Published: August 25, 2025
Evening
Inside the Tree Sea, it was darker and the night came sooner than outside. Although I wanted to continue the experiments more, it would be more dangerous in the dark, so I decided to end early and spend time inside the mansion.
If I immediately returned to Gimul after the successful experiment, Korumi, who had been waiting a long time, would be left alone again for a while. Regardless of the experiment's result, I planned to stay for a week, so the experiment could be postponed until tomorrow.
…That said, what should I do if there’s no experiment?
If the experiment hadn’t succeeded, I would have gone over the points to improve, but it went smoothly. It’s a luxurious problem, but when the work is done, I feel restless. When I look for something to do, there are plenty of options, making it hard to choose.
“Korumi, is there anything you want to do?”
“Hmm, we talked a lot yesterday… I want to watch Ryoma (the resident) work.”
In that case, I thought I’d try the modified version of the "hand of transformation" that Lord Rosenberg advised me on — a cursed art version that can be used publicly. I already had an idea of what to use and how to make the technique, so it wouldn’t take much time.
Korumi agreed when I consulted her, so we moved to another location for the experiment and preparation. At the dismantling site where I had used last time to break down prey, I prepared one Demon King's Fragment and a stone about the size of two adults. With this, I would make a vessel to collect miasma. The image I had in mind was exactly like a “jizo statue.”
“A jizo statue?”
“More precisely, a ‘jizo bodhisattva,’ a deity statue worshiped in the country called Japan where I came from. Strictly speaking, Buddha and gods might be different, but in Japan, folk beliefs and a syncretism called Shinbutsu-shugo mixed Shinto and Buddhism… anyway, it’s a religious object.
It’s said that enshrining a jizo bodhisattva brings lots of merit and blessings, but especially, it’s often seen enshrined as a guardian deity of the land or roads to ward off evil.”
“I see, so you place a jizo to protect land affected by miasma.”
“Exactly. But the design won’t be the original jizo statue’s; I’ll modify it to suit my cursed arts.”
First, since the hand of transformation collects bad things from my body, the statue’s design would reflect my past life — the body unnecessarily muscular. The expression wouldn’t be calm but like someone exhausted from nights of continuous work. Also, instead of sitting in the lotus position, the statue would sit with one knee up, giving a rough impression.
Using earth magic, I carved the rock according to the assembled image, creating a statue of just a tired man. It wasn’t bad, but I wanted a bit more… I loosened the robe it wore, covering only the lower body. On its bare back, I thought of carving a crane picture.
“Why a bird picture?”
“There’s a Japanese phrase ‘a crane in a garbage dump.’ It originally means something excellent or beautiful existing in a dull place, but here, I took it literally — a crane in a garbage dump. Conversely, the crane’s place is a dump, a place where bad things gather.”
It was just a spontaneous idea, but not bad. Lord Rosenberg had said sometimes specific seals are used to solidify cursed arts’ imagery, so it was fitting. As I carved freely, I finished a satisfying sculpture.
I stepped back to check the overall work. It was so excellent I praised myself, but it looked less like a jizo and more like a yakuza leaning against a wall, dying.
“The crane looks like a tattoo because of its position! And since I modeled it after my body, it seems like I became a yakuza and died on the street, which feels kind of unpleasant.”
“A failure?”
“It’s a bit different from the plan, but it suits the cursed art’s target… well, it should still work, so it’s fine.”
It felt wasteful to destroy what I had made, and next time I could make it closer to a jizo statue. If I carved the limbs into the torso to make the body emerge, it would be closer to a real jizo.