The cameraman focused on Rin Takahashi’s upper body. He stood in the early morning sun in front of the blurred-out front gate of Kumotawa Shrine behind him. Rin had a slightly rotund face with a wide smile. He wore a canary yellow suit, a blue shirt, and an oversized red bow tie. Many people thought he resembled a clown due to the combination of his round face, bright clothes, and the big bow ties he always wore. Rin knew it, too, and presented an exuberant personality to fit his appearance.

  “It’s Rin Rin Mystery Time! I smell a story about Mount Kumotawa! As you, my well-informed audience, know, Mount Kumotawa is where Princess Chikako’s samurai defeated a horde of oni terrorizing the countryside. This mountain has many stories about yokai that pre-date this, and there is even the lesser-known story about the konaki-jiji that ate travellers here. Even after the princess vanquished the evil ogres and established Kumotawa Shrine, the legends about yokai haunting the mountain continued. All types of sightings of unknown beasts to the ghostly lights of onibi have been sighted. We have seen that many hauntings are truly unexplained, but we are here today to examine something even more sinister on this mountain. Why do people disappear forever on this mountain when it is foggy?”

  The camera zoomed out to show more of the background. Rin waved his arm around and dramatically pivoted to point at the shrine and the pine forest rising behind it. The grip with the boom mike above him had to quickly raise it. “So—if it is all legends, why do the locals avoid the mountain when it's foggy? Why do the police close the road and paths up the mountain? Town Hall says they do it for public safety as people get lost in the fog, and there are bears. But is there more to it? In this episode, I will piece together the true story of Mount Kumotawa, the haunted mountain, with exciting new developments to explore!”

  Ayako and Chiyo were standing away from a small crowd of curious onlookers and fans. Ayako was able to look over the crowd's heads while Chiyo had to shift around to get a view. The show had posted on social media for people to share their stories about the mountain, and a small crowd showed up for interviews.

  Ayako spoke quietly to Chiyo after they finished the shot. “He sure likes to exaggerate.”

  “You sound like my parents. They were not too happy he asked for permission to film at the shrine, but they figured it was better to let him rather than turn him down.”

  “They’re right. You probably think this is exciting, though.”

  “I’d be lying if I didn’t think this was cool. Last week’s episode was about the haunted tunnels of Hokkaido. Some of the stories gave me the chills.”

  “I can’t believe Karen and you both watch this show. And you live on a weird mountain, too.”

  “I’m used to it, and you just don’t like ghost stories.”

  “Hah! I don’t believe in ghosts and scaring myself for no reason.”

  “Remember that night you thought you heard something in the ceiling?”

  “Really? You’re bringing that up? It was a squirrel. My mom and I sealed up the hole.”

  “But it creeped you out.” Chiyo enjoyed her teasing. “You called me.”

  “Still…” Ayako smiled, “your visions are scarier.” She then frowned a bit. “This could cause problems for us. When I was working at the store last night, Yuriko did not seem pleased either.”

  “I’m sure things will be fine,” Chiyo replied, maybe a little too confidently. “There’s nothing to find. Still, I’d like to watch a little more of this. I want to see if he says anything interesting.”

  *****

  “We are here today with Mr. Kurodo Toyoharu.” The cameraman changed his focus from Rin to a middle-aged man in a hunter’s cap and big wool coat who seemed eager to share his story. “Toyoharu-san is a bear hunter in this area and has helped the police search for missing people in the woods. What can you tell us about your experiences on Mount Kumotawa?”

  “Thank you, I’m glad to be here today. I have hunted in these mountains for over 25 years, and this is the one mountain that is different. When you are in the forest here, you can feel some kind of strange power. It’s like a prickly sensation or that feeling that something is wrong. Many people can’t feel it, but when you have spent enough time in the woods, I can tell.“

  “We don’t feel anything on patrol… What bunk,” Ayako murmured to herself.

  Chiyo poked her in the ribs to stay quiet. “Shhh… You know we don’t go out in the fog.”

  “As I mentioned, People have gone missing on this mountain. The Takamatsu Incident is the most famous recent case. Two teenagers, on a test of courage, went up Mount Kumotawa in the fog nine years ago and never came back. You were involved in that search, were you not?”

  “Why yes, I was. Hundreds of people searched the mountain for a week. The police canvassed all the homes in the area to look for clues and even investigated suspicious strangers. We found nothing other than a bloody, torn jacket. The police said a bear must have attacked them, but I don’t believe that. There were no human remains, and a bear did not make the tracks I saw.”

  “What kind of tracks did you see?”

  “They were like nothing I had seen before. It was like giant lizard footprints. They were in the area where the dogs found the scent of the kids.”

  “Do you think there is a monster on the mountain? Pranksters?”

  “I can’t speculate on that,” the hunter laughed. “I have a reputation to uphold. I can just say that those kids and their scent trail vanished in the middle of the forest. It was like they had been spirited away.”

  “So it is truly an unexplainable disappearance.”

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  “Yes. It is.”

  The cameraman focused on Rin again, who made an excited hand gesture. “The Takamatsu Incident happened almost ten years ago, but here’s the big news. Just two weeks ago, Mr. Kaito Okamoto and his wife Sana went up this very mountain, and a terrible tragedy befell them. Mr. Okamoto is missing, and his wife was found dead. Mr. Okamoto frantically called 119 about his wife falling off of a cliff during one of those foggy periods on the mountain. Emergency personnel were dispatched but were unable to reach them due to thick fog that evening. The fog disoriented rescuers; their compass went crazy, and the GPS failed, so they turned back. The emergency operator called Mr. Okomoto back but was unable to reach his cell phone. Mrs. Okamoto’s body was found at the base of a cliff the next morning. There was no sign of Mr. Okamoto, who was told to stay near the body. He apparently wandered off. Over the next week, an extensive search on the mountain by both drones and dogs found no trace. Mr. Okamoto had vanished into thin air.”

  Rin turned to Mr. Toyoharu again. “Toyoharu-san, you were involved in this search too. What can you tell us about it?”

  “Well… The police and fire department searched the area immediately around Mrs. Okomoto in the morning but found no trace of Mr. Okomoto. They figured he was still on the mountain as his car was still in the parking lot at the bottom of the mountain. That’s when they called in more people to conduct a bigger search. The dogs found his trail coming down the mountain to where his wife fell. From there, the scent trail led deeper into the forest. It looked like he was trying to make for the main trail. Then, the dogs stopped in a certain place. They were agitated, like they smelled something funny, and wouldn’t go forward. We went around it and tried to pick up the trail again, but there was nothing to find. Mr. Okamoto’s trail basically stopped in the middle of the forest.”

  “Wow. Isn’t that something? Mr. Okamoto just disappeared.”

  “Yeah. It was pretty strange.”

  “So, was there anything unusual about the area where Mr. Okamoto’s trail vanished? Strange footprints again? Funny smells? Mysterious goo?”

  “I didn’t see or smell anything odd, but remember that feeling I told you about? It was strong there. It was like there was a crawling sensation on my back.”

  “That certainly seems unusual. Did anyone else feel that sensation?”

  “Unfortunately, no. Just me and the dogs, I think.”

  “If only the dogs could talk! So, what happened next?”

  “The police sure didn’t like the search coming to a dead end. They made us search again, and we went around the whole darn mountain. We even searched the ruins of the Akyu village along with its abandoned silver mine on the back side.”

  “Ahh, yes,” Rin pounced on Kurodo’s last sentence. “Didn’t all the inhabitants of Akyu village disappear one winter in 1828?”

  “It was a long time ago. The village was in decline after the silver mine closed down, so I don’t think there were that many people left. But yeah, it was found abandoned in the spring. There isn’t much left of the village other than the mine works, but we didn’t find Mr. Okomoto anywhere.”

  Rin took an excited breath. “Well, there you have it, folks. Another tale of the unexplained! An entire village even vanished in the past. Maybe the oni got Mr. Okamoto. Maybe he literally walked off the face of the Earth into the underworld. Mount Kumotawa is a place of power where the spirits are strong, which is why there is an imperial shrine here. We have an interview with the head priest of the shrine coming up, and we will be getting the official line from Town Hall later, so stay tuned. Thank you for your insight, Toyoharu-san. It was a pleasure to have you on our show.”

  “Thank you,” Mr. Toyoharu replied.

  Ayako and Chiyo looked at each other when the shoot wrapped.

  “The guy does good guesswork,” Chiyo remarked. “He comes off as a comedian, but he is an investigative reporter.”

  “It was a little too close for comfort,” Ayako replied. “I wonder if he’s this good about the other supernatural stuff?”

  Chiyo didn’t have an answer.

  Rin turned to the crowd still around. “I noticed that we had a good audience here today. This is a little sudden, but does anyone else have a good story about the mountain they would like to share?”

  A murmur went through the crowd. A middle-aged woman wearing glasses and a yellow dress raised her hand. “I’m a big fan of your show! My husband and I saw strange lights in the forest one evening here.”

  “Excellent!” Rin called out, “Please come forward so we can film your story.”

  Ayako’s face was suddenly concerned. “Let's go to your place now before we get interviewed. The grown-ups can deal with this.”

  Chiyo nodded.

  *****

  It was early afternoon. Rin and Kojima’s morning had been packed with interviews.

  “The head priest didn’t say much, did he?” Kojima was Rin’s slender cameraman, panning his camcorder around for some scenic shots to add to the show. He wanted more video of the shrine grounds without the scaffolding at the side of the honden, the main shrine building. It was too bad they couldn’t shoot inside the honden due to the restoration work going on.

  “Yeah. He’s a sly one,” Rin replied. “I’m pretty sure he wasn’t telling me the whole truth about this place. He downplayed everything.” Rin then mimicked, “We are just like any other shrine.”

  “Yeah. Most shrines and such want to play things up just a little. It attracts more tourists.”

  “I do smell a story, though. There’s something behind these disappearances and that fog. It isn’t just a ghost story.”

  “Could we come back to shoot on one of their fog days? Like that overnight we did in the haunted mansion? We’d get tons of views.”

  “That’s a possibility. Maybe I’ll just send a camera crew.”

  “Hey! That’s not nice,” Kojima protested. “You’re disappearing with me!”

  “We could get our hunter to come along, but I think he’d decline.”

  Rin thought a little more. “I think we should play up the crime angle, though. My digging into Mr. Okomoto found that his company was in deep debt. I always get suspicious when there’s an accidental death and possible insurance money. The only problem is that Mr. Okomoto is missing.”

  “Maybe the Yakuza got him. Bad loans and all that.”

  “I don’t think so. They’d want their money back first.” Rin came to a decision. “I think we’ll run with the murder angle too. It’ll tease the viewers with one more mystery. Let’s see if we can line up some more interviews with his company staff.”

  “Sounds good. Let’s have a late lunch in town. We have that interview with the spokesman from town hall after.”

  *****

  Yuriko was crouched down to give Ghost a scritch behind the ear. The grey cat had shown up again that morning after disappearing for a few days. He was curled up in a little cat bed behind the front counter of the convenience store. She was glad the Rin Rin Mystery show had left the mountain for now. It was going to be a hassle in the next few weeks. The episode being filmed would air over the weekend, and it was sure to bring more visitors eager to experience the mysteries of Mount Kumotawa.

  The front door chimed, and she stood up to see who it was and greet them. It was Sergeant Noguchi.

  “Good afternoon, Goro.”

  “Good afternoon, Yuriko.” Goro’s facial expression looked like he had eaten something bitter. “That Rin Takahashi is one annoying reporter. The Town Hall spokesman dragged me into his interview with him as I was the officer in charge of the search. The guy questioned everything we did.”

  “Was he at least polite?” Yuriko joked.

  “Yeah, but he kind of twists everything you say.”

  “He didn’t learn anything, right?”

  “Of course not,” Goro groaned. “I’ve been doing this long enough. It was pretty easy to say we didn’t find anything, as we didn’t, but it wasn’t much fun.”

  “Better you than me.”

  “Thanks for nothing.”

  “Let’s catch the show on TV if you’re not working. You’re a celebrity now. In a twisted kind of way, I’m kind of curious how he’s going to show this.”

  “I’m not sure I want to see it. I might have come across as kind of stiff.”

  “That’s even better,” Yuriko teased. “I’m sure Travis would join us, too! He wouldn’t want to miss that.”

  “I think I’m working that night,” Goro groaned again.

  2. There's the girls of the GGA, who are young, good friends, and capable.

  3. The young princess who has the duty to wield Grasscutter and craves friendship with peers of her age as she has led a secluded life,

  4. A small cast of competent supporting characters who are police, special forces, ninjas, and neighbours (normal people).