Pathway to Japanese Literature

I. The Locked Room of the Peacock King of Wisdom “Though I knew it to be unlawful, I withheld reporting to the jurisdictional police until Your Excellency’s arrival.” “The reason I state this is because it truly constitutes a Dharani miracle unseen in this mortal world.”

Leaving behind unmistakable traces of a Vajra Bodhisattva’s dharma body, the renowned ritual practitioner monk had been brutally torn apart, while beside him lay one of the nuns—likewise slain through an equally mysterious method of strangulation. Not only that—at the scene drifted an otherworldly scent; Brahma’s divine music had been heard; golden petals lay scattered across every surface. “Ah, Honorable Hōsui—though it goes without saying that ultimately this truth of truths will transform into a great flaming light and send tremors through all ten directions of creation… first I must entreat you to employ your unparalleled deductive methods to eradicate all baseless theories seeking to deny this miracle—”

Dear readers will doubtless scoff at this writing of Bantoku Shaba’s as a delusion typical of fanatics—one steeped in utmost absurdity and extravagance. Yet in truth, there was not a shred of falsehood within it. Thirty minutes later, Hōsui Rintarō and Prosecutor Hashikura arrived at Jakko-an nunnery in Kitayama’s Gunbai-gawara, where they now stood before two corpses that unmistakably bore the traces of a Bodhisattva’s crime. It was precisely the blazing zenith of August 13th at 3:00 PM—a furnace-like swelter—marking two hours since the discovery of the incident.

At this juncture, it seems prudent to provide a concise explanation regarding Jakko-an. This nunnery was founded by Kudō Minako—a woman who held the title of Doctor of Letters and styled herself as Bantoku Shaba—who gathered only highly educated nuns to establish it as a sanctum for esoteric Mahāvairocana teachings that openly challenged other sects to doctrinal debates. However, it was recently that an enigmatic figure emerged within this peculiar mystical order—the appearance of a miracle-working ascetic who called himself Suima Koji. Not only did he brazenly trample upon the nunnery's ironclad rules in most bizarre fashion, but Suima Koji also proclaimed himself the reincarnation of Nāgārjuna, performed oracles through various bodhisattvas and conducted inexplicable esoteric rites, gradually elevating his reputation as a thaumaturge. Moreover, he conducted all these rituals deep behind a single-layered curtain, never once revealing his true form—yet this very act conversely served to heighten the aura of mystery, causing his fervent devotees to multiply daily. At that very moment—as if timed by fate—an inconceivable murder case, one that defied all earthly logic, occurred within the temple's Hall of Dreams. And unexpectedly, this became the catalyst that led to Suima Koji's true form being exposed.

Jakko-an was a Tenpyō-period architectural structure reminiscent of Shinyakushiji Temple. In that desolate precinct, after passing a pale blue pond entirely covered with floating water chestnuts, as the wooden lattice of the veranda came into view, the line of the eaves formed a great undulating curve reminiscent of the ocean, pressing down overhead. The main hall stood at the center of the seven-building temple complex, layered like a five-peak eight-pillar turret, and at the entrance to the abbot’s quarters hung a large bronze gong shaped like a Divine Beast Mirror. And with that sound serving as the opening signal, Hōsui began to unravel the grotesque blood mandala woven by demonic shadows in the midsummer daylight.

Hōsui observed Abbess Bantoku’s cropped hair and realized this religious community consisted of nuns who retained their hair. Abbess Bantoku, though over fifty, remained greasy yet lustrous, her entire being radiating an overbearing presence. Yet as he stared, her entire face seemed to swell with unnatural intensity—but within that impression also wavered a dark, witch-like shadow, something secretive and scheming that failed to fully embody her cruel nature. Before long, Hōsui was guided into a room at the side entrance of the main hall. The room had corridors on both sides, and from the lattice windows along the outer edge beyond a single study, a dim twilight drifted in. As they entered, Abbess Bantoku pointed to the door ahead,

“Here it is,” she said in a voice like a man’s. “This hall is called the Hall of Dreams. It was formerly used as a training place for temple music and silent ascetic practices, but recently, Suima Koji has been conducting prayers and spiritual communications here…” There were black-lacquered six-paneled cabinet doors, and above the bronze hasp carved with twin lions hung a large lock. When Abbess Bantoku removed the lock and opened the door, directly ahead was a thick lattice door left half-open, and inside its black frame were lattice shutters covered with western-style paper fitted between the crossbeams. However, as the heavy lattice door opened with a clanging of metal fittings—the metallic scent receding from his nostrils—he felt an oppressive stench of sealed-in heat assault him from close by. The front was an empty room of about twenty tatami mats in size, and in the center of the ceiling—which corresponded to the wooden floor of the lower level and the second floor’s flooring—there was a finely latticed hatch door characteristic of Kantō-style storehouse architecture. As the residual glow of sunlight streamed through both lattice doors, the surrounding walls reflected it back with a dull copper hue that weighed heavily on the space. When those feeble rays struck the wall directly ahead, an uncanny vitality welled forth across the entire surface of the exposed Thousand-Armed Kannon painting. However, as Hōsui stepped over the threshold while staring at the painting, he noticed something bizarre standing at the staircase entrance to his right. In the faintly hazy gloom stood a man in monk-like attire, rigidly upright, his ascetic robe adorned with map-like bloodstains. The man knelt with both hands firmly on his hips, fixing a piercing gaze straight ahead. Yet as his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he saw something even more astonishing: the man’s legs had been severed about three sun below the kneecaps, two wooden pestle-like prosthetics propped against the wall to support his entire body. “This is Suima Koji,” Abbess Bantoku said in a dazed voice that seemed incongruous with the gruesome scene.

“What an irony—the very victim was none other than the miracle worker himself.” “However, from noon when he entered the Hall of Dreams until the discovery at 1:15 PM, there was not a single sound—not even a hoarse cry could be heard...” Though roughly the same age as Abbess Bantoku, Suima Koji’s countenance suggested a being who existed solely within calculation and greed—something utterly inhuman. Sharply angular cheekbones cut into prism-like edges, a rat-gray beard—even enumerating these features, one seemed to epitomize the jagged edges of his personality, while from another emanated nothing but a shallow whiff of heresy and blustering intimidation. Nowhere could one discern any trace of the mystic practitioner who should have been intoxicated by Om’s sacred resonance or engrossed in fiery memorial rites within crescent mandalas. Yet contrary to his visage, Suima Koji’s expressions and posture completely lacked the terror or shock typical of murder victims. More than that—wrapped in an otherworldly dreamlike aura, his eyes shining with crystalline rapture and lips gently twisted—the uncanny atmosphere radiating from him momentarily erased the bloody scene from memory. It could only be described as a pious, primal religious sentiment verging on childishness—something one might liken to blissful reverence or longing. Perhaps some unimaginable vision had manifested before Suima Koji’s eyes. Might it not speak of his obsession clinging to that apparition until his visual world reached its death throes? Yet the blood-drenched body—clad in an elbow-sleeved ascetic robe fastened with a flat braided cord—remained frozen rigid, all warmth departed. Hōsui averted his gaze from the corpse’s thighs, wiped his bloodied right palm, then began examining beneath four massive bloodstains staining the robe. Thereupon—with a heart-gripping shock—the criminal’s aberrant incantation revealed itself.

To describe the four wounds: two were located on the outer sides of both upper arms—specifically about two sun below the shoulder joints—while the remaining two were at the protrusions of the hip bones, namely the triangular area of the gluteus maximus. All were situated at the body's highest lateral protrusions, their positions perfectly symmetrical on both left and right. Moreover, what drew attention was how one pair above and below aligned at either end of a vertical line. But what shocked most was the wounds' distinct character-like shapes and their inhuman precision—as if carved by an exquisitely crafted lathe—with both left and right matching down to microscopic details. To elaborate further: The upper arm wounds appeared to have been struck by an upward-facing sharp hook-like object, their bases reaching three centimeters deep before gradually shallowing as they carved upward, terminating in six-centimeter-long gashes shaped like the Sanskrit character ※訶 (as annotated in the base text; fig45230_01.png). Next, those near the waist area formed the shape of the Sanskrit character ※ (annotated as “口＋羅”; fig45230_02.png). Their total length slightly exceeded the former's while maintaining comparable depth—though this observation alone failed to resolve matters. The questions only multiplied from there. In every case, the wound ends formed irregular stellate shapes rather than V-shapes, leaving marks as if scraped by rod-like implements. In other words, when mentally arranging these four wounds' etiologies, one could only imagine a weapon that vanished and materialized as freely as a cat's claws—one whose nature seemed fundamentally contradictory from start to finish. Hōsui turned to face Abbess Bantoku and posed his question with uncharacteristic nervousness.

“Somehow, I can’t help but think these resemble Sanskrit characters.” “It is indeed as you say.” “These are two instances of *Ra*—both containing the meaning of divine retribution through supernatural power.”

Abbess Bantoku replied with a smile that seemed oddly tinged with sarcasm. “I see.” Hōsui nodded with a somewhat pale face, then began turning his gaze back toward the corpse. Around the corpse, only scant droplets from four wounds formed sporadic stains here and there. The entire body showed the eerie emaciation characteristic of massive hemorrhage—the slackened skin rippled unnaturally, appearing uncannily translucent with a phosphorescent glow. The backs of both hands—where the left middle finger and right ring finger lacked second joints—were completely sunken between the bones, the fingertips not only tapered to a fine point and shone unnaturally, but the wooden pestle-like prosthetics below the kneecaps had withered nearly into conical shapes. From this, one could deduce that somewhere in the Hall of Dreams, a large amount of blood likely remained—and Suima Koji must have been moved from there. However, considering that each of the four wounds avoided major blood vessels and internal organs, how could such massive hemorrhage have occurred in a body that should have had no predisposition to hemophilia? That point struck him as deeply perplexing. However, apart from those four wounds—with not even a pinprick-sized injury elsewhere—Hōsui quickly finished examining the entire body.

Seeing this, Abbess Bantoku spoke. “By now you must have fully understood.” “Why we permitted Suima Koji alone to defy the nunnery’s ironclad rule...” “As you see before you, this person is neither male nor female.” “This came to pass when he sustained injuries from an exploding shell during the Sino-German War—losing both legs and a certain organ.” “Yet strangely enough, after that ordeal... manifestations of Nagarjuna Bodhisattva began appearing to him.”

“That, Abbess, is something glaringly obvious from these thighs.” Hōsui retorted feebly. “They’re twisted inward, aren’t they? If the lower limbs were intact, one would see a shape exactly like a horse’s leg. This is called ‘inverted horse foot,’ and indeed, it’s the most commonly observed phenomenon in cases of traumatic hysteria. Thus, this would first explain the abnormal rigidity, and above all, you must realize that the culprit not only exploited his unconscious state but also repurposed the devil’s claw—a term for the religious hysteria phenomena seen in so-called medieval witches—which had until then been the seed of his mysterious thaumaturgy. However, these wounds shaped like Sanskrit characters must be a feat utterly impossible for human hands.”

“Devil’s claw⁉ Is that really the case?” Abbess Bantoku trembled with anger yet laced her voice with mockery. “Then what exactly becomes of that? Have you failed to notice? From the staircase’s summit to this spot, there isn’t a single drop of blood. Tell me, Mr. Hōsui—by what method do you suppose the blood-drenched Suima Koji was transported here? And regardless of how one considers it, would the primary culprit truly be so careless as to transfer blood to their own garments—a suicidal act of sheer idiocy?”

In fact, it was exactly as Abbess Bantoku had said. The reason they hadn’t noticed until then was that the play of light made everything from the fifth or sixth step upward appear like a pool of blood. After that, Hōsui began investigating the lower floor, but all he did was break the rusted lock on the floor’s trapdoor and retrieve a few fragments of golden pigment from beneath the floorboards. And so, the investigation left the dimly lit lower floor—like a seabed made of red rocks—and was shifted to the stairs above.

However, when he reached the midpoint of the stairs, even he unwittingly froze in place. Dazzled by the sudden flash of golden heat haze that struck his eyes, not only did his awareness of this being a murder scene vanish instantly, but the delusion he had dismissed as fantasy after reading Abbess Bantoku's letter now began congealing like agar before his very eyes. The nun's corpse lying there, the ritual banners, and the sutra desk—all lay buried beneath golden petals, while hundreds of scattered fragments emanated the divine radiance of purple-gold seven treasures. Ah—could this truly be Amitabha Buddha's Pure Land of Ultimate Bliss extolled in the Contemplation Sutra and Ratnakuta Sutra⁉

The upper floor was an undecorated room, just like the lower floor. On the right-hand wall at the top of the stairs was a single small window fitted with iron bars, while the remaining three sides were enclosed by black walls coated in Tokusai lacquer. Moreover, at the far end of the landing, another staircase had been constructed—this one leading up to the attic third floor—where that section alone had been cut out, and along the right side, a protruding floor ran flush against the wall. This was because the third floor’s structure followed the so-called divine horse stable construction. Consequently, approximately a quarter of the area near the floor there had been cut out in a rectangular shape, so when one looked up, a massive beam resembling a dragon’s body could be seen faintly glowing in the upper darkness. Now, Hōsui picked up and examined each one of the scattered golden pigment fragments individually. However, some bore bloodstains on their surfaces while others did not, and with these two types chaotically intermingled, it was undoubtedly impossible to reconstruct the original form of the blood traces anymore. However, when one looked at the four fallen ritual banners, they retained mere specks of golden pigment here and there, nearly stripped bare to nakedness, with the mandala’s dried stems exposed. From this alone, it was clear that these countless fragments had once been part of the ritual banners’ fabric. Yet on the golden pigment, there were no footprints, and not a single scratch marred the mandala’s surface. How on earth had the golden pigment been stripped away—and by what method had this scattering of petals been achieved?!

Hōsui scraped the golden pigment together into a single pile and began his investigation. Only a few bloodstains remained on the floor, but to describe the upper room’s layout—at the center was a grid-shaped trapdoor cut exactly as seen from below, and behind it lay two of Suima Koji’s prosthetic legs, crafted to fit snugly below the kneecaps. Ahead lay two ritual platforms woven in a bamboo-case pattern, with one Flame Drum at their left end and a shō lying at its base. At the center of the two ritual platforms was placed a sutra desk bearing a Five-Pronged Vajra Bell and sutra texts, while at the end of the right platform sat an antique-looking oil clock. It was a mechanism where oil was filled into a bell-shaped glass cylinder marked with gradations, the oil in the middle flowing to the wick at the end of a long handle, with time measured by the decrease in oil accompanying its ignition. However, by that time, the light had already gone out, and strangely enough, the gauge pointed to two o'clock. And by noting the “Five Secrets Mandala” hanging scroll displayed at the far end of the ritual platforms, the entire explanation of the layout would be complete.

The corpse of nun Jōzen lay supine, the eyes wide open, the head facing the stairs and ankles resting on the ritual platform, limbs slightly splayed and stretched out. She was around thirty and not particularly beautiful, but the peaceful death face seemed to carry a solemn quality—something akin to serene contemplation. Moreover, there was no rigor mortis yet, and a faint body warmth still remained, but above all, two astonishing marks had been imprinted. One of these was the presence of ligature marks on unusual areas of the limbs—each left at the midpoint of the upper arms and approximately two inches above the kneecaps on the thighs. Next were even more grotesque marks: four slender fork-like indentations deeply embedded from the throat to below both ears, appearing as if someone had strangled there, each pair imprinted in two parallel lines. Moreover, that all four had been applied simultaneously became evident from how each mark’s end lay atop a single bloodstain without disturbing it in the slightest. Moreover, apart from those, there wasn’t a single abrasion.

“This is horrible!” In a voice strained with effort, Hōsui said, “Not only is the cartilage completely shattered, but there’s even a dislocation in the cervical vertebrae.” “How could such a terrifying force—one beyond our very imagination—exist?” “But these are definitely not marks left by a hard, heavy object.” “These are unmistakably marks left by human fingers,” he said before turning to the prosecutor. “Now, Hashikura, I don’t think we can possibly assign an exact definition to this corpse’s cause of death.” “Indeed, there’s subcutaneous hemorrhaging and swelling—the signs of strangulation are unmistakably evident.” “However, the strange thing is that there are no signs of convulsions—which should always accompany death by asphyxiation.” “And there are no signs of resistance—she died with this peaceful expression on her face.” “Moreover, if you compare the gourd-shaped bloodstain on Suima Koji’s robe with the two scattered on Jōzen’s collar—one shows yellow plasma oozing out to form that shape.” “However, when it comes to this corpse, it is completely absent.” “In other words, even from that single fact alone, it can be proven that the time between Suima Koji’s death and Jōzen’s was by no means immediate.” “However, if that’s the case, a new enigma naturally arises—what on earth was Jōzen doing during that interval?”

“Then the poison—” Prosecutor Hashikura began, but Hōsui cut him off, “However, Hashikura, there’s a monstrous paradox here.” “Though it seems utterly impossible, this woman must have remained conscious until her final moment.” “So if an autopsy fails to prove any poison causing sudden glandular contraction, Jōzen likely endured humanity’s greatest terror during that interval. Doesn’t that chill you?” “With her paralyzed body—only those eyes open—she must have stared fixedly at the gruesome spectacle until hands closed around her neck,” he concluded, rubbing the corpse’s eyeball.

“Look here—there’s no moisture at all.” “And doesn’t it look exactly like wood being polished?” “Generally speaking, a corpse’s mucosa drying after death is the usual course of things.” “But for it to become this severe in just two hours or so probably falls under an exceptional case.” “Moreover, the blood droplets that fell on the eyeball haven’t spread at all.” “Then you’d realize the tear ducts have contracted to an extreme degree.” “In other words, all of this is the product of an abnormal psychological terror, causing the terminal ducts of blood vessels and glands to rapidly constrict.” “However, even if that were the case, the fact that Jōzen was not unconscious during that interval is made abundantly clear by the mere absence of convulsion marks—that single detail alone suffices.”

However, when Hōsui stood up, he shuddered violently—his complexion clearly told of facing a formidable problem.

“But Hashikura, more importantly—where on earth did all that blood go?”

“Hmm, I certainly think we need to measure the external blood volume.” “Sucking might work, but even a vampire would trigger an immediate dreadful physiological reaction in a human,” the prosecutor muttered with feigned reasonableness, which Hōsui met with a derisive look.

“However, in this case, we don’t need Professor Teamke who worked in Polna. Even if we gathered all the scattered golden pigment here, it likely wouldn’t amount to two hundred grams.” After remaining lost in thought with tobacco held between his lips, Hōsui eventually picked up one of the ritual banners. All four banners shared identical dimensions—approximately two shaku wide and seven shaku tall. Their upper thirds featured embroidered Burmese-style Nyoirin Kannon figures seated in half-lotus posture. Only the right index finger pointing at the face protruded, reinforced against breakage by a thin copper plate wrapped in diamond patterns. Beneath this, five finely woven bamboo lattice banners hung centered in a row, each perforated with sun-disc-shaped holes. Remarkably lightweight at six to seven hundred monme each—and conspicuously thicker than standard mandalas—they clearly consisted not of lotus fibers but some other plant’s dried stems. According to Abbess Bantoku’s testimony, they had been seamlessly joined without knots from end to end. Yet when Hōsui attempted fastening one from the third-floor overhang to the platform’s front cord, it left a five-sun gap above the floor. He then pressed a banner’s thick hem-fold against Jōzen’s strangulation marks—the shapes matched strikingly, but both thickness and length proved hopelessly inadequate for comparison. Disappointment plain on his face, Hōsui began pacing until discovering a hole behind the Flame Drum’s mounting. He turned to question Abbess Bantoku.

“This is a speaking tube,” Abbess Bantoku explained in her archaic religious register. “To the right of the ritual platform sat Jōzen, while to the left near the Flame Drum was positioned Suima Koji’s seat. Thus would one hear the sacred words of Nagarjuna manifesting through Suima Koji from the tube’s terminus within the study.” “Today marked Sister Fukō’s turn for this duty,” she continued before commencing her account of events with monastic precision.

When symptoms manifested in Suima Koji, Abbess Bantoku and Jōzen brought him into the Hall of Dreams. The abbess filled the oil clock with oil up to the midnight mark, lit it, and departed the Hall at 12:05. Then, as soon as they exited through the door, the shō began to play—though the Flame Drum’s sound was absent—and that shō continued for only two or three minutes. Afterward, until Sister Chibon discovered the incident at 1:15, not a single sound was heard. As for the nuns’ whereabouts at the time—Abbess Bantoku was in her private quarters, Fukō in the study, Jakuren in the distant sutra repository, and Chibon was redecorating the main hall…… Furthermore, regarding changes within the Hall of Dreams following the incident—there were only two: a small window had been opened, and the oil clock had stopped at 1:30.

When he finished the above questioning, Hōsui began to move again.

“Well then, Hashikura, let’s search for traces of Suima Koji’s skin adhering to the floor.”

However, that search ended in vain; under the sweltering midsummer sun, nothing that should have been adhering to the mirror panel was discovered. However, in the end, the prosecutor’s eyes froze on a single point on the floor. When Hōsui peered obliquely at the spot he had mutely pointed to, he felt as if he had heard his own heartbeat. Beginning from the ritual platform where Suima Koji had been sitting on the left side, faint skin traces dotted their way toward the direction of the third-floor staircase. Centered around a clustered mass in the middle, there were three arrowhead-shaped marks ahead and one behind—each forming a four-star pattern—whose configuration could only be that of a giant bird’s footprint. Moreover, having advanced from the front, they had come to a halt at the edge of the ritual platform. Following them in reverse, they finally climbed all the way up the third-floor staircase and came to a stop before a bamboo mat laid along the wall from the protruding floor.

The prosecutor involuntarily choked his voice as he looked up at the wall ahead. Until then, the many mysteries that had been scattered and separate coalesced there into a single form. The Brahmi-shaped wounds, the disappearance of blood, the inexplicable strangulation marks imprinted on Jōzen’s throat… Could it be that all these elements—every last one—were narrated within the darkened grand painting of the “Peacock King of Wisdom,” who rode a peacock and bore four arms? Within a large painting approximately four shaku in height and three shaku in width was depicted a grotesque female-bodied Buddha seated in lotus position upon a peacock’s back—the Indian peacock spreading its wings across the entire frame—her four hands holding sacred jewels aloft while forming the gesture of preaching. It was a dark beauty—thoroughly esoteric, pathological, and hysterical. Moreover, the red lead pigment colored the center of the feather wheel in a core-like shape, and only those vivid elliptical points floated up from the darkness—a murk diluted as if with blood. However, that demonic aura—reminiscent of a Zen master’s bark and inherent to esoteric Buddhism—in this case did not remain mere atmosphere. Within it, the various bizarre characteristics left by the crime corresponded one by one and materialized, and they were being enumerated in countless numbers.

“Indeed, this is a splendid creation by the culprit.” “In this case, one can only conclude that a peacock escaped from the painting, descended the stairs, and not only mauled Suima Koji with its sharp claws—but that the four-armed bodhisattva on its back then strangled Jōzen,” Hōsui murmured in a dreamlike tone. But immediately afterward, he smiled coldly at Abbess Bantoku. “However, Abbess, the conclusion of this fairy-tale drama will ultimately end up at the assumption of the Bodhisattva’s murder.” “However, the more I think about it, the more I find myself compelled toward that paradoxical interpretation.”

“Very well—what exactly are you trying to imply?” Abbess Bantoku resolutely raised her head.

“In short—it’s a case of theomanic delusion.” “This is a factual account from Bowman’s *Psychic Contagion in Religious Crimes*—at the dawn of the sixteenth century in Zurich’s Roman Catholic church, what was called a miracle manifested.” “One August evening, the chapel’s holy statue suddenly vanished, replaced by a flesh-and-blood Jesus lying beneath the cross as a divine corpse—identical to the statue down to every wound.” “Moreover, these wounds weren’t injuries made externally but had risen from within the skin in mottled patterns.” “Naturally, the city fell into uproar—but more mysteriously still, by next morning this Jesus corpse had vanished without trace, leaving the original wooden Jesus hanging on the cross as before.” “Yet this mystery—venerated as a miracle for three centuries—was finally solved by Jastrow at the nineteenth century’s end.” “You’re likely familiar with the psychological term ‘stigmata’—that professor at the French college identified a country girl and discovered a perverse psychological phenomenon caused by obsessive icon-gazing.” “And so—” Hōsui began, his face blazing with something akin to murderous intensity. “Now consider Switzerland then—under invasion by Anabaptist Protestants, Catholicism’s stronghold teetered on collapse.” “Thus people gradually came to suspect this ‘miracle’ might be the bishop’s treacherous plot.” “And so in this case too—I envision a vicious theomanic delusion.”

Throughout this exchange, Abbess Bantoku had simply looked dumbfounded as she stared at his face, but now she flashed a sardonic smile and declared: "In that case, Mr. Hōsui—if I am to be equated with that bishop—where exactly did I enter from and exit to? To tell the truth, I intentionally left the lattice gate at the entrance half-open even now. The sound of that lattice gate resounds all the way to the riverbed, and the zushi door’s lock remained engaged at the time. Moreover, when Sister Chibon entered, someone was playing the shō on the second floor. You do realize, Mr. Hōsui—this Hall of Dreams was a locked room. In that sealed chamber, who could have been present besides the Peacock King of Wisdom and his attendant birds?"

A locked room—and within it, a large amount of blood had vanished—. Even Hōsui, for all his usual composure, abruptly came to a standstill, his face now vividly showing signs of shame and agitation.

II. The Secret of the Flame Drum

After Abbess Bantoku left, they continued investigating a section of the third floor but found nothing there. When they descended again to the second floor, Hōsui pointed at the oil clock and said.

“All I’ve determined is this much. Why does the oil clock—which had vanished when discovered at 1:15—now indicate 2:00… That’s the crux.” “From this deranged progression, we can discern when the culprit opened the small window.” “Then perhaps it disappeared when the golden petals scattered—wouldn’t that be so?” “Hmm, that seems plausible initially…” Hōsui nodded absently. “But the true issue lies within this oil container… As you observe now, there’s a single detachable limb from a long-legged mosquito caught about five *bu* above the oil’s surface.” The hooked portion faced upward, tilted diagonally to the right. “Yet the torso isn’t in that direction—rather opposite, floating an inch left of the limb on the oil’s surface.” From this, one could deduce the torso had circled the container multiple times. “In short—evidence of a countercurrent.” “Fundamentally, oil clocks are highly temperature-sensitive devices unusable except at night with lamplight. Thus we must consider sunlight exposure.” “To put it plainly—when the mosquito corpse descended to the hooked limb’s position as oil diminished… That’s when the culprit opened the window.” “Sunlight striking the container’s lower portion would heat the oil upward, inevitably forming a countercurrent along the surface edge.” “Moreover, as oil outflow progressively intensified, time advanced abnormally.” “Therefore, Prosecutor Hashikura—we conclude the window was opened around 12:40.”

“I see.” “However, I suspect the culprit’s reason for opening the window wasn’t limited to that alone.” “Or perhaps… to discard the murder weapon…?”

Hōsui interrupted that with a feeble laugh.

“Then go ahead and search—it’s absolutely impossible, you know. Even just seeing how the Sanskrit characters’ shapes align symmetrically, I had already concluded that this case’s murder weapon was not something wielded by human hands—. But more importantly, Prosecutor Hashikura—how were the peacock’s footprints made? Isn’t that the question? For example, even if someone were to make Suima Koji walk, all that would be imprinted is a mere triangular mark from his kneecap.”

“Then what are you suggesting?”

“Hmm, this is an extremely outlandish notion—but in essence, I want Suima Koji to perform a handstand.” “And not even placing his full palms down—balancing his entire weight on the bases of his fingers.” “Don’t be ridiculous.” Prosecutor Hashikura’s face twisted in exasperation as he barked the words.

“But Prosecutor Hashikura,” Hōsui began, his face drawn taut with seriousness as he descended the stairs step by step, “essentially, there exists no other part of Suima Koji’s body that could theoretically produce such an effect.” “The reason lies in what are called ‘light fingers’ manifesting on Suima Koji’s right middle finger and left ring finger—both severed at the second joint.” “Since the nerve trunk was damaged by shrapnel at its base, as you observed earlier, the fingertips have grown slender and pointed, emitting a bluish-white glow.” “However, unlike with major nerve trunks, battlefield hospitals would never consider performing sheath surgeries or such procedures—yet once the wound heals, daily movements become possible without impairment.” “In other words, this occurs due to what Rechewan termed the nerve compensatory function.” “The surrounding nerves—their fibers barely touching—transmit nutrients and vibrations, thereby compensating for that moribund state.” “Yet this phenomenon appears even in experimental reports on traumatic hysteria patients… When surrounding nerves become paralyzed, occasionally only those isolated nerves—receiving vibrations from other muscles—may perform truly inexplicable movements.” “You see, Prosecutor Hashikura—if one could engineer such an outlandish mechanism there, might not Suima Koji have suddenly performed a handstand and begun walking while leaving those peacock footprints behind?”

After leaving the Hall of Dreams, they proceeded directly to Sister Fukō’s quarters. Sister Fukō had regained consciousness some time earlier but remained unable to rise due to severe fatigue. Nearing forty with features marked by contemplation and intellect, she kept her chin buried in the futon’s collar yet maintained precise responses.

“I never imagined a realm of slaughter could exist within Buddha’s palm.” “I heard Suima Koji’s voice crying out sorrowfully.”

“What? You heard the voice?”

“Yes.” “I heard the latticed door click as Abbess Bantoku left the Hall of Dreams. It happened shortly after.” “When the shō began playing, there came a heavy thud—like someone stomping on the floorboards.” “Then, just as the second thud sounded, an eerie drone reverberated through the air… and with that, the shō fell silent.” “About twenty minutes later, I heard Suima Koji cry out about four hands—the upstairs one ended there—and then it echoed up again through the speaking tube downstairs.”

“So, there are two speaking tubes, then.” “Yes, the lower one is located midway down the stairs, between a horizontal board and the wall—a rather inconspicuous spot.” “And then Suima Koji spoke in a low voice this time.” Sister Fukō’s voice quivered faintly, a strange light drifting in her eyes. “‘The jewel has vanished, yet the peacock remains in the sky’—that’s what he said. But soon after that came a sound like something light scattering on the second floor. When it stopped, the shō began playing again—though naturally there was what you might call a pause for breath first.” “Yet the sound ceased abruptly when the latticed door opened.” “There’s nothing more I can tell you...”

“Thank you.” “By the way—have you viewed Suima Koji’s corpse?” Hōsui abruptly interjected with an incongruous question. “Ah... Earlier, I was with Sister Jakuren...” “And so I became utterly exhausted—though...”

“So what did you see in Suima Koji’s traveling robe sleeve?” “Ah… Not at all…” “I know nothing of such matters,” Sister Fukō snapped abruptly, suddenly turning her head away to bury it in the futon collar.

“Two speaking tubes…”

As they stepped into the corridor, Hōsui let slip a meaningful remark. But when he noticed a nearby room, he turned to the prosecutor and said, “What do you say, Prosecutor Hashikura? Let’s conduct the remaining interrogations seated here on this Tenpyō-era chair.”

The first one called in, Sister Jakuren, was a woman of formidable presence. She was likely only twenty-six or twenty-seven, yet as one observed her, she seemed enveloped by something sublime and otherworldly—an almost inhuman quality so translucent it felt she might dissolve into air at any moment. However, this angelic woman serving as the librarian—after stating that she had been in the sutra repository at the time of the incident—proceeded to present an astonishing theory regarding Suima Koji’s cause of death.

“I believe Suima Koji himself fashioned an exquisitely bizarre tomb and entered suspended animation within it.” “Without doubt, that person shall assuredly be resurrected.” “As for Sister Jōzen’s death, Sister Chibon possesses a substantiated theory, though…” “What do you mean—‘suspended animation’?” “You did unequivocally say ‘suspended animation’ moments ago.” Prosecutor Hashikura rounded his eyes interrogatively.

“That is correct.” “In reality, as evidence of this, his internal organs remain undamaged, and despite there having been virtually no blood loss, a state of collapse that would suggest massive hemorrhage has manifested,” Sister Jakuren declared flatly. “Then that would mean you have not read Hannish’s Apocalypse, have you? “What of yogic breathing techniques?” “What of Beelzebub’s sorcery?” “And what of the writings of Daruvira and Tyler?”

“Regrettably, I have yet to read any of them,” Hōsui answered bluntly and brusquely. But then his demeanor shifted abruptly to one of challenge as he continued, “However, Sister Jakuren—Suima Koji’s internal organs must be torn to pieces within less than six hours.”

“What?! An autopsy?!” Sister Jakuren seemed so shocked she nearly recoiled, and a disturbance akin to dizziness began coursing through her entire body. “Why must you insert a blade into a living body? Just as Abbess Bantoku believes in the blood-sucking legend of the Dai Kichigi Shinju Sutra, you too are about to commit a grave error. That makes you a lawful murderer.” “If that is what determines the truth or falsehood of the evidence… I have no objection whatsoever.” Hōsui coldly declared. “It was Voltaire, wasn’t it? ‘If you mix in strychnine, even an incantation can kill a person’—that’s what he said.”

Sister Jakuren’s face contorted into a mask of tragic shadows as she glared at Hōsui with seething hatred, then she violently slammed the sliding door shut and stormed out of the room.

“Tell me, Prosecutor Hashikura—that woman was unquestionably invested in Suima Koji’s brand of sorcery.” “Doesn’t it strike you that this temple stands divided into two factions?” “Therein lies our motive—”

When Hōsui said that, Sister Chibon entered. The woman with faint stubble growing and a masculine build sat down, requested tobacco, and began puffing away while—

“Does it not strike you as absurd? If Suima Koji were truly an incarnation of Nagarjuna, why didn’t he scatter seven mustard seeds to break the locked room, as he did when he shattered the Iron Stupa of South India?” “Indeed, that is an interesting theory. By the way, you seem to know something about Jōzen’s cause of death.” “To tell the truth, I didn’t tell anyone, but I saw the culprit.” “What?!” The prosecutor involuntarily dropped his tobacco, but Sister Chibon began to speak calmly.

“When the shō signaled completion, I took the shrine door key from the key box and opened the lattice gate. Then upon the ceiling grid appeared a shadow frantically performing intricate motions.” “And at once, the shō that had been sounding ceased abruptly.” “But noticing Suima Koji nearby at that moment, I stood frozen there awhile.” “Yet soon regaining my wits, when I climbed up to inspect the stairtop, Sister Jōzen lay indecorously on her back—face veiled by both sleeves.” “Ah yes—though there was no one downstairs then…”

“If that’s the case, the current state of Jōzen’s corpse would differ,” said Prosecutor Hashikura as he looked at Hōsui—and Hōsui too now wore a face of bristling horror.

“Whether Jōzen was still alive at that time, or whether the corpse moved—that’s what it comes down to.” “But before rigor mortis sets in, it shouldn’t budge an inch.”

“Exactly.” “Jōzen was alive at that time and was killed afterward.” Sister Chibon declared in a forceful, incisive tone. “After all, there’s no reason she would stand frozen beside Suima Koji while witnessing his magical murder right before her eyes.” “Moreover, when I rushed out right after that and reported the matter to Abbess Bantoku, she entered the Hall of Dreams and didn’t come out for quite some time.” “Sister Jakuren and I went to check afterward, but at that time, the only thing was that Sister Jōzen’s posture had changed—there were no other abnormalities to speak of.” “In other words, Sister Jōzen killed Suima Koji, and then Abbess Bantoku killed that Jōzen.” “At any rate, there’s no flaw in this logic.” “Probably, with that, Abbess Bantoku intended to produce opium so she could see the finest dream.”

And then, Sister Chibon left, guffawing loudly. Hōsui stood up simultaneously.

“I’ll go inspect Toriwatari Kyōzō. You—kindly obtain from Abbess Bantoku a detailed account of the essential points concerning Jōzen’s corpse.”

About an hour later, no sooner had the second lattice door clanged than Hōsui reappeared. And then, he said in a courteous tone to Prosecutor Hashikura and the old nun, who were glaring at each other with faces like beasts, “Please rest assured. Sister Chibon’s prejudice has now been completely dispelled.” “Hashikura-kun, Jōzen was indeed already dead when discovered,” he placed a book on the table and said, “Among the books you collected, there was one that proved highly informative.” “This is Lops St. John’s *Wild Hunts in the Uebi Region*.”

“So what?”

“Within it there is a passage that states as follows: ‘During my hunt by the lakeside, one of the tribesmen conducted a predawn antelope hunt for our breakfast.’” “‘However, when they placed an antelope struck by a curare-poisoned arrow near a captured hyena’s cage—one they had assumed lay dead and motionless—its pupils suddenly shifted, revealing terror.’” “Hey Prosecutor Hashikura, Jōzen was first felled by an arrowhead coated with trace curare.” “Meaning her motor nerves were paralyzed like the antelope’s—she couldn’t move a muscle while her eyes remained fixedly watching that horrific murder unfold.”

“Don’t be absurd!” Prosecutor Hashikura fired back a retort, seizing the moment. “Where exactly is the external injury?” “It’s hidden within the short hairs at the nape of the neck,” Hōsui said as he opened his palm, revealing a four-sun-long hair tip cleverly fashioned into a needle. “Now, as for how I discovered it—it was from the strange sound that Sister Fukō said she heard while the shō was sounding. She said there was a thud-like sound, as if someone had stepped on the wooden floor—twice—and right after the second one, she heard a droning hum. Let us suppose that someone struck the drum after pulling its skins tightly inward from both sides to completely prevent any vibration. And if that binding were released a second time, wouldn’t a hum arise from the vibrations of the dent returning to its original state—exactly like what was described?” Sure enough, when I examined the Flame Drum based on that idea, there were indeed three needle-sized holes there. “In other words, two of them were marks from threads that had tightly pulled both sides of the skin, while in the third one, a simple wire-made crossbow mechanism had been inserted—utilizing the recoil when the thread was cut by the second strike of the drumstick, returning both sides to their original state.”

And then, once the temporal contradictions surrounding Jōzen’s cause of death had been resolved, Hōsui spoke again to Abbess Bantoku. “In any case, based on that discovery alone, the suspicion against you becomes less substantial. In other words, what Sister Chibon saw would be the shadow of the culprit who was playing the shō—but then, even if we suppose that the culprit who moved Jōzen’s corpse hid on the third floor at that moment—how on earth did they escape from that place? The problem once again hits a dead end with the locked room.”

“Would that not be, in other words, the divine miracle of the Peacock King of Wisdom?” Abbess Bantoku insisted without pause, arching her eyebrows obstinately as she continued asserting the miracle’s existence.

Hōsui responded to that with a sneer.

“However, I must ask you not to misunderstand this one point.” “Even you—merely being released from Sister Chibon’s speculation, that is, escaping a false theory—do not equate to vanishing from correct deductions.” “After all, when it comes to the other three, there’s nothing that definitively proves their movements at the time.” “In due time, when I dissect the locked room, I’ll have the four faces reflected anew upon the pus.”

After Abbess Bantoku left, Hōsui took out a single piece of paper from his pocket. On it were written the following characters.

A reddish-black bat amid yellow spots: Abbess Bantoku

An entirely dark brown gourd—Sister Jakuren A pitch-black map of the vicinity of the English Channel—Sister Chibon

Sister Fukō did not answer. “Ah, a psychological test…” As Prosecutor Hashikura murmured without posing the question aloud, it became clear that Hōsui had imprinted some frenzied possession upon this single leaf of paper.

“Hmm, there was a gourd-shaped bloodstain on Suima Koji’s right sleeve, wasn’t there? That’s the impression I sought out. With this, you can discern each person’s position when they received their strongest impression and approximate the time. Abbess Bantoku saw hers while descending the stairs under frontal lighting. Sister Jakuren and Sister Chibon viewed theirs from the side—the colors differed based on sunlight angles. Now, what conclusions will emerge from this? At present, I haven’t the faintest notion. But compiling this required tremendous sacrifice—I promised Sister Jakuren not to dissect Suima Koji’s corpse.”

3. The True Form of the Blood-Sucking Bodhisattva

Three days later, Hōsui and the prosecutor once again made their way to Jakko-an. But the only information he had obtained by then was that Sister Jakuren—who clung to belief in Yoga-style suspended animation—had begun a ghastly vigil over Suima Koji’s corpse laid out in the underground chamber. From the sight of her neither eating nor sleeping, one would sense an eerie, chilling aura—enough to shudder merely at hearing of it.

By the time the two arrived at Jakko-an, the world was a viscous, windless calm—the very harbinger of a thunderstorm.

However, upon entering, they immediately called Sister Fukō. However, only Hōsui left the room the moment the guiding nun departed and did not return until well after Sister Fukō had arrived.

“I want you alone to listen and recall the sounds you overheard from the speaking tube at that time. Now, before that—how exactly did the criminal escape from the locked room?—I shall begin by explaining that.”

Ah—Hōsui had indeed solved the mystery of the locked room without anyone realizing. What on earth was the criminal’s magic that he began to explain?

“The reason I was able to construct this theory stems from the sensation evoked by what we call a multi-faced, multi-armed Buddha.” “Now, as you know, in the Hall of Dreams hangs an image of the Eleven-Faced Thousand-Armed Kannon on the lower floor’s front wall—nearly life-sized in appearance.” “And I became aware of that sensation precisely around half past four on the day of the incident.” “At that moment, the lattice window’s pattern was reflected upon the black-lacquered surface of the miniature shrine door.” “However, when I then opened the lattice door, I witnessed a peculiar movement occurring in the Thousand-Armed Kannon opposite.” “This happened because I first fixated on the lattice pattern reflected on the shrine door before observing the vertical bars within the lattice door itself.” “In essence—the afterimage of the lattice became trapped between those vertical bars—and at that instant when I opened the door, a real image and an afterimage necessarily intersected, producing what we call a zoetrope phenomenon.” “You might assume this effect would cease once the lattice door moved from view—yet in truth, it persisted for some time afterward.” “The rotation likely continued due to its influence on our visual axis—thus maintaining its prior motion.” “Now—what phenomenon do you suppose manifested in that Eleven-Faced Thousand-Armed Kannon before us?” “The seven arms raised at the shoulders and four lowered near the waist… each coalesced into single hands that seemed to sway laterally—an optical illusion.” “This occurred because vertical lines matching the afterimage rows appeared mobile to observers—and simultaneously, every line and fold across its form began an eerie undulation.” “When I realized this—I thought it might hold the key to unlocking our locked room.” “Yet at that moment of discovery—the timing proved unfavorable—the sunlight through the lattice window had already retreated.” “Thus—I found myself compelled to seek a new filter there once more.” “However—within Jōzen’s corpse upstairs lay a bizarre mechanism—one that imparted motion to the image while concealing a white-robed figure within its blinding glare—”

“What on earth are you saying?” Prosecutor Hashikura involuntarily lost his composure and shouted. “That’s right, Prosecutor Hashikura.” “That corpse—no, the living body that couldn’t move—rotated, you see.” “Surely you remember those rope marks left on peculiar parts of the limbs.” “The reason the criminal bound those areas was that tightly constricting parts of the extremities during mental agitation obstructs blood circulation, causing severe stiffness in those regions.” “A similar example appears in prison doctors’ reports—when binding the wrists of prisoners who’ve nearly lost all sensation before execution, all their fingers supposedly stiffen out and snap rigid.” “In this case too, before committing that bizarre suffocation, the criminal had tied strings to Jōzen’s limbs.” “To explain in detail: first, they raised both knees and elbows, then tightly bound her arms below the upper arms and her limbs slightly above the kneecaps on the thighs using what’s commonly called a monster knot.” “Then they connected the right knee to the left arm and the right arm to the left knee with those bindings, twisted the two strings together at the center and pulled them taut—leaving Jōzen in a posture extremely conducive to rotation, much like a trussed-up monkey.” “When left like that, as the stiffness began setting in, the joints naturally tried extending in different directions.” “The two strings twisted in opposite ways, making Jōzen’s body start rotating.” “And by the time the stiffness peaked and snapped taut, with acceleration added, it spun like a top.” Once this became clear, there had been something whirling within the solitary beam of light from the lattice door—like a film projector’s filter. One would immediately realize this could only be Jōzen. “Of course, this created a motion illusion in the Thousand-Armed Kannon, robbing witnesses of detailed perception.” “In truth, the criminal had stood before the image in a simple disguise matching the statue’s robe lines.” “Prior to that, they first rotated the corpse and released the strings at its peak—naturally, we must assume the spin continued awhile due to momentum.” “Then, as the time approached when the sho would sound, the criminal seized the moment and descended downstairs.” However, when Sister Chibon entered, she immediately noticed the Thousand-Armed Kannon undulating eerily—but having seen this phenomenon repeatedly, it had become a mental blind spot she naturally ignored while mistakenly believing downstairs to be empty. A moment later, she spotted a moving shadow upstairs—yet peering through the lattice from below, she only glimpsed something shadow-like flicker there without bothering to investigate.

“That’s because she discovered the grotesque Suima Koji lying on his side.” “From this, we can deduce that placing Suima Koji at the stair landing served almost entirely to immediately divert the witness’s attention—preventing exposure of the filter’s true nature.” “Thus, using an intricate mechanism to induce optical illusions, they slipped out through the opened lattice door when Sister Chibon eventually went upstairs…” “Now, the remaining mystery boils down to one question—how was the shō sounded?” “There’s no way a criminal hiding downstairs could play the shō upstairs. And if we suppose someone was actually on the second floor, that would mean building another locked room within the original one.”

"Hmm, the only reason Jōzen's posture changed is because the unnaturally induced rigor mortis relaxed after death." "I understand that much, but..." As Prosecutor Hashikura voiced his agreement, a pallid light flashed like a white-hot blade and thunder began to roar. Hōsui—who detested thunderstorms—flinched slightly, his face growing even paler from the shock as he fixed Sister Fukō with an intensity bordering on ferocity.

“Therefore, I wish to deliver my final verdict, but before doing so, I shall recount the results of a psychological test I secretly conducted the other day.” “The basis lies in how each person’s differing impressions of viewing the gourd-shaped bloodstain on Suima Koji’s traveling robe served as predisposing factors.” “Yet you alone answered that you were unaware of it—did you not?” “I detected an abnormal resonance in your claim of ignorance toward such a distinctive shape and immediately commenced its analysis.” “What I realized was that your objectives and mine were fundamentally divergent.” “To rephrase—you have fallen perfectly into my snare.” “To speak truthfully, the genuine purpose behind employing that psychological test lay not in the gourd-shaped bloodstain at all, but rather in the groove wedged between what Sister Chibon described as a map of the English Channel vicinity and the lower bloodstain.” “What you professed ignorance of was precisely that U-shaped groove.” “Now then, Sister Fukō—association constitutes an extraordinarily precise form of psychochemistry.” “Had those two speaking tubes been connected, they would have formed a U-shaped conduit.” “While various phenomena could be imagined with such a U-tube, let us first hypothesize fashioning a harpoon at one end of a speaking tube.” “Then, were one to install a mechanism nearby that violently impacted air into it—what manner of acoustic phenomenon would emerge from the second-floor aperture as mere trivial noise vibrated the air column within? You must have understood this long since.” “No—there exists no necessity for me to laboriously expound upon your sorcery that conjured that shō’s mirage here.” “After all, you confessed it already through unspoken admission.”

Caught in Hōsui’s logic and clever trap, Sister Fukō seemed poised to collapse on the spot without offering the slightest resistance. However, contrary to all expectations, her attitude visibly hardened until she finally stood up with a solemn expression.

“No, I couldn’t care less whatever may come.” “Even if I am framed as the culprit, so long as you can provide counterevidence to these traces of evil unbecoming of a bodhisattva…” “However, as long as the bloodsucking traces left by the Peacock King of Wisdom remain a mystery, don’t you think the sacrifices you’re forced to make for your pride seem far too costly?” “Rather than that, the revival of Suima Koji that Sister Jakuren anticipates appears to be approaching the truth.” “Since it shows no signs of decay whatsoever amidst this sweltering heat.”

And so, just as Hōsui’s efforts finally ended in vain and the locked room downstairs was solved, yet another new one had been constructed on the floor above. However, Hōsui showed not the slightest concern. That day, without meeting anyone else, he conducted only a reinvestigation of the sutra repository before departing through the roaring tempest.

However, on the fifth night thereafter, when Prosecutor Hashikura—having been suddenly summoned—visited Hōsui’s private residence, he spoke with a triumphant smile on his utterly haggard cheeks.

“As expected, Prosecutor Hashikura, I am a thinking machine.” “When I sequester myself in the study, my faculties acquire an uncanny potency.” “At last I’ve wrenched free the four arms of the Peacock King of Wisdom.” “Yet this was no fortuitous revelation—that peculiar rotation of Jōzen’s proved the vital clue.”

Then, Hōsui’s unfolding deductions swiftly tore down the grand temple-like structure the criminal had erected. And thus, The Dream Hall Murder Case finally revealed its full form under the merciless daylight. “Now, whether it’s you or anyone else, you’d inevitably reach an impasse.” “Once we confirm Sister Jōzen performed that magical rotation, your first instinct would be to attribute the scattered gold leaf to centrifugal force—wouldn’t you?” “Yet those four jade banners trouble me—even if rotated, such lightweight objects clearly lack adequate separating power.” “You’re forced to regretfully abandon that most obvious approach.” “But suppose we endowed those banners with mass and expansion—what then?”

“What?! Weight and expansion?!” The prosecutor shouted with a look of bewilderment.

“Yeah, that’s right, Prosecutor Hashikura. Ultimately, it was within such an assumption that the criminal’s terrifying intellect lay concealed.” “In any case, let us proceed to methodically dissect the crime step by step.” Now, it should be evident that the culprit had been hiding within the Hall of Dreams since just before the incident, given that no solid alibis could be established for everyone’s movements at the time. But rather, that very fact could be said to form a paradoxical basis in this case. And as for where they had been hiding—given that the Hall of Dreams at that time was a mystical world illuminated by a single oil lamp—that hardly bears repeating. Now, after confirming that Jōzen’s collapse and Suima Koji’s seizure had taken full effect, the culprit combined the four jade banners to form a square—orienting the convex side of the embroidered Buddha’s fingers inward—and hung it beneath the third floor’s cantilevered floor. “And then, luring the Peacock King of Wisdom from within the painting before Suima Koji’s very eyes… But then, Prosecutor Hashikura, that omnipotent attendant bird instantly descended the stairs and leaped upon Suima Koji, who was lost in his trance.”

After saying that, Hōsui stood up, casting a sidelong glance at the dumbfounded prosecutor, and pulled out a bound document resembling a report from the bookshelf. And then, he placed it on the desk and continued. “Of course, there’s no logical reason for a peacock from a painting to emerge, but there is another explanation for why this could be called the manifestation of the Peacock King of Wisdom.” “The reason for this is that Suima Koji’s bizarre gait had begun.” “You are aware, I presume, that when stimuli are applied to the limbs of patients with hysterical paralysis, they perform various bizarre movements.” “But first—what we call the weight-bearing stump. To explain this in detail, I need you to understand precisely which part of a prosthetic-requiring limb bears weight like the sole of the foot.” “In Suima Koji’s case—as evident from examining his prosthetic leg—this wasn’t at the end of the wooden pestle where his fibula was severed at midshaft, but rather at the uppermost part of the fibula beneath the kneecap.” “And the remaining portion of the pestle below that point dangles freely within the prosthetic leg.” “In other words, pinpointing this weight-bearing location was crucial—and needless to say, the culprit applied stimulation precisely there.” “Need I say that any sane person would walk by placing their kneecap downward?” “Yet when walking in such a trance-like state—conditioned by long habit—he naturally let that uppermost fibular area touch the floor, moving with the upright posture of one conscious of it being his sole.” “He must have walked with a comically gravity-defying gait.” “But for Suima Koji without his prosthetics, this was his most natural state.” “Therefore—given his legs’ malnutrition and marked emaciation—the combination of triangular bone ends around that rhomboid area and the portion corresponding to his kneecap’s lower edge... Wouldn’t this unmistakably resemble peacock footprints?” “And thus, his tracks moving away from the ritual platform perfectly matched those of a peacock approaching from ahead.”

“Ah.” Prosecutor Hashikura wiped away his unstoppable sweat and said, “But why did Suima Koji go up to the third floor?”

Hōsui flipped through a book on the desk and thrust the page he had pinned with his finger toward the prosecutor. “Prosecutor Hashikura, are you aware that among the five senses of hysteria patients, vision persists longest? Moreover, even during seizures, red alone remains faintly perceptible. Of course, witchcraft practitioners skillfully embellish this into terrifying demonic visages—but I happen to possess conclusive documentation proving this.” He continued: “Let’s examine the passage.—(October 1916, Report by Hans Stamraer, Attached Surgeon of Düsseldorf Hussar Regiment at Metz Reserve Hospital) My experiment commenced upon observing premonitory tremors in said patient.” “First,” Hōsui read aloud, “I produced a cylindrical color wheel and began rotating it slowly from violet. Upon reaching red, the subject abruptly rose and commenced circling the apparatus while fixating on crimson.” “Here I devised a new test,” he continued translating. “Displaying red cloth before him, I guided him down a corridor flanked by firearms on both walls.” “The ensuing phenomena proved remarkable: each time I shifted the scarlet fabric toward a wall, he pressed himself against it as though seeking burial—yet recoiled instantly upon contacting weapons, freezing motionless.” “Repeating this trial multiple times confirmed its consistency,” Hōsui’s voice grew clinical. “Thus we conclude—owing to mottled cutaneous sensitivity across his body—that lateral torsion failed to manifest when firearms contacted insensate zones—”

After finishing reading, Hōsui moved his chair forward, slowly lit his tobacco, and continued speaking. “Now, Prosecutor Hashikura, there was the thing that guided Suima Koji there, and another thing that left a wound shaped like a Sanskrit character.” “Of course, it goes without saying that the culprit used a red light to guide Suima Koji.” And then—from the cantilevered floor at the third-floor stairway entrance—they dropped him into the jade banners below that had square holes opened in them. “Moreover, prior to that, the culprit had embedded a retractable hook-shaped weapon into the fingertips of the Embroidered Buddha—but that weapon vanished without a trace after its single use there.” “So, first and foremost—how was the Sanskrit-shaped wound formed?—I will explain that.” “In short, the two hooks initially facing him pierced Suima Koji’s waist. Once they had torn through the muscle, a second fall began, causing the remaining two hooks—which had not yet tasted blood—to stab into both his arms.” “In other words, there had to have been an inconceivable rotation at play.” “However, that was of course not due to any external force being applied; the cause of that rotation lay in the mottled sensory perception that had manifested in Suima Koji’s body.” “As for what became of the two hooks initially embedded in his waist—as weight was applied and they tore upward through the muscle, one of them came into contact with an area of mottled sensory perception.” “Thus, each time it touched that area, he would naturally twist his body to pull away from it, resulting in the Sanskrit-like traces left by this accidental motion perfectly aligning on both sides without the slightest discrepancy.” “In short, Suima Koji’s rotation served the role of a potter’s wheel. However, when the muscles were finally torn through and the support came loose—at that moment, the residual force from the twist caused him to rotate at a right angle and plummet.” “And it was the remaining two jade banners that caught his shoulders with a sharp snap.”

“Then why do the wound’s two ends differ?”

“Now then, Prosecutor Hashikura—how many substances can you list that possess high hardness yet dissolve even in a weak alkali like blood? For example, if someone were to make a hook primarily from an organic calcareous material like a squid’s shell, the hook would dissolve in the bloodstream and upon dislodging, it would transform into the Embroidered Buddha’s rigid fingertip. However, concealed within that transformation was an astonishing vampiric device.”

And as Hōsui's deductions finally reached their pivotal point, the prosecutor who heard this truth found his gaping mouth would not close. Why hadn't I cut open even one of those mandalas back then?

“In other words, what appears most complex is actually the simplest.” “The original plant used to create those mandalas was the dried stem of the Kyūkakuzu vine.” “In Sidhi’s sorcery, those stems and the wire-like roots of the Tegusu plant are employed with such ingenuity that even the foolish Malaysians gawk at them.” “The sponge-like fibrous tissue inside those stems—whether blood or any other liquid—spares none.” “In short, those mandalas are knotless structures formed by embedding thousands of stems—thus enabling them to suck Suima Koji’s blood from the Embroidered Buddha’s fingertips down to the last inch.” “Naturally, this vampiric phenomenon explains why so little blood flowed downward.” “But Prosecutor Hashikura—when that occurs, concepts of weight and expansion inevitably emerge.” “In truth, the four hands that strangled Sister Jōzen likewise writhed within them.” “Now that you grasp this—that the mandala’s dried stems would swell ominously after draining all blood—it requires no further explanation.” “Yet their total length must have increased by over one-fifth—evident from both the absence of bloodstains on the stairs and Suima Koji’s placement at the stairway entrance.” “To put it plainly—Sister Jōzen had weighted jade banner hems pressed against her throat while being violently rotated—culminating in dislocated cervical vertebrae.” “So what did the culprit do? They took one end of the cords suspending jade banners to an upper wall—then maneuvered these banners now swollen around Suima Koji.” Then they extracted the braided cord binding four banners and gradually lowered prearranged side cords. “After restoring hanging cords to original positions and aligning hems into two rows—they pressed four banner hems against Jōzen’s throat.” “However—around then—blood within dried stems began vanishing…because beforehand—to avoid staining clothes—the culprit had opened a small window.” “Naturally—scorching sunlight poured through it.” “Prosecutor Hashikura—blood is over ninety percent water.” After evaporation—its weight reverted nearly to original levels. “But this reduction and shrinkage concluded within two hours before our arrival—so nuns noticed no banner expansion upon discovery.” “Then—as final act—the culprit executed that dazzling golden petal scattering.”

“The reason, of course, lies in Jōzen’s rotation. As for the state of the jade banners embedded in the nun’s throat at that time—due to rapid expansion and contraction occurring in succession, the gold lacquer on their surfaces had lifted and begun to peel away. That violent centrifugal force then scattered it all at once.” “However, the rotation of those jade banners also affected Suima Koji downstairs, imprinting something upon his dying vision.” “You remember Suima Koji’s words: ‘The jewel has vanished, but the peacock still remains in the sky.’” “It’s quite a mystifying phrase, but its true nature is nothing more than a form of abnormal visual perception.” “In other words, the elliptical shape of the Flame Drum reflected in the lattice door’s squares—as the circular holes in the jade banners appeared and disappeared—at times resembled a peacock’s tail feathers, and when the circular holes were not visible, only two or three of them remained. This must have ultimately caused Suima Koji to experience such an optical illusion.”

The prosecutor seemed to have grown quite fatigued just from listening, and he spoke in a dreamlike voice.

“Then what about the locked room?” “And was there another one inside what you cut open?”

“Rather than a locked room, it’s more about how the shō played by itself.” Hōsui made a meticulous correction. “Then, after rigging the shō, the culprit cut down the jade banners and descended to the lower floor— Now, do you know about alcohol thermometers—the principle that alcohol in a thin tube expands with heat? In other words, the culprit stuffed alcohol into the shō’s mouthpiece and exposed its vertically positioned base to sunlight. Then, of course, the expanded alcohol would push out the air in the angular chamber and make the valve hum. However, as a portion of it blew out from the tube and was absorbed by the bamboo material, the expansion temporarily ceased, and the alcohol descended.” In other words, as this process repeated countless times, it created the illusion of a player blowing into the instrument. And eventually, the alcohol vanished without a trace. “But Prosecutor Hashikura, now that we’ve uncovered the entirety of the crime, it becomes clear that not only did the culprit exploit the bizarre physiology of a hysteria patient without reservation—they also concentrated the nerves of a thousand people upon a single small window.”

The prosecutor held his breath and asked the final question. “Then the culprit—just who is the culprit?”

“That would be Sister Jakuren,” Hōsui answered in a somber voice and moved toward the window as if to cool his heated cheeks.

“Come to think of it—on that day, Sister Jakuren did mention something about a ‘peacock blood-drinking legend’ from the Dai-kichijin Shujukyō Sutra.” “However, upon investigating, I found that nowhere in that sutra was there such a passage.” “However, I discovered an uncanny correlation within the sutra repository’s index cards.” “This refers to how the catalog numbers for ‘The Wild Hunts of the Uebi Region’ and the Dai-kichijin Shujukyō Sutra had been swapped—so surprisingly, a description absent from one was discovered in an anecdote from St. John’s writings.” “That is the legend of the Kerat natives.” “It’s said that when a peacock ages, a keratinous spur resembling a fang grows on its tongue—but if one pierces another creature’s skin with it and leaves it soaked in blood, that spur will suddenly snap off cleanly... or so the legend goes.” “Then, Prosecutor Hashikura, it can only be thought that the murder method applied to Suima Koji was implied from there.” “In other words, Sister Jakuren’s demonstrative lie contained elements of those swapped catalog numbers because an association known only to herself had manifested there.” “However, the motive can be summed up in a single word.” “It’s the yearning for miracles.” “Judas—whose betrayal is said to have been to witness Jesus’s miracle of resurrection—Gusevva—the Russian woman who tried to assassinate Rasputin in hopes of seeing a miracle—and Sister Jakuren.” “But I think even a woman that brilliant couldn’t possibly be unaware that a corpse losing its moisture would mummify.” “Even seeing her continue that intense gaze while forgetting even that fact—one understands the terror of mystical thought… how it can plunge even the most erudite person into madness-tinged ancient notions’ abyss.” “Prosecutor Hashikura—since it won’t be long now—we should let that woman wait with ○○○○○.” “That is this macabre incident’s sole glimmer of hope.”