Summer had begun, but the heat was not yet oppressive. The weather was warm, bright, and fresh. A perfect Sunday. Once services finished at Pádraig Aoba Church, the courtyard became lively as the congregation filed out to chat and catch up with each other. Kouki Aoyama recalled his old theology professor lamenting how fewer and fewer people were going to church these days. Aoyama smiled, relieved that his family’s church had escaped such a fate.
Pádraig Aoba had been founded by Aoyama’s great-grandfather, an Irish priest named Diarmuid O’Flaherty, who had come to Japan to help spread Christianity. It was currently managed by Aoyama’s father, the third generation of the family to do so. One of the church’s key characteristics was the lovely way the light streamed in through the skylight, making the place seem warm even in winter. Another was that it was one of the rare Protestant churches to perform demonic exorcisms.
It was Aoyama’s late grandfather who had started the business of driving out demons. When the typical Japanese person thought of exorcisms, their mind probably went to western horror movies or the exotic practices featured on TV during the Souls and Spirits summer special. In other words, it was not the kind of thing that was ever likely to affect them in their everyday lives. Even as a subject of passing interest, a lot of people felt it was a little too dubious to take seriously.
The Pádraig Aoba Church had become rather famous online, and Aoyama had been teased about it more than once while he was in school. He didn’t mind, though. He’d never been ashamed of his family’s background, and demons did exist. Twice in his life, he’d witnessed a demonic possession in person—once as a child and once as an adult.
Real exorcisms were nowhere near as theatrical as the ones depicted in fiction or medieval art. Aoyama’s grandfather had always started by giving proper counseling to the people who came to him to determine whether they were really possessed. A lot of the time, it was just emotional stress or postsickness exhaustion making them see things where none existed. His grandfather could then put them in touch with an appropriate medical practitioner to resolve the case that way.
It was only on very rare occasions that the problem turned out to be genuinely demonic. Aoyama’s grandfather had been an earnest man, and in spite of his online fame, he didn’t receive a lot of hate mail, and his practitioners didn’t get harassed. Aoyama was proud to be related to him.
“Hey, what’re you doing spacing out over here?”
At that moment, he heard a voice and felt a jab in his side. It was his sister, Shouko. While Aoyama had a pale, youthful appearance that made him look much younger than his twenty-seven years, Shouko took after their mother and had a more tanned complexion. She was married but still came home to visit and help out fairly often. Despite her sharp tongue, Aoyama was glad to have her around.
“People are saying the sandwiches and soup were really good. Not bad for a man!”
“It’s old-fashioned to think of cooking as purely women’s work.”
“I didn’t say it was, did I?” She gave him another playful jab.
“You’re not too dependable and kinda flaky, and you keep going back and forth on whether you’re going to take over from Dad or not. But you’re good at cooking, so you’d probably make a decent housewife if all else fails.”
Shouko smiled mischievously and went on.
“Why don’t you just get together with your beloved Rumi? She’s a big eater, so you two would be a good match.”
“Hey, she’s my boss!” Aoyama protested, blushing hard. Shouko continued to leer at him with a devilish grin.
Rumi Sasaki was one of the reasons he was wavering over becoming a full-time minister at the church. She was his business partner, and together, the two of them ran the Sasaki Agency, a consulting firm specializing in paranormal activity.
Rumi had gone to the same college as Aoyama; he’d met her while she was a tutor in Professor Saitou’s seminars. Professor Haruhiko Saitou was a prominent folklore studies expert, but he was more well-known for his side gig—appearing in various media outlets to talk about the supernatural. Aoyama had taken the class more or less on a whim, but Rumi absolutely adored the professor.
Even well into his sixties, Professor Saitou was an active man whose skin had a healthy sheen. He was certainly eccentric, but Rumi was no less so. If anything, she went beyond eccentric and came across as outright weird. She’d turned thirty-four this year, though no one would ever guess based on her appearance. She could have easily gotten away with claiming she was in her fifties or in her teens.
Her age wasn’t the only ambiguous thing about her appearance—her gender was, too. She always wore a dirty gray sweater and thick glasses, with her hair tied in a messy ponytail. It was almost as if she’d chosen to discard any trace of traditional femininity. She was an odd duck and lacked womanly charm, but Aoyama held a special place in his heart for her nonetheless.
First and foremost, Rumi had comprehensive knowledge on a wide variety of subjects, and though her theatrical way of speaking could be off-putting, talking to her was always an interesting experience. Back in Aoyama’s student days, her expertise had saved him countless times when he’d hit a wall with his studies. She’d also literally saved his life.
It had happened during the only demonic possession he’d seen as an adult. The demon had possessed a young man Rumi was acquainted with, screeching in an unnatural voice and going on a murderous rampage. Together with his grandfather—still alive at the time—they’d managed to get things under control again.
But partway through the exorcism, the demon had attacked Aoyama. As he’d stared death in the face, someone had stepped in to save him, heedless of the danger—none other than Rumi herself. Ever since then, he had not only held a deep respect for her but also considered her something of a guardian angel.
Starting the agency had been his idea. He’d suggested it when Rumi told him she wasn’t planning on becoming a folklorist and wanted to pursue her interests in a more active way. Though she hadn’t explicitly asked him to, he handled the admin side of things almost entirely on his own. The two of them had already solved a handful of paranormal cases.