The small, family-run restaurant in the neighboring town was a haven of steam and the comforting smell of soy and dashi. They were the only customers. Akari was hunched over a bowl of katsudon, the pork cutlet glistening under the single overhead light. Sae sat opposite him, listlessly picking at a bowl of rice and pickles. She hadn't eaten more than two bites.
Akari was starving, but as he lifted a piece of pork to his mouth, Izan's voice slid into his thoughts, as casual as a dining companion.
Based on the discoloration of the subcutaneous fat and the laxity of the muscle fibers, there is a 32% chance this particular pig was infected with Taenia solium cysts. This specific cut, from the loin... perhaps 45%.
Akari's chopsticks froze, the pork hovering. 'Are you serious?' he projected inwardly, his appetite vanishing.
No. I have already neutralized them, Izan replied, a cold thread of amusement in its tone. The larval proteins are now inert. Harmless. You should be thankful, fraud. I am cleansing your filth without your knowledge.
Akari gritted his teeth and shoved the pork into his mouth, chewing with defiant, angry bites. He wasn't thinking about tapeworms. He was thinking about spiders.
He glanced at Sae. She was pale, her hands trembling slightly where they rested on the table.
"You fainted," Akari said, his voice flat, professional. It was easier than being gentle. "Tell me what you saw."
Sae flinched, as if waking up. She looked down at her rice. "It... it was the boy, Akari-san. I... I knelt next to him. And he... he spoke."
Her voice was thin, reedy with remembered terror. "He said he was in pain. He said... he said, 'I can see them, but they can't see me.' And then..." She squeezed her eyes shut, a tear leaking from the corner. "His face... his jaw. It... it unhinged. It opened so wide. And... and they came out."
"They?"
"Spiders," she whispered, her voice cracking. "Not... not one or two. A... a river. A flood of them, pouring from his mouth. Big, black... they were everywhere. The sound... clicking... and he was screaming..."
Akari listened, his face a perfect mask of bored neutrality. He slowly picked up his teacup and took a sip.
Inside, his stomach was trying to claw its way out of his throat. He could see it. The unhinging jaw, the black tide of chitin, the high-pitched, wet screeching. He was, psychologically, vomiting.
A sound that was not a sound echoed in his skull—a dry, ancient chuckle that scraped against his nerves. So fragile, Izan mocked him. You are made of water and fear, little man. It was merely an illusion. A simple psychic projection, designed to protect the nest. And you... you cannot even stomach the idea of it.
'Shut up,' Akari thought, his hand tightening on the cup.
He looked back at Sae, setting his cup down with a carefully steady click. "It was a psychic trap," he said, his voice hard. "A 'warning' designed to terrify. To scare us off. It means we're close to the nerve."
"A-a trap?"
"We're missing something." Akari pulled a small, cheap notebook and a pen from his coat pocket, sliding them across the table. "We're going to make a list. Everything we know. Start from the moment the client walked into the office. Every detail. Write it down."
Sae, seeming grateful for a concrete task, picked up the pen. Her handwriting was neat, precise, a stark contrast to the chaos of her recent memories. Akari added his own notes, his script a barely legible scrawl. For half an hour, the only sound was the scratch of the pen and the hiss of the kitchen's vents.
Finally, they had a list.
* Client (Masamune) meets "Dream Woman."
* Describes her as a "spider" in a "web of love, lust."
* They marry. Son (Takeru) is born.
* Wife/Woman VANISHES three weeks ago.
* Symptoms begin in Takeru after she vanishes. (Coma).
* Other exorcists/priests: 1 went insane (webs), 2 died/vanished.
* Sae's Vision: Boy's soul is trapped, "I can see them, but they can't see me."
* Sae's Vision: Spiders from mouth (a "warning" illusion).
* The lone spider in the room ("watcher"/guardian).
Akari stared at the list, rubbing his temple. "It doesn't add up. The priests... they were professionals, probably. They got flattened. We just get... a jump scare? Why are we different? Why the warning? Why not just... drive us mad, too?"
"Maybe... maybe because I'm not a priest?" Sae offered. "Maybe I'm... not a threat?"
"Maybe," Akari muttered. He stared at the list, a deep frown carving lines between his brows. The pieces were all there, but they were in the wrong order. "It's a web... the father said it... she... she's a predator..."
"Akari-san," Sae said, her voice quiet. She was staring at the list, but her mind was back in the house. "Something's... something's been bothering me. A... a contradiction."
Akari looked up.
"The father," Sae said, thinking aloud. "Masamune-san. He... he touches the boy."
"So? He's his father."
"No, you don't understand," she insisted, leaning forward. "When we first arrived, Takeru-kun was on his lap. He held his hand. He brushes his hair. He's always touching him. He lives in that house, breathes that air... but he's fine."
She looked Akari dead in the eyes, the realization dawning on her face. "The priests went insane. I saw the illusion and fainted. But the father... why is he immune? Why can he touch his son, but... but the trap attacked me?"
Akari froze. The restaurant, the pork, the rain outside—it all faded.
Plink.
A mental sound from Izan, like a single, satisfied, plucked harp string. A smirk.
"Sae," Akari breathed, his eyes going wide. "You're a genius."
He grabbed the pen, his hand flying to a fresh page. "He's not immune. He's part of it."
"What... part of what?"
"The web!" Akari said, his mind racing, the pieces clicking into place with audible, terrifying snaps. "She 'caught' him first. The 'web of love' he talked about. He's not immune... he's infected. He's a carrier. He's the first fly she caught. The web... it recognizes him. He's not a threat to it. He's... he's food. We... we're intruders."
His eyes darted back to the list, to the line Sae had written. He underlined it so hard the pen tore the paper.
"I can see them... but they can't see me."
"This line..." Akari whispered, a cold, academic dread seeping into his bones, far deeper than the revulsion from before. "I've read this line before."
"In... in another case file?"
"No. In a book." Akari leaned back, staring at the restaurant's water-stained ceiling. "A stupid, theoretical text I bought in Kyoto because the cover looked ancient. The 'Sutra of the Inverted World.' It was... it was from some minor, heretical Buddhist sect. I thought it was just... lore. Metaphors."
"What did it say?" Sae asked, her fear being replaced by a sharp, focused intensity.
"It talked about the layers of existence," Akari said, his voice distant. "Not just heaven and hell, but... overlaps. Pockets of reality, woven into our own. It described a paradox... the Tengoku no Jigoku. The 'Heavenly Hell.'"
He looked at her, his eyes dark. "It's a state of being, Sae. A personalized dimension. The text said it's the ultimate trap. A soul is lured into a perfect 'heaven'—a beautiful dream, a perfect memory, a world where their mother never leaves, a world with no pain."
"That... that sounds kind of nice," Sae whispered.
"It's a lie," Akari snapped. "It's a feeding trough. The soul thinks it's in heaven, so it never fights, never tries to escape. It's placid. And while it's sitting there, happy and unaware... the 'heaven' is just the... the 'parlor.' A cocoon. And something on the outside... something real... is siphoning it. Sucking it dry. The soul is in heaven, but its reality is hell. The paradox."
He leaned in, his voice dropping. "The sutra... it told the story of a Boddhisatva who fell, who was trapped in one of these 'Heavenly Hells' by a rival god. He was forced to watch his followers... his family... mourn his 'death.' He could see them. He could hear them. But he couldn't reach them. He was screaming, but they couldn't hear him. They just looked... like ghosts."
Akari tapped the notebook, his finger jabbing the torn paper. "Before his mind finally broke and he became a demon, he uttered his last vow. 'I can see them, but they cannot see me. I will tear down the walls between worlds so that my voice is the only thing they hear.' ...It's the same line, Sae. It's the same trap."
Sae's face was chalk-white. "So... Takeru-kun's soul... where is it? In... in hell?"
"No." Akari's voice was grim. He closed the notebook. "That's the problem. It's not in some distant underworld. It's right there. In that house. In that room."
He stood, tossing a handful of yen onto the table, far more than the bill.
"He's phased," Akari said, grabbing his backpack. "He's trapped in the Jorōgumo's 'heavenly hell,' an illusion she wove just for him, with her as the loving mother. He's looking out at us right now... watching his father cry, watching us walk around... screaming for help. And we... we just look like blurry, silent, terrifying ghosts to him."
"Akari-san," Sae said, scrambling to her feet. "Where are we going?"
Akari slung the pack over his shoulder, his face set. "Back to the house. We can't exorcise a demon that's not even there. The Jorōgumo is long gone. But she left her web."
He pushed the restaurant door open, the bell jingling violently.
"And we," he said, looking back at her, "have to go in."