I'm a demon in Tokyo!

Chapter 397 A City Full of Human Heads and Lanterns... You Want to Take My Disciple's Head? The Real Body Has Descended, Then Come and Take It!

A crimson light fell from the sky, which was too high to look up at.

The red light shone through the transparent window onto Chisa's legs, giving the shrine in her arms a bewitching quality.

Through the half-open window, which wasn't covered by curtains, Uesugi Tetsu could see the horrific scene on the street outside.

The colorful, scarlet, and sticky substance had already covered the entire road, along with scattered pieces of bloody human skin.

Uesugi Tetsu could even spot a few scattered pedestrians in the distance, fleeing in panic as if being chased by something.

He knew that it must be a mystery he couldn't see at the moment—Chisa hadn't even opened a single True Sight Eye.

The outside world is in stark contrast to the scene two days ago, when at least superficial order was maintained.

If Kujo Machi died like this right at his doorstep, it goes without saying what might happen in the deeper and more distant parts of Asahikawa City.

Uesugi Tetsu glanced at Chisa, who was tightly hugging the shrine even while taking a nap with her brows furrowed. He smiled and was about to wake her when he caught a more bizarre scene out of the corner of his eye.

Unlike the gruesome and nauseating scene at the left half of the window, the area further to the right was completely clean, with the ground and...

A headless corpse, as if its head had been forcibly removed, yet no blood was flowing out?
Headless corpses lay scattered haphazardly on the road, but their number was probably more than double that of the other side of the hellish landscape!

Even if most of them are fakes, if there are still normal people like Kujo Machi living in Asahikawa City, they will inevitably become the "headless corpses" he is seeing now.

crunch...

The sound of the wooden door hinges waking Chisa from her light sleep, allowing the girl to immediately realize through her Hundred Eyes that Uesugi Tetsu's consciousness had returned!
Overjoyed, she whispered, "Master!"

Holding a water glass, biscuits, and a bag of diapers under his arm at the doorway, Kujo Machi looked up at Chisa's head with a stiff and somewhat frightened expression.

However, some were excited and eager to try.

Uesugi Tetsu glanced at her expression and silently muttered to himself,
"It feels like I've invited an evil god into my home. I'm filled with unease, but I still hope that the evil god will descend and grant me power..."

He then checked the trust rating of the nine truths—

[Current Trust Level for the Nine Insights: 50 (Trust with Caution)]

Because Kujo Machi spent most of the day and a half chatting with Chisa in her room, she did indeed see Hyakume's eyes closed.

Naturally, driven by Kujo Machi's "desire for knowledge," Chisa recounted in great detail Uesugi Tetsu's famous deeds, the time he saved her, and many words of concern.

After Chisa's "sales pitch," Kujo Machi no longer felt the same fear and dread she had at the beginning regarding Uesugi Tetsu, this strange and mysterious meatball master.

They even wanted to see what his "true form" looked like when he descended through the shrine.

But her years of experience in dealing with strange occurrences still kept her at a healthy level of vigilance.

Because perhaps, all of these things are false memories that this "meatball master trick" implanted into Chisa's mind to deceive her.

That being said, Kujo Machi still tends to believe it more.

Having encountered the truly extraordinary power of the shrine, she couldn't help but believe it.

Anyway, the worst outcome of believing the wrong thing is just death.

From a young age, Kujo Machi had an inexplicable and incredibly clear feeling that even if he died, it wouldn't matter, because he could be resurrected after death.

So, it's just a matter of dying.

Kujo Machi smiled inwardly.

Maybe I've already died many times.

Uesugi Tetsu had no idea that Kujo Machi, who had been stunned for a moment, was having so much internal monologue. He then checked Chisa's safety level again—

[Current safety level of Qiansha: Absolutely safe.]

Hmm...not bad, Kujo Machi's room can still be considered a safe house.

Knowing that Uesugi Tetsuya's consciousness had returned, Chisa's tense body couldn't help but relax, and she leaned lightly against the wall.

"Master, Chisa listened to you and didn't leave Miss Kujo's room even once in these thirty-two hours..."

As Chisa spoke, she couldn't help but blush when she saw the diapers that Kujo Machi was carrying.

Uesugi Tetsu nodded slightly upon hearing this and praised her directly, "Chisa, you did a great job."

As expected, Chisa is a reliable person when it comes to getting things done.

Then Chisa chuckled and took out a relatively new-looking notebook from the bed, saying...

"And Master... After something happened outside, I asked Miss Kujo to open the curtains and carefully look through the window, and then I recorded what happened outside."

This surprised Uesugi Tetsu as he looked at Kujo Machi, who was stiffly smiling as he put down the object in his hand.

The latter hesitated for a moment, then made a firm decision and greeted the fleshy ball on Qian Sha's head that was staring at her with scarlet eyes.

Was it saying hello to me?

Uesugi Tetsuya paused for a moment, then couldn't help but chuckle at her terrified expression: "Am I that scary...?"

He thought for a moment and then had Chisa reply, "Ms. Kujo, you did a good job too."

When Kujo Machi was pointed out by "Meatball Master Gui", his first reaction was to tense up, but then he realized the meaning of the words and blinked blankly.

—You "saw" it, but nothing happened?
Kujo Machi looked up, staring directly at Uesugi Tetsuya with undisguised eyes, and spoke slowly and deliberately.
"Chisa's master, she has a fleshy ball with ten eyes on her head... I see you."

Uesugi Tetsu was puzzled but impressed, thinking to himself that this was how "Hundred Eyes" appeared in Kujo Machi's eyes, and then let Chisa give a casual reply.

—After being "seen" by itself, it did not mutate into a more terrifying form, did not open its blood-red mouth to try to devour itself, and did not excitedly scream "You saw me" and pounce on it.

Tears suddenly welled up in Kujo Machi's eyes.

Uesugi Tetsu: “?”

However, having faced countless terrifying monsters and honed his mental fortitude to an extremely high level, Kujo Machi took two deep breaths, pointed at the shrine, and asked...

"Chisa's... Master, the shrine is lit up, aren't you coming over?"

Qian Sha relayed the message: "The thing in the sky is still watching. Coming here rashly might cause unnecessary trouble. There's no rush."

Kujo Machi was initially delighted to be able to have a normal conversation with this master, but then felt a chill in his heart.

Does this master also know about "things in the heavens"?
"Chisa, doesn't she know my name yet?"

Uesugi Tetsu raised an eyebrow in surprise upon hearing Kujo Machi address him, and responded telepathically when Chisa nodded.

“I definitely won’t reveal my master’s name without his permission, or I might get into trouble.”

"Good boy."

Uesugi Tetsu nodded with satisfaction—it was quite rare to see Chisa even being aware of "preventing the use of her real name."

"correct."

Uesugi Tetsu suddenly remembered something and asked, "Where are Kujo Machi's parents now? Have they changed at all?" After Chisa repeated the information, Kujo Machi fell silent.

She opened her mouth, her expression complicated, and replied, "It's daytime now, and my parents have gone to work."

work?

Uesugi Tetsu glanced out the window at the road littered with blood and gore, and chuckled for a moment.

It goes without saying that Kujo Machi's parents were definitely not normal people, but they were also probably not fake people either—the corpses of fake people were appearing in heaps outside.

As for whether it's a ghost story, that seems unlikely.

Otherwise, why would Kujo Machi's room still be rated as "absolutely safe"?
"Chisa, have Kujo's parents paid any attention to you?"

"Ms. Kujo said I was a friend of hers who was a little shy, so she kept me in the room and I didn't meet her parents, which got me through."

Does this work too?
Uesugi Tetsuya pondered for a moment, then gave up thinking.

Things are still too strange...

There is currently a severe lack of information, and we cannot understand it at this time.

Let's first take a look at the notes that Chisa and Kujo Machi took together.

After Chisa flipped through dozens of blank pages, Uesugi Tetsu saw her neat and beautiful handwriting, as if it had been printed out by a printer.

[An overview of Asahikawa City compiled by Chisa and Ms. Kujo Machi]

1. The city is called Asahikawa City. It originally belonged to Hokkaido, but it seems that most ordinary people and pseudo-people are unaware that Asahikawa City has become independent.

2. Asahikawa City contains a large number of "pseudo-humans" and a small number of normal humans.

【False Human: A creature that can roughly disguise its appearance and memories as an ordinary human, but will have subtle differences from the person being disguised.

After their disguise is torn off, they transform into various alien forms, each with the fighting power to kill at least dozens of unarmed adult men simultaneously.

3. Most fake humans are not very aggressive and will likely not kill humans unless their true identities are discovered. (However, there may be some bloodthirsty fake humans.)
4. There are a large number of [Ghosts] in Asahikawa City, but as long as you [cannot see] these Ghosts, you will not be harmed or killed by them.

[Strange: A being somewhat similar to "ghost stories," which, after "confirming that it has been seen," seems to follow some kind of pattern to harm or kill humans.]

But it seems they can't be killed? (At least Miss Kujo has never seen a ghost that has been killed.)

[Postscript: After killing a large number of humans, the level of terror, the range of its killings, and its killing patterns are all confirmed to increase further.]

It turned out to be the case.

There are indeed many imposters in Asahikawa City, but because they are unlikely to kill anyone unless their identities are exposed, ordinary people in the city who know nothing about them originally lived quite well.

Uesugi Tetsu hadn't expected that even Chisa, who had been hiding in the house, could gather so much useful information for him, greatly reducing his time spent on the campaign.

As expected of my apprentice, he is truly bold and meticulous!
If it were an ordinary teenage girl, she would probably have buried her head in the blanket like an ostrich; if it were a superhuman with some strength, she might have gone out and offered herself up for death.

"But there's something strange."

Uesugi Tetsu thought, "If the ghost won't kill unless it's seen, then how come the bell-ringing ghost kills an entire classroom and then affects the whole school?"

This strange event was quickly explained by the record below—

[Further observations following the "Resurgence of the Myriad Ghosts," based on the "Overview of Asahikawa City"]

1. The resurgence of all ghosts is a new concept that I came up with after discussing it with Ms. Kujo—that is, starting with the [Bell Ring Ghost] she encountered at school, the entire ghost capital of Asahikawa City begins to revive.

2. Recovery is the transformation from "unseen by everyone" to "visible by everyone".

[Postscript: The recovery seems to go beyond this. Ms. Kujo says that even the supernatural phenomena that ordinary people "cannot see" will begin to follow the rules of murder and start killing!]

3. The aggression of the fake human will begin to increase, but the fake human can also be killed by the ghost, and is not much different from an ordinary person.

4. Unless absolutely necessary, battles will not occur between the supernatural beings.

These records gave Uesugi Tetsuya a chill.

From being killed for seeing the tricks, to being killed for knowing nothing...

The difference between them is more than 108,000 miles!
If there are so many ghosts on the several-kilometer-long school route in Kujo Machi, then the number of ghosts in Asahikawa City is probably countless!

Ordinary people can't even see the thing that kills them, so how can they survive?
The false humans are becoming increasingly insane, the number of resurrected monsters is increasing, the number of living people is decreasing, and the monsters are becoming more and more powerful... It's a vicious cycle.

Uesugi Tetsu frowned.

If it's only been a day or two and it's already like this, then won't the entire Asahikawa City become a ghost town in less than a month?
Time is really... very tight.

Uesugi Tetsu asked Chisa to turn the page again, where they found some informational booklets about individual monsters.

He saw some familiar ghosts among them—such as the vending machine ghost, the green light ghost, and the ghost that appears when you turn around.

Chisa sensed the heaviness in her master's thoughts, took a deep breath, and then delivered some good news.

“Master, a dozen hours ago, I saw a priest and a priestess passing by outside. It seemed that they knew about the ghosts and had some specific ways to deal with them.”

Palace Secretary, witch?
Shirazu Shrine?

Uesugi Tetsu immediately thought of his side quest—and perhaps more; the people from the local shrine must have a deeper understanding of Asahikawa City.

"We need to find them... Chisa, do you have their contact information?"

Chisa bit her lip and said with some shame,

"I'm sorry, Master... There were already quite a few head lanterns floating on the road at that time. I couldn't figure out why, and I was afraid that my head would also float up with them for no reason, so I didn't dare to go out..."

"A human head lantern!?"

Upon hearing this, Uesugi Tetsuya's eyelids twitched. Only then did he carefully observe the reflection on the ground outside the window and realize that the red light outside was emitted by the floating lanterns made of human heads in the sky!

This number must be at least tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands!

He quickly praised Chisa for doing the right thing, saying that it was really not worth risking one's life for a contact method on the ground that might not even be in contact anymore.

Chisa breathed a slight sigh of relief upon hearing this. Just as she was about to tell Uesugi Tetsu about her experience with the human head balloons, she saw three empty, pale red human skin lanterns slowly flying towards her from not far away.

On the lantern, there was her face, Kujo Machi, and Uesugi Tetsu!

The girl's face turned deathly pale in an instant.

—How could Master's face appear! He clearly didn't come!

Kujo Machi didn't say a word, but a cold sweat broke out on his forehead, and he hurriedly tried to pull the curtains closed.

Following their gazes, Uesugi Tetsu narrowed his eyes.

"You want to take my head and my apprentice's head?"

He gave a cold, emotionless laugh and chose to descend upon [Asahikawa City].
"Then try to get it."

(End of this chapter)