by Nisioisin
“Removing a snake curse by killing snakes─the idea smells fishy to me,” I continued. “And actually, she said her condition started to get worse when she started killing snakes like that─”
“No, Araragi. Repelling a Jagirinawa by cutting up snakes isn’t wrong. Actually, it’s the right and proper thing to do. The method was probably listed in the Jagirinawa section of the so-called Complete Collection… But she’s quite the brave young lady, isn’t she? Catching snakes on her own and killing them. It’s wonderful. You keep describing her as docile and quiet, but I find that hard to believe.”
“Well, this is the countryside at the end of the day. You can’t let yourself be surprised by a girl who picks up snakes with her bare hands.”
“That’s hard for me to accept, as a city boy.”
“What about you makes you a city boy, exactly?”
Well.
You could say Sengoku had been pushed to that point by the curse─by the Jagirinawa.
She’d cried.
There was nothing brave about her.
If anything, she was delicate. Too delicate.
“It’s not that killing snakes will remove a snake curse, Araragi─what’s important here is the cutting up of snakes. Here, the snakes are a metaphor for rope. Jagirinawa─nawa, rope. No matter how tightly you’re bound, cut the rope and you’ll be free.”
“Bound…”
Rope bondage marks.
She was being bound─by a snake.
A rope, huh?
Oshino went on. “There’s a saying that once you’re bitten by a snake, you’ll jump at the sight of a rope, and in this case, snake equals rope. What makes a rope a rope is that it can be cut.”
“…That doesn’t seem to make sense, though. Sengoku said she’s already killed more than ten snakes at that shrine. But far from going away…”
The curse was─only getting worse.
The more snakes she killed, the faster the scales climbed up rolling from her toes─that’s what she told me. It was proof that the curse was progressing.
“Well, like I always say,” reminded Oshino, “when it comes to these things─the process matters. This missy who’s like your little sister is a complete, rank amateur─right? In general, it’s harder to remove a curse than to place one, so of course her condition is going to get worse if she goes by her half-knowledge. If you kill snakes while a snake is possessing you, of course you’re going to make it mad. You’re right in that regard, Araragi.”
“……”
“But this conversation is helping me see why a curse placed by another complete amateur of a middle school girl has been so successful. My initial assumption was that hell has no fury like a woman scorned, but I guess I missed the mark. It’s bad luck.”
“What do you mean?”
“Missy probably learned that a curse had been placed on her before it ever began to work. Judging by the fact that she knows exactly who it was, she must have heard it straight from the girl. ‘Damn you, I placed a curse on you!’ or something. Missy panicked, went to the bookstore to find out how to get rid of it, and climbed up a mountain that’s known for having a lot of snakes─so she could cut ’em up. I guess she found the shrine by accident? Well, maybe she knew about it in advance. Then, she got busy killing those snakes.”
“What about that is ‘bad luck’?”
“The spot. Remember what I said? An air pocket, a hangout─”
“Oh.”
A place where bad things─gathered.
Those bad things that Shinobu’s presence had activated.
“And that─strengthened the curse?” I asked.
“Not strengthened, most likely it wouldn’t have triggered at all if not for that spot. Unlike you and miss sapphy, her body must be a regular human one─so while she probably didn’t feel unwell, the bad things affected her in the form of the Jagirinawa.”
She had no way to fight back─no resistance.
A rank amateur.
“So it’s like she deepened her own wounds,” I said.
“It’s like she wounded herself. Although it’s a cruel way to put it, nothing would have happened if only she’d done nothing. Actually, the description in this Complete Collection of Snake Curses might be half-assed to begin with. I try to refrain from speaking ill of books I haven’t read, but it’s a strong possibility. On top of it all, you have an amateur edition curse-removal ritual in a spot like that. Those bad things must have worked in a bad direction.”
“What a quagmire.”
“A quagmire, indeed.”
Your bad luck─could get that bad?
“I suppose the silver lining for her was being reunited with you right as matters were coming to a head─you do plan on doing something for the girl, right?”
“…Am I wrong to?”
“No, not necessarily. Neither seek nor shun the fight, after all. But it is a little tough for me to understand. I get taking pity on her, but why go so far? Because she’s your little sister’s old friend? Or because her last name reminds you of your girlfriend’s?”
“Huh? Oh, because Sengoku is a ‘thousand koku’ as in how they used to value territories, and Senjogahara means ‘battlefield’? Actually, I’d never considered that one. I only realized for the first time now. Well, no─I mean, she’s in such distress. Isn’t it normal to─want to do something?”
“What a good person,” Oshino said.
He gave it such an unpleasant ring.
“There’s a book called the Compilation of Snake Curses that was put together in mid-Edo─it’s an odd tome containing nothing but snake-related aberrations. That’s where the Jagirinawa first appears in print. With an illustration, to boot.”
“An illustration? What does it look like?”
“It depicts a man who’s being constricted by a giant snake. The tail’s design resembles a straw rope, while the snake’s head is─in the man’s mouth. His jaw is open as far as it can go, almost as if he’s a snake─that’s the picture. Snakes can swallow animals as big as chickens whole, after all.”
“Constricted─”
“Gripped. Possessed.”
“……”
“In other words, Araragi. Missy’s body is─in the grips of such a giant snake as we speak. A snake is gripping and possessing and constricting her. Tightly─and mercilessly.”
“But…she said it doesn’t hurt.”
“That’s a lie, of course it does. She’s trying to endure the pain. Don’t I keep on telling you that trust is key? You’re dealing with a quiet kid, you need to try to read what’s in her heart─looking into her eyes.”
“Looking─into her eyes.”
That reminded me, when Sengoku said it didn’t hurt, Kanbaru seemed to want to say something… So that’s what it was? She said things that needed to be said─but kept her mouth shut if she only wanted to say it. That certainly would have been very Kanbaru.
“Wrapping around a prey’s body and pulverizing its bones to make it easier to eat before swallowing it is typical snake behavior. It’s not easy to get a snake to release you once it has you in its grip.”
“I see… Right, it’s an aberration, so it can ignore her clothes.”
Those marks were only on her skin, and she seemed to be able to take off and put on clothes freely, volleyball shorts aside. That had kept me from thinking that an aberration might have Sengoku’s body in its grip, but what did I know─I just couldn’t see it.
“A rope─right?” I asked Oshino. “And bound? So those scale marks across her body aren’t traces─at this very moment, an invisible snake is manifestly gnawing into her.”
This giant snake, the Jagirinawa, was invisible to my eyes, to Kanbaru’s, and of course to Sengoku’s, so we only saw through to the effect that the aberration was having on Sengoku’s skin.
“Even then,” Oshino explained, “I think it’s only because you and miss sapphy are essentially half-human, half-creature that you can see those marks at all. The
same goes for missy, who’s in its grip. I’d imagine that anyone other than you three─missy tsundere or missy class president, for example─wouldn’t even see the marks. They might be able to see the internal bleeding, though.”
There was no need for her to hide the marks with long pants.
No reason to be ashamed of her body.
That’s what Oshino said.
But that didn’t seem like the problem to me. Yes, that might be the case, logically speaking─and maybe it was another instance of Sengoku’s bad luck that Kanbaru and I happened to be the ones to see her body─but didn’t it more than qualify as an issue if she saw herself that way?
“Maybe,” Oshino admitted. “Yes, you might be right.”
“That was an awfully quick admission.”
“Even I can be honest and upfront at times. I don’t have anything better to do right now.”
“You can’t be honest and upfront if you aren’t just chilling?”
“Come to think of it, I get that she dresses in long sleeves and long pants when she goes out, but what’s she been doing at school so far? Do the girls at your old middle school not wear skirts as part of their uniforms?”
“Not really, they’re more like dresses. Kind of an all-in-one? Have you seen them on your research forays?”
“Ah, yes. So that’s your alma mater. Those are cute─but wouldn’t they still leave her legs exposed?”
“That’s why Sengoku’s been taking school off since those marks became visible, though she managed while she could still hide them with socks─well, okay, Oshino, what about this? Is there some way to make the body of this Jagirinawa visible? Would you be able to see it?”
“No way, I’m just a human.”
Mr. Expert didn’t seem to mind at all that he couldn’t.
He was practically shirking his duties with that line.
“And not just me,” he said. “In this kind of case, it’s basically hard for others to see what the possessed can’t see themselves. No matter how much of a former vampire you may be. As a side note, it isn’t the person in the Jagirinawa’s grip but the one who cast the snake who can see it─and this is an accidental case, so I doubt even she could. This friend probably hasn’t even realized that the curse took. Otherwise, it’d be a huge deal in their class… Well, no, maybe that friend is just keeping quiet about it. That really would be full-blown malice…but I don’t think that’s what it is. Missy would be long dead if it were. But there’s no point in going over all these possibilities. Talk about guesswork. Oh, but one thing─while you may not be able to see it, Araragi, you just might be able to touch it.”
“Hm…like you did once?”
“Uhhh, what’re you talking about?” Pretty pointlessly in my view, Oshino was playing dumb. “If you can touch it, you should be able to peel it off…but you might not want to. Snakes are savage animals. Do that and I’m sure the Jagirinawa will attack you. And even if you somehow escape it, it’ll seek out the classmate who cast the curse next.”
“The curse turning on the caster.”
“You know what they say─when one is cursed, two holes are dug. This girl must not have meant to kill missy and probably doesn’t believe in curses to begin with. I think she honestly intended to just go, ‘Damn you, I placed a curse on you!’ out of spite. Hmm. I don’t like that she decided to get the occult involved over something so petty, though… How’s an outsider like me supposed to make a living? This business is bad for me.”
“I can’t tell if you misspoke there or not.”
“Ha hah. Well, I guess it’s fine.”
With those words, Oshino got off his makeshift bed. He then plodded away and tried to exit the room, so I hastily called out to his back.
“Hey, where are you going?”
“Eh. Wait here a second.”
That was all he said before leaving the classroom for real.
He was a fickle person. Actually, he was just being selfish.
Now what… If I had time, I wanted to check up on Shinobu, but if I missed Oshino in the process, that’d be stupid… Which classroom was Shinobu in, anyway? It was rare for her and Oshino to be in different ones. Had she gotten into another fight with Oshino over some Mister Donuts?
Fine, I would just file a status report.
I pulled out my cell phone and tried calling Kanbaru─Sengoku, by the way, still didn’t have one, in typical fashion for a rural middle schooler. Then again, even if my parents found them, this was Kanbaru so she’d do just fine … As long as they didn’t discover that she was a pretty serious pervert and a real-deal sapphist, Kanbaru was an exemplary young woman who excelled at academics as well as athletics.
But the moment I tried to open my contacts list─
“Thanks for waiting.”
Oshino returned.
That was quick.
So quick that I wondered if he knew what I was about to do.
He really acted like he saw through everything.
“Hm? What’s that modern convenience you have there? Were you about to call someone?”
“Well…I was just thinking of contacting Kanbaru and Sengoku in advance. It seems like this will take more time than I thought.”
“No need to call in that case. I’m already done talking here. Take this.”
From his position at the entryway, Oshino tossed straight at me whatever he was holding in his right hand. The sudden projectile threw me off balance, but I was somehow able to catch the item without dropping it.
It was a traditional amulet.
It was shaped like a standard amulet─but the pouch said nothing.
There were no words indicating if it was for, say, traffic safety or fertility.
A blank design.
“What’s─this?”
“You can purify it with that. The Jagirinawa.”
“……”
“There’s a talisman inside of it. What you might call a protective charm. It’s different from the one I had you place…and the pouch it’s in is nothing, just a sheath. The talisman is a bit of a powerful one, so safety measures are required. Safety measures, or maybe a limiter. Don’t get it wrong, though, it’s not as if all you’re going to have to do is place that talisman on her forehead like she’s a jiangshi or something. In fact, don’t ever take that talisman out of its pouch. Like I said, it’s a safety measure, a limiter. There’s no telling what might happen. I’m going to tell you the correct method for this, so do your best to remember for later. I could go out there myself, but it’s probably better if I don’t─as far as building a relationship of trust with the young lady, you and li’l miss sapphy are already set. That claim of being able to seduce younger girls within ten seconds doesn’t sound like false advertising, either. I’m so impressed. I’m so jealous. Ha hah, and while you seem to have forgotten, it seems missy’s memories of you are rather nice ones, no? She wouldn’t be able to strip on a moment’s notice in a man’s room otherwise, Big Brother Koyomi.”
“……”
I didn’t know about that, to be honest.
When it came to people who never stopped talking like Senjogahara, Kanbaru, Hanekawa, or Hachikuji, I could make some sort of guess about how they felt─whether those words were frank ones or not─but it was hard to deal with someone who spoke so little. Someone with a shy personality. Who buckled under pressure and cast her eyes downward at the smallest provocation─
When I thought about the situation, it was surprising that this very same girl had flatly turned down a boy. Someone with her personality seemed like the type who couldn’t say no and got dragged into being someone’s girlfriend… But, once again, I had no right whatsoever to be talking about these affairs of the heart.
“I think it’s like how you wouldn’t be embarrassed to strip naked in front of a doctor,” Oshino said. “That’s what a relationship of trust is. Oh, wasn’t Asclepius from the constellation Ophiuchus a patron saint of medicine? Another hint, perhaps.”
“But, Oshi
no…is it really okay?”
“Is what okay?”
“For you to be so…quick and simple with a way to purify her. You normally act more pompous, you know? You go into these tiny little details, or you’re never really cooperative. I feel like you went easy on your usual mountain of trivia too. Don’t tell me you’re not being serious about this now that I don’t owe you anything.”