Chapter 6: Kimura’s Ordeal (Part 2)
“The weekend before last? You mean the 9th and 10th, right?” Ōgami Yōsuke’s question was casual enough, but his eyes flickered towards Yomikawa Tsuko with a nervousness he couldn’t quite hide.
Itō Takuma nodded, his expression grim. “The 9th, to be exact. On the 10th, Fujita and I went over to Kimura’s. That’s when he told us… everything that happened up at the hideout.”
“Around two in the afternoon, Kimura headed up Mount Karasu-Go. Packed some snacks, his game console. No big predators up there, no bears or wolves, so he figured he’d just chill, play games until it got dark, then head home.”
“He could actually stay up there until dark?” Takada asked, a hint of surprise in his voice.
“Sure,” Itō said, sketching a rough map in the dust with his shoe. “We were serious when we built that hideout. Found this gentle slope, dug a big hole into the backside of it. Reinforced it with planks, nails, whatever we could scrounge. Used an old, ripped-up blanket for a door.”
“We even put down some wooden boards for a floor. Honestly, if it wasn’t for the swarms of mosquitoes in summer, you could’ve slept up there with just a good blanket. It was big enough for one person to stretch out, no problem.”
Having set the scene, Itō’s voice dropped slightly. “The climb up the mountain was normal. Uneventful. But when Kimura got to the hideout… he knew something was off. Some animal had been there. Paw prints all over. And it had left… stuff.”
“From the prints, it was small. Cat-sized, maybe a little dog. And the stuff it left behind was a mess – cracked nuts, pits from some weird wild fruit he didn’t recognize… just a nasty little pile, right in the deepest corner of the cave.”
Junko rested her chin on her cupped hands. “Maybe a squirrel? They hoard stuff, right? And they’re about that size. Could be it decided your hideout was prime real estate. Doesn’t sound too out there.”
Itō Takuma nodded slowly. “Yeah, Kimura figured the same. But he wasn’t about to let some squirrel squat in his spot. So, he started cleaning it all out.”
“And that’s when he found them. Two bones. Really strange ones. They looked almost identical, perfectly straight, maybe two centimeters long. The joints at each end were different – one big, one small. The middle part was the thinnest, about as thick as a chopstick.”
“Kimura picked them up. They were caked in old dirt, but there were no teeth marks, no scratches. They didn’t look like something an animal had just gnawed on. They looked… ancient. Like they’d been buried for a very, very long time.”
Takada Shōji frowned, trying to picture it. “So? Maybe the squirrel just dragged in some old animal bones with its nuts. Could be from anything.”
Yomikawa Tsuko’s voice, cold and precise, sliced through the speculation. “Or they could be human. The phalanges in a human finger match Itō-kun’s description quite closely. Such a specific structure is actually uncommon in animal skeletons.”
“Hu-human bones?!” Takada’s voice cracked. The implication hung heavy in the air. Human remains meant a possible crime, a possible death. Modern burial practices, cremation or otherwise, made it highly unlikely for human bones to just… turn up, lost in the mountains.
“Yomikawa-senpai… she’s right,” Itō Takuma admitted, a bitter twist to his lips. “Kimura looked at them again, closer this time. And he came to the same chilling conclusion. Human finger bones. He tucked them away, carefully, and decided to scout the area around the hideout.”
“That boy’s got guts, I’ll give him that,” Kana muttered, shaking her head. “Most people find human remains, they’re dialing 110 before they can blink. No wonder he wasn’t scared to be up there alone until dark.”
“Yeah, Kimura’s always been like that. Fearless to a fault,” Itō agreed. “His logic was, they weren’t fresh. If there was a body, it was ancient history. So, a little look around couldn’t hurt, right?”
“Our hideout… it’s about halfway up Karasu-Go. He started following the trails, spiraling upwards, scanning everything. It was late afternoon by then, blazing hot. He searched for a good hour, found nothing. He was just about to pack it in, call it a day, when he stumbled onto something.”
“Near the cliff edge, hidden by some overgrown bushes, he found another cave. This one… this one was different. It was clearly man-made, carved right out of the rock face. And it was huge. At least ten times bigger than our little den.”
“The second Kimura stepped inside, this wave of unnatural cold washed over him. No breeze, nothing. But the hairs on his arms stood straight up. The cave was deep, and the silence was so profound that the crunch of his own footsteps on the sandy floor sounded like gunshots, echoing into the darkness.”
“Kimura said… he said he wasn’t sure if it was just his mind playing tricks on him, but the moment he entered, he got this overwhelming feeling. Like he was being watched. By something he couldn’t see. It made him hold his breath, move like he was walking on broken glass.”
“The cave was L-shaped. Just before the bend, in the deepest part, there was this stone platform. Smooth, neatly carved. On either side of it, there were these two hollowed-out indentations, about the size of a grown man’s fist. And in the very center, a raised section, like something important used to sit there.”
“An altar?” Ōgami Yōsuke breathed, his eyes narrowed in thought.
Itō Takuma nodded vigorously. “Exactly! Kimura said it looked just like an altar. But he was dead certain, whatever was worshipped there… it was something evil.”
“Eh? How could he know that?” Takada frowned. “Could have just been the creepy atmosphere getting to him, making him imagine things.”
“It was the bowls,” Itō said, his voice dropping to a near whisper, his eyes darting around as if the unseen presence from the cave might be listening even now. “The indentations on either side of the altar. They were carved like offering bowls. And Kimura said… he said the inside of both bowls was stained this deep, sickening, blackish-red. Like they’d been filled with fresh blood, over and over, for years, until the stone itself was permanently saturated. It had to be for blood sacrifices.”
“Seeing that… even Kimura started to feel a real, primal fear. He wanted to bolt. But that damn curiosity of his… He noticed something else. In front of the altar, there was this open, flat area. And on the rock walls flanking this space, there were these circular carvings. Dozens of them, arranged in symmetrical patterns. Each one was about the size of a human head. And they looked like faces. Maybe fox faces, maybe human, it was hard to tell. They were ancient, weathered by time, the features blurred and indistinct.”
“But even faded as they were, those carvings were… deeply unsettling. Kimura said he got this horrifying illusion that the faces were alive. That their empty eyes were following him, watching him from the shadows of the rock.”
“He knew, then. This place was a site for some kind of dark, unholy ritual. Standing there, in the center of that open space, Kimura said he felt like… like he was the offering. A cold, crawling dread, unlike anything he’d ever known.”
“So, did he finally get out of there?” Kana urged, leaning forward.
“No.” Itō Takuma managed a weak, grim smile. “Kimura said… maybe he was already under some kind of spell by then. Or maybe it was just that reckless curiosity, pushing him on. He actually walked past the altar, around the bend, deeper into the cave. He had to see what other horrors were lurking back there.”
“Like I said, it was an L-shaped cave. Beyond the turn, the space opened up again. But the sunlight didn’t penetrate that far. It was almost pitch black. Kimura had to switch on his phone’s flashlight to see anything.”
Itō Takuma took a deep, shuddering breath, as if the memory itself was suffocating. “If that first chamber was for the evil rituals… then the space beyond the turn… that’s where they threw the remains. The discarded sacrifices.”
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