of comfort. "Don't be like a mermaid, scaring yourself."
Kitahara Iori: "..."
Where is the logic in that last sentence? What does scaring yourself have to do with a mermaid? Kitahara Iori thought to himself.
Regardless, he checked them in according to the inn's regulations, then pressed the bell for the lounge. Before long, the landlady stepped out from a nearby room and greeted the guests.
"Rest assured, although our inn isn't large, it's a long-established business. We don't have many standout features, but when people praise us, it's usually in two words: sturdy! It doesn't matter how big the typhoon is; guests need not worry."
The landlady said while leading the guests inside, "However, if the wind and rain are truly too heavy, the second floor might leak a little. Why don't I arrange for all of you to stay on the first floor? Everyone on one floor makes it easier to help each other if a problem arises."
"No need, I personally prefer the second floor. Let us go up and take a look around."
Asakura said to the landlady with a beaming smile.
However, although his face was covered in smiles, if one were to truly believe he went up there purely because he liked the second floor, Kitahara Iori felt there was no such thing as such a coincidence.
Then he suddenly realized: Oh no, when he came scrambling down yesterday, he seemed to have forgotten to close the trapdoor.
Could that thing have escaped from the attic?
Thinking of this, Kitahara Iori became restless, fearing the monster might appear at any moment while also feeling worried about the safety of that young man, Asakura Takuma.
☆
On the other side, Asakura followed the landlady to the second floor.
If Kitahara Iori were here, he would be greatly surprised, because the trapdoor he forgot to close yesterday was now shut tight—it didn't look like it had ever been opened.
"Actually, the layout of the 2nd floor is about the same as the 1st. It doesn't make much difference whether you stay here or on the 1st floor," the landlady was still trying to persuade them. "And the bathhouse is on the 1st floor; staying there would be more convenient for bathing."
Asakura glanced at that trapdoor.
In the eyes of an ordinary person, the door was shut tight without a gap, but before Asakura, it was not like that at all. In his eyes, a slime-like substance—a mixture of mud and pus—was constantly oozing from the cracks of the trapdoor, dripping onto the floor and taking a long time to disappear.
"No need, the second floor is fine."
Asakura once again rejected the request with a beaming smile.
Seeing that she couldn't convince them, the landlady didn't say more and simply opened a room for Asakura and the others on the second floor.
"Are we really not going to the first floor? Are we staying on the second?" After the landlady left, Hitori asked in a small, apprehensive voice.
Unlike Kagamihara Nadeshiko, after Hitori realized she could also see ghosts, her spiritual vision had been in a highly active state. Naturally, she also saw that black mud-like substance pouring down from the cracks of the trapdoor.
Unlike Asakura, however, the girl felt it was better to stay far away from that thing.
"Eh? Does that mean there's something here on the second floor?"
Only then did Kagamihara Nadeshiko ask, somewhat after the fact.
"Don't worry, it'll be gone soon."
Asakura replied nonchalantly.
"I don't quite understand what's going on, but since Asakura-kun said so, it should be fine, right?" Kagamihara Nadeshiko seemed to take it well. She quickly put the matter out of her mind and ran to the window with her phone, wanting to film the rainy scenery of the typhoon.
"Really..."
Asakura shook his head. "Alright, Hitori, let's go too."
"Go... where?" Hitori asked, trembling.
"Since we've come all this way, we naturally have to pay a visit to the 'thing' this family is keeping."