A High School Sophomore Girl Linked with a Black-crowned Night Heron and the World Moved by 1mm [Episode 9] Unexplored Regions and Paradise

Mount Kora, a sacred peak, has a deep embrace. Climbing up to the inner sanctuary of Kora Taisha Shrine, the trees grow thick, the air is refreshing, and the sunlight filtering through the trees is divine.

You can aim for the summit from here, but according to the directions I heard from Goicchi, we have to enter a side path that looks like a beast trail.

There was a wide parking lot near the inner sanctuary, so we decided to park the car there and go hiking. Everyone is dressed accordingly.

Hey, hey. Do we really have to go into a place like this jungle for bird watching?

My father complained. He probably thought we would just be admiring birds while strolling along a regular hiking course.

Of course, Kimie is the only one I told that I was going to meet Goicchi.

My father and Odabun also don't know that we are aiming for a place deep in the mountains by taking a forest road that people don't usually use.

Although it looks like a beast trail, it was probably originally cleared for people to enter the deep mountains. If you avoid the obstructive branches and leaves, you can proceed along the path.

However, the surroundings are surrounded by primeval forests, just like the 'jungle-like' place my father grumbled about, and it's easy to mistake it for having wandered into an unexplored region.

Huh. Someone was watching just now.

Isn't it a monkey? Once you get this deep into the mountains, there are wild monkeys.

I heard a rustling sound!

Maybe a deer or a wild boar was surprised and ran away. To them, we are the aliens.

Surprisingly, every time Kimie got scared, Odabun calmed her down calmly. It feels like the roles of the master-apprentice duo have been reversed.

Oda-kun, you've got nerves of steel.

When my father was impressed, Odabun replied.

My mother's parents' home is in Shimabara, Nagasaki, so when I was a child, my grandfather often took me hiking in the mountains.

Shimabara, that means Unzen, right?

Yes. I used to catch rhinoceros beetles and stag beetles there.

Since my father mentioned the specific mountain name of Unzen, Odabun continued happily.

“You’d better be careful, because if you go into the bushes, a hirakuchi will come out. There are amonjo near the spring water.” That’s what I was told.

“Huh, is that a dialect? What does that mean?”

My father seemed to have suddenly become interested.

“When I was a child, I was scared of the unique sound of those words, so I think my grandfather enjoyed using them. When I grew up and looked them up, I found out that hirakuchi means ‘viper,’ and amonjo, or more accurately amojo, means ‘ghost.’”

“That makes me think of ‘Dara-san.’”

“You know ‘Dara-san,’ sir? That’s surprising!”

“I found it when I was looking for manga on my phone during a break at work, and I got hooked.”

“But if ‘Dara-san’ really appeared, we wouldn’t be able to stay as calm as those two, would we?”

“Absolutely impossible.”

“Hahahaha.”

That was when the men were getting excited.

“Eek! What is this?! There’s something gross here!”

A scream echoed.

It was none other than me, who had screamed after finding something that looked like a long, mysterious organism.

“Natsuki… that’s just a snake’s shed skin…”

Kimie told me gently.

“Oh, I see… I was surprised because we were talking about amonjo and Dara-san and all that…”

The men looked at me with exasperated faces as I made excuses in a loud voice to hide my embarrassment.

By the way, “Reiwa no Dara-san” (Author: Haruomi Tomotsuka) is a manga series depicting brothers who encounter supernatural beings deep in the mountains.

Reunion

Quiet.

As we were walking along noisily, feeling like we were on a hike, Kimie stopped in her tracks.

The call of a long-tailed tit.

You mean the one from 'Boku Shimaenaga'?

Shimaenaga are a subspecies of long-tailed tit that only live in Hokkaido.

Odabun chimed in with a whisper, only to be immediately shut down.

Hey, are you really planning on starting birdwatching?

I retorted to Kimie in my head.

Well, I suppose it can't be helped, since I'm the one who asked my father and Odabun to come along under the pretense of birdwatching.

I wonder if that 'chi-chi-chi-chi-pee-pee' sound is a varied tit.

Above all, it seems difficult to suppress Kimie's intellectual curiosity.

I decided to stretch and breathe in the forest air to change my mood as well.

As I did, I felt the scent of the trees and relaxed, and at the same time, I began to hear all sorts of sounds.

Gua-gua.

Kee-kee-kee.

The calls of wild birds and beasts echoed,

Splash!

There was also the sound of something diving into the water.

To us, it's a jungle where even a yokai might appear, but for the animals, it's a place to live.

You really can't understand that such a wild paradise exists on the outskirts of a core city unless you see it for yourself.

Since there is a game trail that was formed based on a forest road, however narrow, there must be at least a few people who know about it.

After walking for a while, a small shrine that had been hidden by the surrounding trees revealed itself.

"That's it."

"Yeah."

Nodding at Kimie's words, I approached the shrine with my heart full.

When I peeked inside the shrine, a bird was crouching there.

"Hey, I finally found you."

"Goicchi!"

I communicated with the bird in my mind and felt tears welling up.

"Odabun. The thing we talked about."

When Kimie read the room and gave the instruction, Odabun took off the small cooler box he had been carrying over his shoulder.

"I heard you use these for feeding wild birds, so I caught some loaches and crayfish."

Watching Odabun prepare them, my father seemed to grasp the situation as well.

"It's a black-crowned night heron. They're usually found by riversides, but it might have wandered deep into the mountains and gotten injured."

I put the loaches and crayfish into one of the containers Odabun had prepared, and poured the "victory water" from my canteen into the other.

"Here you go, Goicchi. I know you must be hungry, but please eat slowly."

Of course, I didn't say it out loud. I called out to it in my mind so as not to make my father or Odabun suspicious.

"Wow! Thank you. Loaches and crayfish—it's been such a long time since I've had a feast like this."

While Goicchi was gobbling them up, Kimie checked in with me.

"What are we going to do now?"

I can't just leave it here like this. I have to take it home and nurse it back to health...

Hearing the two of them talking, my father expressed his concern.

But isn't it illegal to protect wild birds on your own?

I had been careless. Come to think of it, there was a controversy a while back when a celebrity rescued a wild bird chick that had fallen from its nest and it was discovered they were keeping it at home.

And here I was, having even looked for a bird carrier backpack, fully intending to take Goicchi home with me.

You're right. Taking a wild bird home would likely cause problems later, so let's give up on that. Fortunately, the injury doesn't seem deep, so it should be fine.

Kimie looked surprised when she heard my words.

Goicchi. Well, that's that, so take care of yourself.

I made up my mind and conveyed that in my head, then urged the group to leave the shrine behind.

A sense of unease.

We headed back along the animal trail and got into the car at the parking lot near the inner sanctuary. The car ride home was the complete opposite of the trip there; it was as quiet as a funeral.

Part of it was the fatigue from the unaccustomed hiking, but I think it was mostly because we were enveloped in the disappointment of not being able to bring the night heron home.

My father also seemed concerned that his comment had led to this situation, so he didn't bring up the topic of the bird.

Of course, I didn't blame my father. Even if we had protected it by breaking the law, it could have ended up causing misfortune for Goicchi.

When we got home, Kimie sent Odabun home first and followed me to my room. It seemed she was worried about the Goicchi situation.

I can't believe I didn't think of the Wildlife Protection and Management Act; that was a huge mistake on my part.

Since Kimie had helped plan everything on the assumption that we would take it home when I first revealed the situation with Goicchi, she seemed to feel responsible.

You know, you listened to your uncle so well back there. Knowing you, Natsuki, I thought for sure you would push back.

When Kimie said that, I told her the truth.

Because Goicchi told me to. Goicchi communicated this to me telepathically...

I reproduced Goicchi's words.

"Natsuki, your father is right. Even if you take me home, the humans will surely make a fuss. My injuries have healed quite a bit, and I'll be fine as I am. Besides..."

"Besides what?"

Since I choked on my words, Kimie, who was curious, asked.

"Besides, I have something I must do by remaining here. I think there will come a time when I will need your help, Natsuki."

I conveyed all of Goicchi's words to Kimie and then opened up further.

"But, Goicchi felt a bit different than before."

"Is that something beyond words?"

"Yeah, since we communicate inside our brains, it's more like sharing thoughts rather than words, to be precise."

"Maybe, just maybe, communicating with a bird inside your brain might be a first in human history. So I can't even imagine it. Explain it so I can understand better."

"Yeah. How should I put it..."

Precisely because Kimie was genuinely worried about me, I struggled for a moment on how to express it.

"Until now, when I linked with his brain, there was a sense of oneness. Like when I experienced being inside Goicchi and flying through the sky."

"That's an amazing experience... and then..."

As Kimie was surprised and seemed frustrated, I continued.

"I feel like he's hiding something. When I try to link to a certain part, it turns pink and the sense of oneness disappears."

"Hmm, pink, huh..."

Even Kimie was left deep in thought.

To be continued in [Episode 10]

All episodes of 'When a High School Sophomore Linked with a Black-crowned Night Heron, the World Moved by 1mm' are collected in this magazine.

#Novel
#Black-crownedNightHeron
#Goicchi
#KoraTaishaShrine
#MountKora
#Hiking

*Image from 'photoAC': 'Photo material: Forest with light streaming in, Author: Han-raisu Omori^^'