The Legend of Tokyo Taoist

Chapter 122: Yellow Springs House (3)

After returning to the office, Qian Xiaoyi naturally found the same letter at his doorstep. Except that the name was his, it was similar to the one Inuyama Heita had received.

"Although it says it's an invitation, it doesn't say where." Inuyama Heita said, "Isn't this too perfunctory? Are they teasing us? Or are they threatening us?"

"No." Qian Xiaoyi put the envelope under his nose and smelled it. It was just the common scent of stationery with a hint of ink. He said, "Huangquan House... sounds like a store."

"But I can't find this on the Internet." Inuyama Heita looked down at his phone and kept swiping down, but he couldn't find any information about the relevant store.

"How can it be that simple~" Qian Xiaoyi said: "Hey, where's Ajian? Come out and smell this paper."

"Do you think I'm a hound?" Ken crawled out of Inuyama Heita's pocket, approached the letter, sniffed it, and said, "I smell a strange smell, a smell of alcohol... ah, it's so hot!"

He just touched the paper with his hand, and it was as if he had touched a branding iron. He screamed and pulled his hand back.

"This thing...it bites people!" Ajian said in fear.

"Interesting~ This is rare." Qian Xiaoyi raised his eyebrows: "The smell of alcohol... pub? I have an idea. Coincidentally, according to the time, today is the new moon, which is the time when the letter shop is open, so we received this letter today. So, Heitaro, is there any problem on your side? It may be very late today."

Inuyama Heita said, "It's summer vacation already, Brother Otoko. You don't have to go to class anymore."

Qian Xiaoyi came to his senses and said, "I forgot that you students still have winter and summer vacations. That's perfect. Since you also received the letter, let's act together tonight."

Inuyama Heita naturally had no objection. He was also very curious about the other party's background, so he stayed in the office.

While waiting, Qian Xiaoyi also made a phone call to ask Mike. At this time, the "Blues" bar was open, and Mike should be working part-time as a bartender. If you want to find out some strange information, you can't go wrong by asking the bartender of the pub. Some drunken customers would think that Mike didn't understand Japanese because he was a foreign black man and didn't talk much, so they often talked to him. In addition, Mike himself was superstitious, so he knew a lot of strange things.

"Yellow Spring House?" Mike was a little surprised: "Mr. Qian, are you talking about the Yellow Spring Izakaya?"

Qian Xiaoyi didn't expect that the other party really knew, so he asked: "Do you know?"

Mike replied, "I heard it from the drinkers when they were chatting. Sometimes they would talk about which bar or pub has better beer. One time they talked about the legend of Huangquan pub..."

This is an urban legend among drinkers. It is said that there is such a drunkard who often goes to a pub with friends after work to drink. After one round of drinking, he is not satisfied and always changes to the next shop for a second and third round. In fact, this situation is quite common in Japan, so there is no useful information at the beginning of the story.

After laying the background of the story, Mike slowly got to the point.

One day, the drunkard got lost from his companions because he was drunk. He didn't know where he went. When he was lost and vomiting against the wall, he suddenly saw a izakaya not far away. The name of the store was "Huangquan". The drunkard thought to himself, there is a store here that I haven't been to? And the name is so strange? Interesting. So he walked in with a swagger. There was only a little girl in a kimono in the izakaya. The drunkard didn't care, but just drunkenly asked someone to open a bottle of wine for him.

The little girl poured him a glass of wine. After drinking it, the drunkard felt that the taste of the wine was very unique. He had never tasted such delicious wine before, so he asked what the wine was called.

The little girl replied: "This cup of wine is called 'Like a Dream', and it is brewed from the water of the underworld."

The drunkard thought the wine was very good, so he stayed in the pub and continued drinking.

When people found him the next day, his body was cold and covered in vomit. The cause of death was suffocation. It was said that he got drunk and choked to death on the alcohol in his stomach.

So there is a legend circulating among drinkers, which is that after getting drunk, if you see a pub called Huangquan, you must not go in and do not drink anything inside. Once you drink, you will be brought to Huangquan and will not be able to return to the world.

"Another urban legend... Thanks, Mike." Qian Xiaoyi hung up the phone.

Inuyama Heita asked a little nervously: "Is there really such a place? A pub that sends people to the underworld." It was not a happy thing to receive a letter from a dangerous place in urban legend, and it was related to the underworld.

"If you mean those dangerous ghost areas, my answer is yes." Qian Xiaoyi replied, "But I don't think this 'Huangquan Izakaya' is that kind of dangerous place."

"Why?" asked Inuyama Heita.

"Because they have sent us invitation letters." Qian Xiaoyi shook the letter in his hand and said, "These letters can be seen and touched. They really exist in reality, which means that the place is maintained by real people. Of course, it is not ruled out that someone wants to lead us to a dangerous place and kill someone with a borrowed knife, but in that case, these letters will leave traces, which is too troublesome, so I still tend to think that this is an invitation and a test."

"Is that so~" Inuyama Heita breathed a sigh of relief, and then asked: "Then how do we find this store?"

"We still have to rely on these letters." Qian Xiaoyi said, "It's not time yet, so we can't tell anything. Didn't the letter say that the store will open at midnight? So wait, we can go out and try again when the time is almost right. Otherwise, if we go too early, it will be embarrassing if the store is not open yet."

After staying in the office for a while, when the time was almost up, Qian Xiaoyi and Inuyama Heita rode out on the Nuhuomaru.

"Take this and help me find the road." Qian Xiaoyi asked Inuyama Heita, who was sitting in the back, to help look at the compass needle, while he drove the motorcycle in the direction of the compass.

On the compass, the letter papers they received were tied to the ink line, and the pointer was shaking slowly as they moved.

Inuyama Heita reported the location, and gradually some enlightenment came to his mind. He thought: "Is that so? The so-called Huangquan Izakaya is actually a building in the ghost realm? It's incredible that someone can open a store in the ghost realm."

(End of this chapter)